The clerk did not have Archie’s address, which seemed to Jim a very careless way of doing business. He was, in fact, still further depressed by the apathetic approach to the case by Mr. Sills and his staff. They all seemed to think that Archie’s case was hopeless.
Archie, Jim learned, was to be represented in Court by a young barrister called Malcolm Betts, and soon Mr. Betts himself put in an appearance. He was a thickset, ruddy-faced man, with an excessively hearty handclasp. He reminded Jim of a county rugby forward, and although he was by no means as depressing about the case as was the solicitor, his breezy comments did not add much to what Jim already knew of the facts.
Edith, who had accompanied Jim to the office, said nothing, and after a lengthy preamble Jim asked Betts, bluntly what chance there was of an acquittal.
“Oh, none, none at all,” said the barrister, cheerily. “As a matter of fact we’re putting in a plea of ‘guilty’. It wouldn’t pay us to fight it, we haven’t a leg to stand on!”
“But hang it, you did send for me,” grumbled Jim.
Mr. Sills did not appear to hear this, but added:
“He was drinking neat brandy all the way down here. When they got him out of the car he could hardly stand, and kept rambling on and on about the money.”
“What money?” Jim wanted to know.
“Why the money that his wife stole from him,” replied the lawyer.
All this was new to Jim and he said so. The lawyer sifted through some papers and finally unearthed a page of notes, compiled, presumably, at his original interview with Archie.
It contained a reference to the object of Archie’s precipitate journey into the West, and the fact that he had considered himself robbed of all his remaining capital.
“Well, surely you’ll bring this out in court, won’t you?” demanded Jim.
Mr. Sills rubbed his long nose and fixed his eye on the filing cabinet beside the window.
“I don’t know about that,” chipped in Malcolm Betts. “From the information your son gave me it seems that it wouldn’t do to mention the money! I rather gathered it was…er…well—shall we say a little nest-egg, that no one knew about.”
“His wife knew about it, didn’t she?” said Jim.
“That’s so, that’s so,” agreed the lawyer, unhelpfully, “but where does that get us?”
Suddenly Edith spoke up. Until then she had been sitting some way back from Mr. Sills’ table, and they had forgotten her presence.
“It seems to me,” she said, with a note of decision in her voice that Jim did not recall as being in any way characteristic of the spinster of Number Four, “it seems to me that you ought to imply that he had a kind of brainstorm!”
They all looked at her, Jim in astonishment, Mr. Sills with alarm, and Mr. Malcolm Betts with a lively interest.
“Can you elaborate that a little, madam,” he said, politely.
“Certainly,” said Edith, pulling her chair a little nearer the table. “Here’s a young man who suddenly finds he had been deprived of a large sum of money. Surely you won’t need to say how he got that money, or even where it was stolen from, will you?”
“Well,” said Mr. Betts grinning, “that shouldn’t be necessary, unless of course he insists on going into the box.”
“Well,” continued Edith, “he discovers this loss and it puts everything else out of his head! He rushes off, down to his wife in order to try and get it back, and all the time the thought of that money is going over and over in his head, so much so that he’s not even looking where he’s going!”
“What about the brandy?” prompted Mr. Sills.
“You can’t get around that,” mumbled Jim.
“Well, no, you can’t, not exactly,” said Edith, “but anyone might take a drink under these circumstances. I’ve known this young man for twenty years, and I’ve been in and out of his shop almost every day during this time. I’ve never once seen him the worse for drink, and you could just say he took it to steady himself and wasn’t used to it, couldn’t you?”
Jim gasped, and Mr. Sills coughed, but Mr. Malcolm Betts gave Edith an unmistakable look of approval.
“That’s a line that hasn’t occurred to me, I must say,” he exclaimed. “Why, bless my soul, Miss Clegg, you ought to devil for us, you’ve got a naturally tortuous mind!”
He turned back to Mr. Sills and Jim: “That’s not a bad line at all,” he said, “at all events, it’s a good deal better than nothing! I’ll tell you what, we won’t question a single witness but simply put in a strong plea of mitigation on the lines she suggests! Colourful too, might even interest the jury! Never know! There’s one thing, however, we ought to establish that he’s always been known for strict sobriety.”
He turned back to Edith. “Look here, madam, would you go into the box as a friend and neighbour of twenty years’ standing, and tell the court what you’ve just told me about never seeing him the worse for drink?”
“Why, of course I would,” said Edith, promptly. “I was rather hoping that you might ask me to give evidence of character!”
“Wouldn’t it be better if I went in the box,” protested Jim, who was beginning to feel out of his depth.
“Not on your life!” rejoined the barrister, “Relatives’ testimonies don’t amount to a row of pins! Besides, she looks so right!”
“Well, it isn’t a great deal, Mr. Carver, but it’s about the best we can do,” Mr. Sills told Jim. “It might influence the sentence, don’t you think Mr. Betts?”
“It might, indeed,” agreed Betts, glancing across at Edith, with respect. It was not often, he reflected, that old souls who looked as drab and dowdy as this one came forward with any intelligent suggestions. Almost always they fell back on tears and juries were so indifferent to tears.
Jim did not see Archie before his name was called in Court. Up to that moment he was on tenterhooks as to whether the defendant would show up, although, during the luncheon recess, when Jim and Edith were eating in a café across the market from the Town Hall, the considerate Mr. Betts sent a note across, saying that Archie had presented himself in Mr. Sills’ office and had been informed of the line they were taking, and of Miss Clegg’s willingness to testify on his behalf. Jim preferred not to see Archie before the hearing. “There’ll be time enough after. They’re bound to let us have a word with him, whatever happens,” he told Edith.
Archie’s case began about 2:30 p.m. and occupied the court until nearly six o’clock. Mr. Sills’ forecast had been fairly accurate. By the time the prosecution had presented the facts, and half a dozen witnesses had testified as to Archie’s madcap approach round the bend, Jim had made up his mind to expect the worst. He studied Archie closely, and was struck by the immobility of his expression throughout the case. He sat very upright in the dock, his eyes following the movement of witnesses in and out of the witness-box, but never once did he fidget, or turn and look down into the body of the court.
As the repetitive evidence was presented, and the police were called to give details of skid-marks, and general measurements, Jim’s attention began to wander in spite of himself, and his mind ranged back to the previous occasion when he had sat in court and heard a case built up against his sons. That was the time when Bernard and Boxer had been charged with driving their motor-cycles through flood-water, and causing the wash to flow into shopkeepers’ doorways, but that, he reflected, had been a very different kettle of fish, entirely lacking the solemnity of this hearing. When Bernard and Boxer had been in the dock everyone in the court had openly sympathised with them, and had, indeed, regarded the proceedings as being richly comic. Well, thought Jim, those two turned out all right in the end, bless their jolly hearts. He only wished that Archie had turned out half as well and he wondered, dismally, what he could possibly say to the boy when they did meet.
His thoughts were interrupted by Mr. Betts, opening his speech for the defence, and Jim noted that the barrister was sticking very closely indeed to Edith’s suggested appro
ach, a fact that surprised him, for he could not help finding it odd that an elderly, unsophisticated woman like Edith, should be able to point a path to a professional like Betts, or that Betts should be so ready to take advantage of her observations.
Betts did what he could, leading up to the fact that his client was totally unused to spirit-drinking, a claim, thought Jim, that was belied by Archie’s mottled complexion as he sat staring blankly at the empty witness box facing him. ‘I only hope the young fool isn’t exhaling the smell of liquor at this moment,’ thought Jim. ‘He certainly looks as if he had had a few on the way in!’
A moment later Mr. Betts called Edith, who rose briskly from her seat beside Jim and almost tripped up the short stairway to the witness-box.
“I am calling Miss Edith Clegg as a character witness,” explained Mr. Betts. “I do not propose to call any other witnesses, for further than that we are content to throw ourselves on the mercy of the court.
“There remains little to be said, save that my client wishes to express his deepest regret that he was instrumental in bringing about the death of this young woman!”
He turned to Edith, who had now taken the oath.
“Your name is Edith Clegg, and you live at number Four, Manor Park Avenue, a house next door to the defendant’s place of business?”
“That’s quite true,” said Edith, in a strong, clear voice.
“You have known the defendant for how long?”
“For twenty-three years,” said Edith, “and that’s long before he took over the corner shop.”
“During all that time you have seen him and talked with him frequently, I imagine?”
“Almost every day,” said Edith, “his shop was so handy for popping in.”
“Can you tell us what estimate you formed of Mr. Carver’s character?”
“A very good estimate,” said Edith, promptly, and Jim, watching closely, saw Archie’s expression change slightly, the blankness giving place to a faint look of bewilderment, as though Edith’s statement caused him surprise.
“Can you say more than that, Miss Clegg?”
“Only that never once, during that time, did I see him the worse for drink, sir,” said Edith. “He didn’t ever smell of drink, and he was never anything but nice and polite, not only to me, but to everyone along the Avenue. I think.…”
But the court was not to hear what Edith thought at that stage, for Mr. Betts lifted his hand and murmured: “Ah-ah!” in a slightly reproving tone. He beamed at Edith, however as he moved slightly closer to the witness box.
“In fact, you are very surprised to see him here on this grave charge, Miss Clegg?”
“Yes, I am, indeed,” said Edith, and then, like a person judging her distance, preparatory to throwing something at a fixed object, she added, “and he simply couldn’t have been used to drink and that’s the top and bottom of the matter!”
The prosecutor rose, smiling indulgently at the witness.
“I take it you were a regular customer of the defendant’s, Miss Clegg?”
“Yes, I was,” said Edith, tartly, “but what’s that got to do with it?”
“No further questions,” said the prosecutor, and sat down, exchanging a knowing look with his opposite number.
It might, said Mr. Betts, as they stood waiting in the corridor, have been very much worse and the barrister went on to say that things might have gone very badly for Archie, had it not been for the impression created in court by Miss Clegg.
Jim hunched his shoulders. A sentence of eighteen calendar months seemed to him bad enough, and for the first time since he had heard of the accident he found that he could spare a little sympathy for Archie. In 1931 Jim had once spent a day in gaol himself, after he had been involved in Hunger March demonstrations at Marble Arch, but just one day could not be compared to eighteen months, neither could the circumstances accompanying Jim’s imprisonment bear comparison with Archie’s. Jim had been locked up in the company of a score of Welsh miners, and all of them had been conscious of martyrdom. No such uplift could now sustain Archie, shut behind grey walls for a year and a half, in order to expiate an act of criminal folly that had resulted in the death of a total stranger.
Jim found himself resenting the ebullience of the young barrister, who was behaving, he felt, as though he and Edith had scored a notable victory over the prosecution. Perhaps he was right, perhaps his own frank handling of the case, plus Edith’s statement, had indeed induced the judge to reduce his conception of Archie from a homicidal drunkard to that of a reckless simpleton, but the fact remained that the boy’s business life was now in ruins, and he would surely find it very difficult to pick up the threads again, when his sentence had expired.
Thinking this, Jim asked himself whether he would have felt any better if Archie had been acquitted, and he at once decided that he would not. There was the unwritten, as well as the statutory law; a girl’s life had been sacrificed and someone, somewhere, had to pay the bill. Who better than the man who had taken that life, accidentally it was true, but in circumstances far more blameworthy than those surrounding an ordinary road fatality?
The usher came to them at last and said that they could see the defendant for a few minutes before he was taken away. The barrister and Mr. Sills at once excused themselves, and Edith looked hesitantly at Jim.
“Would you sooner see him alone, Mr. Carver?”
“No,” said Jim, decisively, “I’d much sooner you came with me. That is, if you don’t mind coming?”
They followed the usher along a narrow passage, and then down a short flight of steps leading to a barred and sparsely furnished little room, located somewhere in the bowels of the building.
Archie was sitting at a deal table under a fanlight, with the same expression of vacancy on his face, his arms loosely folded, and one plump thigh crossed over the other.
He looked, thought Jim, tired and resigned, and as soon as the usher had been replaced by a uniformed policeman, who remained standing stiffly by the open door, Archie rose with a flicker of a smile and addressed Edith.
“I’m very glad to have a chance of saying ‘thank you’ Miss Clegg,” he told her, and Jim sensed at once that his embarrassment was the less because Edith was there. “You can sit down,” he added, pointing to chairs, “they said we’d got a few minutes.”
Jim cleared his throat. He was at a loss to know what to say. It seemed almost indecent to refer to the present or future, and he and Archie had drifted apart so long ago that they shared very few topics connected with the past. Finally he said:
“You heard about poor old Berni and Boxer?”
“Yes,” said Archie, “Williams, at the shop told me, when I went back there last week. I’m sorry, they were good kids. You’ve heard no more since, I suppose?”
“No,” said Jim, “nothing more so far.”
“What will you do about the shop, Mr. Carver?” asked Edith, anxiously.
“A man called Saunders is going to buy it,” Archie told them, “and he’s agreed to do so over a period and raise a mortgage, if he can. It’ll all be settled one way or the other by the time I come out.”
“You won’t have to…to serve eighteen months, not if…” began Jim, but tailed off, unable to complete the sentence.
“Not if I keep my nose clean? No, about a year,” said Archie, with a flash of his old insolence. Then, turning frankly to Jim: “It was damned decent of you to come down, Dad, and I appreciate it much more than you think! It was more than Maria could bring herself to do!”
Jim detected the bitterness in his son’s voice when he spoke his wife’s name.
“What’s happening about Maria?” he asked. “Is she still down in Somerset?”
“I wouldn’t know,” said Archie, “she and the two younger kids were there until recently, but it wouldn’t surprise me if she hadn’t cleared out by now. She will if she knows what’s good for her!”
“Are you absolutely sure that she ran off with your money?�
� asked Jim.
“She was the only one who knew it was there, and the only one who had a key to the place. That’s good enough for me, Dad.”
“Well, there’s no sense in making more trouble if you do run across her son,” said Jim, gently. “If you intend to recover it, do it through the law.”
“Ah, but look where the law’s landed me,” said Archie, and this time Jim was relieved to see a genuine grin cross his face. The sudden widening of Archie’s mouth reminded him poignantly of Boxer, and the reminder completed the thaw, so that he said, slowly:
“Is there anything Miss Clegg and I can do for you? Anything about the shop? Or could we send you anything…cigarettes, or something?”
“No cigarettes,” said Archie, “it’s a real democracy, once you’re inside.”
He turned to Edith and smiled. Jim had never realised what a charming smile he had when he cared to use it. “There’s one little thing you could do, Miss Clegg…you could tell Elaine Fraser what’s happened, and send on her address to me.”
“She’s still in the Avenue,” said Jim, shortly, “she lives at Number Forty-Three and I catch a glimpse of her every now and again.”
“Oh, well, that’s okay, then,” said Archie, “tell her I’ll write to her there. It’ll give her no end of a kick to get a letter with my new address on the top!”
The constable at the door shifted his stand and glanced significantly at the clock in the corridor. A note of strain entered the group. It seemed to Jim that Archie was making up his mind to say something more but was finding it difficult.
“There’s one thing you ought to know, Dad…I haven’t told anyone else…there’s really no one to tell, but I think you ought to know!”
“Well?”
“My boy…Tony…he’s dead. He was killed at Tobruk, about a month ago. He got the M.C. you know, he did damn well out there! In a way I’m glad he finished up like that…I wouldn’t have liked him to hear about this lark. It would have upset him pretty much, I imagine!”
The Avenue Goes to War Page 37