Death in the Coverts

by Roderic Jeffries

  They stared at each other.

  ‘Sit down,’ ordered the warder.

  He sat down. Here, he was not even allowed the freedom to decide whether to sit or stand.

  ‘How is it, darling?’ she asked.

  ‘Not as bad as it might have been.’

  ‘Your mother sends her love.’

  ‘How’s she taking things?’

  ‘Quite well, really. She keeps saying she’s feeling very old, but she’s doing twice as much cleaning and polishing as ever.’ She was probably feeling very old and very defeated, he thought. Defeat would be infinitely the more bitter of the two. ‘What about you?’

  ‘I’m fine, darling.’

  She was exercising the traditional English approach by which, in the middle of catastrophe, all was made to appear normal.

  ‘Barbara,’ he said and then checked his words.

  ‘Well?’

  ‘Will you… do something for me?’

  ‘Why do you have to ask?’

  ‘It could mean trouble.’

  ‘Just tell me what you want.’

  He looked sideways, at the warder. The man, too far away to hear easily, was studying Barbara with lascivious interest. ‘Go up to London,’ he said, ‘and see a solicitor. It doesn’t matter who just so long as he’s no idea who you are. Then…’ Julian went on speaking, in as low a voice as was possible.

  *

  The second trial of Julian Decker was held in the same courtroom and before the same judge. He was represented by the same counsel and Calaghan was again prosecuting. Only the members of the jury were different.

  Before the opening speech for the prosecution, the judge addressed the jury. ‘You will all have read in the papers, or seen on television, or listened on the wireless, to descriptions or comments on a previous trial. I now direct you that on no account are you to take note of anything you have previously heard, seen, or read. Your duty is to try the accused solely on the evidence you hear in this court.’ The judge looked at Calaghan. ‘Very well.’

  ‘My lord and members of the jury, this is a trial for murder. Murder is defined as the taking of life with malice aforethought, either express or implied, by a person sound in mind.

  ‘In the present case, I suggest that there can be no doubt…’

  *

  The trial proceeded slightly more quickly than had the first one and Lydia Decker completed giving her evidence just before four o’clock on the second day. When she left the witness-box, she walked to one of the benches with the upright carriage of someone who would never bend before fate. But she was looking very old; her face was heavily lined and the flesh about her cheeks seemed to have shrunk.

  Counsel looked pointedly at the clock. ‘Well,’ snapped the judge, ‘who’s your next witness?’

  Welter sighed. With a dinner-party at home that evening, he had hoped to catch an early train back to London. ‘I call the accused, Mr Julian Decker.’

  Julian was escorted to the witness-box by the warder. The usher came forward and Julian took the oath.

  After the preliminary questions, Welter leaned back against the bench behind him. ‘Mr Decker, I want you now to tell the jury in your own words what kind of relationship existed between yourself and the deceased, your brother, Fawcett Decker?’

  Julian made no answer.

  Welter’s voice rose slightly. ‘Will you please tell the court what was the relationship between your brother and yourself?’

  ‘I want to conduct my defence,’ said Julian.

  There was a sudden clamour of conversation that swelled in volume until it became almost a roar. The usher and the policeman on duty by the main doors called repeatedly for silence. After a while, the noise died down.

  The judge spoke to counsel. ‘Mr Welter, were you aware that this was going to happen?’

  ‘Indeed not, my lord. Had I had the slightest idea, I would have…’ He stopped before he said something that might compromise his client.

  The judge leaned back in his red-leather, gold-crested chair. On the wall behind him, the carved wooden scales of justice remained in eternal equilibrium. ‘I have no intention of allowing the law or this court to be mocked,’ he said flatly. ‘The jury will retire.’

  For a while, the courtroom was noisy to the sounds of shuffling feet, then the door was closed behind the jury. The judge spoke to the Press benches. ‘I would ask you not to publish any part of what follows.’ He turned to the witness-box. ‘I propose to make myself quite clear. At a previous trial, a similar demand by you to conduct your own trial led to a position in which I was forced by the rules of procedure governing this court to give you the chance to demand a fresh trial. It had not escaped the court’s attention that a malicious attempt to produce a similar abandonment of this second trial might be made. I therefore warn you, in the strongest possible terms, that no attempt of this nature can succeed. I suggest that in your own interests you withdraw your decision to defend yourself and that you allow this trial to continue in its present form.’

  ‘Am I not now allowed to defend myself?’

  The judge’s voice became harsher. ‘I cannot forbid you to do so.’

  ‘Then I’ll defend myself.’

  The judge stared at Julian for some time, then leaned forward and picked up one of the text books. He read through two pages before putting down the book, open, on his desk. ‘Mr Welter, do you imagine it will be of the slightest use your having a talk with the accused? As much as my inclination might be to allow him to suffer the fruits of his own folly, I feel obliged to do everything possible to avoid this.’

  ‘I could speak to him, my lord.’

  ‘Will you do so, please. If you require a short adjournment, the court will grant one and even, if necessary, will adjourn until to-morrow.’

  Welter walked along the row of benches. Calaghan, in the row behind as he was not a silk, spoke as Welter came level. ‘You picked a ripe one!’

  ‘Over-ripe, and if I don’t soon get a train home I’ll be late for my own dinner-party.’ He went into the gangway and across to the witness-box. ‘Mr Decker, stop being a fool.’

  ‘Am I?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘How else can I get anywhere? What odds will you offer me on a verdict of not guilty?’

  ‘I’ve been doing my best,’ said Welter stiffly.

  ‘But your best can’t possibly be good enough.’

  Welter turned and faced the Bench. ‘My lord, it’s obvious that there’s no chance I shall be able to persuade the accused to change his mind.’

  ‘Would it not be best to take a short adjournment, Mr Welter, so that you may discuss the matter far more fully than you have done?’

  ‘The accused has, my lord, even in so short a time made it perfectly clear that there is nothing to be gained by an adjournment.’

  The judge tapped his fingers on the desk. He looked at the clock on the wall, at Calaghan, and then back at Welter. ‘Mr Welter, this is an intolerable situation. The court owes a duty to a prisoner to see that he does not place himself in greater peril than he is already in, but no court can fulfil such obligation in face of the prisoner’s hostility. Nevertheless, I desire you to speak once more to the accused and explain to him in the most forthright terms where his best interest must lie. I shall therefore adjourn this court until to-morrow.’

  Welter looked up at the clock and tried to remember the times of the next two trains.

  *

  The court resumed sitting at 10.30 in the morning. The jury were back in their seats. The judge questioned Welter. ‘Have you anything to tell me?’

  ‘I regret not, my lord.’

  ‘Very well.’ The judge spoke to the jury.

  ‘The accused has decided to represent himself from now on and to disperse with the services of counsel. In your absence yesterday, I asked the accused to reconsider this decision, deeming it not in his best interests, but he has declined to do so. He has an inalienable right to represent himself here an
d will therefore do so from now on.’

  Julian gave his evidence, as he had given it at the previous trial.

  His cross-examination began and after three quarters of an hour Calaghan was questioning him about the empty cartridge case that had been found near the body.

  ‘Do you dispute the fact that the cartridge case was fired from your gun?’

  ‘How can I?’

  ‘Do you dispute the fact that the cartridge case had been fired on the Saturday in question?’

  ‘Once again, how can I?’

  ‘Do you admit to firing your gun on the ride at the spot where this cartridge was found?’

  ‘I do not.’

  ‘How do you explain the fact that the cartridge was found where it was. Unless it came from your gun when you fired at your brother and killed him?’

  ‘I can’t explain it. I don’t know anything about it. You’re only trying me here because I was in trouble before. If I hadn’t a previous conviction for manslaughter by shooting…’

  ‘It was clear that this was going to happen,’ interrupted the judge. ‘Mr Calaghan, have all the necessary inquiries been made?’

  ‘Yes, my lord.’

  ‘With what result?’

  ‘The accused has never before suffered conviction for any crime.’

  ‘Can you call witnesses to that fact?’

  ‘Yes, my lord.’

  ‘Mr Decker,’ said the judge, ‘full inquiries have been made, making it certain beyond any doubt that you have never suffered conviction for any crime. If you persist in your claim to have suffered such previous conviction, these witnesses will be called to refute your allegation. Do you still wish to maintain that you have been previously convicted of a crime?’

  ‘But I have been.’

  ‘You can do yourself only harm by this. Inevitably, the jury will be led to draw certain conclusions.’

  ‘I’m telling the truth.’

  ‘Mr Calaghan,’ said the judge, ‘the accused will step down from the witness-box and you will call witnesses as to the facts.’

  ‘I was convicted,’ shouted Julian. ‘In the Congo in nineteen-fifty-seven.’

  ‘The… the Congo?’ said the judge.

  ‘I can prove it.’

  ‘How?’

  ‘I have the judgment, signed by the judge.’ Julian brought a large brown envelope from his inside pocket.

  ‘Show it to me.’

  The usher was instructed to collect the envelope. He carried it across to the clerk of the court who handed it to the Bench. The judge opened the envelope and brought out a single sheet of paper which he unfolded. He read the statement which was in French, typewritten, and on headed paper. He put the paper down and consulted passages in two of his law books. ‘Mr Calaghan, under the Act of eighteen-fifty-one, I am obliged to accept this authenticated copy of a judgment since although it bears no seal it specifically states that the court in question has no seal. Further, it purports to be signed by the presiding judge.’ It was a forgery, thought the judge, with bitter anger. It was a forgery, but would it be at all easy to prove it so? Surely, most records in the Congo would have been destroyed during that unhappy country’s civil wars? If Decker had chosen a date when he could show he was abroad… After all, it was only a suspended sentence which had been imposed on him so that a relatively short absence from England would suffice…

  The judge tried to find some way of avoiding what he was obliged to do, but there was no way. He questioned Julian. ‘It is my duty to inform you that when an irregularity such as the accidental disclosure of a previous conviction takes place during the trial of an undefended prisoner, that prisoner has the right to apply that the jury be discharged and the trial be started afresh. If you desire to make such application, you must do so forthwith. Do you so desire?’

  ‘I do,’ replied Julian.

  *

  Faced with a prisoner who had, only temporarily it was hoped, discovered a means by which to use the law to frustrate any trial of himself, the authorities took the only possible course open to them. A nolle prosequi was entered. Although it was usual to enter such a fiat only where the accused person could not be produced in court to plead owing to physical or mental incapacity, it was held that such an entry could be made to meet the unusual needs in the present instance. The nolle prosequi put an end to the proceedings, but did not operate as a bar, a discharge, or an acquittal. Julian would be re-indicted when the law was ready.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Saturday, the 29th of January was a day of contrasts. The sky was cloudless, but the overnight frost had been heavy so that not until late in the morning did the sun melt the white glaze with which everything had been covered. The wind was strong and cold enough to penetrate any amount of clothing and those who were shooting had to choose between being very cold or wearing so many clothes that they could no longer raise their guns easily or swing smoothly.

  In the house, Julian and Henry Decker drank coffee very liberally spiced with rum.

  ‘It’s going to be hell,’ said Julian, ‘but the birds will fly really well. Adams says this frost has driven them all into the coverts.’

  ‘Are you having cocks only at most beats?’

  ‘Just a couple, but no more. I did a bit of research and checked the records and to my mind there’s no doubt that it doesn’t really pay to shoot hens after Christmas. It’s only one year in four or five that the wild hens rear decent sized broods and in all the other years the weather kills off the young. I reckon it’s much better to shoot the hens right through the season and then put down a few more birds than you would have done. Adams, of course, has accused me of heresy.’

  Barbara and Lydia came into the dining room.

  ‘This house is so cold,’ said Lydia. ‘I don’t think we’ll survive. I’m sure it’s not healthy to be cold and that’s why Eskimos die so young and so easily.’

  ‘They die from T.B and ’flu,’ said Julian.

  ‘Nonsense. Germs couldn’t possibly live in such cold.’

  ‘Then on your own argument, the cold must be healthy.’

  ‘Julian, you’re worse than ever. It doesn’t matter what I say, you argue. Your father was quite right when he said you were a born sophist and should have gone into parliament or somewhere equally disreputable. Henry, persuade him to stop arguing.’

  Henry Decker laughed. ‘I’ve always been taught that the Deckers are so pig-headed on certain subjects that no one’s ever been able to teach them that the alphabet doesn’t start at the letter D.’

  ‘That’s rather rude, Henry, but not without its merits.’

  They heard, distantly, the knocking on the front door.

  ‘That’ll be George,’ said Julian. ‘You know George Younger, don’t you, Henry? He’s a damn, good shot on his day, although there’s never any certainty it’s going to be his day. He’s coming in in place of…’ He stopped suddenly.

  The one word ‘Fawcett’ that had not been spoken reminded them all with a brutal shock that this was not just one more shooting party. Julian was there only because the law had found it could not rectify a fault in its make-up as quickly as it wanted to. Soon, the law would be back for him. In the meantime, it was watching him. Doherty had been along the previous day to check if there was going to be a shoot and had then asked that one of his men be allowed to be around ‘just to keep an eye on things.’ Angrily, Julian had demanded whether Doherty expected him to shoot someone else? Doherty had just shaken his head.

  Barbara stepped close to Julian and took hold of his hand in hers, in a gesture that at the same time was comforting him and appealing to him to comfort her.

  George Younger, a tall, thin, spruce man who exactly looked the retired army officer he was, entered the dining-room. He greeted them and gratefully accepted a coffee and rum. ‘By God, that wind’s got knives in it!’ He drank. ‘Are there many birds left, Julian?’

  ‘Adams says there are quite a few. That probably means there are a hell of
a lot.’

  ‘This wind will lift them up.’

  ‘They’ll look like starlings at King’s Beat.’

  Everyone did his or her best to forget why Julian was there and Fawcett was not.

  *

  Adams cursed the beaters for a lot of fiddling pikies. ‘Beat them brambles out,’ he shouted. ‘You won’t get no birds moving by bashing air.’

  ‘Shall we put salt on their tails?’ asked someone.

  ‘You’ll do some bloody work or get back home.’

  Adams moved forward once more and the line moved with him. He saw a hen pheasant get up seventy yards farther on and fly forward. After a while, he heard the sound of a shot. He cursed Mr Julian’s stupid idea of shooting hens at the end of the season. Since time immemorial, no one had shot hens so late because that killed off next season’s crop of birds. But Mr Julian had had his brains twisted by someone, had had a look at the records of the estate and added up the wrong figures, and had come to the wrong conclusions. All he, Adams, could do was to try to drive the hens out sideways so that they never went near the guns, but hens were stupid and seemed to want to go forward in direct contrast to the wily old cocks who were forever trying to break sideways.

  His dog put up a rabbit that was suffering from the first stages of myxomatosis. It moved away, but directly towards a beater who killed it to put it out of its misery. Some townspeople claimed shooting was cruel, thought Adams, but had they any idea what was inflicted on rabbits in the name of better farming so as to feed them with cheap food?

  ‘Straighten the line,’ he called out. Soon, they would be up to the rhododendron bushes and the main flushes. Secretly, he expected a really good drive here.

  *

  Julian watched a cock pheasant fly out of the woods, gain height with beating wings and then plane. The wind drifted it sharply across to the left of him. It was a testing shot. He automatically slipped the safety catch forward, raised the gun to his shoulder, gauged the curving flight, began the swing behind and inside the curve, swung forward and fired. As the gun recoiled, he saw the pheasant’s neck jerk back and both legs drop. The bird arced down to the ground, landing far back in the Larch Plantation. It had been a first-class shot by anyone’s standards. He broke the gun and the empty cartridge in the left-handed barrel – he’d used choke – was ejected several feet away. He pulled a fresh cartridge out of the waist belt and inserted it, closed the gun and, as no other bird was coming over, put his hand in his pocket and depressed the plunger of the counter once.