John Mortimer - Rumpole On Trial

by Rumpole On Trial(lit)

  'It's not the sort of record, is it, Mr Rumpole, that you might expect a good father to have?' The Chair smiled as she invited me to agree but I declined to do so. 'Oh, I don't know,' I said. 'Are only the most law-abiding citizens meant to have children? Are we about to remove their offspring from share-pushers, insider dealers and politicians who don't tell the truth? If we did, even this tireless Local Authority would run out of Children's Homes to bang them up in.' 'Speeches come later, Mr Rumpole.' The loquacious clerk could keep silent no longer.

  'They will,' I promised him. 'Cary Timson is a humble member of the Clan Timson, that vast family of South 29 London villains. Now, remind us of the name of that imaginative little boy you interviewed on prime-time television.' 'Dominic Molloy.' Mirabelle knew it by heart.

  'Molloy, yes. And, as we've been told so often, you are an extremely experienced social worker.' 'I think so.' 'With a vast knowledge of the social life in this part of South London?' 'I get to know a good deal. Yes, of course I do.' 'Of course. So it will come as no surprise to you if I suggest a that the Molloys are a large family of villains of a slightly more dangerous nature than the Timsons.' 'I didn't know that. But if you say so...' 'Oh, I do say so. Did you meet Dominic's mother, Mrs Peggy Molloy?' 'Oh, yes. I had a good old chat with Mum. Over a cuppa.' The Bench and Mirabelle exchanged smiles. I 'And over a cuppa did she tell you that her husband, Gareth, Dominic's dad, was in Wandsworth as a result of the Tobler Road supermarket affair?' 'Mr Rumpole. My Bench is wondering if this is entirely relevant.' The clerk had been whispering to the Chair and handed the words down from on high.

  'Then let your Bench keep quiet and listen,' I told him.

  'It'll soon find out. So what's the answer. Miss Jones? Did you know that?' 'I didn't know that Dominic's dad was in prison.' Miss Jones adopted something of a light, insouciant tone.

  'And that he suspected Tracy's dad, as you would call him, Cary Timson, of having been the police informer who put him there?' 'Did he?' The witness seemed to find all this talk of adult crime somewhat tedious.

  'Oh, yes. And I shall be calling hearsay evidence to prove it. Miss Jones, are you telling this Bench that you, an experienced social worker, didn't bother to find out about the deep hatred that exists between the Molloys and the Timsons, stretching back over generations of villainy to the dark days when Crockthorpe was a village and the local villains swung at the crossroads?' 'I have nothing about that in my file,' Mirabelle told us, as though that made all such evidence completely unimportant.

  'Nothing in your file. And your file hasn't considered the possibility that young Dominic Molloy might have been encouraged to put an innocent little girl of a rival family "in the frame", as we're inclined to call it down the Old Bailey?' 'It seems rather far-fetched to me.' Mirabelle gave me her most superior smile.

  'Far-fetched, Miss Jones, to you who believe in devilworship?' 'I believe in evil influences on children.' Mirabelle chose her words carefully. 'Yes.' 'Then let us just examine that. Your superstitions were first excited by the fact that a number of children appeared in the playground of Crockthorpe Junior wearing masks?' 'Devil's masks. Yes.' 'Yet the only one you took into so-called care was Tracy Timson?' 'She was the ring-leader. I discovered that Tracy had brought the masks to school in the kit-bag with her lunch and her reading books.' 'Did you ask her where she got them from?' 'I did. Of course, she wouldn't tell me.' Mirabelle smiled and I knew a possible reason for Tracy's silence. Even if Cary had been indulging in satanic rituals his daughter would never have grassed on him.

  'I assumed it was from her father.' Mirabelle inserted her elegant boot once more.

  'Miss Mirabelle Jones. Let's hope that at some point we'll get to a little reliable evidence, and that this case doesn't rely entirely on your assumptions.' The lunchbreak came none too soon and Mr Bernard and I went in search of a convenient watering-hole. The Jolly Grocer was to Pommeroy's Wine Bar what the Crockthorpe Court was to the Old Bailey. It was a large, bleak pub and the lounge bar was resonant with the bleeping of computer games and the sound of muzak. Pommeroy's claret may be at the bottom end of the market, but I suspected that The Jolly Grocer's red would be pure paint stripper. I refreshed myself on a couple of bottles of Guinness and a pork pie, which was only a little better than minced rubber encased in cardboard, and then we started the short walk back to the Crockthorpe Palais de Justice.

  On the way I let Bernard know my view of the proceedings so far. 'It's all very well to accuse the deeply caring Miss Mirabelle Jones of guessing,' I told him, 'but we've got to tell the old darlings on the bench, bonny Bernard, where the hell the masks came from.' 'Our client, Mr Cary Timson...' 'You mean "Dad"?' 'Yes. He denies all knowledge.' 'Does he?' And then, quite suddenly, I came to a halt. I found myself outside a shop called Wedges Carnival and Novelty Stores. The window was full of games, fancy-dress, hats, crackers, Hallowe'en costumes. Father Christmas costumes, masks and other equipment for parties and general merrymaking. It was while I was gazing with a wild surmise at these goods on display that I said to Mr Bernard, in the somewhat awestruck tone of a watcher of the skies when a new planet swims into his ken, 'Well, he would, wouldn't he?

  The honour of the Timsons.' 'What do you mean, Mr Rumpole?' 'What's the name of this street? Is it by any chance...?' It was. My instructing solicitor, looking up at a street sign, said, 'Gunston Avenue.' 'Who robbed Wedges?' We had arrived back at the courthouse with ten minutes in hand and I found Cary Timson smoking a last fag on the gravel outside the main entrance. His wife was with him and I lost no time in asking the vital question.

  ''Mr Rumpole', Tracy's dad looked round and lowered his voice, "you know I can't ' 'Grass? It's the code of the Timsons, isn't it? Well, let me tell you, Cary. There's something even more important than your precious code.' 'I don't know it, then.' 'Oh, yes, you do. You know it perfectly well. Get that wallet out, why don't you? Look at the photographs you were so pleased to show me. Look at them, Cary!' Cary took out his wallet and looked obediently at the pictures of the much-loved Tracy.

  'Is she less important than honour among thieves?' I asked them both. Roz looked at her husband, her jaw set and her eyes full of determination. I knew then what the answer to my question would have to be.

  The afternoon's proceedings dragged on without any new drama, and although Cary had told me what I needed to know I hadn't yet got his leave to use the information. The extended Timson family would have to be consulted. When the day's work was done I took the tube back to the Temple and, with my alcohol content having sunk to a dangerous low, I went at once to Pommeroy's for First Aid.

  Then I was unfortunate enough to meet my proposed cuckoo, the old Etonian Charlie Wisbeach, who, being not entirely responsible for his actions, was administering champagne to a toothy and Sloaney girl solicitor called, if I can bring myself to remember the occasion when she instructed me in a robbery and forgot to summon the vital witness, Miss Arabella Munday. Wisbeach greeted me with a raucous cry of 'Rumpole, old man! Glass of Bolly?' 'Why? What are you celebrating?' I did my best to sound icy; all the same I possessed myself of a glass, which he filled unsteadily.

  'Ballard asked me in for a chat. It seems there may be a vacancy in your Chambers, Rumpole.' 'Wherever Ballard is there's always a vacancy. What do you mean exactly?' 'Pity you blotted your copybook.' 'My what?' 'Not very clever of you, was it? Defending devil-worshippers with such a remarkably devout Head of Chambers. It seems I may soon be occupying your room, old man, looking down on the Temple Church and Oliver Goldsmith's tomb.' I looked at the slightly swaying Wisbeach for a long time and then, as I sized up the enemy, a kind of plot began to form itself in my mind. 'Dr Johnson's,' I corrected the man again.

  'You told me it was Oliver Goldsmith's.' 'No, I told you it was Dr Johnson's.' 'Goldsmith's.' 'Johnson's.' 'You want to bet?' Charlie Wisbeach's face moved uncomfortably close to mine. 'Does old roly-poly Rumpole want to put his money where his mouth is, does he?' 'Ten quid says it's Johnson.' 'I'm going to give you
odds.' Charlie was clearly an experienced gambler. 'Three to one against Johnson. Oily Goldsmith evens. Twenty to one the field. Since I'm taking over the room we'll check on it tomorrow.' 'Why not now?' I challenged him.

  'What?' 'Why not check on it now?' I repeated. 'Thirty quid in my pocket and I can take a taxi home.' 'Ten quid down and you'll walk. All right, then. Come on, Arabella. Bring the bottle, old girl.' As they left Pommeroy's, I hung behind and then went to the telephone on the wall by the Gents. I had seen the light in Ballard's window when I came up from Temple station. He usually worked late, partly because he was a slow study so far as even the simplest brief was concerned and partly, I believe, because of a natural reluctance to go home to his wife, Marguerite, a trained nurse, who had once been the Old Bailey's merciless Matron. I put in a quick telephone call to Soapy Sam and advised him to look out of his window in about five minutes' time and pay particular attention to any goings on in the Temple churchyard. Then I went to view the proceedings from a safe distance.

  What I saw, and what Sam Ballard saw from his grandstand view, was Charlie Wisbeach holding a bottle and a blonde. He gave a triumphant cry of 'Oliver Goldsmith!' and then mounted the tomb as though it were a hunter and, alternately swigging from the bottle and kissing Miss Arabella Munday, he laughed loudly at his triumph over Rumpole. It was a satanic sound so far as our Head of Chambers was concerned, and this appalling graveyard ritual convinced him that Charlie Wisbeach, who no doubt spent his spare moments reciting the Lord's Prayer backwards, was a quite unsuitable candidate for a place in a Christian Chambers such as Equity Court.

  That night important events were also taking place in my client's home in Morrison Close, Crockthorpe. Numerous Timsons were assembled in the front room, assisted by minor villains and their wives. Gary's Uncle Fred, the undisputed head of the family, was there, as was Uncle Dennis, who should long ago have retired from a life of crime to his holiday home on the Costa del Sol. I have done my best to reconstruct the debate from the account given to me by Roz. After a general family discussion and exchange of news. Uncle Fred gave his opinion of the Wedges job. 'Bloody joke shop. I always said it was a bad idea, robbing a joke shop.' 'There was always money left in the till overnight. Our info told us that. And the security was hopeless. Through the back door, like.' Uncle Dennis explained the thinking behind the enterprise.

  'What you want to leave the stuff round my place for?' Cary was naturally aggrieved because the booty had, it transpired, included a box of satanic masks to which, as they were left in her father's garage, young Tracy had easy access.

  'You should have known how dangerous them things were, what with young kids and social workers about.' 'Well, Fred's was under constant surveillance,' Uncle Dennis explained. 'As was mine. And seeing as you and Roz was away on Monday.. 'Oh, thank you very much!' Cary was sarcastic.

  'And Den knowing where you kept your garage key...' Uncle Fred was doing his best to protect Uncle Dennis from charges of carelessness.

  'Lucky the Bill never thought of looking there,' Gary pointed out.

  'I meant to come back for the stuff some time. It was a bit of a trivial matter. It slipped my memory, quite honestly.' Uncle Dennis was notoriously forgetful, once having left his Fisherman's Diary containing his name and address at the scene of a crime.

  'Well, it wasn't no trivial matter for our Tracy.' 'No, I knows, Roz. Sorry about that.' 'Look, Den,' Cary started, 'We're not asking you to put your hands up to Chief Inspector Brush...' 'Yes, we are, Cary.' Roz was in deadly earnest. 'That's just what we're asking. You got to do it for our Tracy.' 'Hang about a bit.' Uncle Dennis looked alarmed. 'Who says we got to?' And then Roz told him, 'Mr Rumpole.' So the next morning Dennis Timson gave evidence in the Juvenile Court. Although I had been careful to explain his criminal record he looked, in his comfortable tweed jacket and cavalry twill trousers, the sort of chap that might star on 'Gardeners' Question Time' and I could see that Madam Chair took quite a shine to him. After some preliminaries we got to the heart of the matter. 'I was after the money, really,' Dennis told the Bench. 'But I suppose I got a bit greedy, like. I just shoved a few of those boxes in the back of the vehicle. Then I didn't want to take them round to my place, so I left them in Gary's garage.' 'Why did you do that?' I asked.

  'Well, young Cary didn't have anything to do with the Wedges job, so I thought they'd be safe enough there. Of course, I was under considerable pressure of work at that time, and it slipped my mind to tell Cary and Roz about it.' 'Did you see what was in any of those cases?' 'I had a little look-in. Seemed like a lot of carnival masks.

  That sort of rubbish.' 'So young Tracy getting hold of the devil's masks was just the usual Timson cock-up, was it?' 'What did you say, Mr Rumpole?' The Chairwoman wasn't quite sure she could believe her ears.

  'It was a stock-up, for Christmas, Madam Chair,' I explained. 'Oh, one more thing, Mr Dennis Timson. Do you know why young Dominic Molloy has accused Tracy and her father of fiendish rituals in a churchyard?' 'Course I do.' Uncle Den had no doubt. 'Peggy Molloy told Barry Peacock's wife and Barry's wife told my Doreen down the Needle Arms last Thursday.' 'We can't possibly have this evidence!' Liz Probert rose to object. Perhaps she'd caught the habit from me.

  'Oh, really. Miss Probert?' I looked at her in amazement.

  'And why ever not?' 'What Barry's wife told Mrs Timson is pure hearsay.' Mizz Probert was certain of it.

  'Of course it is.' And I gave her back her own argument.

  'And pure hearsay is totally acceptable in the Juvenile Court.

  Where the interest of the child is at stake we are not bound by legal quibbles. I agree. Madam Chair, with every word which has fallen from your respected and highly learned clerk. Now then, Mr Timson, what did you hear exactly?' 'Gareth thought Cary had grassed on him over the Tobler Road supermarket job. So they got young Dominic to put the frame round Tracy and her dad.' 'So what you are telling us, Mr Timson, is that this little boy's evidence was a pure invention.' At last Madam Chair seemed to have got the message. Uncle Dennis gave her the most charming and friendliest of smiles as he said, 'Well, you can't trust the Molloys, can you, my Lady? Everyone knows they're a right family of villains.' There comes a time in many cases when the wind changes, the tide turns and you're either blown on to the rocks or make safe harbour. Uncle Dennis's evidence changed the weather, and after it I noticed that Madam Chair no longer returned Miss Mirabelle Jones's increasingly anxious smile, Mizz Probert's final address was listened to in stony silence and I was startled to hear a distinct 'thank you' from the Bench as I sat down. After a short period of retirement the powers that were to shape young Tracy Timson's future announced that they were dissatisfied by the evidence of any satanic rituals and she was, accordingly, to be released from custody forthwith. Before this judgment was over, the tears which Roz had fought to control since the dawn raid were released and, at her moment of joy, she cried helplessly.

  I couldn't resist it. I got into Mr Bernard's car and followed the Timson Cortina to the Children's Home. We waited until we saw the mother and father emerge from that gaunt building, each holding one of their daughter's hands. As they came down the steps to the street they swung her in the air between them, and when they got into the car they were laughing.

  Miss Mirabelle Jones, who had brought the order for release, stood in the doorway of The Lilacs and watched without expression, and then Tracy's legal team drove away to do other cases with less gratifying results.

  When I got home, after a conference in an obtaining credit by fraud and a modest celebration at Pommeroy's Wine Bar, Hilda was not in the best of moods. When I told her that I brought glad tidings all She said was, 'You seem full of yourself, Rumpole. Been having a good time, have you?' 'A great time! Managed to extricate young Tracy Timson from the clutches of the caring society and she's back in the bosom of her family. And I'll be getting another brief defending Dennis Timson on a charge of stealing from Wedges Carnival Novelties. Well, I expect I'll think of something.
' I poured myself a glass of wine to lighten the atmosphere and Hilda said, somewhat darkly, 'You never wanted to be a judge, did you, Rumpole?' 'Judging people? Condemning them? No, that's not my line, exactly. Anyway, judges are meant to keep quiet in court.' 'And they're much more restricted, aren't they?' It may have sounded an innocent question on a matter of general interest, but her voice was full of menace.

  'Restricted?' I repeated, playing for time.

  'Stuck in Court all day, in the public eye and on their best behaviour. They have far less scope than you to indulge in other activities...'Activities, Hilda?' 'Oh, yes. Perhaps it's about time we really talked for once, Rumpole. Is there something that you feel you ought to tell me?' 'Well. Yes, Hilda. Yes. As a matter of fact there is.' I had in fact done something which I found it strangely embarrassing to mention.

  'I suppose you've had time to think up some ridiculous defence.' 'Oh, no. I plead guilty. There are no mitigating circumstances.' 'Rumpole! How could you?' The court was clearly not going to be moved by any plea for clemency.