"Mortimer, John - Rumpole on Trial" - читать интересную книгу автора (Mortimer John)
'Money dealings. Telephone bills. Tell me what you find. I think particularly telephone bills.' 64 There is one thing to be said in favour of the decline of civilization as we know it: the slide into the abyss can provide some extremely comic moments. One such came when Soapy Sam Ballard called me into his presence as he had an appointment with Claude. 'I want you there as an observer, Rumpole.
We are not yet ready to sit in judgment. But it's only fair that anything Erskine-Brown may have to say is said in front of witnesses.' 'You mean, taken down and used in evidence against him?' I asked hopefully.
'It may not come to that.' Ballard sounded gloomy. 'I pray to God it may not come to that.' So I sat in Ballard's room and very soon there came a knock at the door and Erskine-Brown was with us and sprawled in Ballard's client's chair, apparently exhausted.
'The investigation into the harassment affair isn't proving all that easy. I'm getting nowhere with Dot.' 'Are you not, Erskine-Brown?' Ballard looked at him sadly.
'Well, I'm sure it's not for want of trying. She is, of course, the young lady you had in mind?' 'Oh, yes. Indeed. I'm absolutely certain she's being harassed, in the workplace. But I simply can't get her to lodge a formal complaint.' 'Can you not?' Once more Ballard spoke more in sorrow than in anger. 'Well, she's made a formal complaint now. To me.' 'Has she?' Claude seemed to cheer up considerably. 'Oh, good!' 'Good? You think it's good! I don't think it's good at all.
She says she's been harassed.' 'Harassed, Ballard,' Claude corrected him. 'I told you that's how they say it nowadays.' 'Harassed or harassed, it comes to exactly the same thing in the end. The fact is that Miss Clapton, who seems a perfectly respectable girl, is extremely worried.' 'I'm not at all surprised. Henry's behaviour was unforgivable,' Claude told him.
'Henry?' Ballard sounded surprised. 'She didn't say a word about Henry 'She didn't? Who's she complaining about then?' 'You!' 'What?' 'She said you pressed her to come into your room on the pretext of showing her your watercolours.' And Ballard weighed up the evidence. 'It sounds a pretty flimsy excuse to me.' 'But Ballard...' Erskine-Brown rose to his feet, clearly alarmed at the unexpected turn of events.
'She said you talked to her about terrible urges,' Soapy Sam went on remorselessly.
'I said I could understand them. We all have them. That's what I said.' 'Speak for yourself, Erskine-Brown,' Ballard rejected the imputation vigorously. 'And it seems you said you found her extremely "fanciable", an expression new to me, but I'm afraid I can guess its meaning. And you promised to get her promoted to a junior clerkship, no doubt for a certain consideration.' 'Ballard, this is a totally unjustified accusation!' 'You never said that?' 'Well, I may have said something like that. But what I meant was...' 'No!' Ballard held up his hand to stop further self-incrimination.
'I want to be perfectly fair to you, Erskine-Brown. I want to give you ample time to consider your defence.' 'My defence!' 'Of course.' Ballard gave his interim judgment. 'This will have to be decided, together with other rather disturbing matters, at a full Chambers meeting. Until then I hope you will have no further conversations with Miss Clapton. She, of course, will be a vital witness. I would only give you one word of advice at this time, Erskine-Brown. Make a clean breast of it to your wife!' 'Rumpole!' Erskine-Brown turned to me as the voice of sanity. 'Do you honestly believe...?' 'I believe nothing, Claude,' I said. 'I haven't made up my mind. I'm here purely as a witness.' 'A witness to what?' 'To your answer to the charge,' Ballard told him. 'What we 66 have here is moral decay,' Soapy Sam said to me after Claude had left in a state of indignation and dismay. 'You know what caused the decline and fall of the Roman Empire?' I had to confess I wasn't entirely clear.
'Lust, Rumpole. Flagrant immorality has reared its head all over this building. Oh, yes. I will have to call on everyone to pull themselves together.' 'According to you, isn't that rather what they're doing already?' 'I really don't know what you're talking about, Rumpole.' I looked at the man. He was undoubtedly a pompous, blinkered, humourless prig who seemed to confuse the Headship of a small, mainly criminal set of Chambers with the Archbishopric of Canterbury. And yet I remembered what Elizabeth had told me I should feel about him. I tried it out.
'I love you, Ballard,' I said.
'What was that?' The poor fellow clearly couldn't believe his ears. So I repeated, 'I love you with all my heart.' He was looking at me and his very worst suspicions seemed to be confirmed. 'Rumpole,' he asked nervously, 'do I detect a curious odour in this room?' 'Perhaps the odour of sanctity.' 'I don't think so. It's a heavy, sweet smell. Cloying. Tell me honestly. Are you perfumed, Rumpole?' 'As I was saying', I ignored his question, 'I believe it's our duty to love everything, and because of that, well, I can only say, "I love you, Ballard."' I had clearly gone too far and taken Elizabeth's advice too literally. The man got up, extremely alarmed. 'Another time, perhaps. I've got a case starting over the road.' And as he hurried to the door he was muttering, 'Think about it very carefully, Rumpole. Moral decay. Getting in everywhere.' So two causes came to trial, the great harassment inquiry in Chambers and the case of R. v. Casterini at the Old Bailey.
The second, greatly to my regret, was held before Judge Sir Oliver, or 'Oilie', Oliphant, who came, as he was never tired of reminding us, from the North of England. In fact he 67 regarded everyone who lived south of Leeds as idle dreamers who spent their time lying in the sun, peeling grapes and strumming guitars. He was firmly of the opinion that all cases could be decided by 'good old North Country common sense', which, so far as he was concerned at least, often proved a somewhat unreliable test.
The proceedings began in a routine manner with the medical evidence and then Detective Sergeant Straw produced the revolver which he had found in the rehearsal room.
'It was not very well concealed?' I asked the officer.
'Not particularly.' 'And no fingerprints were found on the weapon?' 'That is right.' 'Did that surprise you?' 'Let's use our common sense about this, Mr Rumpole.' Mr Justice Oliphant entered the arena. 'No doubt whoever did it removed the fingerprints so as to avoid detection. Does that make sense to you. Members of the Jury? I know it does to me.' 'So is this your Lordship's theory?' I asked politely. 'My client was careful to leave his gun behind, although it could easily be traced to him, but took a lot of trouble clearing off the fingerprints.' 'Or else wore gloves,' the D.S. suggested.
'Or else wore gloves.' The Judge wrote a note. 'That's a possibility, isn't it. Members of the Jury?' Ignoring this interruption I asked the witness, 'Mr Casterini has agreed that it was his gun. He must have been mad to leave it at the scene of the crime, mustn't he?' 'Mr Rumpole,' Oilie Oliphant answered, 'you know we have a saying up in the North where I come from: "There's nowt so queer as folks"?' 'Do you really, my Lord? Down here, in the Deep South, I suppose we're more inclined to look for some sort of logical explanation. That's what I shall invite the Jury to do.' 'And I shall be inviting them to use their common sense.' The Judge repeated his creed.
'What an excellent idea!' I bowed politely. 'I do so thoroughly agree with your Lordship.' 68 ", After this preliminary skirmish my opponent, Hilary Peek, a big beefy Q.C. with an unnervingly high voice, called Peter Matheson, the horn player. He gave the account I have outlined about seeing Desmond and finding the body but, perhaps more interestingly, he spoke of a previous conversation he had heard between Elizabeth and Tom Randall. They came down for the lift, which had chosen to be stuck, on that occasion, on the fourth floor. Matheson's door was open a little and he put down his horn long enough to hear Tom say, 'I'll have to tell him. Before everyone else knows.' ' "I'll have to tell him."' The Judge was writing it down with pleasure. 'No doubt that means, Mr Casterini, the lady's husband.' 'My Lord, there is no evidence of that,' I reminded him.
'But we can use our common sense, can't we, Mr Rumpole?
Isn't this just another of those cases about the eternal triangle?' 'At the moment,' I said, 'all we know is that they were a trio.' Not long after that I rose to cross-examine Mr Matheson, who was a nondescript, nervous young man who only came, entirely to life, I imagined, when playing his horn.
'Did you hear a shot?' was my first question.
'No, I didn't.' 'And did Mr Casterini tell you, straightaway, that he had found Mr Randall dead and he had no idea who did it?' 'He told me that, yes,' Matheson agreed.
'You said you were at college with the members of the trio.' 'Just Tom and Elizabeth. Desmond Casterini met them later.' 'You said you knew Elizabeth Casterini well?' 'I suppose I was a bit in love with her. Most men were.
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