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Do
“I’ve already moved here.” I can see their surprised reactions reflected in her face: she smiles and nods. “Yeah,” she says, almost surprised herself, “I’m renting a house in Lenzie.”
(This is a real estate agent’s lie. The house is in Kirkintilloch, not in Lenzie at all. Lenzie is nearby and twice as posh.)
Susie’s voice is incredulous. “But you haven’t even met him yet. Why did you do that?”
“Because I love him,” Do
“Didn’t you have friends or family back in Leicester?”
“Nope.” She doesn’t sound sad about it.
“Did you have a job?”
“Yeah.”
“Where?”
Do
“Do you have a job up here now?” asks Tucker.
“Not yet, but I’ll get one.”
“Don’t you think you’ll miss your old job?” he says. “Don’t you think you’ll be lonely?”
“I don’t feel alone when I’m near Andrew.” She looks at Susie defiantly. “I may not be alone for very long, anyway.”
“Hm,” says Susie. “Do you think Andrew’ll get out?”
“I don’t care if he’s in here for the rest of his life. I’ll stand by him.”
“Have you discussed the rapes and murders with him?”
Do
“And do you believe him?”
“Of course I do. I trust him.”
“You trust him to tell you the truth?”
“Yes.”
“Are you aware that other women write to him and he writes back?”
Do
“Are you aware that other women visit him?”
“Yes, that’s only to be expected. I hope that’ll change after we meet.”
“Will you be disappointed if it doesn’t?”
“Aye, I will. Of course I will. I love him.”
Susie pauses and I can hear the noise of paper turning. “Doesn’t it seem very unfair,” she says, “for him to be locked up in here for years? Doesn’t it make you think he might be guilty?”
Do
“Would you strive to make Andrew’s life fair?”
She sits back and nods. “Oh, yeah.”
“Do you participate in politics, then? Are you involved in any other campaigns?”
“No.” Do
There’s a smirk in Susie’s voice. “But Andrew isn’t bad?”
“Not to me, no. I know him now, you see.”
Susie shuffles some papers. It feels as if she’s looking for the next question. “I think that’s about it, Do
“Have I done all right?”
“You’ve done very well.”
“Will I be allowed to meet him, then?”
“I’m pretty sure you will. Everything seems fine.”
Susie had the final say in whether Do
Do
I rewind a couple of times to check my impression, but I’m right. Do
PROGRAM 2: DOCUMENTARY
The documentary is about people writing letters to Peter Sutcliffe in prison. Having watched it, I can see why Susie kept it. The women, and they are all women, have written to him on a number of pretexts, each one more flimsy than the last.
One woman was going through a bad time herself, so she went to his trial to cheer herself up and fell in love with him. There are at least two grotesquely mismatched junctions in that sentence. Sutcliffe wrote back, and the letters got more frequent, with more and more exclamation marks and love declarations, just like Do
Next was a happily married woman, all wax jacket, Labradors, and warbling voice, who had seen him in court. She’d done a drawing of him from memory and wanted to visit him to see how accurate it was. She was, without a doubt, the most self-deluding. She couldn’t even admit that her interest in him had a prurient element. Her husband drove her to the hospital once a month for visits and sat outside in the car.
The third woman was very worrying. She was a little old lady who was certain she had served Sutcliffe and another man in a café during the Yorkshire Ripper murders. The other man, Sutcliffe’s friend, had a Sutherland accent that perfectly matched the voice on the bogus tapes sent to the police, the tapes that claimed responsibility and misdirected the investigation for months. Sutcliffe was released to kill again because he had the wrong accent. The old lady wanted Sutcliffe to confess and admit that he had an accomplice. A retired police officer was interviewed and said that it was plausible for two men to have been responsible for the murders. Her husband sat in the background, in a shadow against a wall, like Boo Radley. His face was blank, and he never spoke or moved until she looked at him. She showed off a lot of photographs of them with Sutcliffe. They were hugging him in one, then handing over Easter cards and Christmas presents. She showed off a collection of letters from Sutcliffe that they kept in plastic folders. The woman seemed to have forgotten all about truth and the mystery man by the time she got near to him. She said over and over that he was like a son to her but eventually got a
They had an expert on, and she said that women who form relationships with killers are all lying to themselves and are likely to be motivated by thrill-seeking and, often, a sense of loss. This ties in neatly with all the stuff in the prison-lovers book. I should start reading it again.
PROGRAM 3: HOME MOVIE 2 6/12/98 4:37 P.M.
The camera blanks and starts again. This is another interview, two weeks before Susie got sacked. Susie and Do