Beyond this place (11 page)

But Paul felt no response to the cheerfulness of the room, his attention was riveted upon the man who sat behind the desk. He recognized him at once from the photograph he had seen, and he knew himself to be in the presence of the Chief Constable of Wortley, Adam Dale.

"Sit down, my boy. There. You'll find that a comfortable seat."

The quiet voice, warm with unforeseen friendliness, came to Paul as such a shock; he sank into the easy chair before the desk. He could not take his eyes from Dale.

The Chief Constable was now a man of fifty-five, and had reached, perhaps, the very acme of his physical powers. He had an enormous frame, a massive neck, and arms as thick as an ordinary man's thigh. There was no fat upon him, it was all bone and solid muscle, the features carved in granite, the slant of the face bones, jutting out and downwards from the brow, intimidating in its strength. The forehead was sound, not unintelligent, but the chin, rock-like, and implacable, gave battle to the world. The eyes were grey as ice.

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"I've wanted to see you for some days now, lad," Dale resumed in the same calm, considering manner, "and this seemed as good an opportunity as any to bring you before me."

Paul braced himself in his chair.

"I haven't done anything."

"I trust not. We'll talk of that later. First of all, I want you to understand that I know who you are and all about you. Wortley may seem to you a large city. To us it's only a small village. We're aware of what's going on in it. We hear most things. That's all part of our business. And I had information regarding you just after your arrival." He fingered a telegraph form in the japanned box on his left. "An appeal from Belfast, sent out by your good friends there, asking us to trace you and keep you out of harm. I know where you lodge, what you work at, all that you've been doing."

The Chief Constable picked up an ebonite ruler and turned it thoughtfully in his tremendous hands, which in his early days as a Cumberland-style wrestler had pinned many an opponent to the mat.

"Now look here, lad . . . I've a fair idea of how you feel towards me. You're full of hatred. I'm the brute who sent your father up for life, who nearly brought him to the gallows. That's your side of the case. Well, let me tell you mine. It's this. I only did my duty. In the fact of overwhelming evidence, I had no choice in the matter. Your father was just one of hundreds that have gone through my hands. In fact I'd forgotten all about him until you came along."

Again Dale paused, and turned upon Paul the steady battery of his eyes.

"I am here to safeguard the community. Society divides itself into two classes — those who do right and those who do wrong. It's my job to prosecute the wrong doers and protect the right. Have you got that clear? For if so, I want to put a straight question to you." He paused and pointed the ruler at Paul. "Which side do you belong to? Just ask yourself that. If you set yourself up against the forces of law and order you'll wind up in serious trouble. See where it's got you already. You're found hanging around the grounds of a big house after dark, without the con-

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sent, or even the knowledge, of the owner. Next thing you know you'll be inside. Mind you, I prefer no charges. But we work here on the sound policy that prevention is better than cure. So I'm just warning you, trying to show you for your own good where this sort of mischief is likely to end."

There was a pause during which Paul sat rigid and silent. At first he had meant to speak with all his soul, to pour out his side of the case, to argue, expostulate, and explain. But some inner force, a sense of secret foresight held him back.

"It's not my place to give you advice," Dale's tone, unmistakably sincere, had a reasonable, persuasive note. "But take my tip and go home to Belfast and your mother. You've a decent job waiting for you there and — I understand — a decent girl too. Give up raking around the seamy side of life. D'you hear me? I've children of my own, you know — I'm human. And I'd hate to see you get hurt. That's all. You can clear out of here now. And if you're wise you'll never be back."

He made a gesture of dismissal, cordial rather than curt. Without a word, Paul rose and left from the office, traversed the corridor and the charge room unmolested, and emerged to the cool night air. He was free. Sweating all over now, he walked rapidly away. The Chief Constable's outspoken candour had shaken him. There was no mistaking the other's honesty and sincerity of purpose. Yet through the tumult and disorder of his thoughts he felt, running deep and swift, an undercurrent of resentment. He had committed no wrong. In this free country no one had the right to dictate to him, he could not and would not surrender to Dale's demand. Instead, the very nature of that demand, and the circumstances which had preceded it, awoke in him a hot defiance, a longing for a stronger course of action which for some days had been developing in his mind.

His need of advice upon this matter was immediate, and despite the lateness of the hour, he thought, a trifle desperately:

"I must see Swann ... at once. It's true he told me to go slow . . . but then ... he didn't know this was going to happen. If I'm to be blocked here ... in Wortley ... I must, yes, I must take a more direct approach. After all, it was he who told me I would only get redress at the highest levels."

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Striding through the echoing streets, he quickly reached the infirmary.

But there, when he made his request at the entrance lodge the aged porter, first running a ragged finger nail over the register, raised his spectacled eyes, and mildly shook his head.

"Swann . . . James Swann. I'm sorry, lad. He's off the list for good. He passed away quite peaceful ... at four o'clock this afternoon."

Late that evening, after prolonged reflection, Paul made his decision. He wrote and mailed a letter to Westminster, in London.

CHAPTER XV

THE Liberal Member of Parliament for Wortley enjoyed his brief visits to his constituency, especially in November, when the partridge shooting was at its best. George Birley came of local country stock and his success in London, where, by marrying Lady Ursula Ancaster he had allied himself with one of the most influential Liberal political families in the land, had not dulled his affection for his old friends and his favourite sport. He was a popular figure in Wortley and, at fifty, ruddy, clean-shaven, genial, a great hand at a story, fine judge of a cigar, always well turned out — with a tendency to check suitings in his leisure hours — ever ready to help a friend, to subscribe to a local charity, he had become a kind of symbol for native worth unspoiled by success.

True, his career in Parliament had not been especially noteworthy. He took his seat regularly, voted faithfully in the divisions, played golf annually for the Commons against the Lords. Every public man has his detractors, and there were some who said that Birley had neither the brains nor the qualifications for his position, that a good fellow was not necessarily a good statesman, that he was afraid of his noble spouse, and, indeed, of all

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the lordly Ancasters, that his hail-fellow-well-met heartiness was merely an inverted snobbery, that were it not for his lady wife and her high connections in the cabinet and elsewhere, George might not, for so long, we have had his place in governing the nation.

On this particular morning Birley was in an excellent humour. His journey to Wortley by the early express had been comfortable, and now, seated at breakfast in the suite they always kept for him at the Queen's Hotel, he had partaken of a healthy portion of eggs and bacon, with grilled kidneys and a mutton chop on the side, and was at toast and marmalade and his third cup of coffee. The Courier on his knee, had been pleasant to glance through: the party shaping well in the Cots wold bye-election, no strikes in the offing, the stock market still rising. There had been frost over night, just enough to crisp the ground, and now the sun was breaking through. In ten minutes his car would be at the door, in an hour he would be snuffing the rich earth of his boyhood, tramping through the county furrows, with three other good fellows, good shots also, though perhaps not quite so handy on the trigger as himself. He had a new cocker, too, just broken to the gun, that he thought would do well.

A waiter entered, an oldish man with whiskers, very correct and deferential. George liked the atmosphere of the hotel, standing for the good old-fashioned traditions, opposing all that newfangled nonsense which he hated.

"There's a young man asking for you, sir."

Birley looked up from his paper and frowned.

"I can't possibly see him, I'm going out in ten minutes."

"He says he has an appointment, sir. He gave me this letter."

Birley took the letter which the waiter tactfully handed him — his own letter, with the House of Commons heading. His frown deepened. What a nuisance! He had fixed this days ago, in response to a rather vague communication soliciting an interview, then forgotten all about it. Still, he was a man who prided himself on never going back on his word.

"All right," he said. "Bring him up."

A moment later Paul was shown into the room. Birley, who

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was now lighting a five-shilling cigar, shook hands with him in an affable manner; motioned him to a chair at the table.

"Well!" he exclaimed heartily, through a cloud of smoke. "I've been expecting you ever since you wrote. Will you have a cup of coffee?"

"No thank you, sir." Paul was pale, but his firm expression and well set up shoulders made a distinctly favourable impression on Birley, who always liked to help a respectful, up-and-coming youngster.

"Let's come to the point, then, young man." Birley used the tone of friendly, half-humorous patronage at which he was adept. "I'm rather pressed you know. Have an important conference outside the city. Taking the express back to London tonight."

"I guessed you mightn't have much time, sir." Tensely Paul took a paper from his inside pocket. "So I prepared a typewritten statement of the facts."

"Good, good!" Birley approved blandly, at the same time raising a restraining hand. He objected strenuously to reading statements — why, otherwise, would he maintain two secretaries at the House? "Tell me in a few words what it's about."

Paul moistened his lips, took a swift deep breath.

"My father has been in prison fifteen years for a crime he did not commit."

Birley's jaw dropped, he stared at Paul with bulging eyes, as at something suddenly offensive. Paul, however, gave him no time to speak, he went on steadily with all he wished to say.

At first it seemed as though Birley would stop him. Yet though his face lengthened progressively, though he kept darting at Paul these queer glances of distaste, he did not. He listened. And his cigar went out.

The recital lasted exactly seven minutes, and when it was over Birley sat like a man caught in a most unpleasant trap. He cleared his throat.

"I can't believe tin's is true. It sounds like a complete cock-and-bull yarn to me. And even if it isn't . . . it's very ancient history."

"Not for the man in Stoneheath Prison. He's still living every minute of it."

Birley made a peevish gesture.

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"I can't accept that. And I don't believe in stirring up a muddy pond. In any case it's no affair of mine."

"You're the Member of Parliament for Wortley, sir."

"Yes, damn it. I'm not the member for Stoneheath. I represent decent people, not a bunch of convicts."

He rose and strode up and down the room, furious at the blight put upon his day. If only he hadn't given this young fool an appointment. He couldn't stick his head into such a hornet's nest. No man in his senses would touch it with a barge pole. And yet, even while he glared at Paul, sitting quite still at the table, he experienced an uneasy qualm. Suddenly, with a fretful glance at the clock, he temporized.

"All right, then. Leave me that damn statement of yours. I'll go through it sometime today. Come and see me again this evening at seven."

Paul handed over the typewritten document with a suppressed expression of thanks, then rose and quietly left the room. Outside, he filled his lungs with the morning air. If only he could induce the Member to act, in Parliament, the very fountain head of government, the whole matter must be opened up. As he hurried towards the Bonanza he was hopeful that he had made some impression on Birley.

The day passed with intolerable slowness. Conscious of the fateful processes of thought now taking place in Birley's mind Paul kept glancing at the clock with anxious eyes. Several times Harris, the manager, came over and stood watchfully behind him as though hopeful of seeing him slack off. But at last the hour drew near. Just before closing time Paul went to the washroom, plunged his head in cold water, freshened himself up. He was at the Queen's at quarter past seven and after a short wait was shown upstairs.

But on this occasion, as he entered the room, there was no affability in Birley's manner. The Member for Wortley stood with his back to the fire, his suitcase packed and ready, a heavy travelling ulster flung across the table. By way of greeting he barely nodded, then he favoured the young man with a long, unsociable scrutiny. Finally he spoke.

"I've gone through that paper of yours . . . every word of it.

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Read it in the car going down the country. Read it over again coming back. I must say you've put it together cleverly. Rut there are always two sides to a case. And you've only stated one of them."

"Only one of them can be true," Paul countered quickly.

Rirley frowned and shook his head.

"Things like that simply don't happen with us. They might in some rotten foreign country . . . but not here. Haven't we the best system of legal justice in the world? We lead there, as we do in everything else. What could be fairer than trial by jury? Good God! It's been going on for over seven hundred years!"