CHAPTER XVI
The day fixed for the trial of Frederick Birchill was wet, dismal, anddreary. The rain pelted intermittently through a hazy, chilly atmosphere,filling the gutters and splashing heavily on the slippery pavements. Butin spite of the rain a long queue, principally of women, assembledoutside the portals of the Old Bailey long before the time fixed for theopening of the court. At the private entrance to the courthouse arrivedfashionably-dressed ladies accompanied by well-groomed men. They hadreceived cards of admission and had seats reserved for them in the bodyof the court. Many of them had personally known the late Sir HoraceFewbanks, and their interest in the trial of the man accused of hismurder was intensified by the rumours afloat that there were to be somespicy revelations concerning the dead judge's private life.
The arrival of Mr. Justice Hodson, who was to preside at the trial,caused a stir among some of the spectators, many of whom belonged to thecriminal class. Sir Henry Hodson had presided at so many murder trialsthat he was known among them as "the Hanging Judge." Among the spectatorswere some whom Sir Henry had put into mourning at one time or another;there were others whom he had deprived of their bread-winners forspecified periods. These spectators looked at him with curiosity, fear,and hatred. Mr. Holymead, K.C., drove up in a taxi-cab a few minuteslater, and his arrival created an impression akin to admiration. In theeyes of the criminal class he was an heroic figure who had assumed theresponsibility of saving the life of one of their fraternity. The eminentcounsel's success in the few criminal cases in which he had consented toappear had gained him the respectful esteem of those who consideredthemselves oppressed by the law, and the spectators on the pavement mighthave raised a cheer for him if their exuberance had not been restrainedby the proximity of the policeman guarding the entrance.
When the court was opened Inspector Chippenfield took a seat in the bodyof the court behind the barrister's bench. He ranged his eye over theclosely-packed spectators in the gallery, and shook his head withmanifest disapproval. It seemed to him that the worst criminals in Londonhad managed to elude the vigilance of the sergeant outside in order tosee the trial of their notorious colleague, Fred Birchill. He pointed outtheir presence to Rolfe, who was seated alongside him.
"There's that scoundrel Bob Rogers, who slipped through our hands overthe Ealing case, and his pal, Breaker Jim, who's just done seven years,looking down and grinning at us," he angrily whispered. "I'll give themsomething to grin about before they're much older. You'd think Breakerwould have had enough of the Old Bailey to last him a lifetime. And lookat that row alongside of them--there's Morris, Hart, Harry the Hooker,and that chap Willis who murdered the pawnbroker in Commercial Road lastyear, only we could never sheet it home to him. And two rows behind themis old Charlie, the Covent Garden 'drop,' with Holder Jack and Kemp,Birchill's mate. Why, they're everywhere. The inquest was nothing tothis, Rolfe."
"Kemp must be thanking his lucky stars he wasn't in that Riversbrook jobwith Fred Birchill," said Rolfe, "for they usually work together. Andthere's Crewe, up in the gallery."
"Where?" exclaimed Inspector Chippenfield, with an indignant start.
"Up there behind that pillar there--no, the next one. See, he's lookingdown at you."
Crewe caught the inspector's eye, and nodded and smiled in a friendlyfashion, but Inspector Chippenfield returned the salutation with ahaughty glare.
"The impudence of that chap is beyond belief," he said to hissubordinate. "One would have thought he'd have kept away from court afterhis wild-goose chase to Scotland and piling up expenses, but not him!Brazen impudence is the stock-in-trade of the private detective. IfScotland Yard had a little more of the impudence of the privatedetective, Rolfe, we should be better appreciated."
"I suppose he's come in the hopes of seeing the jury acquit Birchill,"said Rolfe.
"No doubt," replied Inspector Chippenfield. "But he's come to the wrongshop. A good jury should convict without leaving the box if the case isproperly put before them by the prosecution. Crewe would like to triumphover us, but it is our turn to win."
But Inspector Chippenfield was wrong in thinking that Crewe's presencein court was due to a desire for the humiliation of his rivals. Crewehad spent most of the previous night reading and revising his summariesand notes of the Riversbrook case, and in minutely reviewing hisinvestigations of it. Over several pipes in the early morning hours hepondered long and deeply on the secret of Sir Horace Fewbanks's murder,without finding a solution which satisfactorily accounted for all thestrange features of the case. But one thing he felt sure of was thatBirchill had not committed the murder. He based that belief partly onthe butler's confession, and partly on his own discoveries. He believedHill to be a cunning scoundrel who had overreached the police for somepurpose of his own by accusing Birchill, and who, to make his story moreprobable, had even implicated himself in the supposed burglary as aterrorised accomplice. And Crewe had been unable to test the butler'sstory, or find out what game he was playing, because of the assiduitywith which the principal witness for the prosecution had been "nursed"by the police from the moment he made his confession. Crewe bit hardinto his amber mouthpiece in vexation as he recalled the ostrich-liketactics of Inspector Chippenfield, who, having accepted Hill's story asgenuine, had officially baulked all his efforts to see the man andquestion him about it.
He had come to court with the object of witnessing Birchill's behaviourin the dock and the efforts of any of his criminal friends to communicatewith him. As a man who had had considerable experience in criminal trialshe knew the irresistible desire of the criminal in the gallery of thecourt to encourage the man in the dock to keep up his courage.Communications of the kind had to be made by signs. It was Crewe'simpression that by watching Birchill in the dock and Birchill's friendsin the gallery he might pick up a valuable hint or two. It was also hisintention to study closely the defence which Counsel for the prisonerintended to put forward.
It was therefore with a feeling of mingled annoyance and surprise thatCrewe, looking down from his point of vantage at the bevy offashionably-dressed ladies in the body of the court, recognised Mrs.Holymead, Mademoiselle Chiron and Miss Fewbanks seated side by side,engaged in earnest conversation. Before he could withdraw from their viewbehind the pillar in front of him, Miss Fewbanks looked up and saw him.She bowed to him in friendly recognition, and Crewe saw her whisper toMrs. Holymead, who glanced quickly in his direction and then as quicklyaverted her gaze. But in that fleeting glance of her beautiful dark eyesCrewe detected an expression of fear, as though she dreaded his presence,and he noticed that she shivered slightly as she turned to resume herconversation with Miss Fewbanks.
His Honour Mr. Justice Hodson entered, and the persons in the courtscrambled hurriedly to their feet to pay their tribute of respect toBritish law, as exemplified in the person of a stout red-faced oldgentleman wearing a scarlet gown and black sash, and attended by four ofthe Sheriffs of London in their fur-trimmed robes. The judge bowed inresponse and took his seat. The spectators resumed theirs, craning theirnecks eagerly to look at the accused man, Birchill, who was brought intothe dock by two warders. The work of empanelling a jury commenced, andwhen it was completed Mr. Walters, K.C., opened the case for theprosecution.
Mr. Walters was a long-winded Counsel who had detested the late Mr.Justice Fewbanks because of the latter's habit of interrupting theaddresses of Counsel with the object of inducing them to curtail theirremarks. This practice was not only annoying to Counsel, who necessarilyknew better than the judge what the jury ought to be told, but it alsotended to hold Counsel up to ridicule in the eyes of ignorant jurymen asa man who could not do his work properly without the watchful correctionof the judge. But Mr. Walters, whose legal training had imbued in him arespect for Latin tags, subscribed to the adage, _de mortuis nil nisibonum_. Therefore he began his address to the jury with a glowingreference to the loss, he might almost say the irreparable loss, whichthe judiciary had sustained, he would go so far as to say the loss whichthe nation
had sustained by the death, the violent death, in short, themurder, of an eminent judge of the High Court Bench, whose clear andvigorous intellect, whose marvellous mastery of the legal principles laiddown by the judicial giants of the past, whose inexhaustible knowledgedrawn from the storehouses of British law, whose virile interpretationsof the principles of British justice, whose unfailing courtesy andconsideration to Counsel, the memory of which would long be cherished bythose who had had the privilege of pleading before him, had made him anacquisition and an ornament to a Bench which in the eyes of the nationhad always represented, and at no time more than the present--at thispoint Mr. Walters bowed to the presiding judge--the embodiment of legalknowledge, legal experience, and legal wisdom.
After this tribute to the murdered man and the presiding judge, Mr.Walters proceeded to lay the facts of the crime before the jury, who hadread all about them in the newspapers.
With methodical care he built up the case against the accused man,classifying the points of evidence against him in categorical order forthe benefit of the jury. The most important witness for the prosecutionwas a man known as James Hill, who had been in Sir Horace Fewbanks'semploy as a butler. Hill's connection with the prisoner was in someaspects unfortunate, for himself, and no doubt counsel for the defensewould endeavour to discredit his evidence on that account, but the jury,when they heard the butler tell his story in the witness box, would havelittle difficulty in coming to the conclusion that the man Hill was thevictim of circumstances and his own weakness of temperament. However muchthey might be disposed to blame him for the course he had pursued, he wasinnocent of all complicity in his master's death, and had done his bestto help the ends of justice by coming forward with a voluntary confessionto the police.
Mr. Walters made no attempt to conceal or extenuate the black page inHill's past, but he asked the jury to believe that Hill had bitterlyrepented of his former crime, and would have continued to lead an honestlife as Sir Horace Fewbanks's butler, if ill fate had not forged a cruelchain of circumstances to link him to his past life and drag him down bybringing him in contact with the accused man Birchill, whom he had met inprison. Sir Horace Fewbanks was the self-appointed guardian of a youngwoman named Doris Fanning, the daughter of a former employee on hiscountry estate, who had died leaving her penniless. Sir Horace had deemedit his duty to bring up the girl and give her a start in life. Aftereducating her in a style suitable to her station, he sent her to Londonand paid for music lessons for her in order to fit her for a musicalcareer, for which she showed some aptitude. Unfortunately the young womanhad a self-willed and unbalanced temperament, and she gave her benefactormuch trouble. Sir Horace bore patiently with her until she made thechance acquaintance of Birchill, and became instantly fascinated by him.The acquaintance speedily drifted into intimacy, and the girl became thepliant tool of Birchill, who acquired an almost magnetic influence overher. As the intimacy progressed she seemed to have become a willingpartner in his criminal schemes.
When Sir Horace Fewbanks heard that the girl had drifted into anassociation with a criminal like Birchill he endeavoured to save her fromher folly by remonstrating with her, and the girl promised to give upBirchill, but did not do so. When Sir Horace found out that he was beingdeceived he was compelled to renounce her. Birchill, who had been livingon the girl, was furious with anger when he learnt that Sir Horace hadcut off the monetary allowance he had been making her, and, ondiscovering by some means that his former prison associate Hill was nowthe butler at Sir Horace Fewbanks's house, he planned his revenge. Hesent the girl Fanning to Riversbrook with a message to Hill, directinghim, under threat of exposure, to see him at the Westminster flat.
Hill, who dreaded nothing so much as an exposure of that past life of hiswhich he hoped was a secret between his master and himself, kept theappointment. Birchill told him he intended to rob the judge's house inorder to revenge himself on Sir Horace for cutting off the girl'sallowance, and he asked Hill to assist him in carrying out the burglary.Hill strenuously demurred at first, but weakly allowed himself to beterrorised into compliance under Birchill's threats of exposure. Hill'sparticipation in the crime was to be confined to preparing a plan ofRiversbrook as a guide for Birchill. Birchill said nothing about murderat this time, but there is no doubt he contemplated violence when hefirst spoke to Hill. When Hill, alarmed by his master's return on theactual night for which the burglary had been arranged, hurried across tothe flat to urge Birchill to abandon the contemplated burglary, Birchillobstinately decided to carry out the crime, and left the flat with arevolver in his hand, threatening to murder Sir Horace if he found him,because of his harsh treatment--as he termed it--of the girl Fanning.
"Birchill left the flat at nine o'clock," continued Mr. Walters, who hadnow reached the vital facts of the night of the murder. "I ask the juryto take careful note of the time and the subsequent times mentioned, forthey have an important bearing on the circumstantial evidence against theaccused man. He returned, according to Hill's evidence, shortly aftermidnight. Evidence will be called to show that Birchill, or a mananswering his description, boarded a tramcar at Euston Road at 9.30 p.m.,and journeyed in it to Hampstead. He was observed both at Euston Road andthe Hampstead terminus by the conductor, because of his obvious desire toavoid attention. There were only two other passengers on the top of thecar when it left Euston Road. The conductor directed the attention of thedriver to his movements, and they both watched him till he disappeared inthe direction of the Heath. In fairness to the prisoner, it was necessaryto point out, however, that neither the conductor nor the driver canidentify him positively as the man they had seen on their car that night,but both will swear that to the best of their belief Birchill is the man.Assuming that it was the prisoner who travelled to Hampstead by theEuston Road tram--a route he would probably prefer because it took him toHampstead by the most unfrequented way--he would have a distance ofnearly a mile to walk across Hampstead Heath to Tanton Gardens, whereSir Horace Fewbanks's house was situated. The evidence of the tram-men isthat he set off across the Heath at a very rapid rate. The tram reachedHampstead at four minutes past ten, so that, by walking fast, it would bepossible for a young energetic man to reach Riversbrook before a quarterto eleven. Another five minutes would see an experienced housebreakerlike Birchill inside the house. At twenty minutes past eleven a young mannamed Ryder, who had wandered into Tanton Gardens while endeavouring totake a short cut home, heard the sound of a report, which at the time hetook to be the noise of a door violently slammed, coming from thedirection of Riversbrook. A few moments afterwards he saw a man climbover the front fence of Riversbrook to the street. He drew backcautiously into the shade of one of the chestnut trees of the streetavenue, and saw the man plainly as he ran past him. Ryder will swear thatthe man he saw was Birchill."
"It's a lie! It's a lie! You're trying to hang him, you wicked man. Oh,Fred, Fred!"
The cry proceeded from the girl Doris Fanning. Her unbalanced temperamenthad been unable to bear the strain of sitting there and listening to Mr.Walters' cold inexorable construction of a legal chain of evidenceagainst her lover. She rose to her feet, shrieking wildly, andgesticulating menacingly at Mr. Walters. The Society ladies turnedeagerly in their seats to take in through their _lorgnons_ every detailof the interruption.
"Remove that woman," the judge sternly commanded.
Several policemen hastened to her, and the girl was partly hustled andpartly carried out of court, shrieking as she went. When the commotioncaused by the scene subsided, the judge irritably requested to beinformed who the woman was.
"I don't know, my lord," replied Mr. Walters. "Perhaps--" He stopped andbent over to Detective Rolfe, who was pulling at his gown. "Er--yes, I'minformed by Detective Rolfe of Scotland Yard, my lord, that the youngwoman is a witness in the case."
"Then why was she permitted to remain in court?" asked Sir Henry Hodsonangrily. "It is a piece of gross carelessness."
"I do not know, my lord. I was unaware she was a witness until
thismoment," returned Mr. Walters, with a discreet glance in the direction ofDetective Rolfe, as an indication to His Honour that the judicial stormmight safely veer in that direction. Sir Henry took the hint andadministered such a stinging rebuke to Detective Rolfe that thatofficer's face took on a much redder tint before it was concluded. Thenthe judge motioned to Mr. Walters to resume the case.
Counsel, with his index finger still in the place in his brief where hehad been interrupted, rose to his feet again and turned to the jury.
"Birchill returned to the flat at Westminster shortly after midnight," hecontinued. "Hill had been compelled by Birchill's threats to remain at theflat with the girl while Birchill visited Riversbrook, and the firstthing Birchill told him on his return was that he had found Sir HoraceFewbanks dead in his house when he entered it. On his way back fromcommitting the crime belated caution had probably dictated to Birchillthe wisdom of endeavouring to counteract his previous threat to murderSir Horace Fewbanks. He probably remembered that Hill, who had heard thethreat, was an unwilling participator in the plan for the burglary, andmight therefore denounce him to the police for the greater crime if he(Birchill) admitted that he had committed it. In order to guard againstthis contingency still further Birchill forced Hill to join in writing aletter to Scotland Yard, acquainting them with the murder, and the factthat the body was lying in the empty house. Birchill's object in actingthus was a twofold one. He dared not trust Hill to pretend to discoverthe body the next day and give information to the police, for fear heshould not be able to retain sufficient control of himself to convincethe detectives that he was wholly ignorant of the crime, and he alsothought that if Hill had a share in writing the letter he would feel anadditional complicity in the crime, and keep silence for his own sake.Birchill was right in his calculations--up to a point. Hill was at firsttoo frightened to disclose what he knew, but as time went on hisaffection for his murdered master, and his desire to bring the murdererto justice, overcame his feelings of fear for his own share in bringingabout the crime, and he went and confessed everything to the police,regardless of the consequences that might recoil upon his own head. Thecase against Birchill depends largely on Hill's evidence, and the jury,when they have heard his story in the witness-box, and bearing in mindthe extenuating circumstances of his connection with the crime, will havelittle hesitation in coming to the conclusion that the prisoner in thedock murdered Sir Horace Fewbanks."
The first witness called was Inspector Seldon, who gave evidence as tohis visit to Riversbrook shortly before 1 p. m. on the 19th of August asthe result of information received, and his discovery of the dead body ofSir Horace Fewbanks. He described the room in which the body was found;the position of the body; and he identified the blood-stained clothesproduced by the prosecution as being those in which the dead man wasdressed when the body was discovered. In cross-examination by Holymead hestated that Sir Horace Fewbanks was fully dressed when the body wasfound. The witness also stated in cross-examination that none of theelectric lights in the house were burning when the body was discovered.
The next witness was Dr. Slingsby, the pathological expert from the HomeOffice who had made the post mortem examination, and who was much toogreat a man to be kept waiting while other witnesses of more importanceto the case but of less personal consequence went into the box. Dr.Slingsby stated that his examinations had revealed that death had beencaused by a bullet wound which had penetrated the left lung, causinginternal hemorrhage.
Mr. Finnis, the junior counsel for the defence, suggested to the witnessthat the wound might have been self-inflicted, but Dr. Slingsby permittedhimself to be positive that such was not the case. With professionalcaution he assured Mr. Finnis, who briefly cross-examined him, that itwas impossible for him to state how long Sir Horace Fewbanks had beendead. _Rigor mortis_, in the case of the human body, set in from eight toten hours after death, and it was between three and four o'clock in theafternoon of the day the crime was discovered that he first saw thecorpse. The body was quite stiff and cold then.
"Is it not possible for death to have taken place nineteen or twentyhours before you saw the body?" asked Mr. Finnis, eagerly.
"Quite possible," replied Dr. Slingsby.
"Is it not also possible, from the state of the body when you examinedit, that death took place within sixteen hours of your examination of thebody?" asked Mr. Walters, as Mr. Finnis sat down with the air of a manwho had elicited an important point.
"Quite possible," replied Dr. Slingsby, with the prim air of aprofessional man who valued his reputation too highly to risk it bycommitting himself to anything definite.
Dr. Slingsby was allowed to leave the box, and Inspector Chippenfieldtook his place. Inspector Chippenfield did not display any professionalreticence about giving his evidence--at least, not on the surface, thoughhe by no means took the court completely into his confidence as to allthat had passed between him and Hill. On the other hand he told the judgeand jury everything that his professional experience prompted him asnecessary and proper for them to know in order to bring about aconviction. In the course of his evidence he made several attempts tointroduce damaging facts as to Birchill's past, but Mr. Holymeadprotested to the judge. Counsel for the defence protested that he hadallowed his learned friend in opening the case a great deal of latitudeas to the relations which had previously existed between the witness Hilland the prisoner, because the defence did not intend to attempt to hidethe fact that the prisoner had a criminal record, but he had no intentionof allowing a police witness to introduce irrelevant matter in order toprejudice the jury against the prisoner. His Honour told the witness toconfine himself to answering the questions put to him, and not tovolunteer information.
After this rebuke Inspector Chippenfield resumed giving evidence. Herelated what Birchill had said when arrested, and declared that he waspositive that the footprints found outside the kitchen window were madeby the boots produced in court which Birchill had been wearing at thetime he was arrested. He produced a jemmy which he had found at Fanning'sflat, and said that it fitted the marks on the window at Riversbrookwhich had been forced on the night of the 18th of August.
Inspector Chippenfield's evidence was followed by that of the two tramwayemployees, who declared that to the best of their belief Birchill was theman who boarded their tram at half-past nine on the night of the 18th ofAugust, and rode to the terminus at Hampstead, which they reached at 10.4p. m. Both the witnesses showed a very proper respect for the law, andwere obviously relieved when the brief cross-examination was over andthey were free to go back to their tram-car.