‘Throughout the course of this outrageous day I have almost lost count of the offences that you, Mr Bartle, and you, Mr Wolfson, have caused and inflicted upon my court. The most obvious is contempt, the worst to which I believe I have ever been subjected in twenty-five years upon this bench. There is no mitigation or explanation that I will accept from either of you. I have been minded to abandon the full case before it officially opens – which is why I have interrupted the current application before its completion – to report you both to your respective state regulatory and licensing authorities, with the recommendation that you both be subject to official enquiry into your total lack of professionalism. That is still a course open to me and one I might choose to pursue. In deciding to postpone that decision I am mindful of the inconvenience and costs that would be caused your clients, as well as those of Mr Beckwith and Mr Reid. I find no reason why any of them should suffer because of your conduct. When the court resumes, however, I intend advising both doctors who appeared as your expert witnesses that I shall complain to their licensing authorities, dissatisfied as I am with the explanations both have offered. It is I who decide the interpretation and application of the law, not either of you with the sleight of hand of snake-oil salesmen …’
Pullinger paused, clearing his throat after such an uninterrupted diatribe. ‘As both of you would appear to need guidance in law, I will remind you that the course I have chosen today, to address you as I am now doing, is highly unusual and might even be construed as undue and premature bias, although I give you my absolute assurance that this is not nor ever will be the case. It does, however, open the way for both or either of you to object to my continuing to hear any more of this current application or the divorce itself and apply for a new judge. That would, of course, require me to justify this meeting, which I am fully prepared to do. I will continue this recess to enable you both to consider your course of action and discuss it with whomever you choose – and to advise Drs Chapman and Lewell of what I have told you – but warn you that if you decide to continue I will not tolerate any more of the behaviour to which I and my court have been subjected. This meeting is concluded.’
‘Your honour—’ tried Wolfson, immediately to be faced by Pullinger’s halting hand.
‘I have already told you, Mr Wolfson, that I will not accept any mitigation or explanation attempts,’ rejected Pullinger. ‘Leave my chambers and comply with every request I have made of you. Yours are now the decisions to be made.’
Once more neither Alyce, her lawyer nor her accompanying doctor were in the court cafeteria, but it was mid-afternoon, not a recognized break time and Beckwith, without pause, had swept Jordan up on his way from the chambers confrontation, ahead of everyone else who endured it.
With difficulty Jordan held himself back until they’d collected their unwanted coffee and chosen a table beyond the hearing of any surrounding table. And then he demanded, ‘Is it all over: am I out of it?’
‘That wasn’t why we were summoned to chambers,’ calmed Beckwith. ‘I haven’t even made my dismissal submission yet; you know I haven’t.’
‘Then what was it for?’
Jordan sat without movement or question throughout his lawyer’s recounting of the in-chambers meeting. At its end Jordan declared, ‘We’re there, surely!’
‘We’re nowhere,’ dashed the lawyer. ‘If they go for a new judge, we’ve lost everything we thought we’d achieved. No new judge could be told how we’d exposed the shit they tried to dump on us!’
‘You can’t be serious!’
‘Pullinger’s hog-tied them, whichever way they try to run. Which I guess he had to do, being the judge he is. Better than any other judge would have worked out how to do it, in the circumstances.’
‘What would you do, in their position?’
‘Suicide is the first thing that comes to mind.’
‘I’m being serious, for fuck’s sake!’
‘I was, to an extent. Seriously I think I’d go for a rehearing.’
‘What sort of delay would that involve?’
‘Fuck knows! Months, I guess. Appleton and Leanne would have to start over again, from scratch. I don’t know of any case – any set of circumstances – like this on record.’
‘So it would attract more attention than it already has?’ queried Jordan, posing the most prominent of his several concerns.
‘Inevitably.’
A lot of his carefully stabled Trojan Horses would be useless too, Jordan accepted. He’d virtually have to start over to put himself as far ahead as he had this first time. ‘Can Pullinger stop like this, right in the middle of your application? Couldn’t he carry on and decide on my dismissal?’
‘I just told you, I don’t know of any other legal situation like this that’s ever arisen in North Carolina or anywhere else in North America with the criminal conversation statute still in existence. We might have a way out. If today collapses, I’m going to have a lot of time to go through the records, to see if there is a precedent we can use.’
‘What about the cost of the sort of delay you’re talking about?’
‘I’ll certainly apply for costs of everything so far. I don’t see how Pullinger could refuse or Appleton’s side resist …’ Beckwith broke off at the sight of the court usher entering the cafeteria and rose in anticipation, saying, ‘Decision time,’ as he did so.
They were the last to return to court, although Reid was settling Alyce in her seat ahead of them. She sat docilely and Jordan’s impression as he followed to the adjoining table was that Alyce appeared practically catatonic. It was very different on the other side of the court. Everyone was flushed, the two doctors shifting constantly in their seats: Appleton was gesturing with Bartle but Leanne was pulled away from her lawyer, as if she wanted physical separation. Beckwith didn’t sit but continued on to Reid’s table for a huddled discussion until the shouted announcement of Pullinger’s re-entry. The judge didn’t hurry this time, pointedly re-arranging his robes around him. Having done so, he said, ‘Counsel will approach the bench.’
The four lawyers arranged themselves in front of the judge in the order in which they sat. Pullinger said, ‘Well?’
‘My client wishes the hearing – and the case in full – to continue before your honour,’ said Bartle. ‘But my expert witness, Dr Chapman, wishes to address the court.’
‘My client also wishes to continue before your honour,’ echoed Wolfson. ‘Dr Lewell also seeks to address you, your honour.’
Pullinger nodded in dismissal and as he retook his seat Beckwith hissed, ‘We’re going on! Christ knows why, but we are.’ Looking towards his lawyer as he was, Jordan saw Reid hunched towards Alyce, who showed no response – no awareness even – of what she was being told.
‘Dr Chapman and Dr Lewell will stand,’ ordered Pullinger. When both did the judge continued, ‘For the record I will repeat what I know, upon my instructions, has already been communicated to you by your respective lawyers, for whose clients you appeared before me, as well as providing written medical opinion. It is that I intend reporting to your governing, licensing body my displeasure at the manner and lack of professionalism of both your evidence and your written opinions. I am, in turn, advised that you both wish to make representations before me. I am refusing to hear those representations: this is not the court to hear or adjudicate upon your professional conduct. For me to hear whatever it is you wish to say could prejudice any future enquiries in which you might be involved. You will both be provided with a full transcript of all the proceedings in which you have featured thus far, as well as a copy of what I write to your licensing authority.’
‘That isn’t fair!’ protested Chapman.
‘This will not be argued and neither of you will make outbursts in my court, which I order you to leave, immediately. Usher, escort the two doctors from the premises!’ Switching his attention to the other side of the court, Pullinger said, ‘Let’s get on, shall we, Mr Beckwith?’
Jordan w
as aware of a flicker of interest from Alyce as his lawyer stood, reminder notes in his hand. He was aware, too, of Beckwith’s pause: the actor preparing himself for his opening speech.
Beckwith said, ‘As your honour has already had cause to remind us, this is a court of law. It is not, despite the evidence that might be brought before it, a court of morals. It is the law, its interpretation and its administration, upon which I seek to address this court …’ Alyce had definitely emerged from her private world, Jordan decided. He was encouraged, too, by what he inferred to be several nods of approval from the judge.
‘I submit for your honour’s ruling that the North Carolina statute Section 1-52(5) is an inextricably connected hybrid of two parts,’ continued Beckwith, using his reminder notes more as a gesturing prop than a memory prompt. ‘From the first comes the accusation, if proven to your honour’s satisfaction, of alienation of affection, which surely requires the intercession between spouses of a third, destructive party, with the result that the marriage irretrievably breaks down. The second support to Section 1-52(5) is the offence of criminal conversation, which I further invite your honour to interpret as the intentional, alienating seduction by a destructive third party. I seek to prove, to your honour’s satisfaction and agreement, that my client, Harvey Jordan, is not liable to the accusation of criminal conversation because at the moment and time of the admitted affair with Mrs Alyce Appleton there no longer existed in Mrs Appleton any affection whatsoever to be alienated. Therefore there can be no case for criminal conversation. In the submitted papers before you Alfred Jerome Appleton admits adultery with at least two different women. At no time during their marriage, in which considerable difficulties arose, did Mrs Appleton betray her marriage vows. Indeed, there will be evidence produced before you that Mrs Appleton did everything in her power to save her marriage from irretrievable collapse, even attempting a reconciliation and resuming conjugal relations with her husband. It was during this attempted reconciliation that Mrs Appleton contracted chlamydia that has become the subject of so much discussion already and upon which I will not dwell further at this point, although there are points I intend to raise in my closing arguments. Any lingering affection – the remotest possibility of a lasting reconciliation – vanished when Mrs Appleton discovered she had contracted a venereal infection from her husband, who could have been the only source or cause of that infection. She initiated divorce proceedings, the intention of which was communicated to her husband before her departure for a lengthy vacation in the South of France. At the time of that departure Mrs Appleton considered herself married to her husband in name only, a name she sought to divest herself of as quickly as possible. In France she was a lonely woman, a betrayed and humiliated woman only recently cleansed of a sexual disease uncaringly passed on to her by her promiscuous husband …’
Alyce was listening intently now to every word, Jordan saw, actually with a pen in her hand although she did not appear to be taking notes. Both opposing lawyers were, as well as Pullinger. Appleton and Leanne Jefferies were gazing directly ahead, as if oblivious of each other.
‘And in France this lonely, betrayed and humiliated woman met my client, Harvey Jordan—’
‘A gambler!’ broke in Pullinger. The inference was of accusation.
Beckwith managed to pick up practically without pause. ‘That is indeed how Mr Jordan makes his living, which some might regard as an unusual career: certainly out of the ordinary to those of us who follow a more mundane profession. But I would suggest that at this very moment those working on the trading floors of Wall Street – Mr Appleton himself, as a commodity trader – could be described as gamblers. The very men who made America the world leader it is today, the Astors and the Vanderbilts and the J.P. Morgans, were chance-taking entrepreneurs, which is an interchangeable word for a gambler …’
‘Quite so,’ nodded Pullinger.
‘Harvey Jordan was an entirely innocent party in a long ago divorce, the papers of which are before you,’ resumed Beckwith. ‘He was on vacation in the South of France, a region he knows well and in which he vacations most years. He always stays, when he is in Cannes, at the Carlton Hotel. Where, by total and absolute coincidence, Alyce Appleton was also staying. Their meeting was not pre-arranged. It was a chance encounter, like so much is in life. Harvey Jordan took Alyce Appleton on the shortest of excursions along the coast. They had an affair, the briefest of episodes which ended with her return to her country, his return to his country. They did not exchange addresses or telephone numbers. Neither considered it as anything more than what it was: a holiday liaison. Harvey Jordan was not engaged in criminal conversations, intent upon alienating the affection of Alyce Appleton from a husband in name only, for whom her only attitude of mind was contempt for what he had inflicted upon her. To be judged guilty – liable – for an offence, your honour, there surely needs to be evidence produced that a law has been contravened. Here I respectfully submit that there is nothing in law that supports the accusation against my client.’
For several minutes after Beckwith sat – which seemed to catch the opposing tables by surprise – there was the necessary silence for everyone to digest what Beckwith had said. Pullinger broke it. He said, ‘That was an address too eloquent to have been kept from a jury, which must, I suppose, forever remain their loss. What you have told me is, of course, based upon the pre-hearing statements of Mr Jordan and Mrs Appleton. Do you not intend calling them, to support what you just said?’
Jordan’s impression was that for the first time Beckwith was disconcerted, although he concealed it well. Quickly rising again the lawyer said, ‘My address was upon the admitted and uncontested facts, your honour. They require, of course, to be subjected to the examination of the other side.’
For someone who had always until now existed as Mr Invisible, never to be seen and even more importantly never to be recognized, Harvey Jordan’s feeling at being the sole object of everyone’s unrelenting attention lurched into the surreal. He was confident that he had his hand upon the Bible and was correctly reciting the oath, but his mind suddenly blanked of everything he had so carefully memorized to word-rehearsed perfection. The bewildering out-of-body experience remained throughout the early, officially required formalities and only began – and then very slowly – to ease when, straining for concentration, Jordan forced himself to respond to Beckwith’s gentle, yes or no confirmation, of his already provided statement.
Beckwith’s abrupt departure from that statement: ‘Did you consciously, predatorily, set out to seduce Alyce Appleton?’ – finally brought Jordan back to the reality of his surroundings.
Every answer had to be thought through, although without any obvious hesitation, Jordan warned himself: he couldn’t risk once being caught out in a lie. ‘No, I did not.’
‘How, then, did you look upon Alyce Appleton?’
Jordan gave an uncertain gesture, to give himself time. ‘As a fellow guest at the hotel, someone with whom I got into casual, passing conversation.’
‘Yet you lunched together the first day of your meeting?’
Jordan gave another delaying shoulder movement. ‘She’d prevented me losing the book I was reading. It was a snack rather than lunch. It was entirely inconsequential.’
‘What gave it consequence?’
‘Nothing happened specifically to give it any consequence. We talked about books and writers. I knew from my knowledge of the area that Alexander Dumas’ novel, The Man in the Iron Mask, was based on fact and that the victim was at one time imprisoned on an island just off the coast of Cannes. I invited her on a surprise trip to see it.’ Beckwith was building up to how he and Alyce went to bed that first time, Jordan accepted. It hadn’t been ugly, as it would sound here now, in a cold court. It would make Alyce appear a whore, which she wasn’t. Abruptly Jordan remembered Beckwith’s ballpark estimate of the potential damages if Pullinger found against him and Beckwith’s angry insistence that Alyce’s words made her out to be the pursuer,
not the pursued.
‘You chartered a yacht, sailed to the Ile St Marguerite and saw the prison in which the man in the iron mask was incarcerated?’
‘Yes.’ He’d limit his answers as much and as best he could, Jordan decided.
‘Then what did you do?’
‘We had lunch.’
‘On the yacht?’
Beckwith was looking very directly at him, Jordan saw, with what he gauged the beginning of a warning frown. ‘It was a catamaran. And yes, that’s where we lunched.’
‘What happened after that?’
‘We swam.’
‘To do which you had to change. Did you change together, in the same cabin? Or separately?’
‘Separately.’
‘You didn’t suggest that you should undress together?’
‘No.’
‘Did it not enter your mind that you might suggest it, Mr Jordan?’
‘No.’
‘Did you not find Mrs Appleton attractive?’
‘Yes.’
‘Sexually attractive?’
Jordan hesitated, looking at the woman, who looked directly and expressionlessly back at him. ‘Yes.’
‘Yet it did not occur to you, in the circumstances in which you found yourself, to suggest you undress together: make a sexual approach to her?’
‘No.’
‘Why not?’
‘It did not seem … I don’t know … I didn’t.’
‘Did you fear that she would rebuff you?’
‘I didn’t think about whether she would rebuff me or not.’
‘And in the early evening you sailed back to Cannes, arriving around dinner time?’
‘Did you suggest dinner?’
‘Yes.’
‘Did she accept?’
Jordan felt hot, hotter than he had when he’d first stepped, his mind blank, on to the witness stand. ‘No.’
‘What were her precise words?’
‘As best as I remember, she said she was not hungry after the lunch.’
The Namedropper Page 24