The Children Act

  THE CAR SHE reclined in was a 1960s Bentley, her destination Leadman Hall, set a mile inside its park, which she was entering now by the lodge-house gates. Soon she passed a cricket ground, then an avenue of beeches, already agitating in a strengthening breeze, then a lake choked with greenery. The hall, in the Palladian style, recently painted a too brilliant white, had twelve bedrooms and nine staff to accommodate and serve two High Court judges on circuit. Pevsner had mildly approved of the orangery, and nothing else. Only a bureaucratic anomaly had preserved Leadman’s from the cost-cutter’s blade, but the game was almost up; this was its final year as far as the judiciary was concerned. The hall, rented a few weeks a year from a local family with historic coal-mining interests, served mostly as a conference center and wedding venue. Its golf course, tennis courts and heated outdoor pool were, it was now realized, unnecessary luxuries for hardworking judges passing through. From next year, a local taxi firm would be supplying a roomy Vauxhall to replace the Bentley. Accommodation would be in a central Newcastle hotel. Judges on circuit for the Criminal Division, who occasionally sent down for long periods local men with fearsome relatives, rather preferred the seclusion of a grand house. But no one could make the case for Leadman’s without sounding self-interested.

  Pauling was waiting with the housekeeper on the gravel by the main door. For this final visit he wanted to create a sense of occasion. He stepped up to the car’s rear door with an ironic flourish and a click of heels. As usual the housekeeper was new. This one was Polish, a young woman barely in her twenties, Fiona thought, but her gaze was level and cool and she took the judge’s largest piece of luggage in a firm grip before Pauling could get to it. Side by side, clerk and housekeeper led the way to the room on the first floor Fiona considered hers. It was at the front of the house, with three tall windows facing toward the beech avenue and part of the weedy lake. Beyond the thirty-foot bedroom was a sitting room with writing desk. The bathroom, however, was along a corridor and down three carpeted steps. The last time Leadman’s was modernized, the general proliferation of lavatories and showers had yet to begin.

  The storm arrived as she returned from her bath. She stood at the center window in a dressing gown watching squalls of rain, tall ghostly shapes, hurrying across the fields, which for seconds were lost to view. She saw the topmost branch of one of the nearer beeches snap and begin to fall, upend itself and swing as it was held by lower branches, then plunge again, become entangled, then, freed by the wind, hit the drive with a crack. Almost as loud as the rain hissing against the gravel was the moaning tumult in the guttering. She turned on the lights and began to dress. She was already ten minutes late for sherry in the drawing room.

  Four men in dark suits and ties, each holding a gin and tonic, ceased talking and rose from their armchairs as she entered. A waiter in a stiff white jacket mixed her drink while her colleague, Caradoc Ball from the Queen’s Bench, doing the criminal list, introduced her to the others, a professor of jurisprudence, a man whose business was in fiber optics and someone working for the government in coastline conservation. All were connected with Ball in some way. She had not invited guests for the first evening. There followed some obligatory conversation about the violent weather. Then, a digression on how people over fifty and all Americans still inhabited a Fahrenheit world. Next, on how British newspapers, for maximum impact, reported cold weather in Celsius, hot in Fahrenheit. All the while, she was wondering why the young man bending low over a trolley in the corner of the room was taking so long. He brought her drink just as the long-ago transition to decimal currency was being recalled.

  She already knew from Ball that he was in Newcastle for the retrial of a murder case in which a man was alleged to have bludgeoned his mother to death at her home because of her ill-treatment of her youngest child, the half sister of the accused. No murder weapon was found and the DNA evidence was inconclusive. The defense’s case was that the woman had been killed by an intruder. The trial had collapsed when it was discovered that one juror had revealed to the others information he had got from the Internet through his phone. He had found a five-year-old tabloid story about the accused man’s previous conviction for violent assault. In the new age of digital access, something had to be done to “clarify” matters for juries. The professor of jurisprudence had lately been making a submission to the Law Commission, and this must have been the conversation that Fiona interrupted when she came into the room. Now it resumed. The fiber-optic man was asking how one could ever prevent juries from looking things up in the privacy of their homes, or from getting a family member to do it for them. Relatively simple, was the professor’s point. Juries would police themselves. They would be obliged, under threat of a custodial sentence, to report anyone discussing matters not presented in court. Two years maximum for doing so, six months maximum for failing to report a breach. The commission would deliver its conclusions next year.

  Just then the butler came in to invite them to the dinner table. Though he could hardly have been out of his thirties, his face was deadly pale, as though dusted in powder. As white as an aspirin, she had once heard a rural French lady say. But he didn’t seem to be ill, for his presentation was impersonal and assured. While he stood to one side, attentively stooped, they finished their drinks and followed Fiona through a set of double doors to the dining room. The table, which could have seated thirty guests, was set for five at one lonely end. The room was lined with wood panels, painted over in near-fluorescent orange with evenly spaced stenciled flamingos. The diners were now on the north side of the house, where the wind blew and the three sash windows shook and rumbled. The air was chilly and damp. There was a dusty bouquet of dried flowers in the fireplace. The butler explained that it had been blocked up many years ago, but he would bring in an electric fan heater. They considered the placement and after a hiatus of polite dithering, it was agreed that, for the sake of symmetry, Fiona should sit at the head.

  So far she had barely spoken. The pale butler went round with a white wine. Two waiters brought in kipper pâté and thin toast. Immediately to her left was the conservation expert, Charlie, fiftyish, plump, genially bald. While the other three continued to talk about juries, he politely asked about her work. Resigned to a round of necessary small talk, she spoke in general terms about the Family Division. But Charlie wanted detail. What sort of thing would she rule on tomorrow? She felt happier talking of a particular case. A local authority wanted to take two children, a boy of two and girl of four, into care. The mother was an alcoholic, also addicted to amphetamines. She suffered psychotic episodes during which she believed herself to be spied on by lightbulbs. She was no longer able to look after herself or her children. The estranged father had been absent and now had turned up to claim that he and his girlfriend could do the caring. He too had drug problems, as well as a criminal record, but he had rights. A social worker would give evidence in court tomorrow on his suitability as a parent. The grandparents on the mother’s side loved the children, were competent and wanted to take them on, but they had no rights. The local authority, whose children service had been criticized in an official report, opposed the grandparents for reasons that were not yet clear. The three parties, mother, father and grandparents, were bitterly divided among themselves. Another complication was that there were contradictory views of the four-year-old. One pediatric expert said that she had special needs; another, brought in by the grandparents, believed that, though she was disturbed by her mother’s behavior and underweight because of irregular meals, her development was normal.

  There were, she said, many other such cases listed for the week. Charlie put his hand to his forehead and closed his eyes. What a mess. If he had to wade in and take a decision tomorrow morning about just one case like that, he would be up all night, chewing his fingernails and abusing the honor bar in the drawing room. She asked him why he was here. He had come from Whitehall to persuade a group of farmers on the coast to join with some local environmental organizations and
allow their pastureland to be overrun by seawater in order to return it to salt marshes. This was by far the best and cheapest form of defense against coastal flooding, wonderful for wildlife, especially birds, and good for small-scale tourism too. But there was strong opposition from parts of the agricultural sector, even though the farmers would be well compensated. All day he had been shouted down in meetings. The story was going round that the scheme was compulsory. They wouldn’t believe him when he said it wasn’t. He was seen as a representative of central government, and farmers were angry about all kinds of other issues which were not his department. Afterward, he had been jostled in a corridor. A man “half my age and twice my strength” had gripped his lapel and muttered something in the local accent that he had not understood. Just as well. Tomorrow he would go back and try again. He was sure he’d get there in the end.

  Well, that sounded to her like a special circle of hell and she’d settle for a psychotic mother any day. They were chuckling over this when they became aware that the other three had abandoned their conversation and were listening.

  Caradoc Ball, who was an old school friend of Charlie, said, “I hope you realize just how distinguished a judge this is that you’re talking to. I’m sure you remember the Siamese twins affair.”

  Everyone did, and as the plates were cleared and the boeuf en croûte and Château Latour distributed, they talked of and asked her questions about that famous case. She told them everything they wanted to know. Everyone had a view, but since it was the same view, they soon moved on to discuss the passion and competition for the story in the papers. It was a short step to a gossipy roundup of the latest performances in front of the Leveson Inquiry. They finished the beef. In prospect, according to the menu card, was bread-and-butter pudding. Soon, Fiona guessed, they would be arguing about the folly or wisdom of the West not sending its armies into Syria. Caradoc was unstoppable on the subject. And so it turned out; this theme was just being introduced by him when they became aware of voices echoing in the hall outside. Pauling and the white-faced butler came in, paused on the threshold, then approached her.

  The butler stood aside, looking displeased as Pauling, after nodding an apology to the company, leaned over by her chair and said softly into her ear, “My Lady, I’m sorry to interrupt, but I’m afraid there’s a matter that needs your immediate attention.”

  She dabbed her lips with her napkin and stood. “Excuse me, gentlemen.”

  Expressionless, they all rose as she preceded the two men across the room. When she was outside she said to the butler, “We’re still waiting for that fan heater.”

  “I’ll fetch it now.”

  There was something peremptory in his manner as he turned away, and she looked at her clerk with raised eyebrows.

  But he simply said, “It’s this way.”

  She followed him across the hallway and into what had once been a library. The shelves were filled with junk-shop books, the sort that hotels bought by the yard to lend atmosphere.

  Pauling said, “It’s that Jehovah’s Witness lad, Adam Henry. Do you remember, from the transfusion case? He seems to have followed you here. He’s been walking through the rain, completely drenched. They wanted to turn him out, but I thought you should know first.”

  “Where is he now?”

  “In the kitchen. It’s warmer there.”

  “Better bring him in.”

  As soon as Pauling had left she got up and walked slowly around the room, conscious that her heart rate had increased. If she’d answered his letters she wouldn’t have been facing this now. Facing what? Unnecessary involvement with a case that was closed. And more than that. But there was no time to consider. She heard footsteps approaching.

  The door swung open and Pauling ushered in the boy. She had never seen him out of bed and was surprised by how tall he was, well over six feet. He wore his school clothes, gray flannel trousers, gray sweater, white shirt, a flimsy school blazer, all soaked through, and his hair was untidy from being rubbed dry. A small backpack drooped from his hand. A pathetic touch was the Leadman’s tea towel, printed with a collage of local beauty spots, draped across his shoulders for warmth.

  The clerk hovered in the doorway while the boy took a couple of steps into the room and stopped close to where she stood and said, “I’m truly sorry.”

  In those first moments it was easier to conceal a confusion of feeling behind a motherly tone. “You look frozen. We’d better have them bring that heater in here.”

  “I’ll bring it myself,” Pauling said, and left.

  “Well,” she said after a silence. “How on earth did you find me here?”

  Another evasion, to ask how rather than why, but at this stage, while his presence was still a shock, she couldn’t face knowing what he wanted from her.

  His recitation was sober. “I followed you in a taxi to King’s Cross, got on your train, no idea where you’d get off so I had to buy a ticket to Edinburgh. At Newcastle, I followed you out through the station entrance, ran after your limo, then I lost it, so I took a guess and asked people where the law courts were. As soon as I got there I saw your car.”

  She watched him as he spoke, taking in the transformation. No longer thin, but still slender. New strength about the shoulders and arms. Same long delicately structured face, the brown cheekbone mole nearly invisible against a complexion darkened by young health. Mere traces of the purple pouches under the eyes. Lips full and moist, eyes in this light too black for color. Even when he was trying to be apologetic, he appeared too vivid, too hungry for the minutiae of his own explanation. As he looked away from her to order in his thoughts the sequence of events, she wondered if this was what her mother would have called an old-fashioned face. A meaningless idea. Everyone’s notion of the face of a Romantic poet, a cousin of Keats or Shelley.

  “I waited a really long time, then you came out and I followed you through the town and back down toward the river and watched you get in the car. It took me more than an hour, but eventually I found a site on my phone that mentioned where the judges stay, so I hitched a lift, got dropped off on the main road, climbed over the wall to avoid going past that gatehouse and walked up the drive in the storm. I waited round the back by the old stables for ages, wondering what to do, and then someone saw me. I really am sorry. I …”

  Pauling, flushed and irritable, came in with the heater. He may have needed to wrench it from the butler’s possession. They watched as the clerk went down on all fours with a grunt, and partly disappeared under a side table to get to a socket. After he had reversed out and stood, he placed his hands on the young man’s shoulders and steered him into the flow of warm air. Before he left he said to Fiona, “I’ll be right outside.”

  When they were alone she said, “Shouldn’t I think there’s something spooky about you following me home, and then here?”

  “Oh no! Please don’t think that. It’s not like that.” He cast around with an impatient movement, as though an explanation were written somewhere in the room. “Look, you saved my life. And it’s not only that. My dad tried to keep it from me, but I read your judgment. You said you wanted to protect me from my religion. Well, you have. I’m saved!”

  He laughed at his own joke and she said, “I didn’t save you so that you could stalk me the length of the country.”

  Just then a fixed component of the fan heater must have expanded into the orbit of a moving part, for a regular clunking sound filled the room. It grew louder, then diminished, then steadied. She felt a rush of irritation with the whole establishment. A fake. A dump. How had she not noticed before?

  The moment passed and she said, “Do your parents know where you are?”

  “I’m eighteen. I can be where I like.”

  “I don’t care how old you are. They’ll be worried.”

  He gave a gasp of adolescent exasperation and set his backpack down on the floor. “Look, My Lady—”

  “Enough of that. It’s Fiona.” As long as she could keep him i
n his place she felt better.

  “I wasn’t meaning to be sarcastic or anything.”

  “Fine. What about your parents?”

  “Yesterday I had this huge row with my dad. We’ve had a few since I came out of hospital, but this one was really big, both shouting, and I told him everything I thought about his stupid religion, not that he was listening. In the end I walked out. I went up to my room and packed my bag, got my savings and said good-bye to my mum. Then I left.”

  “You must phone her now.”

  “No need. I texted her last night from where I was staying.”

  “Text her again.”

  He looked at her, both surprised and disappointed.

  “Come on. Tell her you’re safe and happy in Newcastle and you’ll write again tomorrow. Then we’ll talk.”

  She stood a few paces off and watched as his long thumbs danced across a virtual keyboard. In seconds the phone was back in his pocket.

  “There,” he said, looking at her expectantly, as though she were the one who was to give an account of herself.