Beyond this place (21 page)

"I saw merely the briefest account of the matter in the Courier," Grahame spoke slowly. "I have given it no consideration whatsoever."

"There never was a more bare-faced snatch for publicity. They never knew what was coming till Birley stood up in the House. The Secretary for State was furious. That same night one of the Ancasters was giving a reception. Birley's wife was there and she said publicly, 'I always knew George was an idiot. But I thought he had enough wits not to shoot his own side!' Did you ever know such imbecility? I'm told they won't let him stand at the election."

There was a short silence. Grahame kept his eyes lowered. At last he said:

"Perhaps his motives were sincere. In any case, don't you think it's better to be a tool than a knave?" He glanced at his watch.

BEYOND THIS PLACE

"Now if you'll excuse me. I must be off." He got up and civilly took his leave.

With darkened face Sprott poured himself another cup of tea, but it tasted bitter in his mouth. The interview had afforded him no satisfaction, and in Grahame's abrupt departure he created for himself an added slight. At this, his expression hardened, and there swept over him a wave of resentful anger. Had he not, in the past, overcome far greater difficulties, survived much deeper malice?

Instinctively, he thought of his triumphs, his shoulders straightened, his lower lip protruded, and something of his "jury" manner descended upon him. He regretted the momentary phase of weakness through which he had passed. Was he losing his fire? Would he give up now, on the threshold of Parliament, when greatness lay within his grasp? No ... a thousand times, no.

In a hard mood he rose and left the club. The porter who showed him out made a pleasant remark about the weather. Sprott, with studied incivility, made no answer. He stepped into a taxi, and curtly ordered the man to drive to Grove Quadrant.

At his home, he let himself in, and to his surprise, found his wife coming towards him in the hall. She kissed him, helped him out of his coat.

"Matthew, dear, there's a young man waiting for you in the library. He's been so patient . . . won't you see him before dinner?"

He raised his eyebrows. It was on the tip of his tongue to tell her that for anyone to be allowed to trespass upon his privacy was quite contrary to his orders. But, because he adored her, he said nothing. He inclined his head and walked towards the library.

CHAPTER XXVIII

IT was a handsome room, this library, with a thick cream carpet, many books, and some fine etchings on the walls. Motionless as

BEYOND THIS PLACE

a statue, Paul had been waiting there for about ten minutes. The prosecutor's wife had herself shown him in, a pretty woman of about forty, rather pale and delicate, wearing a soft grey dress. He could see that she thought he was from her husband's office.

"I hope you have no more work for Sir Matthew," she had remarked with her quiet smile.

Then she had asked him if he would take a glass of sherry and a biscuit. When he refused she smiled again, and went out.

It was very quiet in the room. Then, upstairs, somebody began to practice the piano. One of Chopin's preludes, number 7, played slowly and with some mistakes. It was a child playing and he could hear talking and laughing. The sound of that piano jarred cruelly upon him. He thought of this man with his beautiful home and his attractive wife and laughing daughters. He thought of the other man in his damp stone cell. He couldn't bear it any longer. And then he heard the sound of a car. He knew it was Sprott. He sat up straighter than ever. He felt ready for him. The front door opened and shut. There were voices in the hall. A minute later the library door opened.

Paul sat perfectly still as Sir Matthew came in. He looked at him, but didn't speak. For a moment there was absolute silence. Then Sprott drew himself up.

"What is the reason for this intrusion?" He was very angry. At the same time there was something else in his eyes. Paul could tell immediately that he knew him. "You've no right to come here. This is my private residence."

That remark revealed everything to Paul — the crack hidden away behind the grand facade. He thought: this man has no right to condemn. His brain suddenly became crystal clear. He said slowly:

"When a matter has been waiting for a long time it becomes urgent."

The veins thickened on the other's forehead. He did not attempt to approach Paul, but still stood near the door. He summoned all his dignity, was again the actor, delivering appropriate lines.

"I won't disguise the fact that for some months now I have been notified of your presence, your movements, in this city. You are

BEYOND THIS PLACE

the son of a life-term convict trying to stir up trouble over a case that was judged fifteen years ago."

"There are doubts about that case," Paul said. "There is fresh evidence which should be heard."

For a moment Sir Matthew's anger got the better of him, even overlaying that secret shadow of mistrust.

"Don't be a fool," he said. "After fifteen years it's a legal impossibility. Because of your infernal meddling a petition to reopen was placed before the Secretary of State, and he refused categorically."

"But you need not refuse," Paul said. "You were the prosecutor. Your main duty is to see that justice is administered. And you would feel yourself compelled to take some step, if you were convinced that my father was innocent."

"But I am not convinced," Sprott almost shouted the words.

"If you would listen you would be convinced. The least you can do is to hear the fresh evidence in your official capacity."

Sprott was so enraged he could scarcely speak. His face seemed full of blood. But with an effort he took hold of himself. At least, his anger chilled. He spoke in an icy tone.

"I really must ask you to go. You simply do not know what you are asking . . . the technical difficulties, the legal machinery, the repercussions involved. You are like a stupid child who wants to pull down a great building because he thinks that one brick, in the foundations, has been badly laid."

"If the foundations are rotten the building will come down."

Sir Matthew did not condescend to answer this. His features were now fixed in a heavy sneer. But as he looked sideways at the young man, head thrust forward, small eyes slanting across his face, Paul could see again that vague misgiving, that secret fissure in the facade, and he knew, finally, that if only because the prosecutor must at all costs hide that crack, he would never, under any conditions, move to reopen the case. Still ... he must give him one last chance.

"When a prisoner has served fifteen years of a life sentence . . . isn't it the humane practice . . . for him to be pardoned?"

Sir Matthew, with those protruding, slightly bloodshot eyes, was still looking sideways at Paul. He said cuttingly:

BEYOND THIS PLACE

"The Secretary of State has already pronounced upon that point."

"But you haven't," Paul persisted in a suffocating voice. "A word from you in the proper quarters would carry great influence. One word ... a hint of this new doubt which has arisen . . ."

The prosecutor shook his head, irrevocably, even savagely, disowning all responsibility. With a movement of his arm, behind him, he opened the door.

"Will you go now?" He spoke with that same fixed sneer. "Or must I have you shown out?"

Paul saw then, once and for all, that it was useless. This man would never do anything, would not even stir to utter a plea for pardon. Encased in his official pride, nothing mattered to him but his own dignity, his own position, his own future. Whatever the cost, this must be preserved.

' At that thought an uncontrollable rage came over Paul, rage and desperation, it flowed all through him like a drug. Castles was right! His father, Swann, he himself, every human obstacle or obstruction — all had gone down before this man's insatiable pride. Only one thing remained to be done. He stood up. His joints felt stiff, his limbs didn't belong to him. He started to walk towards the burly figure at the door.

"For the last time." His voice was barely audible. He could scarcely breathe.

"No."

He had his hand in his pocket. All the time he was talking he had been holding the gun. It didn't feel cold now . . . the heat of his hand had made it warm ... as if it were part of him. His finger was on the trigger, he could feel the strength of the spring. He didn't even have to take the gun out of his pocket. He had it pointed towards Sprott, the actor, the hollow man. The prosecutor suspected nothing. He stood there, not looking at Paul, with that snarl of outraged dignity stamped on his face. Paul was abreast of him now, not more than two feet away. He could see the round bulge of Sprott's well-fed stomach. The gun aimed there, point blank. He was not in the least afraid. He shut his eyes, holding himself tense, his lips slightly parted in a sort of

BEYOND THIS PLACE

ecstasy, as though all his being were suffused and elevated by a supreme physical desire.

Then, all at once, a convulsive shudder shook his body, in a pang of re-birth, agonizingly, he came back to reason, to himself. No, oh my God, no, he thought in a stabbing flash of light. They had called his father a murderer. Would they make him a murderer too? His grip on the gun relaxed. He opened his eyes, looked at the prosecutor blindly. He was panting, as though he had been running. He could not speak. But as he met those hostile eyes, a faint smile trembled across his lips, all his face shone with a strange illumination. While Sprott stared at him lividly, he walked straight past him, out of the house.

There, in the cool darkness under the stars, a fountain of tears gushed from his eyes. In a low triumphant voice he whispered brokenly to himself:

"I didn't do it. Oh, thank God, I didn't do it."

Part Two

THREE weeks before, when Paul was dismissed by the Bonanza manager, Lena had witnessed the incident with a heavy sensation of dismay. This lessened somewhat when she called on Paul that same evening. She had talked with him, conveyed a message which seemed to cheer him, she believed that in some way she had helped him. But as the days passed and she did not see him again, life became strangely drab and empty. At the end of the week another pianist, a young woman, was engaged by Harris, and the notes of the piano drifted anew towards the cafeteria. Alas, without avail: the music was good but it wasn't the same. And the heaviness did not lift from Lena's breast. She felt herself slipping back into a state of abject depression such as she had not known since the time of the calamity which had broken up her life.

In telling Paul that she had been happy in her position at the County Arms Hotel two years ago, she had spoken nothing but the truth. Astbury was a charming old town, noted for its ruined abbey, many black and white Elizabethan houses and some interesting Roman barrows, situated on the prettiest reach of the River Trent, something of a resort during the spring and summer months. And the hotel was of a superior class, run by a retired Army officer named Prentice and his wife, patronized mainly by anglers and tourists from the South. The place and the work suited Lena — her prospects were good, she felt that she was liked by the other members of the staff.

Every other Saturday she had a half day off. It was pleasant to take an excursion by train to Wortley and to spend the afternoon looking through the big department stores, filled with so many things that to a country-bred girl were novel and exciting. At five o'clock she had tea, all by herself, at the Green Lantern,

151

BEYOND THIS PLACE

a cheerful little cafe which she had discovered off Leonard Square. Then, flushed and bright, with her few parcels, she caught the six o'clock train to Astbury. The distance from Astbury Station to the County Arms was considerable, over two miles; the road, which bordered the river, was winding and wooded. But this did not trouble Lena who was a splendid walker, and at home, had been accustomed to tramp for miles across the moors that surrounded Sleescale.

One Saturday evening in the late summer, Lena set out, in her usual spirits, with a cheerful "good-evening" to the ticket-collector, to walk from the station to the hotel. The moon lay behind banks of cloud, the road was in darkness. It was a hot and heavy darkness, with stirrings in the unseen woods, and the sultry hum of night insects in the air. A stagnant, jungle darkness. Even Lena seemed to feel its strange oppression, to fear she was being watched. She recollected that on the train there had been a gang of rowdies. Contrary to her usual custom she kept glancing back across her shoulder. When a dry stick snapped on the path behind her she hastened her pace, nervously, almost to a run. Suddenly, as she approached the loneliest bend of the road, out of the darkness, an arm was thrown about her neck. She let out a cry but a hand, thrust brutally against her mouth, stifled it. She struggled fiercely, with all the strength of her young body, but uselessly. There were five in the gang that had attacked her, five powerful young roughs. She was thrown heavily and in falling, struck her head against a stone. Mercifully she lost consciousness.

Certain acts are unmentionable — they belong to the degradations of the brutes and are best left in their primaeval slime. But there is a certain fateful continuity in crime, an interdependence of chance and circumstance which links events that may be years apart. This horror that happened to Lena Andersen, because it bears upon the Mathry case, because indeed, had it not occurred, the Mathry case might never have been solved, has to be recorded here. When she came to herself, Lena groaned, tried as best she could to comprehend, rose, fell again, then, with a gashed cheek and swollen eyes, staggered to the shelter of the hotel.

The immediate shock occasioned by the outrage shook the en-

BEYOND THIS PLACE

tire community. Search parties were organised. But the assailants were never discovered. They were strangers, probably part of the hooligan element from Nottingham that invaded the district at the time of the Mosley Fair.

Major and Mrs. Prentice behaved towards Lena with exemplary kindness. When the first shock had passed, and she was able to get about, they pressed her to take a long holiday at their expense before resuming her duties at the hotel. But neither course was acceptable to Lena. She could not bear the overt solicitude and covert glances, the too obvious attentions showered constantly, and with the best intentions, upon her. She knew that her career at the County Arms was finished. Besides, for another reason, she wanted to get away. Though she told no one, holding the knowledge to herself with stoic reticence, she had discovered, with a shudder, that she was to have a child.