Judge Savage

by Tim Parks

  Max! The young man stopped. Daniel saw his face return from a sort of vacant transport, to polite alertness. His hands left the keyboard and fell to his side. Max? Yes? What is it, Mr Savage? Max, when exactly did you meet Sarah? A breeze from outside rustled the music score. On the table the flowers of two weeks ago had still to be removed. I’m not quite sure. Max hesitated. Last winter. Yes, before Christmas. And she was handing out tracts? Yes. In His Image? Daniel asked, for Your Salvation? That’s right, Max half smiled: She stopped me in the street. And she was very intense I suppose?

  The young man turned the stool to face Judge Savage properly. He seemed glad of the conversation. Yes, she was. When we started to talk, she said actually she was far more confused than I was, about God. She said she was only handing out tracts to see if she really did believe. Which I thought was funny. Daniel was struck by this picture of his daughter. Finding he was still holding his newspaper, he folded it. Quite, he said. Then she took you to one of her mother’s concerts? Yes, I’d told her I was a piano player. She said if I came to a church service with her there was a concert afterwards. I think there was a piece by Satie, I don’t know who played, and then Mrs Savage played Ravel. So it was Sarah introduced you to her? Yes. And what relationship do you think they had, Sarah and her mother?

  Daniel had been speaking very quickly, almost brusquely. It would be evident that he’d already drunk too much. How do you mean? Max’s face contrived to give an impression of complete candour. How do I mean, Daniel wondered? Every evening he came home from work and immediately was filling a tumbler. I’m not sure how I mean, he said. Then another. Just give me your impression, of how they were when you met. What did you think of them? Well, Max said, Mrs Savage was very excited. That’s normal after performing. He hesitated. I think after a few moments Sarah sort of disappeared. I can’t remember, she must have wandered off, then we started talking about arranging lessons. I’d stopped playing for a while and I wanted to start seriously again.

  Have you seen Sarah over the last few days? Again Daniel was brusque. I did phone, Max said. When no one replied here, I tried Carlton Street. Daniel tried to understand what this pleasant young man was thinking. Surely he must find it strange that Daniel was alone with breadcrumbs all over the table, dirty glasses, wilting pinks. Mrs Savage, you see, hadn’t told me she was going away. We were supposed to have our regular lessons. So you called Sarah? That’s right, but then of course I only got her flatmate. Why of course? Max seemed confused: Of course? Well, I mean, because as you said they’re on holiday. He thinks I’m drunk, Daniel saw. In fact, she told me that Sarah had gone off with her mother. She told you that, the Korean girl? Yes. Max was increasingly uneasy. Where have they gone by the way? How old are you? Daniel asked. The boy’s extraordinary civility actually invited you to be rude. Twenty-five, he said. Twenty-five? Can I ask you a brutal question, Max? The young man shrugged: If you like.

  Judge Savage was sitting on the sofa now. He had spread his legs out. He held his tumbler in both hands, elbows on his knees. Sarah had left the flat and gone off with Hilary. How improbable that outcome would have seemed only a short while ago. He tried to assume a posture of ease, as when he used to tell court stories at dinner parties. Max, I’m presently trying a case where a group of people your age or thereabouts are accused of throwing a rock from a bridge over the ring road. That’s right, we’ve already talked about it. Have we? That evening I drove you to the hospital, remember? Oh yes, well, I wanted to ask you, Max, can you imagine why they would have done that? Max was puzzled. The boy couldn’t see how this could be considered a brutal question. The judge explained: It seems, you see, that statistics show that the culprits of such crimes are almost always in their early twenties. And in fact that’s the case with the defendants we have. Max shook his head. There are three couples, Daniel said, in the nine accused. Max looked up: Oh are there girls too?

  Outside it was dark now. Daniel stood, turned on a lamp, went to draw the curtains. Does that surprise you, that there are girls? A sudden movement startled him, but it was only a moth outside against the pane. I’m so nervous, he thought. I suppose I thought it would only be boys, with vandalism, Max said. But this isn’t vandalism, Daniel sat down. These people have no history of vandalism, Max. That’s why I wanted to ask you. They all live at home with their parents. Like you do. They are all employed. They have quite decent jobs actually. Certainly they all have mobile phones. They call each other incessantly. The morning after the crime there were something like eighty phone calls between them. Anyway, I just wanted to throw this idea at you.

  He paused. It was actually extremely indiscreet of him to discuss a case under trial. But what difference could it make? Yes? Max was dutiful. There’s a psychologist, you see, who has served a statement on the relationships within the group, and he remarked on the fact that none of the couples involved, none of them, had normal, well, sexual relations. Oh, the Jewish boy said. They form tentative couples, but their real solidarity seems to be toward this adolescent group, though they are hardly adolescents any more if you see what I mean. Yes and no, Max said. Well, what I’m driving at is that the psychologist suggests that this, oddity if you like, this prevalence of the group over the couple, has something to do with the crime. What do you think about that?

  I . . . Max began. Daniel waited. Well, I don’t see how, Max said. He tried to laugh: Psychoanalysts always think everything’s to do with sex. That’s true, Daniel agreed. On the other hand in this particular case, not fifty yards from the bridge from where the stone was thrown, I think we drove under it ourselves didn’t we, there’s a place where prostitutes stand. You know. Probably you have seen them yourself. Yes, Max said. Actually I’ve heard the police are thinking of asking the papers to publish the names of the men who stop for them. Are they? Judge Savage asked. Really? He hadn’t heard about that. Anyway, those prostitutes must have been in view when whoever it was threw the stone. What I want to know is, do you think, someone your age, Max, might, out of sheer sexual frustration, out of not being able to get started in life, as it were, do something quite mad like that, to show off to the prostitutes, to send a message to his girlfriend? Do you see? Or to another member of the group. Apparently there was some kind of dispute going on between two of the male members of the group.

  Max was perplexed. Very directly, he demanded, But what does it matter, Mr Savage? Daniel sensed resistance. The boy’s amenability was gone. Who cares why they did it? As long as there’s enough evidence to show that it was them. They looked at each other. Fair question, Daniel said. This had once been Minnie’s objection of course. If we know he raped her, who cares what he was thinking?

  Or perhaps it does matter, Max asked more cautiously, does it? He didn’t want to seem stupid. Exactly as he spoke, Daniel became humiliatingly aware of not knowing quite why he had started this strange discussion. I’m drunk, he told himself. In a trial – he tried to think – in a trial, in order to get a conviction, Max, the prosecution has to put together a body of evidence, make a convincing story if you like, and of course it has to make sense. I can see that, the boy agreed. They call it the burden of proof, but it’s rarely really proof, of course. There’s almost nothing you can really prove, in the way that you can do an experiment to demonstrate some scientific formula. Legal proof is a convincing story, a series of persuasive links between the things which appear to be indisputable evidence: in this case the stone, the bridge, a car driven by one of the group with traces of stone in its boot, the nine young people with their mobile phones, two more or less corroborating confessions in an early interview with police, later withdrawn. Right, Max agreed. Right, I see that.

  And stories, Daniel went on, these days are above all psychological, you see. They have to be psychological. When people tell a story they’re thinking psychology. They’re thinking, what is the mind that this collection of facts implies? Actually, Daniel wasn’t even sure whether he believed this. Yes, Max agreed. Rightly or wrongly, o
f course. So if the jury feel the psychology of the prosecution’s story is crazy, that means they can’t imagine that mind, and the lawyer defending of course will do everything to make it look crazy, or at least suspect. At that point, however convincing the evidence, in terms of who saw whom where and when, the jury may still decide not to convict. Or at least hesitate. They feel it doesn’t add up. This bloke couldn’t have done this. I hadn’t thought of that, Max said.

  But the trouble is, Daniel concluded, that so many things that happen, even ordinary everyday things, don’t seem to add up at all. I suppose not, Max was dubious. And anyway they’re so complicated. Which is why people perhaps exaggerate some things and play down others when they start talking about their lives. Or even when they’re giving evidence to the police. To give it a shape and a story. Yes. Max had his youthful body bent forward, clutching his hands together. Yes, I can follow you there, I know people who do that. It’s an aesthetic thing. But looking at the handsome young man, it occurred to Daniel now that he was merely offering a repertoire of postures that might please. He shuffles a pack of pleasing attitudes. This conversation is pointless, Judge Savage thought. Why on earth am I blathering on like this?

  So the thing about the psychologists, he tried to wind up, when all the exaggeration and so on is stripped away, is that they are very good at bridging the gap between what happened, the various facts, and the mystery of the mind that made them happen. In fact, although obviously that’s not officially their job, you could say that it was their secret task, if you see what I mean. Their function. Depending of course on whether they’re serving a statement for the prosecution or the defence. A psychologist can put the jury’s mind at rest that another mind could indeed have operated in this way. So in this case someone comes up with this story of throwing stones in response to sexual inhibition. And I just wanted to know what you personally thought of that.

  Max shook his head. It’s fascinating, he said carefully. He bit a lip. I mean, Daniel went on blindly, I mean you could say that Sarah, for example, had thrown a lot of stones at her father, couldn’t you? Max was silent. Do you see what I mean? Max sat still. Daniel made one last drunken attempt to puncture the boy’s defences. Just think, he said sharply, for example, of the way you met her, Sarah. There you are, walking down a street in town in late spring early summer. You come across a young woman, fresh, attractive I think, sexy even, am I right? Someone you might have looked on as a possible girlfriend, I would have said. How often is it that a man is actually approached in the street by a beautiful girl? Oh God, I’ve drunk far too much, he realised. We all dream of such things, don’t we? But instead of merrily a-courting her, as it were, you spend most of your time with the girl’s mother who’s a good twenty-five years older.

  Judge Savage’s voice had become quite harsh. He wanted to force some sense into the man. But Max replied at once: Well, that’s because she’s a piano teacher. Daniel sighed. Quite, he said. The anger went out of him. He stood up. Yes of course, you’re right I’m sure. Then he announced: Oh they went to Cornwall, by the way. It was a bit of a last minute decision. Hilary said to tell you she was sorry, but it seemed the only way of enticing Sarah out of the flat. You remember we’d had problems. Oh, I see, Max said. His eye had wandered back to his score. Daniel was struck by the fact that even he himself was not really suffering. He picked up the newspaper, spread it on the table and very quickly pulled the rotting flowers from the vase. He rolled them up in the newsprint and found himself to his surprise face to face with the psychiatrist murdered by his architect patient. He burst out laughing. Actually, Max . . . The boy had been poised to start playing again, but waited. Actually you know, Daniel wrapped up the flowers tight, her flatmate’s quite nice too, if you feel like flinging your cap. Max looked perplexed. Sarah’s flatmate, the one you spoke to. Korean, petite. Mid twenties. Probably quite a sack artist, I would have said. I’m sorry? Sack artist, Max, good in bed. One hears these expressions in court from time to time. Oh I see, the boy said.

  TWENTY-TWO

  ON IMPULSE, DANIEL was driving to Carlton Street. I will wrench this into shape were the words that repeated in his head. He drove very fast through a fizz of city light. Already I am in the lift. I will wrench this into shape. The word wrench is very powerful. But he couldn’t get his key in the door. What is wrong with these keys? He checked again. Now the landing light was out. She has changed the locks, he realised. This flat is no longer ours. Christine has changed the locks. I hate Christine. He knew this. He pushed on the bell. He pushed the button down and held it. He held it down. It is late at night to visit, people will be asleep, but he must wrench this into shape. There were footsteps. He heard a chain guard released. We never used a chain. Someone is scared. There was a rattle. Somebody is frightened of opening the door. The door didn’t open. He waited. Open up! The footsteps were retreating. Judge Savage shoved the door which swung effortlessly open onto a cavernous sitting room. Sarah! Her figure was retreating in a dark nightdress. Sarah! He stumbled toward her. Why are my legs so leaden? I’m ageing, Judge Savage thought. I’m no longer young. The figure turned in a doorway. Minnie Kwan was streaming blood. Her face had dissolved in blood. But it was also alight. It was on fire. It was consumed in red flame. You let me die, she said, and Daniel awoke.

  He lay in bed, savouring his dream. A nightmare can be a pleasure when it’s over. The shiver of horror almost immediately became a pleasure. Let her die was what I didn’t do, he thought. Why had he dreamed the opposite? Why did one wake from such a terrible dream to feel so complacent? I don’t have nightmares of being beaten up, he noticed. I don’t regret what I did.

  Experiencing a strong sense of being himself and sure of it, Judge Savage got up in the night and found a piece of paper. Hilary, he wrote, if you are quite decided, let’s sort out terms so that then I can see Tom and Sarah. He felt dispassionate. I will no longer fight for my marriage, he thought. It was more a fact than a decision. There is no kindling in me, he announced, rather oddly. He wrote. Obviously you will have the house. I won’t make trouble about money. I shall move out. Actually, I love you, he concluded. Dan.

  He addressed the letter to her parents and in the same strange mood of assurance and even serenity that the nightmare had brought on, lay down in bed again to doze. At last he could see the future. How strange to feel so calm! I find a small place in town somewhere. I give myself entirely to the court. Judge Savage put his hands behind his head and closed his eyes. I become the finest of judges, the very finest. I give all my energy to it, to the business of running a court efficiently and honestly. I write important articles proposing far-reaching reforms. Somebody must improve the quality of prosecution in this country. Somebody must find a way of saving time and money without undermining anyone’s rights. It would be gratifying to have reached the pinnacle of the judicial system. The children are too old to be taken from me, he decided. Tom and Sarah will always be my children. They are too old to think of anyone else as their father. Then he thought: If the scandal does break, I could go into legal consultancy. Race issues. I will always be in demand.

  He felt blissftilly calm now, completely and utterly decided and serene, as if drifting on his back in some comfortable canoe down a gentle mental stream through the soft late summer morning beyond the town, a distant barking of dogs just penetrating the muslin mist that hung over slopes of wet stubble. It’s all done, he thought. That’s over. Living alone, I need no longer torment myself with the mysteries of those around me, what they might want, what my relationship with them might be. He felt strangely posthumous to himself, as though saying goodbye to the life of one who was dead. I won’t even ask Christine about her talking to Sarah, he thought. The woman’s unhinged, Judge Savage decided. He remembered Father Shilling. Even if I sleep with her, he smiled, I won’t ask her. He chuckled. You don’t rule a woman out of your bed just because she’s unhinged. Who shall I sleep with now I’m no longer married? If I sleep with Kathleen Connolly, he th
ought, I’ll just sleep with her. I won’t ask her any professional questions or be in any way indiscreet about trials in progress. She’s an attractive woman. I will avoid conversation about her sick child. Work, and have the occasional fling, he decided. And I will never need to lie to anyone. Never need to say where I am, when I’m coming home. There will be no separate compartments in my life, no false bottoms. That had been exhausting. I will support the children, he decided rather solemnly, without insisting on knowing too much about their lives, without tormenting myself whether they are successful or not. They can do what they want. They can become evangelists and marry pygmies. I will not interfere. I will sit out.

  What a blissful image this was! Daniel Savage seemed to have detached himself from the hard earth. I will be entirely understanding, he thought, and tolerant. A judge’s responsibilities are enough for one man, he decided. I didn’t let her disappear or die, the thought came back. I didn’t. At least that part of my identity I was true to. That’s the bottom line. I didn’t find her face streaming blood. Again he saw the corridor, the bloody, burning, faceless figure and was not horrified. On the contrary, his soft dozing was cushioned on the pleasing falseness of that nightmare. It was curious that the dream unfolded in the place that used to be his home. Now I don’t have a home, he thought. Double lives happen in homes. Now I don’t need to wrench anything into shape. Not even the stone-throwing trial. I’m just the referee, he told himself. I’ll become a sort of legal priest, Daniel Savage decided, presiding over the sacrament of justice. I can see Frank, perhaps, some Saturday mornings. I can drop by Frank’s stall. This was a charming thought. He and his forgotten brother would chat together at the man’s market stall, all past rancours forgotten. All relationships will be drained of rancour, Judge Savage said out loud. He said it again. Even Hilary. Separated, their relationship would be drained of rancour. Yes, yes, that will happen very soon. He could imagine them all having a drink together. Down by the river, perhaps. Myself and Frank and Hilary. Perhaps Christine too. I’ll take a rowing boat with Tom. His relationship with Sarah would also be drained of pain. I will never slap her again. There would be no more embarrassing conversations of the variety he had embarked on last night with Max. I won’t do that any more because I won’t be trying to comprehend the incomprehensible. It was curious how such a nightmare, a banal nightmare really, the simplest rearrangement of various anxieties, could provoke such a profound change of attitude, such a deep sense of well-being. This story has a happy ending, Judge Savage thought. Suddenly he saw the trajectory of it very clearly. He was convinced. It was stupid to be seduced by the difficulty of these long-term relationships, with wife and children. You set yourself goals, then are overwhelmed by them. You’ve worn yourself out, he decided, that’s the truth, being two and more people at the same time, Hilary’s man, your own man, the courts’ man. A double, indeed a triple life. It was stupid to seek approval, stupid to abase yourself. Duplicity is exhausting, he decided. All the same, there was no need to go down Martin’s path of nihilism. On the contrary. This is blissful, he thought. There would be new interests. Frank seemed perfectly happy with his new friend and his antiques. I’ll allow myself an amorous adventure from time to time, Judge Savage told himself, floating blissfully on the early morning mist. Something a bit more classy and discreet than a Brazilian streetwalker. A conscientious judge is a valuable member of society after all. He deserves his little adventures. He can afford them. Or I might do the rounds of old girlfriends. That was a possible variation. Even Minnie. He hadn’t just abandoned the girl, as he might have. A friendly night together was not out of the question. Now you are free to help anyone you want and likewise to make a pass at anyone you want. So long as they are not sitting on a jury. Those seemed to be the two fixed points of his character, helping and leching. A moral man, with appetite! Judge Savage laughed out loud. He felt good. I must make the stone-throwing summing up an exemplary performance, he thought, I must say quite clearly what’s at stake. You cannot reduce a woman to a faceless mass of gore.