The Judas Window

'Did the manager give you a reference when you left?' 'No.'

'But if you had left for the reasons you tell us, he must have given you a character, mustn't he?'

Sir Walter Storm had not been prepared for this witness. But, with the knowledge of long experience, he knew exactly where to attack without having any actual information to draw on.

'You tell us that on Friday morning, January 3rd, you were "cleaning out the dustbin" in the prisoner's flat?'

'Yes.'

'How long had Mr Answell and Captain Answell been away?'

"Bout a fortnight, maybe.'

'About a fortnight. Why, then, was it necessary to clean out the dustbin, if they had been away for so long?' 'They might have come back.'

'Yet a moment ago you informed my learned friend that no one was expected back. Did you not?' 'It had to be done sometime.'

'It had not been done by anyone during those entire two weeks?' 'No - that is -'

'I put it to you that the dustbin would have been cleaned when the occupants went away?'

'Yes, but I had to make sure. Look here, your Lordship ...'

'You further tell us,' pursued the Attorney-General, leaning both hands on the desk and settling his shoulders, 'that, when you went in to do this, all the blinds were drawn and you made very little noise?'

'Yes.'

'Are you accustomed to cleaning out the dustbin in darkness?'

'Look 'ere! I never thought of it -'

'Or being careful to make no noise to disturb anyone in an empty flat? I put it to you that - if you actually were in the flat at the time you say - it was for a purpose other than cleaning out the dustbin?'

'It was not.'

'Then you never went into the flat at all?'

'Yes, I did, if you'd let me get in a word edgeways; and what I'm telling you is that old Hume was there, and he stole that gun, so help me!'

'Let us see if there is anything else that may help us. There is, I believe, a hall-porter at D'Orsay Chambers?'

"Yes.’

'Will you accept my statement that this porter, when questioned by the police, testified he had not seen anyone resembling the deceased in D'Orsay Chambers on Friday or at any other time?'

'Maybe not. He came in by the back stairs -'

'Who came in by the back stairs?'

'Mr Hume. Anyway, that's how he went out, because I saw him go.'

'Did you offer any of this information to the police at the time?'

'No; how could I? I wasn't there. I left my job the next day-' ‘You left the next day?'

'I had been under notice for a month, yes, and that was Saturday. Besides, I didn't know it was important.'

'Apparently not. There would appear to be a curious notion among several persons as to what may or may not have been important then, but is very important now,' said Sir Walter dryly. 'When you say you saw Captain Answell in the car-park, was there any other person there who could substantiate the statement?'

'Nobody but Captain Answell himself. Why don't you ask him?'

Mr Justice Rankin intervened. 'The witness's remark, though out of order,' he said with some asperity, 'would seem pertinent. Is Captain Answell in court? Considering that a part of the evidence depends on information that he may be able to give ...'

H.M. surged up with a sort of ferocious affability. 'My lord, Captain Answell is goin' to appear as a witness for the defence. You needn't trouble to send for him. He's been under subpoena for a long, long time; and we'll see that he is here, though I'm not sure he'll be a very willin' witness for his own side.'

('What on earth is all this?' Evelyn asked in a whisper. 'You heard the fellow say himself he wasn't to be called as a witness. He must have known he'd be subpoenaed! What is happening?')

It was undoubtedly some trick on H.M.'s part: H.M. being determined to be the old maestro if it choked him. Beyond that nothing was known.

'I have no more questions to ask this witness,' said Sir Walter Storm abruptly.

'Call Joseph George Shanks,' said H.M.

While Grabell was going out of the box, and Joseph George Shanks was going into it, a consultation went on among the counsel for the Crown. The prosecution was in a strange and horned position. They must fight this through. That James Answell had been the victim of a mistake: that Hume had planned a trap for Reginald: even that Hume had stolen the pistoclass="underline" was now being pushed towards a certainty. But these were details which did not, for everything that was said, in the least demonstrate the innocence of the prisoner. I remembered the words in the summing-up of a great jurist at anothercause celebre: 'Members of the jury, there is some circumstantial evidence which is as good and conclusive as the evidence of eye-witnesses ... If I might give you an illustration: supposing you have a room with one door, and a closed window, and a passage leading from that door. A man comes up the passage, goes through the door into the room, and finds another man standing with a pistol, and on the floor a dead man: the circumstantial evidence there would be almost conclusive, if not conclusive.'

We had just such a situation here. The prisoner had still been found in a locked room. The circumstantial evidence of the fact was still conclusive. No doubt had been cast on the central point, which was the only real point at issue. However damaged the case for the prosecution had become, Sir Walter Storm must finish this course.

I was recalled by H.M.'s voice.

'Your name's Joseph George Shanks, and you were odd-jobs man at number 12 Grosvenor Street?'

'Yessir,' said the witness. He was a little, broad man, so much like a dwarfed model of John Bull that his Sunday-best clothes sat oddly on him. Two polished knives of white collar stabbed his neck: they seemed to keep his voice light from the effort of keeping his neck high.

'How long did you work there?'

'Ah,' said the other, considering. 'Six years, more or less, I should think.'

'What were your duties, mostly?'

'Mostly keeping Mr Hume's archery things in order; any repairs to 'em; things like that.'

'Take a look at this arrow, which was used to kill the deceased' - the witness carefully wiped his hands on the seat of his Sunday trousers before accepting it - 'and tell the jury whether you've seen it before.'

'You-bet-I-have, sir. I fastened the feathers on. I remember this one. Dye's a mite dark for the kind I meant.'

'You often fastened the deceased's special kind of feathers to the arrows? And dyed the guide-feather? Mr Fleming told us that yesterday.'

'I did that, sir.'

'Now, supposin' I showed you a little piece of feather,' pursued H.M. with argumentative persuasiveness, 'and I asked you to tell me definitely whether it was the piece of feather missing from the middle, there ... could you do that?'

'If it was off this feather, I could, sir. Besides, it 'ud fit.'

'It would. But - just to take a different sort of question for a minute - you worked in that little workshop or shed in the back garden, didn't you?'

'I'm sure I didn't mean to press you, sir,' said the witness generously. 'What was that? Ah. Yes, I did.'

'Did he keep any cross-bows there?'

The stir of creaking that went through the room affected Shanks with a pleasant sense of importance. He relaxed, and leaned his elbows on the rail of the box. Evidently some stern eye was watching over his conduct from the spectators' gallery lover our heads; for he seemed to become sensible of the impropriety of his posture, and straightened up hastily.

'He did, sir. Three of them. Fine nasty-looking things.'

'Where'd he keep 'em?'

'In a big box, sir, like a big tool-box with a handle. Under the carpenter's bench.' The witness blinked with a painful effort at concentration.