John Carr - The Judas Window

'Please answer the question. Out of over a hundred arrows, over a space of years, can you infallibly identify one on which you put dye in 1934?'

'I shouldn't like to say, sir, may I go to he - may I be - that is, to say everything should happen to me -'

'Very well,' said the Attorney-General, who had got his effect. 'Now -'

'But I'm sure of it just the same, mind I'

'Though you cannot swear to it. I see. Now,' continued the other, picking up some flimsy typewritten sheets, T have here a copy of the prisoner's statement to the police. (Please hand this across to the witness.) Will you take that statement, Mr Shanks, and read out the first paragraph for us?'

Shanks, startled, took the paper with an automatic gesture. First he blinked at it in the same doubtful way he had shown before. Then he began to fumble in his pockets, without apparent result while the delay he was giving the court evidently preyed worse and worse on his mind, until such a gigantic pause upset him completely.

'I can't seem to find my specs, sir. I'm afraid that without my specs -'

'Do I understand,' said the other, who had rightly interpreted that blinking of the eyes, 'that without your spectacles you cannot read the statement?'

'It's not exactly to say I can't, sir; but -

'Yet you can identify an arrow on which you put dye in 1934?' asked Sir Walter Storm - and sat down.

This time H.M. did roar up for re-examination, girded for war. But his questions were short.

'How many times did Avory Hume win the annual competitions?'

'Three times, sir.'

'The arrow was a special prize on those occasions, wasn't it?' 'Yes, sir.'

'So it wasn't just "one out of over a hundred", was it? It was a special thing, a keepsake?' 'Yes, sir.'

'Did he show you the arrow, and call your attention to it, after he'd won the first-shot competition?' 'Yes, sir.'

'Ha,' said H.M., lifting his robe in order to hitch up his trousers. 'That will do. No, not that way out, son; that's the judge's bench; the warder'Il show you.' He waited until Shanks had been taken away, and then he got up again.

'Call Reginald Answell,' said H.M.

XVII

'At the Opening of the Window -'

REGINALD ANSWELL was not exactly under escort: when the warder took charge of him, and led him to the box, he seemed a free man. But just behind him I saw a familiar figure whose name eluded me until I remembered Sergeant-Major Carstairs, who guards the entrance to H.M.'s lair at Whitehall. On the sergeant-major's face was the sinister look of a benevolent captor.

Again you could hear the rustle of the wind in trees of scandal; every eye immediately tried to find Mary Hume as well, but she was not in court. Reginald's long and bony face was a little pale, but very determined. I remember thinking then that he looked a tricky customer, and had better be handled as such - whatever H.M. had in mind. But this may have been due to a surge of dislike caused by the slight (manufactured) wave in his dark-yellow hair, or the cool gaze of self-possession oh his features: the latter more than the former. He took the oath in a clear, pleasant voice.

H.M. seemed to draw a deep breath. It was to be wondered, in view of the wiles that lay beneath the surface, whether H.M. would find himself cross-examining his own witness.

'Your name is Reginald Wentworth Answell; you have no residence, but when you're in London you live at D'Orsay Chambers, Duke Street?'

'Yes.'

‘I want you to understand,' said H.M., folding his arms, 'that you're not obliged to answer any questions which will incriminate you - about any activities.' He paused. 'This question, however, won't incriminate you. When the police talked to you about your general movements on the evenin' of January 4th, did you tell 'em the whole truth?'

'The whole truth, no.'

'Are you ready to tell the truth now, under oath?'

'I am,' said Reginald with great apparent sincerity. His eyes dickered; there is no other way to describe it.

'Were you in London early in the evenin' on January 4th?'

'I was. I drove from Rochester, and arrived at D'Orsay Chambers a few minutes past six o'clock.'

It was possible that H.M. stiffened a little, and an odd air of tensity began to grow again. H.M. tilted his head on one side.

'So-o? I understood it was ten minutes past six o'clock. Wasn't it?'

'I am sorry. It was a little earlier than that. I distinctly remember the clock in the dashboard of my car.' 'Had you intended to see the deceased that night?' 'Yes. Socially.'

'When you got to D'Orsay Chambers, did you see the witness Horace Grabell?' 'I did.'

'Did he tell you about the deceased's visit to your flat on Friday?' 'He did.’

'Did he tell you the deceased had taken your pistol, and gone away with it?' 'He did.'

'And what did you do then?'

'I could not understand it, but I did not like it. So I thought I had better not see Mr Hume after all. I went away. I - drove round a bit, and - and before long I left town. I - did not return until later.'

H.M. sat down rather quickly. There had been a curious intonation in that 'before long'; H.M. had seemed to catch it, for we all did. And Sir Walter Storm was very quick to rise.

'You tell us, Captain Answell,' began the Attorney-General, 'that you "drove round a bit", and "before long" you left town. How long?'

'Half an hour or a little more, perhaps.' 'Half an hour? As long as that?' 'Yes. I wanted to think.' 'Where did you drive?' Silence.

'Where did you drive, Captain Answell? I must repeat my question.'

'I drove to Mr Hume's house in Grosvenor Street,' answered the witness.

For a second the implications of this did not penetrate into our minds. Even the Attorney-General, whatever his thoughts might have been, hesitated before he went on. The witness's air of pale candour was that of the 'engaging' Reginald Answell I had seen yesterday. -

'You drove to Mr Hume's house, you say?'

'Yes. I hoped you would not ask that.' He looked briefly towards the prisoner, who was staring at him. 'I told them I could do him no good. I understood I was not to be called as a witness.'

'You understand that it is your business to tell the truth? Very well. Why did you go to Mr Hume's house?'

'I don't know exactly. I thought it was a queer show, a very queer show. I did not intend to go in; I only intended to cruise past, wondering what was - was up.'

'At what time did you arrive at the house?' demanded the Attorney-General. Even Sir Walter Storm could not keep his voice quite level, in wondering himself what was up.

'At ten minutes past six.'

The judge looked up quickly. 'One moment, Sir Walter ...' He turned his little eyes on the witness. 'If you arrived there at ten minutes past six, that must have been at the same time as the prisoner?'

'Yes, my lord. As a matter of fact, I saw him go in.'

There are, I suppose, no degrees of a man's being motionless. Yet I had never seen H.M. convey such a mere impression of absolute stillness as he did then. He was sitting with a pencil in his hand, enormous under his black gown: and he did not even seem to breathe. In the dock, James Answell's chair suddenly scraped. The prisoner made a curious, wild gesture, like a boy beginning to put up his hand in a class-room, and then he checked himself.

'What did you do then?' asked the Attorney-General.

'I did not know what to do. I wondered what was happening, and why Jim was there. He had not spoken about coming here when I saw him last at Frawnend. I wondered if it concerned me, as having been a suitor of Miss Hume's. For what I did,' said the witness, drawing himself up, 'I do not apologize. Any human being would have done the same. I knew that there was an open passage leading down between Mr Hume's house and the house next door -'