House of Correction 3 (Pages 194 – 360)

SPOILERS!!!

Tabitha keeps trying to investigate from the little scope the prison offers her. She is allowed to watch the CCTV from the local shop, and she writes down everybody who appears on the tape and the times. Something that strikes her as odd is that Rob, he farmer, who claimed to have heard her badmouth Stuart, spent the morning in the town and she wonders where he went.

Michaela, Tabitha’s cellmate, who was released recently, comes to see her, and Tabitha asks her for help. What Tabitha wants is for Michaela to go and see Rob, the farmer, because he refused to come and see her. Michaela returns to say that she went to see Rob, pretending to be a journalist, but he refused to talk to her. She also says that there was a concrete mixer truck there, so she had to wait to leave. Tabitha remembers Laura Rees saying that Stuart had prevented Rob from building some apartments on his property. Now that Stuart is dead, there is nothing preventing him from carrying out his plans.

Tabitha talks to Sam, the school bus driver, who appeared on the tape. The man says that he didn’t see anything, but he reveals that Rob is having an affair with Shona, the midwife, as he has seen them together several times. When Shona comes to see Tabitha next, the latter mentions her relationship with Rob, and Shona reacts angrily and says it was only a fling.

June comes, and Tabitha’s trial starts. Naturally, she is out of her depth, and she makes mistakes, which annoys the judge and amuses the prosecutor. Before the start of the trial, the prosecution proposes a deal. If she pleads guilty of manslaughter, she could get away with a much lighter sentence. However, Tabitha refuses because she didn’t kill Stuart.

I have to say that I love how Tabitha makes herself be heard even if everything goes against her. So far there have been three testimonies: the pathologist’s, Laura Rees’s, and Laura Leavitt, the old woman who claims that she saw Tabitha and Stuart fight and her say that she would get him.

I am not sure who killed Stuart. My bet is that it is Shona. The police got a anonymous note, informing that Tabitha and Stuart were in a relationship when she was fifteen. This information provided the motive for Tabitha killing Stuart, and therefore, the case against her was even stronger. I think the only person who could have known about the relationship was Shona, who went to school with Tabitha. Even though Tabitha thinks that nobody knew, it is obvious that someone knew, so I imagine that Shone might have seen them at the time.

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