BY the time that Abner and the doctor reached Mainstone, Bastard’s body
was growing cold, and the last hope that his unconsciousness was any less
than that of death had vanished. The Pound House was still full of those
who waited for the verdict, a silent, sober company. Mr Hind, who had
not seen the beginning of the struggle, tried vainly to find out what had
happened. All accounts of it were confused and contradictory, and in any
case it mattered little to the landlord, for he knew that his house was
already in the black books of the police, and felt sure that this
catastrophe would mean the loss of his licence. The doctor scarcely
needed to look at Bastard’s body.
‘Yes, fractured base,’ he said. ‘He must have died at once. An elderly
man with brittle bones. There’s nothing to be done, Hind. I’ll knock up
the sergeant when I get back to Lesswardine and telephone the coroner.’
‘I wouldn’t have had this happen for nothing, doctor!’ moaned Mr Hind.
‘Of course you wouldn’t. It’s not your fault.’
‘He must have tripped over that chair.’ And everybody, including the
doctor, stared at the offending piece of furniture with interest.
‘Come on, Abner,’ said George Malpas. ‘Good-night, Mr Hind.’
Mr Hind did not reply.
All through that night the snow fell slowly, incessantly. The soft,
frozen sky drifted downward idly on the land, and George and Abner had to
pick their way back to Wolfpits blindly in the small hours, guided
through the plain by the presence of ghostly trees and in the Wolfpits
valley by the snow-muffled tumult of the Folly Brook. The hills were
desolate and savage. They lay dead, and the sky covered them. Wolfpits
itself rose before the travellers’ eyes sudden and black through the
falling snow. There was no light in any of the windows, for Mary had
given them up long ago and gone to bed. Wood embers smouldered in the
kitchen grate. George poked them into a blaze. They took off their
snow-plastered coats and sat in front of the fire.
‘Well, this is a bloody fine thing!’ said George. ‘Old Bastard gone and
me a murderer. I’ve looked for some queer things but never for this.’
‘I reckon it’s my fault,’ said Abner. ‘That’s bound to come out.’
‘That’s not going to help me,’ said George, with a laugh. ‘Not it! . . .
It’s mother I’m thinking of. There’s no luck in our family. It’s no
good talking about it. It’s my last fling, and I’d do it again for a
pal. If it hadn’t happened to-night, it wouldn’t never have happened at
all.’
Abner could say nothing. Even now he didn’t realise the seriousness of
his friend’s position.
‘Just my blasted luck!’ said George. ‘Better turn in unless you want to
get frozen.’
He went upstairs with his candle, and Abner followed.
When daylight returned the snow had ceased, but the night’s fall had
obliterated the track of their returning feet. Wolfpits had become a
black island in the surrounding whiteness. From the drift upon the
doorstep the snow lay smooth to the tops of the hills which dawn
illumined with a rosy light. Never had the mountains seemed so near to
the house, so beautiful, and so little threatening.
Abner woke early and looked out on this transfigured world. In all the
house no one was astir. Even old Drew, who worked in all weathers, had
not yet emerged from his snowbound door. George and Mary still slept.
It was very cold, and Abner threw his coat over his bedclothes. It was
no good getting up, for he knew that with so deep a fall there could be
no work on the pipe-track that day. He lay in bed, smoking, watching the
clustered chimneys of Wolfpits against the sky. The rosy hue faded from
the mountains. The sky cleared to a thin, dazzling blue. A thread of
smoke issued from old Drew’s chimney, rising, straight as a larch, into
the clear air. In the room beneath him, where George and Mary slept, he
heard voices. No doubt George Malpas was telling his wife what had
happened. Sometimes the talk was rapid; sometimes there were long
silences. Abner was thankful that the sad business of telling Mary had
not been left to him. He heard the children’s voices on the stair. The
time had come when he would have to face them all.
They were all in the kitchen when he came downstairs. He could see from
Mary’s eyes that she had been crying; she scarcely dared to look at him
lest she should cry again. George was pretending to be cheerful. He was
playing with the children, telling them how they must make a snow man in
the drive. He said good-morning to Abner as though nothing had happened
overnight, and Abner’s heart went out to him for his courage. Mary did
not speak to him, but it seemed to him that her red eyes were
reproachful. He felt that she probably considered him responsible for
the tragedy, was conscious of his indirect share of guilt, and wished
there were some way in which he could atone for it. He admired the manly
way in which George took his trouble. Indeed he never felt so wholly
friendly to George in his life.
The elders breakfasted in silence, but the children talked incessantly,
being excited by the snow. An overwhelming impulse to put himself right
with Mary made Abner stop her when she was carrying the breakfast things
into the scullery.
‘George has told you?’ he said.
‘Yes, he’s told me. I suppose there’s nothing to be done?’
‘Naught that I know on,’ he replied. And she left him quickly, for she
did not want him to see her crying again.
George lit his pipe at the fire. ‘Funny to hear them kids,’ he said,
with a half smile. ‘I mind it just the same once before. It was at
Mary’s father’s funeral when his sister, her Aunt Rachel, brought her
youngsters over from Bromyard.’
They were spared more of these harrowing contrasts, for the air was warm,
and the children, carefully wrapped up by Mary, ran out to play in the
glistening stuff. Mary did not reappear, and the two men sat on over the
fire. Only George spoke from time to time.
‘It’s all of a piece with my luck,’ he said. ‘I reckon I was born
unlucky. One thing and another. . . I don’t mind as long as it don’t
come out what I was after in Lesswardine. She’s a decent woman and I
wouldn’t have her damaged by it. I wish to God I’d stayed like she
wanted me.’
He seemed to be waiting for Abner to speak, so that he felt bound to ask
who the woman in Lesswardine was.
‘A young woman, a widow . . .’ said George. ‘I wouldn’t have her name
mentioned if I could help it. She’s got enough to put up with. Probably
I shan’t see her, so I’ll give you a note for her.’
He relapsed into silence. ‘The odds is,’ he went on, after a long pause,
‘this is the last time I shall see Wolfpits at night. Well, I’m not
sorry for that, though there’s no denying that Mary’s been a good wife to
me.’
He spoke more excitedly. ‘There’s one thing: try as they will, they
can’t make it murder. Accidental manslaughter, that’s the most they can
make of it. That means a couple of years hard labour. You can’t tell. . . .
It depends on the damned jury. Only mention the word “poaching” and
the judges are again’ you. Yes . . . you can’t deny she’s been a good
wife, if I hadn’t married her too young. I’ve got mother to thank for
that. But I don’t know what’ll happen to her. She’s too proud for
charity, and she’d starve herself and the children rather than take a
penny piece from mother.’
‘She won’t want while I’m here,’ said Abner.
George looked at him steadily without replying.
‘You mean you’ll stay here and keep the home together?’
‘If you want me to,’ said Abner.
‘You’re a good pal, Abner,’ he replied. ‘I’ve said that before. And I
wouldn’t have her suffer. There’s something in what her dad used to say
. . . about good blood and that. If I hadn’t took a fancy against her
this wouldn’t never have happened. I wouldn’t have the home broke up.’
‘I’ll look to that,’ said Abner. ‘That is, if she don’t turn against
me.’
George’s handsome face was working, against his will. He grasped Abner’s
hand in his. It seemed a natural gesture. ‘You’re a proper pal,’ he
said, and then, in a debauch of self-pity, ‘By God, you’re the only pal
I’ve got that I can trust!’
Morgan came running into the room ahead of Gladys, anxious to be the
bearer of exciting news. He ran straight to his father.
‘Well, son?’ said George.
‘Dad . . . dad. . . . There’s a pleeceman comin’ up the drive with a
bicycle,’ he cried.
‘A strange one we don’t know,’ Gladys added.
‘Go into the back to your mother,’ said George.
The constable from Lesswardine knocked at the door and handed two
summonses to George and Abner. ‘Inquest at the Pound House at two
o’clock. You understand it’s important.’
‘Have a drink of beer before you go?’ said George.
‘I don’t mind,’ said the constable, becoming less official.
George went down into the cellar with a jug.
‘This is a bad job,’ said the constable. ‘A bad job, sure enough.’
Abner asked him which way he thought it would go. ‘There’s no saying,’
he replied. ‘As long as they don’t bring it in “murder.”’
He was a fair young man, newly recruited to the force from some
Herefordshire village. The ride in the snow had freshened his complexion
and made him look healthy and jolly.
‘There’s a nasty drift at the bottom of the hill by the bridge,’ he said.
‘A good six foot of it! Well, here’s luck!’ he said, as he drank off
George’s beer.
‘Luck’s the word!’ said George, ‘and God knows I need some!’
Mary came into the room with a set face. ‘Warrants for the inquest,’
said George.
‘Oh, is that all?’ she answered, with relief.
They set off early for the Pound House, fearing that the driven snow
might delay them. George was almost gay, and Abner wondered at his
friend’s courage. They avoided Chapel Green, being anxious not to pass
the Buffalo. In Mainstone a few women came to their doors and stared at
them. The Pound House door was open. A number of jurors had already
arrived. They were mostly farmers or shopkeepers from Lesswardine and
had agreed that the day was a fine one in spite of the snow and that it
was lucky that the tragedy had happened at a time when they were not busy
on their farms. Susie was nowhere to be seen, but Mr Hind, worried and
paler than usual, was doing an excellent trade in hot whisky and water.
He was sorry, he told them, that there was no lemon in the house. Indeed
he was feverishly anxious to put himself on good terms with the jurors.
When George and Abner entered an awkward silence fell upon the company.
Several of those who knew Malpas said good-day to him. The fact that he
was greeted by these men who were shortly to sit in judgment on him
encouraged him. He took a seat on one of the benches in the corner of
the room. Abner went to the bar and asked for a drink. Mr Hind, with
hatred shining in his pale eyes, served him.
‘Hope you’re all right to-day, Mr Hind,’ said Abner friendlily.
The landlord trembled with rage. He pushed Abner’s glass at him,
spilling a quarter of the whisky. ‘I hope I’ve seen the last of you,’ he
said.
The jurymen now congregated in the other corner of the room as though
they realised that it was not fitting that they should mix with such
important figures in the affair as George and his friend. They talked
together in low voices. Abner and George sat quietly listening, but only
instinctive glances in their direction told them when George’s name was
mentioned. At the end of the bar was another door, leading into the
club-room, generally used for the meetings of friendly societies, in
which the inquest would be held. Abner wondered if the body of Bastard
lay inside it; for heavy steps were heard from time to time through the
closed door. At last the door was opened and the sergeant of police from
Lesswardine appeared in it.
He stood there very erect and official, bending stiffly to recognise the
more important of the group of jurymen. Then his eyes fell on George and
Abner. He beckoned to them and called them into the second room. Abner
had expected that Bastard’s bony carcass would be revealed lying in
state, but instead of this he saw a long deal table with an arm-chair at
the head of it and six other ordinary chairs on either side. In front of
the coroner’s seat were spread a pile of official papers, ink,
blotting-paper, and a selection of equally impossible pens. On the wall
above it hung a trophy, the horns of a North American bison with a boss
of black hair between them, which, in a more savage age might well have
symbolised the official’s power of life and death, but, in fact,
represented those that were vested in the master of the local branch of
the Ancient Order of Buffaloes. The sergeant looked at his watch. It
was already past two o’clock. He went out to look down the road to see
if the coroner was in sight. The young constable who had delivered the
warrants earlier in the day was busy placing a copy of the New Testament
in front of each of the jurymen’s seats. When the sergeant’s back was
turned he winked at George and Abner. Then he closed the door and left
them alone.
‘They’ve summonsed fourteen for the jury,’ said George. ‘I’ve counted
’em. There’s three good friends to me: Mr Prosser of The Dyke, Jones of
Pensilva, and Watkins the tailor. The one I’m frightened of is the big
chap with the red face. Williams, his name is. He fell out with mother
over a hogshead of cider five years ago and haven’t spoken to me nor her
since. He’d be glad enough to see me swing! Well . . . what’s coming’s
bound to come. ’Tis no good thinking on it.’
He said no more, but began to beat out the rhythm of a music-hall song on
the floor with the end of his stick, staring straight in front of him at
the bison’s head. Abner wished that something would happen. He hated
this mechanical tapping.
A loud voice was heard in the bar and with it the scraping of feet. The
coroner had arrived. The sergeant threw open the doors with a flourish
and Mr Mortimer entered. He was a big man, with a handsome, rather heavy
face, bushy white eyebrows over pale blue eyes, and a pointed beard in
which a yellow, like that of tobacco stains, was mingled with white. He
walked quickly to the head of the table, his coat-tails flapping behind.
Under his arm he carried a sheaf of papers that he spread out flat in
front of him. Then he patted the table on either side of them with his
hands and took up a pen. The sergeant stood stiffly at his elbow, and
the jury shuffled into their places. Mr Williams, as by common consent,
planted himself at the coroner’s right hand.
‘I declare this court open in the King’s name,’ said Mr Mortimer in a
deep, impressive voice. The sergeant stood as though hypnotised by the
formula. The coroner turned on him suddenly. ‘Now, sergeant,’ he
boomed, ‘look alive! We don’t want to stay here all day. Get the jury
sworn!’
He dived once more into his papers, yawned, rubbed his hands, glanced
behind him at the symbolical buffalo, and then suddenly decided to clean
his nails with a pen-knife. Meanwhile, with Testaments lifted in their
right hands, the jurymen, one by one in different inflections of the
border tongue, repeated the oath which the sergeant administered to them.
‘_I swear by Almighty God_.’ . . . I swear by Almighty God.’ ‘_That I
will well and duly inquire_.’ . . . ‘That I will well and duly
inquire.’ It was like the chorus that one may hear any morning of the
week outside the windows of a country board-school. From time to time
the coroner looked up impatiently from his manicure, and the sergeant
increased his pace.
‘Finished?’ said Mr Mortimer at last.
‘Yes, sir. All correct,’ said the sergeant.
‘Now, gentlemen, you must choose a foreman. Only be quick about it.
We’re late.’
In point of fact the jury had been waiting for him for more than an hour,
but the question of choosing a foreman did not detain them for long,
since Mrs Malpas’s enemy, Williams of the Pentre, had already virtually
chosen himself.
‘Very good . . . very good!’ said the coroner. ‘Take them to view the
body, sergeant.’
They filed out behind the policeman, opening their ranks at the door to
admit the doctor from Lesswardine, who apologised for his lateness and
shook hands with the coroner.
‘You’ve done the post-mortem?’ said the latter.
‘Yes, that’s what kept me.’
‘And found what you expected?’
‘Yes . . . fractured base. I had no doubt about it.’
‘Cheap two-guineas’ worth. You’d better take your money now to save
time. Sign for it here.’
The doctor pocketed the sovereigns and placed the florin aside, according
to the unwritten law that obtains in such cases, for the sergeant.
‘Sad affair,’ said the coroner, with a yawn. ‘Good man, Bastard. One of
the old sort. Conscientious. No brains. Ideal policeman. What the
devil are those fellers doing? I’ve promised to call for tea at the
Delahays.’
‘I was hoping,’ said the doctor, ‘that you’d come back with me. My wife
. . .’
‘No, thanks. . . Very kind of you all the same.’
‘We don’t often see you this way.’
‘No. Not since Condover’s suicide. I believe his son-in-law’s mixed up
in this affair?’
‘Yes. . . . He’s over there in the corner. It’s the usual thing, I
think. A brawl in an alehouse. Alcohol.’
The coroner nodded his head dolefully. His cellar was the best in
Ludlow.
The jurors returned, and with a final glance at the buffalo’s head, as
though he expected it to tell him the time, Mr Mortimer began business.
First the sergeant identified the body of his subordinate. Standing
rigidly at attention he rattled off the oath at a terrific speed, running
his evidence on to the end of it without a stop. He could soon show the
coroner how to do it. Mr Mortimer never raised his eyes from his papers.
‘I may say, sir . . .’ began the sergeant impressively.
‘You may say what you like, sergeant, when you’re asked for it,’ snapped
the coroner. ‘That’s enough.’
The sergeant stepped back, full of offended dignity. The jury were
impressed. Mr Mortimer was behaving in accordance with his reputation.
Other evidence followed rapidly. George and Abner leaned forward,
listening. George with his head in his hands and his eyes staring out
under the arch of his fingers. The second finger of his right hand still
beat out the rhythm of the music-hall song that was running in the back
of his mind.
‘Dr Hendrie!’
_‘I swear by Almighty God that the evidence I shall give to this court
shall be the truth_, _the whole truth_, _and nothing but the truth_.
Arthur Cuthbert Hendrie. Thirty-eight. M.R.C.S. and L.R.C.P. I am a
physician and surgeon practising in Lesswardine. I had seen deceased but
did not know him. Yesterday evening before ten o’clock I was called to
the Pound House. I arrived there between ten and eleven . . . nearer
eleven, and found deceased lying on the floor of the bar with blood and
serum flowing from ears and nose. Both ears. He was quite dead.’
‘Quite dead. . . . Can you say how long he had been dead?’
‘No.’
‘Very well. Go on.’
‘I immediately formed the opinion . . . they told me that he had had a
violent fall . . . that death was due to a fractured base of the skull.
There was a bruise over the left temporal region.’
‘You performed a post-mortem examination.’
‘Yes. This morning. I found the fracture that I had suspected in the
middle fossa.’
‘Will your honour ask’n what that there means?’
‘The witness means the middle part of the base of the skull. FOSSA,’ the
coroner explained loftily.
‘Death, no doubt, was instantaneous. The condition was consistent with
the story of a violent fall on a stone floor. The same condition might
have been caused by a blunt instrument. Deceased was old for his years,
as shown by the atheromatous condition of the cerebral arteries.’
‘Very good. Have you any questions to ask the witness?’
The jury all shook their heads.
‘If you are in a hurry, Dr Hendrie, I think we can spare you.’
‘Thank you, sir. Good day.’
‘Daniel Prosser Hind!’
Daniel Prosser Hind, forty-nine, was a licensed victualler and the lessee
of the Pound House. The owners were Messrs Astill of North Bromwich. He
knew the deceased: couldn’t say that they were friends, as deceased had
only lately come to Mainstone. He remembered last night. The bar was
middling full. He himself was in the parlour working over accounts, his
daughter being in charge of the bar. About nine-thirty he heard a row
and ran into the bar. The first thing he saw was Mr Badger on the floor
and young Fellows on the top of him. Behind them he saw Bastard lying on
his back, with blood coming from his ears and nose. Some one said
Bastard was stunned. He felt Bastard’s heart and said: ‘No, he’s dead.’
He did not see deceased fall. He was told. . . . He quite understood
and begged his worship’s pardon. If he might say so, nothing of this
kind had ever occurred in a house under his management before. What with
the cloggers and the navvies it was no easy matter to keep an orderly
house. He wished to express regret for what had happened. He could not
say if Badger and Fellows had been drinking. Mr Badger was usually a
temperate man. A man named Connor had the appearance of being the worse
for liquor.
‘Were you not aware of this before?’
No. As he had explained, he was busy with the October accounts.
‘You consider your daughter a fit person to be in charge of a crowded
bar?’
Yes. His daughter was quite competent and used to keeping order.
‘How old is she?’
She was twenty years of age. Messrs Astill, he persisted, always
expected the accounts to be ready by the end of the month, and he had
happened to be a little behind with them. Messrs Astill would speak for
him.
‘You consider that you performed your duty as licensee of this inn?’
Yes. Certainly he considered he had done his duty. He had sent for the
doctor at once.
‘You really expect me and the jury to believe that a girl of twenty is a
fit person to be left in charge of a bar full of those rough men? Very
well. . . . You can stand down.’
Susan Hind, twenty, said she was daughter of the previous witness. She
did not know deceased, though he was in the habit of looking in of
nights. She had never served him in the bar. On the night in question
there was nothing unusual. There were near about twenty men in the bar.
Mr Badger was sitting alone over in the corner. He was not drunk.
Fellows was not drunk. She didn’t think that Connor was drunk. She
ought to know when a fellow was drunk! There was no special rule as to
when they should be served or not. Yes, that was it, she used her
discretion. Certainly Connor was excitable. He had had two or three
quarts. No, that was nothing for Connor. He was always quick with his
tongue, and the others were laughing at him. She agreed with her father
that she could manage men if any one could. She had been used to it for
years . . . ever since she was sixteen. She hadn’t noticed anything
until Badger dropped his glass on the floor and came over to Connor. She
supposed Connor had riled him, but she hadn’t been listening. Connor
always went on at people. She saw Badger give Fellows a hit in the face
and then the two of them went down. She called her father, and while her
back was turned Bastard must have come in. She saw him try to pull
Fellows off Badger. She saw Malpas take Bastard by the arm. He didn’t
use no violence that she saw. Bastard tried to fix Malpas’s arms. She
saw the two of them swaying about together. They must have tripped over
something, they went down so sudden. Bastard did not cry out. She
remembered nothing more, she was that scared. Malpas had not been
drinking. He had had one drink: a small whisky. Of course she couldn’t
say if he had got drink anywhere else. In her opinion he was sober. The
only man in the room that was drunk was Atwell. She had gone on serving
him because she knew by experience that he could behave decent with it.
He was like that most nights.
Atwell, who had smiled at this tribute to his powers, was called next.
He didn’t remember nothing. He couldn’t say if he was drunk because he
didn’t remember. Asked if he wasn’t ashamed of himself, he had nothing
to say.
Michael Connor corroborated the evidence of the witness Susan Hind.
Anything he had said to Badger was not out of the way. He was only
letting on. He admitted having a drop taken. He was nourished, not
drunk. Atwell was drunk, more luck to him! That was making the court no
impertinent answer. He said it by the way of no harm.
‘Abner Fellows!’
He had been sitting half hypnotised by the progress of the evidence.
Each of the witnesses had seemed to him strange and unfamiliar. This
subdued, tight-lipped Susan was not the girl who came passionately to his
arms. Mr Hind was pale, shabby, shrunken. Even Mick was not the radiant
companion that he knew. He heard his own name in a dream. George Malpas
pushed him forward as the sergeant took an officious step in his
direction. He stood at the foot of the long table, staring at the top of
the coroner’s head and the buffalo horns above it. The foreman of the
jury was examining him closely, much as on market days he would have
examined a likely bullock. The man with the white beard went on writing
in a large, fluent hand, while the sergeant thrust the Testament into
Abner’s fingers and dictated the oath to him. He had to clear his
throat, for his voice had left him. The coroner blotted his notes
methodically and looked up.
‘Yes. . . . Abner Fellows. Age?’
‘Twenty.’
‘Occupation?’
‘Labourer.’
‘Tell me all you know of what happened last night . . . not too fast, I
have to write it down.’
Slowly Abner told his own story.
‘Very good! You say that Badger hit you in the face. Are you on bad
terms with Badger?’
‘I never spoke to him before.’
‘When he struck you you lost your temper?’
‘Any one would.’
‘You say Malpas is a friend of yours?’
‘I lodge with him.’
‘And Malpas was not drunk?’
‘Not that I could see.’
‘Do you know where Malpas had been that evening?’
Abner hesitated. He felt that George’s eyes were on him from behind.
‘No.’
‘Very well.’
Abner went back to his seat. He saw Mr Hind rubbing his hands together
nervously, saw the white face of Susie. He flopped down heavily into the
seat beside George. Malpas never stirred. He still sat with his hands
to his head, drumming with his finger on his temple.
‘William Badger!’
William Badger, gamekeeper in the employment of Sir George Delahay, said
he had been to the Pound House on business. His business was to try and
pick up information about poaching on his master’s land. Nothing was
safe in Lesswardine since the navvies had been working there. He was
watching three men.
‘Name them.’
Connor, Fellows, and Atwell. He believed Connor was the ringleader. He
had not come there to watch Malpas. Constable Bastard knew that he was
there on that business. He had told Bastard that he thought he had
recognised Connor in an affray three nights before. He had sat in the
corner quietly listening. Connor had been talking ‘at him’ all evening,
and at last he had lost his temper. He was a quick-tempered man and
couldn’t abide poachers. He had meant to shut Connor’s mouth. He
couldn’t say if he had meant to hit him. When he came up to Connor he
saw Fellows looking ugly. They were all the same gang. He didn’t
remember hitting Fellows in the face, but if he hadn’t done so Fellows
would have hit him. The next moment Fellows was on the top of him. He
didn’t see Bastard come in. Bastard was a friend of his. He did not see
Malpas and Bastard fighting. He could not have seen Bastard fall, as
Fellows was on the top of him. In his opinion Bastard had died in the
performance of his duty. Bastard had been a great help to him.
‘George Malpas!’
George walked straight to the foot of the table, haggard, tall, handsome
as ever. While he gave his evidence he still drummed with his fingers on
the board. The tone of Mr Mortimer’s voice sharpened as he questioned
him, but George’s account of the affair agreed in every detail with that
of the other witnesses.
‘You do not suggest that you attacked Bastard when under the influence of
drink?’
‘No. I had not been drinking.’
‘Where had you spent the earlier part of the evening?’
‘At Lesswardine.’
‘In a public-house?’
‘No. With a friend.’
‘Were you and Bastard on good terms?’
‘I had never spoken to him before in my life.’
‘Then why did you suddenly attack him?’
‘I never attacked him. Badger had hit out at Fellows and Fellows had a
right to get his own back. I wanted to see fair play. I put my hand on
Bastard’s arm.’
‘That’s all very well, you know. It is a serious offence to interfere
with a constable in the discharge of his duty.’
‘Fellows was my pal. I never did nothing to Bastard. When I touched his
arm he turned on me. He was trying to take me in charge. We must have
tripped on something. We fell down together. I had nothing against
Bastard.’
‘Very well, you may sit down.’
The sergeant cleared his throat: ‘If I may say a few words, sir . . .’
The coroner finished his notes, then sat back to listen.
‘I may say, sir, that we have been dissatisfied for some time with the
conduct of this house. Neither Mr Hind nor his daughter bear a good
character with us, and Bastard has had occasion to speak to me about the
goings-on here from time to time. He has also said that Mr Badger was a
great help to him. Connor, Atwell, and Fellows all have the name of
rough characters. We have only been waiting for the necessary evidence . . .’
‘That will do, sergeant.’
‘Very good, sir. On inquiries in Lesswardine, I find that Malpas spent
the evening in the house of a young widow woman named . . .’
George rose to his feet and took a step forward.
‘Sit down!’ shouted the coroner.
‘Named . . .’
‘That will do, sergeant.’
‘As you wish, sir.’
Mr Mortimer adjusted his glasses and sat for a moment in silence, turning
over his paper:.
‘Now, gentlemen,’ he said at last, ‘you have heard this . . . er . . .
very distressing evidence. In this type of case—and I am glad to say
they are rare in the district—it is usual to find a great conflict of
evidence. Here the . . . ah . . testimony is unusually clear. In the
first place you have a public-house. A public-house which, I am bound to
say, appears to me to have been managed with a considerable degree of
laxness. In this part of the country we . . . ah . . . suffer from the
presence of a floating population, gipsies, cloggers, and at the present
moment the men engaged on the North Bromwich Waterworks. These men have
to spend their evenings somewhere, and it appears that the Pound House . . .
ah . . . found favour with them. They were in the habit of drinking
here every night, sometimes under the supervision of a girl of twenty.
The sergeant has said that he considers this young woman . . . ah . . .
advanced for her years. That may well be; but none the less I think Hind
has been lacking in responsibility. Very good. . . . Among the men who
frequent this house are three notorious poachers: Connor, Atwell, and
Fellows. Poaching is another of the pests that this floating population
brings in its train. Badger, the keeper, who gave his evidence very
clearly and straightforwardly, was in the habit of visiting the Pound
House to keep an eye on this . . . ah . . . disorderly trio. As he had a
right to do, he enlisted the help of the deceased. The affair began in
the usual way of a public-house brawl. What Connor said to Badger;
whether Badger assaulted Fellows: these are matters that do not concern
you. Only, in passing, I say that the whole business could not have
occurred in a properly managed house. There was a struggle. The
deceased constable, in the plain performance of his duty, entered the bar
and . . . ah . . . commenced to separate Badger and Fellows. If his
desire was to protect Badger, well and good . . . but even that is
immaterial. Now comes the important part. Malpas says that he . . ah
. . . says that he put his hand on the arm of the deceased and that
thereupon Bastard turned on him and tried to take him in charge. He
then, by his own admission, resisted arrest. He and Bastard struggled
together and fell in each other’s arms. The medical evidence tells us
that Bastard died from a fractured base of the skull, the result of this
fall. You may ask yourselves the question: “Was Bastard within his
rights in arresting, or trying to arrest Malpas?” You need not find an
answer to it. Legally the answer is “Yes;” but all that is expected of
you is to determine how the deceased met his death. He met his death in
a struggle with Malpas. Malpas, by his own admission, first laid hands
on him, thus obstructing an officer in the performance of his duty.
Next, again by his own admission, he resisted arrest. As a result of
this resistance Bastard fell. As a result of the fall he fractured his
skull and died . . . ah . . . instantaneously. You may trace, if you
like, the responsibility for his death backward through Connor, Badger,
and Fellows to Hind; but the immediate cause of it was Malpas.’
The coroner took off his glasses and pushed his notes aside. He spoke
slowly, waving the pince-nez to mark his points.
‘Very well. . . . Now it is your duty to determine the degree of
Malpas’s responsibility. Did Malpas intend to kill the deceased? The
sergeant of the police has tried, very improperly, to make a statement as
to Malpas’s general character.’
The sergeant shuffled his feet and swallowed, but succumbed to a sense of
discipline and was silent.
‘I am bound to say that there is no evidence pointing to Malpas having
killed Bastard of malice aforethought. There is no reason to suppose
that he lied when he told you that he had never spoken to Bastard before.
Did he, then, desire to attack Bastard on the spur of the moment with
intent to kill. He has told you that he wanted to see fair play between
Fellows, whom he describes as his “pal,” and Badger, and I am inclined to
believe him. Another question presents itself: “Did he become murderous
under the influence of drink?” This is negatived by all the evidence.
Now you must be careful. If Malpas laid hands on Bastard with intent to
kill, either under the influence of an old grudge or in a sudden fit of
passion, whether drunk or sober, he is guilty of murder, and it is your
duty to say so. If, on the other hand, he laid hands on Bastard without
intending to offer him any violence, and if, in the course of a struggle
in which he was resisting arrest, he caused Bastard to fall and thus
brought about Bastard’s end, his crime lies on the borderland between
murder and homicide . . . ah . . . manslaughter. If Malpas had no part
in the death of the deceased, you may say that the constable died by
misadventure. I think this is a case in which you may be left to decide
for yourselves. Nothing that you know of Malpas’s private life, and I
presume that you all know something of it, must influence your verdict.
The death of a policeman, a man whom the law provides for your protection
and the protection of your property, is a very serious matter. If
policemen are to be obstructed in their duty with impunity the whole
fabric of life in these remote districts becomes . . . ah . . insecure.
You may now consider your verdict. You had better retire.’
Mr Mortimer put on his glasses. The jury, led by Williams, shuffled out
like a group of sidesmen collecting in church. The sergeant bent over
the coroner, whispered and handed him a paper which he put aside.
‘You’re in too great a hurry, sergeant,’ he said. The witnesses sat
motionless in the back of the court: Susie, as before, staring straight
in front of her as pale and tragic as a young widow; Mr Hind with his
hands clasped in front of him, bunched up like a sack, and his pouched,
owl-like eyes paler than ever, waiting for a rider to the verdict;
Badger, obstinate, with his head thrust forward; Mick and Atwell stolidly
masticating tobacco. Abner saw them all petrified by the gloom of
suspense. George’s finger had ceased from its mechanical tattoo. All
through the coroner’s summing up he had listened intensely; once or twice
his lips had moved and his muscles stiffened as though he wanted to say
something. Now he sat quite still with his hands on his knees, staring,
as it seemed, at the buffalo’s head.
One after another the witnesses were called up to sign their evidence.
The coroner looked at his watch and sighed. It seemed as if he would not
have time to take tea with the Delahays, and this annoyed him, for Lady
Delahay was a very attractive woman and a visit to Lesswardine Court
always left him with a pleasant afterglow and made him feel that but for
his wife he might have become an ornament of county society. The
sergeant stood like a waxen policeman in Madame Tussaud’s. By a
combination of frowns, winks, and rollings of the eyes, he indicated to
his bewildered subordinate that the Testaments on the table might now be
collected. The young constable stumped round the table on noisy tiptoes.
No other sound was heard but the settling of thawed snow on the roof, the
tinkle of a distant anvil, and the noise of a blob of nicotined saliva
which Atwell privily dropped upon the floor and then obliterated with a
sideways motion of his foot.
The jury re-entered and took their seats at the table. The sergeant
insensibly stiffened. Mr Williams held a paper in his hand.
‘Well,’ said the coroner. ‘You have arrived at your verdict?’
‘Yes, your honour. Unanimous. We find . . .’
‘Wait a moment. . . . Yes, very good . . . go on.’
‘We find, unanimous, that the deceased died in accordance with the
doctor’s evidence, and that his death was caused unintentionally by
George Malpas.’
‘That is manslaughter.’
‘Yes, your honour. Unintentional manslaughter.’
‘You can’t qualify it. Manslaughter. You have added no rider?’
‘No, your honour.’
‘Well, I am bound to say I endorse your verdict. I think that you might
profitably have expressed your opinion on the management of this house.’
He called ‘Daniel Hind!’
Mr Hind rose with a gasp.
‘You have heard what I think of the management of your house, and I hope
that the licensing justices will . . . ah . . . endorse it. Another time
when an inquest is held in this room in winter the least you can do is to
put a fire in it. George Malpas!’
George staggered to the end of the table.
‘You have heard the jury’s verdict. You will be committed on my warrant
to take your trial on a charge of manslaughter. You are lucky that the
charge is not . . . ah . . . graver.’
The sergeant, who had been waiting for this, again presented his paper to
the coroner, and Mr Mortimer, having wiped the nib of his pen, signed it
in his bold, deliberate handwriting. He signed it carefully and looked
at his signature afterward. It was not often that he tasted so singular
a sensation of power. The sergeant blotted the document and advanced
toward George Malpas. He came like a dignified spider toward a fly
safely entangled in its web.
‘Better go and tell them,’ George said to Abner. ‘Tell mother first. . . .
Tell ’em I’m all right.’