Touched by Angels

by Alan Watts

  “Eh? But I done nuffing.”

  “… Mr ’Orace King.”

  He produced a set of handcuffs.

  “What… what you talking about? I ain’t done…”

  He glanced at his wife, as he opened his mouth to voice further denial, but she averted her gaze.

  “She did it,” he whispered, struggling up, shocked. He reeled and fell back down, his head pulsing painfully.

  “I suppose she did them cuts and bruises on ’er face too,” Sharp replied, snapping on the cuffs, and yanking him upright, “you’re a bad un, Smiff, and you ain’t gonna winkle out this time. Wiv any luck, Mr Ellis’ll do for you.”

  “I didn’t do it, I tell yer. She did it!” he shrieked.

  He turned to Lil, as Sharp was dragging him to the door, and growled, “Go on, tell ’im the truf, you lyin’ cah! You keep on about ’ow you’re a soddin’ Christian. Go on! Tell ’im.”

  By now, a small crowd, among them grinning regulars from the Dog and Duck, and Mrs O’Brien and Molly, were gathering in the street.

  Benny O’Driscoll, whose nose now pointed permanently to the left, asked, “’oo’s Mr Ellis?”

  “The ’angman, lad,” replied the elderly gentleman who had told Bob to take the farthings back from whence they’d come. He puffed contentedly on his pipe, grinning, as his medals glinted in the sun.

  A scrawny woman near the back, in a shawl, said, shaking her head, “Gawd ’elp us! ’ee must ’ave done ’er in, the poor mite.”

  “Bastard!” muttered somebody else.

  “He’ll dangle,” said another, “’an I ’ope it bleedin’ well ’urts!”

  And yet another, “That poor little lad. It’ll be the poor ’ouse fer ’im, you mark my words. Skin an’ bone ’ee‘ll be inside a year.”

  Big Molly was grinning too, as Bob emerged from the door, with Sharp’s ham-sized fist holding the scruff of his neck. He lifted both hands, which were fettered in front, to shield his eyes from the glare, as his head pounded and thumped. He shouted his innocence up the street, as the crowd bayed and hissed, with one calling out, “You bleedin’ coward. Rope’s too good for yer!”

  Somebody threw a rotten turnip, which struck him of the back of the neck.

  ***

  Robert was watching his front door through a veil of tears. What his mother had said about the sixth commandment was true. He had broken it, the most sacred one of all. Yet it was she who had forced the silence upon him and he knew in his heart of hearts he had no other choice than to keep it.

  He stayed away ’til gone four, aimlessly wandering the streets, feeling as though his and his mum’s lives had reached the end. He had no idea what to expect as he arrived home, though he knew it possible his God-fearing mother might have cracked, and told the truth.

  He saw the horse-drawn hearse of Buck’s Undertakers outside the house. A sizeable crowd had formed once more, some giving cheers at the sight of Horace King instead of Lil Smith, being brought out. As he was loaded into the back, with his Bible, the rent book, on his belly, a cheer echoed from one end of the street to the other, and such is the fickleness of human nature, that for a few minutes at least, Bob was a hero.

  All could relax, and the Inkpens, a family of particular frailty, and Lil’s immediate neighbours, stood in a line as the hearse passed, while Mrs Inkpen, toothless and aged well beyond her thirty-four years, muttered, “Gawd bless ’im.”

  Everybody hung around after the hooves had faded into the distance, hats in hands, hoping to catch a glimpse of Lil, but she never came out.

  Soon, they went back indoors, knowing that at some point soon, a replacement would be sent for Mr King.

  Eleven

  It happened much sooner than even the most cynical would have thought; an hour and ten minutes later, to be exact. The King family were not to be denied their income from the estates they owned in Stepney, Bow and Whitechapel, for even a day.

  Sir Rupert turned up with the two brutes who had accompanied his late brother. Tall, bristle-headed and scarred, one had mutinied from His Majesty’s Navy, and was on the run from the law, while the other, Mr Belcher, had been born in the workhouse itself. Employed for the most part as overseers, they were feared for beating people up during debt collections.

  Knowing they might turn her home over, hunting for the fob, Lil would have had the shock of her life when they came knocking, had she not heard the terrible commotion coming from the Inkpens, to give fair warning.

  With only a few minutes to act, her eyes still raw from crying, she emptied her odd-bod box, and put the watch and money inside. She told Robert to bury it in the patch of earth behind the outside toilet. While he carried on, she listened to the screams and smashing glass and crockery coming from beyond the thin wall.

  It was clear what the problem was. They couldn’t pay their rent, and if that wasn’t bad enough, they had stupidly refused to leave. Through the window, she watched Sir Rupert polishing his monocle, as weasel-faced Mr Inkpen came literally flying out.

  He crashed in a tangle of arms and legs at his feet, where he lay groaning in a cloud of dust, and within minutes, his wife and nine children lay around him like skittles.

  Sir Rupert calmly re-inserted the monocle and wrote several lines in the rent book, as they trooped off, hobbling and crying, never to be seen again.

  The moment he knocked on Lil’s door, she knew her misgivings were right, as after handing over the rent, he snapped, “Where’s my brother’s fob watch?”

  “What fob watch?”

  “The one you stole from him.”

  “I know nothing of…”

  Not caring to argue, Sir Rupert said to the thugs, “Search the house. Ten pounds to the man who finds it. Then, when we have it, we’ll have a constable arrest this harlot and her brat.”

  They shoved Lil and Robert out the way and simply smashed the place to bits. Trembling, Lil held Robert by the shoulders, certain that, when it wasn’t found, they would at least be cast into the street.

  Ten minutes later, they listened with their hearts in their mouths, as the back door was kicked open. Then they heard the tin bath clatter as it was booted off its nail, and more vaguely, the toilet being ransacked, though they were clearly clutching at straws.

  When they came back empty handed, Lil could only hope Robert would have the sense to hide his relief, as she was doing.

  Sir Rupert was nodding and saying, “Mmmmm,” as he regarded them suspiciously, and then, “if you tell me where it is, I’ll give you ten pounds and allow you stay rent free for a year.”

  She was looking at him stunned, thinking she’d misheard him, and when he added, smiling, “Come along, my dear, you must realise it is a very generous offer,” she began to wonder exactly what it was worth.

  She had to force herself to say, “I have no idea where it is,” whilst gently pinching Robert’s shoulder, in case he was tempted to say otherwise, and added, “perhaps the undertakers took it.”

  Sir Rupert regarded her as he chewed his lip, before saying, “I’ll not let this rest. If I find out you’ve got it, or had it…” He left the sentence unfinished and looked at them pointedly, before saying to the thugs, “Gentlemen!”

  They walked off to the next house.

  Lil closed the door, and gasped, “Jesus!” as she and Robert collapsed into each other’s arms.

  Twelve

  When the hysteria had worn off, she told Robert to go and get the watch, and was soon mystified as she examined it, not that she could think straight anyway.

  Thinking of Bob, she felt numb as she turned the expensive, though otherwise ordinary-seeming timepiece over. The dilemma of either allowing the law to take its course or do the decent thing was tearing her apart.

  She knew that, if she did, and even if she managed to avoid prison herself, she and Robert would be knocking on those workhouse doors in very short order, while Bob walked free, not caring a fig, as he made a beeline for the Dog and Duck.

  She
envisaged him supping a frothing tankard, while the upright played, as the big doors opened like a mouth, to swallow them up forever. She saw him blind drunk, while she sewed mailbags and Robert picked oakum.

  As she flicked the face of the watch open though, she knew that, however bleak a picture she painted of him, the guilt would never leave her.

  She knew too, that at some point soon, when the fuss had died down, she could wander into town to get the watch valued. Then get out of here to give Robert the life he should live.

  For now though, she told him to hide the watch under her bed.

  ***

  The trial of course was something they couldn’t avoid. As they made their way to Court, Lil knew that there was no guarantee that however well she primed Robert beforehand, he wouldn’t crumble under cross-examination.“You get it wrong,” a little voice whispered, “and you’ll lose him forever. It’s up to you now, your only son, or the drunken slob who has tormented you without respite. One chance, and one chance only!”

  She had drilled one fact into Robert though, that he must never, never deviate from, whatever anybody said; and that was the fact that she had not been in the parlour when the altercation between his father and Mr King had occurred.

  She had been in the kitchen. There were three people only in the parlour; himself, Mr King and his father. No fourth party had witnessed the assault, she assured him, so nobody could prove a thing, however suspicious they may be.

  “You must remember: the injury was accidental, or your father will be hanged!”

  The trial was taking place in the Inner London Crown Court at Southwark, and, as Robert climbed the polished wooden steps into the witness box, she remembered another passage she had made him read in the Bible, a long time ago. That of Judas Iscariot, who had hanged himself in a thunderstorm after betraying Christ.

  She wished she hadn’t, as such a storm could be heard howling outside now, as Robert looked into his father’s pleading eyes, across the silent courtroom, in the dock.

  ***

  He had never seen his father so scared. It wasn’t hard for him either to recall his mother’s bruises and endless tears. He looked pathetic, washed out and broken.

  His ashen face sported a series of nicks, where he’d cut himself shaving, and Robert knew that if he couldn’t convince the jury that Mr King’s death wasn’t deliberate, it wouldn’t be himself facing the rope, as Judas had, but his father.

  He had to get it right.

  He shuddered as he thought of the possible consequences if he failed; of his mother being led to the noose and himself being loaded onto a ship bound for the dominions.

  He felt the bile come up into his throat, as he tried to dispel the hellish images that formed in his mind. He looked around. He noticed that everything in this correct, chilly place was polished, as he gripped the rail and looked around the sea of grim faces, scrutinising him as if he were some loathsome insect; and there was a smell too, that of buffed leather and varnished wood. It was making his stomach churn. He had been told by his mother to look straight ahead, and not look at anybody, but it was impossible not to. He was surrounded.

  Mrs O’Brien stood among the crowd in the Public Gallery, her face like a side of salt beef under her hat.

  Four places along from her, next to Michael O’Driscoll, stood that horrible man with the monocle, who had told those two thugs to smash their home up, whilst hunting for the fob. Even Mr Myers, his schoolmaster was there, watching him glumly through his bloodhound eyes. He was glad that Lenny, Dick and Nigel weren’t there, perhaps kids weren’t allowed in.

  The courtroom had high windows, and fleetingly, it was lit up in bright yellow as lightning struck somewhere over Victoria Dock.

  The ensuing bang sounded like a furious demon thumping the sky and Robert stumbled and nearly fell.

  The Clerk of the Court steadied him, to murmurings from the gallery, and Robert found himself looking down at a Bible, as the Clerk said, “Please repeat after me. I promise to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help me God.”

  “I promise to tell the truth, the whole truth, and everything but the truth, so…”

  Laughter roared from the jury and public gallery, while Lil closed her eyes, wishing the ground would open up and swallow her.

  She noticed they weren’t all laughing though, which somehow made it worse.

  Sir Rupert King was slowly shaking his head, whilst polishing his monocle, while Mrs O’Brien’s mouth hung open in disbelief.

  Then there was another bang, though not of thunder. The judge’s gavel.

  “I will have silence in this court!” he hissed. The laughter petered out. “Need I remind the Court,” he added, glaring around through watery blue eyes, “that a man’s life may be at stake here?”

  Robert watched his father turn from white to very pale green. He was made to repeat the oath, and this time he fumbled through, just, while Lil watched on, inwardly praying.

  The Counsel for the Prosecution then stood, gripped his black gown in both hands and said, “Please tell the court, precisely what you saw.”

  “Well,” Robert said, “he were drunk, my dad, I mean, and he didn’t mean to do it and Mr King was annoying him…”

  “That may be so, but my question was not to establish his motive…”

  “His what?”

  “His reason for committing the offence.”

  “Objection, your honour!” snapped the Defending Counsel, standing ramrod straight and turning in a swirl of black. “It has not been ascertained yet, whether any offence has been committed.”

  “Sustained,” said the judge. “Please do not lead the witness, Mr Pettigrew. The jury will disregard the Prosecuting Counsel’s inference.”

  Mr Pettigrew bowed briefly to the judge and turned his attention back to Robert, smiling to reassure him.

  “So, what did you see? Please take your time. Cast your mind back. Any detail, however small it may seem.”

  “Well, it were after Mr King came for the rent. Mum was in the kitchen doin’ some…”

  “Lies!” his father growled suddenly. “It’s all lies. It were that lyin’ cah! I’m tellin’ yer. I never touched ’im.” He pointed a shaking finger at Lil, and the gavel banged down once more.

  “If you do not rein in your tongue, Sir,” the judge grated, “you will be held in contempt of court.”

  “But yer lordship, yer ’ighniss, I didn’t do nuffink, as God’s me witness.”

  He crossed himself, something he had seen the Irish do innumerable times, and Mrs O’Brien whispered to herself, “Sweet Mary, Mother of Jesus!”

  “Please continue,” the barrister said.

  “Dad was drunk. He didn’t know what he were doin’, I swear, and he threw mum’s crystal ball at Mr King, and it hit his head and he went down, makin’ funny gruntin’ noises, an’ he was bleedin’, and… well, that’s… how it was.”

  “And only your father, yourself, and Mr King were in the room at the time?”

  “Yeah, like I said. Mum was in the kitchen.”

  Bob was shaking his head in disbelief and for once he was speechless.

  “I apologise for my next line of questioning,” said the barrister, “but it is relevant. Would you say your father is a violent man?”

  “Objection!” snapped the Defence. “This line of questioning is not relevant to the case in hand.”

  “Over-ruled,” said the judge. “I consider it most relevant and so must the gentlemen of the jury. Please continue.”

  Robert was silent for a while, before saying quietly, “Yeah, s’pose he is.”

  “And is your father a dishonest man too, given for instance, to lying, stealing and cheating?”

  “Yeah,” Robert said, hanging his head.

  “Please speak up, so the court may hear.”

  “Yes!” said Robert firmly, while his father gaped.

  “Very good. No further questions, your honour.”

  He sat,
picked up his fountain pen and now Lil began to really sweat, as it was the Defence Counsel’s turn.

  The barrister was a smallish man, with an eagle nose, topped by two of the bushiest eyebrows Lil had ever seen. He looked as keen as Sheffield steel. He looked at Robert for quite some time before speaking, rather like a bird of prey, sometimes consulting his notes diligently and then making marks with his pen.

  “Do you understand, young man,” he began at last, with an indulgent smile tugging his lips, “the meaning of the term perjury?” He said the word slowly and with deliberation.

  “Yeah, it means tellin’ fibs.”

  The barrister was rather taken aback.

  “Well, actually, it doesn’t just mean that, you know. No indeed! Not naughty little white lies in school over marbles or catapults.” He punched the air playfully. “It means something much more serious, and indeed, unforgivable. It means lying under oath.” He grinned condescendingly, and added, “Fibbing, if you prefer, before God himself.”

  “Yeah, I know,” Robert retorted, remembering how his father had once knocked his mother down the stairs and how he had stamped on one of Robert’s few toys, a carved wooden steam engine, smashing it to bits. “And that’s why I didn’t lie.”

  “I sincerely hope not,” he said, seeing his client standing there, glassy-eyed. “Perjury is a very serious crime and you would not go to heaven either.” He paused. “You have asserted that only three persons were in the parlour when the altercation… the fight between your father and the landlord, Mr King, took place.”

  “Yeah, there were.”

  “Who was the third person?”

  Robert gulped and said, “It were me. Mum was in the kitchen, like I said. She was cookin’ or some’ing an’ she didn’t come in ’til after it had happened.”

  The barrister scratched his head.

  “Are you aware that your father may be hanged?” he asked, looking suitably appalled at such a dreadful prospect.