Rumpole Misbehaves (6 page)

So many cases have started in the interview room in Brixton Prison that the place has become a sort of home from home. It was there that I met Scottie Thompson. He was a short, high-shouldered, perpetually smiling man who seemed very anxious to please. When I asked him where he came from north of the border, it turned out that he was not really a Scot, but had so much enjoyed a holiday tour of the Highlands, and had talked about it so much, that his friends had named him Scottie. He had set up a business named, of course, Highlands Transport.

Scottie had known Fred Atkins since they were at school together. He knew that Fred drove a lot over in Europe for what he said was an ‘import and export company'. Fred had a pick-up job in Europe on the day of his daughter's wedding, and Scottie was not particularly surprised when his friend asked him to do it for him.

‘He gave me the paperwork and all that. I couldn't see no problem and it was good pay. Fred gave me the lot.'

I asked him where he picked up the crates.

‘Romanian border. I had a meet there. The man said he'd brought the load over from Russia. Said he couldn't drive the load to Dover “because they knew him too well”. I didn't quite know what he meant by that.'

‘Did you know then where you were supposed to be taking them?'

‘Fred had told me to deliver at a warehouse in the Canary Wharf area. I was to ring him when I'd got through Customs.'

‘And did you ring him?'

‘Yes. I could hear the sounds of the wedding party. I was talking to him when Customs were opening the crates. I told him what was happening and he slammed the phone down on me. Never heard a word from him since. It was then that I saw what I'd brought over. Girls, good-lookers too. They must have had a terrible journey. I wanted to find out more, but I got arrested.'

‘And Fred?'

‘He's done a runner.'

‘We've given all this information to the police,' Bonny Bernard told me. ‘There's a search on for Fred. All the ports and airports.'

‘So the opening of the crates came as a complete surprise to you?'

‘I'd never have done it if I knew, Mr Rumpole. That's no way to make a woman travel, no way at all.'

I looked at Scottie. He seemed puzzled, bewildered. But then his smile was almost proud.

‘They got me for the mastermind, have they, Mr Rumpole?'

‘We'll try to prove that you weren't, that you were an entirely innocent cog in a complicated piece of machinery.'

‘Oh, is that all I was?' Scottie looked almost disappointed.

Did I believe him? I told myself firmly that it didn't matter what I believed, a jury would have to decide.

So we left Brixton Prison and a client who seemed to regret he would never make a serious criminal. He was just someone who, like the girls in the crates, had been taken for a ride.

A week or two later I was contemplating with some satisfaction the current state of the Rumpole career: an important murder in Court Number One at the Old Bailey, from which I had managed to remove the unwelcome assistance of my not so learned leader, and the curious case of the crated women. I treated myself to a couple of ham sandwiches and had just opened my private bottle of Pommeroy's Very Ordinary when, like a dark cloud flitting across a sunlit sky, my ex-leader appeared in the doorway.

‘Rumpole!' Sam Ballard's greeting was not altogether friendly. ‘You're doing it
again
.'

‘Oh yes. I manage to keep going somehow. A number of important cases in the pipeline. There's a satisfactory number of persons who still need Rumpole. And I'm perfectly willing to oblige.'

‘I'm not talking about your criminal practice, Rumpole. I speak of your repeated anti-social behaviour. You've brought food in here again, Rumpole, you're bringing alcoholic drink into Chambers, and when you finish your picnic I've no doubt that you'll be tempted to smoke one of those unhealthy little cigars you still carry about with you.'

‘I have every intention,' I told him, ‘of yielding to that temptation.'

‘Not for much longer! The government will soon see to that.'

Ballard sighed heavily, looked at me in a despairing sort of way and plonked himself down in my client's chair.

‘I'm here to help you, Rumpole, to help and advise you. Now, wasn't it very foolish of you to avoid service of the ASBO?'

‘I couldn't take it seriously.'

‘You'll have to take it seriously.'

‘The serious thing about ASBOs is that they're an outrage to our great legal system. A boy kicking a football can be sent to prison for conduct which is not a crime after not having had a fair trial with the presumption of innocence. The boy either wears his ASBO like a badge of honour or goes to prison, where he can learn to be a serious crook.'

‘Rumpole, you must move with the times.'

‘If I don't like the way the times are moving I shall refuse to accompany them.'

‘Very well then.' Ballard slapped his knees and hinged himself out of my chair. ‘You can expect service of another document.'

‘And what about your behaviour?'

‘What do you mean?'

‘Telling my solicitor Bonny Bernard that you couldn't do the murder case because of a previous engagement when in truth you'd taken a hearty dislike to young Wetherby and all his doings.'

Ballard stood silent for a moment then said, ‘The solicitors don't know that, do they?'

‘Not yet. But they may do if we hear any more about this ASBO business.'

There was a long pause. Ballard heaved a sigh and made his way to the door. ‘I'll have to consult all our members. Some of them were very keen on the idea.'

So he left me. I have to admit that I felt a pang of guilt. Had the criminal instincts of my clients rubbed off on me and was I guilty of blackmail? I dismissed the thought on the grounds that all is fair in love and ASBOs, then I finished my glass of Pommeroy's Very Ordinary.

‘What's that all about?' Bonny Bernard looked puzzled.

‘A poem by Matthew Arnold. Son of a boring headmaster who invented the public-school system. Dover beach meant almost as much to him as it does to us.'

I had persuaded my instructing solicitor to drive me to the coast on a Saturday morning to do some essential research on the Wetherby case. We were at the harbour, looking down at the sea.

‘We've got to discover more about Ludmilla. People usually have some reason for getting themselves murdered.'

‘She died because Wetherby found strangling another way of having sex.' Bonny Bernard always took a pessimistic view of his clients.

‘Do you believe that? Graham Wetherby had been visiting prostitutes for years, him and his birthmark, without resorting to violence.'

‘That may be true. But what do you want to know about the girl?'

‘Ludmilla? She came from Russia. Scottie Thompson told us about a delivery of girls from Russia in crates.'

‘You're suggesting that Scottie had Ludmilla in the back of his lorry?'

‘Probably not. That would be too much of a coincidence. But she may have used the same method of transport. Do you know how Matthew Arnold finished his poem?'

‘Not yet, Mr Rumpole, but I'm sure you're going to tell me.'

‘I don't know what that's got to do with it.'

‘That's what's happening today, isn't it? Ignorant armies clashing everywhere. And lost people running away in search of new homes, safety and regular money. Look! This is where they are unloading the lorries. I wonder how many uninvited guests they've brought in today.'

‘Where are we going now?'

‘In search of beer and a sandwich.'

‘No more poetry?'

‘No more, I promise.'

We went to a harbour bar, a place full of pale, anxious families about to go on holiday, and suntanned happier travellers arriving home.

‘We're going to the Removal Centre next.' I was enjoying a pint of Guinness and a double-decker sandwich.

‘What on earth is the Removal Centre?'

‘Where they either decide to keep you here or, far more frequently, force you to go back to where you came from. It'd be interesting to see how Ludmilla slipped through their fingers.'

‘It won't take too long?'

‘Of course not.'

‘I told my wife that I was just taking you out for a short spin in the country.'

‘As the barrister of your choice, Bonny Bernard,' I told him, ‘I am responsible for many things, but not for what you tell your wife. Drink up now and we can get going.'

 

The Removal Centre was a large, not particularly friendly looking building near to the harbour. It was clearly full to overflowing, with the sounds of children crying, women protesting and men arguing in various languages.

We were shown into an office stuffed with computers, presided over by an unsmiling woman who looked as though she wanted us to be removed without any further delay. I told her that we were lawyers engaged on an important case ‘funded by the government'. I asked her if she could discover whether someone called Ludmilla Ravenskaya entered the country on the date when Scottie's crates were opened, and she was delighted to tell me that there was no record of her having done so. We were about to be dismissed when God, having nothing better to do, came to the aid of a struggling defence barrister. I heard the cry of ‘Mr Rumpole' and turned to see a face I vaguely recognized, pink-cheeked and decorated with a small moustache.

‘Don't you remember? I'm Des Pershore of the M2. They wanted to do me for dangerous driving a couple of years ago.'

Fragments of memory returned, another argument about the reliability of speed cameras and some contradictory police evidence.

‘Didn't I get you off?'

‘Indeed you did, Mr Rumpole! If I'd got a conviction my life wouldn't have been worth living. I work here now. So, what can I do for you?'

‘They say they are on a case funded by the government.' The woman sounded as though she didn't believe a word of it.

‘I'm sure they are. Mr Rumpole is a very important barrister,' Pershore was happy to correct her. ‘Now, how can I help you, Mr Rumpole? It would be a small return for all you did for me.'

I told him that I wanted to know if a Russian woman named Ludmilla Ravenskaya had entered the country via Dover.

This led to prolonged clicking research on various computers, which ended in a cry of triumph from Pershore.

‘I've got it for you, Mr Rumpole. It was 12 September last year. Illegal entry into Dover harbour.'

‘And what happened? Was she sent back to where she came from?'

Pershore was frowning in a puzzled sort of way at one of his machines. ‘It seems not. She was allowed to apply for asylum.'

‘What does that mean exactly?'

‘We let her go free on the condition that she reported regularly to a police station in the Paddington area.'

‘Had anyone suggested that she might be a candidate for asylum?'

‘I'm afraid the computer doesn't tell you that sort of thing. It seems she was just one of the lucky ones.'

‘Not all that lucky.'

‘Why?'

‘She got herself murdered.'

 

In the car on the way back Bonny Bernard accused me of deceit. ‘You said you were doing a case that the government is paying for.'

‘So it is.'

‘What do you mean?'

‘We're defending Wetherby on legal aid. That's the government's money, isn't it?'

‘So you're saying it wasn't a lie?'

‘No. Just a slightly misleading statement, but it was for a good cause.'

‘What good cause exactly?'

‘Finding out who recommended Ludmilla as a candidate for asylum. Who was it who really wanted her here?'

 

As we pulled up outside Froxbury Mansions some time later, I turned to Bonny Bernard and said, ‘Thank you. And thank your good wife for letting us hear the grating roar of pebbles on Dover beach.'

‘You're to be congratulated,' I told the jury after one of my less interesting engagements, ‘on having sat through one of the most boring cases ever heard at the Old Bailey.'

‘It may well come as a surprise to you to know,' responded the presiding judge, Sir Leonard Bullingham no less, who couldn't resist putting in his own two pennyworth, ‘that it is not the sole purpose of the criminal law of England to entertain Mr Rumpole!'

There were some obedient sniggers from the jury at this but I thought it was not altogether funny. My life among so many cheerful criminals and vainglorious judges had brought me more pleasure than could ever be experienced by a rock star or record-breaking mountaineer.

At the end of that day in court the usher told me, ‘Our judge wants to see you in his room, Mr Rumpole.' So, going behind the scenes, I knocked on His Lordship's door and walked in to find the Mad Bull ducking and diving and throwing punches at the reflection of himself in a mirror fixed to a cupboard door. I watched this, fascinated and in the faint hope that he might land a blow on his own reflection. Then he caught sight of me in the mirror.

‘Shadow-boxing, Rumpole. Keep fit, mustn't we? The women expect it of us.'

‘Which women exactly?' I was finding it hard to follow His Lordship's drift.

‘The lovely Hilda.' I remembered then that the Bull had suggested that She Who Must ought to divorce me and marry him–a suggestion she turned down when he added the condition that they might take dancing lessons together.

‘I don't know whether you really understand this, Rumpole. Your wife has a formidable intellect.'

‘Of course I understand. Hilda's no fool.'

‘Certainly not! Did you know that girl of yours remembers every card played in a round of bridge? She's got a mind that would get her straight through the Bar exams. No trouble at all.'

‘Are you trying to tell me,' I was finding the conversation difficult to grasp, ‘that Hilda wants to go to the Bar?'

‘Of course.'

‘She wants to practise? Where?'

‘She would like to practise at the Criminal Bar, Rumpole. Living with you, she knows all about it anyway. Now she's going to be able to put it to good use.'

‘What sort of use is that?'

‘What's the name of that family you're always representing?'

‘The Timsons.'

‘The Timsons, yes! With their perpetual troubles–which aren't really serious enough for a silk to be employed. You would be rather relieved if all those cases could be passed on to Hilda. You'll be glad when you've done it.'

‘Done what?'

‘Taken silk, of course. Hilda will have to go through the Bar exams, but that will be no trouble to a mind like hers!'

‘So you received my letter?'

‘Rumpole, I have considered your letter long and hard.'

‘And are you prepared to recommend me? I need a judge.'

‘I know you do–and here I am. I think the name Bullingham will carry a bit of weight with the Department for Constitutional Affairs.'

I want to confess that I was stumped for words. It was as though I had been ready to meet an angry wolfhound, only to discover that my hand was being licked by an almost embarrassingly attentive Pomeranian.

‘It's enormously kind of you,' I said.

‘Of course it is. Without my name you don't have a cat in hell's chance. The title “High Court Judge” still carries a bit of clout in the corridors of power. And when you've got your silk, Hilda can start firing on all cylinders.'

‘Thank you for doing this for me.'

‘I'm not doing it for you, Rumpole, I'm doing it for her.'

Going home on the tube from Temple station I fell into a sleep. In a moment of dreaming, I saw the huge figure of She Who Must Be Obeyed dressed in a wig and gown with her arms full of briefs in cases.

When I got back to Froxbury Mansions, and Hilda was reduced to the normal size, she said, ‘Leonard Bullingham tells me he's going to back your claim for silk.'

‘He told me that too.'

‘I think it's enormously kind of him, considering how rude you've been to him in court.'

‘Considering how rude he has been to me in court, it's very good of me to accept his help!'

‘Did Leonard tell you I'm thinking of reading for the Bar? He says I have exactly the right talents for it.'

‘If that means you can argue the hind legs off a donkey, I have to agree,' was what I didn't say. Hilda had made her decision and I would have to learn to live with it.

 

A few weeks after the events chronicled above I was seated alone in my favourite corner of Pommeroy's Wine Bar, sharing a bottle of Château Thames Embankment with myself.

At a distant table, presided over by Claude Erskine-Brown, other members of 4 Equity Court Chambers were gathered. Hoskins, a barrister who had to maintain his many daughters, was there, and my ex-pupil Mizz Liz Probert, and Luci Gribble too, perhaps to look after our image. Even our clerk, Henry, was telling some anecdote, no doubt about Rumpole, which appeared to set the table on a roar. Ever since the attempt to serve an anti-social behaviour order upon me, I had been treated by my fellow members like some ancient and outdated piece of machinery, a wind-up gramophone perhaps.

Did I, in fact, represent some antique part of Chambers which needed clearing out in the war against global warming?

I was sitting alone with that thought when a sharp voice said, ‘Lars Bergman, new crime correspondent of the
Daily Fortress
. You're Mr Rumpole, aren't you?'

It was useless to deny it to the youngish man with slicked-down blond hair who immediately sat down at my lonely table uninvited.

‘The man at the bar pointed you out. I'm doing a piece on the Wetherby case. Isn't it a funny sort of case for you to be defending?'

‘I haven't got many laughs out of it up till now.'

‘But it's a hopeless defence, isn't it? I mean, the man is so obviously guilty.'

I refrained from offering Mr Bergman a drink. ‘Hopeless cases,' I told him, ‘are rather my speciality.'

‘That's what my editor objects to.'

‘I'm not really doing my work to please your editor.'

‘He thinks defending hopeless cases is a shocking waste of public money. This
is
a legal aid case, isn't it?'

‘And what does your editor intend to do about it?'

‘He thinks a single judge should look at the case, and if there's nothing that amounts to a defence, he could order a short trial.'

‘Your editor must be extremely old.'

‘A younger man than you are, Mr Rumpole.'

‘He's like our present government. All born before 1215, the date of Magna Carta. They haven't yet heard that no one is to be sent to prison without a trial by his equals.'

Bergman looked at me for a moment in a puzzled sort of way, and then he said something which seemed to switch on lights all around him and make him the sole object of interest for me in Pommeroy's Wine Bar.

‘I suppose I feel strongly about it,' he said, ‘because I met her.'

‘You met Ludmilla Ravenskaya?'

‘Yes. She told me her name. And it was the same address, off Sussex Gardens.'

‘You went there,' here I put it as delicately as I could, ‘as a client?'

‘Not really. My editor wanted me to write about the organization, whatever it was, which was importing these girls in the backs of lorries.'

‘Perhaps I judged your editor too harshly. That's a subject I should love to have investigated.'

‘I saw her name up in a telephone box. “Exotic Russian beauty will show you that the Cold War is over”. There was a telephone number.'

‘So you went to Flyte Street?'

‘And met Ludmilla, yes. She thought I'd come for sex, of course, but I told her I'd come for information which would be far better paid.'

‘So she told you what exactly?'

‘Nothing then. She said she was far too busy with clients, but she told me to call her in a week or two and she'd give me the story. She wanted half the money in advance.'

‘Did she get it?'

‘No, but I gave her £100 as a retainer. That was on top of what I had to pay for the sex I didn't have.'

‘And did you phone her?'

‘I decided to wait, but then the story was all over the papers. Your client Wetherby had shut her mouth forever.'

‘Did you see her maid? A woman called Anna McKinnan.'

‘I suppose so. There was a woman who showed me in and said goodbye to me when I left.'

‘Did you tell her what you'd asked Ludmilla?'

‘No. I simply said we'd had a nice chat. It's no good you asking me these questions, Mr Rumpole. You're going to get a blast from the
Fortress
. “Barristers who get fat and rich on defending hopeless cases”, that kind of thing.'

‘I resent that,' I told him.

‘I'm sure you do. I'm just warning you what to expect.'

‘I may be fat, but I'm certainly not rich.'

So he left me, and I poured out the remainder of the bottle. I thought of Lars, and then of Lars Porsena of Clusium, who, in the old poem,

This Lars's ‘messenger' would go forth in every issue of the
Daily Fortress
to portray Rumpole as the man who throws public money away on nonexistent defences.

And then I remembered a possibly valuable piece of evidence that Lars had brought to me, so I raised a glass to him in spite of everything, an absent friend.