Something to Declare by Cyclist

Chapter 49

We went straight to the police station. This was the sort of thing where clothes would get disposed of, if we didn’t act quickly, and unless Smith and his friends were even stupider than we thought they would have heard the news.

Naomi used a lot of clout to get us heard, and within a very short time we were asked to give statements. It also appeared that there was at least one council-operated camera in the street, and an officer was sent to secure the relevant recordings. I sat in while the duty Inspector spoke to his opposite number in the Met*

“They are on their way as we speak with a number of dog handlers and the big key ** to see who is at home. This does not happen on my patch without consequences. I‘m running a check with H.M. Prison service; I have a sneaky suspicion as to who one of the other three might be. Now, I don’t want to be rude, but as potential witnesses, would you all like to go home and keep quiet about this? I trust we have your contact details. Naomi, please give my best to Albert”

I realised what he was getting at, and Naomi and I went through the recordings again, and yes, there he was. Anstey, who was supposed to be banged away in Lewes Prison. Something had gone wrong and the animal was out on the streets.

Well, things were in motion and all we could do was wait. It seemed strange at first to feel such concern over the fate of a complete stranger, but it did feel almost as if I had known her. The images of Smith’s abuse of her at the bar made me feel physically sick, and I really did not know how Sally could have faced identifying what was left of her.

A couple of days later, after Sally had found the strength to go home, the police let us know a little more. They had found Anstey at home with his wife, where he was on a home visit due to an “illness” she had contracted. He had two broken ribs, apparently from a kick which he claimed to have received from a horse, but which mysteriously seemed to have been wearing a high heel. In the shed behind his place was a bag of his clothes with splashes of blood.

At Smith’s they found Alfie and his two sons, one of whom had a badly blackened eye with the mark of a fine ring on it. I remembered Junior’s comment about my engagement ring, and realised that Melanie, for that was her name, had gone down fighting hard.

Apparently, the older boy had received a dog bite during the arrest. What a tragedy.

I rang Geoff at work to let him know the score and asked if he could look into any advice his house lawyers could give about the rights of Melanie’s so-called family to be involved in the funeral, and then I rang Raj, who had just returned from holiday.

“Ah, Stephanie. I was hoping to speak to you; how are you for a date in May? My system says a slot has just come up and the surgeon can fit you in”

I felt sick. I realised that he hadn’t had a chance to speak to Sally, as she had been with me, and I had a nauseating suspicion that the “slot” was Melanie’s. I could have my surgery, but it would be at the ultimate expense of one dead girl. I quietly filled him in on events to total silence at his end, and then asked a favour.

“Raj, I need you to do a couple of things. Please speak to Sally and make sure she is all right, and it would also be useful if the local support group got involved”

I took a deep breath, and then made my admissions.

“I don’t know if I could sleep easily getting my turn this way, and I also don’t know if I can organise something like this. I would want to make it an event to draw real attention to the hatred that is out there, but really, I haven’t the slightest idea of how to do it”

Raj promised to help; my head was spinning. What a choice to be given, literally dead girl’s shoes. I decided I would leave it till the evening before asking my gentle man.

Geoff was patient with me, as ever, as I explained my doubts. He thought for a minute or two, then picked up the phone.

“Dad will have the best way of looking at this, if you are able to go through this all again”

He passed me the handset and Big Bill answered with an audible smile and the words “Hello, daughter-of-mine-to-be!”

I went through the pattern I had already developed, the apology, the warning, the flat statement of facts, the second apology and the pause. He was quiet for a short while, then in his gentle way he began.

“Steph, trouble seems to follow you around, but that is an illusion. You have these events in your life because you care. Karma brings them to you because it makes you a better person, that person who can never pass by on the other side as in Angela’s book. For whatever reason, you now have your chance to become, to surpass what you have been thus far. You must take it. You are a healing person, you bring harmony and light. This is to let you bring harmony to yourself.

“Melanie has moved on, and she did it fighting almost to the end. If she had known someone like you, perhaps she may still have been fighting today, but she had nobody except Sally. Think of Sally, now, in her grief and sense of failure. You can be the one she got right, and help heal her fractures. And think of the drivers of four or more vehicles, who will only now be realising what they hit.

“Steph, my beloved daughter, for that is who you are to be, you must make this a focus for others. Angela and I will help with the arrangements, I am sure she will when I tell her, and you will not have forgotten that we have experience in such things. Here is what you must do…”

Ten minutes after we hung up, she rang, and for a Quaker she was remarkably robust in her condemnation of the foursome. I asked her how that could be.

“These four are still vermin, despite being human beings. They can be saved , they can be brought back from their degradation, but only if they are shown they are doing evil. That will take time, and much to my shame I hope the time it takes involves throwing away the key. The rest of the world also needs protection from them until they have grown up.”

“You’re a realist, aren’t you, Angela?”

“I know that God loves all of His world, and that is as real as it can get, but that we have a responsibility to make it a better place. The boys are not too old to save, but they must be removed from the depravity of their parents until they can be redeemed.”

So we had a plan, it seemed, and Geoff brought up a rather cogent fact as we listened to the BBC news on radio 4. Were we looking for a sombre affair, with black suits and sad hymns, or a sending off with colour and laughter. We got a little silly in our suggestions, particularly when Geoff proposed six towering drag queens as pall-bearers, but that was our way of breaking our own cycle of horror. I gave my veto to the drag queens, though. I just didn’t think that it was what we wanted to say about Melanie; let people come as they wanted to be, but stress that it would be a celebration of the life of just one more woman.

Perhaps that would make a bigger impact on public perception. Dream on, Steph. The newsreader spoke.

“Three men and a youth have been charged in connection with the death of a 50 year old woman, on Friday evening. Melanie Stevens fell onto the northbound carriageway of the M23 at Worth near Crawley and was struck by at least five vehicles. Police have asked the drivers to come forward to help with the investigation. The four men, Billy James Anstey, Alfie John Smith, Billy Boy Smith and a seventeen year old who cannot be named, all of Belvedere in Kent, have been charged with a number of offences including assault occasioning grievous bodily harm, and the spokesman for Sussex Constabulary has stressed that this is being treated as a hate crime. Three other people have been charged with perverting and attempting to pervert the course of justice”

Sally came round the next evening with a rather short, bearded man, who introduced himself as Jerry Summers, the coordinator of the local transgender support group. He caught my look, and sighed.

“Yes, it was once Geraldine. Easier to get along if you don’t have to keep remembering a new name, if you can understand that”

“Yup. That’s why I changed from Steve”

Sally giggled at his reaction, beamed at me and said “I still keep patient confidence, girl!”

Her smile faltered again, and we hugged. Jerry sighed again. It was obviously his little quirk.

“If only it was so simple for all of us. I would be lost without my wife, and I can see where your strength is. Now, how do we get that across to other boys and girls?”

Geoff and I filled him in on our thoughts, and he snorted at the thoughts of the drag queen pall bearers.

“Yet again we have to educate people about the difference between gender and sexuality, you’d think they’d know by now. Anyway, this is not the first of these events i have had to suffer, so here’s my take. Sally tells me that Melanie was a devout atheist–no, Sally, those were her words, you said---so we are looking at a humanist ceremony, a ‘Speaker for the Dead’ sort of thing. We put the word out to all the various groups and clubs, perhaps the London and Brighton Pride organisers, and we have as much colour as we can, but as a centrepiece we have a dark core to emphasise that this is not a party for the sake of it.”

I nodded. He had hit the nail squarely. Sally looked up again, her face more relaxed than it had been for days.

“Will you play for her, Steph?” she asked softly. Geoff replied for me.

“I think we can do better than that”

*Met: Metropolitan Police, London’s constabulary.
**Big key: sledgehammer or other device for smashing down doors.