A Twist in the Tale (4 page)

“Yes, he was.”

“Were you at
any time aware of a quarrel between the two of them or even raised voices?”

“No, sir.”

“When you saw
them together did Miss Moorland show any signs of distress or need of help?”

“No, sir.”

“Then what
happened?”

“Miss Moorland
joined me in the kitchen a few minutes later, gave me my wages and I let myself
out.”

“When you were
alone in the kitchen with Miss Moorland, did she give any sign of being afraid
of her guest?”

“No, sir.”

“No more
questions, my Lord.”

Sir Humphrey
did not re-examine Maria Lucia and informed the judge that he had completed the
case for the prosecution.
Mr
Justice Buchanan nodded
and said he felt that was enough for the day; but I wasn’t convinced it was
enough to convict
Menzies
.

When I got home
that night Elizabeth did not ask me where I had been, and I did not volunteer
any information. I spent the evening pretending to go over job applications.

*
* *

The following
morning I had a late breakfast and read the papers before returning to my place
at the end of a row in Court No. 4, only a few moments before the judge made
his entrance.

Mr
Justice Buchanan, having sat down, adjusted his wig
before calling on
Mr
Scott to open the case for the
defence
.
Mr
Scott, QC, was once
again slow to rise – a man-paid by the hour, I thought uncharitably. He started
by promising the court that his opening address would be brief, and he then
remained on his feet for the next two and a half hours.

He began the
case for the
defence
by going over in detail the relevant
parts, as he saw them, of
Menzies’s
past. He assured
us all that those who wished to dissect it later would only find an unblemished
record. Paul
Menzies
was a happily married man who
lived in Sutton with his wife and three children, Polly, aged twenty-one,
Michael, nineteen, and Sally, sixteen. Two of the children were now at
university and the youngest had just completed her GCSE. Doctors had advised
Mrs
Menzies
not to attend the
trial, following her recent release from hospital. I noticed two of the women
on the jury smile sympathetically.

Mr
Menzies
,
Mr
Scott continued, had been with the same firm of insurance brokers in the City
of London for the past six years and, although he had not been promoted, he was
a much respected member of the staff. He was a pillar of his local community,
having served with the Territorial Army and on the committee of the local
camera club. He had once even stood for the Sutton council. He could hardly be
described as a serious can-
didate
as a murderer.

Mr
Scott then went on to the actual day of the killing and
confirmed that
Mr
Menzies
had an appointment with Miss Moorland on the afternoon in question, but in a
strictly professional capacity with the sole purpose of helping her with a
personal insurance plan. There could have been no other reason to visit Miss
Moorland during office hours.

He did not have
sexual intercourse with her and he certainly did not murder her.

The defendant
had left his client a few minutes after six. He understood she had intended to
change before going out to dinner with her sister in
Fulham
.
He had arranged to see
her the
following Wednesday at
his of lice for the purpose of drawing up the completed policy. The
defence
,
Mr
Scott went on, would
later produce a diary entry that would establish the truth of this statement.

The charge
against the accused was, he sub-mitted, based almost completely on
circumstantial evidence. He felt confident that, when the trial reached its
conclusion, the jury would be left with no choice but to release his client
back into the bosom of his loving family. “You must end this nightmare,”
Mr
Scott concluded. “It has gone on far too long for an
innocent man.”

At this point
the judge suggested a break for lunch. During the meal I was unable to
concentrate or even take in what was being said around me. The majority of
those who had an opinion to give now seemed convinced that
Menzies
was innocent.

As soon as we
returned, at ten past two,
Mr
Scott called his first
witness: the defendant himself.

Paul
Menzies
left the dock and walked slowly over to the witness
box. He took a copy of the New Testament in his right hand and haltingly read
the words of the oath, from a card which he held in his left.

Every eye was
fixed on him while
Mr
Scott began to guide his client
carefully through the minefield of evidence.

Menzies
became progressively more confident in his delivery
as the day wore on, and when at four thirty the judge told the court, “That’s
enough for today,” I was convinced that he would get off, even if only by a majority
verdict.

I spent a
fitful night before returning to my place on the third day fearing the worst.

Would
Menzies
be released and would they then start looking for
me?

Mr
Scott opened the third morning as gently as he had begun
the second, but he repeated so many questions from the previous day that it
became obvious he was only steadying his client in preparation for prosecuting
counsel. Before he finally sat down he asked
Menzies
for a third time, “Did you ever have sexual intercourse with Miss Moorland?”

“No, sir.
I had only met her for the first time that day,”
Menzies
replied firmly.

“And did you
murder Miss Moorland?”

“Certainly not,
sir,” said
Menzies
, his voice now strong and
confident.

Mr
Scott resumed his place, a look of quiet satisfaction on
his face.

In fairness to
Menzies
, very little which takes place in normal life could
have prepared anyone for cross-examination by Sir Humphrey
Mountcliff
.
I could not have asked for a better advocate.

“I’d like to
start, if I may,
Mr
Menzies
,”
he began, “with what your counsel seems to set great store by as proof of your
innocence.”

Menzies’s
thin lips remained in a firm straight line.

“The pertinent
entry in your diary which suggests that you made a second appointment to see
Miss Moorland, the murdered woman” – three words Sir Humphrey was to repeat
again and again during his cross-examination – “for the Wednesday after she had
been killed.”

“Yes, sir,”
said
Menzies
.

“This entry was
made – correct me if I’m wrong – following your Thursday meeting at Miss
Moorland’s flat.”

“Yes, sir,”
said
Menzies
, obviously tutored not to add anything
that might later help prosecuting counsel.

“So when did
you make that entry?” Sir Humphrey asked.

“On the Friday morning.”

“After Miss Moorland had been killed?”

“Yes, but I
didn’t know.”

“Do you carry a
diary on you,
Mr
Menzies
?”

“Yes, but only
a small pocket diary, not my large desk one.”

“Do you have it
with you today?”

“I do.”

“May I be
allowed to see it?”

Reluctantly
Menzies
took a small green diary out of his jacket pocket
and handed it over to the clerk of the court, who in turn passed it on to Sir
Humphrey. Sir Humphrey began to leaf through the pages.

“I see that
there is no entry for your appointment with Miss Moorland for the afternoon on
which she was murdered?”

“No, sir,” said
Menzies
. “I put office appointments only in my desk
diary,
personal appointments are restricted to my pocket
diary.”

“I understand,”
said Sir Humphrey. He paused and looked up. “But isn’t it strange,
Mr
Menzies
, that you agreed to an
appointment with a client to discuss further business and you then trusted it
to memory, when you so easily could have put it in the diary you carry around
with you all the time before transferring it?”

“I might have written
it down on a slip of paper at the time, but as I explained that’s a personal
diary.”

“Is it?” said
Sir Humphrey as he flicked back a few more pages. “Who is David Paterson?” he
asked.

Menzies
looked as if he were trying to place him.

“
Mr
David Paterson,
112 City Road,
11.30, January 9th this year,” Sir Humphrey
read out to the court.
Menzies
looked anxious. “We
could subpoena
Mr
Paterson if you can’t recall the
meeting,” said Sir Humphrey helpfully.

“He’s a client
of my firm,” said
Menzies
in a quiet voice.

“A client of
your firm,” Sir Humphrey repeated slowly. “I wonder how many of those I could
find if I went through your diary at a more leisurely
pace?
”
Menzies
bowed his head as Sir Humphrey passed the
diary back to the clerk, having made his point.

“Now I should
like to turn to some more important questions . . .”

“Not until
after lunch, Sir Humphrey,” the judge intervened. “It’s nearly one and I think
we’ll take a break now.”

“As you wish,
my Lord,” came back the courteous reply.

I left the
court in a more optimistic mood, even though I couldn’t wait to discover what
could be more important than that diary. Sir Humphrey’s emphasis on little
lies, although they did not prove
Menzies
was a
murderer, did show he was hiding something. I became anxious that during the
break
Mr
Scott might advise
Menzies
to admit to his affair with Carla, and thus make the rest of his story appear
more credible. To my relief, over the meal I learned that under English law
Menzies
could not consult his counsel while he was still in
the witness box. I noticed when we returned to court that
Mr
Scott’s smile had disappeared.

Sir Humphrey
rose to continue his cross examination.

“You have
stated under oath,
Mr
Menzies
,
that you are a happily married man.”

“I am, sir,”
said the defendant with feeling.

“Was your first
marriage as happy,
Mr
Menzies
?”
asked Sir Humphrey casually. The defendant’s cheeks drained of their
colour
. I quickly looked over towards
Mr
Scott who could not mask that this was information with which he had not been
entrusted.

“Take your time
before you answer,” said Sir Humphrey.

All eyes turned
to the man in the witness box.

“No,” said
Menzies
and quickly added, “
but
I
was very young at the time. It was many years ago and all a ghastly mistake.”

“All a ghastly
mistake?” repeated Sir Humphrey, looking straight at the jury. “And how did
that marriage end?”

“In divorce,”
Menzies
said quite simply.

“And what were
the grounds for that divorce?”

“Cruelty,” said
Menzies
, “but. . .”

“But...
?
ould
you like me to read out to
the jury what your first wife swore under oath in court that day?”

Menzies
stood there shaking. He knew that “No” would damn
him and “Yes” would hang him.

“Well, as you
seem unable to advise us I will, with your permission, my Lord, read the
statement made before
Mr
Justice Rodger on dune 9th,
1961, at the
Swindon
County Court by the first
Mrs
Menzies
.” Sir Humphrey
cleared his throat. “‘He used to hit me again and again, and it became so bad
that I had to run away for fear he might one day kill me.”‘

Sir Humphrey
emphasised
the last five words.

“She was
exaggerating,” shouted
Menzies
from the witness box.

“How
unfortunate that poor Miss Carla Moorland cannot be with us today to let us
know if your story about her is also an exaggeration.”

“I object, my
Lord,” said
Mr
Scott. “Sir Humphrey is harassing the
witness.”

“I agree,” said
the judge. “Tread more carefully in future, Sir Humphrey.”

“I
apologise
, my Lord,” said Sir Humphrey, sounding singularly
unapologetic. He dosed the file to which he had been referring and replaced it
on the desk in front of him before taking up a new one. He opened it slowly,
making sure all in the court were following every movement before he extracted
a single sheet of paper.

“How many
mistresses have you had since you were married to the second
Mrs
Menzies
?”

“Objection, my
Lord. How can this be relevant?”

“My Lord, it is
relevant, I respectfully suggest. I intend to show that this was not a business
relationship that
Mr
Menzies
was conducting with Miss Moorland but a highly personal one.”

“The question
can be put to the defendant,” ruled the judge.

Menzies
said nothing as Sir Humphrey held up the sheet of
paper in front of him and studied it.