Alan Hunter: Landed Gently

‘Was it when you invited him here to spend Christmas?’

‘It might have been then. That might have been my idea.’

‘Well, we’ll leave it to the prosecution — they’ll love fighting that out!’ Gently stalked on, fists stuck out like rods in his pockets. ‘But the idea came to you — and it was a fascinating one too. It was nothing as simple as merely getting rid of Earle. If that had been all, you might not have done it. Or you might have done it more cleverly — a gun accident, for instance! But Earle was more than an obstacle. He was also a means to an end. As you contemplated the act you saw all its consequences — you saw the disposition of fate as clearly as though you had it in writing. Here was the great finis, the end you would have sought for yourself — here was the ultimate challenge to stamp your life with significance! Symbolically you would be the sacrifice, the old to the new. With your life, at one stroke, you could repay the debt of your family to society. And in addition to that you would die a martyr — the abolitionist would die by the hand of the hangman. And from the dock, the guilty dock, your voice would be heard. You could thunder to the four quarters of the earth the speech which fell stillborn in the House of Betrayal!

‘Am I still quoting the text? Have you nothing to add?’

‘Go on!’ panted Somerhayes. ‘Go on to the end!’

‘So we come to that particular night, when you overheard the assignation. It was near one in the morning, with everyone in bed or about to retire there. The need and the opportunity had come together. The fate you felt so strongly had provided the moment. You crept after Earle. You were not standing down there by the north-east door. Here is where you were crouching, here beside this pillar, beside the portico, beneath the panel with the truncheons — where your cousin couldn’t see you, nor, as it happened, could Johnson either! And you saw your cousin come, you heard the interview that took place, you saw Johnson come out to look, you saw your cousin return to her wing. And then you saw Earle leave the saloon — stand where you are standing now! — you plucked that truncheon from its panel, and you struck him down the stairs.

‘Why did you wipe the truncheon? Perhaps you can fill in that little item! It could be that you wanted the sensation of the slow approach of justice. In any case, you made certain that it would find you. You phoned the County Constabulary before you phoned Sir Daynes. Sir Daynes, as you knew, would try to find for accidental death, but once you’d given Dyson a smell of the scent, he’d follow you to the kill! Only it so happened that I was around too, and I was given the preference… While Sir Daynes was sidetracked by Johnson, you carefully kept me pointing in the right direction.’

Gently stopped opposite the gasping nobleman.

‘And that’s that, my lord — everything I should know!’

‘Take me!’ exclaimed Somerhayes, twisting round with outstretched hands. ‘I want you to make the arrest — I want you to do it — personally!’

Gently stood looking at him for a long, pitiless moment. Then he slowly shook his head.

‘No,’ he said. ‘It’s too fantastic… It’s psychologically impossible!’

‘You must arrest me — I demand it!’

Somerhayes was still holding out his hands. And Gently was still shaking his head with obstinate decision.

‘I knew you were to be the man — I appeal to you to do it!’

‘I may be the man’ — Gently shrugged — ‘but you’re not the man… there’s the contradiction!’

‘Mr Gently, you have grasped the whole case. As a magistrate, I adjure you to do your duty!’

‘I am trying to grasp it, my lord, and I shall certainly do my duty. But I repeat… you are not the man to commit a crime like this. You are a man to die — yes! But you are not a man to kill. Your whole record makes nonsense of the account I have just drawn up.’

‘How dare you make such a judgement!’

‘I dare, from the facts you have given me.’

‘In so many words, Mr Gently, I hereby confess to the murder of Lieutenant Earle!’

‘I’m sorry, my lord, but your character prevents me from accepting your word in the matter.’

Somerhayes’s hands fell to his sides, and he seemed to shrink back insensibly from the sudden, dramatic pose he had assumed. In the dim light it was impossible to distinguish the expression of his features or his eyes. He was merely a black-etched shape against the impoverished illumination below.

‘Mr Gently, I beseech you’ — his voice had sunk again to its lowest tone — ‘I beseech you to think well what you are doing before you take an irrevocable step. I can count on your understanding. I can count on yours alone. Do not press too far for the ultimate fact, when it may not be in the service of the ultimate truth. Consider, Mr Gently — I beseech you to consider!’

‘Mmn.’ Gently stood planted like a brooding statue.

‘Think again what manner of man I am. Be fearless, be favourless in your summing-up. You know I see myself truly. I am a spiritual man of straw, a decadent, an anachronism, one without value. My only good is to die well, my only excuse to have served an ideal. Before you interrupt what is wholly the course of justice, think — think!’

Gently nodded from his shadowy silence.

‘If men have purpose, and I believe they have, then the worthless have value when they accept the dispositions of providence. And this disposition is mine. By this I fulfil what would appear a useless destiny. Have you the right to withhold your assistance from me at this moment, or to tamper with a disposal bearing the stamp of higher purpose? I say you have not, Mr Gently, and I insist that you acknowledge it!’

Gently hunched his shapeless shoulders, looked away, and looked back again.

‘You can die, my lord,’ he said, ‘but you can’t kill. That’s all I acknowledge just now! And if you didn’t kill Lieutenant Earle, then you are proposing to die for another — and who else can that other be but Leslie Edward Brass?’

‘No!’ cried Somerhayes. ‘Be reasonable, Mr Gently!’

‘Brass,’ repeated Gently, his voice beginning to rise. ‘I say again — who else, my lord? Who else but the man you would turn into an idol? You have sacrificed your career to him — your money — your cousin’s love. And now you want to make the great sacrifice — don’t you? — to lay down your life!’

‘I am nothing!’ exclaimed Somerhayes. ‘Remember — I am nothing.’

‘On the contrary,’ snapped Gently. ‘You are the most profound egotist I have ever had to deal with!’

The nobleman reeled as though he had been struck in the face. The half-light below, catching him in profile, showed the white of his eye in a shocked dilation.

‘You shouldn’t have said that!’ he stammered. ‘Mr Gently, you shouldn’t have said it!’

‘No, I shouldn’t — should I?’ demanded Gently. ‘It wasn’t in the compact! My business was to stop short where you were still a heroic figure. Unfortunately I am not a hero-worshipper, my lord. You mistook your man when you cast me for the part. In the course of a long connection with the criminal character, I’ve been driven to the conclusion that the biggest heroes are the greatest criminals — they are psychopaths, my lord, people who have failed, like you, to reach a working compromise with life.’

Somerhayes caught hold of the balustrade and hung to it, gasping. ‘You are killing me!’ he cried. ‘Every word is like a dagger!’

‘The truth won’t kill!’ Gently pressed on mercilessly. ‘You’re going to face it this time, unlike all the other occasions, when you only played at facing it. Because you never have faced it yet, have you? From Jepson down to the House of Lords and Janice it’s been one long retreat — a retreat to preserve the myth — a retreat to keep intact the vision of Lord Somerhayes the Great. This is what I’ve come to understand. This is where the focus starts getting sharp. You care nothing for your cousin. You care nothing for society. To keep the myth unblemished you would sacrifice the love of the one and bequeath the other a killer — and step on the scaffold in an intoxication of self-love and imaginary grandeur. Where is the hero here, my lord? Where is the nobility I have been summoned to admire? All I can see is a gigantic selfishness, and an egotism so voracious that only tragedy can glut it!’