Into the Gloaming

Surprise witnesses

"What first alerted you to your suspicion that Dr. James was possibly an unfit father?" asked the lawyer. I was pretty sure it was the lawyer who wasn't on my Dad's side. I kept getting confused because they both had slick dark hair and suits.

"It was when he first called about his wife's death."

"Why did that seem odd to you? What did he say?"

"He told me to tell Persephone that no-one would be home when she got home from school until six thirty that day and not to be concerned. I didn't think it was a good idea for her to be at home alone so he suggested that she could wait at school until six thirty when he could fetch her. We don't have an after school programme so I asked if her mother couldn't look after her and he told me that she'd died that morning, so Persephone would have to make her own dinner."

"So he showed no signs of grief at the death of his wife? No concern for Persephone's well being?"

"No, not at all."

"Then what happened?"

"I offered to have the school counsellor talk to Persephone about loss and suggested that it would be best if he came to pick her up before the end of the school day, just to be with her."

"What did he say?"

"He said he'd call me back."

"What happened when he called back?"

"Well by then Persephone was in the sick bay, which joins onto the office, when he called back he asked to speak to her. I could hear him yelling at her from my desk, it just broke my heart, this poor little girl finds out she's just lost her mother and her father is yelling at her on the phone."

"What was he yelling at her about?"

"I don't know."

"What did you do then?"

"I called Child Protection Services; according to protocol for any suspicions the staff might have of child abuse, and asked that they just make sure she was ok."

I couldn't believe what a dirty rotten dobber Mrs. Derrick was! I stared at Phil with my mouth open, trying to look angry. He should have told me! I felt cheated, like he was just pretending to be my friend because stupid Mrs. Derrick had called him up and told him to. He didn't notice me staring at him; he was perching awkwardly on his seat watching the front. Then he jumped up when they called his name and went up to the witness box. What was he doing? Phil hadn't witnessed anything interesting. I grumbled to myself and kicked the chair in front of me with Elizabeth's boots, and then pretended not to notice when the person occupying the chair turned around angrily. It was the naughtiest thing I'd ever done, I felt like a rebel and I didn't even care. Then I decided I should probably be paying attention to the trial.

"What alerted your suspicions about Dr. James?"

"Initially, the way neither Persephone nor her father seemed sad about the death of Caroline James. Then when Persephone called me, extremely distressed, and said that she had found blood on her Dad's jacket, I forwarded my concerns onto the police before going to the family home to check on her."

All I could do was sort of sway backwards and forwards in my seat, gaping at Phil. I couldn't believe that he had told the police about Dad's jacket! I couldn't believe I had been stupid enough to tell Phil about it in the first place. Dad was going to be so mad at me.

"What happened when you got there?"

"Persephone was sitting outside, clearly too scared to be inside the house with her Dad. I sat with her and tried to talk to her and calm her down, and then her Dad drove out of the garage with a lot of their possessions and left, badly damaging my own car and hitting Persephone, who then had to spend the night in hospital."

How dare he say I was scared and distressed!?! I am cool, calm and collected twenty four hours a day, seven days a week.

"What did you do then?"

"I called the police and gave them his number plate, and I took Persephone to hospital, where we had to spend the night until I could arrange accommodation for her the next day."

Then the lawyer said thankyou and Phil came back to sit with me. I crossed my arms and didn't look at him. When I really thought about it, I didn't really have a good reason to be angry at him, but I was anyway.

Then it was my turn in the box. I walked up there with everyone looking at me, my heart pounding, and sat down.