John Carr - The Judas Window

'I heard the prisoner say: "I did not come here to kill anyone unless it becomes absolutely necessary." I heard little of what Mr Hume said, because he usually spoke in a low tone. Presently Mr Hume began talking rather sharply, but I could not make out his words. At the end of it he suddenly said: "Man, what is wrong with you? Have you gone mad?" Then there was a sound which I took to be the sound of a scuffle. I tapped on the door, and called out to ask if anything was wrong. Mr Hume called out and told me to go away: he said he could deal with this. He spoke in a voice as though he were out of breath.

'But he had told me to go and get the car, and I did. I had to, or I should have lost my position. I put on my hat and overcoat, and went round to the Pyrenees Garage. It is about a three or four minutes' walk. They had not quite finished repairing the car, and said they had told us they intended to be even longer. I tried to hurry back, but there was a mist and this impeded me in driving. When I got back it was about six-thirty-two by the grandfather clock.

'Beyond the turning of the little passage that goes to the study, I met Miss Jordan. She said they were fighting, and asked me to stop them. There is not much light in the hall. Miss Jordan fell over a big suitcase belonging to Dr Spencer Hume; and when I said that it would' be more sensible to fetch a policeman, she kicked at me. I think she was crying.

'Then she went to get Mr Fleming, at my suggestion, while I procured a poker. All three of us went to the door. About a minute after we had knocked, the prisoner opened the door. There is absolutely no doubt that up to this time the door had been bolted on the inside.

'When the prisoner said: "All right; you had better come in," Mr Fleming and I did so. I went at once to Mr Hume, who was lying as he is in that photograph. The arrow you show me was protruding from his chest. I did not feel his heart, because I did not wish to get blood all over my hand; but I felt his pulse, and he was dead.

'There was no person hiding in the room. I went immediately and looked at the shutters, calling Mr Fleming's attention to them as I did so. The reason was that even then I could not associate a thing like this with a gentleman such as I had heard the prisoner to be. Both the shutters were still barred, and the windows locked behind them.'

Other eyes, other opera-glasses. The Attorney-General took him over confirmation of Miss Jordan's account.

'Now, Dyer, when mention was made of bringing in the police, did the prisoner say anything?'

'He said: "Yes, I suppose we had better get it over with."'

'Did you make any comment on this?'

'Yes, sir. I know I should not have spoken, but I could not help myself. He was sitting in that chair with one leg thrown over the arm of the chair as though he owned it, and lighting a cigarette. I said: "Are you made of stone?"'

"What reply did he make to this?'

'He replied: "Serve him right for drugging my whisky."'

'What did you make of that?'

'I did not know what to make of it, sir. I looked over at the sideboard and said: "What whisky?" He pointed his cigarette at me and said: "Now listen. When I came in here he gave me a whisky-and-soda. There was something in it, a drug. It knocked me out and someone came in and killed him. This is a frame-up, and you know it."'

'Did you go over and look at the sideboard?'

For the first time the witness put his hands on the rail of the box.

'I did. The decanter of whisky was just as full as when I had left it, and the syphon of soda was also full: there was the little paper fastener still over the nozzle. The glasses gave no sign of being used.'

'Did the accused exhibit any sign or symptom which led you to think he had been under the influence of a drug?'

Dyer frowned.

'Well, sir, I cannot say as to that.' He raised eyes of candour; he violated the rules, he was instantly corrected for it, and he drove a long nail into the scaffold of James Answell. 'But,' said Dyer, 'I overheard your police-doctor say the accused had not taken any drug at all.'

IV

'Either There is a Window, or There Isn't'

AT shortly past one o'clock, when the court adjourned for lunch, Evelyn and I went downstairs gloomily. The Old Bailey, full of those shuffling echoes which are thrown back from marble or tile, was crowded. We got into the centre of a crush converging at the head of the stairs to the Central Hall.

I voiced a mutual view. 'Though why the blazes we should feel so much prejudiced in his favour I don't know, unless it's because H.M. is defending him. Or unless it's because he looks so absolutely right: that is, he looks as though he'd lend you a tenner if you needed it, and stand by you if you got into trouble. The trouble is, they all look guilty in the dock. If they're calm, it's a bad sign. If they're wild, it's a still worse sign. This may be due to our rooted and damnable national belief that if they weren't guilty they probably wouldn't be in the dock at all.'

'H'm,' said my wife, her face wearing that concentrated expression which betokens wild ideas. 'I've been think-ing ..."

'It's inadvisable.'

'Yes, I know. But do you know, Ken, while they were stringing out'all that evidence, I kept thinking that nobody could possibly be as loony as that chap seems to be unless he were innocent. But then along came that business of his having taken no sleeping-drug at all. If they can prove that by medical evidence ... well... unless H.M. will try to prove insanity after all.'

What H.M. wished to prove was not apparent. He had subjected Dyer to a singularly long and singularly uninspired cross-examination, directed chiefly to proving that on the day of the murder Hume had been attempting to get in touch with Answell by telephone as early as nine o'clock in the morning. H.M.'s one good point concerned the arrow with which the crime had been committed, and even this was left enigmatic. H.M. called attention to the fact that half of the blue feather attached to it had been broken off. Was that feather intact when Dyer had seen the arrow on the wall before the crime? Oh, yes. Sure? Positive. But the piece of feather was missing when they discovered the body? Yes. Did they find the other half anywhere in the room? No; they had searched as a matter of form, but they could not find it.

H.M.'s last attack was still more obscure. Were the three arrows hung flat against the wall? Not all of them, Dyer replied. The two arrows making the sides of the triangle lay flat on the wall; but the base of it, crossing the other two, had been set out on steel staples about a quarter of an inch.

'And all that,' Evelyn commented, 'H.M. asked as quietly as a lamb. I tell you, Ken, it's unnatural. He buttered up that little butler as though he were his own witness. I say, do you think we could see H.M.?'

'I doubt it. He'll probably be having lunch at the Bar Mess.'

At this point our attention was forcibly called. Who the man was (whether he was someone attached to the courts or an outsider with a thirst for imparting information) we never learned. With an effect like a Maskelyne illusion, a little man thrust himself out of the crowd and tapped me on the shoulder.

. 'Want to see two of the Ones in the Big Case?' he asked in a whisper. 'Just ahead of you! That there on the right is Dr Spencer Hume, and that there on the left is Reginald Answell, 'is cousin. They're right amongst us, and they'll 'ave to go downstairs together. Ss-t!'

Back went the head. By the convergence of the crowd on the big marble stairs, the two men he indicated were swept to a stiff march side by side. The bleak March light showed them not too favourably. Dr Hume was a middle-sized, rather tubby man with greying black hair parted and combed to such nicety on his round head that it gave the effect of a wheel. He turned his head sideways for a brief look; we saw a nose radiating self-confidence, and a gravely pursed-up mouth. He carried, incongruously, a top-hat, which he was trying to prevent being squashed.