One Law For the Rest of Us

by Peter Murphy

  ‘I would certainly hope so,’ the older, and much larger man standing next to Simon said, ‘after all the dough I’ve spent promoting him.’ The accent this time was unrefined New York.

  Simon laughed. ‘This is my publisher, Ed Rafferty, managing director of Fulbourn and McIntyre, out of New York.’

  They shook hands.

  ‘Simon wrote a book called Lifting the Lid: A Legislature in Crisis,’ Julia said. ‘It went to the top of the New York Times non-fiction best seller list within a week of publication.’

  ‘Of course,’ Ken said. ‘You’re the author who exposed that prostitution racket in Washington, the one involving those senators and congressmen: the one that wasn’t supposed to exist, according to the FBI.’

  Simon nodded. ‘I’m interested in things the authorities say don’t exist.’

  Jean-Claude entered discreetly from the kitchen.

  ‘Dinner is ready, Miss Cathermole, if you’d like us to serve?’

  ‘Yes, of course, Jean-Claude. Let’s all take our seats, shall we? Simon, I’ve put you next to Audrey. Ed, why don’t you sit here next to Ginny? Ken you’re on Ginny’s other side, and Ben, you’re here, next to me.’

  She took Jean-Claude aside.

  ‘Jean-Claude, we have things to discuss. You understand…’

  ‘Of course, Miss Cathermole.’ He turned to the guests. ‘Ladies and gentlemen, welcome. To start, we have a simple tomato salad with French bread. We’ll serve that with the main course, a Languedoc roast chicken with onions and garlic in a red-wine gravy sauce. To accompany it, I’ve selected a red Burgundy. It’s been breathing on the sideboard; it will be ready now. As long as you don’t mind pouring yourselves, we won’t need to disturb you. Just ring when you’re ready for us to clear away.’

  He rang the bell, and almost at once, four black-suited waiters, two men, two women, entered silently bearing the wonderfully aromatic dishes, which they proceeded to distribute. As Julia poured the Burgundy, Jean-Claude hovered around the table, directing operations with a touch here, the pointing of a finger there. The whole process seemed to take no more than a few seconds, and once their service was complete, he waved his staff discreetly into the kitchen. The door closed silently behind them.

  When dinner had ended, and they had poured coffee, Audrey raised her wine glass.

  ‘I don’t know quite how to say this, Julia. But Ken and I want to thank you, and you too, Ben, Ginny, from the bottom of our hearts for everything you’ve done for us, and for Emily. I understand that we’ve reached the end of the road now. I understand that this is a wake – and I couldn’t imagine a more elegant and delicious one. I know this is the end. But I’m glad we came as far as we could. I’m glad we tried. So I want to propose a toast to you – and of course, to Andrew, and John, and the officers, Steffie and Ted. We are humbled that you would do so much for us. Thank you.’

  They drank.

  ‘We are the ones who are humbled, Audrey,’ Ginny replied, choking back a tear. ‘Your fighting spirit, your love and support for Emily – and yourself – you’ve been an inspiration.’

  ‘You’ve touched Jess and me too,’ Ben added quietly. ‘We’re parents now, and – well, you’ve set the standard for us.’

  ‘Goddamn it, Julia, what is it with you Limeys?’ Ed demanded suddenly. ‘What’s all this talk about a wake? This isn’t a goddamn wake – not if I have anything to do with it.’

  ‘What do you mean?’ Ben asked.

  ‘I think,’ Julia said, holding up a hand before Ed could reply, ‘that the moment has come to adjourn upstairs.’ She rang her bell and Jean-Claude appeared as if by magic.

  ‘Jean-Claude, dinner was wonderful.’

  There was a hearty round of applause, which the chef acknowledged with a brief bow of the head.

  ‘We’re going upstairs for a brandy. We won’t need anything else. Can you let yourselves out if you finish clearing up before we come back down?’

  ‘Of course, Miss Cathermole. Good night.’

  60

  Upstairs was the large attic at the very top of Julia’s townhouse. It was a special place, to which only special guests were invited, on special occasions. The chairs and sofas were comfortable, the lighting subdued, and the room’s old, dark wooden beams ran along the ceiling and curved seductively at its corners, down into the walls. Bottles of water and an excellent old brandy were arrayed on a side table.

  ‘Why did we have to wait till we got up here?’ Ed asked. ‘Why all the fuss?’

  ‘Because it’s the only part of the house I keep swept,’ she replied.

  ‘Come again?’

  ‘Somehow, I don’t think you’re talking about how clean your house is,’ Simon said, smiling.

  ‘No. I’m talking about sweeping against bugs,’ Julia replied, matter-of-factly. ‘I do it every month, just to be on the safe side. I know it sounds exotic, but you don’t see it as exotic if you were raised in a service family in a residence abroad. It’s just a fact of life. When I was growing up in Vienna, my father had the house swept every week. I still have contacts with the service; I’ve done some work with them, and I’ve never lost the habit.’

  ‘Do you think they may be trying to listen in?’ Ben asked.

  ‘It’s possible. I thought so during the Digby case. I’m not sure, to tell you the truth, but there are times when I prefer to err on the safe side.’ She paused. ‘So, everyone grab a drink: the protocol upstairs is, help yourselves and make yourselves at home.’

  She waited for everyone to be seated. ‘OK. Audrey, I do have an ulterior motive in inviting you and Ken here tonight. I invited you because it’s possible that we may still have another chapter to write – in the literal sense, as well as the figurative. That’s why Ed and Simon are here. Simon, the floor is yours.’

  Simon sat forward in his chair and looked straight into Audrey’s eyes.

  ‘Audrey, you and I have only just met tonight,’ he said. ‘But I know from Julia that you have an incredible story to tell. I want to write it.’

  ‘It’s a helluva story,’ Ed added, ‘and when’s he’s written it, I intend to publish it.’

  Audrey and Ken looked at Julia, and then at each other.

  ‘You want to write our story? You mean, as a book?’

  ‘You bet,’ Simon replied. ‘Look, Audrey, you’ve been abused, your daughter has been abused, God only knows how many other girls have been abused in schools up and down this country for more than thirty years: and what happens? The schools try to buy their way out of trouble, and the government buries its head in the sand and tries to cover it up.’

  ‘And comes damn close to doing it,’ Ed added. ‘I’m getting angry just thinking about it.’

  ‘I believe it’s going to make a lot of people angry,’ Simon said. ‘This is a major scandal, and we can’t let your government get away with sweeping it under the carpet.’

  ‘Heads are going to roll, Audrey,’ Ed said with a smile. ‘Believe me. We’re going to bring some people down, just like we did in Washington. And it couldn’t happen to a nicer bunch of guys. And even better,’ he added contentedly, ‘it’s going to be a big, big, seller: huge.’ He paused. ‘So, what do you think? Are you ready to stand up and fight another round, or do you still want sit back and enjoy the wake?’

  Audrey laughed. ‘I don’t know what to say.’

  She turned to Ken, who shook his head. ‘Neither do I. It’s something that never occurred to me.’

  ‘I’m sorry we’ve taken you by surprise,’ Julia said, smiling. ‘Perhaps I should have warned you in advance, but I have a weakness for the dramatic moment.’

  ‘Well you’ve certainly succeeded there,’ Ken said.

  ‘I think this gives us one last chance to turn things around,’ Julia said, ‘and you can trust them to do a good job. I’ve known Ed for years. He’s an ol
d family friend, and once it became obvious that the powers that be were intent on burying us six feet under, I called him in New York. It was Ed who suggested Simon – and his track record speaks for itself. We think this would be the perfect sequel to Lifting the Lid.’ She smiled. ‘But of course, I would like counsel’s opinion.’

  Ginny shook her head. ‘Obviously, my main concern would be an action for libel. Libel is an expensive business.’

  ‘What libel?’ Simon asked. ‘We’re going to be telling the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.’

  ‘Yes, but you have to be able to back the story up. I don’t know what the libel laws are like in America. I seem to remember reading somewhere that you make it very hard for public figures to sue, because of the emphasis you put on freedom of speech.’

  ‘That’s exactly right,’ Ed replied.

  ‘But that’s not the case in this country. You have to be able to dot every “I” and cross every “T” if you’re challenged.’

  ‘That’s the way I always work,’ Simon replied, ‘but not because I’m afraid of the law. I don’t worry about the law. I worry about my personal standard. My background is in journalism, and my personal standard is that I don’t write a word unless I believe one hundred per cent in my sources, and I’m one hundred per cent convinced that I’m writing a true story – a story I can back up every step of the way.’

  ‘You can’t do that in this case, Simon,’ Ginny said. ‘The government has put an embargo on all the documents you’d need, under the Official Secrets Act.’

  ‘On you maybe,’ Simon said, ‘but not on me. I haven’t signed any official secrets forms, and I’m not going to be doing my writing here. I’ll be writing this in my apartment on East Seventy-Second Street, enjoying my great view over the Park. I can look at any documents and quote from any documents I want.’

  ‘But we don’t have them,’ Ginny insisted. ‘The government seized whatever they could, and we had to give an undertaking to destroy the rest.’

  Julia coughed. ‘Yes, well, actually, Ginny…’

  ‘What are you saying, Julia?’ Ginny asked, genuinely startled.

  ‘I’m something of a – what is it you Americans call people who hoard things, Ed?’

  ‘Pack-rats.’

  ‘Pack-rats: that’s it. I’ve always been a bit of a pack-rat; and because of my family connections over the years, I have access to secure methods of keeping documents that might turn out to be useful somewhere down the road – methods most people don’t have access to. You’ll understand if I don’t elaborate on that – even if the room has been swept. But if certain documents need to find their way into Simon’s hands, that can be arranged without our fingerprints being on them.’ She paused. ‘I’m not worried. It’s the government that’s going to be embarrassed by this, not any of us.’

  ‘That sounds like a dangerous game, Julia.’

  She smiled. ‘Not if you have the right people playing it with you.’ Seeing Ginny about to protest, she added, ‘That’s all I’m going to say about that.’

  Ginny shook her head, and there was a long silence.

  ‘Can you tell us what documents might be stashed away in your secure places?’ Ben asked.

  ‘Everything,’ Julia replied.

  Ben’s draw dropped. ‘Everything?’

  ‘The court transcripts, EF’s police interview, the documents they found in Father Gerrard’s rooms… everything.’

  Ed smiled. ‘See what I mean? It’s going to be a great book.’

  ‘The government will ask for an injunction to prevent publication, once they get wind of it,’ Ben said.

  Ed laughed. ‘Good luck to them. No disrespect to your Queen, Ben, she’s a fine lady: but the royal writ hasn’t run in the State of New York since 1776. F and M will publish this book in New York, and there’s nothing your government can do to stop us. Not only that, we will sell the book world-wide, and we have unofficial ways of making sure that anyone in Great Britain who wants a copy can get one. It’s not hard, and, don’t forget, it’s going to attract a lot of publicity. This book will be reviewed in all the major papers, in Europe and stateside. What are they going to do here, ban Le Monde and Frankfurter Allgemeine? Ban the New York Times? I don’t think so.’ He laughed again. ‘They’ll get tired of the charade before long, Ben. They’ll abandon the injunction. But it won’t matter. There’ll be plenty of copies in circulation here, even before we can legally give it to our British subsidiary.’

  Ben turned to Audrey. ‘If you do this, it will mean a lot of publicity for you all, Audrey – including publicity for Emily. Are you ready for that?’

  ‘And they may come after you for breach of the settlement agreement,’ Ginny added.

  Audrey and Ken looked into each other’s eyes silently for a long time. Then they smiled, and Audrey turned to Simon.

  ‘Do you have a title in mind, Simon?’ she asked.

  ‘I sure do,’ he replied. ‘I’m planning to call it One Law for the Rest of Us. That has a certain ring to it, don’t you think?’

  61

  Friday 6 May 1977

  ‘May I have your attention, please?’ Ben almost shouted, after he had tapped on his glass with a fingernail for almost a minute, to call those assembled to order. ‘I’ve been asked to do the honours this evening.’

  The occasion was a celebratory chambers party. At the end of a hard-working week, and in the light of good news, the wine was flowing freely. The last two heads of chambers to leave for the High Court bench, Duncan Furnival and Bernard Wesley, were in attendance, and every member and pupil had made sure to return from court in good time.

  ‘The first order of business,’ Ben continued, ‘of course, is to congratulate Mr Justice Gareth Morgan-Davies on his appointment to the High Court bench, and his assignment to the Queen’s Bench Division. In that division he can devote himself, at least some of the time, to criminal work: and judging by my recent experience, that’s an area in which he will be able to bring about some much-needed improvement.’

  He waited for the applause and laughter to subside.

  ‘As you all know, Gareth was my pupil-master. Technically, pupillage lasts for six months or a year, and in that time, the master is supposed to instruct the pupil thoroughly in the ways of our profession. But a real pupillage doesn’t last six months or a year: it lasts a lifetime; and that has been my experience with Gareth. Yes, during my pupillage I learned as much as I could have ever dreamed of about advocacy, about how to behave in court, about how to behave in chambers, about the way we do things at the bar, and about the ways we don’t do them: and that knowledge has served me well in the years I’ve been in practice. But long after my pupillage officially came to an end, I knew that Gareth’s door was always open to me. His advice was always at my disposal, however long it took, and however inconvenient it was to dispense. He regarded it as a lifetime relationship, and so do I. And in the cases we did together after my pupillage ended – both as colleagues and adversaries – he stood up for me and supported me. I’ve never been without his advice and wise counsel.

  ‘I’ve been asked to take a pupil myself in the near future, and I don’t mind admitting that I’m feeling apprehensive about it. I’m sure it’s going to be nerve-wracking, having a pupil at my side the whole time, watching everything I do, and asking awkward questions. Gareth, that never occurred to me while I was a pupil, but I’m beginning to see now what you went through.’

  ‘At last,’ Gareth commented, to chuckles around the room.

  ‘But I have Gareth’s model of being a pupil-master to guide me, and that will be more than enough.

  ‘Everything comes at a price, of course, and in my case the price was having to listen to frequent imprecations in Welsh, and learn to follow the fortunes of Wales in that strange sport, the name of which escapes me, the one they play with that odd-shaped ball.
’

  There was loud laughter.

  ‘After all I taught you, Ben,’ Gareth said, shaking his head. ‘How could you?’

  More laughter.

  ‘But even that proved to be helpful,’ Ben continued. ‘During the Welsh investiture case, Gareth took me to Wales and helped me to understand the forces at work there, the way people thought about Wales, and about independence from England, and about the nation’s pride in itself. He took me to an international at Cardiff Arms Park – you remember, Donald, you were there too – and although the rules of the game remain a mystery to me, the feeling I had, being in the stadium, listening to the singing and the cheering, soaking up the passion, helped me to understand so much about my client and the others involved in the case.

  ‘Quite apart from the benefit I had of being his pupil, Gareth’s leadership of chambers over the last few years, after Bernard left us for the bench, has been outstanding. His calmness, his vision, and his hospitality in his room after hours, have been an inspiration. Ladies and gentlemen, please raise your glasses: I give you the toast: Mr Justice Morgan-Davies.’

  The toast was drunk and greeted with a prolonged round of applause.

  ‘Don’t be a stranger, Gareth. Come back and see us when you can.’

  ‘I will,’ Gareth promised.

  ‘This means, of course,’ Ben said, ‘that Aubrey Smith-Gurney ascends to the exalted rank of head of chambers, and in just a moment, I will ask him to say a few words. Aubrey, congratulations to you, if that’s the right word.’

  ‘Commiserations would be more like it, Ben,’ Aubrey replied.

  ‘And last, but not least, congratulations to Kenneth Gaskell on getting Silk, and to my dear friend and room-mate Harriet Fisk on being asked to sit as a special master in a commercial case. Well deserved, both of you. That’s enough from me. Gareth, would you like to say a word or two?’

  ‘I won’t keep you for more than a moment,’ Gareth replied. ‘It is traditional for the outgoing head to propose a toast to chambers, which I now do. I just want to say that I’ve enjoyed every moment of my years in chambers. There are a few moments in any career when you look at yourself in the mirror one day and ask, “Why did I ever get myself involved in all this?” There have been several such moments in my career, especially since I took over from Bernard as head of chambers; and it was probably on those occasions that Ben heard most of the Welsh imprecations. But on the whole it’s been a delight, and I can promise Aubrey that being in charge is not as bad as he thinks – well, not quite, anyway. The reason for that is the friendship and support you can count on from every member of chambers. You couldn’t ask for a better group of colleagues. Please raise your glasses again, ladies and gentlemen. The toast is: chambers.’