Dex continues to stand on the other side of the alley, immobile, his gaze fixed on me and Anna. It’s at that moment that I become conscious of Anna shaking her head and Dex acknowledging her with a single nod. For a fraction of a second everything seems frozen. Even the man, ramming himself into the woman in the alley. And in that moment of stillness, an instant when nothing moves.

We all know what we are seeing here but in those few seconds and without exchanging a word, we make the fateful, collective decision to close our eyes and turn our backs to it. No one will intervene and no one will tell. The police will not be called. The woman will be left to her fate. From now on, we will do our best to pretend that something else was happening at this time on this night in this alley behind this church in Wapping. We’ll make excuses. We’ll tell each other that the woman brought it on herself. Privately, we’ll convince ourselves that this can’t be a betrayal because you can’t betray a person you don’t know. We will twist the truth to our own ends and if all else fails, we will deny it.

We’ll do nothing. But doing nothing doesn’t make you innocent.

The light at the end of the tunnel snaps off and in a blink Dex and the shadowy figure of Bo have disappeared into the darkness. I look at Anna. She looks back at me, gives a tiny nod, then turns and begins to hurry away up the path towards the church. And all of a sudden I find myself running, past the alley where only the woman remains, slumped against the wall, past the wheelie bins, along the side of the church, between tombstones decked in yellow moonlight and out, finally, into the street.

Want to read on? The Guilty Party by Mel McGrath is available to buy now.

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