Forever Rumpole

by John Mortimer

  ‘After all the publicity, my lady couldn’t take less than fifty thousand.’ Landseer, Chairman of the Bar Council and on the brink of becoming a judge, was nevertheless driving as hard a bargain as any second-hand car dealer.

  ‘Forty and a full and grovelling apology.’ And Peppiatt added the bonus. ‘We could wrap it up and lunch together at the Sheridan.’

  ‘It’s steak and kidney pud day at the Sheridan,’ Dick Garsington remembered wistfully.

  ‘Forty-five.’ Landseer was not so easily tempted. ‘And that’s my last word on the subject.’

  ‘Oh, all right,’ Peppiatt conceded. ‘Forty-five and a full apology. You happy with that, Mr Cuxham?’

  ‘Well, sir. If you advise it.’ Cuxham clearly had no stomach for the fight.

  ‘We’ll chat to the editor. I’m sure we’re all going to agree’ – Peppiatt gave me a meaningful look – ‘in the end.’

  While Landseer went off to sell the deal to his client, Peppiatt approached my man with ‘You only have to join in the apology, Mr Machin, and the Beacon will pay the costs and the forty-five grand.’

  ‘ “Who steals my purse, steals trash,” ’ I quoted thoughtfully. ‘ “But he that filches from me my good name …” You’re asking my client to sign a statement admitting he printed lies.’

  ‘Oh, for heaven’s sake, Rumpole!’ Peppiatt was impatient. ‘They gave up quoting that in libel actions fifty years ago.’

  ‘Mr Rumpole’s right.’ Morry nodded wisely. ‘My good name – I looked up the quotation – it’s the immediate jewel of my soul.’

  ‘Steady on, old darling,’ I murmured. ‘Let’s not go too far.’ At which moment Peregrine Landseer returned from a somewhat heated discussion with his client to say that there was no shifting her and she was determined to fight for every penny she could get.

  ‘But Perry …’ Robin Peppiatt lamented, ‘the case is going to take two weeks!’ At five hundred smackers a day I could only thank God for the stubbornness of Amelia Nettleship.

  So we went into court to fight the case before a jury and Mr Justice Teasdale, a small, highly opinionated and bumptious little person who is unmarried, lives in Surbiton with a Persian cat, and was once an unsuccessful Tory candidate for Weston-super-Mare North. It takes a good deal of talent for a Tory to lose Weston-super-Mare North. Worst of all, he turned out to be a devoted fan of the works of Miss Amelia Nettleship.

  ‘Members of the Jury,’ Landseer said in opening the plaintiff’s case, ‘Miss Nettleship is the authoress of a number of historical works.’

  ‘Rattling good yarns, Members of the Jury,’ Mr Justice Teasdale chirped up.

  ‘I beg your Lordship’s pardon.’ Landseer looked startled.

  ‘I said “rattling good yarns”, Mr Peregrine Landseer. The sort your wife might pick up without the slightest embarrassment. Unlike so much of the distasteful material one finds between hard covers today.’

  ‘My Lord.’ I rose to protest with what courtesy I could muster.

  ‘Yes, Mr Rumbold?’

  ‘Rumpole, my Lord.’

  ‘I’m so sorry.’ The judge didn’t look in the least apologetic. ‘I understand you are something of a stranger to these courts.’

  ‘Would it not be better to allow the jury to come to their own conclusions about Miss Amelia Nettleship?’ I suggested, ignoring the Teasdale manners.

  ‘Well. Yes. Of course. I quite agree.’ The judge looked serious and then cheered up. ‘And when they do they’ll find she can put together a rattling good yarn.’

  There was a sycophantic murmur of laughter from the jury, and all I could do was subside and look balefully at the judge. I felt a pang of nostalgia for the Old Bailey and the wild stampede of the mad Judge Bullingham.

  As Peregrine Landseer bored on, telling the jury what terrible harm the Beacon had done to his client’s hitherto unblemished reputation, Ted Spratling, the deputy editor, leant forward in the seat behind me and whispered in my ear.

  ‘About that Stella January article,’ he said. ‘I bought a drink for the systems manager. The copy’s still in the system. One rather odd thing.’

  ‘Tell me …’

  ‘The log-on – that’s the identification of the word processor. It came from the editor’s office.’

  ‘You mean it was written there?’

  ‘No one writes things any more.’

  ‘Of course not. How stupid of me.’

  ‘It looks as if it had been put in from his word processor.’

  ‘That is extremely interesting.’

  ‘If Mr Rumpole has quite finished his conversation!’ Peregrine Landseer was rebuking me for chattering during his opening speech.

  I rose to apologize as humbly as I could. ‘My Lord, I can assure my learned friend I was listening to every word of his speech. It’s such a rattling good yarn.’

  So the morning wore on, being mainly occupied by Landseer’s opening. The luncheon adjournment saw me pacing the marble corridors of the Royal Courts of Justice with that great source of information, Fig Newton. He gave me a lengthy account of his observation on Hollyhock Cottage, and when he finally got to the departure of Miss Nettleship’s nocturnal visitor, I asked impatiently, ‘You got the car number?’

  ‘Alas. No. Visibility was poor and weather conditions appalling.’ The sleuth’s evidence was here interrupted by a fit of sneezing.

  ‘Oh, Fig!’ I was, I confess, disappointed. ‘And you didn’t see the driver?’

  ‘Alas. No, again.’ Fig sneezed apologetically. ‘However, when Miss Nettleship had closed the door and extinguished the lights, presumably in order to return to bed, I proceeded to the track in front of the house where the vehicle had been standing. There I retrieved an article which I thought might just possibly have been dropped by the driver in getting in or out of the vehicle.’

  ‘For God’s sake, show me!’

  The detective gave me his treasure trove, which I stuffed into a pocket just as the usher came out of court to tell me that the judge was back from lunch, Miss Nettleship was entering the witness-box, and the world of libel awaited my attention.

  If ever I saw a composed and confident witness, that witness was Amelia Nettleship. Her hair was perfectly done, her black suit was perfectly discreet, her white blouse shone, as did her spectacles. Her features, delicately cut as an intaglio, were attractive, but her beauty was by no means louche or abundant. So spotless did she seem that she might well have preserved her virginity until what must have been, in spite of appearances to the contrary, middle age. When she had finished her evidence-in-chief the judge thanked her and urged her to go on writing her ‘rattling good yarns’. Peppiatt then rose to his feet to ask her a few questions designed to show that her books were still selling in spite of the Beacon article. This she denied, saying that sales had dropped off. The thankless task of attacking the fair name of Amelia was left to Rumpole.

  ‘Miss Nettleship,’ I started off with my guns blazing, ‘are you a truthful woman?’

  ‘I try to be.’ She smiled at his Lordship, who nodded encouragement.

  ‘And you call yourself an historical novelist?’

  ‘I try to write books which uphold certain standards of morality.’

  ‘Forget the morality for a moment. Let’s concentrate on the history.’

  ‘Very well.’

  One of the hardest tasks in preparing for my first libel action was reading through the works of Amelia Nettleship. Now I had to quote from Hilda’s favourite.

  ‘May I read you a short passage from an alleged historical novel of yours entitled Lord Stingo’s Fancy?’ I asked as I picked up the book.

  ‘Ah, yes.’ The judge looked as though he were about to enjoy a treat. ‘Isn’t that the one which ends happily?’

  ‘Happily, all Miss Nettleship’s books end, my Lord,’ I told him. ‘Eventually.’ There was a little laughter in court, and I heard Landseer whisper to his junior, ‘This criminal chap’s going to bump up the damages enormously
.’

  Meanwhile I started quoting from Lord Stingo’s Fancy. ‘ “Sophia had first set eyes on Lord Stingo when she was a dewy eighteen-year-old and he had clattered up to her father’s castle, exhausted from the Battle of Nazeby,” ’ I read. ‘ “Now at the ball to triumphantly celebrate the gorgeous, enthroning coronation of the Merry Monarch King Charles II they were to meet again. Sophia was now in her twenties but, in ways too numerous to completely describe, still an unspoilt girl at heart.” You call that an historical novel?’

  ‘Certainly,’ the witness answered unashamed.

  ‘Haven’t you forgotten something?’ I put it to her.

  ‘I don’t think so. What?’

  ‘Oliver Cromwell.’

  ‘I really don’t know what you mean.’

  ‘Clearly, if this Sophia … this girl … How do you describe her?’

  ‘ “Dewy”, Mr Rumpole.’ The judge repeated the word with relish.

  ‘Ah, yes. “Dewy”. I’m grateful to your Lordship. I had forgotten the full horror of the passage. If this dew-bespattered Sophia had been eighteen at the time of the Battle of Naseby in the reign of Charles I, she would have been thirty-three in the year of Charles II’s coronation. Oliver Cromwell came in between.’

  ‘I am an artist, Mr Rumpole.’ Miss Nettleship smiled at my pettifogging objections.

  ‘What kind of an artist?’ I ventured to ask.

  ‘I think Miss Nettleship means an artist in words,’ was how the judge explained it.

  ‘Are you, Miss Nettleship?’ I asked. ‘Then you must have noticed that the short passage I have read to the jury contains two split infinitives and a tautology.’

  ‘A what, Mr Rumpole?’ The judge looked displeased.

  ‘Using two words that mean the same thing, as in “the enthroning coronation”. My Lord, t-a-u …’ I tried to be helpful.

  ‘I can spell, Mr Rumpole.’ Teasdale was now testy.

  ‘Then your Lordship has the advantage of the witness. I notice she spells Naseby with a “z”.’

  ‘My Lord. I hesitate to interrupt.’ At least I was doing well enough to bring Landseer languidly to his feet. ‘Perhaps this sort of cross-examination is common enough in the criminal courts, but I cannot see how it can possibly be relevant in an action for libel.’

  ‘Neither can I, Mr Landseer, I must confess.’ Of course the judge agreed.

  I did my best to put him right. ‘These questions, my Lord, go to the heart of this lady’s credibility.’ I turned to give the witness my full attention. ‘I have to suggest, Miss Nettleship, that as an historical novelist you are a complete fake.’

  ‘My Lord. I have made my point.’ Landseer sat down then, looking well pleased, and immediately whispered to his junior, ‘We’ll let him go on with that line and they’ll give us four hundred thousand.’

  ‘You have no respect for history and very little for the English language.’ I continued to chip away at the spotless novelist.

  ‘I try to tell a story, Mr Rumpole.’

  ‘And your evidence to this court has been, to use my Lord’s vivid expression, “a rattling good yarn”?’ Teasdale looked displeased at my question.

  ‘I have sworn to tell the truth.’

  ‘Remember that. Now let us see how much of this article is correct.’ I picked up Stella January’s offending contribution. ‘You do live at Hollyhock Cottage, near Godalming, in the county of Surrey?’

  ‘That is so.’

  ‘You have a jacuzzi?’

  ‘She has what, Mr Rumpole?’ I had entered a world unknown to a judge addicted to cold showers.

  ‘A sort of bath, my Lord, with a whirlpool attached.’

  ‘I installed one in my converted barn,’ Miss Nettleship admitted. ‘I find it relaxes me, after a long day’s work.’

  ‘You don’t twiddle round in there with a close personal friend occasionally?’

  ‘That’s worth another ten thousand to us,’ Landseer told his junior, growing happier by the minute. In fact the jury members were looking at me with some disapproval.

  ‘Certainly not. I do not believe in sex before marriage.’

  ‘And have no experience of it?’

  ‘I was engaged once, Mr Rumpole.’

  ‘Just once?’

  ‘Oh, yes. My fiancé was killed in an air crash ten years ago. I think about him every day, and every day I’m thankful we didn’t’ – she looked down modestly – ‘do anything before we were married. We were tempted, I’m afraid, the night before he died. But we resisted the temptation.’

  ‘Some people would say that’s a very moving story,’ Judge Teasdale told the jury after a reverent hush.

  ‘Others might say it’s the story of Sally on the Somme, only there the fiancé was killed in the war.’ I picked up another example of the Nettleship æuvre.

  ‘That, Mr Rumpole,’ Amelia looked pained, ‘is a book that’s particularly close to my heart. At least I don’t do anything my heroines wouldn’t do.’

  ‘He’s getting worse all the time,’ Robin Peppiatt, the Beacon barrister, whispered despairingly to his junior, Dick Garsington, who came back with ‘The damages are going to hit the roof!’

  ‘Miss Nettleship, may I come to the last matter raised in the article?’

  ‘I’m sure the jury will be grateful that you’re reaching the end, Mr Rumpole,’ the judge couldn’t resist saying, so I smiled charmingly and told him that I should finish a great deal sooner if I were allowed to proceed without further interruption. Then I began to read Stella January’s words aloud to the witness.

  ‘ “Her latest Casanova, so far unnamed, is said to be a married man who’s been seen leaving in the wee small hours.” ’

  ‘I read that,’ Miss Nettleship remembered.

  ‘You had company last night, didn’t you? Until what I suppose might be revoltingly referred to as “the wee small hours”?’

  ‘What are you suggesting?’

  ‘That someone was with you. And when he left at about five-thirty in the morning you stood in your nightdress waving goodbye and blowing kisses. Who was it, Miss Nettleship?’

  ‘That is an absolutely uncalled-for suggestion.’

  ‘You called for it when you issued a writ for libel.’

  ‘Do I have to answer?’ She turned to the judge for help. He gave her his most encouraging smile and said that it might save time in the end if she were to answer Mr Rumpole’s question.

  ‘That is absolutely untrue!’ For the first time Amelia’s look of serenity vanished and I got, from the witness-box, a cold stare of hatred. ‘Absolutely untrue.’ The judge made a grateful note of her answer.

  ‘Thank you, Miss Nettleship. I think we might continue with this tomorrow morning, if you have any further questions, Mr Rumpole?’

  ‘I have indeed, my Lord.’ Of course I had more questions and by the morning I hoped also to have some evidence to back them up.

  I was in no hurry to return to the alleged mansion flat that night. I rightly suspected that our self-invited guest, Claude Erskine-Brown, would be playing his way through Die Meistersinger and giving Hilda a synopsis of the plot as it unfolded. As I reach the last of a man’s seven ages I am more than ever persuaded that life is too short for Wagner, a man who was never in a hurry when it came to composing an opera. I paid a solitary visit to Pommeroy’s well-known watering-hole after court in the hope of finding the representatives of the Beacon; but the only one I found was Connie Coughlin, the features editor, moodily surveying a large gin and tonic.

  ‘No champagne tonight?’ I asked as I wandered over to her table, glass in hand.

  ‘I don’t think we’ve got much to celebrate.’

  ‘I wanted to ask you’ – I took a seat beside the redoubtable Connie – ‘about Miss Stella January. Our girl on the spot. Bright, attractive kind of reporter, was she?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ Connie confessed.

  ‘But surely you’re the features editor?’

  ‘I never met her.
’ She said it with the resentment of a woman whose editor had been interfering with her page.

  ‘Any idea how old she was, for instance?’

  ‘Oh, young, I should think.’ It was the voice of middle age speaking. ‘Morry said she was young. Just starting in the business.’

  ‘And I was going to ask you …’

  ‘You’re very inquisitive.’

  ‘It’s my trade.’ I downed what was left of my claret. ‘… About the love life of Mr Morry Machin.’

  ‘Good God. Whose side are you on, Mr Rumpole?’

  ‘At the moment, on the side of the truth. Did Morry have some sort of a romantic interest in Miss Stella January?’

  ‘Short-lived, I’d say.’ Connie clearly had no pity for the girl if she’d been enjoyed and then sacked.

  ‘He’s married?’

  ‘Oh, two or three times.’ It occurred to me that at some time, during one or other of these marriages, Morry and La Coughlin might have been more than fellow hacks on the Beacon. ‘Now he seems to have got some sort of steady girlfriend.’ She said it with some resentment.

  ‘You know her?’

  ‘Not at all. He keeps her under wraps.’

  I looked at her for a moment. A woman, I thought, with a lonely evening in an empty flat before her. Then I thanked her for her help and stood up.

  ‘Who are you going to grill next?’ she asked me over the rim of her gin and tonic.

  ‘As a matter of fact,’ I told her, ‘I’ve got a date with Miss Stella January.’

  Quarter of an hour later I was walking across the huge floor, filled with desks, telephones and word processors, where the Beacon was produced, towards the glass-walled office in the corner, where Morry sat with his deputy, Ted Spratling, seeing that all the scandal that was fit to print, and a good deal of it that wasn’t, got safely between the covers of the Beacon. I arrived at his office, pulled open the door and was greeted by Morry, in his shirt-sleeves, his feet up on the desk.