Death of a Wine Merchant (26 page)

‘Written in French or English?’ They could both hear a cry of ‘Mr Pugh, where are you?’ coming from the behind the door.

‘French,’ said Lady Lucy.

‘Try to get it translated and typed up if you can,’ said Pugh, opening the door, ‘and send it in as soon as possible through the Clerk of the Court.’ With that he ran at full speed towards the judge’s rooms.

Mr Justice Black was settled deep into his chair as the lawyers began to file in, defence solicitors on the side of Charles Augustus Pugh, the last to arrive, Detective Chief Inspector Weir for Sir Jasper. The judge was the proud possessor of a handsome room in the new Old Bailey, a fire burning in his grate, bookshelves lined with legal documents, a forbidding desk for his lordship with a couple of humble chairs on the opposite side. So far Mr Justice Black was still in the genial mood he had at the start of the day.

‘Mr Pugh,’ he said firmly. When he learnt of the circumstances of the judge’s weekend a year later, Powerscourt was to say that the judge’s weekend was the most important single event in that day at the Old Bailey. The judge was a keen, and very successful, bridge player. He had spent Saturday evening at his club playing for rather high stakes. He had won a great deal of money. The memory of that last finesse to secure the final rubber would stay with him for a long time. Claret, that was how he planned to spend his winnings. The judge was very fond of claret. He had brought with him that day the latest catalogue from Berry Bros. & Rudd to read on the train.

‘My lord,’ said Pugh, ‘I beg the court’s forgiveness for what I am about to request and I convey my apologies to you for the inconvenience I may be about to cause.’

‘Get on with it, for God’s sake,’ his junior whispered to himself and began a drawing of the foreman of the jury.

‘My lord,’ Pugh went on, ‘the defence would like to ask the court to consider admitting fresh evidence it wishes to
put before the court. This evidence only reached London on Sunday evening. It is, I believe, germane to the very substance of this case. I have given a copy of the papers to my learned friend, Sir Jasper, and to yourself.’

Pugh sat down. The judge peered at Pugh.

‘This is irregular, Mr Pugh, most irregular.’ Pugh wondered for a moment if he was simply going to throw the new evidence out without even hearing it.

‘Mr Pugh,’ the judge began, ‘you will forgive us, Sir Jasper and I, while we read these new documents.’

‘The page with the English translation is under the page with the French, my lord. The French wedding certificate is in your bundle, my lord. And before you start reading, forgive me, but I have yet another document relevant to the proceedings. It only came from France this morning, my lord. The Clerk will bring it in once the translation and typing is complete, my lord.’

‘When documents come from France,’ said the judge, searching for his glasses, ‘they come not as single spies, but in battalions.’

Mr Justice Black read the pieces of paper. Then he read them again.

‘Correct me if I am wrong, Mr Pugh. Your new evidence tells us that Randolph Colville was a bigamist, with a second wife living in Burgundy. And, furthermore, that he was flirting with another Frenchwoman whose husband caught them kissing and threatened to kill Randolph Colville. God bless my soul. It does make you wonder about their morals over there, it really does.’

Pugh restrained himself from saying that the same or worse could be said about English morals over here. There was a knock at the door. The Clerk of the Court shuffled in and handed over copies of the letter.

‘Battalions, gentlemen, battalions,’ said the judge grimly and read the final piece of evidence from Beaune.

‘There is a precedent, my lord, for documents arriving late
being admitted as evidence. Regina versus Spick, my lord, 1897. Late financial information from America was accepted by Mr Justice Williams in that case.’ Pugh did not bother to point out that his young assistant had discovered five other cases where the late evidence had not been admitted before tumbling on Spick at a quarter to two in the morning.

The judge muttered to himself as if precedents were not going to hold much weight with him. ‘Mr Pugh,’ Mr Justice Black laid his glasses on a pile of papers on his desk, the one concealing the wine catalogue, ‘what can you tell us about the provenance of these documents?’

‘Well,’ said Pugh, ‘the defence has been fortunate to have at its disposal a private investigator who went to Burgundy, discovered the other wife and tried to give their testimony such legitimacy as he could. You will note that the first two are signed in the presence of a French lawyer and the Mayor of Beaune? And there is the marriage certificate, of course.’

‘Did you say private investigator?’ asked the judge. He made it sound like the lowest forms of rat catcher.

‘I did, my lord, he is a most distinguished man in his field, called Powerscourt.’

‘Powerscourt, did you say, Mr Pugh? Lord Francis Powerscourt?’ asked Sir Jasper.

‘The same, Sir Jasper. He is without, if you would like to question him.’

‘Forgive me, Mr Pugh,’ said the judge, ‘I should like to hear from Sir Jasper about the attitude of the prosecution to these documents. I have to say I regard it as most irregular. There are no witnesses. The proper course would be for me to adjourn the trial for forty-eight hours and send a reliable man over to Burgundy who can confirm that these statements are reliable. Or I could throw them out altogether. Sir Jasper?’

‘My lord, my initial reaction is one of suspicion. These documents could all be forgeries after all. I see that the note from Lord Rosebery vouchsafes the veracity of the translations but not the veracity of the documents themselves. Where
are the witnesses, my lord? Why are these two ladies not in court to give their evidence? Why is there nobody for me to cross-examine to establish the truth? That, after all, has always been a fundamental right of counsel in English law going back centuries.’

Richard Napier was making a lightning sketch of Sir Jasper now, Bentinck in Full Flow he had decided to call it.

‘I think we can launch a limited investigation into the truth of the documents right here in this court, my lord.’ Sir Jasper was sounding very efficient now, a man rising to the occasion. ‘I believe we have the wife of the defendant and the wife of the victim in the witness room, both of whom took part in family discussions on these matters. I propose to request Detective Chief Inspector Weir here to ask the two ladies if they believe this new material to be true, and if they object to this evidence coming out in court.

‘I must confess an interest here, my lord. I have not had the privilege of meeting Lord Francis Powerscourt in person. But I know many people who have. Indeed I recall our former Prime Minister Lord Salisbury speaking most highly of his integrity and his abilities in my hearing shortly before he died, Lord Salisbury that is, not Lord Powerscourt. Perhaps, my lord, if we could summon him here he might be able to help me.’

‘By all means,’ said Mr Justice Black in cheerful mode at the memory of his winning contract of six spades redoubled in the penultimate rubber. ‘Bring him in when Sir Jasper has finished his conversation with the Chief Inspector.’

Richard Napier went off to find Powerscourt. Pugh suddenly saw that Powerscourt, although he would not be aware of it, might hold the whole case in his hands. If he could convince Sir Jasper that the documents were genuine, then the prosecution would accept them and the judge would have little option but to agree with that decision. If Sir Jasper was not convinced, then there would be no documents and the case would almost certainly be lost.

Another chair was brought forward opposite the judge. Powerscourt bowed to him and shook hands with Sir Jasper.

‘Good of you to join us, Lord Powerscourt,’ Sir Jasper began. ‘I would like to ask you a few questions about these documents if I may.’

‘By all means,’ Powerscourt replied, turning slightly in his chair to face the prosecution counsel.

‘Could I begin by asking what took you to France in the first place? Did you suspect that Randolph Colville might be running a separate establishment over there?’

‘May I say something about the different ways of operating between barristers and judges and private investigators?’ said Powerscourt. ‘You gentlemen here in these august surroundings are dealing with the full majesty of the law. You need facts. You need evidence. You need to be able to cross-examine witnesses to test the truth of their statements. With me it is very different. I went to Burgundy on a hunch, on instinct. It was, admittedly, a hunch of several different parts. Randolph Colville was ambidextrous, totally so. He could play tennis without ever using a backhand. The Colville man in Burgundy disappeared around the time of the murder. He was often asked to England but never came. When representatives of the firm who knew Randolph Colville went to Beaune, he was always away on business. This man in France was also ambidextrous, able to write his name with both hands at the same time. It seemed to me that they might be one and the same person.’

‘Are you telling us,’ Sir Jasper sounded incredulous, ‘that you were not aware of the bigamy factor until you went there?’

‘I was guessing, Sir Jasper. I took a recent photograph from his English wife’s house with me so that the wife and the other woman could confirm his identity.’

‘Let me ask you two related questions, if I may,’ said Sir Jasper. ‘Was it impossible for the two women to come and give evidence? And are you certain this marriage certificate is genuine?’

‘I tried, believe me, Sir Jasper, to persuade one or both of them to come to London. The wife was too upset. She was, after all, married to a man who was married already. Her children, their children, had lost their father and, possibly, their future. She was going to travel as soon as she could to her mother’s house somewhere in the Auvergne. The other lady could not face the shame of telling a court in another country what she had done in her own. And she was waiting for her husband the sergeant to come back. You mention marriage certificates, Sir Jasper. I have brought the one in the possession of the lawyer Antoine Foucard from Givray who witnessed the statements of the two women. His father had been the lawyer responsible for the wedding. His father had been a guest at the reception. When I showed him the photo of Randolph Colville by the Thames he was in no doubt it was Jean Pierre Drouhin. Madame Drouhin was reluctant to let me take her copy away as she thought she would need it in any arguments with the legal gentlemen about the will. The one I have brought is the one from the lawyer’s office. I am certain it is genuine.’

Detective Chief Inspector Weir had found an empty office to talk to the two Mrs Colvilles. He explained that the defence were trying to bring new evidence to bear concerning the bigamous behaviour of Randolph Colville.

‘When did you first hear of this bigamy business?’ asked Weir.

‘I’ll handle this, Hermione,’ said Isabella Colville. ‘We first heard about ten days before the wedding.’

‘But you didn’t see fit to inform the authorities?’ said Weir sternly.

‘No, we didn’t,’ said Isabella, ‘we didn’t think it was any of their business.’

‘I must ask you this, ladies, did you believe it was true, this information about the other wife in France? That there was another Mrs Colville, as it were?’

‘Of course it was true, it is true.’ Isabella Colville sounded indignant. ‘Randolph didn’t deny it, he never said it wasn’t true. He admitted the whole thing, for heaven’s sake.’

‘Could I ask, Lord Powerscourt, if you were operating through a translator in these discussions in Burgundy?’ said Sir Jasper.

‘No, I was not, Sir Jasper. I am fluent in French and my wife Lady Lucy speaks it perfectly. She is, if I could coin a phrase, linguistically ambidextrous between French and English.’

Sir Jasper glanced at his watch. It was now ten past ten, fifty minutes to go before the court re-assembled.

‘One last question, Lord Powerscourt. This is all most irregular. What can you say to convince me that these statements are genuine, that we are not being hoodwinked by a couple of crafty Frenchwomen out to feather their nests in some way or other?’

‘Gentlemen,’ said Powerscourt addressing the judge and Sir Jasper, ‘in my profession, as in yours, you acquire over the years an acute sense of when people are lying to you. I am absolutely convinced that the two women were telling the truth, that their statements are genuine. If you asked me to go into the witness box behind us and swear under oath that they were true I would gladly do so.’

‘Thank you,’ said Sir Jasper, ‘thank you very much.’

‘I must put one other point to you, ladies.’ Weir was well used to being treated as a fool by now. ‘Do you have any objection to this information coming out in court? About the bigamy, I mean.’

Mrs Isabella Colville paused. She knew there were people who suspected that her husband Cosmo was keeping his silence because of some secret, and if those people knew about her brother-in-law’s bigamy, they might assume that
the bigamy was the cause of the silence. Would Cosmo want her to admit the bigamy into court proceedings? Would it bring shame on the Colville name? Suddenly she remembered the look on Charles Augustus Pugh’s face and the tone of his voice the previous Friday when she asked him outside the Old Bailey about her husband’s chances. His words were optimistic. His face and his voice were not.

‘It’s the defence that’s asking for it, isn’t it, Detective Chief Inspector?’ Scandal or no scandal, Isabella Colville wanted her husband back. ‘Well, it’s my husband who’s on trial. If his defence team want it, then I think they should have it. Absolutely. No objections here.’

Sir Jasper and the rest of the lawyers listened gravely to the Detective Chief Inspector’s account of his interview.

‘Gentlemen,’ said the judge, ‘I would welcome a brief summary from both of you of your own position. Mr Pugh?’

‘My lord,’ said Pugh, ‘I have very little to say. I believe Lord Powerscourt put the case for the acceptance of the French evidence very clearly. We believe that the signed documents and the marriage certificate are sufficient proof that the women of Givray are telling the truth. We have just heard that the Colville women here are convinced the bigamy is true – the husband never denied it after all – and they have no objections to the matter coming out in court. Of course the defence would like to see the new evidence included. But that is not my decision, my lord. It is for you and Sir Jasper and the defence is most grateful for the way the matter has been handled. I remain in your debt, my lord, for your willingness to look at this late request. We shall, of course, accept your judgement.’