The story so far was slight. A Mrs. Eileen Morrisey, aged thirty-four, had been found stabbed to death in a flat in Camden Town late on Sunday night. The discovery was made by the tenants, Mr. and Mrs. Kealy, who had returned late on Sunday from a visit to Mr. Kealy’s parents. The dead woman, who was the mother of twin daughters aged twelve, was a friend of Mrs. Kealy. Detective Chief Inspector William Holbrook was in charge of the investigation. It was understood that the dead woman had been sexually assaulted.
Gabriel folded his paper with the same precise care as he did on any ordinary day. Of course, he would have to tell the police what he had seen. He couldn’t let an innocent man suffer, no matter what the inconvenience to himself. The knowledge of his intention, of his public-spirited devotion to justice, was warmly satisfying. For the rest of the day he crept around his filing cabinets with the secret complacency of a man dedicated to sacrifice.
But somehow his first plan of calling at a police station on his way home from work came to nothing. There was no point in acting hastily. If the boy were arrested, he would speak. But it would be ridiculous to prejudice his reputation and endanger his job before he even knew whether the boy was a suspect. The police might never learn of the boy’s existence. To speak up now might only focus suspicion on the innocent. A prudent man would wait. Gabriel decided to be prudent.
The boy was arrested three days later. Again Gabriel read about it in his morning paper. There was no picture this time, and few details. The news had to compete with a society elopement and a major air crash and did not make the first page. The inch of newsprint stated briefly: “Denis John Speller, a butcher’s assistant, aged nineteen, who gave an address at Muswell Hill, was today charged with the murder of Mrs. Eileen Morrisey, the mother of twelve-year-old twins, who was stabbed to death last Friday in a flat in Camden Town.”
So the police now knew more precisely the time of death. Perhaps it was time for him to see them. But how could he be sure that this Denis Speller was the young lover he had been watching these past Friday nights? A woman like that—well, she might have had any number of men. No photograph of the accused would be published in any paper until after the trial. But more information would come out at the preliminary hearing. He would wait for that. After all, the accused might not even be committed for trial.
Besides, he had himself to consider. There had been time to think of his own position. If young Speller’s life were in danger, then, of course, Gabriel would tell what he had seen. But it would mean the end of his job with Bootman’s. Worse, he would never get another. Mr. Maurice Bootman would see to that. He, Gabriel, would be branded as a dirty-minded, sneaking little voyeur, a Peeping Tom who was willing to jeopardise his livelihood for an hour or two with a naughty book and a chance to pry into other people’s happiness. Mr. Maurice would be too angry at the publicity to forgive the man who had caused it.
And the rest of the firm would laugh. It would be the best joke in years, funny and pathetic and futile. The pedantic, respectable, censorious Ernest Gabriel found out at last! And they wouldn’t even give him credit for speaking up. It simply wouldn’t occur to them that he could have kept silent.
If only he could think of a good reason for being in the building that night. But there was none. He could hardly say that he had stayed behind to work late, when he had taken such care to leave with the porter. And it wouldn’t do to say that he had returned later to catch up with his filing. His filing was always up to date, as he was fond of pointing out. His very efficiency was against him.
Besides, he was a poor liar. The police wouldn’t accept his story without probing. After they had spent so much time on the case, they would hardly welcome his tardy revelation of new evidence. He pictured the circle of grim, accusing faces, the official civility barely concealing their dislike and contempt. There was no sense in inviting such an ordeal before he was sure of the facts.
But after the preliminary hearing, at which Denis Speller was sent up for trial, the same arguments seemed equally valid. By now he knew that Speller was the lover he had seen. There had never really been much room for doubt. By now, too, the outlines of the case for the Crown were apparent. The Prosecution would seek to prove that this was a crime of passion, that the boy, tormented by her threat to leave him, had killed in jealousy or revenge. The accused would deny that he had entered the flat that night, would state again and again that he had knocked and gone away. Only Gabriel could support his story. But it would still be premature to speak.
He decided to attend the trial. In that way he would hear the strength of the Crown’s case. If it appeared likely that the verdict would be “Not Guilty,” he could remain silent. And if things went badly, there was an excitement, a fearful fascination, in the thought of rising to his feet in the silence of that crowded court and speaking out his evidence before all the world. The questioning, the criticism, the notoriety would have come later. But he would have had his moment of glory.
He was surprised and a little disappointed by the court. He had expected a more imposing, more dramatic setting for justice than this modern, clean-smelling, businesslike room. Everything was quiet and orderly. There was no crowd at the door jostling for seats. It wasn’t even a popular trial.
Sliding into his seat at the back of the court, Gabriel looked round, at first apprehensively and then with more confidence. But he needn’t have worried. There was no one there he knew. It was really a very dull collection of people, hardly worthy, he thought, of the drama that was to be played out before them. Some of them looked as if they might have worked with Speller or lived in the same street. All looked ill at ease, with the slightly shifty air of people who find themselves in unusual or intimidating surroundings. There was a thin woman in black crying softly into a handkerchief. No one took any notice of her; no one comforted her.
From time to time one of the doors at the back of the court would open silently, and a newcomer would sidle almost furtively into his seat. When this happened, the row of faces would turn momentarily to him without interest, without recognition, before turning their eyes again to the slight figure in the dock.
Gabriel stared too. At first he dared to cast only fleeting glances, averting his eyes suddenly, as if each glance were a desperate risk. It was unthinkable that the prisoner’s eyes should meet his, should somehow know that here was the man who could save him and should signal a desperate appeal. But when he had risked two or three glances, he realised there was nothing to fear. That solitary figure was seeing no one, caring about no one except himself. He was only a bewildered and terrified boy, his eyes turned inward to some private hell. He looked like a trapped animal, beyond hope and beyond fight.
The judge was rotund, red-faced, his chins sunk into the bands at his neck. He had small hands, which he rested on the desk before him except when he was making notes. Then counsel would stop talking for a moment before continuing more slowly, as if anxious not to hurry his Lordship, watching him like a worried father explaining with slow deliberation to a not very bright child.
But Gabriel knew where lay the power. The judge’s chubby hands, folded on the desk like a parody of a child in prayer, held a man’s life in their grasp. There was only one person in the court with more power than that scarlet-sashed figure high under the carved coat of arms. And that was he, Gabriel. The realisation came to him in a spurt of exultation, at once intoxicating and satisfying. He hugged his knowledge to himself gloatingly. This was a new sensation, terrifyingly sweet.