Part Thirty Six
Yvonne greeted the others with a broad smile of welcome.
"Am I glad to be up here in the gallery with the rest of you. It's seemed bleeding ages that Cassie and I have been stuck in some dump of a waiting room. The worst part of it is wondering what the bloody hell is going on and fearing the worst. Cassie's been great though." And here her voice softened. "I owe her a lot for talking sense into me and keeping me on the level all last week." "She'll need to watch out for that wanker of a lawyer of theirs. Cassie's the sort of woman who'll get right up his nose," Came Nikki's slightly amused reflection.
"For being…." Questioned Babs.
"The woman she is. She doesn't even have to say anything, she just is." "I can tell that she's confident," Laughed Roisin. "She was up at the crack of dawn and spent twice as long putting her makeup on as usual." "You really love her, don't you." The look in Roisin's eyes told Helen clearer than words she might have said "that's my woman out there." "I said a prayer for her this morning, not that she'll need much help as she'll run rings round that fool," Babs precise voice broke in to the proceedings.
"Come on, we'd better get into our places," Yvonne's terse tones revealed her edginess. This was the first time she had been up in the gallery since the trial of that bitch Merriman and her Ritchie. Last time around, she and all the others had willed Jo Mills to nail Merriman. Her Ritchie had made his bed with her and stabbed her and Lauren in the back, so the hard surface side of her reckoned that he stood to take what was coming to him. At the end of the trial, she had rejoiced that justice was done. She had expected him to go down and that was that. The last thing she had expected was that he had done himself in. It made her feelings of what had gone on before seem horribly wrong and she hadn't really got her head round that. What right had she got to switch sides and passionately want her daughter defended? They are both Atkins, brother and sister, after all. "Hey, Yvonne, we're with you as well as for Lauren." A light hand on her shoulder and that friendly, well-modulated voice came up from behind and a few teardrops were squeezed out of Yvonne in total gratitude for those few kind words.
Nikki could see from behind her, that decisive nod as Yvonne squared her shoulders and climbed the last few steps at a steady, assured pace and not in a frenetic hurry. Her Lauren needed her and this time around, the issues were simple. Whatever the emotional fallout of Lauren killing that bastard Fenner, she needed to be here for her own and she had the best of friends to help her. What cheered her up most of all as she looked down from the top of the gallery, was Cassie's casual relaxed manner as she made her way to the witness stand. Even at the distance and angle below her, she could see that quick reassuring smile at her.
Cassie made her leisurely, unhurried way to the witness stand. A lot of water had flowed under her bridge since she had stood in the place where Lauren was standing now. At that time, her fall from grace seemed overwhelming as it had stripped from her that certainty of her place in the world and of all the luxuries that money could buy. The sheer paralysing shock of her discovery and the cold figures of the discrepancies in the accounts had unnerved her at the time and made it hard for her to argue the toss. Her love had been hatefully distanced away from her singles flat to that cosy domesticated, husband, wife and two children suburban cosiness. She thought that she had despised that lifestyle but in her own unique way, she now shared it with her love and had become stronger because of it. Roisin's own inner certainty had rubbed off on her and life with their children had taught her flexibility and agility in thinking. Above all else, she was entitled to her rights as much as anyone and that black guy's disdain for her wouldn't put her off. She would wipe that look off his face once she got stuck in. Jo Mills on the other wing of the bench, was a woman who she had admired from afar last time around. This time, she adjusted the focus on her thoughts and memories to sharp precision to go out there and do her stuff. Above and behind her, the powerful and benevolent presence of the judge made her take heart, one guy she really respected. In his way, he was as much of an individual as she was conscious of being. It could be a lot worse, she concluded, she could have had that narrow minded nobbing judge who sent her down along with Roash. He made it pointedly clear how repulsed he was by everything she and Roisin represented in his prim Old Etonian stunted lifestyle. A glance at Lauren in the dock took in that slight smile directed to a dear friend who she knew would do her best for her.
She grinned broadly at her audience in that expansive, infectious way and took the oath. In turn, Jo's spirits were lifted by Cassie's grin and sailed straight into questioning her. Witnesses were not normally as confident as this.
"Miss Tyler, can you explain to the court how and when you came to know the defendant?" "It was through her mother, Yvonne Atkins. She was there already when I first came to Larkhall. That was about 3 years ago." "Were you and Mrs. Atkins close?" "Pretty close, yeah. She acted as a sort of mother to all the younger women who first came to Larkhall when they were nervous and hadn't found their feet. I was different as I was brash and big mouthed but she put me through a number of growing up lessons which I needed. She saw through my act straight off and tipped me in the right direction with my girlfriend, my present partner when we were having problems." Cassie was immediately conscious of Neumann Mason-Alan's wooden expression and saw the instant disapproval, something that was not lost on the gallery. Jo smiled inwardly at Cassie's rapid concise command of the facts. All she had to do was to lob the right questions at her and she would get the sort of answers that would leave a clear implant in the minds of those who mattered, the jury of twelve average citizens. "Under what circumstances were you and your girlfriend released from prison?" "Lauren's brother and his girlfriend set off an explosion as cover for getting her out of prison. Some cover……Roisin Connor, that's my partner, and some more of us were trapped in the library by a fire, which was set off by the explosion. Mr. Grayling, the Governing Governor was lying unconscious on the floor and ….." "I fail to see where this rambling story is leading this trial. Probably nowhere in particular," Neumann Mason-Alan's disdainful voice cut across Cassie's. "If you let me finish, Mr. Whatshisname, you'll hear that Roisin and I pushed Mr. Grayling through a wall of flames and we got him to a doctor who was able to save his life. When he was better, Mr. Grayling put us up for a free pardon." Niamh and Michael would have recognised the way that Cassie effortlessly swatted down any childish bickering. Others not used to Cassie, sat open mouthed with shock and a variety of accompanying emotions.
"Jesus, Cassie would make a bloody good bouncer at my club," Nikki muttered to an equally impressed Helen.
"For future reference, Miss Tyler, the counsel opposite you is called Mr. Mason-Alan. I feel the court have been given a clear explanation, which is relevant to the case in hand. Proceed, Mrs. Mills." John concealed a brief smile behind his hand and hesitated slightly before remembering to shift his direction to Jo to direct the questioning to continue. To his mind, his growing opinion that Larkhall prison made women very tough, both sides of the prison bars had been confirmed by practical demonstration. "Miss Tyler, can you relate to the court the defendant's reactions throughout the trial of her brother?" "My learned friend has not established that the witness was present throughout the trial of the defendant's late brother and was therefore privy to the defendant's feelings," jumped in Neumann Mason-Alan.
"Mr. Mason-Alan, you might not know this, but both Mrs. Mills and myself were made highly aware of the witness's presence in the gallery as one of my more amusing hecklers. I remember her presence very well. She, along with the defendant were present in the gallery for long stretches of that trial and I direct the jury to accept as fact that the witness was well placed to gauge the defendant's reaction. I shall let this matter pass this time. I would advise you, Mrs. Mills, as a general observation, not to ask questions that leap ahead of themselves. Mr. Mason-Alan's objection is reasonable in principle." Oh God, I get recognised whatever I do, Cassie worried. I'm getting Jo Mills into trouble like others before her. This sort of situation had happened before going back to when she was at school. She did her best to assume a contrite expression of innocence which all of those who knew her smiled to themselves as a big act. They marvelled at her unique facility in not being diminished, whoever she was up against.
"The children are sure to ask us how Cassie got on today. What do I say?" A random impulse worried away at Roisin, much though Cassie's antics had her in stitches.
"The truth." Babs's simple words with Christian authority cut a line through the tangle of Roisin's parental worries.
"Miss Tyler, can you explain where the defendant enters the picture?" Jo added hastily to capitalise on the sharp rebuff to Neumann.
"I've seen Lauren around when she came to visit Yvonne, I mean Mrs. Atkins. As soon as we were released, Roisin and I had got custody of our, I mean her children and we'd had six, seven months to get settled. When she got out around Christmas 2002, we looked her up straight away." "Can you explain to the court why you chose to look up someone you'd never known before you went to Larkhall?" "When you're inside, you live your lives twenty four seven right up against those you hate and those you love. You stand by your mates and they stand by you far more than anyone you've only known on the outside ever does. I could never pretend that someone who I really looked up to had never existed once I'd got free." Cassie stumbled slightly in her delivery as her memories and the close fitting space of the witness box gave her claustrophobic, shut in flashbacks and that intense mixture of feelings that a few seconds ago were only spoken words. It worried her that, up till then, the sort of fevered dreams that occasionally haunted both Cassie's and Roisin's sleep were brought to life before her eyes. Defiantly, Cassie shook a lock of fair hair out of her eyes as she got a grip on herself. In turn, the quiet words spoken by that very modern woman in the witness box struck a chord with the judge who was placed above and behind her. There were ancient ideas of loyalty, which stretched far back into the distant past over generations. These were ingrained into the very fabric of his being and he was highly sensitive to pick up on it, no matter what guise it might appear in. "What did you make of the defendant when you first met her?" "A great friend," Cassie grinned, answering Jo's soft spoken words at her usual carrying volume. "An ordinary happy go lucky woman to go out clubbing with. Mind you, you want to watch out for her as she can drink anyone under the table. She had to carry me home as I got legless trying to keep up with her." "Can you tell the court if her behaviour changed over time and how different she seemed to you?" "It was during the trial of her brother Ritchie. She was with us in the gallery up there." Cassie pointed dramatically upwards to emphasise the point and the distance now separating Lauren from the dock to where she once sat.
"We were all together, Lauren included, in wanting to see you nail that brother of hers and Snowball Merriman. You'll remember it, I'm sure." Cassie's reflective tones made the whole experience very real to herself and her blue eyes brought a jolt of recognition to Jo. Yes she was here before and she was forcibly reminded of this by this articulate woman who changed from the gleaming sunlight shining on the water to the shadowed reflective depths.
"It all changed one day in the middle of the trial when Yvonne arrived home and caught Lauren smoking dope. Probably because I'm nearer to Lauren's age, she asked me to talk to Lauren about why smoking dope really wasn't a good idea. The thought of that scared me rigid." "Why was that, Miss Tyler?" "It wasn't that she was stoned out of her mind, it was that she was acting as if she was somehow disconnected from herself, from her family, from responsibility, from the woman I knew. I've seen friends of mine go like that and it scared me. That's how they all start on drugs. My partner was the last person ever to go near drugs, but she was separated from her children when she went to prison, and the pain of it drove her to some kind of release, anything, so that she ended up on heroin. It all started from something she wanted so she could get to sleep. That's what prisons can do for mothers. I laid it on the line with Lauren, and found out what was really bothering her." "And what was that, Miss Tyler?" "She was jealous of Denny Blood who Yvonne treated like she was her daughter, and that made her insecure. She admitted to that one. What was really screwing her up, was that she had found out that Yvonne was having a relationship with Karen Betts. I asked her about that one and she stopped me and told me to 'shut the fuck up.' When an Atkins talks that way to you, you listen." Jo was feeling on top of the world, as Cassie Tyler was moving the story effortlessly along. Her words needed next to no clarification to ensure the jury heard matters right. Her touches of humour went down well with an English jury who might have been prejudiced against the implications in her lifestyle. "What else gave you reason for concern about the defendant's state of mind?" "It was the night that Lauren's brother committed suicide, when we got the phone call. You may have heard this all before, but the thing I can remember most was the way Yvonne's glass of wine shattered which she was holding in her hand. What I noticed while Karen saw to Yvonne's hand and after Yvonne went to bed, was the way Lauren took to the bottle. Karen went out later to identify Snowball's …body and, when she returned, Lauren changed in a flash." "In what way?" Cassie shivered inside as she started to recount the events of a night she wanted to forget. Having to refer to Ritchie in the cold impersonal way the trial required her to, went clean against her nature. To her, Ritchie was a guy she had never seen but was stupid or evil enough to nearly get her and Roisin and others burnt to death. He was Lauren's brother and despite everything she knew how much that meant to her. The poor kid had little enough in her family outside her mum.
"She blamed Karen for being around to be kidnapped by Snowball Merriman and that he stopped the bullet that was meant for her. If he hadn't been in a wheelchair as a result of the bullet, he might not have taken his life. She spoke in terms of both loving and hating her brother and was all over the place. Maybe Lauren knew even then that she was blaming the wrong person but she couldn't admit it to herself, much less to me. That's why what I'm saying sounds crazy and not logical. It's no use trying to get someone who was so much in pieces to accept the calm logical truth, so I didn't even try. I just let Lauren run with it. When Karen went up to bed, only then did Lauren let herself cry her eyes out. I made her a cup of coffee and Roisin and I went upstairs with Lauren, to be there for her and give her some comfort. Yvonne would have done that, believe you me, but she was totally out of it so we took her place." "Would you say, Miss Tyler, that only when Miss Betts was out of the room did she let herself cry? If I understand what I am hearing from you correctly, the defendant was switching between grief and anger until the object of her anger was removed from the situation." "Yes, that's exactly it," Cassie said with all the certainty in the world. At that point, the very large heart within her was melted by a glance from Lauren, which conveyed all the thanks she was able to give. Cassie had spent a lifetime appearing to be cool and devil may care in the same way Lauren tried to appear hard. Neither of them could sustain their acts and they both knew it.
"No further questions, my lord."
Neumann jumped up to his feet as if his back were spring loaded. He had been chafing at the bit while the whole pathetic sob story was being unreeled by that bleeding heart liberal on the opposite side of the bench. The verbal sparring match earlier on had stung him and he was eager for revenge against this woman who brazened out her differences from what was normal and proper.
"Miss Tyler, can I establish a few facts about yourself and your …partner. I understand that you live with a woman, a Roisin Connor in an intimate relationship." I can tell that nobbing waste of space is secretly fantasising about Roash and me in bed even if he can't admit it to himself, Cassie thought while she kept a straight face.
"Yeah, while we were in Larkhall and ever since we got out." "You describe the children of the association as both yours and also solely your partner's. Can you explain this discrepancy." "That's easy. Roisin was married when we met, before we went to prison. The biological father of our two children is Roisin's ex husband, Aiden Connor. When we got out, Roisin got custody of the children and I became a second mum. I love them as if they are my own flesh and blood, and that's why I talk as if the children are ours. That's the way they see me and that's all that matters." Nikki could not restrain herself any more and broke into a spontaneous round of clapping which fizzled out when she saw the judge's eye on her. Jesus, she'd never met a guy who had this force of personality to shut her up this way. Some of the more pathetic screws who were around in her time at Larkhall could take a few lessons from him in keeping order. "So you broke up Mrs. Connor's marriage." "It was broken up before I met her. I gave Roisin and our children an exit to a better life. I ought to say that the love I feel for Michael and Niamh is as much as an adoptive parent feels for his or her child. It's just that there are two women bringing them up, that's all." Jo looked at the floor so that her grin wouldn't be obvious. She might have known that Cassie Tyler could give back at least as good as she got. Because of this, she couldn't see the universal grin on the first row of the gallery and black scowls from the back row.
"Let us turn to another matter," Neumann said ponderously to reestablish his sense of dignity. "Can you tell the court why you and Mrs. Connor ended up in prison." "For being fool enough to embezzle money from the firm I used to work for where Roisin worked as my P.A. It isn't something that I'm proud of, as I let a lot of people down, myself included. I - I mean Roisin and I - have far too much to lose and too much to live for to dream of doing anything like that again. We hope we're living a life to make up for all that." "Miss Tyler, I was questioning you and not your partner as well," Neumann snapped spitefully.
"Roisin and I are a 'we' in the same way as you and your wife, assuming that you are married. Anyway, you'd better get on with your questions," Cassie finished, theatrically suppressing a yawn to teach the moron a lesson for harping on about 'Mrs. Connor' and plugging away at her alternative preferred title.
"Miss Tyler, I would gently remind you that it is my role to give directions to the conduct of court proceedings. Nevertheless, the point is well made as the questions about Miss Tyler's background seem to me of doubtful relevance. I expect you to get to the point." Cassie turned round and looked upwards at John who was trying to look sternly down at her, except the twinkle in his eye gave him away. This woman's unique brazen sharp wit was too dangerously and appealingly akin to his own regular teasing of the apparachtiks of the Lord Chancellor's Department. Keeping a straight face was becoming a real strain as the trial went on.
"You explained in very touching terms of the tragic experiences of Mrs. Connor with hard drugs and of the defendant who was partaking of a similar illegal substance, as if you are quite an authority on drugs. Have you ever taken drugs yourself?" A very faint blush crept its way over Cassie's face. She couldn't help but tell the truth. Instinct told her that if she tried to lie her way out of this situation, she was potentially setting herself up to lose her own credibility later and, worse still, damage Lauren's case.
"Yeah. I used to take cocaine occasionally." "How occasional is occasional? Can you be precise upon the matter." "It was a weekend thing and certainly not every weekend." "Are you sure it was not more often than that?" "Quite sure. I had a job to do." "And can you enlighten the court as to how a woman who is somehow involved with the care of two children, came to be involved with a sordid criminal activity involving taking a class 'A' drug." "You've got the sequence of events back to front. In another lifetime before I met Roisin, I was young, single, footloose and fancy free in a high-pressure job that paid me a fortune. Many like me in the crowd I used to hang out with, bought into the idea that living the high life to unwind at weekends included taking a so called 'clean drug' would only give you a recreational high. All the celebrities take it so all the magazines tell you or so I believed when I was young and impressionable. I saw a close friend of mine get into a mess over that stuff and I started to wise up. I started to realise the downside of that sort of life and I backed away from all that scene. When I went to prison, it made everything simpler. I know from what Roisin went through, that the sort of drugs that get brought in are uppers and downers and heroin, but I've never heard of coke. That's because prisoners only have a limited weekly spends, enough to buy phone cards and shampoo. No one could possibly afford street price coke, believe you me." Her voice trailed away as she hoped against hope that the squalid little man wouldn't ask her if her and Roisin had ever taken coke together. That inner fear was transformed into a real anger, which propelled her into a much more combative style. She wanted to hit back as hard as she could at this man. He was the sort of ignorant moraliser who she had hated and despised all her life. This trial had become personal for her, both for herself and for those she loved.
"That's the reason why drugs give me the horrors. I saw what happened to Roisin with drugs as I know much better than some innocent Miss Middle England how dangerous the stuff is and I'll fight like hell to ensure that our kids stay away from it." John inwardly applauded this woman's very courageous stand and fired his anger in a very cold, cutting precise tone to cut short this man who he increasingly despised. He felt that he had been given a generous length of rope with which to hang him and could justify himself to any legal authority to take the step that he did.
"You do not appear to have any remotely relevant questions to ask, Mr. Mason-Alan or else you would have asked them by now. I have held back and given you every chance to ask such questions. I am therefore determined to curtail your attempts at character assassination. You will sit down this very minute." The force of this delivery made Neumann's legs move of their own accord to sit in his place despite himself. "Do you have any questions to ask the witness?" John asked softly, turning to Jo.
"No, my lord," She felt that between Cassie Tyler and Neumann Mason-Alan, her case was making rapid progress.
"Court is adjourned." Cassie made her way out of the box feeling as if she had run a marathon, seething with anger, glaring at the barrister whose expression was po faced and removed. She received a soulful smile from Lauren and that dissipated her anger as that was the clearest sign that she had done right by her mate. She emerged into the open air to be warmly hugged by the others and finally to be greeted by Roisin's shining eyes and look of total admiration. She wanted to get the hell out of here.
Cassie, Roisin and the children were all snuggled together on the big sofa in that comforting slice of time between dinner and bedtime. The light was on dimly but unaccountably, the children said they were bored with watching television. Since that cut across their favourite programmes, both Roisin's and Cassie's sharp antennae were on the alert. "Cassie," Michael piped up. "If I ask you something, will you tell me the answer like you always do." "What's the problem?" Cassie gently smiled. Her mind ran over the possible questions the boy's enquiring mind might want to know. God help her when he wants to know about the birds and the bees, Roisin would be better at that one. "We were wondering if there was anything wrong with you and mum," Niamh's greater facility with words came into play.
"No, nothing could be better with both of us." "It's just that mum said something about court and we wondered……." Niamp started to speak and stopped dead, a worried expression written all over her face and Michael's.
"It's all right, children. We've been going to court but it's not that we've done anything wrong," Roisin broke in eagerly.
"You're sure?" Michael's big wide eyes looked doubtfully at her. They were growing up to be pretty well adjusted and happier than Neumann Mason-Alan dreamed possible but there was one shared memory, which disturbed them. It all started the day when, for the first time in their lives, their father had collected them from school instead of mum. She had always swept them up in her arms and chatted awhile to the other mothers while their father impatiently took them back to the car. Instead of mum's infectious chatter, their father was silently angry about something. They could tell. When they stepped into the hall, their very grey haired and stern grandmother was there to say the usual grownup things but where was mum? Nobody would say. For months afterwards when they were stiffly told, there was a hole in the house where their mother had been and something had taken her away which they could not understand. They used to call out to their mother at nights into the pillow and make believe she was there but make believe didn't work.
"I've been what they call a witness in a trial. I chose to go. Nobody made me and mum and all our friends were watching." "What's a witness?" Michael urged. He didn't understand but if Cassie chose to go, it wasn't as bad as they first feared.
"If a teacher punished a friend of yours for something he thought he'd done wrong, but you knew something the teacher didn't, you'd go up and talk to the teacher, wouldn't you?" "Depends on the teacher," Michael answered. Cassie wasn't afraid of anyone but he knew some teachers listened and some didn't. Cassie was relieved to hear that she made more sense than she feared, feeling brain dead after that day in court.
"We know doing the right thing isn't easy, but this is what you should do." "Well a witness in the trial is the same thing, only bigger with two people taking turns to ask you questions." "Who have you been witnessing for?" "Auntie Lauren. We told you why you haven't seen her recently and that she is where we were." The children took everything in warily. They had not known to begin with why she had stopped calling and why Yvonne who always laughed and joked when she called was so sad though she pretended she wasn't. "Well, I've been in court putting in a good word for her." "Were the men nice to you?" "The man in charge is very nice even if he was dressed up in funny clothes which I'll draw for you later. The woman who was on Lauren's side was lovely," Enthused Roisin. "But the man who was against Lauren was horrible and Cassie made him out to be the idiot that he is." The children grinned more easily. They knew what Cassie was like and they wished they had seen the fun. "Cassie, can you tell me what the word 'nobbing' is. I've heard you say it when you didn't think we were there. I asked Miss Jackson, the English teacher only she looked up in the dictionary and couldn't find it." Cassie spilt the cup of tea slightly on the arm of the sofa and looked horrified. Jesus, she was now in danger of getting the kids into trouble.
"It's only a made up word of mine. It doesn't mean anything. You'd be too young to understand. I'll tell you when you get older." Michael and Niamh smiled smugly to each other. So they were right. They could picture this court and while it was sad about auntie Lauren, at least Cassie and mum were safe and so were they. They were bored and, besides, they wanted to watch TV before they went to bed.
"So what's it like in the gallery, Roash. At last, I get to go up in the gallery for future." "Well, there's one interesting thing," grinned Roisin. "I think that Karen is attracted to that very attractive blond barrister, George Channing, who was on the other side last time and the feeling is mutual." "She's a dark horse. She kept everything quiet about her private life when we were inside. I must admit, she's got good taste. They've both changed sides in more ways than one," Cassie grinned broadly. It would add a spice of interest to when she took her place in the gallery at last.
The house was as silent as the grave where they knew that outside the soft world of their bedroom, their children were in a deep and dreamless sleep. Cassie was dead beat but with that warm satisfaction of something well done and Roisin was proud of the woman who stuck up so strongly for them. Everything felt peaceful and secure around them as they dropped straight down into a deep sleep.
Yvonne greeted the others with a broad smile of welcome.
"Am I glad to be up here in the gallery with the rest of you. It's seemed bleeding ages that Cassie and I have been stuck in some dump of a waiting room. The worst part of it is wondering what the bloody hell is going on and fearing the worst. Cassie's been great though." And here her voice softened. "I owe her a lot for talking sense into me and keeping me on the level all last week." "She'll need to watch out for that wanker of a lawyer of theirs. Cassie's the sort of woman who'll get right up his nose," Came Nikki's slightly amused reflection.
"For being…." Questioned Babs.
"The woman she is. She doesn't even have to say anything, she just is." "I can tell that she's confident," Laughed Roisin. "She was up at the crack of dawn and spent twice as long putting her makeup on as usual." "You really love her, don't you." The look in Roisin's eyes told Helen clearer than words she might have said "that's my woman out there." "I said a prayer for her this morning, not that she'll need much help as she'll run rings round that fool," Babs precise voice broke in to the proceedings.
"Come on, we'd better get into our places," Yvonne's terse tones revealed her edginess. This was the first time she had been up in the gallery since the trial of that bitch Merriman and her Ritchie. Last time around, she and all the others had willed Jo Mills to nail Merriman. Her Ritchie had made his bed with her and stabbed her and Lauren in the back, so the hard surface side of her reckoned that he stood to take what was coming to him. At the end of the trial, she had rejoiced that justice was done. She had expected him to go down and that was that. The last thing she had expected was that he had done himself in. It made her feelings of what had gone on before seem horribly wrong and she hadn't really got her head round that. What right had she got to switch sides and passionately want her daughter defended? They are both Atkins, brother and sister, after all. "Hey, Yvonne, we're with you as well as for Lauren." A light hand on her shoulder and that friendly, well-modulated voice came up from behind and a few teardrops were squeezed out of Yvonne in total gratitude for those few kind words.
Nikki could see from behind her, that decisive nod as Yvonne squared her shoulders and climbed the last few steps at a steady, assured pace and not in a frenetic hurry. Her Lauren needed her and this time around, the issues were simple. Whatever the emotional fallout of Lauren killing that bastard Fenner, she needed to be here for her own and she had the best of friends to help her. What cheered her up most of all as she looked down from the top of the gallery, was Cassie's casual relaxed manner as she made her way to the witness stand. Even at the distance and angle below her, she could see that quick reassuring smile at her.
Cassie made her leisurely, unhurried way to the witness stand. A lot of water had flowed under her bridge since she had stood in the place where Lauren was standing now. At that time, her fall from grace seemed overwhelming as it had stripped from her that certainty of her place in the world and of all the luxuries that money could buy. The sheer paralysing shock of her discovery and the cold figures of the discrepancies in the accounts had unnerved her at the time and made it hard for her to argue the toss. Her love had been hatefully distanced away from her singles flat to that cosy domesticated, husband, wife and two children suburban cosiness. She thought that she had despised that lifestyle but in her own unique way, she now shared it with her love and had become stronger because of it. Roisin's own inner certainty had rubbed off on her and life with their children had taught her flexibility and agility in thinking. Above all else, she was entitled to her rights as much as anyone and that black guy's disdain for her wouldn't put her off. She would wipe that look off his face once she got stuck in. Jo Mills on the other wing of the bench, was a woman who she had admired from afar last time around. This time, she adjusted the focus on her thoughts and memories to sharp precision to go out there and do her stuff. Above and behind her, the powerful and benevolent presence of the judge made her take heart, one guy she really respected. In his way, he was as much of an individual as she was conscious of being. It could be a lot worse, she concluded, she could have had that narrow minded nobbing judge who sent her down along with Roash. He made it pointedly clear how repulsed he was by everything she and Roisin represented in his prim Old Etonian stunted lifestyle. A glance at Lauren in the dock took in that slight smile directed to a dear friend who she knew would do her best for her.
She grinned broadly at her audience in that expansive, infectious way and took the oath. In turn, Jo's spirits were lifted by Cassie's grin and sailed straight into questioning her. Witnesses were not normally as confident as this.
"Miss Tyler, can you explain to the court how and when you came to know the defendant?" "It was through her mother, Yvonne Atkins. She was there already when I first came to Larkhall. That was about 3 years ago." "Were you and Mrs. Atkins close?" "Pretty close, yeah. She acted as a sort of mother to all the younger women who first came to Larkhall when they were nervous and hadn't found their feet. I was different as I was brash and big mouthed but she put me through a number of growing up lessons which I needed. She saw through my act straight off and tipped me in the right direction with my girlfriend, my present partner when we were having problems." Cassie was immediately conscious of Neumann Mason-Alan's wooden expression and saw the instant disapproval, something that was not lost on the gallery. Jo smiled inwardly at Cassie's rapid concise command of the facts. All she had to do was to lob the right questions at her and she would get the sort of answers that would leave a clear implant in the minds of those who mattered, the jury of twelve average citizens. "Under what circumstances were you and your girlfriend released from prison?" "Lauren's brother and his girlfriend set off an explosion as cover for getting her out of prison. Some cover……Roisin Connor, that's my partner, and some more of us were trapped in the library by a fire, which was set off by the explosion. Mr. Grayling, the Governing Governor was lying unconscious on the floor and ….." "I fail to see where this rambling story is leading this trial. Probably nowhere in particular," Neumann Mason-Alan's disdainful voice cut across Cassie's. "If you let me finish, Mr. Whatshisname, you'll hear that Roisin and I pushed Mr. Grayling through a wall of flames and we got him to a doctor who was able to save his life. When he was better, Mr. Grayling put us up for a free pardon." Niamh and Michael would have recognised the way that Cassie effortlessly swatted down any childish bickering. Others not used to Cassie, sat open mouthed with shock and a variety of accompanying emotions.
"Jesus, Cassie would make a bloody good bouncer at my club," Nikki muttered to an equally impressed Helen.
"For future reference, Miss Tyler, the counsel opposite you is called Mr. Mason-Alan. I feel the court have been given a clear explanation, which is relevant to the case in hand. Proceed, Mrs. Mills." John concealed a brief smile behind his hand and hesitated slightly before remembering to shift his direction to Jo to direct the questioning to continue. To his mind, his growing opinion that Larkhall prison made women very tough, both sides of the prison bars had been confirmed by practical demonstration. "Miss Tyler, can you relate to the court the defendant's reactions throughout the trial of her brother?" "My learned friend has not established that the witness was present throughout the trial of the defendant's late brother and was therefore privy to the defendant's feelings," jumped in Neumann Mason-Alan.
"Mr. Mason-Alan, you might not know this, but both Mrs. Mills and myself were made highly aware of the witness's presence in the gallery as one of my more amusing hecklers. I remember her presence very well. She, along with the defendant were present in the gallery for long stretches of that trial and I direct the jury to accept as fact that the witness was well placed to gauge the defendant's reaction. I shall let this matter pass this time. I would advise you, Mrs. Mills, as a general observation, not to ask questions that leap ahead of themselves. Mr. Mason-Alan's objection is reasonable in principle." Oh God, I get recognised whatever I do, Cassie worried. I'm getting Jo Mills into trouble like others before her. This sort of situation had happened before going back to when she was at school. She did her best to assume a contrite expression of innocence which all of those who knew her smiled to themselves as a big act. They marvelled at her unique facility in not being diminished, whoever she was up against.
"The children are sure to ask us how Cassie got on today. What do I say?" A random impulse worried away at Roisin, much though Cassie's antics had her in stitches.
"The truth." Babs's simple words with Christian authority cut a line through the tangle of Roisin's parental worries.
"Miss Tyler, can you explain where the defendant enters the picture?" Jo added hastily to capitalise on the sharp rebuff to Neumann.
"I've seen Lauren around when she came to visit Yvonne, I mean Mrs. Atkins. As soon as we were released, Roisin and I had got custody of our, I mean her children and we'd had six, seven months to get settled. When she got out around Christmas 2002, we looked her up straight away." "Can you explain to the court why you chose to look up someone you'd never known before you went to Larkhall?" "When you're inside, you live your lives twenty four seven right up against those you hate and those you love. You stand by your mates and they stand by you far more than anyone you've only known on the outside ever does. I could never pretend that someone who I really looked up to had never existed once I'd got free." Cassie stumbled slightly in her delivery as her memories and the close fitting space of the witness box gave her claustrophobic, shut in flashbacks and that intense mixture of feelings that a few seconds ago were only spoken words. It worried her that, up till then, the sort of fevered dreams that occasionally haunted both Cassie's and Roisin's sleep were brought to life before her eyes. Defiantly, Cassie shook a lock of fair hair out of her eyes as she got a grip on herself. In turn, the quiet words spoken by that very modern woman in the witness box struck a chord with the judge who was placed above and behind her. There were ancient ideas of loyalty, which stretched far back into the distant past over generations. These were ingrained into the very fabric of his being and he was highly sensitive to pick up on it, no matter what guise it might appear in. "What did you make of the defendant when you first met her?" "A great friend," Cassie grinned, answering Jo's soft spoken words at her usual carrying volume. "An ordinary happy go lucky woman to go out clubbing with. Mind you, you want to watch out for her as she can drink anyone under the table. She had to carry me home as I got legless trying to keep up with her." "Can you tell the court if her behaviour changed over time and how different she seemed to you?" "It was during the trial of her brother Ritchie. She was with us in the gallery up there." Cassie pointed dramatically upwards to emphasise the point and the distance now separating Lauren from the dock to where she once sat.
"We were all together, Lauren included, in wanting to see you nail that brother of hers and Snowball Merriman. You'll remember it, I'm sure." Cassie's reflective tones made the whole experience very real to herself and her blue eyes brought a jolt of recognition to Jo. Yes she was here before and she was forcibly reminded of this by this articulate woman who changed from the gleaming sunlight shining on the water to the shadowed reflective depths.
"It all changed one day in the middle of the trial when Yvonne arrived home and caught Lauren smoking dope. Probably because I'm nearer to Lauren's age, she asked me to talk to Lauren about why smoking dope really wasn't a good idea. The thought of that scared me rigid." "Why was that, Miss Tyler?" "It wasn't that she was stoned out of her mind, it was that she was acting as if she was somehow disconnected from herself, from her family, from responsibility, from the woman I knew. I've seen friends of mine go like that and it scared me. That's how they all start on drugs. My partner was the last person ever to go near drugs, but she was separated from her children when she went to prison, and the pain of it drove her to some kind of release, anything, so that she ended up on heroin. It all started from something she wanted so she could get to sleep. That's what prisons can do for mothers. I laid it on the line with Lauren, and found out what was really bothering her." "And what was that, Miss Tyler?" "She was jealous of Denny Blood who Yvonne treated like she was her daughter, and that made her insecure. She admitted to that one. What was really screwing her up, was that she had found out that Yvonne was having a relationship with Karen Betts. I asked her about that one and she stopped me and told me to 'shut the fuck up.' When an Atkins talks that way to you, you listen." Jo was feeling on top of the world, as Cassie Tyler was moving the story effortlessly along. Her words needed next to no clarification to ensure the jury heard matters right. Her touches of humour went down well with an English jury who might have been prejudiced against the implications in her lifestyle. "What else gave you reason for concern about the defendant's state of mind?" "It was the night that Lauren's brother committed suicide, when we got the phone call. You may have heard this all before, but the thing I can remember most was the way Yvonne's glass of wine shattered which she was holding in her hand. What I noticed while Karen saw to Yvonne's hand and after Yvonne went to bed, was the way Lauren took to the bottle. Karen went out later to identify Snowball's …body and, when she returned, Lauren changed in a flash." "In what way?" Cassie shivered inside as she started to recount the events of a night she wanted to forget. Having to refer to Ritchie in the cold impersonal way the trial required her to, went clean against her nature. To her, Ritchie was a guy she had never seen but was stupid or evil enough to nearly get her and Roisin and others burnt to death. He was Lauren's brother and despite everything she knew how much that meant to her. The poor kid had little enough in her family outside her mum.
"She blamed Karen for being around to be kidnapped by Snowball Merriman and that he stopped the bullet that was meant for her. If he hadn't been in a wheelchair as a result of the bullet, he might not have taken his life. She spoke in terms of both loving and hating her brother and was all over the place. Maybe Lauren knew even then that she was blaming the wrong person but she couldn't admit it to herself, much less to me. That's why what I'm saying sounds crazy and not logical. It's no use trying to get someone who was so much in pieces to accept the calm logical truth, so I didn't even try. I just let Lauren run with it. When Karen went up to bed, only then did Lauren let herself cry her eyes out. I made her a cup of coffee and Roisin and I went upstairs with Lauren, to be there for her and give her some comfort. Yvonne would have done that, believe you me, but she was totally out of it so we took her place." "Would you say, Miss Tyler, that only when Miss Betts was out of the room did she let herself cry? If I understand what I am hearing from you correctly, the defendant was switching between grief and anger until the object of her anger was removed from the situation." "Yes, that's exactly it," Cassie said with all the certainty in the world. At that point, the very large heart within her was melted by a glance from Lauren, which conveyed all the thanks she was able to give. Cassie had spent a lifetime appearing to be cool and devil may care in the same way Lauren tried to appear hard. Neither of them could sustain their acts and they both knew it.
"No further questions, my lord."
Neumann jumped up to his feet as if his back were spring loaded. He had been chafing at the bit while the whole pathetic sob story was being unreeled by that bleeding heart liberal on the opposite side of the bench. The verbal sparring match earlier on had stung him and he was eager for revenge against this woman who brazened out her differences from what was normal and proper.
"Miss Tyler, can I establish a few facts about yourself and your …partner. I understand that you live with a woman, a Roisin Connor in an intimate relationship." I can tell that nobbing waste of space is secretly fantasising about Roash and me in bed even if he can't admit it to himself, Cassie thought while she kept a straight face.
"Yeah, while we were in Larkhall and ever since we got out." "You describe the children of the association as both yours and also solely your partner's. Can you explain this discrepancy." "That's easy. Roisin was married when we met, before we went to prison. The biological father of our two children is Roisin's ex husband, Aiden Connor. When we got out, Roisin got custody of the children and I became a second mum. I love them as if they are my own flesh and blood, and that's why I talk as if the children are ours. That's the way they see me and that's all that matters." Nikki could not restrain herself any more and broke into a spontaneous round of clapping which fizzled out when she saw the judge's eye on her. Jesus, she'd never met a guy who had this force of personality to shut her up this way. Some of the more pathetic screws who were around in her time at Larkhall could take a few lessons from him in keeping order. "So you broke up Mrs. Connor's marriage." "It was broken up before I met her. I gave Roisin and our children an exit to a better life. I ought to say that the love I feel for Michael and Niamh is as much as an adoptive parent feels for his or her child. It's just that there are two women bringing them up, that's all." Jo looked at the floor so that her grin wouldn't be obvious. She might have known that Cassie Tyler could give back at least as good as she got. Because of this, she couldn't see the universal grin on the first row of the gallery and black scowls from the back row.
"Let us turn to another matter," Neumann said ponderously to reestablish his sense of dignity. "Can you tell the court why you and Mrs. Connor ended up in prison." "For being fool enough to embezzle money from the firm I used to work for where Roisin worked as my P.A. It isn't something that I'm proud of, as I let a lot of people down, myself included. I - I mean Roisin and I - have far too much to lose and too much to live for to dream of doing anything like that again. We hope we're living a life to make up for all that." "Miss Tyler, I was questioning you and not your partner as well," Neumann snapped spitefully.
"Roisin and I are a 'we' in the same way as you and your wife, assuming that you are married. Anyway, you'd better get on with your questions," Cassie finished, theatrically suppressing a yawn to teach the moron a lesson for harping on about 'Mrs. Connor' and plugging away at her alternative preferred title.
"Miss Tyler, I would gently remind you that it is my role to give directions to the conduct of court proceedings. Nevertheless, the point is well made as the questions about Miss Tyler's background seem to me of doubtful relevance. I expect you to get to the point." Cassie turned round and looked upwards at John who was trying to look sternly down at her, except the twinkle in his eye gave him away. This woman's unique brazen sharp wit was too dangerously and appealingly akin to his own regular teasing of the apparachtiks of the Lord Chancellor's Department. Keeping a straight face was becoming a real strain as the trial went on.
"You explained in very touching terms of the tragic experiences of Mrs. Connor with hard drugs and of the defendant who was partaking of a similar illegal substance, as if you are quite an authority on drugs. Have you ever taken drugs yourself?" A very faint blush crept its way over Cassie's face. She couldn't help but tell the truth. Instinct told her that if she tried to lie her way out of this situation, she was potentially setting herself up to lose her own credibility later and, worse still, damage Lauren's case.
"Yeah. I used to take cocaine occasionally." "How occasional is occasional? Can you be precise upon the matter." "It was a weekend thing and certainly not every weekend." "Are you sure it was not more often than that?" "Quite sure. I had a job to do." "And can you enlighten the court as to how a woman who is somehow involved with the care of two children, came to be involved with a sordid criminal activity involving taking a class 'A' drug." "You've got the sequence of events back to front. In another lifetime before I met Roisin, I was young, single, footloose and fancy free in a high-pressure job that paid me a fortune. Many like me in the crowd I used to hang out with, bought into the idea that living the high life to unwind at weekends included taking a so called 'clean drug' would only give you a recreational high. All the celebrities take it so all the magazines tell you or so I believed when I was young and impressionable. I saw a close friend of mine get into a mess over that stuff and I started to wise up. I started to realise the downside of that sort of life and I backed away from all that scene. When I went to prison, it made everything simpler. I know from what Roisin went through, that the sort of drugs that get brought in are uppers and downers and heroin, but I've never heard of coke. That's because prisoners only have a limited weekly spends, enough to buy phone cards and shampoo. No one could possibly afford street price coke, believe you me." Her voice trailed away as she hoped against hope that the squalid little man wouldn't ask her if her and Roisin had ever taken coke together. That inner fear was transformed into a real anger, which propelled her into a much more combative style. She wanted to hit back as hard as she could at this man. He was the sort of ignorant moraliser who she had hated and despised all her life. This trial had become personal for her, both for herself and for those she loved.
"That's the reason why drugs give me the horrors. I saw what happened to Roisin with drugs as I know much better than some innocent Miss Middle England how dangerous the stuff is and I'll fight like hell to ensure that our kids stay away from it." John inwardly applauded this woman's very courageous stand and fired his anger in a very cold, cutting precise tone to cut short this man who he increasingly despised. He felt that he had been given a generous length of rope with which to hang him and could justify himself to any legal authority to take the step that he did.
"You do not appear to have any remotely relevant questions to ask, Mr. Mason-Alan or else you would have asked them by now. I have held back and given you every chance to ask such questions. I am therefore determined to curtail your attempts at character assassination. You will sit down this very minute." The force of this delivery made Neumann's legs move of their own accord to sit in his place despite himself. "Do you have any questions to ask the witness?" John asked softly, turning to Jo.
"No, my lord," She felt that between Cassie Tyler and Neumann Mason-Alan, her case was making rapid progress.
"Court is adjourned." Cassie made her way out of the box feeling as if she had run a marathon, seething with anger, glaring at the barrister whose expression was po faced and removed. She received a soulful smile from Lauren and that dissipated her anger as that was the clearest sign that she had done right by her mate. She emerged into the open air to be warmly hugged by the others and finally to be greeted by Roisin's shining eyes and look of total admiration. She wanted to get the hell out of here.
Cassie, Roisin and the children were all snuggled together on the big sofa in that comforting slice of time between dinner and bedtime. The light was on dimly but unaccountably, the children said they were bored with watching television. Since that cut across their favourite programmes, both Roisin's and Cassie's sharp antennae were on the alert. "Cassie," Michael piped up. "If I ask you something, will you tell me the answer like you always do." "What's the problem?" Cassie gently smiled. Her mind ran over the possible questions the boy's enquiring mind might want to know. God help her when he wants to know about the birds and the bees, Roisin would be better at that one. "We were wondering if there was anything wrong with you and mum," Niamh's greater facility with words came into play.
"No, nothing could be better with both of us." "It's just that mum said something about court and we wondered……." Niamp started to speak and stopped dead, a worried expression written all over her face and Michael's.
"It's all right, children. We've been going to court but it's not that we've done anything wrong," Roisin broke in eagerly.
"You're sure?" Michael's big wide eyes looked doubtfully at her. They were growing up to be pretty well adjusted and happier than Neumann Mason-Alan dreamed possible but there was one shared memory, which disturbed them. It all started the day when, for the first time in their lives, their father had collected them from school instead of mum. She had always swept them up in her arms and chatted awhile to the other mothers while their father impatiently took them back to the car. Instead of mum's infectious chatter, their father was silently angry about something. They could tell. When they stepped into the hall, their very grey haired and stern grandmother was there to say the usual grownup things but where was mum? Nobody would say. For months afterwards when they were stiffly told, there was a hole in the house where their mother had been and something had taken her away which they could not understand. They used to call out to their mother at nights into the pillow and make believe she was there but make believe didn't work.
"I've been what they call a witness in a trial. I chose to go. Nobody made me and mum and all our friends were watching." "What's a witness?" Michael urged. He didn't understand but if Cassie chose to go, it wasn't as bad as they first feared.
"If a teacher punished a friend of yours for something he thought he'd done wrong, but you knew something the teacher didn't, you'd go up and talk to the teacher, wouldn't you?" "Depends on the teacher," Michael answered. Cassie wasn't afraid of anyone but he knew some teachers listened and some didn't. Cassie was relieved to hear that she made more sense than she feared, feeling brain dead after that day in court.
"We know doing the right thing isn't easy, but this is what you should do." "Well a witness in the trial is the same thing, only bigger with two people taking turns to ask you questions." "Who have you been witnessing for?" "Auntie Lauren. We told you why you haven't seen her recently and that she is where we were." The children took everything in warily. They had not known to begin with why she had stopped calling and why Yvonne who always laughed and joked when she called was so sad though she pretended she wasn't. "Well, I've been in court putting in a good word for her." "Were the men nice to you?" "The man in charge is very nice even if he was dressed up in funny clothes which I'll draw for you later. The woman who was on Lauren's side was lovely," Enthused Roisin. "But the man who was against Lauren was horrible and Cassie made him out to be the idiot that he is." The children grinned more easily. They knew what Cassie was like and they wished they had seen the fun. "Cassie, can you tell me what the word 'nobbing' is. I've heard you say it when you didn't think we were there. I asked Miss Jackson, the English teacher only she looked up in the dictionary and couldn't find it." Cassie spilt the cup of tea slightly on the arm of the sofa and looked horrified. Jesus, she was now in danger of getting the kids into trouble.
"It's only a made up word of mine. It doesn't mean anything. You'd be too young to understand. I'll tell you when you get older." Michael and Niamh smiled smugly to each other. So they were right. They could picture this court and while it was sad about auntie Lauren, at least Cassie and mum were safe and so were they. They were bored and, besides, they wanted to watch TV before they went to bed.
"So what's it like in the gallery, Roash. At last, I get to go up in the gallery for future." "Well, there's one interesting thing," grinned Roisin. "I think that Karen is attracted to that very attractive blond barrister, George Channing, who was on the other side last time and the feeling is mutual." "She's a dark horse. She kept everything quiet about her private life when we were inside. I must admit, she's got good taste. They've both changed sides in more ways than one," Cassie grinned broadly. It would add a spice of interest to when she took her place in the gallery at last.
The house was as silent as the grave where they knew that outside the soft world of their bedroom, their children were in a deep and dreamless sleep. Cassie was dead beat but with that warm satisfaction of something well done and Roisin was proud of the woman who stuck up so strongly for them. Everything felt peaceful and secure around them as they dropped straight down into a deep sleep.