The Anti-Social Behaviour of Horace Rumpole (8 page)

‘Immigration!' The Minister for Constitutional Affairs almost spat out the word, as though it were some sort of incurable disease. ‘The curse of all governments.'

‘Is it as bad as that?'

‘Worse. They imagine we are letting in floods of foreigners who'll take away their jobs, their houses, certainly their wives, probably their children if they get half a chance. And when it comes to letting in Russian prostitutes… I can just imagine the headlines in the
Fortress
.' He had obviously been following my little Flyte Street murder case.

‘Someone decided to set the girl free to apply for permanent residence.'

‘We heard you'd been making inquiries.'

There was a pause then while the Minister for Constitutional Affairs sipped thoughtfully at his champagne, then he said, ‘Of course that was all
long before the murder. How or why she got into the country can't be any part of your defence.'

‘I'm not entirely sure of that.'

‘Well, it's obvious, isn't it?'

‘There's a lot in this case which isn't entirely obvious.'

At this the Minister drained his glass and gave me a smile which I felt unusually chilly. ‘I hope your application for silk goes well, Rumpole,' he said. ‘I can't be sure what view the committee'll take of you. They haven't had many barristers who've been given an ASBO by the members of their own chambers. We'll have to see how that works out.' He looked at his watch. ‘I've got to rush. Dinner at the Swedish Embassy. That'll hardly be a laugh a minute.'

Then he left me to think back on our conversation, which I hadn't found particularly amusing either.

Mr Horace Rumpole, famous for his defence tactics in some high-profile murder cases, is having to defend a new client in the magistrates' court today – himself!

The news was blasted to its readers by the
Daily Fortress
. And now I found myself what I had never thought to be, a defendant before a ‘district judge' (stipendiary magistrates we used to call them), rising
to make a final speech on behalf of that dangerous and determined criminal Horace Rumpole, BA (the letters added after a rather poor study of the law at Keble College).

Of course I had not taken the ASBO seriously. Who could have? I kept a bottle or two of Pommeroy's Very Ordinary in the filing cabinet and I lit up my small cigars without noticing any rise in the water level along the Thames Embankment.

I did notice an embarrassed silence when I entered the client's room. Mizz Liz Probert seemed too embarrassed to speak to me as I picked up some documents concerning my ASBO and filed them in the wastepaper basket, unread. But when I asked our clerk, Henry, if I was in court next week, he told me that I was, in order to attend my own trial.

The prosecution was undertaken by a certain Lesley Perkins, a lady counsel who had to be corrected by me several times during her opening address. I had not even been paid the compliment of a competent prosecutor. No one from my chambers had the time to turn up at the proceedings. The press benches, however, were full of excited scribblers eager to join in the persecution of the Lion of the Old Bailey.

What surprised me more was that Hilda had been particularly sympathetic as I left at breakfast time to face my final humiliation. She knew there were those in my chambers who were hellbent on destroying my reputation. ‘They won't win, Rumpole,' she said as we parted and after she had cooked me a couple of eggs on a fried slice to give me strength for the fight to come. ‘We'll get you out of this somehow,' she went on, in what I then thought was a vain promise, intended only to raise false hopes.

I had helpfully admitted the truth of all the complaints brought before the court. Now the district judge, a pale figure with a long, inquisitive nose who had clearly enjoyed my prosecution more than his normal trade of drink-driving and soliciting in the streets, said, ‘Well, Mr Rumpole, what have you got to say for yourself?'

‘I don't speak for myself, sir. I speak for all those unfortunate enough to be caught up in this new type of illegal procedure.'

‘Are you calling the ASBO rules “illegal”? You'd better go back to Parliament and tell them they made a mistake.'

This unhappy attempt at a joke by the judge was aimed at the journalists, who rewarded it with suppressed titters.

‘No need for that,' I told him. ‘But you must see the absurdity of this nonsensical and inept piece of legislation. What is my crime? I have looked through the statutes over and over again and nowhere do I find that eating at your desk is a criminal activity.

‘I keep a bottle or two of Pommeroy's Very Ordinary claret in my filing cabinet drawer. This is not Pichon-Longueville perhaps, but drinking it if you have the courage and the stamina is surely not a criminal offence.

‘We live in an unhappy period when the government wants to use its legislative powers to tell us how to lead our lives. It wants to tell us what to eat and drink, what to smoke and how we cross the road. Children are not allowed to grow fat and if they do they are snatched from their families and put into a home. If you smoke cigarettes, you won't be treated by the doctor.

‘There are plans afoot to turn us into a nation of vegans who drink carrot juice and go on hiking tours to the Lake District. This case is an object lesson in this form of tyranny. It's geared to send a man to prison for eating a slice of pie.

‘In the great days of our history, magistrates such as you, sir, stood up against a tyrannical king who
tried to enforce taxes not approved by Parliament.

‘Today you're being asked to enforce laws against activities which have never been made crimes by our Parliament.

‘You have your chance today, sir, to reject these illegal and inappropriate proceedings. You can stand up for justice. You have a chance today, sir, to become the Pym or Hampden of the City Magistrates' Court. You may be criticized by the thinking bureaucrats of Westminster, but you'll be acclaimed by all those who cherish our ancient freedoms, our constitution and the proper rule of law.'

I then sat down and saw the lonely figure on the bench look, I thought a little desperately, at the clock, from which he seemed to get some encouragement. ‘I'm looking at the time,' he told us unnecessarily. ‘I'll give my decision at two o'clock.'

‘It's not too bad,' I told Bonny Bernard, who had acted as my solicitor for the case. ‘I always wanted to know how it felt to appear in the dock, like my clients.'

‘We must keep hoping for the best,' Bonny Bernard said without any particular conviction. ‘We must always go on hoping.'

‘I don't think “Sir” wants to be a John Hampden of the City. When I go down I'll get plenty of time for reading. I could read Milton. I've never really got on with him. Not many jokes in
Paradise Lost
, are there? Not too many laughs. Anyway, it'll be interesting to find out what life's like for your clients after you've lost their cases.'

But when we were called back to court I wasn't to be given the great opportunity of laughing away with Milton. I saw that Soapy Sam Ballard was in court, sitting beside the lady prosecutor, and as soon as ‘Sir' was back in his seat she rose to say that my Head of Chambers, none other than the eminent Samuel Ballard, QC, had decided not to go on further with this case. He was anxious that any custodial sentence might prevent Mr Rumpole from practising, at least for a while, and he didn't think it was in the interests of his chambers, or the Bar in general, to proceed with a judgement against Rumpole.

Thus Rumpole was dismissed, with few words given.

What happened when we got back to court had been quite unexpected and so the shades of the prison-house vanished as ‘Sir' reluctantly agreed.

*

‘It must have been my final speech that did it,' I told Hilda when I got home that afternoon. ‘That must have made them come to their senses.'

‘It wasn't your final speech at all, Rumpole. It was all down to Leonard.'

‘Leonard Bullingham?'

‘Of course. He knows I want you to get your silk so I can pick up some of your future briefs. So he was going to ask your Head of Chambers not to go on with the case.'

‘Did he?'

‘He was away on circuit. I phoned to tell him that the case was on and he got hold of Sam Ballard in the lunchtime break. Apparently he told your Head of Chambers that he wouldn't be considered for a judgeship if he dragged his chambers' name through the courts.'

‘Soapy Sam Ballard's being considered for a judgeship?'

‘I told you that, Rumpole.'

‘And your friend Leonard decided to help
me
?'

‘He did it for
me
, Rumpole.'

‘I'm sure he did.'

So fortune brings its mysterious changes. I was entering my future years at the Bar by courtesy of the Mad Bull, to whom I must be particularly grateful.

 

‘You set me impossible tasks, Mr Rumpole.'

‘Never mind. The impossible ones are often the easiest. They bring out the best in you. What've you got to report?'

I was sharing a portion of Melton Mowbray pie at my desk with Fig Newton, the ingenious and reliable detective who seemed to suffer from a perpetual cold. Free from the ASBO, we ate lunch and drank Château Thames Embankment from tumblers at my desk.

‘It's taken me a time, Mr Rumpole. But I think I might be on to something.'

‘I'm sure you are.'

‘I had a drink in a number of bars and public houses round the Canary Wharf area.'

‘Hard work for you.'

‘It was a long time before I got a bit of news.'

‘What sort of news?'

‘Someone was talking about an empty bit of an office block in Tinkers Passage with a drive-in garage. Someone said they had heard the chattering of girls. Another said they had seen girls being driven away in a car. Foreign girls was what they reckoned.'

‘God bless you, Fig! You're a detective without equal. So did you carry on your observation in this Tinkers Passage?'

‘Several nights, but nothing happened.'

‘Keep an eye on it. Oh, and see if you can find out who owns the building. That would be extremely helpful.'

Not long after the detective had left me there was a sharp tap on the door and it opened to admit Soapy Sam Ballard, the man whose accusations had landed Rumpole particularly close to the cooker.

‘Well now, Rumpole.' Our Head of Chambers looked suitably embarrassed. ‘I see you're enjoying your lunch.'

‘No thanks to you, Ballard.' I didn't mince my words. ‘If you'd had your way I'd be enjoying it under lock and key.'

‘It wasn't my doing, Rumpole,' Soapy Sam protested. ‘It was just that everyone else in Chambers felt that I had to take some steps to see that the views of the majority were respected.'

‘The test of democracy is the tolerance shown by the majority to minority opinions. Didn't darling John Stuart Mill say something like that?'

‘Mill?' Ballard looked puzzled. I hoped he might ask me what chambers this person was in.

‘He thought you might be tolerant of people who fancy a slice of pie at their desk occasionally,' I said.

Ballard changed the subject. ‘Is Mr Justice Bullingham a good friend of yours?'

‘We are extremely close. He met my wife at her bridge club and now we are just one big happy family.'

‘I acted quickly when he asked us to drop the case against you.'

‘I noticed that.'

‘And Bullingham is one of the judges who has the ear of the Minister for Constitutional Affairs?'

‘Constantly. He has his ear night and day. Particularly when the time comes to appoint new judges.'

Soapy Sam's smile broadened. It became hopeful. ‘Well,' he said, ‘I'd best be getting along. A silk gown would suit you very well. Enjoy your lunch, Rumpole.'

The committee for the appointment of Queen's Counsel for England and Wales gathered itself together in a large room in the Outer Temple. Taking my place in front of this august assembly, I felt more nervous than I ever did before the most ferocious Old Bailey judge or even when I was the prisoner at the bar in the matter of the Rumpole ASBO. I was afraid of disappointing both Hilda and the accused murderer Graham Wetherby, and also of being robbed of a prize which I felt I so richly deserved.

The room, I thought as I took my seat, seemed to be full of people whom I had never seen in any court and who might not be able to tell a QC from a plastic surgeon. There was also a smattering of solicitors unknown to me and a few QCs who,
having acquired silk gowns, might enjoy the sight of an elderly junior trying hard to climb up beside them.

In the chair was Dame Mildred Wrightsworth, a judge from the Family Division who specialized in sensational divorce cases and disputes over the custody of children.

‘We've all seen your CV, Mr Rumpole.' The Dame spoke. ‘It seems your practice is entirely criminal.'

‘As I would wish it to be,' I told the meeting.

‘Why do you say that?' came from one of the unknown QCs.

‘Because if you go down to the Old Bailey you'll find that all life is there, the real world with all its sins, mistakes and occasional beauty and good behaviour. Go and watch the huge international companies suing each other in the Queen's Bench Division and you move into a world of fantasy and make-believe.'

‘We have learned,' said another of the seated QCs, looking at me with disapproval, ‘that you can be discourteous to judges.'

‘Only when they act as leading counsel for the prosecution. Only when they indulge in such tricks as responding to the defence evidence with a sigh
of disbelief. Only when they jump down from the bench and fight in the arena for a conviction. Then I feel they deserve a touch of discourtesy. Otherwise some of my very best friends are judges.'