Isaac Asimov - The Early Asimov. Volume 2

Wilson 's mouth twisted into a sour grimace. He continued on a lower key.

'You say, Mr. Jenkins, that you occupied Harley Hall for ninety years.'

'Ninety-two years next month. The Hall wasn't built - in its present form, anyhow - until 1876, but I occupied the house that stood on the site previously.'

'What did you do before then?'

'Before then?' The voice paused, then said doubtfully, 'I don't remember.'

'You're under oath!' Wilson flared.

The voice got firmer. 'Ninety years is a long time,' it said. 'I don't remember.'

Tret's see if I can't refresh your memory. Is it true that ninety-one years ago, in the very year in which you claim to have begun your occupancy of Harley Hall, Hank Jenkins was killed in a gun duel?'

'That may be true, if you say so. I don't remember.'

'Do you remember that the shooting occurred not fifty feet from the present site of Harley Hall?'

'It may be.'

'Well, then,' Wilson thundered, 'is it not a fact that when Hank Jenkins died by violence his ghost assumed existence? That it was then doomed to haunt the site of its slaying throughout eternity?'

The voice said evenly, 'I have no knowledge of that.'

'Do you deny that it is well known throughout that section that the ghost of Hank Jenkins haunts Harley Hall?'

'Objection!' shouted Turnbull. 'Popular opinion is not evidence.'

'Objection sustained. Strike the question from the record.'

Wilson, badgered, lost his control. In a dangerously uneven

voice, he said, 'Perjury is a criminal offense. Mr. Jenkins, do you deny that you are the ghost of Hank Jenkins?'

The tone was surprised. 'Why, certainly.'

'You are a ghost, aren't you?'

Stiffly, 'I'm an entity on the astral plane.'

'That, I believe, is what is called a ghost?'

'I can't help what it's called. I've heard you called a lot of things. Is that proof?'

There was a surge of laughter from the audience. Gimbel slammel his gavel down on the bench.

'The witness,' he said, 'will confine himself to answering questions.'

Wilson bellowed, 'In spite of what you say, it's true, isn't it, that you are merely the spirit of a human being who had died through violence?'

The voice from above the blood drops retorted, 'I repeat that I am an entity of the astral plane. I am not aware that I was ever a human being.'

The lawyer turned an exasperated face to the bench.

'Your honor,' he said, 'I ask that you instruct the witness to cease playing verbal hide-and-seek. It is quite evident that the witness is a ghost, and that he is therefore the relict of some human being, ipso facto. Circumstantial evidence is strong that he is the ghost of the Hank Jenkins who was killed in 1850. But this is a non-essential point. What is definite is that he is the ghost of someone who is dead, and hence is unqualified to act as witness! I demand his testimony be stricken from the record!'

Tumbull spoke up at once. 'Will the counsel for the defense quote his authority for branding my client a ghost - in the face of my client's repeated declaration that he is an entity of the astral plane? What is the legal definition of a ghost?'

Judge Gimbel smiled. 'Counsel for the defense will proceed with the cross-examination,' he said.

Wilson 's face flushed dark purple. He mopped his brow with a large bandanna, then glared at the dropping, sizzling trickle of blood.

'Whatever you are,' he said, 'answer me this question. Can you pass through a wall?'

'Why, yes. Certainly.' There was a definite note of surprise in the voice from nowhere. 'But it isn't as easy as some people think. It definitely requires a lot of effort.'

'Never mind that. You can do it?'

'Yes.'

'Could you be bound by any physical means? Would handcuffs hold you? Or ropes, chains, prison walls, a hermetically sealed steel chest?'

Jenkins had no chance to answer. Turnbull, scenting danger, cut in hastily. 'I object to this line of questioning. It is entirely irrelevant.'

'On the contrary,' Wilson cried loudly, 'it bears strongly on the qualifications of the so-called Henry Jenkins as a witness! I demand that he answer the question.'

Judge Gimbel said, 'Objection overruled. Witness will answer the question.'

The voice from the chair said superciliously, 'I don't mind answering. Physical barriers mean nothing to me, by and large.'

The counsel for the defense drew himself up triumphantly.

'Very good,' he said with satisfaction. 'Very good.' Then to the judge, the words coming sharp and fast, 'I claim, your honor, that the so-called Henry Jenkins has no legal status as a witness in court. There is clearly no value in understanding the nature of an oath if a violation of the oath can bring no punishment in its wake. The statements of a man who can perjure himself freely have no worth. I demand they be stricken from the record!'

Turnbull was at the judge's bench in two strides.

'I had anticipated that, your honor,' he said quickly. 'From the very nature of the case; however, it is clear that my client can be very definitely restricted in his movements - spells, pentagrams, talismans, amulets, Exclusion Circles and whatnot. I have here - which I am prepared to deliver to the bailiff of the court - a list of the various methods of confining an astral entity to a restricted area for periods ranging from a few moments to all eternity. Moreover, I have also signed a bond for five thousand dollars, prior to the beginning of the trial, which I stand ready to forfeit should my client be confined and make his escape, if found guilty of any misfeasance as a witness.'

Gimbel's face, which had looked startled for a second, slowly cleared. He nodded. 'The court is satisfied with the statement of the counsel for the plaintiff,' he declared. 'There seems no doubt that the plaintiff can be penalized for any mis-statements, and the motion of the defense is denied.'

Wilson looked choleric, but shrugged. 'All right,' he said. That will be all.'

'You may step down, Mr. Jenkins,' Gimbel directed, and watched in fascinatiori as the blood-dripping column rose and floated over the floor, along the corridor, out the door.

Turnbull approached the judge's bench again. He said, 'I would like to place in evidence these notes, the diary of the late Zebuloh Harley. It was presented to my client by Harley himself last fall. I call particular attention to the entry for April sixth, nineteen seventeen, in which he mentions the entrance of the United States into the First World War, and records the results of a series of eleven pinochle games played with a personage identified as "Old Hank." With the court's permission, I will read the entry for that day, and also various other entries for the next four years. Please note the references to someone known variously as "Jenkins," "Hank Jenkins" and - in one extremely significant passage - "Old Invisible."'

Wilson stewed silently during the slow reading of Harley's diary. There was anger on his face, but he paid close attention, and when the reading was over he leaped to his feet.

'I would like to know,' he asked, 'if the counsel for the plaintiff is in possession of any diaries after nineteen twenty?'

Turnbull shook his head. 'Harley apparently never kept a diary, except during the four years represented in this.'

Then I demand that the court refuse to admit this diary as evidence on two counts,' Wilson said. He raised two fingers to tick off the points. 'In the first place, the evidence presented is frivolous. The few vague and unsatisfactory references to Jenkins nowhere specifically describe him as what he is - ghost, astral entity or what you will. Second, the evidence, even were the first point overlooked, concerns only the years up to nineteen twenty-one. The case concerns itself only with the supposed occupation of Harley Hall by the so-called Jenkins in the last twenty years - since 'twenty-one. Clearly, the evidence is therefore irrelevant.'