B-Berry and I Look Back (4 page)

“‘Are you sure you didn’t dream this?’ I said. ‘You were very short of sleep.’

“His reply was so violent that the jury began to laugh…

“All’s fair in love and war, so I led him on – asking him questions designed to provoke his wrath. He rose to every fly, and the jury laughed like hell. But Cranbrook saw my game and began to get cross.

“‘What’s the point of these questions?’ he said.

“Well, I couldn’t very well tell him. Besides, he knew. So I bowed and sat down at once – much to the jury’s annoyance, for they were enjoying themselves. From their point of view, Cranbrook had spoiled sport.

“The stall-holder left the box, and counsel for the Crown summed up. Then I rose to address the Court.

“I can’t remember most of what I said, but I do remember suggesting that, after the sleepless and fruitless nights, each followed by a tiring day, the stall-holder was ready to see anything and seize anyone who so much as approached his stall. I think I put it better than that, for the jury laughed quite a lot. Then I sat down, feeling quite hopeful; and when Cranbrook, who was fuming, summed up dead against me, I felt that the jury might take the bit in their teeth.

“And so they did. To Cranbrook’s justified fury, they found the night-watchman not guilty – and that was that.

“Of course it was an outrage: but it wasn’t a major crime, and I had only done what I was engaged to do.”

“I can only hope,” said Berry, “that you are ashamed of yourself.”

“When I think of the stall-holder, I am. It was most unfair. But Cranbrook did his bit. I should never have got away with it before Coles Child.”

“Why?” said Daphne.

“Well, he would have smiled with the jury and left me alone. And then, in his summing up, he’d have said, ‘Well, we’ve all had a good laugh, gentlemen, but now I’m afraid we’ve got to get back to the facts.’ Or something like that. And the jury would have done as he said.”

“Nor,” said Jonah, “would you have got away with it at the Old Bailey.”

“Not on your life,” said I. “A City of London jury would have put me where I belonged.”

“Well, I’m glad he got off,” said Jill.

“I don’t expect,” said I, “he was free very long.”

Berry cleared his throat.

“After this shocking revelation—”

“Rubbish,” said Daphne. “You know it’s done all the time. Boy’s job was to get the man off, and I consider he did it extremely well.”

“He knew he was guilty,” said Berry.

“I had no doubt,” I said. “But he didn’t admit it to me. If he had, I should have made him plead guilty, or else have returned the brief.”

“Is that the law?” said Jill.

“The unwritten law, my sweet. A barrister’s first duty is to the Court.”

“Duty?” cried Berry. “You don’t know the meaning of the word. You twisted an honest man’s tail and then befooled twelve others. I don’t wonder Cranbrook was cross. I wish you’d been before me. I’d have made you think. And now go back for a minute. Just now you mentioned Eve, the Chancery Judge. And you said you’d bearded him when no one else in your chambers would touch the case. May we have that reminiscence? Or is it as obscene as it sounds?”

I began to laugh.

“There’s nothing obscene about it. It’s really more of a side-light on the spirit and manners of the Bar – in 1913, any way.”

“Proceed,” said Berry.

“Well, a brief came into Chambers one Wednesday afternoon – pretty late, it was, I think, about five o’clock. The senior clerk was out, but the junior took it in. When the senior clerk returned, he saw at once that it was a Chancery brief.

“Now as, no doubt, you know, the procedure in the Chancery Courts is entirely different to that in the Common Law Courts and Chancery matters are handled by Chancery men. And Chancery’s a very close borough – at least, it used to be. But we were Common Lawyers in Number One, Brick Court.

“The name of the head of my Chambers was on the brief, but he was down in the country doing some motoring case; so the senior clerk rang up the firm of solicitors who’d sent the brief, thanked them politely and said there was some mistake.

“‘No, there isn’t,’ said the managing clerk. ‘We’d like Mr Harker to do it, although he’s not a Chancery man.’

“‘Well, I don’t think he will,’ said our clerk. ‘It’s not his line. Any way, he’s down in the country and won’t be back till late. And I see it’s fixed for tomorrow afternoon.’

“‘Well, try him,’ said the other. ‘It’s only an application – won’t take him a quarter of an hour.’

“‘What if he won’t?’ said our clerk.

“‘You’ve other gentlemen in Chambers. Give it to one of them. It’s a loser, any way. Eve will never grant it. But it’s got to be made.’

“So our clerk said, ‘All right’ and put it on Harker’s table against his return.”

“Nice sort of solicitors,” said Berry.

“They were only acting as agents for a North Country firm. As like as not, they didn’t do Chancery work. But they knew and liked Harker and thought it best to go to someone they knew. Besides, they were up against time.

“Well, Harker never got back till seven o’clock – to London, I mean. So he never came to Chambers, but went straight home. When he arrived the next morning, there was the brief on the table, waiting for him. He took it up and looked at the back-sheet.

“‘What’s this?’ he said. ‘This ought to have gone to the other side of the road.’

“I’d better explain that saying. The Inner and Middle Temple are Common Law Inns of Court: and The Temple lies south of Fleet Street. Lincoln’s Inn is the home of the Chancery Bar: and that lies north of Fleet Street and so, as we always said, ‘on the other side of the road.’”

“What about Gray’s Inn?” said Jonah.

“I can’t be sure,” I said, “but I think some Chancery men were members of that. Common Lawyers certainly were. Birkenhead’s Inn was Gray’s Inn.

“And now to go back.

“The clerk explained the position and Harker heard him out.

“Then –

“‘I’m not going to do it,’ he said. ‘I’d like to oblige them, but I’ve been at the Bar too long to go out of my ground and make a fool of myself in a Chancery Court. Before Eve, too. No thank you.’

“When the clerk brought it to me, I had a look at the back-sheet and shook my head. ‘Nothing doing,’ I said. ‘Try somebody else.’

“Well, no one would take it on. So the clerk came back to me. ‘They’re all afraid, sir,’ he said. ‘Well, so am I,’ I said. ‘He can’t eat you, sir. Have a look at the case.’ Just then his telephone went, so he laid the brief on my table and left the room. I eyed it uncertainly. I wasn’t sure Eve couldn’t eat me, but I was rather ashamed of being afraid. Harker couldn’t afford to make a fool of himself; but I had no standing at all.

“So I rang up a fellow I knew at the Chancery Bar. When I told him what had happened, he laughed like hell. (I think it was his derision that forced me up to the gate. When I heard his mocking laughter, I knew I should take the case.) ‘Go and be murdered,’ he said. ‘Old Eve will chew you up. Besides, you’re poaching. That’s a Chancery brief.’ ‘That’s not my fault,’ I said. ‘The solicitors like us best. Now be a sport and tell me what to do.’ ‘I’d love to be there,’ he said, ‘but I’m on in another Court.’ ‘Thank God for that,’ said I. ‘But how do I go to work?’

“Well, so far as I could make out, applications were made, as usual, after the luncheon adjournment at two o’clock. My job was to sit quite still and hold my tongue until the usher cried out
Any more motions behind the bar
? And if nobody else got up, then I must get to my feet and state my case.”

“What does that mean?” said Daphne. “What is a motion and what is ‘behind the bar’?”

“I didn’t know then, my sweet, and I don’t know now. And, frankly, I really don’t care. The words are Chancery lingo and they can have them for me.”

“Allow me to observe,” said Berry, “that you ought to be in jail. Talk about obtaining money by false pretences…”

“Be quiet,” said everyone.

“Well, then I read the brief.”

“Only then,” said Berry. “God give me strength.”

“First things first,” I said. “Besides, they’d said it was a loser…

“Well, when I read it, it gave me rather a shock. The motion or application—”

“There you are,” said Berry. “You said a moment ago you didn’t know what a motion meant.”

“At that moment, I didn’t,” I said. “But now I do remember that, when someone makes an application to a Judge, he is said to be ‘moving the Court’ to do as he asks.

“Well, the motion or application which I was to make was on behalf of two sons to commit to prison their father for Contempt of Court.”

“You do seem to have had some nice cases,” said Berry. “Parricide now.”

“I admit it sounds rather bad; but it wasn’t as bad as it sounds. As far as I can remember, the position was roughly this.

“The father and his sons had a business in a North Country town. All three were partners. The sons, I may say, were hard-working, married men. A few months before, the three had agreed together to sell the business, as it stood. They had received an offer of twelve thousand pounds. This they had accepted. The father, as senior partner, was to take six, and each of the junior partners three thousand pounds.

“Well, the business was taken over, but the purchaser didn’t pay. When the sons protested, their father said, ‘That’s all right. He only wants time.’ Several weeks went by. At last the sons got impatient, and one of them went to see the purchaser. The latter said nothing, but rose and went to his safe. Then he laid before the son his father’s receipt for the sum of twelve thousand pounds. This bore the very date on which the purchase money should have been paid.

“As you may well believe, that was more than enough for the sons. They went to Court forthwith, and the father was ordered to pay the two their share, six thousand pounds, within seven days.

“That order was made on Monday, so he had till Monday next. But now the sons had discovered that their father had booked his passage for South America, and that the ship was due to sail on Saturday next. So that, if no action was taken, on Monday next he would be out of the jurisdiction… Hence this application.

“There could be no doubt that their money had already been transferred to some South American Bank: so that if their father sailed, they would never see it again. So I was to ask for an order to apprehend him at once and put him into prison, so that he could not sail. His behaviour, of course, was gross Contempt of Court.

“There’s no pretending that it was a savoury case. Sons don’t ask for their fathers to be cast into jail. But fathers, as a rule, don’t double-cross their sons: and six thousand pounds was a very great deal of money in 1913. The trouble was that Eve was not a Queen’s Bench Judge. He was very old-fashioned and had nothing to do with crime. I don’t suppose he’d ever been inside the Old Bailey. And he would be shocked to the marrow by an application which was redolent of such impiety.

“Well, I reached his Court in good time and sat down to wait for my cue. As the benches filled up, my neighbours regarded me. And not with sympathy. For I was a stranger – and I had a brief in my hand. Then a ‘silk’ turned round and favoured me with a stare. At last we all stood up, and Eve took his seat on the Bench.

“Some applications were made. Eve seemed to regard every one as a personal affront. He wasn’t rude, but he granted them grudgingly: and he jumped on anyone who put a foot wrong. And he seemed to know most of the counsel – called them by name.

“And then at last my turn came. The usher said his piece, but nobody else got up. And so I got to my feet.

“Before I could open my mouth –

“‘And what do you want?’ said Eve.

“That was rude – and the rudeness loosened my tongue.

“‘I’ll tell your lordship,’ I said. ‘I’m here on behalf of two sons to seek an immediate order committing their father to prison for Contempt of Court.’

“As soon as he could speak –

“‘Well you don’t think you’re going to get it, do you?’ barked Eve.

“As the Registrar gave him the affidavits –

“‘My lord,’ I said, ‘I venture to hope that your lordship will hear what I have to say. On the face of it, my lord, this is an impious request. But…’

“You see, the idea was to take the wind out of his sails. So I got in the word ‘impious’ before he did. I apologized for the motion and said that I hoped he’d believe that it was just as distasteful to me to make it as it must be for him to consider it, but that I had no choice: and that if he refused my request, two honest, decent men would be robbed of six thousand pounds.

“Well, he barked a good deal and was pretty rough with me. But the affidavits didn’t leave anything out. Then he played for time, but I was ready for that.

“‘Today is Thursday, my lord; and the time is half past two. And the ship sails on Saturday morning. If your lordship adjourns this motion, such adjournment will cost my clients six thousand pounds.’

“He spoke with the Registrar and he hummed and hawed. But in the end he granted the application.

“‘With the greatest reluctance,’ he said, ‘I do as you ask.’

“‘If your lordship pleases,’ I said, and resumed my seat.

“I never left a Court so quickly in all my life.”

“Allow me to say,” said Jonah, “that you did deserve to get on.”

“I quite agree,” said Daphne.

“My sweet,” said I, “I’ve mentioned two occasions on which I came off. But I had so many failures – lost cases I ought to have won. But those I try to forget. Any way, I’m talking off the record. This mustn’t go into a book.”

“I disagree,” said Jonah. “I’ll tell you why. You’re giving the low-down on the Bar – a thing that no legal memoir has ever done. You take us behind the scenes, revealing a state of affairs of which no layman dreams. Look at what you’ve just told us. Six thousand pounds at stake, and the sands running out, and clerks and solicitors and counsel all trying to pass the buck. To my mind this was a case for a powerful Chancery ‘silk’: instead, the lot falls upon you – who don’t even know the ropes. A Common Lawyer, you have to ask the procedure, before you go into Court – to confront a testy Judge and endeavour to make him grant an odious request. A daw among peacocks, you get a hostile reception; and you only get home, thanks to your mother wit and the grace of God. And this is not fiction, but fact.”