Rumpole Rests His Case (7 page)

I had taken my seat next to a purple-fringed shawl and an uncased guitar in the corner of the sofa, while Bernard was balanced, a little unsteadily, on another bean bag. Looking round the room, sniffing the exotic odours, I thought we were in a museum, a careful reproduction of the past, like the Victorian dining-rooms or eighteenth-century boudoirs that might be constructed to educate the public on the way we lived then. Or did Tony Thrale, by all accounts a conventional solicitor by day, come home each evening to life in a time warp?

‘Mr Rumpole,' Glenda Thrale was speaking to me in a voice that was curiously high and seemed to come from a long way off, ‘don't you adore the Beach Boys?'

Was she casting serious doubt at my sexual orientation? I must say I bridled a little and answered, in an aloof sort of way, ‘I'm afraid I don't spend much time on beaches.'

At this Glenda fell into a prolonged silence, and my spirits sank to a new low when Tony offered us, by way of a pre-dinner sharpener, a temperance beverage, a curiously unattractive mixture of lime and mango juices, said to be rich in vitamins but sadly deficient in alcohol.

I had pushed the lentils round my plate, hidden some under the untouched couscous, and, in describing the repast as ‘delicious', committed perjury. Now we were about to get what we'd come for — Tony Thrale's reminiscences of swinging Perivale. ‘Jo was very beautiful. Clear blue eyes and a lot of blonde curls.'

‘With flowers in them?' I remembered the photograph.

‘Flowers in them quite often.'

‘And her husband?'

‘He was a surprise. I could never quite make out why she'd married him. He was very good looking, of course, and I think they'd been childhood sweethearts. She was the girl next door to his parents' house in Perivale. They went to school together, he carried her books, all that sort of that sort of thing ...'

‘Did you get to know him?'

‘Hardly at all.'

‘What was his job?'

‘Something in the building trade — I believe he did rather well. Moved off the sites and into the office. She said he practically ran the business.'

I remembered the statements of the semi-detached neighbours. At about the time Jo vanished, her husband had got in building materials. They heard sounds at night and he explained he was dealing with a damp wall in the kitchen.

‘Did they go out together?'

‘Never. So far as I remember. I think she said he was seriously religious and spent a lot of his spare time doing things for a particular church. He wouldn't have enjoyed the Karma Club, or The Age of Aquarius in Alperton. That's where the cool people went.'

‘Was it cool for you,' I wondered, ‘being an articled clerk in a solicitors' office?'

‘I wrote a column for an underground magazine. It was called “Kill All Lawyers”. I showed it round the Aquarius so I kept my credibility.'

‘What did your law firm think about that?'

‘It was printed in green ink on green paper, so it was more or less illegible. Anyway, I don't think the partners subscribed to
Peeping Tom.'

‘Did the Twinehams quarrel about her going out, do you remember?'

‘I'm not sure she told him everything. I mean, she always said she loved him and it would have been hard for anyone not to love her. I don't think she told him about all the clubs and bars we went to - she had some story about evening classes and study groups. Exams she had to prepare for. I got the feeling that he didn't ask too many questions, and our life was something she didn't take home with her.'

‘Your
life?' I asked him the question direct.

Tony Thrale smiled, less with embarrassment than a sort of pride. ‘You know what we believed in then. “Make love not war.”'

‘Was war an available alternative?'

‘Well, of course it wasn't. So we just made love.'

Glenda Thrale had been busy with a pouch and packet of cigarette papers. She had rolled a fairly fat cigarette which she now lit and inhaled deeply. Having got the thing alight, she handed it to her husband.

‘You mean,' I thought this had to be asked, ‘you and Josephine Twineham made love?'

‘It's hard to describe her.' Tony Thrale was now drawing heavily on the joint, a habit which seemed to have a strong following among the over-fifties. ‘When she walked into the club, or even if you bumped into her in the street, you'd feel somehow better, happier, more optimistic, as though the sun had just come out from behind a cloud and was shining brightly. She was beautiful, yes, and kind and interested in everybody. But it wasn't just that. She made people feel it was better to be alive.' He passed the joint back to his wife.

‘She was a little tart.' Glenda, after inhaling again, came out with this verdict, a condemnation quite out of fashion in the sixties.

‘She gave generously of herself.' Tony gently brought the language into the Age of Aquarius.

‘Do you think Will Twineham ever found out, about you and Jo, I mean?'

‘I don't think she ever told him. She didn't tell him everything.'

‘Or very much. Could he have found out?'

‘There was one time ... I'd got an afternoon off. I can't remember why. And we went to the cinema together ... What was the film? ...
Blow up.
I'm sure I can remember. Well, we'd done pretty much everything you can do in the double seats at the back of the old Regal and we came out still interested in each other and we ... well, we kissed. For a long time and pretty thoroughly. In the street. And then she said, “Don't look now”. But I turned and saw her husband. He'd just walked out of a shop across the road. I'm not sure if he saw us. I don't think he did.'

At this point, Glenda handed me the wet-ended stub. Feeling that the information might peter out if I rejected it, I put the object between my lips, drew in a mouthful, choked slightly and blew two columns of smoke out of my nose, producing a small, mirthless laugh from Glenda. Tony took the dank object from me and handled it more expertly.

‘Did she tell you if he ever tackled her about having seen you?'

‘No. She'd left.'

‘Left?'

‘Shortly after that we heard she'd left him. No one ever knew where she'd gone.'

‘Not with you?'

‘I'm afraid not.'

‘Or anyone else from the Age of Aquarius?'

‘We were all mystified. There must have been someone else, we thought, someone we didn't know anything about.'

‘Now you know what happened.'

‘Of course. He killed her, didn't he? Will murdered her.'

‘Is that what you think?'

‘Don't you? Who else did they dig up, if he didn't?'

‘I don't know.'

There was a silence then. No one spoke and the tape on the sound system was over. All the trappings of the past, the incense and the dope, the voices of Glenda's favourites, the Incredible String Band and Van Morrison (she had announced the performers' names as the music changed) had died away. Tony gave a little shiver, as though shaking off the past and doing his best to face the realities of the present.

‘Of course,' he said firmly, ‘there's no way you'll get me to come to Court to tell them any of this.'

‘We realize that, Tony.' Bonny Bernard was conciliatory. ‘This is mere background information. That's all Mr Rumpole wanted from you.'

‘It doesn't help you anyway, does it?' Tony was looking at me. He was a man making, in a determined fashion, for the way out. ‘I mean, the fact she had other lovers would only give him a motive for ... doing what he did.'

‘You think so?'

‘Isn't it obvious?'

And isn't it obvious, I might have added, that you, Tony Thrale, ex-swinger and survivor from the Age of Aquarius, might have been, partly at least, the cause of her death. Instead I thanked him. ‘You've been a great help, telling us about Jo. One more thing — how was her health?'

‘She had enormous energy.'

‘Never ill?'

‘She did acid, of course. Acid was what we did then. Gave her some funny dreams at times, she told me.'

‘No other problems?'

‘She got breathless sometimes. She became quite faint, as though she couldn't breathe. I thought it was the way she lived. Trying to cram everything in while there was still time.'

‘Did she go to a doctor? About the breathlessness, I mean?'

‘I think she did once. She told me something about an enlarged muscle to her heart.' He smiled. ‘I told her her heart was absolutely perfect.'

‘Did she get any treatment?'

‘I think she forgot about it. That would have been her way.'

Not long after that, Bernard and I were out in the street, breathing in air free from incense and the smell of exotic cheroots. I asked my solicitor to find out who Jo Twineham's doctor was and see if any notes survived.

‘I'm afraid they weren't much help.' Bernard was apologetic.

‘Well, at least we know a good deal more about the Twinehams.'

‘None of it's much help to the defence, is it? You've got to admit that. All we know just explains why he did it.'

‘I wouldn't agree with that . . . entirely. Oh, and if we have to meet Tony again, let's do it in Pommeroy's, shall we? At least somewhere he's living in the present.‘

 

 

On my way into Chambers a few days later, I stopped at Cameras R Us and took delivery of several copies of the photograph Owen Oswald, the helpful ex-drummer, had thoughtfully sent me.

‘Who was that group, the Pithead Stompers?' the girl who slid the vital evidence into a large envelope asked me. ‘I've never heard of them.'

‘No,' I told her, ‘I don't imagine many people have. But they will now.'

I was at my desk in the smoke-free zone, idly turning the pages of Ackerman's
Forensic Medicine
to check on what the Master of the Morgues had to say on the information available from skeletons, when Soapy Sam again intruded on my life.

‘Rumpole,' he said, ‘I've been thinking about that case of yours. The chap who buried his wife under the floorboards.'

‘Who is alleged to have buried her. We haven't had the trial yet.'

‘I did offer to lead you in that case, Rumpole.'

‘I thought I said “Thanks, but no thanks”.'

‘Of course, I would have done my best for your client.'

I didn't tell him what I thought of his best. Instead I raised a more immediate subject. ‘Ballard, you and I have a vital matter to discuss.'

‘But I have come to the conclusion not to take a brief in R. v.
Twineham,'
Ballard ploughed on. ‘Your man has no possible defence.'

‘This is a formal request to you, Ballard, to return my room to its status as a refuge for the peaceful enjoyment of a small cigar.'

‘Rumpole, neither of us has anything to gain by taking up impossible causes.'

‘I don't regard my cause as impossible. I understand you may have certain formalities to go through. Chambers meetings, getting the formal agreement of such puritanical spirits as Mizz Liz Probert, so I'll give you — well let's say three weeks. But you can do it, Ballard. You're entitled to do it as Head of Chambers. And I have to give you fair warning. If I'm still smoking in the street by the end of the month, the consequences to you may be dire.'

‘Rumpole, I have absolutely no idea what you mean.'

It was the moment to produce Exhibit A, the prosecution's trump card. I produced it, handing a copy to the accused.

There was a silence during which I took Soapy Sam to be slowly appreciating the damning nature of the evidence. When he spoke, it was, I have to admit, with considerable self-control.

‘That's me at Uni,' is what he said.

‘True,' I told him. ‘That central figure with its hair down to the shoulders, holding a guitar in a horribly suggestive fashion, is indeed you, Bonzo Ballard.'

The man attempted a brave smile and merely said, ‘Fancy you having that.'

‘A present from a well-wisher,' I told him. ‘Look at the drummer.'

‘Owen Oswald gave it to you?'

‘Indeed he did.'

Rising from his seat, Ballard said, ‘May I keep it?'

‘Do what you like with it. Burn it. Tear it into small pieces and flush it down the clerks' room facility. I have copies. And one goes up on the Chambers notice-board if my reasonable request isn't granted by the end of the month.'

Ballard was on his way out, looking at the photograph and smiling, as I thought, bravely.