Murder

This programme contains strong language and some scenes which some viewers may find upsetting

When we fished Rafe Carey out of the river, he was as clean as a whistle.

He'd been washed clean by the river running over him for five hours.

That shirt of his was as clean as the moment

he put it on that morning. Cleaner, probably.

Durridge's, too. Beautifully laundered.

The reason I thought of it,

everything I was wearing was laundered.

Suit dry-cleaned, shirt pristine, new boots.

Only, I was alive and he was dead.

The Tweed took him and swept him away and smashed him up

and washed him clean.

But he didn't die from being smacked on the rocks

and he didn't die from drowning.

He died from a deep stab wound

just beside his armpit, near his heart.

Near enough bled out.

Murder - my first day back.

How can Ruth be dead and I'm not? How can that be?

In a way, it would've been better. If one of them had to go,

it would've been better...

Might've been better if it was Leo.

I can't believe I said that.

She had to persuade him, Rafe.

She thought I couldn't hear him on the phone to him, but I could.

They love to talk, the middle classes.

The chattering classes.

They think if they talk long enough, the facts will bend round and fit.

That's their experience of life - persuasion, nuance, finesse.

I've got colleagues who try and hector

the middle classes in interrogation.

'Prod them and poke them and keep to the point. Wrong.'

Sit back and listen.

Drink that stuff in. I love to listen to that.

Listen to them trying to recast a catastrophe word by word.

Because, as I said before, I go fishing with him.

He's been trying and trying to get me to go fishing with him

and then, each time, on the day, I've pulled out,

after he's paid out for fishing permits

and taken the day off work and whatever.

Wasn't up to it.

Now, finally, I say yes, and Katrina can see I mean it and she couldn't

be happier and she's phoned and said,

"This time he really means it."

And then, it rains all night and blows a gale

and any normal human being would cancel,

but she's calling him first thing and asking him not to.

THUNDER RUMBLES

"I know it's not the weather for it, but, please, Rafe.

"For me.

"For me."

"Please, God." I was thinking, "Please, God, let it go well.

"Let this be the start. Please."

Because he can't grieve.

While he's blaming Rafe, he can't grieve.

And if he can't grieve, then I can't grieve.

Sonia's all alone.

And we're all alone.

She ran me there in the car on the way to work.

No time to stop, no time to stop.

She was desperate to get me there.

Get it done.

He asked me to stop halfway there, stop at the cash machine.

I said, "There's no time for that."

I thought, "He's just going to walk away.

"It's going to be the same thing all over again."

But he came back to the car.

The whole time, I thought, "He's just going to walk away."

But he didn't. He didn't.

I knew then he was really going through with it

Which cashpoint? Where?

I could feel the police parts of my brain getting back in gear.

Did they stop at the cashpoint or didn't they?

The cogs starting to grind. She said, "The Bank of Scotland one.

"The one round the corner from the other two."

She says there's never a queue,

that people don't know it's there.

I said, "I'll take the car and drop you at work,"

but she didn't want that. She wanted to make sure I really went,

but also, that we'd go in the same car, me and Rafe.

And we'd be sitting together and we would talk

while we drove to the river.

There'd be banter.

I told her once, talking in cars was easy.

She remembered that.

You don't have the eye contact thing and there's stuff going on,

other stuff.

Probably she said that to Rafe

and that's where he's come up with the fishing idea in the first place.

Same as in the car, sit side by side, not across from someone,

and there's things...

going on, things in the river or flask of coffee.

Sandwiches, business with tackle, business with the bait.

Before you know it, time's passing, conversation's flowing.

I said, "I told her it was too wild, Rafe, but she won't listen."

I said, "We're never going to catch any fish in this."

He said, "Since when is going fishing

"had anything to do with fish?"

He put his hand on my shoulder.

He said, "I'm right, aren't I, Leo?"

He was a big toucher, Rafe.

Big hand-on-the-shoulder guy. He touched me. She saw it.

I kept our energy up.

"Try again. We'll have another. We're still young."

And all the time, Rafe was desperate to make amends.

To see us again, to see him.

So I'd say, "You really mustn't blame Rafe. You really mustn't.

"He feels nearly as bad as we do."

And he'd say, "Rafe is your brother. You're bound to say that.

"But he doesn't, he goes home every day to that big house of theirs,

"with three kids of his own, two of Emma's and, maybe,

"now and then, they think about us and what they did. Now and then."

And I'd say, "What they DID, Leo? But what did they do?

"Tell me what they did.

"They looked after our daughter when we were away.

"They looked after her, but she was ill and she died.

"Nobody could've stopped that.

"Nobody.

"They did their best, they wanted to help.

"They acted with love and in good faith

"and a terrible thing still happened.

"And as long as you keep acting like this was somehow Rafe's fault,

"then we can't deal with it.

"We can't deal with it. You and me."

"Here are the rods, the chairs, the keep nets, the boots.

"Just add water," he said. "We've plenty of that".

He was kind, Rafe.

He was always kind to me.

"He was gung-ho. He was cavalier with our daughter's life.

"He never feels a moment's doubt, yet he's always wrong.

"He's got five strapping lads and he doesn't know.

"He doesn't know what it's like to have one little girl

"and then, to have nothing.

"Nothing."

That's what he said.

"Nothing."

CHILD LAUGHS

I'd drop it. I'd go back to keeping him alive.

Three years nearly, keeping him alive

when he'd rather have been dead.

Put my own grief on hold for that.

My grief for Sonia.

Still on hold.

Then, last night, it was... it was like

not a door had opened, but maybe, a window -

a tiny window - and let in some light, some tiny glimmer of light.

And he was just that tiny bit more like himself

and I thought, "This is a man who can forgive."

After I dropped him off,

I had to stop the car halfway to work and just cry.

It felt like the beginning.

Detective Sergeant Corinne Evans

is an officer with an exemplary track record.

Her training and probation were characterised

by high marks and extremely positive feedback.

Her career progress since that time

has been swift and assured.

She has been in her current post for two years, during which time

she has been commended for her initiative and her detective work

and received the prestigious Borders Area Police Bravery Award.

Three months ago, her friend Laura McDade was killed

in a hit and run on the A703.

Detective Sergeant Evans requested permission to investigate

the incident, but was refused.

A charge of insubordination

and another of criminal damage were brought and subsequently dropped,

on compassionate grounds, and Corinne Evans was referred to me

for bereavement counselling.

I recommended a course

of ten therapeutic sessions, all of which DS Evans attended punctually.

"Frankie! Frankie! Frankie!" Shouts from the river bank.

I could hear the panic in the voice, the concern.

We left the rods and walked upstream a bit, to where the rapids are.

He thought I should take a video of the kingfisher on my phone,

thought Katrina would like it.

I could hear three people.

Hear them over the rushing of the river, the roaring of the wind.

Someone the shouter cared about.

Then, the splash.

The sort of shouts you should tell someone about,

if you talk to people.

Up. There.

He said the rapids oxygenate the water.

He said you can get a lot of fish there if you know what you're doing.

He did not know what he was doing.

The water was high, high and fast.

It was tearing away the banks.

"It's stupid standing here, Rafe. It's stupid."

I said that.

It had us in the blink of an eye.

It was like being dragged by a powerboat by your ankle.

I knew right away the river had taken him.

The river had us...

'..both of us.'

I like to cover all the bases, because now and then,

I get told I'm over-zealous. So, I said to the pathologist,

I said, "He was tossed around in the water for hours.

"Could it have been, I don't know, a branch off a tree or a sharp stone?

"Was it definitely a bladed weapon?"

He said, "Let me see... It was definitely a bladed weapon.