‘I’m afraid …’ began Rusk.
‘I know what you’ve got to do and I won’t embarrass you by staying here. I hope you’re at last satisfied?’ She hurried out of the room.
He looked round the books, the unfashionable but comfortable furniture, the oak panelling, the oak window frames, the leaded panes. The sun was very bright outside.
Rusk came out of the office, which was next to Kremayne’s bedroom, and walked along the passage that bounded the large drawing-room which was so strange a feature of the upstairs floor. He came to Anne Kremayne’s bedroom, entered, and suffered an irritating certainty that the DI was enjoying his task of prying through the drawer of underclothes.
‘Everything finished?’ asked the DI.
‘Not yet, sir.’
‘Then what’s keeping you?’
‘I found this in a box-file in the office.’ Rusk opened his hand. In it was a buckle of brass in the form of two entwined snakes.
CHAPTER 11
Superintendent Fearson stood behind the desk in his office, his vast hands shoved deep into his pockets. He had undone the belt and front buttons of his uniform coat and the bulge of his stomach was obvious. He was a fanatical keep-fit merchant, but no matter what he did, how many times he touched his toes each morning, his waistline stayed expanded. His wife, an excellent cook, could have told him why.
‘The papers have come back,’ said the superintendent.
The DI, sitting in a chair, leaned forward slightly. He made it a shade too apparent that he was on the look-out to do the right thing at the right moment. ‘What do the legal experts say, sir?’
‘Much as we thought. We can’t charge Kremayne with both murders because the evidence against him in the Ellery case is too thin.’
‘Can we cite the facts in that case, sir, when we charge him with the murder of the Johnson girl?’
‘There are certain cases where one is allowed to prove similar facts of other crimes — to rebut any suggestion of mistake or to prove guilty intent, but as far as I can grasp the law, you can’t use one act simply and solely to prove the act you’re charging the man with. In any case, Kremayne isn’t sufficiently tied up with the Ellery murder. We’ve got to forget that one.’
‘The jury’s bound to have it in mind, sir.’
The superintendent removed his hands from his pockets; he examined the nails of his right hand. ‘Yes, Mr Carren, I think they probably will, which makes this one of the few occasions on which I can see any justification whatsoever for the jury system.’
*
Jonathan Edgar Royce Kremayne appeared before the magistrates’ court on the charge of murdering Fiona Johnson. His counsel’s plea that there was no case to answer was dismissed. He reserved his defence and was committed to the next assize.
*
The case had attracted considerable attention and the Press desks, immediately in front of the dock, were more than three-quarters filled. Editors of national papers were not willing to rely on copy sent in by reporters from the local newspapers. Most of the reporters at that moment, though, were openly inattentive. Cletford was making his opening speech.
Cletford went on talking. His thin, almost aesthetic face went well with his tall lankiness. His courtroom voice was calm, unhurried, and deliberately unimpassioned.
Kremayne sat in the dock. He had dressed with his usual flamboyant care and his old school tie was in evidence, perfectly knotted. He looked strangely confident, almost as though he couldn’t quite appreciate the enormity of the charge against him.
‘ … And so, members of the jury,’ concluded Cletford, ‘the accused was arrested, taken into custody, and charged with the murder of Fiona Johnson. I shall now call the first witness, Roland Jones.’
While a constable left the courtroom and called for Roland Jones outside, the nine men and three women who formed the jury shifted about on their uncomfortable benches and generally looked both embarrassed and unhappy.
Jones entered the courtroom. He was dressed as he dressed for Tuesday markets, and a faint scent of dung seemed to accompany him. He entered the witness-box, which was between the jury and dais, blinked nervously, accepted the New Testament and leaned right forward to read the oath on the printed card the usher held up for him.
‘Will you please tell the court in your own words,’ said Cletford, after the preliminary questions had been dealt with, ‘what you found on the morning of the twenty-fourth?’
‘A body in the field. There was blood … ‘
‘I’m sorry, but we shall have to take each question in turn. What field was this?’
‘Mine. The one what I bought off Pally a couple of year back. I was lookering the bullocks and …’
‘What precisely does that mean?’
‘Seein’ how they was making because the Ministry was due at any moment.’
‘Please continue.’
‘I was lookering and the roan wasn’t any too clear to see and I particularly wanted to see it on account of it being a bad dooer. I started to go caterwise across the field and next thing is, I sees a body.’
‘What kind of body?’
‘A dead ’un.’
‘Quite so, but male or female?’
‘Female.’
‘How were you able to tell?’
‘She hadn’t no clothes on and there weren’t no doubting.’
‘Where were her clothes?’
‘I didn’t see ’em, but they did tell me that …’
‘I fear, Mr Jones, we are not allowed to hear what they told you.’ Cletford turned over a page of the proof before him, looked quickly at the jury. ‘What did you do after you’d seen the body?’
‘Went ’ell for leather to the nearest house with a telephone and told the police and then ’ad a cup of tea what the people were kind enough to give me.’
‘Did you guide the police to the field in which was the body?’
‘I did, and I asked ’em to keep out of the rest of the field so as not to disturb the bullocks afore the Ministry came, but they went all over …’
‘Thank you, Mr Jones.’
Steine stood up. ‘No questions.’ Steine was a Jew and proud of it. He had a faintly hooked nose, very black hair, and a dark complexion. At times he looked rather like a seventeenth-century corsair.
Jones left the witness-box. His place was taken by Bert and then his boss, after that by several expert witnesses.
Carren took the oath so quickly his words ran one into another. He did not bother to look at the printed card. ‘In the morning of the twenty-fourth I was called to a field in the parish of Fetters. On my arrival, I went into the field and there examined the body of a girl which had been found near the hedge.’
‘Will you please identify these photographs. Exhibit number four.’ Cletford half turned to the right and addressed the bench. ‘The photographer has been called, my Lord.’
‘Quite so,’ replied the judge. Mr Justice Finnley was a man who, when out of robes, at first sight looked rather dustily clerical. He was short and small, had a long face with pointed chin, a sensitive mouth, and he wore hom-rimmed glasses. A closer appreciation of his character, however, revealed a definite suggestion of an outstanding mind. In robes, there was never that first impression of clericalism. He was then a man of cold logic, clever, rather remote, and able to cut through a mass of lies and subterfuges more quickly than any other judge. He seemed unable to find any sympathy for those who had done wrong.
Photographs were handed to the judge and the jury.
‘I must warn the ladies of the jury,’ said the judge, ‘that these photographs are of an exceedingly unpleasant nature.’
Cletford gave the jury half a minute in which to look at the photographs, then he turned and faced the witness-box. ‘Inspector, you found the girl in the position recorded in these prints?’
‘Yes, sir. It was clear she was dead so I examined the body and the surrounding ground and had photographs taken before the doctor made h
is examination. To the left of the dead girl I found two imprints I took to be the marks made by someone kneeling. These were photographed and casts were made. After I had finished the preliminary investigation, the doctor examined the girl.
‘I caused a search of the surrounding fields to be made and in the one next to the one in which the body was found, was a pile of clothing, carefully folded. That is a photograph of the pile,’ he said, as he was handed a print. ‘These clothes were put into plastic containers for dispatch to the laboratory. At the same time as I began the task of determining the identity of the dead girl, I …’
Carren’s flat, toneless voice continued to detail the course of the investigation. He spoke with deliberate lack of emphasis so that none might accuse him of anything but a desire to tell the facts exactly as they occurred. He had a fear of the bench, and to a lesser extent of counsel, that was also a reverence. This infuriated him and because he couldn’t destroy it, he did all he could to hide it, even from himself, but whenever he appeared in court it accompanied him.
When Steine rose to cross-examine, Carren mentally braced his shoulders.
‘You have said, Inspector, that you searched for the knife that was used to kill the deceased. For this purpose men from your division and men drafted in from other divisions were employed, as were tracker dogs and finally army personnel with mine detectors. Yet you didn’t find the knife?’
‘No, sir, we didn’t.’
‘What kind of knife were you searching for?’ Steine’s voice was smooth, calm, and friendly.
‘I was told that the knife in question was probably a sheath knife with a blade about four and a half inches long and an inch deep at the thickest point.’
‘These measurements aren’t from any observations and deductions you may have made, of course?’
‘No, sir. They were given to me.’
‘Inspector, accepting those figures, would you say that such a knife is of a commonly-found type?’ He looked down at his hands which he held about four inches apart. Steine used his hands constantly to underline his words: quite often, it seemed he was wielding an invisible cutlass.
‘I don’t know, sir.’
‘Come now, Inspector, I’m not asking you to sign away your life — only to express an opinion that you must have formed as a member of the police force of many years standing.’ Steine’s voice became a shade tighter. ‘You’ve undoubtedly seen and handled a number of sheath knives, so on that experience would you call a blade four and a half inches long an unusual size?’
‘No, sir.’
‘If you and I wished to go out today and buy a knife in this town with a blade of that size, would we probably be successful?’
‘I’d imagine so, sir.’
‘So the murder weapon was probably one that anyone, anywhere, could buy?’
‘I suppose so, sir.’
‘I expect you tried to trace the purchase of the murder knife — or, more accurately, a knife that could have been the murder one?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘With what result?’
‘None, sir.’
‘Why not?’
‘Too many shops sell such knives and they don’t keep any kinds of records.’
‘Then you really knew the answer to my earlier question, didn’t you, right from the beginning?’
Carren was silent but the set of his thick lips suggested anger. As innocuous as had been the point just made, he believed he had been made to look a fool.
‘Let’s turn to the shoe-marks and the impressions near the body which we have been told represent the murderer’s kneeling. Dealing with the knee-marks, I believe I’m right in saying you don’t claim that these show anything other than the fact that the murderer probably knelt by the body?’
‘That is so, sir.’
‘But you deduce more from the shoe-marks?’
‘The wearer’s feet are size ten or ten and a half, sir. Because of the general form of the impression we are able to say they were made by plimsolls.’
‘And thanks to some excellent work by the police, you were even able to trace the make of plimsoll?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘And you bought a pair of these which were then worn by a man to make a comparison print, or prints? And this experiment convinced you that the marks near the body were made by a new, or very nearly new, pair of plimsolls?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘Do you know where the comparison plimsolls were bought?’
‘At a multiple store.’
‘One branch of an organisation that has branches all over the country?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘In each of which this make of plimsoll is sold?’
‘I believe so, sir.’
‘Would you know how many size ten and ten and a half plimsolls are sold in the British Isles in a year?’
‘I only know it’s a considerable figure, sir.’
‘I won’t be exaggerating, will I, if I say that several hundreds of people at the very least in this country have plimsolls of the same make and size as the person who left the imprint near the body?’ Steine folded his arms across his chest, turned slightly to face the middle of the jury-box. ‘So far then, your evidence tells us that the murderer used a knife that could probably have been bought anywhere in the country, and he wore plimsolls that certainly could have been bought anywhere. Now we have been told that an examination of the semen enabled a typing to be made and that the murderer is from group B and is what is known as a secretor?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘And we’ve heard evidence that the accused’s blood is type B and he is a secretor?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘Have you any idea how many people in the British Isles are also group B and secretors?’
‘Ten percent, sir, are …’
‘Not percentages, Inspector, which are merely cold statistics, but in terms of human beings.’
‘I can’t say I’ve ever worked it out.’
‘Then I’ll tell you. Allowing the population to be fifty million — you’ll excuse my wish for round numbers but my mathematics have always been notoriously weak — there are five million people in the British Isles who possess group B blood, and, of these, three million five hundred thousand are secretors.’
The judge spoke. ‘You may be pleased to hear, Mr Steine, that your mathematics are not at fault on this occasion. I also make the figure three million five hundred thousand.’
Steine bowed. ‘Much obliged, my Lord. — Inspector, do you know that such figure represents more than three-fifths of the whole of the population of Scotland and her surrounding islands? That all these people possess the same blood characteristics as the murderer?’ He paused. ‘Over three-fifths of the population of Scotland and her surrounding islands.’ He paused again, then shrugged his shoulders and unfolded his arms; thrusting his thumbs into the small pockets of his frock coat, he allowed his outstretched palms to span part of his stomach. ‘You found tyre-marks near where the body was found?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘Will you explain to the court how you know beyond any shadow of doubt that those tyre-marks were made by the murderer’s car and not by some other car parked in that spot at some other time?’ Carren’s face became sulky. ‘I said earlier on, sir. We can’t be certain about that.’
‘You merely think it more likely to have been the murderer’s car?’
‘If you find a body, sir, nearly a mile from a broken-down Jaguar …’
‘I think we ought to make it clear to the jury that you are now surmising and making the facts fit the pattern.’
The judge put down his pencil. ‘Mr Steine, the witness has agreed that these tyre-marks could have been made by another car but he has further said, in his examination-in-chief, that in his opinion it seems reasonable to suppose, all things considered, they were made by the murderer’s car.’
‘I think, my Lord, the jury must be clearly shown that the inspector�
�s beliefs are not incontrovertible fact.’
‘I feel certain you have underlined the point sufficiently for it to be taken.’ Steine smiled, and looked particularly villainous. ‘As your lordship pleases. — Inspector, you’ve said the marks were made by Michelin X tyres?’
‘Yes.’
‘No doubts on that score? No surmises?’
‘None, sir.’
‘Forgive me if I feel it necessary to be certain … Was there anything distinctive about these marks? Anything to say that without a doubt they’d been made by the defendant’s Rover?’
‘They showed the tyres were about half-worn, sir.’
‘And is that so very important?’
‘The tyres on the prisoner’s Rover were about half-worn.’
Steine rubbed his nose, then fondled his chin with his right hand. When he spoke, his voice expressed quiet, sarcastic amusement as though he were about to suggest that a captive of his should take a nice, quiet walk along the plank. ‘You claim an identification because the tyres which made the mark were half-worn, and the tyres on the defendant’s Rover were half-worn. There must, of course, be more to it than this — perhaps you were able to measure most exactly the amount of wear in each case?’
‘Only roughly, sir.’
‘A man’s conviction for murder can rest on your evidence and you are prepared to use the word “roughly” … ? I don’t think I need labour the point.’
‘Certainly, no further,’ murmured the judge.
Steine made a quick ironical bow in the direction of the bench. ‘Inspector, let’s investigate these marks of blood you found on the steering-wheel of the defendant’s Rover. You were, of course, searching for blood-stains?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘The dead girl had bled severely. So when you found dried blood on the steering-wheel you scraped it off and sent it to the laboratory for testing and typing. Tell me, did you discover blood anywhere else in the car?’
‘No, sir.’
‘Surely, if the girl bled as much as we presume she must have, the murderer would have become covered in blood: so that one would have expected to find it on the door, the seat, the gear lever, the instrument panel?’
Exhibit No. Thirteen Page 10