Simon Tolkien - Final Witness

“He referred to you by name. He said you were the one who showed him how the hiding place worked.”

“No, he didn’t. Thomas has made that up. It’s pretty convenient, isn’t it, that this Rosie character should mention me by name just when he could be sure that Thomas would overhear?”

“Please just answer the questions, Lady Robinson,” said Sparling in an effort to keep control of his cross-examination. But he was being beaten back and he knew it. He’d noticed out of the corner of his eye how several of the jurors had nodded in agreement immediately after Greta’s last observation. Sparling was in fact half relieved when the judge chose this moment for a ten-minute midmorning adjournment.

At the very moment that Judge Granger was sitting back in his easy chair in the privacy of his chambers inhaling the smoke from his first cigarette of the day, Thomas and Matthew were sitting at a table in the cafeteria of the Family Records Office with an array of half-drunk cups of coffee and empty soft-drink cans in front of them. They’d just returned from a third unsuccessful attempt to persuade Andrew the applications clerk to expedite their application.

“Bastard, officious bastard.” Thomas spat out the words while giving further expression to his feelings by crushing an empty Coke can in his hand.

“I know,” said Matthew. “But if you’d carried on, we’d probably have gotten thrown out and then we wouldn’t get the certificates at all.”

Thomas didn’t answer. He’d begun work on another can.

“We should still be okay even if we get the certificates at twelve-twenty. It’s not far from here to the court in a taxi, and then we’ve only got to find Sergeant Hearns. He’ll sort it out, Tom.”

“If he can. But it may be too late by then. My father told me that Greta’s not calling any other witnesses except him, so once he’s given evidence, we’ve had it. Hearns said that there can’t be any more evidence after the defense has closed its case.”

“We should have gotten him to help with this.”

“I couldn’t get hold of him all day yesterday, and he’s not going to get the information any quicker this morning than we are. Besides, what we’ve got out of the index book doesn’t really amount to that much if you think about it. Jonathan B. Rowes married a Someone Grahame somewhere in Liverpool sometime in 1989. So what! Why should Rowes be Rosie? Why should Grahame be Greta?”

“Because they are,” said Matthew fervently. “Because of what your father heard Greta saying on the telephone. That she wasn’t his Greta Rose anymore.”

“But she can explain that. Greta Rose is her real name. That much is in the index books.”

“His Greta Rose. That’s what she said.”

“All right, Matthew,” said Thomas, suddenly smiling. “You’re right. We’ve got to keep our hopes up and stop speculating.”

But Thomas’s frustration returned as he gazed up at the cafeteria clock for the hundredth time that morning just as the hands came together at noon.

The bells of the City’s many churches had just finished tolling the hour when John Sparling rose from his chair to resume his cross-examination of Lady Greta Robinson. The courtroom was packed, but there was no noise at all. The world outside seemed a very long way away.

“Let’s focus on the events surrounding the murder of Lady Anne Robinson,” said the prosecution barrister.

“If you wish,” replied Greta in a tone that implied that she didn’t mind if they did or they didn’t.

“You told us yesterday that you rang up Mrs. Ball at Lady Anne’s request to ask if Thomas could go over there.”

“That’s right. It was on the Sunday afternoon.”

“Had Lady Anne ever asked you to do such a thing before?”

“She may have done. I don’t recall. It didn’t seem a very significant request at the time. She had one of her headaches and so she asked me to make the call.”

“Did Lady Anne say why she wanted Thomas to go to his friend’s for the night?”

“No.”

“Didn’t the request strike you as being a bit strange?”

“No. As I said, the whole thing didn’t seem very significant.”

“But Lady Anne had never asked you to make any arrangement for Thomas in all the two and a half years that you’d been working for her husband. Isn’t that right, Lady Robinson?”

“I told you, Mr. Sparling. I don’t recall.”

“You don’t recall. Do you recall lying to Jane Martin about how the arrangement came to be made?”

“No, but I recall Jane Martin lying to this court about what I said to her. I never told her that Mrs. Ball had invited Thomas.”

“What did you tell her?”

“I simply told her about the arrangement. I said nothing about whose idea it was. There was no reason to. She didn’t ask and I didn’t tell her.”

“Why wouldn’t Lady Anne have called Mrs. Ball and made the arrangement herself?”

“Because she had a headache. I told you that already.”

“It must have been a pretty bad headache to stop her making a quick telephone call.”

“It was. They weren’t really headaches, they were more like migraines that she got. She couldn’t do anything when she had them.”

“Except that on this particular Sunday she was able to give you instructions about ringing up Mrs. Ball and making an arrangement for Thomas.”

“That’s right. It didn’t take long.”

“But nor would it have taken her long to make the call.”

“I don’t know. Maybe Anne thought that Mrs. Ball would keep her on the phone.”

“Where’s all this heading, Mr. Sparling?” asked the judge, stirring restlessly in his chair. “We seem to be going round in circles. I think it would be best if you just put your case on this issue and then moved on.”

“Yes, my Lord. My case is this, Lady Robinson. You telephoned Mrs. Ball and made the arrangement yourself without consulting anyone and then you told Lady Anne and Jane Martin afterward that it was Mrs. Ball who had called up to invite Thomas.”

“Why would I do all this, Mr. Sparling?” asked Greta evenly. “Why would I make this arrangement?”

Sparling did not answer immediately. He made it a policy not to allow defendants to start asking the questions. That meant surrendering control over the cross-examination; it meant surrendering his greatest advantage. However, the situation here was different. He could see the jurors looking at him expectantly out of the corner of his eye. They wanted to hear his answer. The trouble was that this was not the strongest part of his case. Sparling inwardly cursed the judge for his intervention. It had forced him onto his back foot, and now the defendant was trying to push him over.

“You did all this because you wanted Thomas Robinson out of the house on the Monday evening so that Lady Anne would be alone and defenseless when the killers came.”

“So I basically wanted to kill the mother but save the son. Is that what you’re saying, Mr. Sparling?” asked Greta with a look of bafflement on her face.

“That’s right, Lady Robinson,” said Sparling. “You had no reason to suspect that Thomas had seen you with your accomplice in London.”

Greta was about to respond, but Sparling pressed straight on to his next question before she could do so.

“You left the study window open for them, didn’t you?”

“No, I just forgot about it.”

“Thomas found it wide open when he got back to the house from the Balls.”

“Yes, I opened it wide because it was stuffy in the study when I was working in there. I’m not the only one who says it was a warm evening. Besides, Anne hadn’t gone to bed when we left.”

“Are you saying you expected her to close it?”