I spot Caroline Fairfax. She is wearing her ‘court clothes’, a matching skirt and jacket, both black, over a white collared blouse. As I draw nearer, I realise that she’s not alone. Details slowly register – the freckles, bird-like skeleton and upturned nose. Evie has been transformed. Her hair is dyed to a more natural colour and she’s wearing a dress and cardigan buttoned up to her neck. Ankle-length boots give her another few inches in height. She looks great, yet miserable, as though forced to wear sackcloth, or a hair shirt.
I smile.
‘What are you looking at?’ she snaps.
‘Doesn’t she look great,’ says Caroline.
I nod. Evie tells me to fuck off.
‘You have to stop doing that,’ says Caroline.
‘What?’
‘Swearing. It can’t happen in the courtroom.’
‘I’m not a complete moron,’ says Evie, who tugs at the collar of her cardigan and adjusts the elastic of her knickers in a less than ladylike manner.
Caroline must have helped her with her make-up, which is understated and subtle rather than plastered on with a trowel.
I hear someone call my name. Guthrie waves to me, wanting me to join him. He’s standing with two men, lawyer-types in charcoal-grey suits. By comparison, the social worker is his usual slovenly self in baggy corduroy trousers and a tweed jacket with a canary-yellow fleck that makes his skin look jaundiced.
The taller of the lawyers introduces himself as Derek Hodge, QC, the silk representing Nottingham City Council. His colleague is the instructing solicitor, Stephen Carter. Hodge has a finger-mangling handshake and a way of leaning forward, as though trying to intimidate or establish the pecking order. Carter has his arms full of ring-bound folders and can only nod a greeting.
‘It’s good that you’re here,’ says Guthrie. ‘Mr Hodge wants to call you as a witness.’
‘Me?’
‘Evie Cormac wouldn’t agree to see a court-appointed psychologist, but I told him that you’d spoken to her.’
‘I’ve met her twice – not in a clinical setting.’
‘But you were there during the knifing incident,’ says Hodge, looking at me straight and steady, as if to say, ‘No pretending, no ducking out.’
‘What difference does that make?’
Hodge answers. ‘Evie Cormac asked a highly agitated adolescent to stab her?’
‘That’s not what happened.’
His right eyebrow arches up his forehead as though trying to join his hairline.
‘I’ve seen the CCTV footage. She points the knife at her heart and pulls it towards her chest.’
‘She disarmed him.’
‘She asked the young man to stab her.’
‘She knew he wouldn’t do it.’
‘And you know this because . . .?’
‘She told me.’
Hodge chuckles without warmth, or humour, and I realise that I don’t like him.
‘I’m not comfortable giving evidence,’ I say. ‘I only came to observe.’
‘On whose behalf?’
‘Mine.’
Guthrie looks embarrassed for me. ‘I thought you wanted to help Evie.’
‘I do.’
‘Don’t worry about it,’ says the barrister. ‘The judge has Evie’s history and the written submissions, which should be more than enough.’ He glances towards Caroline. ‘And we’re not facing the big guns.’
I like him even less.
A loudspeaker interrupts us. The case is being called. Hodge nods at the solicitor. ‘This shouldn’t take long.’
The hearing is closed to the public to protect Evie’s identity and the details of her past. I’m allowed to sit in the small public gallery because I’m a court-accredited expert witness, whether I give evidence or not.
Caroline and Evie take chairs at one end of the bar table, while Hodge and Carlton are at the other. Guthrie sits close behind them, ready to consult or pass notes. Judge Sayle enters through a side door. Middle aged, with tea-black hair and strangely grey eyebrows, he smiles and welcomes everyone, making a note of their names, before addressing Evie directly.
‘It’s nice to meet you, Miss Cormac. I know this place may seem intimidating, but we’re not here to punish or repudiate anyone. This is a safe space, where you can speak freely and honestly.’
He then addresses the lawyers. ‘I’m sure you all appreciate the strict secrecy provisions that apply in this case. I have read all the relevant submissions and will give each of you an opportunity to present closing arguments before I make my ruling. I would also like to hear from Evie – if that’s all right with you.’
Evie doesn’t react but seems to be holding herself in check.
‘Perhaps you’d like to begin, Miss Fairfax,’ says the Judge.
Caroline gets to her feet and gives Evie a fleeting look. She consults her notes and pulls back her shoulders.
‘Evie Cormac became a ward of this court six years ago after all attempts to establish her identity and find her family proved fruitless. It was hoped that eventually somebody would come forward, or that Evie would be successfully fostered or adopted but none of these things have occurred.
‘Normally care orders are put in place because a child is believed to be at risk of suffering significant harm. In Evie’s case, that harm had already been done. She was discovered in a house in north London, hiding in a secret room. She was dirty, malnourished and suffering from rickets, among other ailments.’
Hodge gets to his feet. ‘Your honour, I hope my learned friend isn’t planning to give us a complete history lesson. None of these facts are in dispute.’
‘But they are,’ says Caroline. ‘The most important fact. Evie’s age.’
Judge Sayle motions her to continue.
‘Your honour, the duty of care exists in common law, derived from the historic judgements made by the courts, that places an obligation upon an individual or organisation to take proper care of a child, or to avoid causing foreseeable harm. In the case of Evie Cormac, the local authority has done that job and she is now asking to be released because she is eighteen.’
‘She could be sixteen,’ interrupts Hodge, twirling a pen across his knuckles.
‘Or nineteen,’ counters Caroline. ‘My client is an adult and wants to be treated like an adult.’
‘She can’t have it both ways,’ says Hodge. ‘She is trying to divorce the local authority like a child divorcing a parent.’
‘What case law can she use to seek redress?’ argues Caroline.
‘Perhaps if she’d acted more like an adult,’ says Hodge, who has stayed on his feet. Caroline tries to object, but Hodge ignores her. ‘Setting aside the issue of Evie Cormac’s age, we cannot ignore her mental fitness and her propensity for self-harm and violence. On twelve occasions, she has been fostered by safe, stable, loving families, but each time she has chosen to fight the system. She has run away from care at least twenty times, going missing for weeks at a time. Stealing, taking drugs, gambling, drinking, abusing police, resisting arrest . . .’
‘Now who’s giving a history lesson?’ asks Caroline.
‘A very pertinent one, Miss Fairfax,’ chides Hodge. ‘Evie Cormac has spent the past four years in a high-security children’s home because of her refusal to obey the rules or, dare I say, to act her age. She has abused staff, her peers, mental health care workers, therapists, psychologists and psychiatrists – many of whom have provided submissions to Your Honour. Evie’s case officer is in court today and he regards Evie as the most damaged child he has ever encountered. Only last week she was involved in a malicious wounding incident at Langford Hall where she grabbed a knife, pointed it at her heart and asked a highly disturbed young man to kill her.’