One other thing has happened. As I was reading it through to see if it was coherent, the telephone rang. My wife answered it. I heard her say:
‘Yes? — Yes? — Yes? — who is it speaking, please? — Oh, yes — I’m not sure — I’ll go and see — Will you hold the line a minute?’
She put her hand over the mouthpiece and said, almost in a whisper:
‘It’s Mr Lathom, asking to speak to you.’
‘Oh, God!’ I said.
If I warned him now — there would still be time — and the man had been at school with me — and we had lived in the same rooms — and he was a great painter — something would be lost to the world if they hanged Lathom.
Elizabeth did nothing. She stood with the receiver in her hand.
‘Tell him—’
‘Yes?’
‘Tell him I am out.’
She turned back to the instrument.
‘I am so sorry, my husband is out. Can I give any message? No, very well. You’ll ring up again. Good-night.’
She came over and stood by me.
‘Elizabeth, tell me, am I an unutterable sweep?’
‘No. There was nothing else you could do.’
I want to know whether Lathom knows the sort of woman he did it for. I want to know how much she really knows or suspects. I want to know whether, when she wrote that letter which drove him to do it, she was deceiving him or herself. I want to know whether, in all these months, he has been thinking that she was worth it, or whether, in a ghastly disillusionment, he has realised that the only real part of her was vulgar and bad, and the rest merely the brilliant refraction of himself. What is the good? Whatever he realised, he must have gone on telling himself she was worth it, or he would have gone mad.
Perry would say that this was God’s judgement. Life outraged, vindicating itself against the powers of death and hell. Or no, Perry expressly refuses to recognises judgements. Besides, if Lathom had known just a little more about chemistry, he could have defeated the judgement. Ignorance is no excuse in law. Nor in the law of Nature. Well, we know that. All the same, if I were in Lathom’s place, I would hate to have been tripped up by a miserable asymmetric molecule.
I hope Lathom will not ring up again.
53. Note by Paul Harrison
This statement concludes the evidence, which I have to lay before you. You have already, I understand, received a brief communication from Sir James Lubbock, confirming the account of his experiment with the synthetic muscarine. Munting’s narrative is of some value as indicating the lines on which such an experimental proof, though unusual and somewhat technical in character, might be presented to a jury of reasonably intelligent persons.
The unsatisfactory part of the case is, as you will see, that which concerns the woman, Margaret Harrison. As the letter No. 46 shows, she has taken pains to protect herself against any suspicion of complicity. Although, morally, she is quite equally guilty with Lathom, and though I have personally no doubt that the letter is an impudent hypocrisy, it will probably be difficult to bring home to her a guilty knowledge of the actual commission of the crime. That she instigated and inspired it is, to my mind, certain; but Lathom will strenuously deny this, and I have failed to secure any reliable evidence against her. I trust that you will use every possible endeavour to prevent this abominable woman from getting off scot-free.
I re-open this parcel to add that I have received a message from Mrs Cutts. Lathom, she tells me, has given a week’s notice to his landlord. This may mean everything or nothing, but prompt action seems advisable.
Sir Gilbert Pugh, Director of Public Prosecutions, turned the last page of the manuscript, and sat for a few minutes in silence. Mentally he watched his expert witnesses displaying an asymmetric molecule to a jury of honest tradesmen, under a withering fire of commentary by the counsel for the defence.
He sighed. This sort of case always meant a lot of work and bother.
‘Simmons!’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘Get me the Chief Commissioner on the phone.’
[Pinned to the portfolio at some subsequent date.]
Extract from the ‘Morning Express’ of November 30th, 1930
MANATON MURDERER HANGED
The execution took place in Exeter Gaol, at 8 a.m. today, of Harwood Lathom, who was convicted in October of the murder of George Harrison at ‘The Shack’, Manaton, by poisoning him with muscarine.
THE END