Mr Lacey

“You pride yourself on being exact, Ms Mayhew,” said Anthony Lacey. “Let’s be exact.”

He said it kindly. He said everything kindly. On Friday he had spent five hours being kind to her, and she had come out of the box at twenty past four with a mark on the side of her finger and no idea where he was going, which she had understood by Friday night was the point.

Now, at three minutes past ten on Monday, the screens along the front of the jury benches changed, and she knew.

Schedule Fourteen. Six years across the top. The lettings companies down the side. And the fourth line down, year four, which somebody in the defence team had shaded in pale yellow, so that twelve people who had not known on Thursday what a schedule was could find it in a second.

“Would you read the jury the figure…