Rumpole and the Penge Bungalow Murders (20 page)

But my pleasure in the result so far was not shared by His Lordship, who was looking meaningfully at the clock on the wall of the court. ‘Mr Rumpole,' he said, ‘need we waste time on events which occurred years before the night these crimes took place? As the witness has said so rightly, it was all a long time ago.'

‘My Lord, Mr Winterbourne in opening his case told the jury that Jerry Jerold was a war hero. I'm entitled to put it to the witness that he was perhaps not as heroic as all that.'

‘Whatever degree of heroism he attained, Mr Rumpole, he didn't deserve to be shot.'

I don't quite know what degree of heroism I had reached as a white wig, but I was astonished at my new-found courage when I heard myself say, ‘That's a question I intend to discuss with the witness in due course. May I also remind Your Lordship that, in view of the fact that this crime arose from a discussion about the war, you ruled I could ask questions about earlier talk on the same subject.'

‘I'm beginning to regret I did that.' The judge was looking at the clock again.

‘That was Your Lordship's ruling.'

‘Oh, very well, Mr Rumpole. You may learn in the fullness of time that the most effective cross-examinations are those that are kept brief.'

‘We'd finish more quickly if you took another snort of snuff and let me get on with it.' I didn't of course say that, my heroism hadn't reached such a point of daring, and perhaps never would. I turned to another subject. ‘You knew David Galloway, the navigator?'

‘Very well indeed.'

‘Was he a particular friend of yours?'

‘Perhaps my closest friend.'

‘Until he died in the burning plane?'

‘Until he was killed, yes.'

I repeated his answer. ‘Until he was killed. But to keep his memory alive, you proposed a toast in the bar of the Cafe Royal.'

‘I did that, yes.'

‘May I remind you of the words you used on that occasion. They are in Martyn Dempsy's evidence, My Lord.'

The judge, who had been flipping back his notebook pages at high speed, said, ‘Yes, I've got it, Mr Rumpole,' in a voice which meant, ‘For God's sake, speed it up.'

‘Did you congratulate Jerry Jerold and Charles Weston on their extraordinary good luck in escaping from a burning aeroplane without getting burned?'

‘I may have said something like that.'

‘Martyn Dempsy swore that you said exactly that.'

‘Perhaps I didn't mean it entirely seriously.'

‘It was a strange subject to joke about, wasn't it?' I waited for an answer and didn't get one, so I took an enormous and necessary risk. ‘You never took the whole story of their plane crash entirely seriously, did you?'

‘I don't know what you mean.' The witness tried a shake of the head and a tolerant smile.

The judge did his best to help by saying, ‘I too would welcome it if Mr Rumpole clarified the question.'

‘Certainly, My Lord. This was the situation. Both Jerry Jerold and Charles Weston had become increasingly terrified of flying on their bombing raids, hadn't they?'

‘Of course. We were all terrified from time to time. We weren't all on the ground staff like you, Mr Rumpole.' Benson got a small laugh for this and a warning from the judge that the witness was there to answer questions and not to discuss Mr Rumpole's war record, however humble it might have been. And I was left with the certainty that Benson had found out more about me than a witness needs to know.

‘I can quite understand a bomber pilot's terror,' I assured him, ‘and it must have reached a high level with those two pilots. But we have to add the fact that Jerry Jerold thought we would lose the war and no doubt persuaded “Tail-End” Charles to share his opinions.' It was then that the memory of Uncle Cyril Timson came into use. ‘So they decided that prison was the only safe place for them. Is that what you suspected?'

‘Do you mean an English prison, Mr Rumpole?' In the silence that followed my question the judge asked for further particulars.

‘No, My Lord, a German prison.' And then I turned to the witness. ‘Or perhaps something better than that, if they brought down the plane and handed it over to the enemy? Did you know that was their plan?'

There was another long silence, in which the jury were suddenly still and all staring at Peter Benson with increased interest. It took him a long time to answer, and when he did so it was hardly a denial. ‘How was I to know what they planned? All we heard was that the plane was lost and they were, all three of them, missing. That was all we heard.'

‘Until after the war?'

‘Until Jerry came back to England, yes.'

‘And did he tell you that David the navigator was caught in a burning plane?'

‘He told us all that.'

‘Did you believe him?'

‘That was what he told us.'

‘And were you deeply suspicious of the whole story?'

‘Why would I be suspicious?'

‘Because Galloway's family had heard something about an officer found shot near an abandoned plane. Did you tell Jerry Jerold that?'

‘I may have done.'

‘Did you?'

‘Yes,' Peter Benson, who had no idea what evidence I was about to call, thought it best to admit it.

‘So you started to check up on the whole story, didn't you? You wanted Jerry Jerold to agree to you getting confirmation that he'd been a prisoner of war.'

‘He didn't want me to do it.'

‘I know he didn't. So there was a quarrel?'

‘A bit of an argument. Yes.'

‘An argument because by then you couldn't believe Jerold's story?'

‘There were things about it that puzzled me perhaps, yes.'

My foot had got further into the door, so I pushed it and dared to ask, ‘Did it occur to you that David Galloway might have been killed because he wouldn't agree to the surrender?'

‘Which surrender are you talking about?' I got a dusty answer.

‘The surrender of Jerold and Weston, those two officers. '

‘How would I get an idea like that?' Peter Benson smiled.

‘Over the years perhaps. When you had your suspicions and kept close to Jerry Jerold because you wanted to find out the truth.'

‘And how do you think I'd do that?' Benson was cross-examining me.

‘I'm not sure,' I had to confess. ‘Perhaps from things Jerry said when you were out drinking together. Perhaps from your researches, when you couldn't find any evidence of his being an official prisoner of war. Did you imagine they might have got a warmer welcome from the enemy?'

‘What the witness imagined,' the judge told me, ‘is scarcely evidence. You can only ask him what he knew.'

‘Very well, My Lord. Mr Benson, you knew a great deal and suspected more, didn't you, when you went on that night out at the London Palladium?'

Peter Benson's bright eyes flickered as he took in the whole court, again with the exception of the dock. Finally he was looking at counsel for the prosecution as though for help, but the growling Winterbourne had his head down, close to his notebook, and even Reggie Proudfoot failed to return his gaze, so no help was forthcoming from either of them. Again, he thought perhaps that a complete denial might be dangerous in the light of unknown evidence to come. He decided on a moderate concession.

‘I thought there were questions still to be answered, yes.'

‘Questions still to be answered.' I gave the jury a look to remember and said, ‘So now we have reached the events in Jerry Jerold's Penge bungalow after the theatre.'

‘I'm sure we're all extremely grateful for that, Mr Rumpole,' the Lord Chief Justice said with what I took to be a distinct note of irony and gave another look at the clock.

‘You kept your overcoat on?' I asked the witness.

‘I don't know what you mean.'

‘Your overcoat. You kept it on until you left, and you were the last to leave.'

‘I feel the cold. I haven't been well lately.' Again he looked round the court as though asking for sympathy. ‘Anyway I thought I wouldn't stay all that long.'

‘But things got dramatic and you did stay.'

‘Yes.'

‘What did you think of Jerold and some of the others baiting young Simon for not having taken part in a war?'

‘I . . . I didn't like it.'

‘Did you protest as Harry Daniels did and ask them to stop?'

‘No. But I didn't join in.'

‘Very brave of you! With your unanswered questions about Jerry Jerold's crashed plane and his admitted terror of bombing raids, didn't you think it was a bit rich that he attacked his son for not fighting in a war?'

‘I may have thought that.'

‘But you didn't say so.'

‘No.'

I looked at the jury. I could see in their faces that they no longer felt any affection for Mr Peter Benson.

‘We've heard that someone threatened to remove Simon's trousers and he picked up the Luger pistol.'

‘And threatened to kill his father with it,' Peter Benson was pleased to add.

‘And you were the one who got him to give up the gun.'

‘I was.'

‘No one else tried to do it?'

‘I suppose I was the quickest.'

‘Did he resist you? Did he try to keep hold of the gun?'

‘Not very effectively.'

‘The witnesses all say he let go of the gun without any resistance at all.'

‘Let's say I was stronger than him.'

‘And they all say they didn't see him put the magazine in. Did you see that?'

‘I can't remember him using the magazine.'

‘So we can agree that he may have been pointing an empty gun?'

‘Perhaps he was at that time. Things may have been different later.'

‘Oh, yes, they were. Entirely different.' I picked up a sheet of paper then, part of my brief, anything that would do to make the witness feel that I had more to back up my interpretation of the events of that night than an inspired guess and a curious faith in Simon's innocence. ‘Every witness called by the prosecution has said that they couldn't remember you putting the gun back on the mantelpiece after Simon had gone to his room.'

‘They may not have noticed.'

‘Or you may not have put it back?'

‘Of course I put it back.'

‘Nobody saw you do it, Mr Benson. And do you know why nobody saw you?'

‘I can't answer for them.'

‘Because it went straight into your overcoat pocket. Together with the magazine, which you collected when the drinks began to flow again and nobody was looking.'

‘That is entirely untrue!'

‘Entirely untrue,' the judge repeated as he made his note and underlined the words.

‘Why ever would I want to take the gun away with me?' The witness smiled at the jury, perhaps hoping to get them to join him in ridiculing the suggestion, but I felt I had at least held their attention.

‘Let me try to help you. Here were two officers you thought apparently surrendering their plane and themselves to the enemy. What would have been the penalty if that sort of conduct had been discovered during the war? The penalty for treason.'

‘I suppose . . . possibly death.'

‘“Execution” was the word Mr Dempsy heard you use. And you had another score to settle with those two men, because you were sure they'd killed your friend David Galloway.'

‘I told you, they said David died when the plane caught fire.'

‘Of course they did - and you didn't believe them. So you saw your perfect opportunity to do justice.'

‘I don't know what you mean.'

‘Let me help you again. Young Simon had threatened his father with a gun. In a shooting, of course he'd be the number-one suspect, and that's why he's sitting there in that dock, on trial for his life.' Here I pointed to Simon, but the witness wouldn't turn his face to look. ‘So you could return later, perhaps an hour later, and execute both of the officers.'

‘You mean murder.' The witness's quiet voice had sunk almost to a whisper.

‘Yes, Mr Benson. That's exactly what I mean. And when you'd done it, all you had left to do was to wipe the gun and the magazine free of fingerprints and leave them in the Jerolds' dustbin as further evidence against the young man who may have to pay with his life for the crimes you committed.'

‘That's not true! None of that's true.' His voice was almost dying when he gulped water and told the jury, ‘Lies! From start to finish. Stupid lies.'

By then I had sat down, my best cards played. I had nothing left in my hand but Simon's evidence, and my final speech. I looked at the jury and managed to find, I told myself, the beginnings of doubt on some of their faces.

Meanwhile, the judge, whose interest in the time was still obvious, said, ‘I have been looking at the clock. I expect you may have a number of questions to ask in re-examination, Mr Winterbourne?'

‘Oh, I have, My Lord.' The prosecutor rumbled to his feet to help the judge's release.

‘Then I suggest we adjourn now as it's Friday. Would Mr Benson be available to deal with your questions on Monday morning?'

‘My Lord, indeed he would.'

‘He's not of course to discuss his evidence over the adjournment.'

‘My Lord, I'm sure he understands that.'

‘Mr Rumpole, in view of the serious charges you've made against this witness and the pressure put on him, do you agree to the course I have suggested?'