Quite Honestly

by John Mortimer

  ‘Of course it was a joke,’ he told me when we first met.

  ‘What was a joke?’

  ‘You taking your friend’s picture. Thirkell was your friend, wasn’t he?’

  ‘Once. Not recently.’

  ‘Anyway, you took away his picture as a prank, meaning to give it back to him, didn’t you?’

  ‘No, it wasn’t a prank. It was entirely serious.’

  ‘What do you mean, it was serious?’

  ‘It was a serious attempt to commit a serious crime. Unfortunately it turned out that I wasn’t very good at it.’

  ‘You’re not telling me you did it to get a share of 400,000?’

  ‘No, I’m not telling you that.’

  ‘Then for what?’

  ‘Because I wanted to really understand Terry. Because I wanted to feel what he felt. Because I wanted us to be really together. Because I love him. Oh, I know it sounds stupid.’

  ‘Yes, it does.’

  ‘I don’t expect you to understand.’

  ‘Please don’t say any of that in the interview.’

  ‘Why not? It’s the truth.’

  ‘Oh, good heavens!’ He looked so boyish then that I felt sure he was going to come out with, ‘Oh gosh!’ but he went on, ‘If everyone I defended felt they had to tell the truth in interviews we wouldn’t get many of them off.’

  ‘I can’t help it. I just feel I’ve got to tell the truth and, what do they call it, the whole truth.’

  ‘For the moment, let’s keep your boyfriend, Terry, out of this. Where does he live?’

  ‘Notting Hill Gate. We live together.’

  ‘What’s he do? I mean what’s his job exactly?’

  ‘Thief.’

  Mr Bethell looked as though he had walked through an open door which had then banged shut and struck him smartly on the head. He seemed surprised and pained. ‘Then for God’s sake let’s keep his name out of this,’ is what he said.

  ‘All right. I won’t mention Terry.’

  ‘I was talking to the detective sergeant . . .’

  ‘The rap artist.’

  ‘I don’t know why you call him that.’

  ‘Ask him. He’ll know.’

  ‘We won’t bother about that. He says you came with two other people, who drove away.’

  ‘I’m not going to answer any questions about them.’

  ‘Were they thieves as well?’

  ‘I’m not going to tell anyone about them.’

  ‘Men of bad character, perhaps, who forced you to help them steal the picture?’ Once again, as at the start of our conversation, Mr Bethell looked suddenly hopeful.

  ‘It’s just me that’s responsible for all this. I’m not blaming anyone else.’

  ‘The police would be grateful if you gave them some names.’

  ‘I’m not naming names. Not for the rap artist or anyone. I’m not going to get anyone else into trouble.’

  Mr Bethell’s spirits sank. Once again he looked like a schoolboy who’d been told that he’ll be off sweets at least for a week.

  ‘When this interview’s over,’ he said, ‘I’ll have a word with your father, the bishop. I’m sure he’ll have some sensible advice to give you.’

  ‘Oh please,’ I begged him, ‘don’t drag Dad into this. He’s had quite enough to worry about, what with the way God’s been behaving lately.’

  It was then they called us for the interview and I was determined to irritate the rap artist at least as much as I’d managed to irritate poor Mr Bethell, who, after all, was only trying to help me out of a hopeless situation.

  28

  Her father told me she was coming up the next day in the Aldershot Magistrates’ Court. He said the question of bail would be considered.

  ‘I can’t believe it,’ he said. ‘Is this something you planned to do together?’

  ‘Absolutely not! I told you, I wanted to make her stop stealing.’

  ‘Oh yes.’ He seemed surprised at having to remember. ‘I didn’t take you entirely seriously. I should have done, I suppose.’

  ‘You certainly should.’

  ‘It’s so difficult.’ The bishop seemed lost in a world he couldn’t understand any longer. ‘God has sided with President Bush, my dear daughter has been arrested for stealing and you’re at liberty.’

  ‘For the moment, yes.’

  ‘I just don’t know how Lucy will cope with life in the cells. Luckily we sent her to boarding school, which may have given her some sort of training for it.’

  ‘Let’s hope she gets bail.’

  ‘Oh yes. Let’s hope profoundly and of course I shall do some solid knee work for it. Although,’ now the bishop sounded doubtful, ‘I’m not sure this God really appreciates being prayed to any more. The world seems to be full of unanswered prayers.’

  ‘I’m sorry about that,’ was all I could think of to say.

  ‘Her solicitor rang me. He wants me to give evidence on the bail application. He says they won’t be able to refuse a bishop. Would you agree, with your experience of courts?’

  ‘My experience of courts is you never can tell what they’re going to do.’

  ‘Well yes.’ He sounded disappointed. ‘The solicitor says you arranged for him to see Lucy. Is that true?’

  ‘Yes, through my probation officer, Mr Markby.’

  ‘That was good of you. Very good.’

  ‘It was nothing much. I care about her.’

  I don’t know if he heard because he didn’t answer. He might have gone before I said it to do some of that knee work from which he didn’t seem to expect any great results.

  The Aldershot Magistrates’ Court was crowded. I guessed there were a lot of journalists wanting to write ‘Bishop’s Daughter on Theft Charges’. I could feel their excitement at Lucy’s troubles and I hated them for it. But what I wanted most of all was to see Lucy. There was a fat bloke wandering round with a list and I asked him if I could see Lucy Purefoy.

  ‘Purefoy, Purefoy . . . bail application. We should get to it around twelve o’clock.’

  ‘I just wanted to see her before then. Where should I go?’

  ‘You want to see Purefoy?’ A smiling character came up to me. I put him down as of Caribbean extraction. ‘I’m Detective Sergeant Macdonald, officer in charge of the case. And you are . . . ?’

  ‘Terry Keegan,’ I told him.

  ‘Of course.’ The DS’s smile broadened. ‘I have heard you spoken of frequently when my prisoner was in the company of my girlfriend, Deirdre. In fact I think I met you once. What an extremely small world this is after all!’

  ‘Amazingly small.’ I thought I’d better agree with him. ‘So can I just pop down and see her in the cells or wherever she is?’

  ‘No.’ Our world may have been small but it was no longer friendly. ‘I’m afraid you can’t just “pop” down into the cells, as you call it. Prisoners here are not able to receive visitors.’

  ‘Not even if they’re friends of the officer in charge of the case?’ I did my best to smile back at him.

  ‘Particularly not if they are friends of the officer in charge of the case. In the Met we are taught to act without fear or favour.’

  ‘I must see her though.’

  ‘Of course you will see her.’

  ‘Thank you.’ It seemed the Old Bill had a bit of a heart after all.

  ‘You will be able to see her from the public gallery. I advise you to go up there now to be sure of a place in the front row.’

  So I sat in the public gallery and in time the magistrates came in. In the middle was Madam Chair, a large grey-haired woman with the look of someone who had just discovered that her dog has done a huge shit on the white carpet in the lounge. On one side of her was a burly-looking character with the physique of a nightclub bouncer who had something in his buttonhole, perhaps a trade union badge. Anyway, I told myself he was the sort that might take a fancy to Lucy and want to do the best for her.

  I wasn’t too hopeful about the bloke o
n the other side of Madam Chair. He was a hawk-faced person with rimless glasses who might have been an off-duty headmaster and looked at everyone who came up for a decision as though they had been caught having sex in the playground and bringing shame to the high reputation of Aldershot Comprehensive. The most active person in the court, however, was the little clerk who sat under Madam Chair and kept bobbing up to give her advice, which sometimes she seemed to take, though often she treated him as though he was the same dog that did the mess on the carpet and I fancied she muttered, ‘Down, boy. Down!’

  So I sat there and listened to people applying for various things, like having their careless-driving trials or their soliciting-on-the-streets-of-Aldershot cases postponed. I saw the bishop, Lucy’s dad, sitting behind a brief who took his place in the solicitors’ row. I guessed that man was Mr Bethell, who my probation officer recommended as likely to do his best for Lucy. On the other side there was a small bald-headed man who’d greeted all the court officials as though they were close personal friends. I was sure he was there from the Director of Public Prosecutions as, at last, he plumped himself down in front of DS Macdonald, the Old Bill representative who had sent me up to the public gallery.

  ‘R. v. Purefoy. Bail application.’ The clerk read it out from a bit of paper. ‘Application for bail. Put up Purefoy.’

  So they did. And there she was, Lucy in the dock, a position I’d been in more times than I’d had hot dinners. It didn’t seem to affect her or have changed her at all. She had, as she always did, half a smile and a look which meant that she hoped they would like her, but deep down she didn’t care whether they did or not.

  There was a bit of droning on. The DPP man, who turned out to be called Mr Hastie, took a while to explain that the accused was charged with stealing a picture of enormous value. During this, Lucy looked round and even glanced up at the public gallery. She saw me and smiled, and I did my best to smile back. For a moment it seemed we were alone in the court and then Madam Chair told Lucy she could sit down, as though she was giving her a real treat. Lucy sat down obediently and didn’t look back to me again.

  Then her brief, Mr Bethell, got up on his hind legs and said he was applying for bail. He said it in a silky sort of a purring voice which I’m sure he thought would get the magistrates on his side, but I noticed that Madam Chair and her two supporters didn’t seem to be all that impressed. He obviously expected a better reaction when he announced that he was going to call the Bishop of Aldershot to give evidence. As he said this there was certainly no round of applause or even a smile from the bench. Then the chat went on more or less like this, beginning with Mr Bethell asking Lucy’s dad if he was the Right Reverend Robert Purefoy, Bishop of Aldershot.

  ‘Yes, I am.’

  I could see the newspaper people in court licking their pencils and turning to a new page in their notebooks to write their ‘Bishop Gives Evidence for Arrested Daughter’ stories. Mr Bethell asked, ‘And you are the father of Lucinda Purefoy, who is here in the dock?’

  ‘Yes, I am. In fact we always call her Lucy. Everybody does.’ He gave what he hoped was a winning smile at Madam Chair, but it was not returned.

  ‘As we know, your daughter, Lucy, is of good character with no convictions.’

  ‘Only one or two for going too fast in that Polo car of hers. Women drivers! Well, you know what they are.’

  I suppose the bishop thought this might get a laugh from the bench. In which case he was wrong.

  ‘But Lucy has no convictions for dishonesty. She has never been arrested before?’

  ‘Certainly not! Indeed she has worked hard helping convicted criminals to reform and lead an honest life. She joined SCRAP as a praeceptor.’

  ‘What is SCRAP exactly?’

  ‘Social Carers, Reformers and Praeceptors.’

  ‘Lucy worked for them?’

  ‘For the best part of this year.’

  ‘As a praeceptor?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Which means - for the benefit of those of us in court who may not have had a classical education . . . ?’

  ‘Being a guide, philosopher and friend to some young offender freshly out of prison.’

  ‘And did Lucy get paid for such work?’

  ‘Not at all. It was quite voluntary. Lucy has always wanted to do a bit of good in the world.’

  I looked at Madam Chair. Her expression was unchanged. It was as though she thought that wanting to do some good in the world was the next worst thing to a criminal conviction.

  ‘If the bench grants her bail,’ Mr Bethell was asking, ‘would Lucy come and live with her parents at the palace?’

  ‘I imagine not.’ The answer seemed to have disappointed Mr Bethell. ‘I imagine she will continue to live in her flat in Notting Hill Gate.’

  ‘Will she live there alone?’

  ‘No. With her boyfriend.’ The bishop turned to speak directly to Madam Chair and explain, ‘They are in a stable relationship.’

  Madam Chair looked as though she knew what a stable relationship meant and she didn’t think much of it.

  ‘But she can visit you and you’ll be able to keep an eye on her?’ Mr Bethell asked.

  ‘Yes, of course! Lucy and Terry will always be welcome at the palace.’

  ‘Thank you, Bishop Purefoy.’ Mr Bethell sat down, looking like a man who has done as much as possible with some pretty ropy material.

  But now the man from the Director of Public Prosecutions was on his feet and Madam Chair’s ‘You have some questions, Mr Hastie?’ was warmer than anything she had handed out to Mr Bethell.

  ‘Can you tell the bench this, Bishop.’ Hastie began. ‘When you say that your daughter is in a “stable relationship”, does she live with this young man as his wife?’

  ‘They’re not married.’ The bishop looked puzzled.

  ‘No, but they are living together and having sexual intercourse? ’

  ‘Let us hope so. God gave us our bodies as a source of pleasure and delight.’

  ‘So you approve of sex before marriage?’

  ‘I can’t see why anyone should fail to do so.’

  ‘Some sections of the Church wouldn’t agree with you.’

  ‘Some sections of the Church have failed to move with the times.’

  ‘Talking about moving with the times, is it true that you’re in favour of gay marriages in church?’

  ‘I really can’t see why not.’

  ‘Doesn’t the Bible forbid homosexuality?’

  In his answer, Lucy’s dad asked a surprising question. ‘Do you enjoy prawn cocktail, Mr Hastie?’

  Of course, the clerk of the court jumped up to speak urgently to Madam Chair, who told the bishop that he wasn’t there to ask questions and that the bench failed to see what a prawn cocktail had to do with a bail application.

  ‘I’m quite prepared to answer the question.’ Mr Hastie was showing how fair he could be even though he was there for the DPP. ‘Yes, Bishop. I do enjoy a prawn cocktail.’

  ‘Then let me remind you. It’s true that the book of Leviticus says, “Though shalt not lie with mankind, as with womankind: it is abomination.” ’

  ‘I thought it did.’ Mr Hastie obviously felt he’d scored a hit.

  ‘But it also says, “Whatsoever hath no fins nor scales in the waters, that shall be an abomination.” Therefore no shellfish and, in particular, no prawn cocktail!’

  ‘What’s that meant to prove?’ Hastie obviously felt he’d been outsmarted.

  ‘It proves that we needn’t take too much notice of those ancient bits of desert law.’

  Madam Chair probably missed the point of all this because she was having another whisper with the clerk of the court, who then spoke out for her. ‘The bench wishes you to get on with matters relevant to this bail application.’

  ‘Then I’ll raise a matter very relevant to this bail application.’ Mr Hastie had been handed a bit of paper by the DS in charge of the case, who had turned out to be Lucy’s friend Is
hmael.

  ‘Is the man she’s living with, as husband and wife, called Terry Keegan?’

  ‘He is. And he’s here in the public gallery.’

  Almost everyone except Lucy turned to look at me. The DPP’s man handed his bit of paper in to the clerk of the court.

  ‘That’s a list of Keegan’s convictions. All for theft.’

  Madam Chair and her two sidekicks received the list gratefully. Clearly they found it far more interesting than bits of the Bible.

  ‘So, Bishop, if your daughter is granted bail on this serious theft charge she will be living, as man and wife, with a convicted criminal. I suppose you’ll tell this court that you thoroughly approve of that?’

  ‘Of course,’ the bishop plunged in happily. I just wished he could keep quiet and not be so bloody forgiving about everyone. ‘Jesus Christ was a convicted criminal,’ he told Mr Hastie.

  ‘But this man Keegan is a thief.’

  ‘And Jesus was crucified between two thieves. May I remind you of the gospel according to St Luke?’

  ‘If you have to,’ Mr Hastie sighed.

  ‘One of the thieves said to Jesus, “Lord, remember me when thou comest into thy kingdom,” and Jesus said, “Today thou shalt be with me in Paradise.” ’

  ‘Are you suggesting that Terry Keegan is going to heaven?’ Mr Hastie asked, to which the bishop replied, ‘I think he’s got a better chance than most of us.’

  ‘One more matter.’ Mr Hastie seemed anxious to get away from my chance of heaven. ‘Your daughter is accused of stealing a picture from God’s Acre Manor. Did she know Mr Robin Thirkell, who owns the picture?’

  ‘Oh yes, he’s an old friend of Lucy’s. They used to be very close.’

  ‘Were they in a relationship, as you call it?’

  ‘Oh yes. Of course.’

  ‘So the suggestion here is that your daughter stole a valuable picture from a house she knew well and from a friend who trusted her.’