Beyond this place (37 page)

"Consider the case of this ordinary citizen, not a strong character, a trifle irresponsible, inclined perhaps to vanity, but on the whole neither better nor worse than his fellows. Unhappy at home, chilled by the air of conjugal austerity, he understandably lets his eye wander in the hope of lighting on a more svmpa-thetic face. At this juncture he is introduced by a friend to an attractive young woman, he flirts with her a little, and, after some weeks, while alone in a dingy commercial hotel in a distant city, sends her a post card — upon which, since he has a talent for drawing, he had sketched a rustic scene — asking her to din-

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tion and analysis of the trial it is crystal clear that he is innocent, the victim of a terrible, a ghastly travesty of justice. The witness Burt now stands before you a self-convicted perjurer and, driven from her morass of lies, she has indicated only too plainly the real perpetrator of the crime.

"My lords, I am not an agent of the police, nor is it part of my duty to hail the guilty party before this court, but I have led evidence of sufficient weight to enable me to name that party. Let the authorities seek out that man and the last shadow of doubt will be removed. My lords, by all the sacred tenets of justice I entreat you to redress this awful wrong, to admit the culpability of the Crown, and to proclaim to the world the innocence of Rees Mathry."

Grahame sat down amidst intense silence, then the hush was broken by a storm of cheering. Only by threatening to clear the court was the uproar finally stilled. There were tears in Paul's eyes, he had never heard anything so moving as Grahame's final appeal. Carried away, he glanced from the quiet figure of the young advocate to his father, who sat, confused, as though unable to understand that the same public, which fifteen years ago had execrated him, now cheered him to the echo.

When at last order was restored the Attorney-General, having completed a long consultation with his colleagues, got reluctantly to his feet for the Crown. Although his expression was dignified and calm it was plain he did not relish his task, yet was constrained to put as good a face on it as possible. He spoke for barely an hour, a strain of moderation running through his tempered phrases. By contrast with Grahame's prolonged and masterly address, it was, perhaps by design, an unimpassioned effort. When he sat down the Lord Chief Justice immediately adjourned the court so that their lordships might confer before announcing their decision.

It was four o'clock before their lordships returned to the court. Then, amidst a bated hush, the Lord Chief Justice, dignified and impenetrable, delivered the verdict.

"The case," he announced, "is one of great difficulty, presenting an unusually complex issue upon which the balance of judgment might easily be influenced."

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There was a long pause. Paul's heart was pounding like a sledgehammer. He looked at his father who, with twitching cheek, his ear cupped in his hand, was listening with a kind or painful desperation. The judge continued:

"However, the court is of the opinion that the instructions given in the charge by both the prosecutor and presiding judge amounted to misdirections in law. We believe also that the new facts here disclosed are material to the issue."

An even longer pause, during which Paul could scarcely breathe.

"We announce, therefore, that the judgment of the court before whom the appellant was convicted should be set aside."

Pandemonium . . . hats in the air . . . wild and unrestrained cheering. Dunn and McEvoy smiling, shaking hands with each other, with Nigel Grahame, with Paul. People crowding round to pat Paul on the back. Why, here was old Prusty, wheezily embracing him. Ella Fleming, and his mother, close together, bewildered, and still ashamed. The pastor, his eyes closed, as if in prayer. Dale, more than ever stony-faced, Sp-rott pressing towards the exit, dazed by the blow. A vision, in the gallery, of a slight gesticulating figure . . . could it be Mark Boulia?

Then he swung round and moved to where was seated, amidst the hubbub, bowed, as though not yet comprehending, that broken man, whom they would no longer call a murderer.

CHAPTER XIX

PAUL got back to the Windsor at tour o'clock. They had won . . . not all the circumlocution of the verdict, the legal phrases and formal manner of the judges, the cold aloof precision of the court, could flatten out the triumph of this final victory. Yet his nerves were still overcharged, he felt himself in a state of strange unreality, faced with a future that remained undetermined and precarious.

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As he came along the corridor leading to the end wing of the hotel he saw Ella's luggage standing strapped and labelled, while through the half-open door he made out his mother, engaged in packing, in her room. This, in a sense, prepared him. When he entered the sitting room he found Ella, seated there, wearing her hat and gloves, and that determined air which in the past presaged a fixed course of action for them both.

The sight of her seemed to crystallize all his uncertainty. He went to the sideboard and took a drink of water from the carafe, all the time feeling her eyes upon him.

"Well, it's all over now."

"I should hope so." Sitting very erect, with her lips drawn down, she gave her head a sharp toss. "And not before time either."

"I know it hasn't been pleasant, Ella," he said reasonably. "But we had to go through with it."

"Oh, we had, had we? That's what you think. But I don't. I think it's all been completely unnecessary. More than that. Completely useless. And it's all been your doing. You started it. You went on with it. In spite of everybody. And what have you got out of it? Nothing. Absolutely nothing."

"Surely it's something to have won our case."

"What good will that do you? You heard how they wrapped it up — they all stick together, these lawyers. You'll have to go to Parliament to get any money. And even if they grant it you'll never touch it."

He flushed indignantly but forced himself to answer without rancour.

"I'm not interested in the money. I never even thought of it. All I wanted was to vindicate my father. And I've done it."

"That's a fat lot of good. The way he's been carrying on, you'd have been better if you'd left him where he was, if you're so concerned about his reputation. He's just shown up for what he is ... a drunken, disgusting old man."

"Ella! The prison did it. . . . He wasn't always that way."

"Well, he's that way now. And I've more than had enough of it. It was bad enough when he was a convict. But at least he was out of the way then. People never saw him, never even knew about

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him. Why, even in the court he had to make an exhibition of himself. That's why the judges treated us like we were dirt. I was never so ashamed and humiliated in my life, to think that nice people would know I was even remotely connected with such a person. I tell you straight, if it hadn't been for you, I'd have picked up my things and left."

He saw that she was quite incapable of grasping the real issues involved. Nor had she the least consideration for the sacrifices he had made, the struggle that had been waged. She took into account only the damage to that gentility she perpetually craved, the loss suffered bv her vanity and self-esteem. And because of that she threw at him complaints and reproaches which were more pettv because she felt them to be justified. How could he ever have been so foolish as to entertain that weak infatuation for her pretty face, hallowed by her sickly religious sentiment?

A silence had fallen which, in the light of past experience, she interpreted as an indication of his submission. Mollified by this, and by his failure to "answer back," she spoke in a milder tone, the martyred accents of one who, though deeply injured, is prepared by a Christian effort to forgive.

"Come along, then. Get your things packed."

"What for?"

"Because we're leaving, silly. There's nothing to wait for. Mr. Dunn has settled up the hotel bill — and well he might, seeing what his paper's made out of us. We're taking the seven-o'clock boat from Holyhead."

"I can't leave him, Ella."

She looked at him, amazed, and then aghast.

"I never heard such nonsense in my life. You don't want him. and he doesn't want you. The minute he came out of the court he slunk off to some low pub. Well, let him stick there. When he comes back here he'll find we've all gone. . . ."

He shook his head.

"I'm not coming."

The blood mounted to her forehead. Her eves flashed.

"If you don't, Paul, I warn you, you'll be sorry. I've put up with

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a good deal for your sake because of our love. But I can go so far, and no further. . . ."

While she continued to upbraid him the door opened, Mr. Fleming and Paul's mother came into the room. Both were dressed for the journey. The minister glanced from Paul to his daughter.

"What is the matter?" he asked.

"Oh, it's everything," Ella cried. "After all that we've done for him here, Paul has the nerve to pretend he isn't coming back with us."

A troubled expression came into Fleming's eyes. During these last weeks he had suffered considerably, victim of a constant warring within himself. He had hoped to regenerate Mathry, and despite all his efforts, all his prayers, he had failed. The defeat weighed upon him, pressed on the roots of his belief. And now his daughter and Paul — the situation left him troubled and at a loss. He temporized, in well-worn phrases he had almost come to despise.

"Don't you think you have done enough, my boy? You have worked so ... so nobly."

"Oh, yes, Paul." His mother pleaded in a subdued voice. "You must come with us."

"After all, from the moral point of view, you have no obligation to remain." Fleming considered, then compromised again. "Or perhaps ... if we go now . . . you may return later."

"If he doesn't come now," Ella broke in, "he'll bitterly regret it."

"Be quiet, Ella." Fleming rebuked her with a touch of anger. "Is there no end to your selfishness?"

But, breaking into angry tears, she was not to be restrained.

"So far as I'm concerned, it is the end. It means he cares more for that wicked old man than he does for me. I'll never, never speak to him again."

Pale and frowning slightly, Fleming made an effort to gather up the strands of his thought, to pacify his daughter. But it was useless. Ella was too far gone in temper and vexation to heed his words. And Paul's mother, completely stricken by her recent trials, was now too cast down to aid him. She desired nothing but immediate escape.

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At last the minister gave it up, salved his conscience and saved his dignity in part by approaching Paul and communing with him in a long and silent handclasp.

A lew minutes later they were gone.

Paul could scarcely believe it. A load seemed to be lilted from his mind. Alone in the room, he sank into a chair with a sigh of weary relief. His resolution to remain had not been premeditated. But he knew that because of it, he would never see Ella again. He felt free.

As he sat there, not moving, he heard a heavy step in the passage. After a pause the door opened, and, slowly, Mathry came into the room.

Paul gazed at his father in surprise — usually it was after midnight when he found his way back, uncertainly, to the hotel. Mathry was quite sober; but he seemed tired and out of sorts, slower in his movements, wearing, in the face of his vindication, a strangely disheartened air. His shoddy suit, which had not worn well, was burst under the armpit, and spotted on the lapels. A mud stain on his knee, where at one time he had fallen, was only partly brushed oft. He advanced sluggishly to a chair, sat down, and darted a glance at Paul from beneath his ragged brows. He seemed to wait for the other to address him, but when Paul said nothing, after a moment he asked, heavily:

"Have they cleared out?"

"Yes."

"Good riddance." Then, with a touch of his usual ungraciousness, he added: "What keeps you hanging around? I suppose you want some of my cash when I get it?"

"That's it," Paul agreed calmly. He had found this the best way of dealing with his father's sardonic thrusts. And indeed, the answer silenced Mathry. But, from time to time, he darted these queer glances at his son, biting on his chapped upper lip, again almost as though he hoped that Paul would speak to him.

"Lost your voice?" Almost in desperation Mathry threw the question.

"No."

"Had your supper?"

"I was just going to order something."

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"Then order for me as well."

Paul went to the room telephone and asked them to send up the table d'hote dinner tor two. Deliberately, he made no comment to Mathry, but took up a book again while the table was being set.

Presently the meal arrived — soup, roast mutton served with peas and potatoes, apple pie, all kept hot under double covers — and they sat down to it in silence. Mathry ate with less than his usual appetite, and after a while his efforts seemed to flag. Without finishing his dessert, he stood up and went over to the armchair where he slowly filled and lit the pipe which he had recently adopted. His lumpy figure sagged into the weak chair springs. He looked a spent old man.

"Aren't you wondering why I'm in tonight?" he inquired, at length. "Now the show's over, I ought to be out on the skite."

"Nothing you do surprises me," Paul said.

While he continued to use that indifferent tone which he knew would most provoke Mathry to continue, he got up from the table and took a chair on the opposite side of the fireplace.

"I'm sick of that gang I've been running around with." Mathry spoke with sudden bitterness. "All they're doing is making a mug of me. They keep telling me what a great man I am, then they order the drinks and let me pay for them. Dirty lot of spongers. The women are the worst. What do they care? Not a cursed thing. They'd take my last bob, and laugh at me. And you know for why. Because I'm no good at all now . . . not a stricken bit of use."