A Lesser Evil - Lesley Pearse [185]
She continued with what took place the following day, right up to where Yvette put the pillow over Angela’s face. ‘She did do it, Dan, I know she did,’ she sobbed. ‘She even told me about getting the clean sheet to cover her.’
Dan was completely stunned. Had he known earlier today that it was Trueman who’d raped Angela, he wouldn’t have stopped at just beating him up. He felt absolute disgust for the man and all the others who’d been there that night, and that made Yvette’s part look almost kindly. But of course it wasn’t. Yvette should have got help for the child the minute she knew what was going to happen. It wasn’t her place to play God and decide the child would be happier dead.
‘She must have been mad,’ he exclaimed, so bewildered by what he’d heard, that seemed the only explanation.
‘She called killing Angela the lesser evil,’ Fifi said sorrowfully, clinging to Dan’s chest. ‘And I think she hanged herself because that was the lesser evil too.’
‘Well, it saved her from a public trial,’ Dan said grimly.
‘No,’ Fifi exclaimed, lifting her head to look at him. ‘I know that wasn’t her reason for it. She was a very moral person, I think she felt she must be punished. But starving to death with me would mean no one would ever know what she’d done. Even if we were rescued, it’s doubtful she would have been hanged, because of the circumstances. By killing herself, she took what she saw as the appropriate punishment.’
‘Shit!’ was all Dan could say.
They were silent for some time, Fifi lying in Dan’s arms while he stared into space. He couldn’t really think about the bigger implications of what Yvette had done, only about how this nightmare week would affect Fifi.
Suddenly she sat up, turning to look at him again. ‘The question is, do I tell the police about it?’ she asked.
‘Well yes, of course,’ Dan said.
‘But if I tell them they’ll have to let Molly and Alfie out, won’t they?’
Dan looked at her in consternation. ‘Why?’
‘Well, they can’t hold them for murder, can they?’
Dan saw what she meant. ‘But selling your seven-year-old daughter must be a pretty serious charge.’
‘What proof of that is there?’ Fifi asked. ‘Yvette’s dead. Jack Trueman isn’t likely to admit he bought and raped Angela. You can bet that anyone else there that night will deny it too. So what would there be left to charge Alfie and Molly with? They didn’t kill John Bolton, nor did they abduct Yvette and me.’
Dan was impressed that she could think things through so well after such an ordeal, and he could see her point. Alfie and Molly were two people anyone sane would want locked away for ever. ‘But if no one else admits to raping Angela, Alfie will get charged with it.’
‘And what will he get for that?’ Fifi asked derisively. ‘Five years maybe? That’s if they can even find enough proof to convince a jury he did it. Molly will be right off the hook, won’t she? She’ll cry and say how much she loves her children and that she didn’t know what was going on. Before you could say Jack Robinson she’ll be back in that house with her children!’
Dan thought Alfie would get a longer sentence than five years, and he didn’t think Molly would manage to wriggle out of any responsibility that easily either, or get her children back. But he could see Fifi’s point: there wasn’t a lot of hard evidence against the Muckles, not since Trueman abducted Fifi and Yvette. If Fifi chose not to reveal what she knew, there would be a kind of poetic justice in them being hanged or banged up for life for the one thing they didn’t actually do, when they’d got away with so much in the past.
‘Okay. But if you keep quiet, where does that leave Trueman? I don’t only want to see him go down for John Bolton’s murder and your abduction. I want to see him pilloried for raping Angela.’
Fifi nodded. ‘Yes, but even if I tell the police what really happened that night, unless someone else who was there that night confirms it, he’ll get away with that,’ she said wearily. ‘He won’t admit having any part in Bolton’s death