“I believed him wholeheartedly. And then he told me about this new job he had in Poole and the flat and everything and asked me if I wanted to live with him there. It was like another dream to me, but a good dream for a change. He said the police had never stopped hounding him, that he wanted to protect me from all that, so it was better just to let people think I was his girlfriend.
“We were happy together. He was rebuilding his life, I think, after breaking up with his latest woman. He was honest enough about that side of himself, too. He said he had a weakness for the ladies. He said that had caused all of his troubles. He even told me about his fraud conviction, and he said he’d only done what he’d done then because he’d got into financial trouble when he’d been trying to run two families. I suppose I believed what I wanted to believe. Because I had always wanted something like that, to find my real father or mother again, to get to know them.
“I thought I did know him, too. When he was arrested I believed in him absolutely, and when I came forward after he was convicted I still believed in him. A lot of what the police and the lawyers said, though, about my being disturbed by what had happened to me as a child, did get through to me. Because I knew that none of it was clear, whatever I said, none of my memories were clear. They were all hazy around the edges.
“Then, after my father won his appeal, I began to get the dreams again. The dreams I couldn’t understand. That’s why I thought it might be best to move away from him for a while. I started looking for work elsewhere. I had been an office manager before, and I was rather good at it. I found a new job quite easily and moved here to Hammersmith. I didn’t tell my father about the dreams. I didn’t want to face up to them, I suppose. But they began to get worse and worse.
“So when you told me that my father had confessed more or less, to that crime reporter on the Sun, it really got through to me. And then when you explained about Recovered Memory Syndrome and suggested I see Dr. Huxtable, well, I wanted to do it at once even though I didn’t admit it either to myself or to you, John. I hadn’t talked to any other journalists. I’d never heard of RMS. I don’t read the papers a lot. I just wasn’t aware of it. For the first time in my life I could see how it might be possible to open a window into my past.”
Jennifer paused, and Karen could hear a swallowing sound as if perhaps she was taking a drink of something. When she started to talk again there was a definite catch in that flat well-educated voice.
“Dr. Huxtable just talked to me at first and then put me into hypnotherapy. We started to have results almost at once. I began to remember things in bits. It was like the dreams but this time I knew, just knew, it was what had really happened. I didn’t have any doubts at all.
“Suddenly I remembered it all so clearly as if it was yesterday. It was like I was five again, like I was there again.
“Our mother hadn’t tried to kill us in the car in the garage, neither had she killed herself. No...”
Jennifer’s voice broke completely. Karen could hear muffled sobs, and the young woman was still crying when she continued to tell her story.
“There was a terrible row. Lorraine and I were playing in our room upstairs but there was so much noise that we crept out onto the landing and then downstairs to see what was happening. We lived in a hotel, of course, and there were guests, but they wouldn’t have heard anything because the guest bedrooms were all in the new extension. Mummy and Daddy were in the kitchen. They were shouting at each other, screaming. Then Daddy caught hold of Mummy around the neck and started shaking her. She made this awful sound. This gurgling noise. I can hear it now, I can still hear it. I just turned and fled upstairs, but Lorraine was always braver than me. She ran into the room and I could hear her shouting at Daddy to stop.
“Then after a bit Daddy came upstairs with Lorraine in his arms. She was still in tears but she was fairly calm. Daddy said everything was all right and Mummy was fine. Lorraine and I just huddled together because we were frightened. Then a little later he came back and said that Mummy had been very cross with him and she’d gone away and he was going to take us next door to the neighbours because he wanted to go after her and find her.
“Even Lorraine was too frightened to say much that night but at school the next day she kept telling the teacher that Daddy had got rid of Mummy. I think that’s what she said. I think those were her exact words.
“We went back to the neighbours’ house after school that day but early the next morning Daddy came to fetch us. He said that Granny would be coming to look after us. I couldn’t take any of it in, really. Then he said we could have the day off school as a special treat. I still don’t remember much about that day. We stayed indoors, I think, until bedtime. And I do remember that when he put us to bed Lorraine kept asking him what he’d done to Mummy. Why had he hurt Mummy? Where had he put Mummy? I just clung to him, though. I don’t think I even wanted to know what was going on. I sensed that I had lost one parent, I suppose. I really didn’t want to lose another.
“Eventually I fell asleep. And I have no idea what else happened that night. But in the morning Lorraine wasn’t there. Her bed was empty and I never saw her again.
“Daddy said he was taking me to live with some kind people for a while who would look after me until he’d found Mummy and Lorraine. He kind of suggested that Lorraine was with Mummy, I think. I was too young to understand, to question anything.
“He took me to Carol and Michael. They had wanted children all their lives. They looked after me and cared for me and helped me forget, I suppose. So I blocked it out. That’s what kids do. Sounds incredible but it’s very common with small children faced with something terrible, Dr. Huxtable told me. They just shut everything out.
“Without his help, without learning about Recovered Memory Syndrome from you, I would never have remembered all this. Never have known the difference between my nightmares and the truth.”
Kelly’s voice broke in. “Are you quite sure of this, Jennifer?”
He sounded stunned, as indeed he might, thought Karen. Whatever he may have suspected, whatever any of them may always have believed, hearing it first-hand after all these years was something none of them would have thought possible. It was a total shock to Karen, too.
“Oh, yes, I’m quite sure. I can see it so clearly. It’s absolutely real to me. I can see our father bringing Lorraine upstairs and trying to tell us everything is all right. I can even see the scratches on his face, angry weals down both cheeks. Mummy must have tried to fight him off, but he was always such a strong man...”
Jennifer completely broke down in tears then. Karen found that her own hands were trembling, just as Kelly’s had been in Hammersmith Police Station. She remembered what her mother had said. “Scratches, he had scratches on his face.” The tape was silent for almost a minute before Jennifer’s voice filled the room once more.
“Lorraine wouldn’t stop accusing him. I have no doubt at all that he killed Lorraine, too. But not me. I survived because I didn’t really question our father, I think. Didn’t question him at all, in fact. Also, I think I’d always been his favourite. I was a complete daddy’s girl. I didn’t want to believe he’d done what he’d done, so I just didn’t accept it. And I was only five.”
Kelly’s voice came on the tape. “What now, Jennifer?” he asked. “What are you going to do? What do you want me to do? We should go to the police, you know.”
Kelly no longer sounded like a journalist doing an interview. It was as if he had been overwhelmed by the magnitude of what he had just learned. And Karen could understand that well enough.