"Mortimer, John Clifford - Rumpole 01 - Rumpole of the Bailey" - читать интересную книгу автора (Mortimer John)

'Now, Miss Tigwell, apart from the fact that persons of different sex, sat together ... Did you ever observe anything suspicious from your post in the crow's nest?' 'I saw a man giving her money.' Miss Tigwell was playing her King.' Quite a lot of money. It was in ten pound notes.' 'Was this the first time you had ever seen money passing or any sort of dealing going on in " Nirvana " ?' 'The first time, yes.' The judge was making a note. I decided to play my Ace and prayed that I wouldn't be trumped by the prosecution.

' Can you describe to his Honour the man you saw passing the money?' 'Dreadful-looking person. A clear criminal type. Looked as if he'd been dragged through a hedge backwards.' 'Longhair?' 'And a horrible sort of moustache.' 'Beads? Embroidered jeans? Afghan goat's hair and purple silk fancy for the neck?' I saw Detective Sergeant ex-hippie Smedley bow his head in shame, and I knew I was home and dry.

'Disgusting! I saw it all quite distinctly!' Miss Tigwell ended in triumph.

'Congratulations, madam. You have now given us a perfectly accurate description of Detective Smedley of the local force.' As I took off the wig in the robing room. Farmer Tooke was looking distinctly worried. I did my best to cheer him up. 'Ah, Tooke ... I have good news for you. Hope to get you all off in time for the gymkhana tomorrow. Got a daughter, have you, in the potato race?' 'Do you think the judge is agin me?' Tooke felt all was not well with the prosecution.

' Not you, personally. But I know what he's thinking.' 'Do you?' 'Encourage that sort of police officer and he'll be out in a frock on the Prom tomorrow, soliciting the chairman of the bench.' Tooke saw the point. 'I say. I suppose that sort of thing is worrying.' ' Not English, if you want my opinion.' At which Tooke, climbing into his Burberry, put the law behind him and extended an invitation.

'What are you doing tonight, Rumpole? I mean, there'll be a few of us dining at the Bar hotel... With the leader of the Circuit.' ' Roast lamb, sea shanties and old jokes from Quarter Sessions ? No. Not tonight, Tooke.' 'Oh well. I'm sorry. We like to give our visitors a little hospitality.' 'Tonight, I am dropping out.' Dinner at 'Nirvana' was a distinct surprise. I'd expected nut cutlets and carrot juice. I got an excellent steak and kidney pud and a very drinkable claret. Oswald had told me he was something of a ' wine freak'. The house was clean and the big cushions and old sofas remarkably comfortable. The babies were good enough to withdraw from the company, the record-player gave us unobtrusive flute music from the Andes and Kathy tended to all my needs, filling my glass and lighting my cigar, and remained a perpetual pleasure to the eye. I began to think that I'd rather live at 34 Balaclava Road than at the Gloucester Road mansion flat with She Who Must Be Obeyed; I'd rather sit back on the scatter cushions at 'Nirvana' and let my mind go a complete blank than drag myself down to the Bailey on a wet Monday morning to defend some over-excited Pakistani accused of raping his social worker. In fact I thought that for tuppence, for a packet of small cigars, I'd give up the law and spend the rest of my life in a pair of old plimsolls and grey flannel bags, shrimping on the beach at Coldsands. The only fly in this soothing ointment was the fellow Dave.

When I told Kathy she wouldn't even have to go into the witness box if we won our agent provocateur argument, Dave said, 'I'm not sure I agree with that.' I told him firmly that I wasn't sure he had to.

'When we brought you here I thought you'd understand ... It's not just another case,' Dave protested. Protesting seemed to be his main occupation.

'Every case is just another case,' I told him. 'To you, all right! To us it's a chance to say what we have to. Can't we put the law straight, on the drug scene?' 'I mean, this isn't a den of thieves, is it? You've seen "Nirvana"!' Oswald put the point more gently. He was right, of course, I had seen 'Nirvana'.

'Now's our only chance to get through to the law,' Dave told me. I decided to instruct him on the facts of life.

'The law? You know where the law is now? Down in the George Hotel drinking the Circuit port and singing " What Shall We Do with the Drunken Sailor". The law is talking about the comical way the old Lord Chief passed a death sentence. The law is in another world; but it thinks it's the whole world. Just as you lot think the world's nothing but poetry, and perhaps the occasional puff of a dangerous cigarette.' 'That's what we've got you for. To put our point of view across.' Dave had mistaken my function.

'You've got me to get you out of trouble. That's what you've got me for. I'm not going to get up tomorrow and teach old Rice Crispies to sing protest songs ... to a small guitar.' 'You're just not taking this case seriously!' Dave was totally wrong, and I told him so.

'Oh yes I am. I am seriously determined to keep Kathy out of prison.' At which Miss Trelawny said it was time for their nightly poem. She found a book and gave it to me open.

'Me?' 'You like this. Read it to us ...' So I read to the lotus eaters, quietly at first and then with more emphasis, enjoying the sound of my own voice. 'It is a beauteous evening, calm and free, The holy time is quiet as a Nun Breathless with adoration; the broad sun Is sinking down in its tranquillity.' They were all listening as though they actually enjoyed it, except for Dave who was whispering to Kathy.

'Dear Child! dear Girl! that walkest with me here, If thou appear untouched by solemn thought...' Kathy was shushing Dave, making him listen to the old sheep. I looked at her as I read the last lines.

' Thy nature is not therefore less divine: Thou liest in Abraham's bosom all the year; And worshipp'st at the Temple's inner shrine, God being with thee when we know it not.' I slammed the book shut. I needed to sleep before Court in the morning.

'The Officer was only doing his duty. Active, your Honour, in the pursuit of crime!' Tooke was making his final speech on the point of evidence, to an unenthusiastic audience.

'Or in the manufacture of a crime? That's what troubles me." The judge was really troubled, bless him. He went on. 'If I thought this young woman only collected drugs ... only got in touch with any sort of supplier because of the trap set for her, then would you concede, Mr Tooke, I would have to reject the evidence?' ' I think your Honour would.' Tooke was a lovely prosecutor. Everything was going extremely well when Rice Crispies adjourned for lunch. So I was in festive mood when I set off for a crab sandwich and a nourishing stout in the pub opposite the Shire Hall, looking forward to whetting my whistle and putting the final touch on my clinching argument. But I was stopped by Friendly who said the client wanted to see me as a matter of urgency. He led me into a small room, decorated with old framed leases and eighteenth-century maps of Coldsands, and there, clearly bursting with news to impart, were Miss Kathy Trelawny and her friend Dave.

'We want to tell the truth.' I closed the door carefully and looked at her Dave without encouragement.

'What truth?' 'It's the only way I can get Peter's case across,' Kathy said. She was smiling no longer.

'Peter?' 'My brother. I told you. He was busted.' 'In Turkey. I remember. Well, this isn't Turkey. And it's not Peter's case or anyone else's.' I looked at Kathy.' It's yours.' 'Kathy wants you to know why she did it.' She was about to speak, and I almost shouted at her, hoping it still wasn't too late.

'Shut up!' 'You see I had ...' 'The conference is over! Got to get a bite of lunch. Come on. Friendly.' I moved to the door.

' It appears we have new instructions, Mr Rumpole." Friendly looked concerned, not half so concerned as I was.

'The old instructions are doing very nicely, thank you. Don't say a word until this evening. When it's all over tell me what you like.' 'She wants everyone to know. How else can we get Pete's case into the papers?' Dave, like an idiot, had moved between me and the door. I had no way of escaping the fusillade of truth which Kathy then let fly.

'I got the stuff last year after Pete got busted in Istanbul. I was going to sell it anyway. It was going to cost ten thousand pounds to get him out in lawyers' fees and ...' she looked at me almost accusingly, 'bribes, I suppose ... He got twelve years. We've got to get people to care about Peter!' So it was quite clear, she was telling me that she hadn't committed her crime as the result of a request from an agent provocateur. She had the stuff before Detective Sergeant Smedley of the west country Drug Squad first came to 'Nirvana'. That was the truth, the last thing in the world I wanted to know. I looked at my watch, and turned to Friendly.