The Second Rumpole Omnibus

by John Mortimer

  But I am going too fast. I should watch his Lordship’s pencil, or my rapidly fading biro. All I wished to bring to your attention at the moment is the remarkable loyalty, as some would say, or the unspeakable clannishness, as others would hold, of the English public school system. Now I would ask you to turn, as my wife Hilda did on that gusty March morning at breakfast time in our mansion flat at 25B Froxbury Court, to the news pages of the Daily Telegraph. Hilda takes the Telegraph, although I prefer the Obituaries and the crossword in The Times. The Telegraph gives Hilda much that she needs, including detailed coverage of many scandalous events. On that particular morning the stories on offer in Hilda’s favourite journal included one entitled, ‘London Vice House Catered for Top People’, and described the committal at the Central Criminal Court of a couple named Lee, on charges of blackmail and keeping a disorderly house.

  ‘Can you understand it, Rumpole?’

  ‘Understand what, Hilda?’ I was spreading butter on my toast and couldn’t see that the news item presented any form of intellectual challenge.

  ‘These members of the aristocracy, top civil servants, and a vicar! Well really, haven’t they got wives?’ No doubt she was referring to the patrons of the Lee house in Barnardine Square.

  ‘Life at the top isn’t all roses, Hilda. Is that the marmalade gone to ground under your Daily Telegraph?’

  ‘Well! Surely a wife’s enough for anyone.’

  ‘Quite enough,’ I said, munching toast and Oxford marmalade.

  ‘So why – run after other women?’ Hilda seemed genuinely puzzled.

  ‘I must confess, I’m baffled.’ It was, I suppose, decidedly rum. I stood up, finishing my toast. Hilda looked at me critically, apparently finding that I might come last in any contest for the best-dressed barrister.

  ‘Rumpole,’ she said, ‘come here. You’ve got marmalade on your waistcoat!’ She fetched a damp teacloth from the kitchen sink and started to dab at me in a violent manner.

  ‘I quite like marmalade on it,’ I protested.

  ‘You’ve got to be careful of your appearance now Guthrie Featherstone’s been made a judge.’

  ‘Out of respect to the dead?’ I wasn’t following her drift.

  ‘Because you’re going to take your rightful place, now Guthrie’s gone, as Head of Chambers! Well, they said they’d come to a final decision, didn’t they, when you got back from the jungle?’

  ‘It wasn’t the jungle, Hilda. It was the High Court of Neranga. Chief Justice Sir Worthington Banzana presiding.’

  Hilda, however, pursued her own train of thought and disregarded the connection. ‘There isn’t another Q.C. to take Guthrie’s place. You’re the only candidate! I shall ask my friend Dodo Mackintosh to take on the catering at your first Chambers party. Marigold Featherstone will never have put on a do like it.’

  I sighed. ‘Those occasions are quite grim enough without Dodo’s rock cakes.’

  ‘Nonsense. Dodo’s pastry’s as light as a feather.’ She stood back, apparently noticing some sartorial improvement in my good self. ‘There now. You look more like a Head of Chambers! Someone fit to take the place Daddy once occupied!’

  I beat it hastily to the door. Hilda hadn’t noticed that, for the sake of greater comfort after my return from Africa, I had taken to wearing a delightful old pair of brown suede shoes with the dark blue suit I wore when I wasn’t actually engaged in any of Her Majesty’s Courts of Justice. Whilst I was working in Chambers I hoped that the Sovereign wouldn’t notice my feet.

  About an hour later I put my head round the door of the clerk’s room in Equity Court and saw Henry checking the diary and Dianne busily decorating her fingernails with some preparation that smelled of model aeroplanes.

  ‘This be the verse you grave for me:

  “Here he lies where he longed to be;

  Home is the sailor, home from the sea,

  And the hunter home from the hill!” ’

  I announced.

  ‘You’re back then, Mr Rumpole.’ Henry scarcely lifted his eyes from the diary.

  ‘And not much thanks to you, Henry,’ I said. ‘That idiotic cable you sent me to Africa! I was almost dragged off to execution.’

  ‘It was my duty to keep you informed, sir, about your position at the Old Bailey.’

  ‘They thought I was going to do a murder. Not appear in one.’

  ‘Oh really!’ Dianne gave one of her silvery laughs. ‘How dreadful!’

  ‘Anyway,’ said Henry, who didn’t seem to appreciate the dire effects of his message. ‘That murder’s gone off. It won’t be this term.’

  ‘I came back ready for anything. Are you trying to tell me there’s no work, Henry?’ I started to open the various bills and circulars which had been awaiting my return.

  ‘Oh, it’s not as bad as that, sir. Mr Staines rang. He wanted a con. today, in the bawdy house case, R. v. Lee.’

  My heart leapt up at the sight of what might be said to be a bit of a cause célèbre.

  ‘Keep thy foot out of brothels, Henry! Such places are no doubt more entertaining to litigate about than to visit. Tell Stainey that I’m ready for him.’ I did a quick sorting job on my correspondence. ‘On Her Majesty’s Service! Hasn’t our gracious Queen anything better to do than to keep writing me letters?’ I shed a pile of expendable mail and opened another envelope. ‘What’s this? A communication from L.A.C.! “Lawyers As Churchgoers – Moral Purpose in the Law – A Call to Witness for all Believing Barristers”!’ I let that one follow the circulars. ‘Brothel case, eh? Not much danger of finding a moral purpose in that, I suppose.’

  At this point Claude Erskine-Brown came into our clerk’s room, started to collect his letters, and looked up to see the traveller returned.

  ‘Rumpole! We thought you’d gone native. We pictured you ruling some primitive tribe under a bong tree!’

  ‘Most amusing, Erskine-Brown!’ I gave him a rapidly disappearing smile. ‘Well, now I suppose I’ve got to take over the extremely primitive tribe in these Chambers?’

  I realized that She Who Must Be Obeyed would never let me hear the last of it if I didn’t claim my rightful place as Head, now that Guthrie Featherstone had been translated.

  ‘We’re deciding the Head of Chambers problem at the end of the month. When we have our meeting.’ Erskine-Brown was always a stickler for formality.

  ‘And after that I’ll have to shoulder the cares of office. No one in Mr Justice Featherstone’s old room, is there, Henry?’

  ‘I don’t think so, but…’

  I had left him and was going up to take possession of the Captain’s Quarters before he could finish his sentence. However, as I was mounting the stairs, Erskine-Brown came panting after me; apparently he had something to communicate in the deepest confidence.

  ‘Horace. I think I should let you know. I’ve done it!’

  ‘Then your only course is to plead guilty.’ I gave him sound legal advice, but the fellow looked distinctly miffed.

  ‘I have applied for silk, Rumpole,’ he said with dignity. ‘I think I’ve got a reasonable chance. Philly’s right behind me.’

  ‘I can’t see her.’ I looked behind him in vain.

  ‘I mean,’ he said, with some impatience, ‘my wife is right behind me in my application for silk. “Claude Erskine-Brown, Q.C.” How do you think it sounds?’

  ‘Pretty encouraging, if you happen to be on the other side.’ He looked displeased at that, so I went on brightly, ‘Tell me, Claude. When is this Q.C. business likely to happen?’

  ‘In about six weeks’ time.’

  ‘After the decision as to Head of Chambers?’

  ‘Yes. I suppose so. After that.’

  ‘Well, that’s all right then. Best of British luck.’

  I gave the man a reassuring slap on the shoulder. Of course, if he were to acquire a silk gown before the Chambers meeting, Claude would be entitled to that position which Hilda had set her heart on for me. As it was, I could see no way of stoppin
g the ‘Rumpole for Head of Chambers’ bandwagon. I entered into my inheritance, Guthrie Featherstone’s old room, and heard the sound of a woman in tears.

  The woman in question was, in fact, no more than a mere slip of a girl. She was wearing dark clothes, had longish dark hair and, from what I could see of her face, she was extremely personable. At that moment she was in clear distress; her eyes were pinkish, she was dabbing at them with a small handkerchief which she had wound into a ball, and an occasional sob escaped her.

  ‘I’m sorry.’ I didn’t quite know why I was apologizing; perhaps it was because I had intruded on private grief. ‘Can I help at all?’

  She looked up at me guiltily, as though I had caught her doing something wrong. ‘I thought it was all right to come in here,’ she excused herself. ‘Doesn’t this room belong to a judge who doesn’t come here any more?’

  ‘Bare ruin’d choirs, where late old Guthrie sang. Yes that’s right.’ I was overcome by curiosity. ‘What’s the trouble? Shoplifting? You look too young for a divorce.’

  ‘I’m a b… b… barrister.’ She sobbed again.

  ‘Oh, bad luck!’ I was sorry it seemed to be causing her such distress, and I offered her a large red-and-white spotted handkerchief as a back-up to the sodden ball of lace she was clutching.

  ‘I’m Mrs Erskine-Brown’s pupil. Thanks.’ She dabbed her eyes again.

  ‘Mrs Erskine-Brown, Phillida Trant that was, the Portia of our Chambers? Miss Trant now has a pupil? How time flies!’ Much had happened, it seemed, during my absence in the tropics.

  ‘She left me in a case after lunch at Tower Bridge. Well, there was a terrible argument about the evidence and I said I couldn’t do it without my learned leader, Miss Trant, who was in a difficulty.’

  ‘You should have plunged in – taken your chance,’ I told her.

  ‘And the Magistrate said, “What sort of difficulty?” and I said, “I think she’s still at the hairdresser.” ’

  I could understand our Portia’s irritation with her tactless and inexperienced pupil. ‘You forgot the most important lesson at the Bar,’ I told her. ‘Protect the private life of your learned pupil master – or mistress.’

  ‘Now Mrs Erskine-Brown says I’m wet behind the ears and I’d better get a nice job in the Glove Department at Harrods. She says that they probably won’t want another woman in Chambers anyway.’ She gave one final sniff, and handed me back my handkerchief.

  ‘Got a name, I suppose?’ I asked her.

  ‘Fiona Allways.’

  ‘Well, it’s not your fault,’ I comforted her.

  ‘It’s all I’ve ever wanted to be,’ Fiona Allways explained. ‘When the girls at school wanted to ride show-jumpers, I just stood in front of the mirror and made speeches in murder cases!’

  I looked at her, made a decision and went to sit behind Featherstone’s old desk.

  ‘I’ve got a conference later. You could take a note of it, if you’d like to. Make yourself useful. No particular objection to prostitution, have you?’ To my dismay she seemed to be about to cry again. ‘Well, what on earth’s the matter now?’

  Miss Allways looked at me, fighting back her tears, and said, ‘I suppose that’s all you think I’m fit for!’

  The police had been keeping observation on the Lees’ large Victorian house in Barnardine Square for weeks. They had chronicled, in boring detail, the visits of a large number of middle-aged men of respectable appearance to that address and had seen girls arrive in the morning and leave at night.

  On the day of the arrest, a particularly respectable middle-aged man arrived on the doorstep, rang the bell, and was heard to say in to the door speaker, ‘I’m a caller. Come to visit a friendly house.’ He was a man who would subsequently become unknown to the world as ‘Mr X’. As the door was opened, police officers invaded the house and flushed out a large number of distinguished citizens in positions of unusual friendliness with certain youngish ladies. Mr X was asked for his name and address and subsequently gave a lengthy statement to the police. Both Mr Napier Lee, the owner of the premises, and his wife, Mrs Lorraine Lee, were present when the police raided. Mr Lee protested and said that an Englishman’s home was, after all, his castle. Mrs Lee asked if the matter couldn’t be dealt with in a civilized manner, and invited the officers to take a nice cup of Earl Grey tea. Now Mr and Mrs Lee were in conference with my learned self; also present were Mr Staines, our solicitor, and Miss Fiona Allways, who had so far recovered her spirits as to be able to take a note.

  ‘Apart from the little matter of keeping a disorderly house,’ I reminded the assembled company, ‘there’s an extremely unpleasant charge of blackmail.’

  ‘Demanding money with menaces. I have explained that to the clients,’ said Mr Staines.

  ‘Neither Napier nor I can understand anyone saying that about us, can we, Nappy?’ Mrs Lee sounded deeply hurt. ‘All our clients are such awfully decent people. Public school, of course, and I do think that makes such a difference.’

  This madame, I thought, would appear to be the most appalling old snob. I looked at my visitors. Mr and Mrs Lee were the sort of genteel, greying couple you might meet any day at the Chelsea Flower Show. He was wearing an elderly tweed suit, meticulously polished shoes, and what I later assumed to be an Old Lawnhurst tie. Mrs Lee was in a twinset and pearls, with a tweed skirt and brogues. Only Mr Staines, the solicitor, who affected striped suits and a number of rings, looked anything like a ponce.

  ‘All our visitors are thoroughly good sorts, Mr Rumpole,’ Mr Lee assured me. ‘All out of the absolutely top drawer, not a four-letter man among them! And I’ll tell you something else my lady and I have noticed, haven’t we, Lorraine?’

  ‘What’s that, Nappy?’ His wife smiled vaguely.

  ‘Absolutely no side. I mean, they come into our home and behave just like one of us.’

  ‘I’m sure they do,’ I murmured.

  ‘Napier was at Lawnhurst,’ Mrs Lee told me proudly. ‘Down for it from birth, weren’t you, Nappy?’

  ‘Oh yes. The guv’nor put me down for Lawnhurst at birth.’

  We had had enough, I thought, of childhood reminiscences, and I spoke a little sharply. ‘Mrs Lorraine Lee, Mr Napier Lee, it may be all very pleasant to sit here, over a cup of tea, and discuss the merits of the public school system, but you are charged with obtaining money by threats from a certain…’

  ‘Please, Mr Rumpole!’ Mrs Lee held up her hand in a call for discretion.

  ‘There’s no need to name names, is there?’ Mr Napier Lee asked anxiously.

  ‘Not when it comes to a man in his position.’ Mrs Lee was referring, deferentially, to the future ‘Mr X’.

  ‘Lawnhurst, New College Oxford, the Brigade of Guards and then the Ministry.’ Mr Lee gave the man’s curriculum vitae.

  ‘Napier was destined for the Foreign Office if his guv’nor hadn’t had a bit of bad luck in the City, weren’t you Nappy?’ Mrs Lee was now positively glowing with pride.

  ‘Well, dear. I never had the “parlez-vous” for the Foreign Office.’ Mr Lee smiled at his wife modestly. I was anxious to return to the case and picked up a couple of accounts from the brief.

  ‘This gentleman in question seems, from time to time, to have paid your gas bills,’ I reminded them.

  ‘When business was slack, I’m not denying it, he helped us out, Mr Rumpole.’ Mrs Lee smiled with extreme candour.

  ‘And did you threaten to publish his little secret?’ It was the sixty-four-thousand-dollar question, but the Lees rejected the suggestion with disdain.

  ‘Oh no. He knew we’d never have done that. Didn’t he, Nappy?’ Mrs Lee appealed to her husband.

  ‘Of course he knew. That would have been against the code, wouldn’t it?’

  ‘Sneaking! One does not sneak, does one?’ Mrs Lee gathered up her handbag, as though to bring the proceedings to an end. ‘Well Nappy,’ she said, ‘I really think that’s all we can tell Mr Rumpole.’

  ‘No, it’s no
t,’ I said firmly. ‘You can tell me something else. How did you get into this business?’ I asked Mrs Lee. ‘Looking at you, a small cardigan shop in Cheltenham Spa might have seemed more appropriate.’

  ‘Napier had a bit of bad luck in the City. Also his health wasn’t quite up to it after the war.’

  ‘Ticker a bit dicky. You know the sort of thing.’

  ‘It was Nappy’s war service.’

  ‘Four years playing a long innings against Brother Boche.’

  ‘And Napier had a dicky ticker.’

  ‘Then I happened to run into a friend. Quite by chance,’ Mr Lee told me. ‘Well, we discussed the possibilities of a business along the lines of the one we’re running now.’

  ‘A friendly house!’ Mrs Lee smiled. ‘For the nicer sort of customer. People Nappy got to know on the “Old Boy Net”.’

  ‘And this fellow very decently came up with a spot of capital.’

  ‘And was this helpful friend someone you’d known for a long time?’

  ‘Oh yes. An old “mate”, you understand. From way back. Of course, we’d drifted apart a bit, over the years.’

  ‘An old school friend, perhaps?’ I suggested.

  ‘Oh, Napier couldn’t possibly tell you that.’ Mrs Lee pursed her lips.

  ‘No. I couldn’t tell you that,’ Napier agreed.

  ‘Against the code?’ I wondered.

  ‘The unwritten law,’ Napier said. ‘The sort of thing that just isn’t done. It would be as unthinkable as…’ He searched for some suitable enormity. ‘Well, as wearing brown suede shoes with a blue suit, for instance.’ Then he looked down at my feet.

  ‘Don’t worry,’ I said. ‘I wasn’t at Lawnhurst, you know.’

  When the conference was over, I went into the clerk’s room to say goodnight to the workers. There Henry told me, somewhat puzzled, that he had just had a telephone call from She Who Must Be Obeyed.

  ‘Did she want me?’ I wondered what I had done amiss.