CHAPTER 25
Hollis led the conversation, interrogation, interview, Baillie making notes in an A4 book rather than the little notebook I expected. The woman was quietly spoken, but very clear in her questions.

“You were found in a disused blast shelter in the Dinorwic quarries, Alys. You were last heard of near the Penrhyn quarries, the other side of the hill. Can you tell us how you got there? From the beginning, please. Take your time, but it would help us if you could explain why you were there in the first place. DC Baillie here is what we call a statement taker, as am I. We will not put words in your mouth, but rather do our best to help you be clear in what you say. Is that acceptable?”

“Yes”

Hollis nodded, then turned to me.

“Ms Hiatt, this will be stressful on all of us, but please try not to answer on her behalf. I am really grateful she will have your support through this process, but the answers have to come from Alys alone. Will that be okay for you?”

I nodded, which brought a smile that looked genuine, and then she began the ‘process’.

“Alys, why were you at the Penrhyn quarry?”

“I was doing a species count, on a metre square”

“What does that entail?”

“I am hoping to do a conservation course at University. I’m interested in how life comes back to the quarry floor, regreening. Dad made me a really clever piece of kit, a folding metre square”

“What is that, Alys?”

“It’s a sort of grid. One metre to a side, with a string net breaking it up into ten centimetre sections. You put it on the ground and mark out what species is growing in each section. Hard on the knees, so I take a bit of camping mat to kneel on”

“Does this involve taking samples? Digging anything up?”

“No! Whole point is to leave things as they are, then come back after a few months and compare the results”

“So you wouldn’t have been carrying any tools, like a trowel or a fork?”

“What for? No. Nothing like that”

Hollis nodded to Baillie, and I understood: Alys had not been armed in any way. The woman continued her questions.

“You were on your knees most of the time, then?”

“Yes. That was how it was when… I was looking at an area away from where they are doing the restoration work. Didn’t want to see nothing but heather and grass. I had a perennial sow-thistle in my sample grid, so I was looking to see where it was rooted, how deep the soil was, because… Sorry. Details you don’t need”

“So would it be fair to say you were engrossed in your work?”

“Definitely”

“Can you tell us where you were working?”

“If you follow the access road round to the East of the big pool under the zipwire place, it goes up in hairpins. There’s a terrace below the track, on the pool side. Below the second hairpin. Patch of scrub on the next level down; I’m trying to map how the plants from the scrub are colonising the slate spoil.

“So you were busy working, concentration on the ground. What happened then?”

“I was bent over, moving a couple of slate chips that were around the plant, and then there was a shadow”

“What made the shadow?”

“It was four people standing behind me”

“Did you recognise any of them?”

“I recognised all of them”

“Do you know their names?”

“Ifor Watkins, Ioan Saunders, Beci Jones and Rhianon Walters”

“How do you know these people?”

“Ifor and Ioan are, were, in our year at school. The girls were the year below. It is ‘were’ now, isn’t it?”

“Not now, Alys. You’re doing well, but this is your story. What then happened?”

Alys tightened her grip on my hand.

“Ifor spoke to me”

“What did he say?”

“He said ‘Look at the fucking tranny queer’. His voice… he was all slurred in his speech. Then he punched me in the face”

“Thank you, Alys, for staying with us. If this gets too distressing, please tell us and we will take a break”

“I have my lover with me. I can cope, now”

“Thank you again. Was it just the one blow?”

“No. He hit me three or four times, then kicked me in the stomach. I think he wanted to kick me lower down, but I was kneeling”

“How did you feel after the blows?”

“Physically? I was really woozy, stunned. Might have passed out for a second. How did I feel mentally? I was terrified. Please: some water?”

Baillie passed her the glass, and then Alys continued.

“Ioan threw my square and mat into the scrub, and Beci went through my rucksack, took my purse, the thieving bitch, and that went into the scrub as well”

Hollis held up a hand to signal a pause, pulling out a mobile phone and tapping a number in, switching to English as she was answered.

“Graham? It’s Claire. We need SOCO out to the Penrhyn. Looking for three items at least: a rucksack, a sort of grid square thing and a section of closed cell matting”

She confirmed colours and sizes with Alys, then gave the location details to what was clearly a colleague.

“Gray, the items should have traces from who we were talking about. May be dabs, may be DNA. Please ask SOCO to do their best for us”

Once her phone was away, she turned back to Alys.

“You okay, love? We can do this another day, if you would prefer”

Alys shook her head, wincing.

“Sorry. Get a little dizzy when I do that. No. Get it done, while I can”

“Okay. After you were assaulted, what then happened?”

“There was a car. They put me in it, girls either side. Back seat. Ifor was driving. Silly speeds, it felt like. Lots of sharp cornering, the two boys laughing all the time. I was dizzy, wanted to be sick. Lost track of everything; think I passed out again. Don’t know how long we were driving about. Woke up, and there were noisy road sounds, crunching. Like we were on gravel. Car stopped, and they dragged me out. It was another quarry, and god knows how Ifor had got us so high up. Must have broken a fence down”

Hollis was nodding as Alys spoke.

“Yes. We found a stretch that had been cut through. Real trick getting that car all the way to--- No, Claire. Alys, if you can, please continue”

“I was still out of it, still wobbly. Doctor says I had concussion. There was a lot of stumbling, and I remember one of the girls trying to pour cider down my throat, big plastic bottle of it. Ioan and Ifor had a bottle of vodka. Ifor smashed it against a lump of rock, laughing. Then…”

Her grip nearly broke my fingers, the rest of her body starting to tremble, and DC Hollis saw.

“Going to take a few minutes, ladies. DC Baillie here owes me a favour, so he will take a short walk to secure some teas. That okay, Dave?”

Baillie grinned, far too brightly, and took his leave, pulling out his own phone as he rose, probably to emulate his mate’s lead in calling in the location of the broken vodka bottle. Once he was back with one of those cardboard cup-holders and our tea. ‘Claire’ smiled at him.

“No biscuits, Dave?”

A more genuine smile, and the wave of a paper bag.

“Millionaire’s shortbread do instead?”

“Hero you are! Alys, we’ll eat this, and then decide how you are feeling. Enfys?”

“Yes?”

“If your girl here is doing conservation, what do you have planned?”

“Adventure sports science”

“That sounds cool. What’s your sport?”

“I’m a climber, like my parents”

“A good one?”

Alys answered for me.

“A very good one. She climbs on slate, in that quarry”

“Oh, not my thing at all. Give me a sun-lounger and a cold drink, in a warm country, that’s my style. And that’s the cake. Alys?”

She nodded.

“Go for it”

“Right. Ready, Dave?”

“I am”

“Okay. Alys, when we paused, you were in a quarry. Bottle of vodka just smashed”

“Yes. All of them were laughing, and Ioan had a smelly cigarettes he was passing around. We were by a little hut, Ifor pulled the door open, then he punched me in the face some more”

“How many times did he punch you at that point?”

“Can’t remember. I know I was in the dark then. In the hut. My jacket and fleece were gone, and Beci and Rhianon were pulling off my T-shirt and then my Ron Hills, When they were off, that was when Ifor kicked me between the legs. Then they pulled off my knickers and bra”

“Was anything said by any of them?”

“Yes. Beci laughed at my knickers, said they were boring, just like me. Rhianon said ‘What the fuck does he need a bra for, the pervert?’ and ‘Look at that fucking maggot. He’s had that in the girls’ toilets, fucking queer’. Ioan was just laughing. He was the one who tied my hands behind my back”

Claire looked down at her knees for a couple of breaths.

“Would it be correct to say you were thus naked, Alys?”

“Yes. I know I don’t have proper breasts yet, but the hormones have started working, and they get sensitive, which is why---”

“Alys, please don’t”

“Don’t what?”

“Don’t try to justify what you did. There is no need. I know about trainer bras, and why, and so does your girlfriend. It is what women do, what we all need. We understand who is the victim here. Now, I know this is going to be the hardest part, but we are almost done. Your pace, though. Ready?”

“Yes. I was naked, completely. They had me lying on the floor, and that was when Ifor opened his flies and… he got his penis out, and it was erect, and he was grinning. Told the others to hold me”

“What did he say?”

“He said that if I wanted to be a girl, I should learn what being fucked felt like”

Claire looked across at Dave once more.

“Always, always the same stupid ideas. Not a single original thought from any of the--- sorry again, Alys. What… what then happened?”

I moved onto the bed as she pulled me to her, taking her in my arms as she reached the black heart of it all.

“It was Beci. Rhianon and Ioan had rolled me over so that my face was pushed into the floor, and I heard Ifor’s belt buckle hit the floor. I knew what he was going to do”

“What did you think his intention was, Alys?”

“Rape me. Put his… Rape me anally”

I heard an odd sound from Claire, and realised she was muttering under her breath before she asked the next question.

“Did he carry that out?”

“No. As I said, it was Beci. Don’t mean she did, you know, that. She just said ‘Ifor Watkins, if you think I am letting you put your cock in my fanny after you have been stabbing shit up his arse, you can think again’. She was… she was really clear about that”

I caught Dave’s mutter clearly: “Classy girl”

Claire gave him a sharp look, getting a shrug in reply, and then continued.

“What then happened, Alys?”

“They all left. I managed to get to my feet, but the door was jammed. I couldn’t get it open. That was all, really. Nothing else I could do but wait”

“Did you have anything to wrap yourself in? Any food or drink?”

“No. I got cold and I got thirsty, and I… I saw the flash when Neil took the pictures, and then it was the ambulance crew, and here. That’s all, really”

“Neil? Neil Strachan?”

“Yes. Friend of Mr Hiatt”

“Can we please confirm one point, Alys?”

“What?”

“Neil Strachan had no involvement in the… in the bad stuff?”

She tried to sit upright, but I pulled her closer to me.

“No! Without him, I’d be dead. How can you think he was involved?”

Claire’s smile this time was a genuine one.

“We don’t, Alys. We just need any outsider, a jury for example, to be clear n that point. We have spoken to Mr Strachan, and it is very clear how distressed this has made him. Finished here, and this doesn’t affect your evidence, so I can tell you. Neil thought you were dead, love. He was taking pictures in case there was anything that might help us. We have his memory card already. I am not allowed to say some things, to be explicit, but, well, we all know who it was, and where they are now. We will return your purse when this is over. Now, Dave is going to write out the statement properly for you, and we will give it to you for checking, but I really think you two need a little bit of privacy. We’ll be about an hour, I would think”

They gathered their things, pushing the door closed as they left, and I snuggled closer to my lover.

“Enfys?”

“Yes, love?”

“Is that what I am?”

“What do you mean?”

“Not even enough of a girl to be worth raping?”