Cynthia Manson (ed)

I realized that Christmas was upon
us when I saw a sprig of holly over the list of prisoners hung on the wall of
the cells under the Old Bailey.

I pulled out a new box of small
cigars and found its opening obstructed by a tinseled band on which a
scarlet-faced Santa was seen hurrying a sleigh full of carcinoma-packed goodies
to the Rejoicing World. I lit one as the lethargic screw, with a complexion the
color of faded Bronco, regretfully left his doorstep sandwich and mug of sweet
tea to unlock the gate.

“Good morning. Mr. Rumpole. Come to
visit a customer?”

“Happy Christmas, officer,” I said
as cheerfully as possible. “Is Mr. Timson at home?”

“Well, I don’t believe he’s slipped
down to his little place in the country.”

Such were the pleasantries that were
exchanged between us legal hacks and discontented screws; jokes that no doubt
have changed little since the turnkeys unlocked the door at Newgate to let in a
pessimistic advocate, or the cells under the Coliseum were opened to admit the
unwelcome news of the Imperial thumbs-down.

“My mum wants me home for
Christmas.”

Which Christmas? It would have been
an unreasonable remark and I refrained from it. Instead, I said, “All things
are possible.”

As I sat in the interviewing room,
an Old Bailey hack of some considerable experience, looking through my brief
and inadvertently using my waistcoat as an ashtray, I hoped I wasn’t on another
loser. I had had a run of bad luck during that autumn season, and young Edward
Timson was part of that huge south London family whose criminal activities
provided such welcome grist to the Rumpole mill. The charge in the seventeen-year-old
Eddie’s case was nothing less than wilful murder.

“We’re in with a chance, though, Mr.
Rumpole. ain’t we?”

Like all his family, young Timson
was a confirmed optimist. And yet, of course, the merest outsider in the Grand
National, the hundred-to-one shot, is in with a chance, and nothing is more
like going round the course at Aintree than living through a murder trial. In
this particular case, a fanatical prosecutor named Wrigglesworth, known to me
as the Mad Monk, was to represent Beechers, and Mr. Justice Vosper. a bright
but wintry-hearted judge who always felt it his duty to lead for the
prosecution, was to play the part of a particularly menacing fence at the Canal
Turn.

“A chance. Well, yes, of course
you’ve got a chance, if they can’t establish common purpose, and no one knows
which of you bright lads had the weapon.”

No doubt the time had come for a
brief glance at the prosecution case, not an entirely cheering prospect. Eddie,
also known as “Turpin” Timson, lived in a kind of decaying barracks, a sort of
highrise Lubianka, known as Keir Hardie Court, somewhere in south London,
together with his parents, his various brothers, and his thirteen-year-old
sister, Noreen. This particular branch of the Timson family lived on the
thirteenth floor. Below them, on the twelfth, lived the large clan of the
O’Dowds. The war between the Timsons and the O’Dowds began, it seems, with the
casting of the Nativity play at the local comprehensive school.

Christmas comes earlier each year
and the school show was planned about September. When Bridget O’Dowd was chosen
to play the lead in the face of strong competition from Noreen Timson. an
incident occurred comparable in historical importance to the assassination of
an obscure Austrian archduke at Sarejevo. Noreen Timson announced in the
playground that Bridget O’Dowd was a spotty little tart unsuited to play any
role of which the most notable characteristic was virginity.

Hearing this, Bridget O’Dowd kicked
Noreen Timson behind the anthracite bunkers. Within a few days, war was
declared between the Timson and O’Dowd children, and a present of lit fireworks
was posted through the O’Dowd front door. On what is known as the “night in
question,” reinforcements of O’Dowds and Timsons arrived in old bangers from a
number of south London addresses and battle was joined on the stone staircase,
a bleak terrain of peeling walls scrawled with graffiti, blowing empty
Coca-cola tins and torn newspapers. The weapons seemed to have been articles in
general domestic use, such as bread knives, carving knives, broom handles, and
a heavy screwdriver. At the end of the day it appeared that the upstairs flat
had repelled the invaders, and Kevin O’Dowd lay on the stairs. Having been
stabbed with a slender and pointed blade, he was in a condition to become known
as “the deceased” in the case of the Queen against Edward Timson. I made an
application for bail for my client which was refused, but a speedy trial was
ordered.

So even as Bridget O’Dowd was giving
her Virgin Mary at the comprehensive, the rest of the family was waiting to
give evidence against Eddie Timson in that home of British drama, Number One
Court at the Old Bailey.

“I never had no cutter, Mr. Rumpole.
Straight up, I never had one,” the defendant told me in the cells. He was an
appealing-looking lad with soft brown eyes, who had already won the heart of
the highly susceptible lady who wrote his social inquiry report. (“Although the
charge is a serious one, this is a young man who might respond well to a period
of probation.” I could imagine the steely contempt in Mr. Justice Vosper’s eye
when he read that. )

“Well, tell me. Edward. Who had?”

“I never seen no cutters on no one.
honest I didn’t. We wasn’t none of us tooled up, Mr. Rumpole.”

“Come on, Eddie. Someone must have
been. They say even young Noreen was brandishing a potato peeler.”

“Not me, honest.”

“What about your sword?”

There was one part of the
prosecution evidence that I found particularly distasteful. It was agreed that
on the previous Sunday morning, Eddie “Turpin” Timson had appeared on the
stairs of Keir Hardie Court and flourished what appeared to be an antique
cavalry saber at the assembled O’Dowds, who were just popping out to Mass.

“Me sword I bought up the
Portobello? I didn’t have that there, honest.”

“The prosecution can’t introduce
evidence about the sword. It was an entirely different occasion.” Mr. Barnard,
my instructing solicitor who fancied himself as an infallible lawyer, spoke
with a confidence which I couldn’t feel. He, after all, wouldn’t have to stand
up on his hind legs and argue the legal toss with Mr. Justice Vosper.

“It rather depends on who’s
prosecuting us. I mean, if it’s some fairly reasonable fellow—”

“I think,” Mr. Barnard reminded me,
shattering my faint optimism and ensuring that we were all in for a very rough
Christmas indeed, “I think it’s Mr. Wrigglesworth. Will he try to introduce the
sword?”

I looked at “Turpin” Timson with a
kind of pity. “If it is the Mad Monk, he undoubtedly will.”

When I went into Court, Basil
Wrigglesworth was standing with his shoulders hunched up round his large, red
ears, his gown dropped to his elbows, his bony wrists protruding from the
sleeves of his frayed jacket, his wig pushed back, and his huge hands joined on
his lectern in what seemed to be an attitude of devoted prayer. A lump of
cotton wool clung to his chin where he had cut himself shaving. Although well
into his sixties, he preserved a look of boyish clumsiness. He appeared, as he
always did when about to prosecute on a charge carrying a major punishment,
radiantly happy.