‘Oh yes. Guilty to the theft, my Lord. With the very greatest respect!’ I had said most of what I had always longed to say in Bullingham’s Court, and my very last case was over.
‘Ferrets! The Molloys said the Timsons were ferrets. They called it out after your wives in the street.’ I was in the interview room again with Liz Probert and Mr Bernard, saying goodbye to our client Dennis Timson. ‘I wonder why he used that particular expression. Ferrets are little animals you send down holes in the ground. Of course, the Molloys found out what you were up to and they simply followed you down the burrow. And after you’d got through the wall, what were they going to do? Use the gun to get the money off you and Cyril when you’d opened the safe? Anyway, it all ended in chaos and confusion, as most crimes do, I’m afraid, Dennis. You heard the Molloys and thought they were the Old Bill and ran towards the passage. The Molloys got their hands on the rest of the booty. Then Mr Huggins, the bank guard, appeared, some Molloy shot at him and dropped the gun and they scarpered back down the tunnel, leaving you and Cyril in hopeless ignorance, blaming each other.’
‘But there weren’t any fingerprints.’ Liz Probert wondered about my cross-examination of Broome.
‘Oh no. But the DI told Peanuts Molloy he’d found his and got him talking. In fact, Peanuts grassed on the rest of the Molloys.’
‘Grassed on his family, did he?’ Dennis was shocked. ‘Bastard!’
‘I’m afraid things aren’t what they were in our world, Dennis. Standards are falling. When you’ve got this little stretch under your belt you’d do far better give it all up.’
‘Never. I’d miss the excitement. You’re all right, though, aren’t you, Mr Rumpole?’
‘What?’ I was wondering whether I would miss the excitement, and decided that I could live without the thrills and spills of life with Judge Bullingham. ‘I said you’re all right,’ Dennis repeated. ‘On the old four-horse accumulator.’
‘Oh yes, Dennis. I think I shall be all right. Thanks entirely to you. I shan’t forget it. You were my last case.’ I stood up and moved towards the door. ‘Give me a ring when you get out, if you’re ever passing through Lotos land.’
I had looked for Gerald as I arrived down the cells, but the gate had been opened by a thin turnkey without a sandwich. On my way out I asked for Gerald, anxious to collect my fortune, but was told, ‘It’s Gerald’s day off, Mr Rumpole. He’ll be back tomorrow for sure.’
‘Back tomorrow? You don’t know the name of his bookmaker by any chance?’
‘Oh no, Mr Rumpole. Gerald don’t take us into his confidence, not as far as that’s concerned.’
‘Well, all right. I’ll be back tomorrow too.’
‘Dennis Timson well satisfied with his four years, was he?’ the thin warder said as he sprang me from the cells.
‘He seemed considerably relieved.’
‘I don’t know how you do it, Mr Rumpole. Honest, I don’t.’
‘Well,’ I told him. ‘I’m not going to do it any more.’
I gave the same news to Henry when I got back to our clerk’s room and he looked unexpectedly despondent. ‘I’ve done my positively last case, Henry,’ I told him. ‘I shan’t ever be putting my head round the door again asking if you’ve got a spare committal before the Uxbridge Magistrates.’
‘It’s a tragedy, Mr Rumpole,’ my former clerk said, and I must say I was touched. A little later he came up to see me in my room and explained the nature of his anxiety. ‘If you leave, Mr Rumpole, we’re going to have that Mr Hearthstoke back again. He’s going to get your room, sir. Mr Ballard’s already keen on the idea. It’ll be a disaster for Chambers. And my ten per cent.’ His voice sank to a note of doom. ‘And Dianne’s threatened to hand in her notice.’
‘I delivered you from Hearthrug once before, Henry.’ I reminded him of the affair of the Massage Parlours.
‘You did, Mr Rumpole, and I shall always thank you for it. But he’s due here at five o’clock, sir, for an appointment with Mr Ballard. I think they’re going to fix up the final details.’
Well, why should I have cared? By tomorrow, after a brief bit of business with Gerald and a word in the ear of my man of affairs at the Caring Bank, I would be well shot of the whole pack of them. And yet, just as a colonial administrator likes to leave his statue in a public park, or a university head might donate a stained-glass window to the Chapel, I felt I might give something to my old Chambers by which I would always be remembered. My gift to the dear old place would be the complete absence of Hearthrug. ‘Five o’clock, eh?’ I said. ‘Courage, Henry! We’ll see what we can do!’
Henry left me with every expression of confidence and gratitude, and at five o’clock precisely I happened to be down in our entrance hall when Hearthstoke arrived to squeeze Ballard and re-enter Equity Court.
‘Well, Hearthrug,’ I greeted him. ‘Good win, that. An excellent win!’
‘Who won?’ He sounded doubtful.
‘You did, of course. You were prosecuting. We pleaded guilty and you secured a conviction. Brilliant work! So you’re going to have my old room in Chambers.’
‘You are leaving, aren’t you?’ He seemed to need reassurance.
‘Oh, yes, of course. Off to Lotos land! In fact, I only called in to pack up a few things.’ I started up the stairs towards my room, calling to him over my shoulder, ‘Your life’s going to change too, I imagine. Have you had much experience as a father?’
‘A father? No, none at all.’
‘Pity. Ah, well, I expect you’ll pick it up as you go along. That’s the way you’ve picked up most things.’
I legged it up to the room then and had the satisfaction of knowing that he was in hot pursuit. Once in my sanctum, he closed the door and said, ‘Now, Rumpole. Suppose you tell me exactly what you mean?’
‘I mean it’s clear to all concerned that you’ve fallen for Mrs Erskine-Brown hook, line and probably sinker. When you move into Chambers she’ll be expecting to move into your bachelor pad in Battersea, bringing her children with her. Jolly brave of you to take her on, as well as little Tristan and Isolde.’
‘Her children?’ he repeated, dazed. The man was clearly in a state of shock.
‘I suppose Claude will be round to take the kids off to the Ring occasionally. They’ll probably come back whistling all the tunes.’
There was a long pause during which Hearthrug considered his position. Finally, he said, ‘Perhaps, all things considered, these Chambers might not be just what I’m looking for …’
‘Why don’t you slip next door, old darling,’ I suggested, ‘and tell Bollard exactly that?’
I must now tell you something which is entirely to the credit of Mrs Phillida Erskine-Brown. She was determined, once the case was over, to save the neck of her old friend and one-time mentor, Horace Rumpole, despite the fact that she had only recently been merrily engaged in cutting his throat. She had no idea of my stunning success with the horses, so she took it upon herself to call on the Bull in his room, just as he was changing his jacket and about to set off for Wimbledon to terrorize his immediate family. When she was announced by Shrimpton, the Court Clerk, the learned Judge brushed his eyebrows, shot his cuffs and generally tried vainly to make himself look a little more appetizing.
When Phillida entered, and was left alone in the presence, an extraordinary scene transpired, the details of which our Portia only told me long after this narrative comes to an end. The, no doubt, ogling Judge told her that her conduct of the defence had filled him with admiration, and said, ‘I’m afraid I can’t say the same for Rumpole. In fact, I shall have to report him for gross professional misconduct.’ And the old hypocrite added, ‘After such a long career too. It’s a tragedy, of course.’
‘A tragedy he was interrupted,’ Phillida told him. She clearly had the Judge puzzled, so she pressed on. ‘I read the second half of that speech, Judge. Rumpole was extremely flattering, but I think the things he said about you were no less than the truth.’
‘ “One of the fairest and most compassionate judges ever to have sat in the Old Bailey”; “Combines the wisdom of Solomon with the humanity of Florence Nightingale” – that’s only a couple of quotations from the rest of his speech.’
‘But … but that’s not how he started off!’
‘Oh, he was describing the sort of mistaken view the jury might have of an Old Bailey Judge. Then he was about to put them right, but of course the case collapsed and he never gave the rest of that marvellous speech!’
‘Florence Nightingale, eh? Can you tell me anything else’ – the Bull was anxious to know – ‘that Rumpole was about to say?’
‘ “With Judge Bullingham the quality of mercy is not strain’d,/It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven.” Rather well put, I thought. Will you still be reporting Rumpole for professional misconduct?’
The Bull was silent then and appeared to reserve judgement. ‘I shall have to reconsider the matter,’ he said, ‘in the light of what you’ve told me, Mrs Erskine-Brown.’ And then he approached her more intimately: ‘Phillida, may I ask you one question?’
‘Certainly, Judge,’ our Portia answered with considerable courage, and the smitten Bull asked, ‘Do you prefer the hard or the creamy centres? When it comes to a box of chocolates?’
After this strange and in many ways heroic encounter, Phillida turned up, in due course, at Pommeroy’s Wine Bar, and sat at the table in the corner where she had formerly been drinking with Hearthrug. She was there by appointment, but she didn’t expect to meet me. I spotted her as soon as I came in, fresh from my encounter with the young man concerned, and determined to celebrate my amazing good fortune in an appropriate manner. I sat down beside her and, if she was disappointed that it was not someone else, she greeted me with moderate hospitality.
‘Rumpole, have a choc?’ I saw at once that she had a somewhat ornate box on the table in front of her. I was rash enough to take one with a mauve centre.
‘Bullingham gave them to me,’ she explained.
‘The Mad Bull’s in love! You’re a femme fatale, Portia.’
‘Don’t ask me to explain yet, I’m not sure how it’ll turn out,’ she warned me. ‘But I went to see him entirely in your interests.’
‘And I’ve just been seeing someone entirely in yours. What are you doing here, anyway, alone and palely loitering?’
‘I was just waiting for someone.’ Phillida was non-committal.
‘He’s not coming.’ I was certain.
‘What?’
‘Hearthrug’s not coming. He’s not coming into Chambers, either.’ She looked at me, puzzled and not a little hurt. ‘Why not?’
‘Henry doesn’t want him.’
‘Rumpole! What’ve you done?’ She suspected I had been up to something.
‘Sorry, Portia. I told him you wanted to move into his bachelor pad in Battersea and bring Tristan and Isolde with you. I’m afraid he went deathly pale and decided to cancel his subscription.’
There was a longish silence and I didn’t know whether to expect tears, abuse or a quick dash out into the street. I was surprised when at long last, she gave me a curious little half-smile and said, ‘The rat!’
‘I could have told you that before you started spooning with him all round the Old Bailey,’ I assured her and added, ‘Of course, I shouldn’t have done that.’
‘No, you shouldn’t. You’d got no right to say any such thing.’
‘It was Henry and Dianne I was thinking about.’
‘Thank you very much!’
‘They don’t deserve Hearthrug. None of you deserve him.’
‘I was only considering a small adventure …’ she began to explain herself, a little sadly. But it was no time for regrets. ‘Cheer up, Portia,’ I told her. ‘In all the circumstances, I think this is the moment for me to buy the Dom Perignon. Méthode Champenoise is a thing of the past.’
She agreed and I went over to the bar where Jack Pommeroy was dealing with the arrival of the usual evening crowd. ‘A bottle of your best bubbles, Jack.’ I placed a lavish order. ‘Nothing less than the dear old Dom to meet this occasion.’ And whilst he went about fulfilling it, I saw Erskine-Brown come in and look around the room. ‘Ah, Claude,’ I called to him. ‘I’m in the chair. Care for a glass of vintage bubbly?’
‘There you are!’ he said, stating the obvious I thought. ‘I took a telephone message for you in the clerk’s room.’
‘If it’s about a murder tomorrow, I’m not interested.’ My murdering days were over.
‘No, this was rather a strange-sounding chap. I wouldn’t have thought he was completely sober. Said his name was Gerald.’
‘Gerald?’ I was pleased to hear it. ‘Yes, of course. Gerald …’
‘Said he was calling from London airport.’
‘From where?’
‘He said would I give his thanks to Mr Rumpole for the excellent tips, and he was just boarding a plane for a warmer climate.’
‘Gerald said that?’ I have had some experience of human perfidy, but I must say I was shocked and, not to put too fine a point on it, stricken.
‘Words to that effect. Oh, then he said he had to go. They were calling his flight.’
What do you do if your hopes, built up so bravely through the testing time of a four-horse accumulator, are dashed to the ground? What do you do if the doors to a golden future are suddenly slammed in your face and you’re told to go home quietly? I called for Jack Pommeroy and told him to forget the Dom Perignon and pour out three small glasses of the Château Thames Embankment. Then I looked at Phillida sitting alone, and from her to Erskine-Brown. ‘Claude,’ I told him, ‘I have an idea. I think there’s something you should do urgently.’
‘What’s that, Rumpole?’
‘For God’s sake, take your wife to the opera!’
During the course of these memories I have stressed my article of faith: never plead guilty. Like all good rules this is, of course, subject to exceptions. For instance, readers will have noticed that having got Dennis Timson off the firearm charges, I had no alternative but to plead to the theft. So it was with my situation before She Who Must Be Obeyed. I knew that she would soon learn of my announced retirement from the Bar. If I wished to avoid prolonged questioning on this subject, no doubt stretching over several months, I had no alternative but to come clean and throw myself on the mercy of the Court. And so, that night, before the domestic gas-fire I gave Hilda a full account of the wager I had placed with Gerald, and of the fat screw’s appalling treachery. ‘But Rumpole,’ she asked, and it was by no means a bad question, ‘do you mean to say you’ve got no record of the transaction?’
‘Nothing,’ I had to admit. ‘Not even a betting slip. I trusted him. So bloody innocent! We look after our clients and we’re complete fools about ourselves.’
‘You mean’ – and I could see that things weren’t going to be easy – ‘you lost my hundred pounds?’
‘I’m afraid it’s on its way to a warmer climate. With about three hundred thousand friends.’
‘The hundred pounds I spent on the new hearthrug!’ She was appalled.
‘That hundred pounds is still in the account of the Caring Bank, Hilda. Coloured red,’ I tried to explain.
‘You’ll have to go and talk to Mr Truscott about it,’ she made the order. ‘I don’t suppose he’ll be inviting you to the Savoy Grill now, Rumpole?’
‘No, Hilda. I don’t suppose he will.’ I got up then to recharge our glasses, and, after a thoughtful sip, Hilda spoke more reasonably.
‘I’m not sure,’ she told me, ‘that I ever wanted to sit with you on a hotel verandah all day, drinking Planter’s Punch.’
‘Well. Perhaps not.’
‘We might have run out of conversation.’
‘Yes. I suppose we might.’
She had another sip or two and then, much to my relief, came out with ‘So things could be worse.�
�
‘They are,’ I had to break it to her.
‘What?’
‘They are worse, Hilda.’
‘What’ve you done now?’ She sighed over the number of offences to be taken into consideration.
‘Only promised Detective Inspector Broome that I’d done my last case. Oh, and told the jury exactly what I thought of the Mad Bull. In open Court! I’ll probably be reported to the Bar Council. For disciplinary action to be considered.’
‘Rumpole!’ Of course she was shocked. ‘Daddy would be ashamed of you.’
‘That’s one comfort.’
‘What did you say?’
‘Your Daddy, Hilda, has already been called to account by the Great Benchers of the Sky. I hope he was able to explain his hopeless ignorance of bloodstains.’
There was a long silence and then She said, ‘Rumpole.’
‘Yes.’
‘What are you going to be doing tomorrow?’
‘Tomorrow?’
‘I mean’ – and Hilda made this clear to me – ‘I hope you’re not really going to retire or anything. I hope you’re not going to be hanging round the flat all day. You will be taking your usual tube. Won’t you? At 8.45?’
‘To hear is to obey.’ I lifted my glass of Pommeroy’s Ordinary to the light, squinted at it, and noted its somewhat murky appearance. ‘ “Courage!” he said, and pointed towards the Temple tube station.’
So it came about that at my usual hour next morning I opened the door of our clerk’s room. Henry was telephoning, Dianne was brightening up her nails and Uncle Tom was practising chip shots into the waste-paper basket. Nothing had changed and nobody seemed particularly surprised to see me.
‘Henry,’ I said, when our clerk put down the telephone.
‘Yes, Mr Rumpole?’
‘Any chance of a small brief going today, perhaps a spot of indecency at the Uxbridge Magistrates’ Court?’
Rumpole and the Tap End
There are many reasons why I could never become one of Her Majesty’s judges. I am unable to look at my customer in the dock without feeling, ‘There but for the Grace of God goes Horace Rumpole.’ I should find it almost impossible to order any fellow citizen to be locked up in a Victorian slum with a couple of psychopaths and three chamber pots, and I cannot imagine a worse way of passing your life than having to actually listen to the speeches of the learned friends. It also has to be admitted that no sane Lord Chancellor would ever dream of the appointment of Mr Justice Rumpole. There is another danger inherent in the judicial office: a judge, any judge, is always liable to say, in a moment of boredom or impatience, something downright silly. He is then denounced in the public prints, his resignation is called for, he is stigmatized as malicious or at least mad and his Bench becomes a bed of nails and his ermine a hair shirt. There is, perhaps, no judge more likely to open his mouth and put his foot in it than that, on the whole well-meaning, old darling, Mr Justice Featherstone, once Guthrie Featherstone, QC, MP, a Member of Parliament so uninterested in politics that he joined the Social Democrats and who, during many eventful years of my life, was Head of our Chambers in Equity Court. Now, as a Judge, Guthrie Featherstone had swum somewhat out of our ken; but he hadn’t lost his old talent for giving voice to the odd uncalled-for and disastrous phrase. He, I’m sure, will never forget the furore that arose when, in passing sentence in a case of attempted murder in which I was engaged for the defence, his Lordship made an unwise reference to the ‘tap end’ of a matrimonial bathtub. At least the account which follows may serve as a terrible warning to anyone contemplating a career as a judge.
The Collected Stories of Rumpole Page 44