by Peter Murphy
Julia Cathermole admired those qualities, because they closely mirrored her own. At thirty-nine, Julia was six years older than Virginia Castle. In little more than a decade after being admitted to practice as a solicitor, she had built her firm, Cathermole & Bridger, into a force to be reckoned with on the London legal scene. The two partners and six associates were becoming accustomed to dealing with high-profile cases almost as a matter of routine. Julia had a gift, which she loved to exploit, of causing opponents to underestimate her. Her record at Roedean and Girton – where she had taken a starred First in law and played a hard game of hockey – spoke for itself. But it was surprising how often that record was overlooked. She had a cheery, outgoing manner which suggested that she might be just as much at home with horses at a country show as representing clients in difficult court cases in London. Opponents frequently misread her, to their cost. At some point they inevitably discovered that the breezy solicitor with the wild hair had a photographic memory, a gift for reducing complex cases to an understandable, manageable simplicity, and a steely determination to win for her clients. Often her opponents recognised these qualities only when it was too late.
‘This is Professor Francis Hollander,’ Julia said. With a nod, Hollander shook hands with Miles and Ginny. Miles seated Hollander and Julia in chairs in front of his desk and took his own seat.
‘I hope Vernon offered you a cup of tea or coffee,’ he said.
‘We are fine. We had coffee after lunch, thank you,’ Julia replied.
Overton nodded and was silent for some moments before beginning.
‘Well, Julia, even by your standards, this is – how to put it… a challenging one.’
Julia smiled. ‘That’s why I am here, Miles. I need the best. Not only is it a challenging case, but against us we have Harper Sutton & Harper and Bernard Wesley.’
‘So I understand,’ Overton replied. ‘That, of course, only makes our task even more difficult. Not only does Professor Hollander make an extremely serious charge against a distinguished member of the Bar, a Queen’s Counsel, but he does so, as far as I can see, without any real evidence to support the charge. You must forgive me, Professor Hollander, but there is no point in beating about the bush. I hope you will forgive me if I speak bluntly.’
‘I would prefer it.’
‘Good. Then I must tell you that, as the case stands now, neither Miss Castle nor I see any way to defend you against liability for libel. Our best course would be to offer an immediate apology and retraction, and mitigate the damage to Digby’s reputation as much as possible. I can talk to Bernard Wesley. I doubt that Digby is interested primarily in money. His family is wealthy, and he has a good practice at the Bar. He is interested mainly in his reputation, and it may well be that there is still time to salvage it.’
Hollander shook his head.
‘That is not what this is about, Mr Overton. I went into this with my eyes open. It was not my intention to smear a man’s reputation unjustly. Digby has betrayed his country. I know it.’
‘What you think you know is neither here nor there,’ Overton replied.
‘But …’
‘Let us assume for a moment that you are correct: that James Digby has been passing secrets to the Russians for some years. God knows how, and God knows why, but let’s assume he did. Who knows about it? Who can prove it in court? On your account of the matter, it may be that Viktor Stepanov knew it, but unfortunately Viktor Stepanov is no longer with us, and even if he were, we don’t know how credible he would be. Virginia, I believe you have looked into the possibility of getting any statements he may have made into evidence?’
‘Yes,’ Ginny replied. ‘A judge has some power to allow some hearsay under the Evidence Act 1938, but the Act was not intended to take the place of oral evidence, and I can’t see any judge letting in such important evidence when the other side would have no means of challenging it.’
‘If Digby sues,’ Hollander said, ‘it will all come out.’
‘Oh? And how exactly will that happen?’
‘Quite naturally,’ Hollander replied. ‘Do you recall the case of Oscar Wilde?’
For some moments Overton stared at him blankly before he burst out laughing.
‘Oscar Wilde?’
‘Wilde brought everything on himself in the end, didn’t he?’ Hollander said. ‘If he had not had Queensberry prosecuted for libel originally, the truth would not have emerged. If the truth had not emerged he himself would not have been prosecuted. The authorities would never have disturbed him. His position in Society would have protected him. He was one of their own. It is the same with Digby. He is part of the Establishment. They would never go after him on their own initiative, left to their own devices. It goes too much against the grain. But I believe that he will not be able to resist suing me and, once he does, the truth will come out. That will leave the authorities with no choice.’
‘So you see yourself in the role of the Marquess of Queensberry, Professor, do you?’ Overton asked. ‘Not a particularly worthy role model, I should have thought.’
‘Even a Marquess of Queensberry may have a good cause, Miles,’ Julia suggested.
Overton shook his head.
‘I know you relish a good fight, Julia, but it’s not like you to point an unloaded weapon at Harper Sutton & Harper and ask them to put their hands up. What am I missing?’
She smiled. ‘I don’t give up just because a case is a challenge, Miles, you know that. I understand your reaction to this article. My reaction was exactly the same when I first read it. But even having known Francis for as short a time as I have, I think I can shed some light on what led him to publish it.’
‘I would be delighted to hear it,’ Overton replied.
She nodded. ‘My experience of academics is that there are essentially two kinds,’ she said. ‘The first kind is the ivory tower brigade, who shut themselves away and pursue esoteric subjects and write abstract treatises which are of little use to mankind, and which very few people outside their own specialism even bother to read. Why they do that I have never personally understood, but they seem to derive some satisfaction from it. The second kind is the crusader brigade, who think that their research and teaching should serve a useful purpose in the real world. Francis falls into the second group. He needs to feel that his work makes a difference.’
‘That’s all very well,’ Overton protested. ‘But the only difference he is making here is that he is going to bring a ruinous lawsuit down on his own head, and that of his University. I am not sure what useful purpose is served by that.’
‘The University is not involved in this,’ Hollander pointed out. ‘The Journal is entirely independent of the University. I founded it with two friends just over three years ago, and we run it on a shoestring. We have no assets. They can sue all they want, but there is no money for them there.’
‘That does not give you a licence to publish libel,’ Overton said.
‘I don’t believe my article is libellous,’ Hollander retorted.
‘A jury will almost certainly find otherwise, unless you can produce some evidence. What did you expect to gain from this?’
‘I have already told you. I am trying to expose truths that need to be exposed.’
‘Think about it for a moment, Miles,’ Julia persisted. ‘Francis is a patriotic American. The concerns he raises are real concerns, which affect both his country and ours. You know what’s been going on these last few years. Our security services are out of control. Even now, after Burgess and Maclean, after Philby, after Blake and the others who have been convicted, our Government either doesn’t know, or is refusing to tell us, how much damage has been done, what advantage we have handed to the Soviets through their treachery and our sheer incompetence. It is time someone stood up and said so. If we remain silent, we have only ourselves to blame when Russia starts pushing its empire even fu
rther in our direction.’
Overton pulled himself up in his chair, and placed his hands in front of him on his desk.
‘I understand that, Julia,’ he said, ‘and I am the first to agree that something must be done about the incompetence of the Security Services. If you had written about Burgess and Maclean, if you had written about Philby, if you had demanded a public inquiry – not that you would have been the first to do that – no one could have any possible complaint. But …’
‘It’s not just about the incompetence of the Security Services,’ Hollander interrupted, his voice animated. ‘It’s not even about the fact that your Government covers everything up, that it instinctively protects everyone who wears the old school tie, or comes from the right kind of family – bad as all that is. The fact is, Mr Overton, that this treachery has cost lives. How many, I don’t know. But when agents are betrayed behind the Iron Curtain, they are tortured, and then either killed or sent to the Gulags. We don’t even know how many Digby betrayed every time he went to Moscow.’
Overton did not reply immediately. As a Silk, he was unused to being interrupted during a consultation. Moreover, he had no doubt about what he had already said – the case was legally indefensible, and Hollander’s stance was almost suicidal in terms of legal strategy. But Overton found it impossible to ignore the sincerity of his manner. Hollander deserved to be heard, as well as told what was best for him. He decided to try another approach.
‘Leaving Stepanov aside,’ he asked of the room in general, ‘what do we have?’
Ginny spoke up. ‘Digby did make a lot of trips to the Soviet Union,’ she pointed out, ‘and I imagine they would be easy enough to document?’
‘Absolutely,’ Hollander replied. ‘For one thing, he would have needed a visa to visit the Soviet Union. And he did in fact send back articles to the newspapers and chess magazines. No, he was there. There is no doubt about that.’
‘Can we put him together with Stepanov?’ Ginny asked.
‘I am sure we can. They were together at many tournaments, including the 1948 World Championship. Stepanov wasn’t a great player, but he was one of the Soviets’ fixers. He was one of the people they relied on to smooth things over with FIDE and tournament organisers.’
‘Smooth things over in what way?’
‘The Soviets like to think they dominate world chess,’ Hollander replied. ‘In fairness, they do, in terms of playing strength. They have almost all the strongest grandmasters. But they try to dominate in other ways also. There have been persistent rumours that they fix tournaments – I mean, they order some of their players to lose to or draw with others to achieve a particular result, or to promote a particular grandmaster popular with the Government. Chess is a highly political issue in the Soviet Union because they like to hail their successes as proof that the Marxist-Leninist system works. They have a record of non-cooperation with the International Federation. But however dominant they are over the board, they have problems in terms of the world game. They need a few diplomats like Stepanov, men who speak other languages and know how to talk to foreigners in a civilised way, to sort things out for them. So Stepanov was a regular at international tournaments, as well as the Soviet championship. There is no doubt that we can put him with Digby – on many occasions. There are probably photographs.’
‘That’s something,’ Ginny said. ‘But we would still need a connection …’
‘That may be possible,’ Julia said. She hesitated. ‘I can’t say any more at present, but I believe it is possible that we may soon have access to some evidence to support Professor Hollander’s article.’
Every eye in the room was on her. Hollander, in particular, seemed taken aback.
‘Are you going to tell us what this evidence consists of?’ Overton asked quietly.
‘I don’t know,’ she replied candidly. ‘But I will know within a few days, and I will make it available to you as soon as I can.’
Overton considered for some time.
‘Well, I suppose there is no need to do anything at this precise moment. The ball is in Digby’s court. But I fully expect that Harper Sutton & Harper will issue a Writ and serve a Statement of Claim for libel within a matter of a few days. You should tell Herbert Harper that you will accept service on Professor Hollander’s behalf. But then, once that happens, we will have to make a very serious decision. Virginia…?’
‘The only possible defence we see to this claim is one of justification,’ Ginny said.
‘In other words, we have to prove that the allegations made in Francis’s article are true,’ Julia said.
‘Wholly or substantially true. We gave some thought to a defence of fair comment on a matter of public interest, but there is no real sense in which this article is comment. It is putting forward new facts rather than commenting on existing facts.’
‘You must understand, Professor Hollander,’ Overton resumed, ‘that once you set out to justify what you have written, you are in effect repeating the libel in court and attacking Digby’s reputation for a second time. That will increase the level of damages if you lose. There is a potential for enormous damages if you fail to substantiate your claims against Digby. Once they serve their Statement of Claim, we will have fourteen days to file our Defence, so we must decide what we are going to do. If you would like me to approach Bernard Wesley and try to find a solution to this case, this would be the time to do so. If we delay, it will probably be too late.’
‘We will justify the claims,’ Hollander said.
‘I cannot advise that without some evidence,’ Overton insisted. ‘James Digby is not Oscar Wilde. If we are going to justify, we need some evidence.’
‘The evidence will be there,’ Hollander replied.
9
Saturday, 13 March
Baxter would have preferred to meet Julia Cathermole somewhere less conspicuous than St Ermin’s Hotel. For one thing, the choice of venue there was limited. The Caxton Bar, with its dark interior and low ceilings was claustrophobic, and there was nowhere you could sit that afforded a view of all the tables. Besides, Baxter had a personal distaste for the metal-topped bar. The alternative was the lobby balcony, the hotel’s trademark meeting place, accessed from the entrance hall by means of steep, narrow stairs which give a shockingly sudden sense of height, of climbing so far over such a short distance; and which can induce vertigo when you turn around at their summit and find yourself confronted with what appears to be a precipice, an abrupt drop back down to the entrance hall. Once you get over the vertigo, the lobby balcony, presided over by a central, faintly ridiculous pulpit-like edifice, is open and airy, defined only by its sinuous balustrades curving seductively back on themselves around its perimeter, the low ornate ceiling providing the only sense of intimacy. It offers complete visibility, but is correspondingly more public. Julia had specified the lobby, the corner to the left of the main entrance. At least her choice of table was sound. Well, with her background, Baxter thought, she ought to have some sense of how things should be done, some knowledge of basic tradecraft.
Baxter’s other objection to the hotel was that it was too obvious in itself, almost a cliché, really. The Special Intelligence Service’s association with St Ermin’s was one of the worst-kept secrets in London. The Service had taken over a floor of the hotel during the War. Churchill had used it for the meeting which created the Special Operations Executive, the special section of the Service designed to play havoc with the enemy in Europe. But C had told him that Julia had a sentimental attachment to St Ermin’s because it had been a favourite haunt of her father’s, and at present Baxter needed Julia’s full and willing cooperation. He consoled himself with the thought that if anyone was watching, they could probably have followed him wherever he went, and they could certainly follow Julia. It had become too easy to be inconspicuous in London – unless, of course, you were an MI6 watcher wearing the regulation raincoat a
nd trilby.
They shook hands. She already had a coffee in front of her. He sat, and ordered one for himself as soon as the waiter approached.
‘Thank you for giving Professor Hollander a lift from the airport,’ she began.
‘My pleasure,’ Baxter replied. ‘I hope he is comfortable at the Reform.’
‘He seems to be,’ she said. ‘I know you must be busy, Mr Baxter, as am I, so may I come straight to the point?’
‘Please do.’
‘I would like to confirm, if I can, the details of the conversation you had with Professor Hollander during the drive. First of all, I understand that you told him that the Service has an interest in the outcome of the action which Sir James Digby is about to bring against him. Is that correct?’
‘It is.’
‘The Service is prepared to take sides against an Establishment figure, a baronet and leading Queen’s Counsel, on behalf of an unknown American academic apparently bent on stirring things up?’
‘I would prefer to say that the Service is interested in discovering the truth, regardless of who may be implicated. We are very interested in whatever information Professor Hollander may have to give us, and we may have something of value to offer him in return. Professor Hollander is not the first person to delve into Sir James Digby’s history. We would like to know what he has.’