legends · 5 min read ·
Verbatim
A court stenographer notices a second text written under every answer a witness gives.
**Crown Court, Courtroom 3 — Transcript excerpt, Day 4**
**Case:** R v. Dominic Shale · **Judge:** Hon. Margaret Quill · **Stenographer:** Lydia Frome
*[Transcript prepared from stenographic notes. Words in brackets are the stenographer's own annotations.]*
· · ·
**MR. HOLLAND (prosecution):** Ms. Frome, please read back the witness's last answer.
**STENOGRAPHER:** I have it, Mr. Holland.
**MR. HOLLAND:** Then please read it.
**STENOGRAPHER:** [Pause.] "I didn't see him move. I only saw the window. It was open. He was standing in it, but he was standing in the room as well."
**MR. HOLLAND:** Thank you.
· · ·
I've been a stenographer for twenty-two years. I know the rhythm of a courtroom the way a pianist knows a piece: the rise of the judge's voice before an objection, the pause before a witness breaks down, the drop in the room when someone says something they can't take back.
The trial was a plain one. A man named Dominic Shale was accused of killing his neighbour in a flat above a launderette. The neighbour's body was found in the stairwell. The witness was the neighbour's daughter, a tall, careful woman of thirty-four who had spoken in a steady voice for most of the morning.
When I wrote out the transcript, I noticed something I hadn't caught in court. The witness never said *I*. She said *we*, or *she*, or *he*, or simply *the window*.
· · ·
**Transcript — Day 4, afternoon session**
**MS. DRAKE (defence):** You say you were in the flat when the incident happened.
**WITNESS (Amara Vell, 34):** Yes.
**MS. DRAKE:** Where were you standing?
**WITNESS:** At the foot of the bed.
**MS. DRAKE:** And where was the defendant?
**WITNESS:** By the window. He was holding her. He was saying her name over and over, very softly, like he was trying to get her to wake up.
**MS. DRAKE:** And your mother?
**WITNESS:** [Pause.] Mum was on the landing.
**MS. DRAKE:** The landing outside the flat?
**WITNESS:** Yes. She was looking down the stairwell. She said we should go down and help. She said the stairs were too long.
**MS. DRAKE:** Did you go down?
**WITNESS:** No. We stayed in the room. The stairs kept going down, and the window kept getting bigger.
· · ·
[Stenographer's note: The witness has stopped speaking. The judge has asked the court to wait. The witness's hands are on the rail of the box and are shaking. I have written "shaking." I have not written what I heard under the witness's voice while she spoke, which was another voice, very low, repeating each sentence a half-second behind her, as if reading her answers from a card in another room.]
· · ·
**MS. DRAKE:** Miss Vell, is there anything you'd like to add?
**WITNESS:** Yes. Please write this down exactly. I didn't see him move. He never moved. He was in the window, and I was at the foot of the bed, and Mum was on the stairs. The room is still the same size. The window is still open. And whoever is saying my words back to you is in the room with us now. Please don't look at the gallery.
**MR. HOLLAND:** Your Honour, I object.
**JUDGE QUILL:** On what basis?
**MR. HOLLAND:** The witness is describing something outside the evidence.
**JUDGE QUILL:** The witness is describing her own recollection. She may continue.
**WITNESS:** [Pause.] Thank you. He's not in the window now. He's in the stairwell. He's coming up.
· · ·
**Judge's order (Day 4, 16:20)**
The court is adjourned. The witness is to be taken from the witness box to the room behind Courtroom 3. The jury will be discharged for the day. Counsel are asked to remain in court for the purposes of the record.
The stenographer's transcript of the afternoon session is to be sealed. Counsel for both sides are reminded that the transcript records what was said in court. Any repetition of the witness's words by persons outside the courtroom is contempt.
· · ·
**Stenographer's note (Lydia Frome, after adjournment)**
I have taken down every word of the day. I've checked the record against my machine. The machine is accurate. The transcript is accurate.
But my notes, in the margin of the paper tape, show a second line of text under every answer the witness gave. It's very neat, in a hand I don't recognise. It doesn't match the words spoken in court. It says the things the witness didn't say.
*He was in the room the whole time. He was standing at the foot of the bed. It was my mum who was on the stairs.*
I went to the room behind Courtroom 3, to check on the witness. The room was empty, except for a chair facing the wall, and a small window at the back, open to a grey afternoon.
On the chair, someone had left a folded sheet of paper with my name on it. The handwriting was careful. It was the handwriting I've been reading all week, in the margins.
*Thank you for writing it all down. Please keep the record accurate. The tape should be checked once more before it's sealed. We'd like the transcript to say what actually happened, not what was said in the room.*
· · ·
**Transcript — sealed (Day 4, corrected version, as filed)**
**WITNESS (Amara Vell, 34):** I didn't see him move. He never moved. He was standing at the foot of the bed the whole time, and I was in the window, and Mum was in the room, and the stairs kept going down to the street.
**MS. DRAKE:** And the defendant?
**WITNESS:** He was on the landing. He's still there.
**MS. DRAKE:** Thank you, Miss Vell.
· · ·
I was asked to read the corrected version into the record the following morning. I did. My voice was steady. The court was quiet.
When I finished, the judge looked at me over her glasses for a long moment. Then she said, very quietly, "Thank you, Ms. Frome. Who gave you the second copy?"
I didn't know what she meant. I looked at the stack of transcripts on the desk in front of me. Every page had been stamped *Sealed*, and every page had a second, fainter line under the main text, in a hand I have never seen, and never will.
The judge read the line out to herself, under her breath, and I saw her mouth shape the words before she closed the file.
*Please keep counting. We're nearly at the bottom.*