John Mortimer - Rumpole A La Carte

by Rumpole A La Carte(lit)

  'Really,' Hilda protested, 'this is no way to spend a honeymoon.

  Mr Swainton looked as though he thought I'd done you in or something. Apparently he's doing research on a new book called Absence of Body. He says it's all about someone who disappears during a cruise.' 'Hilda,' I said, 'couldn't you do a bit of research on a glass or two of champagne? And on what they've got on those little bits of toast?' So She Who Must Be Obeyed, who has her tender moments, went off in search of provisions. I watched her go back into the saloon and make for the table where the guzzle and sluice were laid out. As she did so, she passed Mr Justice Graves. I saw him turn his head to look at her in a stricken fashion, then he muttered some apology to the Captain and was off out of the room with the sudden energy of a young gazelle.

  It was then I realized that not only was Rumpole fleeing the Judge, the Judge was fleeing Rumpole.

  Back in the cabin, Hilda put on her dress for the dinner dance and added the finishing touches to her maquillage, whilst I, wearing bedroom slippers and smoking a small cigar, paced my confinement like a caged tiger. 'And you'll really like the Britwells,' she was saying. 'He's going to be a parson in Malta. They're quite elderly, but so much in love. Do come up to dinner, Rumpole. Then we could dance together.' 'We did that on our first honeymoon!' I reminded her. 'And lt sn't an astonishing success, so far as I can remember.

  Anyway, do you think I want Gravestone to catch me dancing?' don't know why you're so frightened of him, quite 131 honestly. You don't exactly cower in front of him in Court from all you tell me.' 'Of course I don't cower!' I explained. 'I can treat the old Deathshead with lofty disdain in front of a jury! I can thunder my disapproval at him on a bail application. I have no fear of the man in the exercise of my profession. It's his friendship I dread.' 'His friendship?' 'Oh, yes. That is why, Hilda, I have fled Judge Graves down the nights and down the days.' And here I gave my wife a heady draught of Francis Thompson: 'I fled Him, down the arches of the years; I fled Him, down the labyrinthine ways Of my own mind, and in the mist of tears I hid from Him, and under running laughter.' 'Well, there's not much running laughter for me', Hilda was displeased, 'going on a second honeymoon without a husband.' When Hilda was made-up, powdered and surrounded with an appropriate fragrance, she left me just as the Britwells were emerging from the cabin opposite. They were also in eveningdress and were apparently so delighted to see my wife that they cordially invited her to inspect the amenities which they enjoyed. As the Britwell berth seemed in every way a carbon copy of that provided for the Rumpoles, Hilda found it a little difficult to keep up an interesting commentary or show any genuine surprise at the beauty and convenience of their quarters.

  At a loss for conversation she looked at their dressingtable where, she told me, two large photographs in heavy silver frames had been set up. The first was a recent wedding portrait of the Reverend and Mrs Britwell standing proudly together, arm-in-arm, outside a village church. The bride was not in white, which would have been surprising at her age, but she wore what Hilda called a 'rather ordinary little suit and a hat with a veil'. The other was a studio portrait of a pretty, smiling young girl in a sequined evening-gown. She asked if that were Bill's daughter, to which he laughed and said, 'Not 132 I;,., exactly.' Before she could inquire further I whistled to Hilda from our door across the corridor as I had an urgent piece of advice for her.

  'For God's sake, if you see the Judge,' I warned her through a chink in our doorway, 'don't encourage the blighter. Please, don't dream of dancing with him!' I was not in the least reassured when She answered, 'You never know what I might dream of, Rumpole.' Hilda didn't dance with the Judge that night. Indeed Mr Injustice Graves didn't even put in an appearance at the function and was busily engaged in lying as low as Rumpole himself.

  Most of the dancing was done by the Britwells, who whirled and twirled and chasseed around the place with the expertise of a couple of ballroom champions. 'Aren't they good?' Hilda was playing an enthusiastic gooseberry to Swainton and his secretary, Linda. 'Don't you think he dances rather too well?' Swainton sat with his head on one side and looked suspiciously at the glittering scene.

  'I don't know exactly what you mean.' Hilda was puzzled, but Linda told her, 'Howard looks below the surface of life.

  That's his great talent!' When the husband and wife team came off the floor, perspiring gently after the tango, Howard Swainton repeated, 'We were saying you dance unusually well, Britwell, for a vicar.' 'Don't forget I wasn't always a vicar. I spent most of my life in insurance.' 'Oh, yes. I remember now. You told us that.' Howard Swainton seemed to be making a mental note.

  Hilda said, 'Do men in insurance dance well?' 'Better than vicars!' Mrs Britwell was laughing. The elderly newly-weds did seem an ideally happy couple.

  'I was in insurance and Mavis ran a secretarial agency.' Bill was telling the story of his life. 'Of course, I married her for "er money.' He raised his glass of wine to his wife and drank "er health.

  And I married him for his dancing!' Mavis was still 133 laughing. 'Why don't you let Bill give you a slow foxtrot, Mrs Rumpole?' 'Oh, that would be very nice', Hilda had not had a great deal of practice at the foxtrot, 'but not this evening, perhaps.' She was looking anxiously about the room, a fact which the sleuth Swainton immediately noticed. 'Are you looking for someone?' he asked.

  'Oh. Oh, well. A judge, actually. I happen to have met him before. I'm sure he was at the Captain's cocktail party but I don't seem to see him here.' 'A judge?' Swainton was interested.

  'Oh, yes. He used to be just down the Bailey, you know,' Hilda told them. 'But now he's been put up to the High Court.

  Scarlet and ermine. A red judge. Sir Gerald Graves.' 'Graves?' Howard Swainton was smiling. 'That's a rather mournful name.' But the Reverend Bill didn't join in the laughter. He made a sudden movement and knocked over his glass of red wine. It spread across the tablecloth, Hilda told me, in words I was to remember, like blood.

  Swiftly, swiftly flew the ship, Yet she sailed softly too: Sweetly, sweetly blew the breeze On me alone it blew.

  It blew on me alone because I was taking a solitary stroll in the early morning before the waking hour of the most energetic judge. The good ship Boadicea clove the grey waters, seagulls chattered and soared in the sky behind us, hoping for scraps, and I trod carefully in the shadows of boats and deck buildings.

  Like one, who on a lonesome road Doth walk in fear and dread, And having once turned round walks on,. And turns no more his head, Because he knows, a frightful judge Doth close behind him tread.

  Coleridge's memorable lines were sounding in my ears as I i34 ,.:, looked fearfully around me and then, almost too late, spotted an energetic old party in a blue blazer out for a constitutional.

  I ducked into the doorway of the Ladies Health and Beauty Salon, while Graves stopped and peered furtively into the window of the room where breakfast was being served to the Ducal passengers.

  I know that he did this from the account that Hilda gave me later. She was at a table with Swainton and Linda Milsom, getting stuck into the coffee and eggs and bacon, when she saw the judicial features peering in at her. She only had time to say, 'Ah. There he is!' before the old darling vanished, and she said, 'He's gone!' Bill Britwell joined them with a plate of cornflakes he'd been fetching from a central table. 'Who's gone?' he asked.

  'Mr Justice Graves. He must be an early bird.' The Reverend Bill sat and ate his breakfast and Swainton asked how Mavis, who was noticeably absent, was that morning.

  'Well, not too good, I'm afraid. Mavis isn't quite the ticket.' 'The what?' Linda Milsom seemed to be listening to a foreign language.

  'Not quite up to snuff.' Bill did his best to explain his meaning.

  'He means she's sick,' Howard Swainton translated for Linda's benefit and his secretary looked deeply sympathetic.

  'What, on her honeymoon?' 'Do tell her we're all so sorry for her.' Swainton was also solicitous, and then he turned his attention to Hilda and asked her, with obviou
s scepticism, 'And how's your husband, Mrs Rumpole? Have you heard from him lately?' 'Oh, yes, I have,' Hilda told him.

  'Still busy, is he?' 'Well, he's on the move all the time.' Gee, I hope your wife gets better,' Linda was saying to Bill Britwell in a caring sort of way. 'I've got these great homoeopathic capsules. I could drop them into your cabin.' 'That's very kind of you but,' Bill told her firmly, 'I think e'd like to be left alone for the moment.' Such a terrible shame!' Hilda was also sympathetic. 'And she kerned so full of life last night.' 135 laughing. 'Why don't you let Bill give you a slow foxtrot, Mrs Rumpole?' 'Oh, that would be very nice', Hilda had not had a great deal of practice at tlhe foxtrot, 'but not this evening, perhaps.' She was looking anxiously about the room, a fact which the sleuth Swainton innmediately noticed. 'Are you looking for someone?' he asked.

  'Oh. Oh, well. A judge, actually. I happen to have met him before. I'm sure he was at the Captain's cocktail party but I don't seem to see hiimhere.' 'A judge?' Swainrton was interested.

  'Oh, yes. He used to be just down the Bailey, you know,' Hilda told them. 'B-utnow he's been put up to the High Court.

  Scarlet and ermine. A red judge. Sir Gerald Graves.' 'Graves?' Howard Swainton was smiling. 'That's a rather mournful name.' But the Reverend Bill didn't join in the laughter. He made a sudden movement and knocked over his glass of red wine. It spread across the tablecloth, Hilda told me, in words I was to remember, like blood.

  Swiftly, swiftly flew the ship, 'Yet shie sailed softly too: Sweetly, sweetly blew the breeze On me alone it blew.

  It blew on me alone because I was taking a solitary stroll in the early morning before the waking hour of the most energetic judge. The good ship Boadicea clove the grey waters, seagulls chattered and soared in the sky behind us, hoping for scraps, and I trod carefully in the shadows of boats and deck buildings.

  Like one,, who on a lonesome road Doth walk in fear and dread, And liaviixg once turned round walks on, " And turns no more his head; Because he knows, a frightful judge Dothcl°se behind him tread.

  Coleridge's memorable lines were sounding in my ears as I 134 looked fearfully around me and then, almost too late, spotted an energetic old party in a blue blazer out for a constitutional.

  I ducked into the doorway of the Ladies Health and Beauty Salon, while Graves stopped and peered furtively into the window of the room where breakfast was being served to the Ducal passengers.

  I know that he did this from the account that Hilda gave me later. She was at a table with Swainton and Linda Milsom, getting stuck into the coffee and eggs and bacon, when she saw the judicial features peering in at her. She only had time to say, 'Ah. There he is!' before the old darling vanished, and she said, 'He's gone!' Bill Britwell joined them with a plate of cornflakes he'd been fetching from a central table. 'Who's gone?' he asked.

  'Mr Justice Graves. He must be an early bird.' The Reverend Bill sat and ate his breakfast and Swainton asked how Mavis, who was noticeably absent, was that morning..; 'Well, not too good, I'm afraid. Mavis isn't quite the ticket.' 'The what?' Linda Milsom seemed to be listening to a foreign language.

  'Not quite up to snuff.' Bill did his best to explain his meaning.

  'He means she's sick,' Howard Swainton translated for Linda's benefit and his secretary looked deeply sympathetic.

  'What, on her honeymoon?' 'Do tell her we're all so sorry for her.' Swainton was also solicitous, and then he turned his attention to Hilda and asked her, with obvious scepticism, 'And how's your husband, Mrs Rumpole? Have you heard from him lately?' 'Oh, yes, I have,' Hilda told him.

  'Still busy, is he?' 'Well, he's on the move all the time.' 'Gee, I hope your wife gets better,' Linda was saying to Bill Britwell in a caring sort of way. 'I've got these great homoeopathic capsules. I could drop them into your cabin.' 'That's very kind of you but,' Bill told her firmly, 'I think e'd like to be left alone for the moment.' 'Such a terrible shame!' Hilda was also sympathetic. 'And she seined so full of life last night.' i35 'Yes, that's exactly what I thought.' Howard Swainton was looking at the Reverend Bill as though he were an interesting piece of research and he repeated Hilda's words, 'So full of life!' After funking a meeting with Hilda in the breakfast room, it seemed that Mr Injustice settled himself down in a deck-chair, with a rug over his knees, in a kind of passage on the upper deck between the side of the gymnasium and a suspended boat into which his Lordship, in time of trouble, ought, I suspected, to be ready to jump ahead of the women and children. There he sat, immersed in Murder Most Foul, the latest Howard Swainton, when, glancing up after the discovery of the fourth corpse, he saw Hilda standing at the end of the passage. His immediate reaction was to raise the alleged work of literature over his face, but he was too late. My wife gave a glad cry of 'Mr Justice Graves!' And, advancing towards him with indescribable foolhardiness, added, 'It is Sir Gerald Graves, isn't it?

  Hilda Rumpole. We met at Sam Ballard's wedding. You remember he got spliced to the ex-matron of the Old Bailey and astonished us all.' Whereupon she sat down in one of the empty chairs beside him and seemed prepared for a long chat.

  'Mrs Rumpole', Hilda, who is always a reliable witness, alleges that the old Deathshead here 'smiled quite charmingly', 'of course, I remember. I had no idea you were on the boat.' And he added nervously, 'Are you here on your own?' 'Well, yes. On my own. In a sort of way.' 'Oh, I see. Oh, good!' His Lordship was enormously relieved, but then, Hilda told me, a sort of hunted look came into his eyes as he inquired anxiously, 'Your husband isn't about?' 'Not about? No. Well. Definitely not about. Of course, Horace's got a very busy practice,' Hilda explained. 'I believe you had him before you quite recently. I don't know if you remember?' 'Your husband's appearances before me, Mrs Rumpole, Graves assured her, 'are quite unforgettable.' 'How sweet of you to say so.' She was gratified.

  'In fact, we judges are all agreed,' Mr Justice added, 'there's simply no advocate at the Criminal Bar in the least like Horace Rumpole.' 'A "one off". Is that what you'd say about him?' 'Without doubt, a "one off". We're all agreed about that.' 'I'm sure you're right. That may be why I married him.

  He's a bit of a "one off" as a husband.' Hilda began, strangely enough, to treat the old Gravestone as a confidant.

  'Forgive me, Mrs Rumpole', Graves clearly didn't want to be let into the secrets of the Rumpole marriage, 'I have absolutely no idea what Rumpole is like as a husband.' 'No. Silly of me!' And here I believe that She laid a friendly hand on the old party's arm. 'Of course, you don't know what it's like to go on one honeymoon with him, let alone two.' 'No idea at all, I'm delighted to say.' 'But I'll tell him all the nice things you've said about him.

  About him being "unforgettable" and a "one off" and so on.' 'You'll tell him?' His Lordship's hunted expression returned.

  'When I next see him.' 'Oh, yes, of course.' And he suggested hopefully, 'Back in England?' 'Or wherever. It may encourage him to break cover.' 'To do what, Mrs Rumpole?' There was a distinct note of panic in the judicial question.

  'Well, to come out into the open a little more. Would it surprise you to know, Rumpole's really a very shy and retiring sort of person?' By this time the shy and retiring Rumpole had outstayed his welcome in the entrance hall of the Ladies Health and Beauty Salon and I began to make my way back to the safety of our cabin, taking cover, from time to time, in such places as the children's play area (where I might have been spotted peering anxiously out from behind a giant cut-out clown) and the deck quoits' storage cupboard. Then, getting near to home, I glanced down a passage between a building and a boat and saw Hilda seated on a deck-chair, her knees covered with a rug.

  ne back of the hanging boat prevented me seeing her companion, until it was far too late. 'Hilda!' I called. 'Yes, Rumpole.

  Here I am,' came the answer. And then, as I moved towards her, the sight I dreaded most hoved into view. We were forced together and there was no way in which a meeting between old enemies could be avoided. What was remarkable was that the Deathshead greeted me with apparent bon
homie.

  'Rumpole!' He didn't rise from his seat but otherwise he was cordial. 'My dear fellow! This is a surprise. Your good lady told me that you weren't about.' 'Well,' I admitted, 'I haven't been about. Up to now.' 'What's up, old chap? Not got your sea legs yet? I always thought of you as a bit of a landlubber, I must say. Come along, then. Sit yourself down.' I did so with a good deal of trepidation on the seaward side of She Who Must Be Obeyed.

  'The Judge has been sweet enough to tell me that your appearances before him were "unforgettable",' Hilda said.

  'Oh, yes? How terribly sweet of him,' I agreed.

  'And like no one else.' 'And I honestly meant it, my dear old fellow,' Graves assured me. 'You are absolutely sui generis.' 'To name but a few?' 'Even if you have so very little Latin. What was the last case you did before me?' 'It was an application for bail.' And I added, with heavy irony, 'With the greatest respect, my Lord.' 'Of course it was!' Graves seemed to recall the incident with delight. 'You should have been there, Mrs Rumpole. We had great fun over that, didn't we, old fellow?' 'Oh, yes,' I assured him. 'It was a riot. Tony Timson's been laughing so much he could hardly slop out in Brixton.' 'He will have his joke, won't he, Mrs Rumpole?' The Judge's cheerfulness was undiminished. 'Your Horace is a great one for his little joke. Well, now I've met you both, there's no leason why we shouldn't have a drink together. After dinner in i the Old Salts' bar at, shall we say, five minutes past nine exactly?' At which point, the Gravestone took up his copy of Murder 138 I Most Foul and left us to the sound of my, I hope derisory, 'If your Lordship pleases.' When he had withdrawn, I turned a tragic face to Hilda. 'The Old Salts' bar,' I repeated. 'At five past nine. Now look what you've done!' 'I had to flush you out somehow, Rumpole,' She said, unreasonably I felt. 'I had to get you to take part in your own honeymoon.' But my mind was on grimmer business. 'I told you, it's the awful threat of his friendship. That's what I dread!' That evening, in the privacy of our cabin, Hilda read out an account of the delights of the Old Salts' bar from the ship's brochure: '"Tonight and every night after dinner,"' she told me, '"Gloria de la Have sings her golden oldies. Trip down Memory Lane and sing along with Gloria, or hear her inimitable way of rendering your special requests."' 'And that's not the only drawback of the Old Salts' bar,' I added. 'What about "Stiff sentences I have passed", the longplaying record by Mr Justice Gravestone?' 'Oh, do cheer up, Rumpole. We've got each other.' 'Next time you decide to go on a honeymoon, old thing,' I warned her, 'would you mind leaving him behind?' 'Poor Mavis Britwell getting sick like that!' Hilda's mind flitted to another subject. 'She'll be missing all the fun.' 'Tonight,' I told her, having regard to the rendezvous ahead, 'the sick are the lucky ones.' When we left the cabin on our way to dinner, Hilda's mind was still on the misfortunes of Mavis, and she knocked on the door of the cabin opposite with the idea of visiting the invalid.