Heaven Knows Who

by Christianna Brand

  ‘So when I heard a’ was quate and no noise, I gaed away to ma bed again and wisna lang in it till I fell asleep again.’

  ‘How long did you lie?’

  ‘I lay till about six o’clock o’ the morning, and she always used to come up. I lay wauken after that. She always used to come up with a little porridge about eight o’clock.’

  ‘And this morning—did she come up?’

  ‘She did not come up that morning and I was surprised she didna come. I wearied very much for her. I lay still till nine o’clock—’

  ‘And then?’

  ‘Then I raise and put on ma claes. I forget whether I washed masel’ before I went down; but I gaed down to her door and gied three chaps that way.…’

  He knocked three times on the ledge of the witness-box with his knuckles; and the sound must have rung through the courtroom like the knocking at Macbeth’s castle gates. But here was none to answer. ‘I tried the sneck of the door and fan’ that the door was locked. There was no key in the door and sae I gaed up till the store-room’ (i.e. ‘I went into the pantry’).

  ‘The store-room is adjoining the maid’s bedroom?’

  ‘Ay, the store-room and her bedroom was just adjoining ane anither maistly.’

  ‘And in the store-room—?’

  ‘I gaed into the store-room and then I found what was a bit window in the area standing open.’

  ‘Is that window usually open?’

  ‘Nae, it did not use to be that way.’

  ‘Then what did you do?’

  ‘I drew it to and returned to the fire again. The fire was wake. I put some coals on the fire.’

  ‘You say the fire was low; but was it still burning?’

  ‘Ay, it was still burning.’ He added, presumably inconsequentially: ‘That was Saturday morning, ye ken.’

  ‘Saturday morning, yes. And then?’

  ‘And then after that the main door bell was rung. I went to the door. It was Mr Stewart, the next-door neighbour’s servant. I dinna mind her name. She wanted the len’ o’ a spade to clean the back door. She said her people were all away to the coast the nicht before.’

  ‘Did you give her the spade?’

  ‘I gaed doun to get the bit spade to the washing-house, and when I got to the washing-house there was nae key in it. I could not get the key and the girl did not get the spade.’ He added with another of his apparently inconsequential turns: ‘At the same time, ye ken, when I got out to give the girl the spade, the back door was locked, and the key on the inside o’ the door, ye ken. That was the way I gaed down to look for the spade.’

  ‘What o’clock was it?’

  ‘Eleven o’clock,’ said the old man. ‘After that Mr Watson, the baker’s man, cam’ wi’ his van and the bell was rung and I gaed up.’ Mr Watson is not mentioned elsewhere and was not called to give evidence; but here is yet another visitor to whom apparently Mr Fleming did not think fit to mention the odd disappearance of the maid. The same thought may have occurred to him, for he switched again. ‘But did I tell you first about the main door not being locked?’

  ‘No,’ said Mr Gifford, doubtless delighted. ‘Tell us about that.’

  ‘It was not locked. The key was in the inside o’ the door and the door was on the latch; just snecked, ye ken, not locked. Sae whaever had been in,’ elaborated Mr Fleming, ‘they had got out by that door; there is nae doubt of that.’ But that brought him back to his reason for being at the door. ‘An’ so Mr Watson, the baker’s man, ca’ wi’ his van shortly after that servant girl was seeking for the spade, and I took a half-quarter loaf.’ But perhaps, after all, he wouldn’t have been able to confide in Mr Watson about Jess. ‘The man was sitting upon the cart; he had a little boy that handed me in the loaf at the door.’

  ‘And so then?’

  And so then, Mr Fleming is reported as saying—and elsewhere not reported as saying—‘always looking and wearying, windering what had become of Jessie that she did not make her appearance’, he had stopped in till about twelve o’clock and then thought he would go to the office. ‘I looked for the check key and got it on a shelf in the pantry, and I locked the door and went away to the office in Glasgow, and stoppet a wee while there and then I gaed awa’ down to the Briggate to see a property that I had charge of. A water-pipe had burst there two or three days before, and I went down to see if it was all right and to see whether they had plaistered it up—it had to be plaistered up wi’ lime, ye ken. All was right and I cam’ awa’ up again to the office and stopped till about two o’clock.’

  ‘And then?’

  ‘And then I took the bus and gaed up to Sandyford, thinking maybe that Jess would be waiting till I gaed up. But when I got up all was quiet and no appearance of Jess.’

  ‘What did you do?’

  ‘I did not go out again that night. I made masel’ a bit o’ dinner.’

  ‘Did you see anyone?’

  ‘Ay, about seven o’clock at the night the bell was rung and a young man came to the door. He said he was from Falkirk and his name was Darnley. He said he had promised to call on Jess when he was in town. I said she was not in. He went away.’

  ‘What did you do next?’

  ‘My shirts—there were a dozen of them—were on the screens in the kitchen, set on the side of the fire. I laid them by, one by one, off the screens, which were laid against the pantry door—?’

  ‘Against the pantry door?’

  The old man was apparently accustomed to call the true pantry—the small room next to the maid’s room, looking on to the area—the store-room. By the pantry he probably meant the large built-in cupboard in the kitchen. The screens were lying in the kitchen beside the pantry door, he repeated; they had been ‘laid or driven down’—he meant that the screens or clothes-horses had been overturned. ‘There was a pantry door they keep their things in and the screens were either laid or driven ower upon it. So I took my shirts off the screens.’

  ‘Very well. Then what did you do?’

  ‘There was a room off the kitchen that my drawers and kist [chest] stood in, I laid by my shirts.’

  ‘Did you observe anything about your shirts?’ asked Mr Gifford, skipping over it, perhaps, with a carefully casual air. (But it would have to come out!)

  ‘Ay; there were two marked with—like—blood upon them.’ He had laid them by, he added, probably just as casually as Mr Gifford, on the tap o’ the ithers.

  ‘Did you get any supper that night?’

  ‘I made masel’ a cup of tea.’

  ‘What time would this be?’

  ‘It would be eight o’clock. I thought if Jess had gone awa’ with any of her acquaintances she would make her appearance.’

  ‘But she did not?’

  ‘Na, she did not. I sat up till after nine and then went to bed.’ Next morning, he added, the Sabbath, the bell was rung by the milkman; but he did not answer.

  ‘What did you do then?’

  ‘Well, I made ma breakfast again: a cup of tea and a boiled herring to it, that was ma breakfast.’ And then he had gone to church—‘Mr Aikman’s church in Anderston.’

  ‘And then?’

  ‘And then after the church skailed I went straight hame.’

  ‘Did you speak to anyone that morning?’

  ‘When I was going to the church Mr John M’Allister, who was coming out of his house door to go to the church, spoke to me.’

  ‘And in the afternoon—?’

  In the afternoon the pious old gentleman had gone to church again.

  Now another visit from Darnley must be faced. Mr Fleming took it straight. ‘After I was hame, the lad Darnley, who had ca’ed before, ca’ed again and asked if Jess M’Pherson was in. I said no. He asked, “Is she at church?” I said, “I don’t know.” Says he, “If she comes out the town, will she come this way?” I said, “I suppose she will.” He went away. I had no more calls that night that I recollect, and at half-past nine I went to bed.’

  So ended the second da
y of the servant’s being missing; and no word of her disappearance to anyone. Mr Gifford’s heart must have sunk at the thought of conducting his garrulous witness through almost the whole of yet a third. One face in court, however, will have reassured him. The judge would be at hand to help out whenever the old gentleman got into a bit of a tangle. Lord Deas was already quite evidently all for Mr Fleming.

  ‘We come then to Monday morning …?’

  On Monday morning, said Mr Fleming, he had risen at eight o’clock as was usual and went about his business. ‘I afterwards went to the office and gied in what cash I had gotten. I then gaed awa’ hame to Sandyford—’

  ‘What o’clock would this be?’

  ‘This would be about one or two o’clock. All was quiet and I heard naething.’

  ‘What did you do?’

  ‘I kent that Mr Fleming would be hame after he came up frae doun the water and that he would be out for dinner—’

  ‘And when he came?’

  ‘About four o’clock young John came in, and his father followed him.’ He described the discovery of the body. ‘Her head was covered either with a skirt or white sheet, which was all blood, and her body was naked as she was born, downwards; she was lying on her face. He was in an unco’ state tae, and he ran out and got in some neighbours, Mr Chrystal and some ithers, and went to the Police Office.’

  ‘Did the police come?’

  ‘The police officers came directly and took possession of the body. Dr Fleming and Dr Watson were also brought to the spot directly, but their presence was of no avail, ye ken, the woman was gone.’ Some observers report that the old gentleman added approvingly that ‘it was regular that they should be called.’ This was not the moment to remark that he might have thought of it himself three days earlier.

  ‘From the Friday night to the Monday morning, did you make all your own meals?’

  ‘I was not verra particular but I made all that I needed.’

  ‘Did you use any silver spoons or forks?’

  ‘I dinna think I did. If I did, I only used a teaspoon; but I dinna mind.’

  Mr Gifford asked that exhibits eleven to eighteen be shown to the witness; these were the articles of silver recovered from Lundie’s pawn which, Jessie’s first statement declared, the old man had brought to her to be pledged. He identified them as his son’s property: they were in daily use when his son was at home. Mr Gifford, on happier ground at last, asked solemnly: ‘Did you take any of that plate out of the house?’

  Mr Fleming, also on more comfortable ground, had lost his rather senile garrulity. For almost the first time so far in his examination he answered with one word: ‘Never.’

  ‘Did you give them to anybody on that Friday—?’

  ‘I did not.’

  ‘Or that Saturday, Sunday or Monday?’

  ‘I never gave them to any person.’

  ‘Look at the prisoner: do you know her?’

  They confronted one another, those two. But if Jessie hoped that the old man ‘would shudder at it’, she was disappointed. He said simply that yes, he knew her; he had known her first when she was servant to his son John.

  ‘How long is that?’

  ‘She left when the ither girl (Jess M’Pherson?) came back, ye ken.’

  ‘It is some years ago?’

  ‘It will be three years ago, I’se warrant, but my memory is not sae good.’

  ‘Have you seen her since she left your son’s service?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Where?’

  Mr Fleming’s memory was certainly rather peculiar. He could describe three or four specific occasions when he had seen her, more than a year ago, but had apparently forgotten his habit of dropping in at any odd time at the house in the Broomielaw—Jessie’s sister, who had lived with her for eight months in the previous year, had seen him there at least half a dozen times; and we know that the reason that Jessie had taken to timing her visits to Sandyford Place very late was because, if he was still up, she had to see him. ‘She came up along wi’ her husband to pay a visit to Jessie M’Pherson; I saw her that night in Mr Fleming’s house, Sandyford Place; that is twelve months ago.’ But Jess M’Pherson’s foster-sister, Mrs M’Kinnon, had seen Jess only a month before her death, and Jess had told her then—so surely it must have been a fairly recent thing?—that, when Jessie M’Lachlan and her husband had come round, ‘not to give the old man satisfaction’ she had taken them to her own room; but he had come into her room and said, ‘Oh, Jessie, is that you?’ and Jessie had said, ‘Yes, who did you think it was?’ and he ‘had sat them out on that occasion.’

  ‘Did you ever see her anywhere else?’

  ‘Yes, she invited me to see her house.’

  ‘When?’

  ‘A twelvemonth ago.’

  ‘Did you ever see her on any other occasion?’

  ‘I saw her in her own house at another time; that was before she flitted to that other, her last house.’

  ‘How long ago?’

  ‘It would be two or three years ago.’

  And he had seen her also at the examination in the County Buildings. ‘The Sheriff showed her to me there.’ On that occasion, or at least so it was reported, he had denied knowing her at all—Mr Wilson had told Jessie that he had done so. Reminded that she had once been a servant in John Fleming’s house—for two years; and, after all, she knew him well enough to address him as ‘Grandpa’—he had replied that he wouldn’t have taken her for the same person.

  ‘Excepting at those times you have mentioned; you have never seen her, did you?’

  ‘Not since she left my son’s service,’ reiterated old Mr Fleming, undeterred by this curious ellipse of grammar.

  ‘Did you give her these articles?’—referring to the silver plate.

  ‘No, never.’

  ‘Did you ever tell her to pawn them?’

  ‘No, never.’

  ‘Did you see her on the Friday evening that Jessie M’Pherson was a-missing?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Did you ever get any money from her?’

  ‘Never.’

  ‘Did you give her any money on that Friday or Saturday?’

  ‘I did not.’

  ‘Did you ever call at her house excepting on the occasions you have told us about?’

  ‘I only called twice to my recollection.’

  ‘And these are the two occasions you have already referred to?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Have you any money in the bank?’

  ‘Yes, a little.’ A hundred and fifty pounds in the Savings Bank, he said, and thirty in the Royal Bank; he identified his two bankbooks, exhibits 58 and 59.

  Mr Gifford took him back to the business of the pantry window or ‘wicket’ which he said he had found open on the Saturday morning.

  Old Fleming’s motive, if he were lying in this matter, would obviously be to suggest that the murderer had entered by this window, climbing the railings, dropping down into the area, and getting through into the basement via the pantry; killing and robbing the maid, going on upstairs and taking the silver and letting himself out by the front door—which door he said he had found only latched, not locked.

  It is a little difficult to visualise the arrangement of the pantry window. There seems to have been this small barred door or ‘wicket’ leading into the area, with a smaller glass window, working up and down on sash-cords, let into the door. ‘You told us, Mr Fleming, that on the Saturday morning you went into the pantry and found the wicket open?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Did you open the glass window?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘You say that you drew to the wicket?’

  ‘I did.’

  ‘Tell us how you got that done.’

  ‘It was straight open. It opens outwards.’

  ‘Did you put out your hand to pull it to?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘To do that had you to lift the window?’

  ‘It was a little wi
ndow, ye ken, inside of the big window.’

  ‘How did you get hold of the wicket to draw it to?’

  ‘I put out ma hand and drew it tae.’

  ‘Did the glass window not prevent you?’

  ‘I forget,’ said Mr Fleming.

  ‘Is there not a glass window to the pantry?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Was it open or shut when you went into the room?’

  ‘It was open.’

  ‘The glass window was open?’

  ‘Yes, or I could not have got out my hand to draw it tae, ye ken.’

  ‘Well, did you open the glass window or did you find it open?’

  ‘I found it open.’

  ‘The glass window?’

  ‘Yes,’ said the old man. He added, according to one source, ‘I opened naething, but just put oot ma hand and drew it tae.’

  Mr Gifford sat down and Mr Rutherford Clark rose to cross-examine.

  The opening question in a cross-examination is often of paramount importance. The witness has come through his examination-in-chief—a little battered, it may well be if he be not telling the truth, and thankful to have such an ordeal safely over. He relaxes, breathes a sigh of relief; and before he has had time to brace himself for the shocks in store, calmly, without sign or ceremonial of change-over, the next question comes. One man has sat down, one man has risen to his feet, and that is all. But it is his friend who has sat down; the man he now faces is his enemy.

  Mr Rutherford Clark’s first question was: ‘Was your watch right that Saturday morning?’

  The old man must have been taken a little aback; such a casual general question, not apparently leading to anywhere in particular. He answered ‘Yes.’

  ‘You know that?’

  ‘Ay, it gangs very regular,’ said old Mr Fleming.

  ‘Therefore you are sure about the hour you have given us?’

  So that was it!—a point of no particular importance (of no particular danger his heart must have said, if his heart held guilty secrets). He thought counsel referred to the screams he had heard in the night. ‘Yes, exactly four o’clock and a fine clear morning.’