The Judas Window

by Carter Dickson

  “That’s right.”

  “What was your job there?”

  “I was an Extra Cleaner-Up.”

  “What’s an Extra Cleaner-Up, exactly?”

  “It’s like this. It’s the mess they makes, that the chambermaids don’t like. When their ashtrays gets full, they empties ‘em into the wastepaper baskets. They sticks their old razor-blades anywhere they can, to get’m out of sight. They leaves things about—well, you know what I mean. Extra Cleaner-Up, especially when there was parties.”

  “Were you working there round about the third of January, last?

  “On that date,” corrected Horace Carlyle Grabell, with a pounce. “On that date, I was.”

  “Yes. Did you know the deceased, Mr. Hume?”

  “I hadn’t the honor of his personal acquaintance—”

  “Just confine yourself to answering the question,” said the judge sharply. “Very good, your Lordship,” said the witness smoothly, and his jaw extended at the same time his upper lip drew away from his teeth. “I was about to say: except once when we got very matey, and he gave me ten pounds to keep my mouth shut about his being a thief.”

  Several times before, a recorder would have had the opportunity of writing the word “sensation.” This one, which could hardly be called a full-fledged sensation since nobody knew what it meant, was all the more pronounced because of the casual way in which Grabell spoke. The judge slowly took off his spectacles, disengaging them from under his tie-wig, folded them up, and contemplated him.

  “You quite understand what you are saying?” inquired Mr. Justice Bodkin.

  “Oh, very good, your Lordship.”

  “I wished to make sure of that. Proceed, Sir Henry.”

  “We’ll try to make certain of it, my lord,” growled H.M. “Now, then. How’d you come to know the deceased so well by sight?”

  “I used to work at another place—not far away. Every week, Saturday mornings, they used to take the week’s takings up to the Capital Counties Bank in a leather bag. I went along; kind of a bodyguard, you see; not that it was ever needed. The deceased, he didn’t actually do nothing; I mean, he didn’t take the money across the counter or nothing. He would just come out of that little door at the back of the bank, and stand with his hands behind his back, and nod to Mr. Perkins who brought the money, like as if he was giving his blessing to it.”

  “How many times d’ye think you saw him there?”

  “Oh, umpteen.”

  “A dozen, do you think?”

  “More’n that,” insisted the witness, shaking his head skeptically and drawing the air through a hollow tooth. “Every Saturday for six months or so.”

  “Now, where were you on the morning of Friday, January 3, last?”

  “Cleaning out the dustbin in 3C,” answered Grabell promptly. “That’s Mr. Answell’s flat.” He made a sign of quick and saturnine friendliness towards the prisoner, pushing his fist under his own chin as though to keep it up; and instantly checked this with an air of portentous solemnity.

  “Where’s the dustbin?”

  “In the kitchenette.”

  “This kitchenette opens into the dining room?”

  “Same as usual,” agreed Grabell.

  “Was the door closed between?”

  “Yes. Or very near. Just a crack.”

  “What’d you see or hear then?”

  “Well, I wasn’t making much noise. While I was standing in the kitchenette, I heard the door of the dining room open—that’s the other door to the dining room, leading to the little entry. I thought, ‘Ullo! Because Mr. Answell wasn’t expected back. I peeped through and see a man come into the dining room, walking very soft and quick. You could tell he was up to no good. The blinds was all drawn in the dining room, too. First he gave a tap on all the walls, like as if he was looking for a safe. Then he started to open the drawers in the sideboard. What he took out I didn’t know first going-off, because his back was to me. Then he went over and raised the blind to get a better look. I saw who he was, and I saw what he’d got in his hand.”

  “Who was it?”

  “This deceased, Mr. Hume.”

  “And what had he got in his hand?” asked H.M. in a louder voice.

  “Captain Answell’s gun, that you’ve got down on the table there.”

  “Hand it up to the witness. Take a closer look, and make sure it’s the one the deceased took out of that sideboard on Friday morning.”

  “That’s the one,” said the witness, reeling off the serial number of the pistol before it was put into his hand. He pulled out the clip and snapped it back again, turning round the automatic in a way that made the nearest woman juror shy back. “Why, I had to unload it meself once, when they was getting gay at a party.”

  “Tell us what happened after you saw Mr. Hume.”

  “Couldn’t believe my eyes, that’s what. He got out a little notebook and compared something in it, careful as careful; then he stowed away the gun in his pocket. Well, that was too much. I walked out quick and said, ‘Hullo.’ I’d got no call to be respectful to a chap who was there to steal. It gave him a turn, though he tried not to show it. He turned round with his hands behind his back and his eyebrows pulled down—trying to look like Napoleon, I daresay. He said, ‘Do you know who I am?’ I said, ‘Yes; and I also know you’ve just pinched Captain Answell’s gun.’ He said not to be ridiculous; he said it was a joke. I know that tone some of the nobs takes when they’ve done the dirty and try to carry it off; I know it; and that’s why I knew he knew it. Why, there was that time Lord Bore-fastleigh got caught flat with the ace, king, and jack of trumps in his waistcoat pocket—”

  “You will omit that,” said the judge.

  “Very good, your Lordship. I said, ‘Joke or not, you’re going down to the manager and explain why you’ve just pinched Captain Answell’s gun.’ Then he got much quieter. He said, ‘All right; but do you know which side your bread is buttered on?’ I said, I don’t know about that, guv’nor; considering as I’ve never seen any butter in my life.’ He said, in a way I’ll bet he didn’t talk at the bank, ‘There’s a quid in it for you if you keep your mouth shut about this.’ I thought I’d just see what he was up to, and I said: I know what that is, guv’nor; that’s margarine; and I’ve had plenty of that on me bread.’ He said, ‘Very well; ten pounds, and that’s my limit.’ So he went away with the gun.”

  “Did you take the ten pounds?” inquired the judge.

  “Yes, your Lordship, I did,” answered Grabell, with defiant querulousness. “What would you have done?”

  “It is not a matter on which I dare pass judgment,” said Mr. Justice Bodkin. “Go on, Sir Henry.”

  “He went away with the gun.” H.M. wagged his head. “And what did you do after that?”

  “I knew he was up to no good, so I thought I’d better warn Captain Answell about it.”

  “Oh? Did you warn Captain Answell about it?”

  “Yes. Not that he’s good for as much as a bob; but I thought it was my duty to, that’s all.”

  “When did you warn him?”

  “I couldn’t do it then, him being away in the country. But he turned up unexpected the next day—”

  “Uh-huh. So, after all, he was in London on the Saturday of the murder, was he?” said H.M. He allowed a pause, taking the other’s movement of the jaws, carried almost to the point of making a face, for a reply. “When did you see him?”

  “‘Bout ten minutes past six on Saturday evening. He drove into the place behind the block of flats, where they park the cars. There was nobody else about, so I told him Mr. Hume had been there the day before and pinched his gun.”

  “What did he say?”

  “He looked queer for a minute; thoughtful-like; then he said, ‘Thanks; that’ll be very useful,’ and up and handed me half-a-crown. Then he turned the car round and whizzed out of there.”

  “Now listen to me, son. The pistol that was found in the accused’s pocket—that gun�
�the gun he’s supposed to have taken with him on Saturday night to use on Mr. Hume—was actually stolen out of the flat on Friday by Mr. Hume himself? Is that right?”

  “That’s as true as God made little apples,” retorted the witness, leaning out of the box in response to H.M.’s pointed finger.

  H.M. sat down.

  Grabell might have been an insolent and garrulous witness, but these facts themselves made an enormous impression. We knew, however, that a tussle was coming. The antagonism which sprang up between this witness and Sir Walter Storm was apparent before the Attorney-General had uttered a word. Due to the Londoner’s instinctive awe and reverence before a red robe, which represents a hazy conception of Law-cum-Empire and things deeply rooted in them, Grabell had shown towards the judge a submissiveness approaching humility. Towards the prosecution he held no such views. They evidently represented to him someone who was merely out to do you down. Grabell must have gone into the box with one eye on them, and ready to bristle. This was not soothed by Sir Walter’s—entirely unintentional—lofty stare.

  “Ah...Grabell. You tell us you accepted ten pounds from Mr. Hume?”

  “Yes.”

  “Do you think it was an honorable act for you to accept it?”

  “Do you think it was an honorable act for ‘im to offer it?”

  “Mr. Hume’s habits are not, I think, in question—”

  “Well, then, they ought to be. You’re trying to hang that poor devil there because of ‘em.”

  The Attorney-General suddenly must have looked so dangerous that the witness drew back a little. “Do you know what contempt of court is, Grabell?”

  “Yes.”

  “In case you do not, my lord may have to make it quite clear to you. To avoid any unpleasant consequences, I must tell you that your business here is to answer my questions—nothing else. Do I make myself understood?”

  Grabell, rather pale, looked as though he were straining at a leash; but he jerked his head and made no comment.

  “Very well. I am glad you appreciate that.” Sir Walter set his papers in order. “I should deduce,” he pursued, with a sidelong glance at the jury, “that you are a follower of the doctrines of Karl Marx?”

  “Never heard of him.”

  “Are you a Communist?”

  “That’s as may be.”

  “Have you not made up your mind?—Did you, or did you not, accept a bribe from Mr. Hume?”

  “Yes. But I went directly and told Captain Answell afterwards.”

  “I see. Your ‘honor rooted in dishonor stands.’ Is that what you wish us to believe? Do you wish us to believe that you are all the more trustworthy because you were twice unfaithful to a trust?”

  “‘Ere, what’s all this?” cried the witness, staring round.

  “You tell us that round about January 3 you were employed at D’Orsay Chambers, Duke Street. Are you not employed there now?”

  “No. I left.”

  “You left: why?”

  Silence.

  “Were you dismissed?”

  “You could call it that, yes.”

  “So you were dismissed. Why?”

  “Answer the question,” said the judge sharply.

  “I didn’t get on with the manager, and they were overstaffed.”

  “Did the manager give you a reference when you left?”

  “No.”

  “But if you had left for the reasons you tell us, he must have given you a character, mustn’t he?”

  Sir Walter Storm had not been prepared for this witness. But, with the knowledge of long experience, he knew exactly where to attack without having any actual information to draw on.

  “You tell us that on Friday morning, January 3, you were ‘cleaning out the dustbin’ in the prisoner’s flat?”

  “Yes.”

  “How long had Mr. Answell and Captain Answell been away?”

  “‘Bout a fortnight, maybe.”

  “About a fortnight. Why, then, was it necessary to clean out the dustbin, if they had been away for so long?”

  “They might have come back.”

  “Yet a moment ago you informed my learned friend that no one was expected back. Did you not?”

  “It had to be done sometime.”

  “It had not been done by anyone during those entire two weeks?”

  “No—that is—”

  “I put it to you that the dustbin would have been cleaned when the occupants went away?”

  “Yes, but I had to make sure. Look here, your Lordship...”

  “You further tell us,” pursued the Attorney-General, leaning both hands on the desk and settling his shoulders, “that, when you went in to do this, all the blinds were drawn and you made very little noise?”

  “Yes.”

  “Are you accustomed to cleaning out the dustbin in darkness?”

  “Look ‘ere! I never thought of it—”

  “Or being careful to make no noise to disturb anyone in an empty flat? I put it to you that—if you actually were in the flat at the time you say—it was for a purpose other than cleaning out the dustbin?”

  “It was not.”

  “Then you never went into the flat at all?”

  “Yes, I did, if you’d let me get in a word edgeways; and what I’m telling you is that old Hume was there, and he stole that gun, so help me!” “Let us see if there is anything else that may help us. There is, I believe, a hall-porter at D’Orsay Chambers?”

  “Yes.”

  “Will you accept my statement that this porter, when questioned by the police, testified he had not seen anyone resembling the deceased in D’Orsay Chambers on Friday or at any other time?”

  “Maybe not. He came in by the back stairs—”

  “Who came in by the back stairs?”

  “Mr. Hume. Anyway, that’s how he went out, because I saw him go.” “Did you offer any of this information to the police at the time?”

  “No; how could I? I wasn’t there. I left my job the next day—”

  “You left the next day?”

  “I had been under notice for a month, yes, and that was Saturday. Besides, I didn’t know it was important.”

  “Apparently not. There would appear to be a curious notion among several persons as to what may or may not have been important then, but is very important now,” said Sir Walter dryly. “When you say you saw Captain Answell in the car park, was there any other person there who could substantiate the statement?”

  “Nobody but Captain Answell himself. Why don’t you ask him?”

  Mr. Justice Bodkin intervened. “The witness’s remark, though out of order,” he said with some asperity, “would seem pertinent. Is Captain Answell in court? Considering that a part of the evidence depends on information that he may be able to give—”

  H.M. surged up with a sort of ferocious affability. “My lord, Captain Answell is goin’ to appear as a witness for the defense. You needn’t trouble to send for him. He’s been under subpoena for a long, long time; and we’ll see that he is here, though I’m not sure he’ll be a very willin’ witness for his own side.”

  (“What on earth is all this?” Evelyn asked in a whisper. “You heard the fellow say himself he wasn’t to be called as a witness. He must have known he’d been subpoenaed! What is happening?”)

  It was undoubtedly some trick on H.M.’s part: H.M. being determined to be the old maestro if it choked him. Beyond that nothing was known.

  “I have no more questions to ask this witness,” said Sir Walter Storm abruptly.

  “Call Joseph George Shanks,” said H.M.

  While Grabell was going out of the box, and Joseph George Shanks was going into it, a consultation went on among the counsel for the Crown. The prosecution was in a strange and homed position. They must fight this through. That James Answell had been the victim of a mistake: that Hume had planned a trap for Reginald: even that Hume had stolen the pistol: was now being pushed towards a certainty. But these were details which did not
, for everything that was said, in the least demonstrate the innocence of the prisoner. I remembered the words in the summing-up of a great jurist at another cause célèbre: “Members of the jury, there is some circumstantial evidence which is as good and conclusive as the evidence of eyewitnesses...If I might give you an illustration: supposing you have a room with one door, and a closed window, and a passage leading from that door. A man comes up the passage, goes through the door into the room, and finds another man standing with a pistol, and on the floor a dead man: the circumstantial evidence there would be almost conclusive, if not conclusive.”

  We had just such a situation here. The prisoner had still been found in a locked room. The circumstantial evidence of that fact was still conclusive. No doubt had been cast on the central point, which was the only real point at issue. However damaged the case for the prosecution had become, Sir Walter Storm must finish this course.

  I was recalled by H.M.’s voice:

  “Your name’s Joseph George Shanks, and you were odd jobs man at number 12 Grosvenor Street?”

  “Yessir,” said the witness. He was a little, broad man, so much like a dwarfed model of John Bull that his Sunday-best clothes sat oddly on him. Two polished knives of white collar stabbed his neck: they seemed to keep his voice light from the effort of keeping his neck high.

  “How long did you work there?”

  “Ah,” said the other, considering. “Six years, more or less, I should think.”

  “What were your duties, mostly?”

  “Mostly keeping Mr. Hume’s archery things in order; any repairs to ‘em; things like that.”

  “Take a look at this arrow, which was used to kill the deceased”—the witness carefully wiped his hands on the seat of his Sunday trousers before accepting it—”and tell the jury whether you’ve seen it before.”

  “You-bet-I-have, sir. I fastened the feathers on. I remember this one. Dye’s a mite dark for the kind I meant.”

  “You often fastened the deceased’s special kind of feathers to the arrows? And dyed the guide feather? Mr. Fleming told us that yesterday?”

  “I did that, sir.”

  “Now, supposin’ I showed you a little piece of feather,” pursued H.M. with argumentative persuasiveness, “and I asked you to tell me definitely whether it was the piece of feather missing from the middle, there...could you do that?”