Chapter 6: The Retraction
Eleanor's office was on the fourth floor of a Georgian building in Holborn, the kind of place that had housed solicitors for a hundred years and looked like it intended to house them for a hundred more.
Diane sat across from Eleanor's desk with her hands in her lap and her coat still on, as though she might need to leave quickly.
Eleanor set a recorder on the desk between them.
"I want to be clear about what this is," Eleanor said.
"This is a voluntary retraction of a witness statement given under oath in the criminal trial of Genevieve Anne Sterling.
Once recorded and signed, this document will be submitted to the Court of Appeal as supporting evidence in the appeal application.
Do you understand?"
"Yes," Diane said.
"And you understand that by retracting, you are acknowledging that the original statement contained false information?"
"Yes."
Eleanor looked at her steadily.
"And you understand that the Crown Prosecution Service may choose to investigate the original statement?"
Diane's hands tightened in her lap.
"Yes."
"All right." Eleanor pressed record.
"In your own words."
Diane looked at the recorder.
She looked at me, standing by the window.
I did not nod.
I did not encourage her.
This had to be hers.
She looked back at the recorder.
"My name is Diane Catherine Sterling," she said.
"In March 2022, I gave a witness statement claiming that I saw my sister, Genevieve Sterling, threaten Victoria Hayes outside the Meridian Hotel on March fourth.
That statement was false.
I was not present at the Meridian Hotel on March fourth.
I did not witness any interaction between Genevieve and Victoria Hayes on that date." She paused.
"I gave the statement because Julian Sterling asked me to.
He told me it was true.
I later discovered it was not.
I have since learned that my sister was in Chicago on March fourth, which I already knew at the time because she had called me from there." Another pause, shorter.
"I am retracting this statement in full."
The room was quiet.
Eleanor stopped the recorder.
She slid a document across the desk.
"Sign here, here, and initial here."
Diane signed.
Eleanor countersigned as witness, dated it, and placed it in a folder.
"There's a second matter," I said from the window.
Eleanor looked at me.
"Diane has information relevant to Victoria Hayes's original testimony.
Specifically, a statement Victoria made approximately six months ago in Diane's presence."
Eleanor turned to Diane.
"Can you describe what was said?"
Diane straightened slightly.
"We were at dinner.
Julian's house.
Victoria had been drinking.
She was talking about the timing of everything — the trial, the conviction — and she said the miscarriage had been convenient.
She used that word.
Convenient.
And then she laughed."
"Did anyone else hear this?"
"Julian's housekeeper was in the room.
She was clearing plates.
She stopped when Victoria said it."
Eleanor wrote something on her notepad.
"Do you know the housekeeper's name?"
"Mrs.
Adaeze Okafor.
She's been with Julian for six years."
I had not known that detail.
I looked at Diane.
She met my eyes.
"I wrote it down when I got home that night," she said.
"I wrote everything down.
I have a notebook."
"I'll need that notebook," Eleanor said.
"I brought it." Diane reached into her bag and set a small green notebook on the desk.
Eleanor picked it up carefully, as though it were something that might dissolve.
She opened it to the first page, read for ten seconds, and closed it.
"Genevieve," she said.
"Yes."
"We need to move the appeal hearing date forward." She was already reaching for her phone.
"If Victoria's testimony was fabricated — and if there's a witness who heard her admit it — the conviction doesn't just get appealed." She looked up.
"It gets overturned."
My phone rang.
Julian's name on the screen.
I let it ring four times.
Then I answered and said nothing.
"Genevieve." His voice had lost the dinner-party smoothness.
Something underneath it was showing now.
"I know you're with Eleanor.
I know about the retraction.
I want you to understand something." A pause, calculated.
"I have a recording.
From prison.
A phone call you made in your second month of incarceration.
You said — and I have this verbatim — 'He will pay for this.
Whatever it takes.' That is a recorded threat.
I will take it to the CPS."
I looked at Eleanor across the desk.
She shook her head once.
*Let him talk.*
"Julian," I said.
"A recorded statement of intent, made by a wrongfully convicted woman to a private party, is not a criminal threat.
You know that.
Your lawyers know that." I paused.
"But thank you for confirming you've been monitoring my prison communications.
That's going to be very useful."
Silence.
"Five o'clock," he said.
"Withdraw the appeal."
"Goodbye, Julian."
I ended the call.
Diane was watching me.
"He's going to try something else," she said.
May you like
"Yes," I said.
"He's going to try Victoria."
