VIII
A little after midnight it began to rain, a dull steady dripping rain which never ceased. The sun rose, but not into sight. Grey banked clouds slowly appeared, and that was the one sign of day. Along Lewes High Street there was no sound save the regular drip, drip of water from pipes and gables and sign boards. Water streamed from the hair, the robes and the sword of the fat stone Justice on the Assize Court, as though she had just risen from the leaden waves of a “pleasure resort,” like Venus out of the Mediterranean. Unperturbed by cold and damp she stared across the street at the windows of the White Hart with an expressionless gaze. A blind was raised and a young man looked out for a moment at the street. Through another window the fading light of a candle could be seen moving upwards, as an elderly, sharp-featured man mounted the stairs to bed. The flames of the two street lamps ceased to be bright gold breaches in the dark and became finally a faint yellow smear on a grey page. Presently an elderly man shuffled along the pavement and turned them out. By order of Lewes Corporation day had officially begun.
For several hours yet there was no movement of human beings in the street. A thin grey cat trod delicately along the gutter in a kind of dignified despondency, and a dog came trotting from a side turning, tail erect in spite of the rain. The cat leapt up three steps of a house and stood with bristling curved back, spitting defiance, while the dog, crouching close to the ground, barked in short, sharp bursts, more for amusement than from any real enmity. The blind of the White Hart was again raised and the same young man looked out, watching the byplay with an intent interest. He was fully dressed and his eyes were strained as though he had been unable to sleep. The cat, suddenly conscious that she was a show for two male creatures, leapt on a railing and disappeared. Dog and man watched in disappointed boredom the steps on which she had stood.
About an hour later a gang of men appeared with brooms and attempted the impossible task of cleaning the street in preparation for the coming of the judge. Sir Edward Parkin was a man of the utmost fastidiousness and the Mayor had learned at a previous Assizes the unpleasant results of displeasing him. While the men scrubbed and brushed and the falling rain defeated their efforts, the clock of St. Anne’s Church struck seven and the High Street sprang automatically to life. A milk cart rattled down the road, blinds clattered up, the smell of cooking foods crossed the street, maids came out of doors and emptied pails of water on the steps. As the day advanced little knots of people collected on the pavement and turning their backs on the Assize Court stared up the street. They were waiting for the judge.
In his lodgings Sir Edward Parkin buttered his toast deliberately. He was a short, plump man with a very white face and very white hands. It was rumoured in London that he powdered them like a woman. His voice, when he spoke across the table to his marshal, was high and affected. It played tricks at an empyrean height, curvetting like a skittish mare. He complained peevishly of the breakfast which had been laid before him.
At the White Hart Sir Henry Merriman breakfasted with his papers before him on some dry toast and coffee. Lucy was still in bed, and Mr. Farne at the other end of the table was silent and thoughtful.
Sir Henry looked up. “Is he still in the hotel?” he asked.
Mr. Farne nodded.
“Will he stay the course, I wonder?”
Mr. Farne shrugged his shoulders.
Outside, the javelin men marched along the street to the judge’s lodgings, their bright uniforms shining dimly through the grey veil of rain. They were followed at a short interval by the trumpeters of the local militia. They formed up outside the lodgings and Sir Edward Parkin rose, dusting crumbs from his knees. He had timed his breakfast to a minute. He sent his marshal out to find snuff. “It must be Bentley’s.”
At the prison they were fastening the irons on six men. Five were big bearded fellows who cursed, defiantly, but in the best of humour. Their lawyer had seen them the previous day and he was supremely confident in the jury. They only needed a loophole for an acquittal and that loophole he had devised. The sixth man had not understood what the lawyer had said. He dimly realised that a man was dead, and he was in the dock for murder. He was white and shaken by sudden bouts of terrified tears. He was the half-witted boy Tims.
Some time before this a maid had knocked on Andrews’s door and offered him breakfast. He had refused it. He had no appetite. He felt that it was he who was about to enter the dock and be tried for his life. His mouth was so dry that he wondered how he would be able to answer counsel’s questions. “I am doing the right thing,” he told himself over and over again. “This is what Elizabeth would have me do.” But the answer was too obvious. “This is not for her.” If only it were. He remembered how the day before he had seen her cottage from the down and had taken the smoke for turning, twisting birds. His heart too had flown that now felt as though it must drag in the mud forever. He was afraid to raise her image, since it had been so easily and completely defeated by a courtesan. If it had not been for that, for the bargain he had made, he felt that he could have faced his trial, if not with courage, at least with an echo of a resemblance to it.
Somewhere from a long way off there came a broken blare of trumpets. It meant, he knew, that the judge was entering his carriage. Any moment now they would be coming for him. It was not fear so much as disgust and regret that filled his mind to the exclusion of any clear thought—disgust at his actions and his words the night before, disgust at the young lustful woman who had come between him and a strange, purifying dream, regret that he was going to face death for so mean a reason. He heard someone moving on the stairs. Was it too late? He flung himself on his knees beside the bed and prayed for the first time for many years, with a disjointed passion. “O God, if you are God,” he implored, “give me courage. Forgive last night. I will try to forget it. I will try not to see that woman again. I will not take her reward. Give, give me back the old motive.”
Mr. Farne’s face appeared in the doorway. “You must come along,” he said. He looked puzzled, embarrassed and therefore a little angry.
Crowds lined the pavements, and a long queue had formed up in front of a side door for entrance to the public gallery. Andrews turned up the collar of his coat, lest he should be recognised. There were many in Lewes who knew his face, innkeepers to whom the smugglers had sold their goods, housekeepers with convenient cellars in which to store barrels.
In the Court was a buzz and movement which made Andrews feel dizzy and confused. His brain was tired with the constant wakefulness of the previous night, and it was indistinctly, as though through a mist, that he picked out Sir Henry Merriman where he sat at the counsel’s table. Mr. Farne had joined him and there was a third man whom Andrews did not know, as well as the two counsel for the prisoners. From where he stood he could not see the occupants of the dock and he was glad. His time would come in the witness box only too soon.
Outside the Court was a clash and rattle as the javelin men grounded their weapons, and then, heralded by a blare of trumpets and the usher’s cries, Mr. Justice Parkin entered and took his seat. As though engaged in some children’s game of musical bumps the Court bobbed up and bobbed down. Mr. Justice Parkin helped himself to Bentley’s snuff, and the buzz of conversation began again, as though the Court were a glass tumbler containing a number of irritated and heated flies. Already the solicitors had begun to yawn.
The Clerk of the Arraigns arose below the Bench and in a tone of intense boredom informed the six men in the dock that the good men whom they would hear called, and severally that did appear, were to pass between them and the King, upon the trial of their several lives or deaths: and that, if they meant to challenge them, or any of them, they must challenge them as they came to the Book to be sworn, and before they were sworn, and they should be heard. He then sat down again, closed his eyes and apparently went to sleep. Mr. Justice Parkin smoothed his hands and gazed at the public gallery, where a number of young women sat.
The panel was then called over. There was a challenge by the Crown to the name of an innkeeper of Southover, and then the Court settled once more into inertia while the jurymen were sworn. Afterwards the Clerk of the Arraigns, rousing himself from his sleep, charged the jury on the indictment against the prisoners and on the Coroner’s inquisition. Mr. Justice Parkin, sighing faintly at the necessity of removing his attention from his hands, ordered the witnesses out of Court. A police officer pulled at Andrews’s sleeve and led him into a small room marked on the door with a large label in bold vulgar lettering “Male Witnesses only.” In the middle of the room was a big, shiny red mahogany table, now covered by hats and coats and sticks. Round the four walls ran a narrow wooden seat tightly packed with people, who stared at him with hostile curiosity. They made no effort to move closer and find him room to sit. Andrews walked to the end of the room and leant against the window, watching his companions out of the corners of his eyes. One side of the room was entirely given up to men in the blue uniforms of the revenue. They commented on his appearance loudly amongst themselves till he found himself blushing scarlet.
“Who’s this young child?” said one.
“Can’t even dress decently to appear before his lord high mightiness.”
“Look at the mud on him. Street scavenger I’d say he is.”
An elderly man with a benevolent face called out to him. “What’s your name, young fellow?”
Andrews rose trustingly to the kindness in the voice. He felt very alone, standing in an isolated position, stared at and criticised by every man in the room. He longed to make an ally and so he answered promptly and truthfully, “Andrews.”
The elderly benevolent man turned sharply to his colleagues. “Andrews,” he said, “that’s one of the men we’ve been looking for these last days.” He got up and stood in front of Andrews with his hands on his hips. “You ought to be in the dock, you ought,” he said. “What are you doing here, eh, contaminating this company? Aye, you’ve cause to blush, you have. You are among honest men here.”
“Can’t you leave me alone?” Andrews said. “I’m tired. I haven’t had any sleep.”
“Nor you ought,” the man said. “What are you doing here, aye? Sneaked on your comrades, aye?” He turned to his companions and raised his hands protestingly. “I wouldn’t mind now if he was an honest smuggler,” he said. “But a sneak thief, a damned informer. It’s too thick. Are we going to let him stay in this room among honest men?”
“Hi, boy,” called a man from the opposite bench, “is that true? Be you a bloody informer?”
“O’ course he is,” the elderly revenue man continued, twisting round again to face Andrews. He danced from one foot to the other. “Can’t you answer an honest question—you rat?”
Andrews clenched his fists and half closed his eyes. “I’m not low enough to take an insult from a gauger,” he said.
“Not, aye?” the benevolent faced man asked and struck Andrews on the face with the palm of his hand.
Andrews raised his fist and then let it sink again to his side. O God, he silently implored, let this be my penance for last night. Now do your part and give me courage. Aloud he said. “You are an old man if you are a gauger. I’m not going to fight you,” and he turned his back on the room so that no one might see that his eyes were filled with tears. This is not the worst, he thought. How can I go through with this to the end?
“O let him alone, Bill,” someone said. “He’s only a kid.”
“He stinks,” said Bill abruptly. “Why should we be put in the same room as an informer? Either he clears out of here or else I clear out.”
“You’ll clear out anyway,” an officer said, putting his head through the door. “Your turn in Court. Get along now. Hurry.”
One by one they went, dropping out of Andrews’s sight like the sands of an hour glass. He waited nervously for his own name to be called, but still he remained free, free to stare through the window at a rain-lashed sodden yard, with the knowledge that he had not yet finally put the seal upon his treachery. At last the moment came. “Andrews, Andrews,” he heard his name called very faintly from the door of the Court, taken up louder and carried along the corridors, till it broke on him where he stood by the window cold and sick and frightened.
The Clerk of the Arraigns sat down and without a moment’s interval apparently subsided again into sleep. Sir Henry Merriman rose. “May it please your lordship, gentlemen of the jury …” His voice showed no sign of the past sleepless, hard worked hours. Clear, cold, vital, it tautened the minds of all the idle spectators in court. The subdued murmur of conversation in the gallery ceased. The phrases with which he addressed the jury were timeworn but were lit with new life by the fire of sincerity in the man himself. “You are to pronounce your verdict on the evidence and on the evidence alone. You are to forget all that you may have ever heard or read on the subject, for it is probably erroneous and is, at all events, unsupported by proof. You are to come to the consideration of this case with pure and dispassionate judgments, to hear the evidence, and give, on that evidence, a true verdict.” A true verdict! Watching the twelve men opposite him he searched in vain for one answering spark of sincerity. They watched him back with cow-like, unintelligent and hostile faces. “You are trying to trick us into hanging our friends,” they seemed to say.
“Gentlemen, the crime with which the prisoners stand charged is one of great enormity, the death of a man.” He was flinging his words against a wall of prejudice. To them he knew very well it was not the death of a man, but only the death of a gauger, the modern publican. It was useless to try and convince them that the life lost had any value. The only way in which he could get a conviction was by leaving them no loophole for an acquittal.
“The murdered man, Edward Rexall, was a revenue officer for the County of East Sussex and was stationed at Shoreham. His superior officer, Mr. Thomas Hilliard, acting on certain information, proceeded with Rexall and ten other men on the night of February 10 to a point on the shore three miles east of Shoreham. The officers then concealed themselves behind the sand dunes which at that particular point fringe the shore. This was at 12:15 a.m. At a little after one a red light appeared to seaward hung apparently from the mast of a small lugger. Mr. Hilliard then exposed a lantern found on one of the pack horses. Seven minutes later a ship’s boat grounded on the sand. In it were ten men, six of whom we hope to satisfy you are the men now in the dock. They were on the point of unloading a number of casks, when the quietness of the beach and the absence of their friends apparently aroused their suspicions, and they began hastily to re-embark. Mr. Hilliard then showed himself and called upon them to surrender. The smugglers thereupon scattered and ran in various directions along the shore. Mr. Hilliard had, however, so posted his men that they were able to drive the smugglers together again, when they would undoubtedly have captured the whole band, if the smugglers had not opened fire. In the momentary confusion which followed three of the smugglers escaped in the boat. Six, however, were captured, and it was then found that Edward Rexall had been shot dead. From start to end of the struggle no shot was fired by the revenue officers, and if there should be any doubt in your mind on this point, I propose to bring evidence to show that the bullet found in Rexall’s body was of a type carried by the smugglers and not of the type served out to officers of His Majesty’s service. It is not necessary for the prosecution to prove which of the men in the dock fired the fatal shot. It is not even necessary to prove that it was fired by one of the prisoners and not by one of the band who escaped. It was fired by one of the smugglers, whether he at this moment is standing in the dock or is flying for his life a hundred miles from here, and every member of the gang who took part in the resistance to His Majesty’s officers is as guilty of murder as if he was himself seen to fire the bullet which killed Rexall. It is seldom, gentlemen, that murder is committed under circumstances which enable us to bring forward eyewitnesses of the crime. This case, therefore, is an unusually simple one for you to decide. I have detailed to you the principal facts which it is now my duty to establish by competent evidence. I have forborne to state anything which I do not believe will come out in that evidence. If any doubts should arise in your minds, sincere doubts quite apart from any personal knowledge you may have of the prisoners, you will, as you are bound in conscience to do, give the prisoners the benefit of them; but if the case shall be established clearly and satisfactorily, you are equally bound by the oath which you have taken before God, to find that verdict which the well-being of society and the demands of justice require.”
Mr. Hilliard was called. His evidence seemed to leave no loophole for acquittal. Sir Henry Merriman, watching the jury between every question, saw them stir restlessly, uneasily. Mr. Braddock, who led for the defence, rose to cross-examine. He was a large man with an apoplectic face which might well have been formed by an undue consumption of contraband liquor. His hair was black, just mottled with grey, but his eyebrows made a continuous dead white streak like a scar across his face. He scowled at Mr. Hilliard, leaned a long way backward, as though the better to spring, wrapped his gown tight round his arms by a fierce circular movement and pounced.
“Are you considered by your superiors an efficient officer, Mr. Hilliard?”
Mr. Hilliard flushed crimson and gazed appealingly at the judge.
“Is that a relevant question, Mr. Braddock?” said the judge.
“It is, my lord,” Mr. Braddock returned briskly. Sir Edward Parkin was visibly put out. “The witness cannot be asked what his superiors think, Mr. Braddock.”
Mr. Braddock glared and gulped and turned again on the witness.
“You have been in command of the revenue post at Shoreham for over four years?”
“Yes.”
“Have you or have you not received complaints from headquarters that you are not properly fulfilling your duties with regard to the prevention of smuggling?”
“Mr. Braddock,” the judge again interrupted, his eyes on the young women in the gallery, “that is not a relevant question.”
“My lord,” Mr. Braddock fired up, “I am very well aware of what is relevant and what is not relevant. If the defence is to be hampered …”
“That is not the way to address the Bench. You must learn to keep your temper, Mr. Braddock. I am anxious to give the defence every latitude. Well, Mr. Hilliard?”
“I have received complaints, my lord.”
“He has received complaints, Mr. Braddock. There you have your answer. Will you proceed?”
“Did you receive a complaint within the last month?”
“Yes.”
“Did you say in the hearing of a number of your men that unless something was done quickly you and they would be dismissed the service?”
“No.”
“Now, Mr. Hilliard, think carefully upon that point and remember that you are upon your oath.”
“I cannot remember saying so.”
“Yes or no, Mr. Hilliard.”
Sir Edward Parkin fluttered a white hand impatiently. Attention in the public gallery was becoming too centred on counsel. “The witness has already answered you, Mr. Braddock. He cannot remember.”
Mr. Braddock snorted and shrugged his shoulders with an eye on the jury.
“Now, Mr. Hilliard, listen very carefully. I suggest to you that there was urgent need, if you were not to be dismissed from the service, for—shall we say a grand coup?”
“I don’t know.”
“I suggest Mr. Hilliard that your whole story, and the story your men will tell, is a complete fabrication?”
“That’s a lie.”
“These men are known to be smugglers. I suggest that you arrested them not on the shore but in their homes?”
“That’s another.”
“Don’t laugh at me, Mr. Hilliard. This is a serious matter for you. The jury have only your word and the word of your men against the word of these prisoners in the dock.”
“Counsel for the defence,” Sir Edward Parkin interrupted, “cannot address the jury. Confine yourself to cross-examining the witness, Mr. Braddock.”
“Can I say something, my lord?” Mr. Hilliard asked. “It’s not only our word. There’s the body.”
“I shall come to the body in good time,” Mr. Braddock said. “In the last three years, Mr. Hilliard, are these the first successful arrests you have made?”
“Yes.”
“I suggest to you that it is curious that after three years of apathy you are able suddenly to hit on the exact portion of shore where these men landed?”
“I acted on information.”
“Information is a vague word. Do you mean your imagination?” Mr. Braddock grinned fiercely at the jury and they tittered nervously back.
“No, I received an anonymous letter.”
“Have you made any attempt to trace the writer?”
“No.”
“Is that letter going to be produced in court?”
“Are you asking for it to be read, Mr. Braddock?” the judge asked.
“No, my lord.”
“Well, then, you know as well as I do that it cannot be produced. It’s not evidence.”
“Your source of information then was an anonymous letter?”
“Yes.”
Mr. Braddock laughed. The sound was like the clang of iron gates. “An anonymous letter!” With a rough sweep of his hand he seemed to brush away incredulously the whole story. “I have no more to ask this witness, my lord,” he said, and sat down.
“Do you wish to reexamine, Sir Henry?”
Sir Henry Merriman with a faint smile shook his head. Mr. Braddock was behaving exactly as he had foreseen.
The next witness was the elderly gauger with whom Andrews had had his encounter. He repeated the same story as his chief. Mr. Braddock rose to cross-examine. He adopted a friendly, insinuating manner which sat on him less naturally than his previous bullying ways.
“Have you been at all afraid of dismissal during the last year?”
“We been all afraid of that.”
“Thank you. Did you know the dead man, Rexall, well?”
“Middlin’.”
“Are you aware of any quarrel he has had during the last year?”
“Lots.”
Laughter broke out in the gallery and the usher had to call for silence several times. Mr. Farne spoke rapidly in Sir Henry Merriman’s ear.
“He was of a quarrelsome disposition?”
“Middlin’.”
“Did you know personally any of the men in the dock?”
“All of ’em.”
“Did Rexall?”
“Aye.”
“Thank you. That is all.”
Sir Henry gave a nod to Mr. Farne and Mr. Farne rose.
“Are you aware of any quarrel which Rexall may have had with any of the prisoners in the dock?”
“No. We got on middlin’ well wi’ ’em all.”
Mr. Farne sat down.
One after the other the gaugers were called to testify to the truth of Mr. Hilliard’s story. Mr. Braddock let them troop in and out of the box without stay, until the last had given his evidence. Then he rose again. He smiled triumphantly at Sir Henry Merriman, and Sir Henry returned the smile, for he had kept back a trump card, of which Mr. Braddock was unaware.
“Do you know,” Mr. Braddock asked, “of any quarrel which Rexall had with one of the prisoners?”
“Aye, it was that scared-looking one in the front row,” and the witness, a wizened ratlike man, raised a finger and pointed at the boy Tims.
“Can you tell us about it?”
“Why, ’e met the boy in the street and ’e started a teasing of ’im. An’ the boy up an’ slapped ’is face.”
“And what did Rexall do?”
“Nought. That’s only a mad boy.”
“Thank you.”
Mr. Braddock sat down. Sir Henry turned to Mr. Farne and spoke under his breath. “The swine. They are going to throw suspicion on that half-wit. Shall we reexamine?”
“No need,” said Mr. Farne. “Our next witness smashes their whole tale.”
“Andrews.” The name, his own name, overwhelmed him where he stood by the window. He turned and faced the officer who called him as he would face an enemy, with clenched fists. “Get on, you sneak.” A voice came to him from the benches. He wanted to stay and explain, to tell them that he was about to stand in greater danger than did the prisoners in the dock—“betraying them thus openly I stand above them.” But bowing his head so that he should not see their contemptuous faces he passed from the room, passed down the long corridor into the Court. As he went he fingered his cheek, which smarted where it had been struck.
He allowed himself to be pushed forward into the witness box, murmured without noting them the familiar words “the whole truth … nothing but the truth,” but still did not raise his eyes. He was afraid of the anger and astonishment on the faces of the prisoners. He knew too well how each would look, how Druce would finger his lower lip, how Hake would pull at a particular portion of his beard. He knew, as though he heard them, the words they would whisper to each other. Haven’t I lived with them, eaten with them, slept with them, for three years, he thought. He was afraid to look at the gallery. There would be young, desirable women there who would watch him with contempt—“The informer, traitor, Judas.” Not even honour among thieves. And he was afraid, too, damnably afraid. Suppose that he should raise his eyes and see Carlyon there, the apelike face he had seen transfigured with an ideal, the face which, during three years of misery, he had come near to worshipping, now filled with loathing. It was not incredible. It was just the kind of quixotic, romantic, foolish thing that Carlyon loved—to venture his neck voluntarily into the noose for the sake of his companions.
“Are you Francis Andrews?” It was Sir Henry Merriman who spoke, but the question struck the witness like an accusation, like another blow on the cheek. His blood quickened to meet it. Elizabeth had said to him, “Go to Lewes, go to the Assizes, bear your witness and you will have shown yourself to have more courage than they.” You are here for lust of your body, the inner critic murmured, but with a gesture of the hands visible to those in Court, he renounced that motive and that reward. “No,” he whispered, his lips moving, “for Elizabeth.” The sound of her name gave him courage. It was like a trumpet blown a long way off by a pale courageous spirit. He raised his eyes.
“I am,” he answered.
Imagination had steeled him to meet the expected gestures. They did not affect him. For the unexpected he was not ready. Tims leant forward with a smile of recognition and of relief. His smile said as clearly as though he had spoken: “We are all right now. Here’s a friend.”
Andrews turned his eyes hastily away and watched the gallery.
“Where were you on the night of February 10?”
“On board the Good Chance.”
“What were you doing there?”
Thank God! Carlyon was not there. “I was engaged in smuggling. We were to run a cargo that night.”
Mr. Farne smiled triumphantly along the table at Mr. Braddock and Mr. Braddock scowled back. His purple face turned an unpleasant shade of blue. He rose and began to speak hurriedly to one of the men in the dock.
“How long had you been engaged in this—profession?”
“Three years.”
“Do you see any of your companions in the Court?”
Still watching the gallery in fear of seeing a familiar face Andrews nodded. “Yes.”
“Will you point them out to the jury?”
Out of the vague turmoil of unfamiliar faces, faces old and young, fat and lean, fresh and faded, swam towards him a man’s face, thin, livid, cunning, with receding chin and squinting eyes. The eyes avoided his, but presently returned with a kind of terrified fascination.
“Will you point them out to the jury?” Sir Henry Merriman repeated with impatience. The face knew that it was seen and recognised. A tongue appeared and moistened the lips. The eyes no longer avoided Andrews’s, but clung to them in apprehensive appeal. Andrews knew that he had only to raise his finger, point to the gallery, “there,” and another of his enemies would be rendered powerless. Only Carlyon and that blundering giant Joe would remain. The face knew it also. Andrews began to raise his hand. It was the safest course. If he let Cockney Harry go free, Carlyon would know for certain who their betrayer was.
“There,” he said and pointed to the dock. You fool, you fool, you sentimental fool, he taunted silently in his heart, and his heart marvellously, miraculously, did not care. It was light and drunken with its triumph over his cowardly body and carried with pride like a banner the name of a girl. This will cost you your life, he told himself, but that distant trumpet and that close banner at his heart gave him courage. I will win through, he answered, and she will praise me. This is the first foolish thoughtless thing which I have ever done.
Because he looked no longer at the gallery, Andrews did not see a stout old woman, with flippant streaks of yellow hair struggling towards the door, and when two minutes later Mr. Braddock, a scrap of white paper in his hand, left the Court, he was answering a question from Sir Henry Merriman. “And what did you do there?”
“I helped load the boat with the casks of brandy. Then I got in with them and rowed to the shore. They began to unload the cargo, and while they were doing it I slipped away. There was no moon. It was very dark and they did not see me go. I got away among the dunes and hid.”
“Why did you slip away?”
“I didn’t want to be there when the gaugers appeared.”
“How did you know that the gaugers were there?”
“Two days before I had sent an anonymous letter to the officer in command at Shoreham stating the time when we intended to run the cargo and the exact place where it was to be run.”
“You went and hid among the dunes. What happened then?”
“There was suddenly a lot of shouting and the sound of men running. Then there were shots. I waited till all the noise was over and then I crept away.”
“Now, be careful in answering. Can you tell the jury who were with you when you landed?”
“Yes.” He named without hesitation the men in the dock.
“Were there any others?”
“Yes. Carlyon, the leader, a man we called Cockney Harry and Joe Collier.”
“Do you know where these men are now?”
Again his eyes met the eyes in the gallery. Again his enemy’s were full of terrified appeal. Andrews smiled. He was sure of himself now. “No,” he said.
“While you were hiding how many shots did you hear fired?”
“I don’t know. They were all together and confused.”
“More than one man was firing in fact?”
“Yes. Several.”
“It has been suggested that one of your companions had a personal quarrel with the man Rexall. Do you know anything about that?”
“No.”
“Thank you. That will do.”
As Sir Henry Merriman sat down, Mr. Braddock reentered the Court.
He smiled a little maliciously at Sir Henry and began his cross-examination.
“How long have you been associated with the crew of the Good Chance?”
“For three years.”
“Have your relations with them been friendly?”
“In a way.”
“What do you mean by ‘in a way’?”
Andrews narrowed his eyes and answered not to counsel but to the men in the dock. “I was on sufferance,” he said, “treated with contempt. My opinion was never consulted.”
“Why didn’t you leave them?”
“Mr. Braddock, is this relevant?” Sir Edward Parkin asked, with a note of petulance.
“My lord, in my submission, highly. If your Lordship will have patience—”
“Very well then, go on.”
“Why didn’t you leave them?” Mr. Braddock repeated fiercely. Andrews turned his eyes away from the familiar faces in the dock and gazed at the red choleric face of counsel. It amused him to think that a man with a face like that should question him on such shadowy things as motives. Facts, hard and firm as chips of wood, were the only things that he would appreciate.
“I had nowhere to go,” he said, “and no money.”
“Did it ever occur to you to work honestly for your living?”
“No.”
“Did you have any other motive in remaining with the Good Chance for three years?”
“Yes, friendship for Carlyon.”
“Why did you first join?”
“Friendship for Carlyon.”
“The man whom you have betrayed?”
Andrews reddened and felt his cheek with the tips of his fingers. “Yes.”
“What were your motives for laying information with the Revenue?”
“Do you really want to know that?” Andrews asked. “Isn’t it wasting your time and the time of the Court?”
“Don’t make speeches,” Sir Edward Parkin snapped in his high, supercilious voice. “Answer the questions put to you.”
“It was because I had a father whom I hated and he was always being put before me as a model. It made me mad. And I’m a coward. You all know that.” Andrews gripped the edge of the box and leant forward, his voice angry, his face red and ashamed. “I was afraid of being hurt and I hated the sea and the noise and the danger. And unless I did something it would have gone on for always and always. And I wanted to show those men that I was someone to be considered, that I had the power to smash all their plans.”
“And to hang them?”
“I never thought of that. I swear it. How could I tell they’d fight?”
“And your friend, the man Carlyon? Did you do nothing to warn him?”
“It was a case of him or me.”
A bearded man called Hake in the second row of the prisoners sprang to his feet and shook his fist at Andrews. “It’s him or you still,” he cried. “He’ll get you for this.” A warder pulled him down.
The Court was growing unbearably stuffy. The judge and the ladies in the gallery were fluttering scented handkerchiefs. Andrews’s forehead was hot and sticky with sweat. He wiped it with the palm of his hand. He felt as though he had been standing for hours exposed to the gaze of the Court. His lips were dry and he longed for water. Give me strength to go through with this, he implored silently—not of God but of the image which he carried in his heart and behind which he tried to hide the faces that watched him.
“Where is your father?” Mr. Braddock asked.
“In hell I hope,” Andrews answered, and a burst of laughter from the gallery came like a breath of cool spring wind to a tropic night. No relief of cool winds was allowed in a court of justice. Laughter was suppressed by the usher’s cries.
“Do you mean that he is dead?”
“Yes.”
“And it was jealousy of a dead man which impelled you to betray comrades of three years’ standing?”
“Yes.”
“Do you expect the jury to understand that?”
“No.” Andrews’s voice drooped wearily. He felt a sudden longing to explain to this red-faced counsel who plagued him so with questions that he had not slept all night. “I don’t expect anyone to understand,” he said. In his heart he added—save Elizabeth—and Carlyon.
“Do you expect the jury to believe it?”
“It is true.”
The red face came at him again with the persistence of an insect.
“I suggest to you that your whole story is untrue?”
Andrews shook his head, but he could not shake off that voice which came at him again and again and again.
“That you never laid any information?”
“I did.”
“That you are telling this story to save yourself from the dock?”
“No.”
“That you never landed with a cargo on the night of February 10?”
“I did, I tell you.”
“That you were with a woman, a notorious woman?”
“No. It’s untrue.”
Andrews’s weariness grew on him. He held the sides of the witness box as a support. I could sleep now, he said to himself.
“Will you stand there on your oath and tell the jury that you have not been keeping company with a loose woman?”
“No, I refused,” he said wearily. He could not understand how this red bladder with the bullying voice was so well aware of his movements.
“What do you mean you refused?”
“I was in the Sussex Pad at Shoreham when the girl came up to me. But I wouldn’t have her. Carlyon came in to drink and I was afraid that he’d see me. So I said ‘No.’ I said ‘No. I won’t sleep with you. Not tonight.’ And I slipped out. And I don’t know whether Carlyon saw me or not. I was afraid and I ran for miles, for miles up over the downs.”
“That is no doubt another woman. There’s no need to tell the jury of all the women with whom you have consorted.” Mr. Braddock sniggered and the jury tittered. Sir Edward Parkin allowed himself a faint smile as he watched the young women in the public gallery.
The faces in front of Andrews, the solicitors at the table, the usher, the now soundly sleeping Clerk of Arraigns, the bearded prisoners in the dock, the spectators in the gallery, the twelve hostile cow-like jurymen, were becoming rapidly an indistinct blur, one large composite face of many eyes and mouths. Only Mr. Braddock’s face, red and angry, protruded very distinctly out of this mass, as he leant forward to shoot out his questions, which seemed to Andrews absurd and meaningless.
“Do you still persist in saying that you landed with the prisoners on the night of February 10?”
“But it’s true, I tell you.” Andrews clenched his fists and longed to beat back that red aggressive face into the grey mists which surrounded it. Then I could sleep, he thought, and his mind dwelt with longing on the cool white sheets and warm clean blankets which had been wasted on his restless mind and body the night before.
“Carry your mind back two days. Were you not in the company of a notoriously loose woman?”
“No. I don’t understand. I haven’t been with a woman like that for weeks. Can’t you take my answer and have done.” Staring at the face of Mr. Braddock, as it darted back and forth, Andrews was surprised to see it apparently disintegrate under his eyes. It softened and collapsed and reformed itself into a kind of tigerish amiability.
“I don’t want to tire you. This must be a very trying experience for you.” Mr. Braddock paused, and even in his weariness Andrews smiled, remembering the weaver Bottom—“I can roar you as softly as any sucking dove.”
“I think we are talking at cross-purposes. I am sure that you don’t wish to hinder the course of justice. Only tell the jury where you were staying two nights ago.”
“At a cottage out Hassocks way.”
“Not all by yourself, surely?” The red face creased itself into a sneer, the coarse mouth with two great gravestone teeth sniggered out loud, seeming to give a lead and a cue to laughter from gallery and jury. The usher, grinning himself, called perfunctorily for silence.
“What do you mean?” The laughter confused Andrews. It was like a mist between himself and any clear thought.
“Answer the question,” Mr. Braddock snapped at him. “It was plain enough. Were you alone?”
“No. Why? I was with—”
“With whom?”
He hesitated. He did not know her name, he realised.
“A woman?”
The word woman seemed too general and too coarse a name to describe the banner under which he now fought. A woman? He had known many women, and Elizabeth was not like one of them. She was something more remote and infinitely more desirable.
“No,” he said, and then seeing Mr. Braddock’s great mouth open for another question, he grew dismayed—“at least …” he said and stood confused, hopelessly barren of words.
“Don’t jest with us. It must have been either a woman, a man or a child. Which was it?”
“A woman,” and before he could add some qualifying phrase he was struck by a wave of laughter from every corner of the Court. He came out of it, as though half drowned, red, gasping, blind to everything but the face of his questioner, which was already darting forward for another question.
“What is her name?”
“Elizabeth,” he murmured indistinctly, but loud enough for Mr. Braddock to hear. He gave it to the Court with the air of a jester. “Elizabeth. And what is the young woman’s surname?”
“I don’t know.”
“What was that the witness said?” Sir Edward Parkin tapped the sheet of paper in front of him with his pen.
“He doesn’t know her surname, my lord,” Mr. Braddock replied with a grin. Sir Edward Parkin smiled, and as though his smile gave an awaited sanction, laughter again swept the Court.
“My lord,” Mr. Braddock continued, when silence had been restored, “the witness’s ignorance is not as astounding as it may seem. Opinion on the point differs a great deal among her neighbours.”
Andrews leant forward and banged the edge of the box with his clenched fist. “What are you insinuating?” he said.
“Be quiet,” Sir Edward Parkin turned on him, fingers poised in the act of taking snuff. He turned and smiled ingratiatingly at Mr. Braddock. The case was proving more amusing than he had foreseen.
“Well, my lord, I shall bring a witness to show that the girl is the daughter, probably illegitimate, of a woman called Garnet. The woman is dead and no one knows whether she ever had a husband. They had a lodger staying with them and he took over the farm when the woman died. It is a common idea in the countryside that the girl was not only the daughter of this man, but also his mistress.”
“Where is the man?”
“He is dead, my lord.”
“Do you propose to call the girl as a witness?”
“No, my lord, the information has only this moment come into my hands, and in any case the girl would not be a witness in whom the jury could place any credence. The whole story is a very sordid one.”
“My God, do you know what’s beautiful?” Andrews cried.
“If you cannot keep silent,” Sir Edward Parkin said, “I shall commit you for contempt of court.”
“My lord,” Andrews appealed, and hesitated, trying to shake off the mist of weariness that clung round his brain and clogged his words.
“Is there something you want to say?”
Andrews lifted a hand to his forehead. He must find words in the mist which shrouded him, words to express the gold which suffused it from the light of candles lit in a far place behind the brain.
“Say what you want to say or be silent.”
“My lord, it’s not sordid,” he muttered very low. It seemed hopeless to find words until he had slept.
“Mr. Braddock, the witness says that it is not sordid.” The laughter beat upon Andrews’s head, till it felt physically bruised as though by hail.
Mr. Braddock felt himself riding to victory upon a gale of laughter.
“Take your mind back to two mornings ago. We will leave out the night,” he added with a snigger. “Do you remember a woman coming to the cottage?”
“Yes.”
“Is it true that your friend without a surname, Elizabeth, told the woman that you were her brother?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“I can’t remember.”
“Did she say that you’d been staying with her for a week?”
“I think so. I can’t remember anything. I’m tired.”
“That is all I want to ask you.”
Can I at last sit down and sleep? Andrews wondered incredulously. His doubt was justified. Sir Henry Merriman rose.
“Did you stay at the cottage for a week?”
“No. Two nights. That was all.”
“Think hard. Can’t you remember why she told those lies. They were to help you?”
“Of course. She’d never lie for herself. It was because I was afraid that the woman would talk in the town. I was afraid of Carlyon.”
“Why were you afraid?”
“He knew that I’d betrayed him. He was after me. He came to the cottage while I was there. But she hid me. She fooled him. She was brave like a saint. She drank out of my cup. How can he say there was anything sordid? It’s all lies they tell about her. If I wasn’t so tired I could tell you all.”
“Why did she do all this for you? Were you her lover?”
“No. It was just charity. I’ve never touched her, I swear it.”
“Thank you. That is all.” Andrews stood where he was, unbelieving that the end had at last come, that he had done what Elizabeth had urged him to do, that all was over now and he could sleep. He felt a hand pull at his sleeve. He stumbled down the steps to the floor of the court, still under the influence of the guiding hand, which now pulled him gently and insistently towards the door.
As he passed the dock a voice called to him, “Andrews.” He stopped and looked up. It took him a moment to focus his eyes. Then he saw that it was Tims. “Let me out, Andrews,” he implored.
There was a hostile murmur from the gallery and Andrews flushed. Anger, unreasoning and undirected, against himself, against his father, against this boy who held him for one moment from his sleep, tossed back an answer. “You fool, I’ve put you there.” Then he was outside the Court.
“I want to sleep,” he said. “Can I go?”
He found that he was speaking to an officer. “Not outside I shouldn’t,” the man said. “There’s a crowd there. You ain’t too popular. Better wait till the case is over. They’ll look after you then.”
“Anywhere—a chair.” He put his hand against the wall to support himself.
“There’s the witness’s room.”
“I can’t go back there. They won’t give me any peace. Isn’t there anywhere?”
The officer softened a little. “Here,” he said, “you’d better sit here.” He pointed at a bench against the wall. “It’s against orders,” he added grudgingly, but already Andrews had sank down on it and had let sleep come, instantaneous, dreamless sleep, that carried for one instant only a confusion of faces, bearded angry faces, sniggering red faces, one pale face, a gold mist and then nothing at all.
“That is the case for the Crown.” Sir Henry Merriman’s voice, filtering through the big double doors of the court, came too softly to disturb Andrews, where he slept. To him in a state of content, of unknowing, without dreams, weeks might have passed and not hours. The voice was a clear whisper. That was all. And he had not wakened, when, a long time previously, the Court had risen for luncheon. The whispers of the witnesses had then ceased to sound in the corridor. There had been silence, a shuffle of persons rising to their feet and then, as the doors of the Court swung open, loud voices and a roar of conversation which burst like a bomb. Andrews slept on, slept on through the heavy reluctant return of feet, weighed down by a good meal eaten, slept on as the doors closed and the whispers of the witnesses began again.
The officer in the corridor leant his ear against the door and listened, avid for any excitement to conquer boredom. He cast an eye towards Andrews in the hope of conversation, but Andrews slept. The prisoners inside were making their defence; so much the officer could gather from the broken sentences that reached him. Each man’s defence had been written out for him by his solicitor, and it was read in a toneless stumbling voice. Through the glass front of the door the officer could see the prisoners. The trial was reaching its final stages and so was the light. The Court was veiled depressingly in grey, not yet sufficiently dark to justify the lighting of the candles. The prisoners, in spite of their confidence in the jury, felt the gloom and were a little touched by fear. Each as he read from the sheet of paper in front of him felt the constraining presence of a dead man rise to refute his arguments. A man had been killed. A hundred alibis could not turn that fact into a falsehood. As though by mutual consent, bent on the sacrifice of an unwanted Jonah, they edged a little away from the half-witted youth, until he sat in a small cleared space, which in that crowded Court took on the dimensions of a desert.
Each man’s defence was a little subtly changed. This man at the supposed time of the affray had been drinking with a friend, this man had been in bed with his wife. All would bring witnesses to prove their stories and only the perorations were similar, “So help me God I am innocent.”
Four times the stumbling, mechanical stories were repeated to set the officer yawning, and then there was a change. It was the turn of Hake, the large black-bearded man who had threatened Andrews from the dock. When he rose the candles were being lighted in Court and his shadow swung across the ceiling in the manner of a gigantic bird. His voice boomed into the corridor like struck metal deeply toned.
“My lord, the gentlemen of the jury have a responsibility on them today the like of which will never come their way again. Whose word are they going to take? Those gaugers, afraid of losing their jobs the whole lot of them, ours—men they’ve drunk with—that sneak’s, that Andrews with his loose woman, or ours? If they hang us and the truth comes out who’ll speak for their souls in the day of Judgment? Who’ll defend their bodies here?”
“Prisoner,” a high petulant voice, “are you threatening the jury? The jury have nothing to do with the punishment. They have only to decide whether you are innocent or guilty.”
“I only warn them …”
“The jury will be protected in the performance of their duty. Threats do not strengthen your case.”
“Are you going to hang us?”
“I am anxious to be fair, but unless you proceed with your defence, you must sit down.”
“My defence is the same as these others. I wasn’t there. I’ll prove it with witnesses as these will. But a man’s been killed, you’ll say, you can’t get over that. Well, I’ll tell you who killed him. He did,” and his finger pierced across and emphasised the desert which surrounded Tims. Tims leapt to his feet. “You don’t mean it,” he said, “you are lying. Tell them you are lying.” He sank down again on his chair and covering his face with his hands began to cry with a peculiar moaning sound like a sick animal’s. Mingled with the booming voice it made a peculiar orchestral effect in the corridor.
“I’ve heard him, I tell you, talking about it. He’s a half-witted loon, you can see that for yourself, more fit for the asylum than for the gallows. He used to tell me many a time what he intended to do to Rexall. Rexall used to tease him in the street. You’ve heard a gauger say so himself, but there’s more evidence than that to it. I wouldn’t expect you to take a gauger’s word. But listen here—you are honest men and will bring us in innocent.”
“You are not addressing the jury, you are addressing the Court.”
“I’m sorry, my lord, what I mean to say,” he leant forward over the edge of the dock towards the jury, “the jury will want to know what’s to happen to that Judas and his woman. Let them leave it to us, I say, let them leave it to us.”
Before Sir Edward Parkin could speak he sat down. The officer stole a glance at Andrews. He slept on.
The Court seemed peculiarly silent when that booming voice was still. They were waiting for the last prisoner to make his defence, but he remained seated, his face covered by his hands which shook spasmodically in time with his moans.
“Richard Tims, this is the time that it becomes your duty to make your defence.”
He made no reply, no sign even that he had heard the judge’s voice.
“Mr. Braddock, you represent the prisoner, do you not?”
“I, my lord?” Mr. Braddock rose, sweeping his gown round him, as though to escape pollution. “This prisoner? No, my lord. I represent the other prisoners.”
“No one ever seems capable of making out the lists correctly. You are put down for all the prisoners, Mr. Braddock.”
“I was never so instructed, my lord.”
“Which of you represents this prisoner?”
There was no reply.
“Has this prisoner had no legal advice?” Sir Edward Parkin protested with a faint note of annoyance.
“If he had wished, my lord, he could have had counsel.”
“This is very trying. The case has gone on long enough as it is. I don’t want any delay. The Assizes is a very full one.”
“My lord,” an elderly little man with blinking eyes rose to his feet, “I will represent the prisoner if you so wish it.”
“Thank you, Mr. Petty. Will you explain to the prisoner that he must make his defence?”
Mr. Petty stepped delicately to the edge of the Court and holding a handkerchief to his nose spoke to the boy.
“It’s no use, my lord, the prisoner is not in a fit state to make his defence.”
“The jury will take it that he merely asserts his innocence. Mr. Braddock will you call your witnesses?” Sir Edward Parkin leant back and dabbed his fingers furiously in his snuffbox. He was annoyed. The case had been held up for at least two minutes. His breakfast had been a bad one, his luncheon worse, and he was hungry. The trial showed no sign of reaching an end, but his hunger, far from leading to an adjournment, only confirmed his obstinacy. He would sit till midnight if necessary, but he would finish the trial.
One after another men, women and children filed into the witness box and committed mechanical perjury. This woman was in bed with that man at the time of the murder, this man was toasting another in whisky, a child had heard its father undressing upstairs. Sir Henry Merriman shrugged his shoulders at Mr. Farne. “They have us,” he seemed to say. “That man Andrews,” Mr. Farne whispered, “was worse than useless.” Only occasionally did they trouble to cross-examine. The witnesses had been too well primed in their stories. Mr. Petty, having magnanimously undertaken the task of representing the half-wit, closed his eyes and went to sleep.
Mrs. Butler scrambled up the steps of the witness box and allowed her ample breasts to flow over the edge. Yes, she had seen Andrews at a certain woman’s cottage two days previously. Yes, there had been every indication that he had slept in the place. The woman had told her that Andrews had been there for a week. Yes, the woman was a notoriously loose liver. All the neighbourhood knew it.
“What the neighbourhood says is not evidence.”
“No, my lord, but what my eyes have seen is evidence.”
Sir Henry Merriman’s voice stabbed itself into the corridor, sharp and clear as an icicle. “Did you hear this woman call the man Andrews her brother?”
“Yes.”
“Was that true?”
“No, of course it weren’t true. They didn’t take me in, I can tell you.” Her hand unerringly sought the thin strands of gold in her hair and she stroked them lovingly. “I know what it is to love,” she said in her sweet, damp voice. “I could tell the love light in ’is eyes.”
“What does the woman mean?”
“She means, my lord,” Mr. Braddock explained with unction, “that the man Andrews appeared to be in love with the woman.”
“How on earth could she tell that?”
“A woman’s intuition, m’ lord.” Mrs. Butler’s hand stroked one capacious breast. “And I can tell you something else, m’ lord. Only one bed had been slept in.”
“If the woman lied with regard to her relationship with Andrews, have you any reason for believing her other statement that he had been with her for a week? I suggest that he had arrived only the night before.”
“Well, I don’t know anything, sir. But ’e must ’ave made quick time with ’er, mustn’t ’e?” Mrs. Butler leered ingratiatingly at Sir Edward Parkin. “Men are very shy, my lord. I’ve known many in my time, my lord, and I speak with conviction.”
Sir Edward Parkin turned away his face, screwed up a little as though he suffered from nausea. “Have you finished with this good woman, Sir Henry?”
“Yes, my lord.”
Mr. Braddock rose. “That, my lord, is the case for the defence.”
“Have you any witnesses to call, Mr. Petty?”
“No, my lord.”
“Gentlemen of the jury, it is growing late, but by the law of England I am not allowed to discharge you until the case is finished. I am obliged to keep you together, though, no doubt, proper accommodation will be afforded you. But I am for myself perfectly willing to go on to finish the case before we separate. I have been accustomed to bear fatigue of this kind and am willing to bear it. The foreman will consult with his brethren and collect their wishes.”
There was a brief nodding of heads and the foreman intimated that they wished to finish the case. Sir Edward Parkin leant back in his seat, took a liberal helping of snuff, smoothed his white hands with some complacency and began his summing up. The officer with an impatient sigh removed his ear from the door. He had in past assizes experienced the bitter boredom of Mr. Justice Parkin’s meticulous care and accuracy. Only occasionally did he put his ear to the door to gain some indication of the progress of the judge’s charge.
“If you accept the evidence of the revenue officers that these men landed with a cargo on the night of February 10, and that in a fight which ensued Rexall was killed, it is unnecessary to fix the guilt of firing the shot on any one man. By the law of England they are all equally guilty of murder. The prisoners, in answer to the charge, have returned a complete denial and five of the prisoners have brought evidence to show that they were in a different place when the fight, described by the officers of the Crown, took place. Gentlemen, with regard to the credibility of the prisoners’ witnesses I would have you bear in mind …
“The evidence for the prosecution rests not on the bare word of the officers alone. One of the prisoners’ companions, on whose information the officers are said to have acted, appeared in the witness box. You must decide for yourselves upon his credibility, but I would point out that his story is similar in every point to that given by the officers …
“There remains, gentlemen, the body, and here an unexpected line has been taken by five of the prisoners. They have accused one of their number of having committed the murder as a climax to a series of quarrels with the officer Rexall. They have adopted part of the evidence of the prosecution in their own defence. Medical evidence leaves no doubt of the cause of Rexall’s death, and the bullet found in his body is similar to those in the possession of these men. No evidence has been brought by this prisoner in his defence, but until a late stage of the trial he was unrepresented by counsel, and you can judge for yourself of his mental state. I would point out to you that it is for the prosecution to prove a case of guilt. The prisoners’ statements are not evidence, and the prosecution have not attempted to prove the man Tims guilty alone. He and his companions in this respect must be judged together …
“You are not concerned with the past, and the evidence of the witness Andrews dealing with the life of crime lived on the ship Good Chance must not be taken into consideration. You are not to try the prisoners on their bad characters, nor are you to try them on the good characters which have been given to them by certain witnesses for the defence—you are to try whether they be guilty of the crime with which they are charged. It has been stated that they are good fathers, good husbands, good sons, but if they were angels and if the evidence as to the crime were clear and satisfactory, it would be your duty to return a verdict accordingly …
“An ill-advised attempt has been made by one of the prisoners to influence your verdict by threats. I can promise you, gentlemen, that whatever your verdict you will have the full protection of the law …”
The officer drooped like an undignified and top heavy flower. The candles in the Court were burning low in their sockets, but Mr. Justice Parkin, with the stage all his own, talked on …
Through Andrews’s sleep came first a hum of talk, then a distant burst of cheering. He opened his eyes. Through a window he could see that it was dark. Groups of talking people passed him and paid him no attention. The door of the Court stood open. He sat up and cleared sleep from his eyes with the back of a hand. Sir Henry Merriman and Mr. Farne came from the Court. Mr. Farne was talking with gentle insistence, his hand on the older man’s arm. “We shall never put down smuggling in the Courts,” Mr. Farne said. “There is only one way—to remove the duty from spirits.”
Sir Henry Merriman stared at the ground. “No,” he said, “I am growing old. I must retire and give room for younger men. You, Farne.”
“That is nonsense,” Mr. Farne said. “No man could have made that jury convict.”
Andrews slowly rose to his feet. “Do you mean to say,” he said, “that those men are acquitted?”
Mr. Farne turned. “Yes,” he said shortly. “Listen. The whole town’s cheering them.”
“Don’t go,” Andrews implored. “Tell me what am I to do. Have they been released?” Mr. Farne nodded.
“You’ve cheated me,” Andrews cried. “You got me to give evidence and now—don’t you understand that you’ve let them loose on me?”
Sir Henry raised eyes that seemed blurred with weariness. “I have already promised you,” he said, “that you shall be protected as long as you stay in this town. I should advise you to leave for London, however, as soon as you can. I admit that certain threats were made against you. Give Sussex a wide berth and you will be safe.”
“How can I get to London? I have no money.”
“Come to me tomorrow,” Sir Henry said. “You shall be given money.” He turned his back on Andrews. “Farne,” he said, “I am tired. I shall go to bed now. Listen. Isn’t it rather bitter, that cheering? If we had won there would have been less enthusiasm. You remember the Duke of Northumberland, who declared for Jane Grey—‘the people press to see us, but not one saith God speed’?”
“I won’t let you go like this,” Andrews cried. “That cheering only means defeat to you. It will be death to me if I’m seen. How can I get away from here?”
“I have given orders to the runners,” Sir Henry said. “They will see you back to the hotel. Two men will be stationed there to accompany you at any time through the town. If I were you I should catch the first coach to London in the morning.” Mr. Farne pushed Andrews on one side and the two men moved away.
Andrews turned to the officer. “You see,” he said, “that’s their gratitude. I did my best for them, didn’t I, and I’ve risked my life, but what do they care?”
“And why should they care for an informer like you? I’m sure I don’t,” he beamed at Andrews genially. “I’d let your friends get you, but orders is orders. Come this way.”
Escorted by way of a back door and a succession of dirty lanes Andrews reached the White Hart through the stables.