Not that people were jumpy without reason. It was war all right. Out in the September sea off Ireland, the liner Athenia, packed as full of children as a day‐nursery, was settling down in the water with half her keel blown away by a torpedo. And the U‐boat that had fired it was standing by on the surface, shelling the survivors. There was something fateful and symbolic about the whole affair. It was as though the uneasy quarter‐century since 1914 had come round full circle, and von Tirpitz was risen from his grave to re‐direct operations.
It was the same on the Continent. The Great War had come again. Only this time it was east and not west that the Germans were striking. Belgium was safe in its neutrality. But Poland, sliced like a ham, had been made into a neat sandwich with Germany and the U.S.S.R. squeezing it tighter every day. People, remembering Finland, talked about the Russians being as bad as the Nazis – it certainly didn’t look good with the Communist Party standing out against the war – and wise men reminded the world that it is always easier to start a war than to end one. And so it went on. Policemen wore tin‐helmets and fire‐pumps were attached as trailers to the backs of taxis. Peace News doubled its circulation and shoppers carried their gas‐masks in their baskets. Income tax was at seven and sixpence and the National Register was taken. Sandbags were piled in doorways and the barrage balloons floated overhead like silver sheep. There was a black‐out all over Britain and Winston was back at the Admiralty.
And all the time, the law – quiet, methodical and as undistracted as ever – had been proceeding with its briefs and depositions, its summons to jurors and its calendar of trials. Everything was now ready for the case of Rex v. Percy Aloysius Boon.
2
There is nothing in the least prepossessing about the Old Bailey, even from the outside. It has none of the complicated Gothic charm of the Law Courts – all Tennysonian turrets and arrow‐slits and things – and none of the almost domestic friendliness of the better‐class County Courts. It is just a large bleak factory of criminal law with an enormous gilt doll, dressed up as Justice, standing on top of the dome, and a public lavatory and an A.B.C. tea‐shop opposite. Old Bailey itself is a miserable thoroughfare, narrowing down at the Ludgate Hill end until it looks as though you could scarcely get a horse and cart through it. The other frontage – on Newgate St – is better. But that isn’t where they’ve put the front door.
For a big murder trial the crowd begins to form quite early. It has to. The Central Criminal Court is so much taken up with the judges and the counsel and the clerks and the witnesses and the jury and the prisoners that there is hardly any room for the public. Just a few benches up against one of the walls. Many quite promising amateur criminologists have been turned away by the ‘House Full’ notice. Of course if you know one of the judges or have had a K.C. to dinner it’s different. There are private tickets for the Old Bailey just as there are for everything else. Society ladies can pretty nearly always get in when they feel like it. But the humbler folk, retired civil servants and old clergymen up from the country for the day, can rarely find a seat without a tussle. It’s one law for the poor and another for the rich.
Mr Josser was one of the privileged ones. He’d got a ticket: Mr Barks had seen to that. But somehow he wasn’t looking forward to using it.
‘I don’t like it, Mother,’ he said. ‘I know everything’s going to be all right. But I can’t help it. I don’t like it.’
Mrs Josser made no reply, because Mr Josser had said the same thing twice already and she had answered on the two previous occasions. There had been a lot of discussion as to whether she should go with him, and she had finally decided against it. She couldn’t, despite everything that Mr Josser had told her about the way Percy was taking it, believe that he wouldn’t be embarrassed to see her sitting there. Even the thought of being able to write to tell Mrs Boon all about it afterwards hadn’t moved her. The mere thought of the Old Bailey sent cold shivers through her and she was afraid that she might faint or something. All the same as the time drew nearer – Mr Josser was already lacing up his boots – she half regretted her decision.
‘They’re devils some of those barristers,’ Mr Josser observed from somewhere down at knee‐level. ‘They don’t mind what questions they ask.’
‘He’s got that Mr Blaize on his side, hasn’t he?’ Mrs Josser answered. ‘Oh yes, he’s got Mr Veesey Blaize all right,’ Mr Josser replied. ‘But, after all, he’s only human. He doesn’t know what the prosecution may have discovered. It’s like that in a law court – you can’t tell from one moment to the next. It’s enough to tear the hide off a man.’
Mrs Josser regarded him out of the corner of her spectacles.
‘Have you ever been to one?’ she asked him.
Mr Josser glanced up for a moment.
‘No,’ he admitted. ‘If you put it like that, I haven’t.’
He gave a short tug at his lace as he spoke and said, ‘Damn!’
His lace, his practically new lace, had snapped off short and he had to start again from the very bottom.
‘Poor old Percy,’ he said at length. ‘I don’t rightly know how I’m going to stand it. Not if anything goes wrong, that is.’
That settled it in Mrs Josser’s mind.
‘Would you feel better if I came too!’ she asked.
Mr Josser gave a rather sad little smile at the suggestion.
‘Do you know, Mother, I would,’ he said. ‘It’d make all the difference.’
It was just what he had been longing for. And he knew that Percy would appreciate it. It would show that, even in his trouble, Dulcimer Street hadn’t entirely forgotten him.
3
They had a bit of a surprise when they reached Ludgate Circus. There just in front of them was Mr Puddy. With a small attaché case in his hand he was crossing the road in the direction of Benson’s.
‘D’you see who’s there?’ Mr Josser asked.
Mrs Josser drew in her lips.
‘I do,’ she said. ‘He’s probably going too.’
‘Oh, no,’ Mr Josser told her. ‘He wouldn’t be doing that. Not him. He hardly knew Percy…’
There was no difficulty for the Jossers when they reached the Old Bailey. Mr Barks’ card had seen to that. A policeman, looking rather strange without his helmet, took them straight along as though they owned the place. They were given seats in what seemed to be a kind of family pew.
Mr Josser looked around him. There wasn’t much doing yet because it was early. A junior counsel in wig and gown was undoing a large bundle of papers tied together with red tape and a small man in a black office coat was sharpening a pencil. Two large policemen with nothing to do talked in whispers. Mr Josser let his eyes rest on the huge coat of arms above the judge’s throne. It was about the most interesting thing in the room. The judge hadn’t appeared yet. Nor had Percy.
He was quite startled when Mrs Josser dug him suddenly with her elbow.
‘Look up there,’ she said.
Mr Josser looked. Over the rail of the public gallery a small dried‐up face under a black hat with a feather peony on it was showing. The face was turned in Mr Josser’s direction, and one eye in it winked. It was Connie. But in his astonishment at what he saw behind her, Mr Josser scarcely noticed Connie. One row back, and in the opposite corner, sat Mrs Vizzard, very smart‐looking in a new black costume, and beside her was Mr Squales wearing his light grey.
‘Well, if that isn’t nice of them,’ said Mr Josser.
‘They didn’t tell me they were coming,’ Mrs Josser replied, and drew in her lips.
But at that moment there was a distraction. Mr Barks wearing a creaseless blue suit and carrying another sheaf of papers came bustling in breathing heavily, and at his elbow marched a squat square man whose face under the grey wig was almost mulberry coloured. The junior got up and greeted him politely.
‘That’ll be Veesey Blaize,’ Mr Josser whispered.
They were both looking at him when Mr Blaize without even putting
his hand up to his mouth closed his eyes and yawned. Evidently he had been up into the small hours poring over his brief. All the same, both Mr and Mrs Josser were secretly a little disappointed that he didn’t seem fresher. He might just have been roused from a rather long after‐luncheon slumber. Mr Josser in particular had a sudden doubt as to whether he was going to get his money’s worth.
By now, however, there was too much going on for them to concentrate exclusively on Mr Veesey Blaize. Already, the jury was filing in. They were not an impressive lot. Indeed, they might have been chosen by an unenterprising casting director who had rung up a theatrical agency and asked for a dozen little puddingy people, eleven men and a woman. At least six of them were completely interchangeable and the other five had the air of being made up of spare parts. They all wore neat dark suits. The identical six wore hard white collars and the other five had dimly‐coloured ones. Even the woman was wearing a dark dress with a white collar like a governess’s. And in character they seemed to have something in common, too: they were wuffly and undecided. Even though there were only three rows of benches on which to sit, the little puddingy people couldn’t decide where to place themselves. Then one of them, slightly rounder and fuller than the rest, seated himself in the front row nearest to the judge’s throne and undid his coat. He had a thick gold watch‐chain with which he started to fiddle. It was obvious that when the time came, he was going to be foreman.
Mr Veesey Blaize took one glance at them and then yawned again. Altogether he seemed extraordinarily out of sorts this morning. He pulled himself together, however, when another learned counsel came in and said good‐morning to him. For a moment he became alert and affable in a big bland sort of way – became in fact more what Mr Josser had imagined him. But this may have been only because the other counsel was such an impressive figure of a man that Mr Veesey Blaize felt that he simply had to do something to keep up his own dignity.
At first, indeed, Mr Josser had thought that the newcomer must be the judge himself. He was as tall as a Guardsman and had a large grey face with all the features just a shade too pronounced. When he spoke his Adam’s apple, absurdly prominent between the two wings of his collar, rose and fell as though it were on a spring. He kept rubbing his long colourless hands together, alternately stroking first one and then the other.
Indeed, after the sight of him – he was Mr Henry Wassall, K.C. for the prosecution – the judge himself came as a bit of a disappointment. The usher called something out, the whole court stood up and, emerging from a kind of stage door, on to the bench clambered a tiny pink‐and‐white man all bundled up in his enormous wig and robes of office. He was such a small and insignificant little body that it seemed impossible that he should be in charge of things. In charge of Mr Veesey Blaize with that terrifying temper of his hidden away somewhere behind the yawn, and of the big‐boned Mr Wassall with the all‐grey face. Even his pink‐and‐whiteness did not appear to have anything to do with good health. It was of an extreme delicacy all its own and suggested that his lordship on rising had spread a thin layer of peach‐blossom porcelain over his old cheeks. Altogether Mr Justice Plymme cut a disturbingly dainty and fragile sort of figure.
But this was only a layman’s view of things. The Law knew Mr Justice Plymme and respected him. So did the Society of Fine Arts and the English Madrigal Society. Likewise Queen’s Club and Shaftesbury Avenue and the Flyfishers’. For Mr Plymme off duty went everywhere and did everything. He was a kind of respectable bachelor leprechaun who exhibited himself at first nights and private views and tennis finals. And after dinner his thin voice, high and clear like a choir‐boy’s, had been heard rising in one city hall after another, urbane, cynical and remorselessly witty, in a brittle, brilliant sort of fashion. Mr Justice Plymme, in fact, was one of the cries of old London.
When Percy was called and stood there in between the two warders, Mr Josser couldn’t at first bear to look at him. And, when he did look, it was all just as he had feared. He looked so out of place there. It needed only one glance at the purplish suit, the coloured handkerchief and his fair wavy hair to see that he belonged to a different world altogether. He’d obviously got himself up pretty carefully for the occasion. But, even so, you could see that he was nervous. A faint smile kept playing round the corners of his mouth as he peered about him.
An astonishing amount of time was wasted at the outset in proving that Percy Boon was really Percy Boon. It suggested that Mr Wassall had been badly caught that way before. Then the prosecution began calling witnesses. And to Mr Josser’s amazement it was all old stuff. They were simply going over everything that had been said at the police court; checking up on the magistrate as it were. First of all, there was the accountant from Norbury. He identified the car. It was an Austin 12, No. PQJ 1776 that he had bought new three months before. It was practically new. He had taken it to the local Carlton and had left it locked in the car‐park. When he had come out shortly after eleven the car was missing. Was he quite sure that he had locked it? Quite sure. He spoke in a clipped, busy‐sounding kind of voice and Mr Wassall was obviously prepared to take his word for things. He thanked him in a dead, formal manner and told him that he could stand down.
Dead. Yes, that was it. Mr Wassall’s own voice was like something rumbling round in a tomb. By the time it reached the open court there was a distinctly coffiny and brass‐handle ring to it.
The next witness whom Mr Wassall called was a policeman. The evidence proceeded as smoothly as though it had been rehearsed – which, in the circumstances, wasn’t really surprising.
Mr Wassall:
‘You are P.C. Lamb?’
P.C. Lamb:
‘I am.’
Mr Wassall:
‘Where were you on the evening of the 3rd June, 1939?’
P.C. Lamb:
‘I was on Wimbledon Common, sir.’
Mr Wassall:
‘What part of Wimbledon Common?’
P.C. Lamb:
‘On the main Wimbledon–Putney Road. By the Long Pond.’
Mr Wassall:
‘There had been an accident, hadn’t there?’ P.C. Lamb: ‘There had.’
Mr Wassall:
‘What sort of an accident?’
P.C. Lamb:
‘A cyclist had been knocked off his machine and injured.’
Mr Wassall:
‘Well, what did you do about it?’
P.C. Lamb:
‘I moved the injured man to the side of the road and sent someone to ring for an ambulance.’
Mr Wassall:
‘I see. You had moved the injured man to the side of the road. So you weren’t causing any obstruction. There was room for, let us say, a car to get past without disturbing either of you.’
P.C. Lamb:
‘There was room for two cars…’
Mr Veesey Blaize rose suddenly to his feet.
‘M’ lud,’ he said, ‘I object. Can the examination really be necessary? This is a murder case that your lordship is hearing, not a running down charge.’
Mr Justice Plymme turned towards Mr Wassall.
‘I suppose that there is some relevance in the constable’s evidence, Mr Wassall?’ he asked.
He spoke in a polite, interested voice as though he would not have minded in the least if Mr Wassall had told him that nothing had got to do with anything.
‘Of the first relevance, m’lud,’ Mr Wassall replied promptly. ‘It is quite essential to the prosecution, in fact. I am afraid that I shall have to ask your Lordship’s indulgence for a long sitting if my learned friend is to interrupt me further in this way.’
‘Then pray proceed, Mr Wassall,’ Mr Justice Plymme invited him. ‘So much evidence that is irrelevant is heard in every court that your assurance is most welcome.’
Up in the press gallery the reporters began writing hard. It was the first clash between Mr Veesey Blaize and Mr Wassall and also Mr Justice Plymme’s first bon‐mot. Every one seemed pleased. Mr Wassall continu
ed louder than ever.
Mr Wassall: ‘Yet you were nearly run into, were you not?’ P.C. Lamb: ‘I was.’
Mr Wassall: ‘By what?’
P.C. Lamb: ‘By a car.’
Mr Wassall: ‘What kind of a car?’
P.C. Lamb: ‘By an Austin 12.’
Mr Wassall: ‘Did you obtain the number of the car?’
P.C. Lamb: ‘I did.’
Mr Wassall: ‘Well, tell the court what it was.’
P.C. Lamb: ‘It was PQJ 1776.’
Mr Wassall: ‘How did it happen?’
P.C. Lamb: ‘I stepped into the roadway and raised my hand.’
Mr Wassall: ‘How far were you out from the kerb?’
P.C. Lamb: ‘There wasn’t a kerb, sir.’
Mr Wassall uttered a deep, grampus‐like sigh. Then he blew his nose and resumed.
Mr Wassall: ‘Well, how far were you from the side of the road? From the grass verge or whatever it was.’
P.C. Lamb: ‘About a yard.’
Mr Wassall: ‘And how wide is the road?’
P.C. Lamb: ‘Twenty‐eight feet.’
Mr Wassall: ‘Did the car try to avoid you?’
P.C. Lamb: ‘No, sir. It came straight on in a direct line.’
Mr Wassall: ‘What did you do?’
P.C. Lamb: ‘I jumped clear.’
There was a noise, half titter half sneeze, from Connie’s corner of the public gallery. P.C. Lamb was a large man and it would have been funny to see him jumping clear of anything. But the joke was a purely private one and the court continued without pausing.
Mr Wassall: ‘Did you see the person who was driving?’
P.C. Lamb: ‘I did.’
Mr Wassall: ‘Was it a woman?’
P.C. Lamb: ‘No, sir.’
Mr Wassall: ‘Then it was a man?’
Mr Josser was staring at Mr Wassall in amazement. Really, he seemed to have an intelligence of the most obvious kind.
P.C. Lamb: ‘Yes, sir.’
London Belongs to Me Page 52
