The Baker Street Jurors (17 page)

No one truly wanted to get out of the warm dry van. The wind was nearly thirty knots now, and the rain was pelting down in near horizontal sheets. But no one raised their hand.

“Let's get started then,” said the judge.

“Slickers at the ready, if you've got them,” shouted Ms. Sreenivasan, with completely unwarranted cheerfulness, because few had brought slickers. Only the two sturdiest umbrellas of the group were of any use; the compact collapsible ones did exactly what they were designed to do—expand, and then immediately collapse.

Constable Bailey was wearing an actual full-length mac, and he gallantly removed it, handed one end of it to Ms. Sreenivasan, and the jurors huddled together in a sort of phalanx—with the constable's expanded mac at the front and the two surviving umbrellas—including Nigel's—on either side. The jurors did their best to take shelter behind them as they marched out.

They slogged on orange-brown mud, past low-lying scrub plants, toward the outcroppings of slick, black, lichen-colonized rock at the far end of the promontory.

They proceeded some twenty yards in that direction—and then the judge raised his hand, and the entire group paused. “We can do it in small groups,” he said to the constable. “It's too narrow for the whole group all at once. So just a few at a time. Walk out to where the witness is standing now, look down over the edge, and then, just walk on back.”

“Are you sure it's safe to do this?” shouted Nigel.

“Of course it is!” Pemberton yelled as loudly as he could. “Just mind your step, and Bob's your uncle!”

Nigel was doubtful. He was pretty sure he had no uncle. And he knew that rocks on the water's edge get adopted by invisible slime and you don't know it's there until you are slip, sliding away.

And he wasn't the only one hesitating.

“You first,” said Lucy, standing behind him.

Nigel wasn't sure whether she was addressing him or the constable, but he didn't want to seem unduly timid, and he began to take a step forward.

“No, no, no,” said the defense attorney. “Primary jurors first. Then the alternates.”

“Why do you suppose the primary jurors have to go first?” said Lucy.

“Because the weather is getting progressively worse,” said Nigel. “And the primary jurors are more valuable.”

And it was indeed getting worse. Constable Bailey walked the first group of four jurors out onto the promontory—with wind howling, rain slashing, and waves crashing below—and they all came gladly back two minutes later. When the second group walked out, the wind had already increased by several knots, and they hurried back in less than a minute, chased by sheets of rain.

“Next!” shouted Constable Bailey. He could hardly be heard at all over the wind, but his lips were moving and his gestures made his intent clear—he wanted Nigel and the remaining jurors to take their turn now, and walk out onto the promontory.

Nigel shouted back at the constable, “This isn't safe!”

Nigel realized that no one more than four feet away could hear him; he shook his head emphatically, gestured out toward the sea, and made a motion like a wave crashing.

The judge, who had now returned to the area of the vehicles, saw this, looked out toward the rocks, and hesitated. But the constable looked back at Nigel, shook his head, and made a gesture to suggest nice, calm little waves no more than knee high.

And to suggest Nigel was a wimp.

The barristers, standing at a safe distance, glared at Nigel, and gestured emphatically toward the far end of the promontory.

“Quickly now!” The constable shouted at Nigel and the remaining jurors. “While the seas are calm!”

Nigel thought that ship had already sailed. But the insurance agent—who during all this had been paying more attention to a flask he had concealed in his coat pocket—looked up.

“Bloody hell,” he said, looking around at the others. “Let's just get it over with.”

And with that he strode boldly, if a bit unsteadily, out onto the promontory.

The constable took advantage of that initiative and immediately summoned Lucy, Bankstone, and Siger as well, with Nigel and Mrs. Peabody right on their heels.

Nigel walked deliberately just to the right side of Mrs. Peabody, positioning himself between her and the slick, sloping boulders of the cliff. She seemed a bit wobbly on the heels she had worn. Nigel hoped it wouldn't be necessary to catch her, but he felt obliged to be ready.

Constable Bailey stood boldly in the wind and rain, gesturing to them all to hurry forward. The witness, still at a safer distance, pointed to where the jurors were to position themselves—at the very edge of the rocks.

“You first!” shouted Nigel, and this time, all the other jurors followed Nigel's example, and halted—until the witness himself stepped cautiously onto the rocks, using Constable Bailey as a shield, and pointed below.

“There,” he said, pointing down at the surf. “I was standing right here, and down there is where I saw McSweeney!”

The witness then hastily stepped back.

The insurance salesman stepped up to look, followed by Lucy. He glanced down, barely, then took two quick steps back. Lucy took a moment longer at the edge—actually looking to see, rather than just pretending to—and Siger stepped up next to her and looked down as well. Then they, too, stepped back.

Mrs. Peabody and Nigel both approached the edge.

“No,” said Nigel, as Mrs. Peabody started to go to the very edge of the rock to look down. “You're already close enough. I know it might look safe, but trust me—it's a slip-and-slide. The rock is covered in slime; you just can't see it.”

“Oh,” she said. And just as she said it, her front foot did indeed begin to slide. But Nigel already had her by the elbow.

“Thank you,” she said.

She stepped back, and now Nigel looked out over the edge himself. He saw what he'd expected to see—a cauldron of crashing waves directly below them. But he looked farther out. Some twenty yards farther up the beach was a natural rock reef—causing the surf at that specific location, and only at that location, to well up into a shoulder, which broke gradually—and very powerfully in the current conditions—toward the south.

No one was attempting to ride it today, in the windy conditions. On a good day, for an experienced surfer, it could be rideable. Not wise or likely for someone of McSweeney's limited experience, but theoretically rideable.

But to the south only, in Nigel's opinion. That was the only direction in which the break could go, given the shape of the reef. Not toward the north as the witness had said McSweeney was riding. But to the south.

Which meant that the witness could not have seen what he said he saw. It was impossible.

Nigel turned his head to look back at Pemberton, to see if the man had realized that his false testimony had now been revealed—at least to Nigel.

But then came the rogue wave.

Nigel had known it was possible, even likely at some point—but he hadn't seen it coming. Even though he had been looking out at the surf line just seconds before, he hadn't seen it. It was the very nature of such waves in a storm. If you fled from the surf every time you thought you saw one possibly forming, you would never so much as put foot in the water, or sit on the beach, or stand on a rocky cliff. But if you turned your back or looked away—well, then heaven help you.

It was head-high when it hit the rocky tip of the promontory. If it had been any higher, the main force of the wave would have been enough to wash every one of them into the sea.

For an instant, the spray by itself blanked everything out—no one could see anything but the salty water striking their eyes.

And on the slick black rock, Nigel's feet went out from under him.

He hit face-first on the slimy boulder on which he'd been standing. He instinctively reached for the narrow crevice where that boulder lined up with another. He found it—with just his fingertips—barely enough, for the moment.

The water rushed back now from the promontory rocks to the sea. It pulled at Nigel's legs, and Nigel held on—but he sensed something—or someone—to his right side being dragged away.

Nigel reached out with his right hand—while his left still clung desperately to the crevice—and he tried to grab whoever was sliding past him. He caught hold of an edge of peach-colored cotton cloth. But only an edge. In an instant it was torn from his grasp.

The water subsided. Nigel pulled himself up onto his hands and knees. All around him he heard groans, and some curses.

And then a woman's scream.

Nigel struggled to his feet. He shook the salty water from his face and looked.

Where before there had been five individuals standing on the rocky promontory with Nigel, now there were only four. The constable, who somehow seemed to have kept his feet through all of it. Mrs. Peabody and Siger, who had both fallen, but far enough in from the slick rock to not slip away. And Lucy—still on her hands and knees, but near the edge of the rock—and looking down. It was she who had screamed.

Nigel joined her there and looked down as well.

Some fifty feet below, the body of the insurance salesman lay on a shoreline boulder. The collar of his peach-colored Lacoste shirt was turning red. The incoming and outgoing waves moved his arms like a broken puppet and washed blood from his head into the white froth.

He was faceup, and Nigel could see that there was no doubt. There would be no rescue, no resuscitation; the only possibility was recovery—and that possibility was limited.

Constable Bailey came over now and looked down. “Everyone stay back!” he shouted.

The judge came running out to the vantage point now, and probably would have slipped himself, but the constable and Nigel stepped in and slowed him down. They all looked over the edge, along with Lucy, who hadn't budged.

“If we wait for help,” said Nigel, “another wave is going wash him away.”

“We have a rope and blanket in the van,” said the constable, looking down at the body. “We can make a sling. I will go down and get him, if someone will pull him up from above.”

It was a brave offer. The face of the cliff was a straight vertical drop—challenging for professionals, but impossible for the untrained.

“I'll go with you,” said Nigel.

“I won't risk more juror lives over the one we've already lost,” said the judge. “Get what we need from the van. Only Constable Bailey goes down. You can help the officers of the court—our two barristers and myself—pull him up.”

 

17

The remaining jurors huddled in their vehicles for shelter from the rain, with Ms. Sreenivasan making sure they didn't budge.

Nigel, and Langdon, who didn't have much bulk but was fit, pulled on the rope, with the judge and Slattery backing them up.

Slowly, painstakingly, with Constable Bailey clinging to the slick rocks and guiding the sling—and with the rope tied to him as well—they pulled the body of the insurance salesman to the top of the cliff. Nigel and the constable carried it back to the van. Jurors in the back moved forward and scrunched together to make room.

The judge was on his mobile, almost screaming into it to be heard over the wind and rain.

Nigel returned to the sedan. This time he was in the front, beween Lucy and Mrs. Peabody. Siger, Bankstone, and Armstrong were in the back.

“Are they calling for a helicopter?” said Mrs. Peabody.

“Yes, but they're not getting one, not in this weather,” said Nigel. “Even the news helicopters have gone home, and that was an hour ago, in less wind. And the hotel doesn't have a boat large enough to go out in this wind and surf. So they'll have to take him back to the hotel in the van, no other choice.”

“The judge looks very distressed,” said Lucy, sitting in the driver's seat of their sedan.

“I think he feels responsible,” said Nigel. “And regardless of what he feels, the Crown will probably find him so. Never mind that the fellow was half-drunk.”

“Odd how things happen in the force of nature, isn't it?” said Siger. “The insurance man had completed his viewing, and was standing farther from the edge, toward the center of the solid land. You and Mrs. Peabody were much closer to the edge. Yet it was the insurance man who fell to his doom.”

“Oh my, you're right,” said Mrs. Peabody. “There's just no telling, is there?”

Now the constable came running over to their car, through fierce wind and rain, and he rapped on Nigel's window. Nigel lowered it; a sheet of water blew in.

The constable shouted and waved his arms toward the road on which they'd driven in. “We're going back. Right now! Turn around! We're all heading back. Back to the hotel!”

Nigel rolled the window up and Lucy started the car. The constable dashed back to the van, which was already chugging exhaust fumes and beginning its turn.

The van got out onto the road first. The sedan tried to follow. Its wheels spun in the deepening mud, Lucy struggled with the gear shift, and finally they got out onto the road.

It was dusk now. The van was nearly a quarter mile ahead, its tail lights barely visible through the sheets of rain.

“Shouldn't we be right with them?” said Mrs. Peabody.

“I am trying,” said Lucy, and Nigel knew that she was. There was only so much that the four-cylinder front-wheel-drive sedan could do.

They rounded a curve. On one side was the beach cliff; on the other was a steep rise that led to higher ground; and in front of them, the road was descending toward a narrow canyon that they had crossed when they first drove out from the hotel's boat dock.

“We must be getting near the bridge,” said Nigel.

“I don't see it,” said Lucy.

“Neither do I,” said Nigel, staring with her into the fog and rain. “But I think I see taillights…”

It was just a glimpse of the vehicle ahead of them, which had just crossed the bridge and was starting up the other side. But now Nigel stopped talking. He'd heard an ominous sound. It wasn't coming from the car, and it certainly wasn't the wind or the rain, and it wasn't thunder. It was a low, guttural sound, of something massive that was straining to the breaking point.