A Traitor's Crime

by Roderic Jeffries

  ***

  The following morning, dressed in civvies, Keelton parked his car in the municipal car-park and then walked through to Tyler Road and the Silver Galleries.

  The manager, who recognised him, having been on the council in the past, was immediately co-operative. He opened the old-fashioned safe and brought out from it the apostle spoon.

  ‘We haven’t sold it,’ he said, ‘and I’ll confess to you that although I knew it wouldn’t go the next morning, I did reckon we’d have sold it by now. I hoped one of the regular American buyers would have taken it, but they all say that money’s too tight over there just now.’ He shrugged his shoulders. ‘Still, they’re bound to be back in the market pretty soon for pieces of real quality.’

  Keelton studied the spoon. He found it interesting, but not so attractive that he wished he could afford to buy it. ‘Are there any shops which specialise in this sort of piece?’

  ‘There are one or two in London, but nothing round here. Not even we could afford to carry such specialised lines regularly.’

  ‘If you wanted to buy several apostle spoons where would you go?’

  ‘Craster and MacDonald in Regent Street, no question about it. They’re real specialists.’

  ‘Would you do something for me?’

  ‘Anything I can, Mr Keelton.’

  ‘Lend me this spoon for a day or two?’

  ‘Lend it?’

  ‘That’s right. If you feel you can trust me?’

  The manager laughed. ‘If I can’t trust our chief constable, I can’t trust anyone, can I?’ His expression suddenly changed. ‘Your chap was asking questions before. He swore it wasn’t stolen — no fear of that now, is there?’

  ‘Almost certainly not.’

  ‘That’s all right, then. Must be a pretty big case for you to be directly concerned, Mr Keelton?’

  ‘It’s big — if it’s anything,’ replied Keelton grimly.

  CHAPTER XV

  Craster and MacDonald dealt exclusively in gold and silver. Their five show windows seldom had more than a couple of pieces in any window, but each piece would be a collector’s item. In the old days, they had designed and made silver gilt dinner services for kings and maharajas.

  A commissionaire in bottle green uniform opened the main door for Keelton: a man in morning suit stepped forward and asked how he could be of assistance. When Keelton said he wanted to speak to the manager, the man in morning suit looked askance at him.

  The manager, surprisingly, was not concerned with his own sense of importance. He listened to Keelton, then took the apostle spoon out of the box and examined it.

  ‘Quite a nice example, by one of the provincial silversmiths — can’t say exactly who it was because, as you probably know, the surviving records of maker’s marks don’t go back beyond the very end of the seventeenth century. It dates from the time of the Commonwealth when so many apostle spoons were made. One explanation for this is that it was the only way the wealthy could hang on to their silver — the religious motif stopped the Roundheads from smashing them up or melting them down … I’m not happy with that theory, but that’s quite by the way.’

  ‘Have you handled this spoon before?’

  The manager dropped his eye-glass into his hand. ‘I’ll check through the records. We keep a full note of every major piece that goes through our hands so I’ll soon be able to say.’ He turned and opened a large ledger that was on the desk.

  As Keelton waited, he wondered whether the visit was going to have fruitful conclusions or whether it was going to prove a wild goose chase. Perhaps Simlex had never heard of G.K Chesterton: perhaps he had either not enough imagination, or too much.

  The manager turned. ‘The spoon is one of five that we sold to a customer.’

  ‘By God!’ said Keelton loudly.

  ‘What?’

  ‘It’s just that you’ve … Have you got a note of the marks on the other four?’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘Who sold the spoons?’

  ‘Peabody. He’s an acknowledged expert on domestic cutlery.’

  ‘I’d like to have a word with him.’

  The manager used the internal telephone to call Peabody. The latter entered the office within the minute. He was a tall, thin man with a long, thin face that ended in a very rounded chin. ‘I remember them. They were well priced, but the buyer paid in cash. The man was not a connoisseur, not by a long way,’ Peabody said scornfully. ‘He might have been buying chromium-plated ware for all he cared.’

  ‘Some people these days merely see old silver as an investment,’ said the manager hurriedly, as if hoping to stop any further comment.

  ‘Do you remember what the buyer looked like?’ asked Keelton.

  Peabody rubbed his chin again. ‘Faces are always a bit difficult. First, I remember the piece of silver, then the way the buyer handles the silver: whether he examines it with care, appreciates it, fondles it … ’

  The manager coughed.

  ‘But at the moment I can’t focus the face. I do know there was something that caught my attention … Of course. The man stuttered.’

  ***

  Keelton, in one of the public call-boxes on Charing Cross Station, asked the operator for Gregory Bolt’s number and waited, tapping the top of the coin box with one of the sixpenny pieces. He thought how bitterly ironic it was that he had to break the law in order to ensure the law was observed.

  A woman answered the call. He recognised Anne Bolt’s voice. ‘Anne, it’s John here. John Keelton.’

  ‘What fun to hear from you! When are you and Mary coming to stay with us?’

  ‘Just as soon as we can, and that’s a promise. Is Greg in?’

  ‘He’s in the other room and I’ll get him. You tell Mary from me that it really is time you both put skates under yourselves.’

  As he waited, he tried to light a cigarette, using only one hand. The match-box fell to the floor and he cursed.

  ‘That sounds like the bloke I used to know,’ said Gregory Bolt.

  ‘Greg — I’ve got to go ahead.’

  ‘So you’re going to tell the court they were had for suckers, eh? Send me a photo of their faces.’ He roared with laughter.

  ‘You do realise what could happen to you if this broke wrongly?’

  ‘Sure, boy. They’d order me to write out the Magna Carta fifty times, in my best dog latin.’

  ‘It could be very serious.’

  ‘I was born lucky.’

  ‘I hope to God your luck’s going to hold.’

  ‘You sound all washed up, boy. Let’s go for a holiday to Yugoslavia. They tell me the beaches there are filled with women who’ll make old men like you and me feel frisky colts … Anne’s just shouted out she’ll do the decent thing and stay at home.’

  ‘Greg, if you knew what your help really means … ’

  Bolt hastily broke in. ‘It’s Yugoslavia for us, then, and beaches packed with long-legged beauties. By God, even the thought’s making me thirsty!’

  Shortly afterwards, Keelton rang off. He pocketed the loose change still on the coin-box, then bent down and picked up the box of matches. He lit the cigarette, left the call-box and went round to the counter of Smiths where he bought an early edition of the Evening News. There was only a quarter of an hour before the train left and it was standing at the platform. He made his way to an empty first-class compartment and sat down. He tried to read the paper, but found himself unable to concentrate.

  ***

  On his return to the office, Keelton called for Astey.

  ‘Percy,’ said Keelton, as the other entered the room, ‘drop everything else and go and see a Thomas Vinner at a hundred and one, Riverbank Road. Find out where he was on the seventh and eighth of October.’

  ‘In connexion with what, sir?’

  ‘He was one of the jurors in the Elwick case. I’ve just received word that he was never in the jury-box.’

  ‘Then what the hell’s supposed to have happe
ned?’

  ‘On the face of it, there’s been a personation of a juryman.’

  Astey silently whistled. ‘That’ll be a new one for us.’

  ‘Clear it up just as quickly as you can, Percy.’

  ‘Right, sir.’

  Keelton watched Astey leave the room. Astey was smart. Would some of the possibilities occur to him? If they did, would he keep his mouth shut?

  ***

  Vinner had just returned home from his work at the council offices. He was a small man, sharply featured and belligerent. He led Astey into the front room.

  ‘What d’you want to know about these days for?’ he demanded.

  I’m checking up on a report that’s come through, Mr Vinner.’

  ‘So you said. But what’s the report? I’ve never broken the law and I ain’t used to having detectives coming and asking me what I was doing on such and such a day. I reckon I’d better have a word with my solicitor … ’

  ‘It’s nothing like that,’ said Astey wearily.

  ‘Then what is it like, eh?’

  ‘I want to know where you were on those two days — the days you were called to serve on the jury?’

  ‘Me — I was at work.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Why? Because I ain’t some bloated plutocrat with a big enough income not to work, that’s why. Never a day from work in twenty-nine years, that’s me.’

  ‘But you were supposed to be on jury service.’

  ‘Maybe I was, but when I gets to court no one wants to know me. Then why bother me, I said … ’

  ‘What exactly happened?’

  ‘Aren’t I telling you? I got called to this jury thing and I don’t mind saying that didn’t best please me. When I reached court, they sent me to a room where there was a lot of other people and after a bit a man walks in and reads out twelve names and says we’re the jury and everyone else but two can go home. We get sent along to the courtroom and I’m walking along when a bloke stops me and says there’s been a mistake and I’m really one of the blokes who can go home again — they’ll call me back if someone goes ill and they need me in a hurry. I told him just what I thought of being mucked around.’

  ‘Who was this man?’

  ‘How should I know? The place was full of people I didn’t know. Didn’t want to know, what’s more.’

  ‘Was he a court official?’

  ‘Haven’t I just said I don’t know?’

  ‘Then how d’you know he’d the right to give orders?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘How d’you know he had any authority?’

  Vinner stared at Astey, an almost ludicrous expression of astonishment on his face. ‘But … Well he spoke as if he was a bloke with the right … Here, he was wearing a gown.’

  ‘Because he gave you an order, you automatically assumed he was entitled to give that order?’

  Suspecting that he had been made to look a fool, Vinner became angry. ‘Blokes don’t go around giving orders for the fun of it, mate.’

  How many people, thought Astey, blindly accepted authority, provided only it was authoritatively laid down in a way they could reasonably expect? ‘Can you describe this man?’

  ‘Well — he was a big bloke, with an officer’s voice, if you know what I mean. Looked tough.’

  ‘What kind of face? Round? Pointed?’

  ‘Round, I suppose.’

  ‘You only suppose?’

  ‘I don’t remember all that clearly.’

  ‘Colour of hair?’

  ‘Well, it was … Kind of mouse. I think.’

  ‘Any peculiar characteristics?’

  ‘Don’t think so.’

  ‘Ever seen him before?’

  ‘Never.’

  ‘Or since?’

  ‘No.’

  Astey sighed.

  ***

  Mr Justice Saxmund, one of the three judges sitting in court, interrupted Peace. ‘You say that Mr Vinner accepted the order as genuine and without any query?’

  ‘My Lord, without going into the psychology of the innate human acceptance of authority … ’

  ‘I’d much rather you didn’t,’ said Mr Justice Jamesson, who sat on the right of Mr Justice Saxmund.

  ‘Quite so, my Lord,’ said Peace. ‘I would however suggest that it is a fact that when a man is in a position in which he expects to receive orders, he will automatically and without question accept an order that seems reasonable and is given by someone who appears to be in the position of authority to give that order.’

  ‘It would seem Mr Vinner did not display much reluctance in accepting an order discharging him from his public duties!’

  ‘In the circumstances, my Lord, his actions may be said to be possessed of some logic. I would once again draw your attention to the fact that the unknown man was wearing a gown.’

  ‘Hardly a definite sign of authenticity of rank.’

  ‘Not to you or me, perhaps my Lord, but to a layman I would suggest it is otherwise. My Lord, if you were addressed in a perfectly proper manner in this court by a man you did not know but who wore wig and gown, would you call for the Law List to check that his name appeared in it and he was truly a barrister-at-law, entitled to address you, or would you assume that as everything appeared to be in order, everything was? Omnia praesumuntur legitime facta donec probetur in contrarium.’

  ‘I hope you are not suggesting anyone would dare to impersonate a barrister?’

  ‘Especially in this court and before us,’ said the third judge present, Mr Justice Raymond. There was some subdued laughter.

  Mr Justice Saxmund spoke impatiently. ‘It is an academic point since we are not here to judge Mr Vinner’s conduct,’ he said, conveniently forgetting it was he who had raised the point. He sat back in his chair. ‘It is quite clear that there has been gross misconduct in the course of the trial and that one of the jurymen was impersonated. Our task now is to consider the consequences of this impersonation. Will you address us on that, Mr Peace.’

  ‘My Lords, I regretfully have to say that in my opinion the consequences are quite clearly laid out. The law was explicitly stated as recently as nineteen-fifty. If a juror is called, whose name has been on the books, and he is sworn and serves on a jury and after the conclusion of the trial it is discovered he was disqualified from being a juror the trial is not necessarily a nullity. But it is a nullity if there has been impersonation of a juror or a mistake as to the identity of a juror.’

  ‘Does this hold good whenever there has been an impersonation or only when the person who carried out that impersonation was himself disqualified from acting as juror?’

  ‘Mr Lord, I do not think we are called upon to decide that particular point. We do not know who was the impersonator and therefore we cannot say whether he was qualified or disqualified to be a juror. In such circumstances, we are surely bound to assume the worst in order that no injustice may be done?’

  ‘Assume the impersonator was disqualified from acting as a juror?’

  ‘Yes, my Lord.’

  ‘And therefore you would hold the trial was a nullity?’

  ‘With respect, yes, my Lord.’

  Mr Justice Jamesson and Mr Justice Raymond got up from their chairs and stood close to Mr Justice Saxmund, who remained seated. There was a short conference. The two judges returned to their seats.

  ‘We find,’ said Mr Justice Saxmund, ‘that the trial, the Queen against Elwick was a nullity. We direct the police to make every conceivable effort to trace the man who carried out this wicked impersonation and to bring him to justice.’

  ‘I will see your lordship’s directions are conveyed to the right quarters,’ said Peace.

  CHAPTER XVI

  The second trial began at ten-eleven on Wednesday, the twentieth of December, just before the close of the Michaelmas sittings. The court sat late in order to be certain of finishing the case within two days and Simlex was called at about four fifty-four p.m.

  Peace, looked even more gn
ome-like because his wig had become pushed forward over his forehead, put the preliminary questions and then picked up a sheet of foolscap paper. ‘Sergeant, did you know before these raids were made that they were to take place?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’ Simlex spoke loudly, almost defiantly. Those close enough to him could see that from time to time his right eye-lid suffered a nervous tic.

  ‘How long before the two raids under discussion took place were you told about them?’

  ‘I can’t exactly remember, sir. It was at least a few hours.’

  ‘Did you take part in both raids?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘Did you tell anyone outside other members of the police force that either of these raids was to take place?’

  ‘No, sir.’

  ‘Then you are not the informer?’

  ‘I am not.’

  ‘You are on oath.’

  ‘I am not the informer.’

  ‘Do you know a man called Joe Prater, nicknamed Stuttering Joe?’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Joe Prater.’

  ‘I know of him, of course, sir.’

  ‘Have you ever met him?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Have you ever spoken to him?’

  ‘Never.’

  Mettram stood up. ‘My Lord, unnecessary as this should be, I feel I must point out to my learned friend that not only is the question of whether this witness does or does not know a man called Prater quite immaterial, but this is the prosecution’s own witness and if the prosecution wishes to cross-examine him, they really must get the court’s permission.’

  ‘Mr Peace?’ said the judge.

  Peace half bowed, said nothing, and sat down.

  Mettram cross-examined very briefly. ‘If you were the informer, do you suppose you would confess to that fact here, in this court?’

  ‘No, sir.’

  Mettram sat down.

  ***

  It was nine-seventeen that same night. Keelton sat in his office at the central police station and waited. He was chain-smoking and had already used up a full packet of cigarettes.

  The telephone rang. ‘Yes?’

  ‘John, are you coming back to dinner?’