The Benefits of Death

by Roderic Jeffries

  “Quite so, my Lord.”

  The judge stood up and the usher called for silence. He had no hope of obtaining it.

  *

  One hour later, the court resumed sitting.

  The judge crossed the dais, walked to his chair, bowed briefly, and sat down.

  An overweight uniformed superintendent gave evidence. “We’ve done all we could, my Lord. We’ve managed to contact two people who were in the hall at the time of the incident and who saw Mrs. Breslow running to the main entrance.”

  “Were they able to assist you?”

  “Their evidence is contradictory, my Lord.”

  The judge’s expression became grimmer. “Is that all the guidance you can offer the court?”

  “Yes, my Lord.” The superintendent seemed about to explain and excuse, but he rightly decided not to.

  “The court will obviously have to adjourn for a longer period in order that far more extensive inquiries can be made.” The judge spoke to counsel. “Mr. Alliter, for how long may we adjourn?”

  Alliter successfully covered the fact that the answer momentarily escaped him. “Surely, my Lord, that depends on how long the court wishes to adjourn for?” He blandly left it at that. Since the judge was one of the greatest living experts on criminal law and procedure, Alliter thought he could answer the question.

  The judge picked out one of the text books from the small case to the right of the desk and he studied the index. He then opened the book near the beginning, read rapidly through a paragraph, and looked up.

  “As is not uncommon, Mr. Alliter, the authorities are not on all fours. We are told that, once the jury have been sworn, adjournments are only allowed until the next day, but that a trial can be temporarily suspended. Again, a judge may adjourn the trial after the close of the case for the defence, but on the other hand, the court has no power to adjourn once the jury are sworn. Perhaps the best statement of the law is that an adjournment may be allowed whenever justice demands it, but that such adjournment must not be against the prisoner’s interests which are, of course, that he shall not be held, before verdict, longer than is absolutely necessary. In the present case, justice most certainly demands that a fuller investigation is made into Mrs. Breslow’s story and therefore this trial must be adjourned. However, I cannot conceive that it could be said no harm would be done to the prisoner’s interests if this trial were to be set back to the next assize — quite apart from the practical difficulties — so that I hold it must be concluded before the end of the present assize.”

  “My Lord,” said Alliter, “that does not allow very long for the inquiries to be made.”

  “I agree. But in my opinion that is something over which we have no control.” The judge’s cold glance rested on Pamela Breslow. “I trust the police will make fullest use of the time available.”

  *

  Murch’s ulcer had never caused him so much distress; and as he bullied his underlings, wooed the newspapers to give him the publicity he needed, and pacified his superiors, his temper and consumption of stomach tablets rose.

  In the afternoon before the trial was due to be resumed, a conference was held at H.Q.

  Murch spoke first. “Our aim and object has been to prove that there can’t possibly have been anyone in the hall who could have been the deceased woman.”

  There was some laughter at the incongruity of those words. It ceased abruptly when Murch slammed his fist down on the table. “If anyone thinks it’s funny, perhaps they’ll bloody well explain why?”

  Fifteen uniformed men and detectives became solemn.

  “If you’d all done a decent job, there wouldn’t be any of this. The only witnesses you’ve found are two men and one constable who were in the hall — the P.C. seems to have been asleep — and one woman immediately outside on the pavement.

  “Their evidence makes me want to bloody weep. The Breslow woman ran like hell, but of course she did because she’s smart. But did they not see Mrs. Leithan as well? One of the men in the hall says he might have seen someone running ahead of Mrs. Breslow and this someone might have been a woman. His companion says there wasn’t any second person. The woman outside swears no one came out of the building in front of Breslow. The constable didn’t see a goddamn thing except what was pointed out to him.”

  Jaeger spoke. “Are we going to get any more evidence, sir?”

  “What the hell’s it look like?”

  “Suppose it stays as it is now?”

  “You suppose.”

  “It’s going to be dodgy. After all, we haven’t the proof to show there was no Mrs. Leithan and couldn’t be. Mrs. Breslow ran out of the building and called out to the constable. When she got back to court, she was all puffed. On the facts, there could just have been someone there — someone who was Mrs. Leithan.”

  Murch marched up and down behind the table. “You’re being real smart. Get smarter. What d’you say?”

  “She’s trying to pull a fast one. But, even if it’s a thousand to one against, she might just be telling the truth. Suppose Evadne Leithan has been laying a false trail all this time because she loathes his guts and wants to get him into trouble over his eyebrows?”

  “So you’ve doubts?”

  “Not doubts, sir. Just the vision of a possibility. And in this case the prosecution have to prove everything to the hilt and back, and if there’s any question it’s not for the defence…”

  “I know all that.”

  “There could easily be a question left, couldn’t there?”

  *

  Jentry was examined by Alliter on the following morning.

  “I heard a woman shout something and I looked round.” Jentry, a small man with a nervous habit of suddenly shaking his head, was one of the two who had been in the hall.

  “What did she shout?”

  “Something like ‘Stop her,’ but I can’t be certain of the exact words. It all took place so suddenly.”

  “What happened then?”

  “I saw a woman run to the outside door of the hall. When she reached it, the constable began to go after her.”

  “Did you at any time see anyone else running in any direction?”

  Jentry looked round the courtroom. His head shook and until it was realised that that was his nervous habit, it seemed as if he were emphatically denying the possibility. “I…I don’t… It all happened so terribly quickly,” he protested.

  “The court understands that, Mr. Jentry.”

  “At the time, I really didn’t think it all mattered.”

  “But with those reservations in mind, I’ll put the question to you again. Did you, at any time, see anyone else running in any direction?”

  “I… Well, I think I did.” Jentry spoke with sudden pugnacity. “I think I saw someone running through the doors ahead of the second woman.”

  “You think this first person was a female?”

  “I…I didn’t mean it quite like that. I’m not certain.”

  “Would you describe him or her as tall or short, large or small?”

  “I don’t know.”

  Alliter slowly sat down. Imagination after the event, or a moment of truth?

  “No questions,” said Tarnton.

  Krenshaw, Jentry’s companion, was called.

  “I heard a woman shout something so I looked round to see what was what, like. There was a woman running to the road door and I wondered what she was making such a fuss about.”

  “Did you notice anyone else running?”

  “There wasn’t anyone else. I can swear to that.”

  “You are swearing to it,” snapped the judge.

  Krenshaw appeared unabashed. “There wasn’t no one else around. Except for the copper, that is.”

  “Would you judge that anyone could have left the hall without your seeing her between your hearing the call and looking up?”

  “Not possible. It was all instantaneous, like.”

  “Thank you.”

  “No questi
ons,” said Tarnton.

  P.C. Gerdhaw was called. He gave his evidence smartly, but clearly with distaste. “I was on duty in the hall, sir, and I was guarding the two doors into this courtroom. I was marching back towards the second door when I heard a cry of ‘Stop her’. I turned round and saw a woman, whom I have since identified as Mrs. Pamela Breslow, running to the street doors. I went after her to see what was wrong. When I reached the door and stepped outside, I could not see her because of the large number of people around.”

  “Did you see anyone else running to that door?”

  “No, sir.” Gerdhaw wanted to be allowed to explain why it had taken him those vital few seconds before he responded to the cry — he had been hesitant about leaving his post of duty for a woman who seemed to have no reason for her call — but he was, of course, given no such chance.

  There was no cross-examination.

  Miss Elizabeth Casey was called. A stern-looking woman, approaching old age, her voice was surprisingly gentle. “I was walking along the road and as I neared the steps to the building I saw a young lady come running out. I have since learned she is Mrs. Pamela Breslow. She went along the road and very soon disappeared behind a number of people who seemed to belong to a party.”

  “Did you see anyone else leave the building?”

  “I did not.”

  “Do you think you would have noticed if anyone had run out ahead of Mrs. Breslow?”

  “I should.”

  “To make it perfectly clear to everyone, Miss Casey, can you be certain you were watching the exit to this building for a reasonable period of time before you saw Mrs. Breslow leave it, and watching it sufficiently closely that had anyone come out you must have seen them?”

  For the first time, she hesitated. “I certainly think so,” she finally said, “but I could not say I am completely certain. I might have been looking away at one time. I do remember seeing a very charming child in reins and I was surprised to see anyone so carefully dressed.”

  Alliter decided not to put any more questions. Her evidence, and that of the others, was almost conclusive, even allowing for Jentry. Yet what about the word “almost”? Having practised a great deal in the criminal courts, he was only too aware of the utter fallibility of human eye-witnesses: men and women would swear in all honesty to having seen something that they could not have done, and to not seeing something they must have done. So, bearing that in mind, how did the equation work out? Four witnesses, almost unanimous, against one woman who would lie herself to hell and back to save the man she loved? The answer seemed obvious. Yet he could still wonder if it was, even if that doubt was very slight. He considered the police evidence to come: the proof that Evadne Leithan had not caught the train, that the dog had been shot with Leithan’s revolver, the human hairs on the brambles, the handbag, the suitcase, the nation-wide search for the missing woman. He thought of the already proven evidence. Evadne Leithan had drawn no money since the eighteenth, she had not attended a meeting it was certain she would have attended had she been alive, Leithan had avoided compromising himself with Pamela Breslow until the night of the eighteenth, after which it no longer mattered if he were compromised since the trust fund had become his and the divorce clause was no longer operative…

  “Thank you,” said Alliter.

  “No questions,” said Tarnton.

  “Detective-Inspector Jaeger,” said Alliter.

  Chapter XVI

  There were old lags who swore that Mr. Justice Cator was the hardest judge on the bench: unwittingly, they were paying tribute to the way in which he invariably cut through all the smoke-screens laid by the defence and so arrived at the truth. Nothing so distressed an old lag as the truth.

  “…The evidence of Mrs. Pamela Breslow,” said the judge in his cold, incisive voice, “will receive your immediate attention, members of the jury, and you must assess it with the very greatest possible care. For if she saw Mrs. Leithan in this building, you do not need me to tell you that there is only one possible verdict you can bring.

  “It is my duty to point out to you, as Mr. Alliter has already done so, that in this connection you have to consider three questions. Did Mrs. Breslow see Mrs. Leithan in the hall? Or did she erroneously, but in good faith, think she saw Mrs. Leithan? Or did she lie about the incident in a desperate attempt to try to save the man she has admitted she loves?

  “In order to answer these questions, you first have to examine the evidence of Mrs. Breslow and of the four witnesses, Mr. Jentry, Mr. Krenshaw, Miss Casey, and P.C. Gerdhaw. Mr. Jentry says he thinks he may have seen a second person running out of the building immediately after Mrs. Breslow called out, while the other three are certain they saw no one. Both Mrs. Breslow’s evidence and her actions are consistent with her claim that she saw Mrs. Leithan, but, equally, they are consistent with the behaviour you would expect were she wishing to establish a lie.

  “You will closely consider the testimony of these four witnesses and it may be, I do not for one moment say it will be, that you will still remain a little undecided about what to believe. You have doubts. It is now that you will examine the wider aspects of the case — facts you may very well have to consider again at a later stage of the trial and in a different context — in order to assist yourselves in coming to the necessary conclusions. You saw Mrs. Breslow in the witness-box, and I venture to suggest that there will be no objection from the defence when I say that it is perfectly obvious that she is so strongly attached to the accused that there is nothing she will not do to try to save him in his present trial: indeed, when pressed by the prosecution, she said that she had not lied when she claimed she saw Mrs. Leithan, but that she would have been perfectly prepared to do so. Here, then, is a possible motive to explain why Mrs. Breslow might lie or a reason why, in an overwrought state she might imagine she saw Mrs. Leithan.

  “How are you finally to decide whether to believe or disbelieve Mrs. Breslow’s story? Let me suggest that it will be by considering the further problem: is Mrs. Leithan alive or dead? This was what I meant by considering the evidence within two different contexts. You first examine it to discover whether you believe Mrs. Leithan to be dead, in which case Mrs. Breslow’s evidence must be a lie, and then, if that is your opinion, you examine it again to decide whether Mrs. Leithan died at the hands of the accused.

  “Members of the jury, when there is no body but a man is charged with murder, the evidence of death has to be utterly and completely watertight. How watertight is the evidence in this present case? To find out, let us examine the life of a person, in Mrs. Leithan’s position, in the world to-day. She needs food and shelter and in order to gain both she has either to be given them or she has to buy them…”

  *

  The jury room was dirty and it smelt because of the two lavatories that were at the far end. On the wall hung a reproduction of Landseer’s “The Monarch of the Glen” and in the fireplace a coke fire struggled to stay alive. On the oblong table were paper, pencils, blotting-paper, three water containers and three plastic mugs. Around the table, nine men and three women tried to reach a decision.

  “She’s dead. She must be. If she isn’t, why’s the dog dead?”

  “And why was her hair on the bramble?”

  “And what’s she been living on all this time? Air?”

  “And why should she let the trial go on? She wasn’t mental.”

  “And didn’t the judge make it clear enough what he thinks?”

  “Yes,” agreed the woman, who wore strangely-shaped glasses. She was plump and her looks suggested that twenty years ago she had been reasonably good looking. She was dressed in very ordinary clothes. “But suppose…”

  “Could you live on nothing for over two months? With the Government deliberately forcing the prices up? Could you?”

  “And what about the dog? I suppose it shot itself?”

  “Didn’t that judge say no woman ever willingly let go of her handbag?”

  “I…I was thinking,�
�� she said. Someone doubted it.

  “I was thinking that it could just have happened as that woman said: she could have seen Mrs. Leithan in the hall. I know it sounds all queer, but can’t you see what I’m trying to say? I suppose you all think I’m being silly, but I couldn’t live with myself if I said he did it and somewhere inside me I was thinking all the time, suppose she was telling the truth or suppose she might have been telling the truth? What I mean is, I know what it all looks like, like you keep saying to me, but there isn’t a body, is there, and so she could just still be alive, couldn’t she? Terrible things have happened in the past. My husband was telling me about it last night. He’d read about it in one of the Sunday papers. They hanged a man in England and the man he was supposed to have killed turned up.”

  “That didn’t happen recently, I know.”

  “I think it was in sixteen hundred and…”

  “For Gawd’s sake, the world’s spun on a bit since then.”

  “Suppose we did something like that? I mean, suppose she just had a heart attack like the barrister for the defence suggested?”

  “Then she couldn’t have been outside the court and the Breslow woman’s lying, like we all say. And who shot the dog? And why was her hair on the bramble where she was dragged to the road? And what was a woman like her doing in the middle of a wood?”

  “I don’t know. But can’t you see what I’m trying to say, that it could have happened? And the judge said to us we had to be absolutely certain. I couldn’t live with myself if I thought that… Well, I’m not quite certain where I was, but…”

  *

  THE CLERK OF THE COURT: Members of the jury, have you agreed on your verdict and do you find Charles Protheus Leithan guilty, or not guilty, of the wilful murder of Evadne Mary Leithan?

  FOREMAN OF THE JURY: Not guilty.

  *

  Tarnton went into the robing-room. He dropped his brief on to the table in amongst the clutter of wig boxes, blue and red bags, note-books, text books, and odd articles of clothing. He removed his wig and untied the tabs from about his neck. He sighed and caressed his forehead.