I, Dreyfus

by Bernice Rubens

  He waited for a reply, but James must have thought the question rhetorical, because he didn’t immediately answer.

  ‘Did you hear my question?’ Simon asked.

  ‘Yes,’ James said.

  ‘Then I await your reply.’

  ‘Yes, sir,’ James said. ‘I am aware of those things.’

  ‘It seems to me, Mr Turncastle, that you have chosen these symbols with a great deal of care. As if you had researched them. As if you had read a book on Jewish ritual practices and have put them forward to support your suspicions of my client’s faith. What was the book called, Mr Turncastle?’

  ‘I didn’t read it in a book,’ James said.

  ‘Then someone must have rehearsed you.’

  ‘No they didn’t,’ James said.

  But I noticed that his voice faltered and I delighted in this first crack in his credibility.

  Now it was Simon’s turn to give pause. He turned and stared at the jury. ‘Our witness does not seem too sure,’ he said. Then turning back to James, he said, ‘May I remind you that the symbols that you have chosen to finger my client’s faith are those of very orthodox Jews. Pious Jews. Practising Jews. Jews who do not shave, who are never bare-headed. Jews with cover of a hat or a skull-cap. Would you look at the prisoner and tell me if he has a beard?’

  James was thus forced to look at me and as he did so, I pitied him, for clearly it was painful for him to look me in the face. It was but a glance but it was more than enough for him, for quickly he turned to face the court.

  ‘No,’ James said.

  ‘And would you look once more and tell me whether his head is covered?’

  Again a furtive glance.

  ‘No,’ James said.

  ‘Then it is highly unlikely that my client made use of any of those tokens and that you have lied about seeing them at all.’

  ‘No,’ James said. ‘I did see them. On my honour.’ He was a little boy again, a lying little boy trying to get himself out of trouble, and though I thought that Simon was doing a creditable job of destroying the boy’s evidence, I could not help but pity him.

  ‘And as to the ludicrous bathing story,’ Simon went on, ‘I suggest that, like all your fantasies, it is pure fabrication. An orthodox Jew, one who puts on a prayer-shawl, one who wears fringes, dons phylacteries, one who is bearded and hatted, such a Jew does not bathe in a public place that is open to women as well as men. And if your little book on Jewish ritual told you that he did, then that little book was wrong.’

  James was silent. He even hung his head a little.

  ‘Now let us come to the day before George Tilbury’s disappearance was reported. You say that at two o’clock you saw the accused walking to his car in the company of George Tilbury.’

  ‘Yes, I did.’

  ‘It was in the middle of the day. There must have been a number of people walking around. Going to lessons. To sports. Yet nobody else has come forward to testify that they saw George Tilbury in the company of the accused. And with his arm about his shoulder. Surely others would have noticed that?’

  ‘I didn’t see anyone else about,’ James said.

  ‘And as to the car which came back at three o’clock in the morning of April the fourth, there are other students whose rooms overlook the headmaster’s house. That noise, the tyres on gravel, if it was loud enough to wake you, is it not strange that others did not hear it and come forward to corroborate your vision the following morning? Because you probably dreamt it all, did you not, Mr Turncastle?’

  James made no reply and I almost heard his whole evidence crumbling.

  ‘No further questions,’ Simon said. Then very slowly he returned to his seat.

  The judge rapped his desk for silence, though there was very little noise in the court.

  ‘Court adjourned till tomorrow at ten o’clock,’ he said.

  So ended my first day at the Old Bailey. I was taken away through the back door of the court and, despite my means of exit, there was a mob there too, together with a posse of photographers. Again I was glad of the blanket-shield, though I could not close my ears to the cries of ‘murderer’ and ‘scum’. Back in my cell that night, I found it difficult to sleep. Despite Simon’s partial demolition of James’s testimony, I was not hopeful. I sensed that I had already been found guilty, and if better liars than James were to be witnesses for the prosecution, then I was indeed condemned.

  And the first witness of the following day confirmed my fears.

  ‘Call Police Constable Derek Byrd,’ an usher shouted.

  The witness entered from the side door of the court. His face was fairly familiar; I had seen him foot-patrolling in the neighbouring town and we had acknowledged each other as a mere formality. He had a cruel face and hair so closely cropped that it was almost shaven, and his jowls were heavy with superiority. He did not look at me which wasn’t easy for him since I was in his direct eye-line, and I knew instinctively that he, like James, had been schooled in fabrication. He took the oath, which I considered pretty audacious, then gave his name and ashamedly his rank, below which it was impossible to sink.

  ‘Would you tell the court,’ the prosecutor said, ‘of your duties in the early hours of April the fourth last?’

  PC Byrd coughed to clear his throat. He was nervous I thought, and though I was convinced he was about to deliver a parcel of lies, I knew that his uniform gave him a certain credibility.

  ‘I was called out to investigate a break-in in a tobacconist’s corner-shop,’ he said. ‘As I made my way to the premises, I saw a saloon car driving rather fast down the main road in the direction of the school. As it passed me, I was surprised to see the accused in the driving seat. It was his car. I had often seen it. I looked at my watch and noted the time as 2.40.’

  He had said it all in one breath. He had clearly learned it by heart and did not trust himself to pause at any time during his recital. When he had finished, his jowls jutted even further. I think he expected some applause.

  ‘No further questions,’ the prosecutor said. And at once Simon got to his feet.

  ‘Constable Byrd,’ he said, ‘you say you saw a car driving at speed down the road in the early hours of April the fourth.’

  ‘Yes, sir,’ Byrd said.

  ‘You say the time was 2.40.’

  Again, ‘Yes, sir.’ Byrd was happily safe with the monosyllable.

  ‘You say you were called out to investigate a break-in at a tobacconist’s corner-shop.’

  ‘Yes, sir.’ Byrd was still happy.

  ‘Yet there is no record at the station of any report of a break-in at that time,’ Simon said. ‘We too have investigated. No report at all. How d’you account for that, PC Byrd?’

  The constable was flummoxed. ‘They must have forgotten to put it down,’ he said feebly.

  ‘I don’t think they forgot at all. There was simply nothing to put down. There had been no break-in, and no reports of one. You were certainly on duty that night, but your beat was on the other side of the village, far away from the main road. So I suggest you didn’t see the car at all, much less the prisoner in the driving seat. No further questions,’ Simon said quickly. He gave a wave of his hand as if to confirm that PC Byrd’s testimony was pure poppycock.

  I felt that Simon was doing rather well and a sliver of hope comforted me. But that soon dissolved at the sight of the next witness, whose appearance at my trial stunned me. Anthony Ellis, the maths master from my old school in Hammersmith. I did not remember him for his teaching abilities, which were pretty mediocre, but how could I forget his presence in the staff urinals on that shameful day? I have already written about that ignoble incident, and I have no intention of spelling it out once again. But I had to listen to it, as Ellis unfolded with some relish, the story of my deception. He told it with much elaboration, using such phrases as ‘indecent exposure’, and ‘flashing’. I heard sighs of disgust from the courtroom and I knew that I was damned. I could see the lurid headlines of the morning
papers. I daren’t look at Ellis, so I can’t be sure that he was looking at me. But I suspect he gave me a leer of triumph. Ellis had very much wanted the headmastership at Hammersmith and this was his splendid revenge.

  At one point in the testimony, Simon rose with an objection.

  ‘My Lord,’ he said, ‘I submit that this account has nothing to do with the trial. The prisoner stands accused of murder. The witness’s story has nothing to do with that. It is totally irrelevant.’

  ‘My Lord,’ the prosecutor interrupted, ‘I am simply trying to establish the fact that the prisoner was at pains to publicly pass himself off as an uncircumcised Gentile. It is germane to my argument.’

  ‘Proceed,’ the judge said, and Simon had to sit down. But mercifully, he did not cross-examine and I was grateful that the subject would not be aired yet again. In any case, what Ellis had said was true, and apart from my own testimony, possibly the only truth spoken during the whole of my trial.

  The prosecution’s next witness was Smith from geography.

  ‘Could you tell the court of your first meeting with the prisoner?’ he asked.

  I had forgotten that first encounter, but suddenly I recalled it with fear. My chickens had truly come home to roost.

  ‘It was at a dinner at the school,’ Smith said, ‘before the prisoner was appointed headmaster. We were in the library and the talk turned to our childhoods. He said that he was a country boy and that he had been brought up in a village in Kent. He talked about the village church and the fact that his parents had been married there. He added that he himself had been baptised in that same church.’

  ‘And, in the light of what we now know, how do you regard that conversation?’ the prosecutor led him on.

  ‘I think we were grossly misled,’ Smith said with some indignation.

  The prosecutor gave much pause while he swivelled slowly around the court. Returning to Smith, he said, ‘And now would you give your account of the events at the school on the morning of April the fourth.’

  ‘I heard about George Tilbury’s disappearance when Sir announced it to the staff and upper school. He organised a thorough search. It seemed to me odd that he had not immediately informed the police. When I mentioned this to him he said he didn’t want police interference until he’d spoken to George’s parents. He hoped that George would be found before spreading panic.’

  ‘How did you view this delay?’ the prosecutor asked.

  ‘In the light of the evidence revealed,’ Smith said, ‘I think it was possible that Sir wanted time to get rid of the body before informing the police.’

  ‘Thank you,’ the prosecutor said. Then to Simon, ‘Your witness.’

  ‘You say, Mr Smith,’ Simon said, ‘that the prisoner delayed calling the police because he wanted to give time to have George Tilbury’s body hidden.’

  ‘That is right, sir.’

  ‘You say that that is your opinion. Simply your opinion. May I remind you, Mr Smith, that the witness-box is not a platform on which you may state your opinions. It is a platform for facts. No further questions.’

  I felt that Simon’s cross-examination was timid and unconvincing, despite his strut back to his seat, and in the light of Smith’s opinions, coupled with Ellis’s facts, my already threadbare hopes for acquittal were dashed. And the testimony of the next witness did nothing to revive them.

  His face was familiar and I placed it in our childhood village, and when he gave his name and the nature of his work, I recalled him immediately. He was a Mr Clerk, a verger at Canterbury Cathedral, who lived with his sister in our village. Neither of them were particularly liked in the community. They were uppity and they did not mix. No one had ever been inside their cottage, but there were rumours that it was like a museum, housing a collection of sorts though no one knew exactly what that collection consisted of. There was a whisper too, that they were rather more than brother and sister.

  I was not pleased to see him. He took the oath then stared at me. I looked away, fearful of his testimony. He told the court that on the evening of the third of April, at about nine o’clock he hazarded, he was walking through the field at the back of our cottage and he had noticed that a large hole had been dug in the garden.

  ‘I assumed there was a problem with the drains,’ he said, ‘and I thought no more about it. I was working late that night – Cathedral work –’ he added for the benefit of the jury, ‘and I didn’t retire until 11.30. As I drew the bedroom curtains, I saw a figure in the prisoner’s garden, and I noticed that the hole had been filled up.’

  ‘Did you recognise the figure?’ the prosecutor asked.

  ‘No. It was dark and the view from my window is oblique. It was possibly a man, but in all honesty I couldn’t describe him further.’

  This admission gave his sworn evidence the stamp of utmost credibility. I looked at the jury and I saw that they were impressed.

  ‘And what did you do then, Mr Clerk?’ the prosecutor was chatty.

  ‘It puzzled me a little,’ the virtuous verger said, ‘but I thought no more about it. It was when I heard of the location of the body of George Tilbury that I saw fit to go to the police and tell them what I had seen.’

  Mr Clerk gave the impression of being an innocent and upright citizen. His evidence was cut and dried. He spoke as if he had done his duty. I looked up to the public gallery and caught sight of a woman whom I recognised as his sister. I noticed that she was smiling. And suddenly I gathered in my mind all those witnesses who had testified against me, and I sniffed the undeniable smell of conspiracy.

  ‘Your witness,’ the prosecutor said, and to my horror, Simon declined.

  I don’t know what he could have said to question the verger’s story, but his refusal to discredit it simply let it lie and remain acceptable. I wondered whether he was beginning to doubt my innocence. Mr Clerk stepped down from the box, and as he was leaving the courtroom he looked up to his sister for her approval.

  I was glad that an adjournment was called at that time for it gave the jury something to dwell upon. But after lunch, the plot thickened, a plot fashioned by a person or persons unknown and fashioned with meticulous detail.

  The next prosecution witness was one Albert Cassidy, who owned a hardware store on London’s Tottenham Court Road. I had never seen him before in my life, and I was thus unnerved when he looked at me with a nod of recognition. Then I knew that he too was part of a conspiracy. He told the court, and under that laughable oath, that he was serving in his shop at three o’clock on the afternoon of April the second when a gentleman came in and viewed a collection of knives along a shelf. ‘I saw that he picked up a selection,’ he said, ‘and tested the blades and points with his thumb. There was no other customer in the shop at the time, so I was able to see him very clearly. After about five minutes’ perusal, he made his choice and paid for it at the counter. It was a wide kitchen knife with a shortish handle. And very sharp. It cost twelve pounds and eighty pence. Stainless steel,’ he added in the judge’s direction. ‘I made out a bill. When I saw the photograph of the prisoner in the paper, I recognised him as my customer and I handed the bill to the police.’

  He’d learned it all by heart, I thought, and had gone over it as diligently as I had practised my ‘not guilty’ plea, and it was as much a lie as my rehearsal had been the truth. The bill, Exhibit A, was passed to the bench, and I felt my knees melting. Had I been on the jury, I would, with little hesitation, have found myself guilty, and when Simon again passed on cross-examination, I knew that I was doomed.

  Neither did he cross-examine the following witness, Mr Cassidy’s assistant, who swore to have seen me in the shop at the knife shelf. By now I was totally without hope. I was certainly in London on that day. It was known that I went to a meeting of school inspectors. It was also known that that meeting was due to finish at lunch-time. These facts were known to the staff members. And of course Lucy knew them too. I searched for her in the body of my court, and spotted her immediatel
y. The look on her face was strange. I’d not seen it before and it frightened me. It was a look from which all trust had been drained and I feared for a moment that she doubted the stated purpose of our London trip and that she wondered if she’d been persuaded into coming along in order to provide an alibi for at least part of the day. I wanted to scream, ‘It’s not true. It’s not true. Nothing of this is true.’ Just for Lucy’s ears. I had suffered some desperate moments in the course of my trial but that moment was the most desolate of them all.

  The next witness was Inspector Wilkins, the arresting officer. I harboured no more hope of him than I did of any of the other witnesses. Truth in that courtroom would have been an intrusion. But Wilkins proved the exception.

  ‘What information led you to arrest the prisoner?’ the prosecutor asked.

  ‘I received a telephone call at the station. The caller would not give his name and the line was untraceable. He stated that he had seen a man burying what looked like a body in the garden of the accused’s country cottage. I asked him if he could describe the man, and he said that he was of medium height and probably in his forties.’

  ‘In other words,’ the prosecutor said, ‘that could well have been a description of the prisoner.’

  Inspector Wilkins was indignant. ‘That fact did not occur to me at the time,’ he said. ‘It could well have been a description of thousands of men.’

  ‘What did you do about the phone call?’

  ‘We get many hoax calls at the station, and I am wary of those which are untraceable,’ the honest Wilkins replied. ‘But I was disturbed by the location he had given. I could not overlook that call. I decided to examine the site. And in doing so, we discovered the body. I arrested the prisoner a few hours later.’

  ‘Thank you, Inspector,’ the prosecutor said.

  Simon did not cross-examine. He knew that Wilkins was telling the truth. If there was indeed a conspiracy to frame his client, the Inspector played no part in it. He had done simply what he had to do.

  The prosecutor then called his final witness and I knew he’d saved his last for the clincher. I did not know the man but he wore a policeman’s uniform of a respectable rank and announced himself as being attached to the Kent Constabulary. He stated that, together with forensics, he had minutely examined the prisoner’s car. He had found no traces of blood or fibres, but there were fingerprints. Apart from those of the prisoner, there were fairly newish prints of young George on the dashboard.