Rumpole and the Angel of Death (11 page)

‘Members of the Jury, you and I weren't born yesterday and I think we're astute enough to get over this little technical difficulty. Now we don't want Mr Pearson, the accused man here, to start giving us a lecture, do we? So what we're going to do is to take it he's pleading not guilty and then ask Mr Marcus Pitcher to get on with it and open the prosecution case. You see, there's no great mystery about the law. We can solve most of the problems if we apply a wee bit of worldly wisdom.'

I suppose I could have got up on my hind legs and said, ‘Delighted to have been of service to your Lordship,' or, ‘If you're ever in a hole, send for me.' But I didn't want to start a quarrel so early in the case. I sat quietly while little Marcus went through most of the facts. The Jury of twelve honest Gloucestershire citizens looked stolid, middle-aged and not particularly friendly to the animal rights protesters who filled the public gallery to overflowing. I imagined they had grown up with the hunt and felt no particular hostility to the Boxing Day meet and horses streaming across the frosty countryside. They had looked embarrassed by Dennis's speech from the dock, and flattered when Jamie MacBain shared his lifetime's experience with them. Like him, they hadn't been born yesterday, and worldly wisdom, together with their dogs and their rose gardens, was no doubt among their proudest possessions. As I listened to my little learned friend's opening, I thought he was talking to a jury which, whatever plea had been entered, was beginning to feel sure that Den was as guilty as he was anxious to appear.

The first witness was the rambler, a cashier from a local bank who, out for a walk with his wife and daughter, had been met with the ghastly spectacle of an elderly woman almost decapitated and fallen among the brambles of Fallows Wood.

‘Where was the horse?' was all I asked him in cross- examination.

‘The horse?'

‘Yes. Did you see her horse by any chance?'

‘I think there was a horse there, some distance away, and all saddled up. I think it was just eating grass or something. I didn't stay long. I wanted to get my wife and Sandra away and phone the police.'

‘Of course. I understand. Thank you very much, Mr Ovington.'

‘Is that all you want to ask, Mr Rumpole?' Jamie MacBain looked at me in an unfriendly fashion.

‘Yes, my Lord.'

‘I don't think that question and answer has added much to our understanding of this case, Members of the Jury. I'd be glad if the Defence would not waste the time of the Court. Yes. Who is your next witness, Mr Marcus Pitcher?'

I restrained myself and sat down in silence ‘like patience on a monument'. But my question
had
added something: Dorothea's riderless horse hadn't galloped on and jumped the stile. We learnt more from Bob Andrews, a hunt servant who, when the hunt was stopped, went back to the wood to recover Dorothea's horse which had been detained by the police. I risked Jamie's displeasure by questioning Andrews for a little longer.

‘When you got to the wood, had Mrs Eyles's body been removed?'

‘It was covered. I think it was just being taken away on a stretcher. I knew the ambulance was in the road. The police were taking photographs.'

‘The police were taking photographs – and where was Mrs Eyles's horse?'

‘I think a police officer was holding her.'

‘Can you remember, had Mrs Eyles's horse lost a shoe?'

‘Not that I noticed. I looked her over when I took her from the policeman. He seemed a bit scared, holding her.'

‘I'm not surprised. Horses can be a little alarming.'

‘Can be. If you're not used to them.'

There were a few smiles from the Jury at this; not because it was funny but as a relief from the agony of hearing the details of Dorothea Eyles's injuries. The Jury, I thought, rather liked Bob Andrews, while the animal rights enthusiasts in the public gallery looked down on him with unmitigated hatred and contempt.

‘Mr Andrews,' I went on, while Mr Justice MacPain (as I had come to think of him) gave a somewhat exaggerated performance of a long-suffering judge, bravely enduring terminal boredom, ‘tell me a little about the hunt that day. You were riding near to Mr Eyles?'

‘Up with the master. Yes.'

‘Did your hunt go near Fallows Wood?'

‘Not really. No.'

‘What was the nearest you got to that wood?'

‘Well, they found in Plashy Bottom. Down there they got a scent. Then we were off in the other direction entirely.'

‘How far is Plashy Bottom from Fallows Wood?'

‘About half a mile . . . I'd think about that.'

‘Did you see Mrs Eyles leave the hunt and ride up towards the wood?'

‘Well, they'd got going then. I wouldn't have looked round to see the riders behind me.'

‘Did you see anyone else – Miss Tricia Fothergill, for instance – leave the hunt and ride up towards Fallows Wood?'

‘I didn't, no.'

‘He's told us he wasn't looking at the riders behind him, Mr Rumpole.' Jamie managed to sound like a saint holding on to his patience by the skin of his teeth.

‘Then let me ask you a question you
can
answer. It's clear, isn't it, that the hunt never went through Fallows Wood that day?'

‘That's right.'

‘So, it follows that in order to come into collision with that wire, Mrs Eyles had to make a considerable detour?'

‘That's surely a matter for argument, Mr Rumpole.' Jamie MacBain did his best to scupper the question so I asked another one, very quickly.

‘Do you know why she should make such a detour?'

‘I haven't got any idea, no.'

‘Thank you, Mr Andrews.' And I sat down before the Judge could recover his breath.

Johnny Logan replaced the whipper-in. He was wearing a dark suit and some sort of regimental tie; his creased and brown walnut face grinned over a collar which seemed several sizes too large for him. He treated the Judge with a mixture of amusement and contempt, as though Jamie were some alien being who could never understand the hunting community of the Cotswolds. Logan said he had heard most of the dialogue between the sabs and the hunters in the driveway of Wayleave Manor. He also told the Jury that he had seen the saboteurs' van at various points during the day, and heard similar abuse from them as he rode by.

‘You never saw the saboteurs' van near Fallows Wood?' I asked when it was my turn.

‘We never went near Fallows Wood as far as I can remember.'

‘Then let you and I agree about that. Now, will you tell me this? Did you ever see Mrs Eyles leave the hunt and ride off in a different direction?'

‘No, I never saw that. I'm not saying she didn't do it. We were pretty spread out. I'd seen a couple of jumps I didn't like the look of, so I'd gone round and I was behind quite a lot of the others.'

‘Gone round, had you?' Jamie MacBain, about to make a note, looked confused.

‘Quite a lot of barbed wire about. I don't think you'd have fancied jumping that, my Lord,' Johnny Logan added with a certain amount of mock servility.

‘Never mind what I'd've fancied. Just answer the questions you get asked. That's all you're required to do.' It was clear that the Judge and the witness had struck up an immediate lack of rapport.

‘Did you see anyone else leave the hunt?'

‘I don't think so. Well, you mean at
any
time?'

‘At any time when you were out hunting, yes.'

‘Well, I think Tricia Fothergill left. But that was at the very end, just before the police arrived and told us that Mrs Eyles had been – well, had met with an accident.'

‘So that must have been after Mrs Eyles's death?' The Judge made the deduction.

‘You've got it, my Lord,' Johnny Logan congratulated him in such a patronizing fashion that I almost felt sorry for the astute Scot.

‘Why did she leave then, do you remember?'

‘I'm not sure. Her horse was wrong in some way, I think.'

‘Just one more thing, Mr Logan.'

‘Oh, anything you like.' Johnny showed his contempt for us all.

‘It would be right to say, wouldn't it, that Mr Rollo Eyles was devoted to his wife?'

‘He would certainly never have left her. Is that what you mean?'

‘That's exactly what I mean. Thank you very much.'

As I was about to sit down, the Judge said, ‘And what were the Jury meant to make of that last question and answer?'

‘They may make of it what they will, my Lord, when they are in full possession of the facts of this interesting but tragic case.' At which point I lowered my head in an ornate eighteenth-century bow and sat down with as much dignity as I could muster.

‘Work at the Bar!' little Marcus said. ‘Sometimes I think I'd rather be digging roads.'

‘Only one thing to be said for work at the Bar,' I tended to agree, ‘is that it's better than no work at the Bar.'

It was the lunch adjournment and the three of us – Marcus, Bernadette and I – were in a dark corner of the Carpenters Arms, not far from the Court. There they did a perfectly reasonable bangers and mash. Marcus and I had big glasses of Guinness and Bernadette took hers from a bowl on the floor. The little prosecutor said he was looking forward to going for a holiday with a Chancery barrister called Clarissa Clavering on the Isle of Elba. ‘I'd been living for the day, but now it seems likely I'll have to cancel.'

‘Why on earth?'

‘I can't find anyone to leave Bernadette with. Clarissa only likes cats. And I do love her, Rumpole! Love Clarissa, I mean. She has a lot of sheer animal magnetism for a girl in the Chancery Division.'

‘Couldn't you put her in a kennel? Bernadette, I mean.'

‘I couldn't do that.' Marcus looked as though I'd invited him to murder his mother. ‘Much as I fancy Clarissa, I couldn't possibly do that.'

‘Then, there's nothing else for it. . .'

‘Nothing else for it.' His little mouselike face was creased with lines of sorrow. My heart went out to the fellow. ‘Except cancel the holiday. I won't blame Bernadette, of course. It's not
her
fault. But . . .'

‘It's a pity to miss so much animal magnetism?'

‘You've said it, Rumpole. You've said it exactly.'

When we arrived back at the Court, there was a certain amount of confusion among the demonstrators. They started with the clear intention of cheering me and Bernadette, who, even if she was part of the prosecution team, was, after all, an animal. They knew they should boo and revile young Marcus, the disappointed lover. Finally, when they saw that I, as well as Bernadette, was on friendly terms with the forces of evil and the prosecutors of sabs, they decided to boo us all.

In the entrance hall the prospective witnesses sat waiting. I saw Tricia Fothergill as smartly turned out as a pony at a show, with gleaming hair, shiny shoes and glistening legs. She was prepared for Court in a black suit and her hands were folded in her lap. On the other side of the hall sat the prospective witnesses for the Defence: purple-haired Angela Ridgeway, Sebastian and Judy from the bookshop, and shaven-headed Roy Netherborn. Janet, the schoolteather, sat next to Roy, but I noticed that they didn't speak to each other but sat gazing, as though hypnotized, silently into space. Then, as I was wigged and gowned by now, I crossed the entrance hall towards the Court. Roy got up and walked towards me slowly, heavily and with something very like menace. ‘What the hell's the idea,' he muttered in a low voice, full of hate, ‘of you getting into bed with the prosecution barrister?'

‘Little Marcus and I are learned friends,' I told him, ‘against each other one day and on the same side the next. We went out to lunch because his dog Bernadette felt in need of a drink. And I didn't get into bed with him. I left that to his girlfriend Clarissa of the Chancery Division. Any more questions?'

‘Yes. Haven't you got any genuine beliefs?'

‘As few as possible. Genuine beliefs seem to end up in death threats and stopping other people living as they choose. I do have one genuine belief, however.'

‘Oh, do you? And what's that when it's at home?'

‘Preventing the conviction of the innocent. So, if you will allow me to get on with my job . . .' I moved away from him then, and he stood watching me go, his fists clenched and his knuckles whitening.

Tricia had given her evidence-in-chief clearly, with a nice mixture of sadness, brightness and an eagerness to help. The Jury had taken to her and Jamie MacBain seemed no less smitten than little Marcus was with Clarissa, although there was a great gulf fixed between them and she called him my Lord, and he called her Miss Fothergill in a voice which can best be described as a caressing, although still judicial, purr. She looked, as she stood in the witness-box and answered vivaciously, prettier than I had remembered. Her nose was a little turned up, her front teeth a little protruding, but her eyes were bright and her smile beguiling.

‘Tricia Fothergill, you say your name is?' I rose, after Marcus had finished with her, doing my best to break the spell woven by the most damaging prosecution witness. ‘Why not Patricia?'

‘Because I couldn't say Patricia when I was a little girl. So I stayed Tricia, even when I went away to school.'

‘Which, I'm sure, wasn't long ago. Don't you agree, Members of the Jury?' the judge purred and a few weaker spirits in the jury box gave a mild giggle. Tricia Fothergill, in Jamie's view, it seemed,
had
been born yesterday.

‘I'll call you Miss Fothergill, if I may, if that's your grownup name. Or is it? Were you once married?'

‘Yes.'

‘And your husband's name is . . .?'

‘Charing.'

‘Cheering, did you say?'

‘No, Charing.'