The Progress of a Crime

by Julian Symons

  Newton sat down abruptly. In a moment Gavin Edmonds, a dapper, mottled man in his forties, who represented Garney, was on his feet.

  “What’s he like?” Michael whispered.

  “Good enough, but lightweight,” Fairfield whispered back. “Makes a speciality of attacking the police. Gets the headlines but doesn’t do much good, especially in a murder case.”

  Edmonds spoke in support of the application, in a dry, clipped voice that contrasted strongly with Newton’s. It was a fear that Garney’s case might be prejudiced through association with Gardner’s that was in his mind, it seemed, and he began to quote his own authorities. The Judge showed signs of impatience, and Edmonds spoke for only twenty minutes. Eustace Hardy, who was leading for the Crown, rose slowly. Mr. Justice Beckles peered at him over the spectacles.

  “I don’t think that I need trouble you, Mr. Hardy.”

  Eustace Hardy was very ready to sit down again.

  “An application of this sort is often made on the ground that there has been mutual recrimination of one prisoner by the other, or that what one says will incriminate the other. That does not apply in this case, and it seems that the two accused are close friends. It is said that there is a conflict of evidence, but this is for a jury to decide, and the mere fact of a possible conflict of evidence cannot be accepted as a reason for granting separate trials, in which the great mass of evidence referring to both defendants would have to be repeated before two juries. In my opinion no sufficient reason has been shown for making the order, and I must refuse the application.”

  “First blood to them,” said Fairfield. There was a scraping of feet in the public gallery, a shuffling of papers in court. Newton leaned over in earnest consultation with his junior, Toby Bander. Jill Gardner looked once briefly at her brother, smiled and looked away. Her father sat with hands on knees staring at the Judge in wig and robes.

  Now Eustace Hardy was on his feet at last, and speaking in a voice which was quite unlike the clipped tones of Gavin Edmonds or Newton’s fine but monotonous boom. He had what is still sometimes called a silvery voice, beautifully delicate and clear, a voice which was quite plainly recognisable, by those who cared to recognise such things, as the product of a particular public school and a particular university—even, as some claimed, of a particular college at that university. The jury, naturally, made no such act of recognition, but they understood instinctively that Hardy represented something alien to their own way of life. There was a sort of effortless superiority in his manner, a quite unintended air of talking down to those beneath him in the social and intellectual scale, that had stirred deep prejudices against him in many juries. Against the prejudice often raised by his manner could be put his extraordinary lucidity of exposition, the incisive intelligence of his mind, and his quite deadly skill in cross-examination. The credits outweighed the debits by a long chalk, but the debits undoubtedly existed.

  “The night was dark,” Hardy was saying, “but the scene was illuminated by the bonfire and also by a green flare—that is, the flare of a firework—which was burning at this time. There was quite sufficient light for anybody who was standing close beside Corby to see who attacked him. You will hear that Joe Pickett, a local gardener, saw three boys attack Corby, and identified the prisoners as two of them. You will hear Dr. Mackintosh, who also saw the attack, and who identified Garney. You will hear Maureen Dyer, a young girl whom Gardner knocked over before he moved on towards Corby, and a local reporter named Bennett, who grappled with Gardner and later identified him. In deciding which of the boys stabbed and murdered Corby, these witnesses are of vital importance.

  “And it is important also, ladies and gentlemen, to consider the behaviour of these six boys after the assault. Four of them went to a dance hall called the Rotor that evening, and you may feel that their conversation and the admonitions, or even threats, used by Garney, who was by common consent their leader, are instructive…”

  “Not a good word, admonition,” Michael whispered to Fairfield. “Half of them don’t know what it means.”

  Fairfield did not look up. He was making notes. Michael made a face at him and began to take notes himself.

  “…We do not know what was in the note which, according to what young Frank Jones said to his father, was left for him after he reached home that Friday night. But we know that Frank Jones was frightened by it, and told his father that he would run away. Yet he did not run away. Perhaps he was too frightened even for that. He went instead to keep an appointment in the deserted cottage that was used by the boys as their headquarters. He was killed in that cottage, brutally stabbed to death. He suffered eight stab wounds, inflicted by one or more hands.

  “Now, ladies and gentlemen, according to the medical evidence Jones was killed between midnight on Friday and six o’clock on Saturday morning. The boys did not reach home after their interrogation by the police until past midnight, so that the time of the murder was in the early hours of Saturday morning. I do not pretend to have traced the prisoners’ movements at this time, when it would be natural to suppose that they were in bed and asleep. I will say frankly that we have no witness who saw them in the vicinity of the cottage. But I shall present what is, I believe, irrefutable evidence—evidence based on laboratory research into Gardner’s clothes and on the investigations of Detective-Superintendent Twicker and Detective-Sergeant Norman—that Gardner was at the cottage that night. On that night, ladies and gentlemen, and not on any other night. That means, if you will bear in mind the times I have already given you, that Gardner was present when Jones was murdered.”

  Hardy paused for a moment and then continued, moving on to another point. Could it be said that there was anything like a sensation in court? Hardly. Mr. Justice Beckles, above them all in his red robes, placed a hand over his mouth and stifled, ever so delicately, a yawn.

  30

  “May we join you?” Fairfield asked, for him a little formally. He had bought a sandwich at the pub counter, and had a glass of beer in his other hand.

  “It’s a free country,” Gardner said.

  “I know you don’t like me.”

  “It’s not you. It’s the paper you work for.” He made this response in an imperfectly audible voice.

  “His teeth,” Jill said. “He broke his plate this morning. It had fallen on the floor somehow and he stepped on it.”

  It was possible to see now that Gardner’s whole face had caved in, leaving the cheeks gaunt and hollow, the whole expression curiously changed. When he cut a piece of the pie on his plate and pushed it about in his mouth, the effect was somehow pathetic.

  “I wanted to talk about this question of the grey trousers. I expect you’ve had the defence solicitors along to see you. Ah, here’s Hugh.”

  The Petty Sessional Court at Welby had yielded only two paragraphs, one on the assault and another on one of the traffic offences, in which a well-known local tradesman had been found guilty of exceeding the speed limit in a built-up area, and also of driving with a faulty speedometer.

  “How’s it going?” Hugh asked.

  “Only just begun. What about the trousers?” he said to Jill.

  “Somebody came along from the solicitors. But I couldn’t explain. I just don’t understand it. Leslie says he doesn’t understand either.”

  “Leslie went straight to bed that Friday night and slept till morning,” Gardner said indistinctly. Fairfield ignored him.

  “Now look, the police never asked you about this, did they? So they must have got their information direct from this laundry.”

  “They asked Mrs. Edwards, that’s Taffy’s mother, what laundry we used,” Jill said.

  “So they went behind your backs. I’ve seen the new depositions, we know pretty well what they’re going to say, but if we can find out exactly how they got the information it might be useful.”

  “How?” Hugh asked.

&n
bsp; “I just don’t know, Hugh. I feel it might be, that’s all.”

  “I meant how are you going to do it?”

  “A man at the Banner, named Crawley, used to know the boss of the Kwick-N-Clean. He’s called Bostick.” He looked at them interrogatively, but they shook their heads.

  “I’ve never heard of him,” Jill said.

  “I’ve got an appointment to see him at half-past five. Will you come, Hugh?”

  “Of course.”

  “You’re doing a lot for us. Don’t think we’re ungrateful,” Jill said. She looked at her father. George Gardner had finished his pie, and was licking the crumbs off his finger.

  31

  With the dexterity of a ballet dancer Hardy led them through the events of Guy Fawkes night. After the humdrum police and medical evidence, given by P.C. Buckley and the police surgeon, came Dr. Mackintosh, who had been standing, as he said, some six yards from Corby at the time of the attack.

  “Will you tell us exactly what you saw?”

  “I’ve told you already about the firework throwing. Some of the boys rushed forward at Corby and grappled with him. I heard a voice say ‘Get him, King,’ and then a groan.”

  “You say some of the boys. How many?”

  “I’m not sure. Two or three. You must realise that things were very confused. I just caught a glimpse of their faces.”

  “There was enough light for that?”

  “Yes.”

  “Did you afterwards attend an identification parade?”

  “I did.”

  “And pick out one of the boys you had seen?”

  “That is correct.”

  “Will you tell us if that boy is in court.”

  “That one.” The doctor pointed to Garney.

  Gavin Edmonds devoted himself to establishing in cross-examination that the doctor might have recognised Garney from his photograph in the newspapers. Newton was brief but effective.

  “You were unable to identify any other boy who attacked Corby?”

  “That is so.”

  “And you are not certain whether two or three boys were involved in the scuffle?”

  “I couldn’t be sure. It was a dark night.”

  “To be sure, to be sure. And no moon.”

  “No. But there was the light from the bonfire.”

  “This light, however, wasn’t enough to enable you to identify any boy except Garney?”

  “No.”

  “And you were standing at just about this distance from Corby.” Newton walked across the well of the court. He certainly looked very near to the doctor. Eustace Hardy got up, and looked distastefully down his long nose.

  “My lord, the prosecution has never maintained that this witness was able to identify the prisoner Gardner. Is it necessary for my learned friend to indulge quite so obviously his sense of drama?”

  Mr. Justice Beckles looked over his spectacles. “This demonstration has some purpose, Mr. Newton?”

  “It has indeed, my lord. But this is my last question, if the witness may be allowed to answer it.”

  “Pray continue, Mr. Newton.”

  “At about this distance?” Newton repeated. He struck no particular attitude but stood in the court, a dumpy, slightly ridiculous figure with his wig a little awry.

  Dr. Mackintosh looked uncertain. “I suppose so. These things seem rather different in daylight.”

  Newton looked at the jury, as though marking his position on their minds by means of a metaphorical chalk line. Then he went back to the bench and sat down.

  Lopsided Joe Pickett, wearing his clothes like a tailor’s dummy, looked an unpromising witness, but under gentle handling from Hardy he told a coherent tale. Here, as Hardy induced Pickett to tell the story, was a witness who had had a chance of looking closely at the boys when they were at the dance, who had been standing beside Corby and had seen two boys strike him, had seen a knife drawn, and had picked out both Garney and Gardner at the identification parade.

  Gavin Edmonds made one dent in the identification, but it was a dent for which Hardy must have been prepared.

  “You picked out the two prisoners at the identification parade,” Edmonds said. “You’re quite sure of that identification?”

  “Certain sure.”

  “But you made some other identifications too, didn’t you?”

  “How’s that?” Pickett’s head went even more to one side.

  “You identified some of the other boys,” Edmonds said loudly, as though he were speaking to a slightly deaf imbecile. “Were they all the right boys? Were they, Mr. Pickett?”

  “Got two wrong,” Pickett grumbled.

  “So you identified four boys, and two of them were completely innocent people who had nothing at all to do with the case. That’s so, isn’t it? Isn’t it, Mr. Pickett?”

  Pickett reluctantly admitted that apparently it was.

  Magnus Newton stood up and teetered on his little legs. Subduing his melodious boom he said, “You were standing close to Corby that night, weren’t you?”

  “That’s right.”

  “How close?” Newton asked invitingly. “Close enough to touch him?”

  Pickett looked wary. “Ah. Wouldn’t like to say I coulda touched him. No, don’t think I coulda touched him.”

  “But closer than Dr. Mackintosh?”

  “Aye, closer than the doctor. Close enough to see,” he said emphatically.

  There was a hush as Newton walked slowly to that metaphorical chalk line he had made in the well of the court. “Would you say, supposing I was Corby, that you were about as near as this to me?”

  “Could be. Or could be I was a foot or two farther away.”

  “A foot or two farther away. But still, you were nearer than Dr. Mackintosh?”

  “Aye, nearer than the doctor.”

  Newton thrust his head forward. His face was suddenly red and angry. “This is the distance at which Dr. Mackintosh said he was standing. Were you nearer than this?” Pickett did not answer. Newton repeated the question.

  “Mighta been a couple of feet nearer,” Pickett said reluctantly.

  “You might have been a couple of feet nearer than Dr. Mackintosh. No more than that?”

  “Suppose not.”

  “Dr. Mackintosh was able to identify only one boy. I suggest that you could see no more than he did.”

  “Oh, I saw ’em all right.”

  “Do you regard yourself as so very much more observant than Dr. Mackintosh?” Newton asked with heavy irony.

  Joe Pickett’s little eyes screwed up, a sideways grin spread over his face. “Not in the usual way, no. But Doctor wasn’t wearing his glasses. Can’t see too well without ’em.”

  There was a ripple, the merest ripple that quickly died, of something like laughter. Newton stared angrily at Joe Pickett for a moment, then walked slowly back to his place and went on asking questions. But the effect he was aiming at had been destroyed, and it was really almost unnecessary for Hardy to show in re-examination that whatever the precise spot on which Joe Pickett had been standing, he had certainly been nearer to Corby than had Dr. Mackintosh, and that, while his identification of the two innocent boys had been a general one, his recognition of the two in the dock had been that they were positively attacking Corby. Newton’s old trick had not come off, but perhaps he had planted a seed of doubt in some jurymen’s minds.

  32

  The Kwick-N-Clean laundry smelt of laundry, but from the office of the managing director, Mr. Charles J. Bostick, all laundry smell had been abolished. In fact almost all smell had been abolished from it, as though the mahogany-panelled green-carpeted room existed in a vacuum within the laundry—but a vacuum in which it was perfectly possible to live and breathe, and to look as fatly, heartily healthy as Mr. Bostick, who now greeted them with a fi
rm handshake, set them down in metal-legged semi-circular chairs that were a lighter shade of green than the carpet, and opened the cocktail cabinet. While he was pouring two pink gins and Hugh’s plain Dubonnet, Mr. Bostick talked.

  “It’s a long time since I heard from Edgar Crawley. We were up together, Edgar and I, and you could see that he was a brilliant fellow. I remember a little essay he wrote on—would it have been the Franco-Prussian War now—you gentlemen won’t know, but I remember everybody said Edgar had a brilliant future ahead of him. And they were right. Mark you, it’s no secret that Edgar always had a great eye for the main chance.” He laughed uproariously.

  “He hasn’t lost it,” Fairfield said.

  Bostick laughed again. He was professionally genial, one of nature’s Rotarians. “And so when I heard Edgar’s voice on the telephone, I thought, there’s only one reason why Edgar would want to talk to an old laundryman like me, he wants something out of me.” He laughed so much at this that Hugh and Fairfield felt constrained to join him, in a modest way.

  “And you were right,” Fairfield said.

  “I was right. That’s Edgar.” It seemed for a moment that Bostick would be set off again, but he controlled himself. “Edgar said it was a matter of importance. That means it’s something to do with the Guy Fawkes case. Am I right?”

  “Right.” Fairfield paused, then leaned forward. A little of the gin slopped on to his fingers. “Have you read about to-day’s proceedings?”

  “I’m a working man. I read the evening papers at home in an arm-chair.”

  “And nobody, no police official, has called to see you in relation to the case?”