The Edge of the Fall (57 page)

‘Yes, sir.'

‘But the police officer asserts that she was at a distance of almost a hundred feet. That is much further than you are now from our constable at the back of the room. More than twice as far.' There was coughing and rustling from the gallery. Mr Bird looked around the room.

‘That would make a distance of about the length – well, from
the constable perhaps to that other officer over there. Much, much further, would you agree?'

Mr Werth looked down. ‘Yes, sir. I suppose so. I am not so good at judging distances by eye.'

‘So are you saying that you were mistaken in our initial discussion of distance? That Mr and Mrs de Witt were actually a hundred feet away from you?'

‘I don't know. It didn't feel that way. Maybe the officer was wrong.'

‘The officer was wrong? When he measured where your wife was sitting? This may be the case, of course. But we are benefited by the fact that the officer was a local man. He knew the cliffs so well that he didn't have to measure distance. In fact, he noted your wife's position by saying that she was sitting a foot to the left of a prominent stone which he knew well. The stone had apparently been a favourite spot for his own children. Do you remember the stone?'

‘Possibly.'

‘Well, I quite understand the officer. I am sure all of us who are parents here remember the certain places that our offspring wished to visit over and over during their childhood. But I wanted to be sure. So I went to the stone myself, accompanied by my clerk, Mr Honeywell. We took some photographs of the place itself.' He walked back to his seat and Mr Honeywell passed him a bundle of photographs. ‘If I have permission to hand these to Mr Werth?'

The judge held out his hand. ‘If I might look at them first, Mr Bird.'

‘Of course, Your Honour.' Mr Bird handed the photographs to the clerk.

The judge regarded them, slowly. ‘There are ten photographs here of the cliff and the area around it. There are photographs of the stone that has been discussed. Allowed. Mr Werth may peruse them, then they should be handed to the jury. The jury may ask to see these again. As may I.'

‘Yes, sir.' Mr Bird took the photographs from the clerk and handed them to Mr Werth.

‘Do you see the stone on these photographs, Mr Werth? I believe it is photograph four?'

‘I do.' Mr Werth's voice was quiet.

‘And could you say that this was where your wife was sitting?'

‘She might have been. You could say she might have been.'

‘And would you agree with our measurement that this is about a hundred feet away from the side of the cliif?'

‘If you say so, sir.'

‘Indeed. I think it is actually a little more than a hundred. Mr Honeywell and I put it at one hundred and two feet and one inch. And, if I recall correctly from my geography lessons as a schoolboy, we lose a little of a cliff every year, and so, nearly five years ago, you might have been separated from Mr Witt by a distance of one hundred and two feet and another half foot or so.'

Mr Werth dropped his head. ‘Perhaps.'

‘As I said earlier, Mr Werth, we cannot deal in probabilities. We must have certainties. As I do not need to remind anyone in the room, a man's life is at stake. We must be absolutely sure, sure beyond reasonable doubt, that Mr de Witt purposely pushed his wife over the cliff. And I don't need to remind you, sir, that your evidence is key here. So we must be entirely sure. Can you definitely say you were at a distance of fifty feet from Mr de Witt?'

Mr Werth paused, shook his head. He said something, very slight.

‘Could you repeat that, Mr Werth? I am not sure everyone here quite heard.'

‘No,' said Mr Werth, more loudly. ‘No, I can't.'

‘You were closer? Or further?'

‘Further.'

‘How much further? I suggest you were not fifty, but over one hundred feet away from Mr de Witt. And that, as we all know, is a most significant distance. Many of us cannot see well over the length of a hundred feet, Mr Werth. I myself could not without my spectacles. Do you, sir, use spectacles?'

There was a silence. Mr Werth looked down.

‘Do you use spectacles, Mr Werth?'

The judge leant forward. ‘Answer the question, please, Mr Werth.'

‘Yes, sir.'

‘For short sight or long sight?'

‘Short sight.'

‘Which means you cannot see clearly things far away?'

‘Yes, sir.'

‘And were you wearing them when Mrs de Witt fell over the cliff?'

‘No, sir.'

There was a gasp from the gallery. The judge frowned at his papers. Mr Werth looked down.

‘If His Honour will permit me, I have an experiment. I would say that the back of the gallery is about a hundred feet away. Would His Honour agree?'

About that, Mr Bird.'

‘Thank you, Your Honour. Now, at the back of the court is a lady who will now stand up.' He waved up at the gallery and the lady stood. ‘That, Mr Werth, is Miss Sillen, who occasionally does some extra typing for me. An excellent secretary, and a very attractive young lady, as you can see, perhaps. Or perhaps not. Could you tell me the style of her hair, Mr Werth?'

Mr Werth looked down. ‘No, sir.'

‘Or the colour of her eyes?'

‘No.'

‘Could you tell me if she is smiling or frowning?'

‘I cannot.'

‘And what is the cut of her coat?'

‘I cannot say, sir.'

‘Can you see her at all, Mr Werth?'

‘I confess I cannot really see her, sir.'

Mr Bird waved up. ‘I shall not ask Miss Sillen to say “no”, for this is a courtroom that is quite silent. But I have been to the rock in question and the wind is very high. I propose that no one a
hundred feet away, in conditions of wind, could hear a shout of anything. I would be very happy to take His Honour to the spot to show him quite how windy it is.'

‘I don't think that will be necessary,' said the judge. ‘Thank you.'

Mr Bird waved up again. ‘Thank you, Miss Sillen. Most kind.'

He turned back to Mr Werth.

‘Are you sure, Mr Werth, that you heard the word “no”?'

Mr Werth's head was drooping low.

‘Are you quite sure? Might it not just have been a trick of the wind? The wind tricks us, after all. It could have been any sound. Perhaps even a child crying out when he had lost his balloon. Anything. Are you quite sure it was Mrs de Witt? Remember, sir, a man is on trial for his life.'

Mr Werth raised his eyes. He shook his head.

‘Are you saying you cannot be sure?'

‘I cannot be sure.' Mr Werth sat back, his face crushed. Celia stared at him. He'd misremembered, captured in the glamour of it like everybody in the gallery, all those people writing in the newspapers.

‘Thank you.' Mr Bird turned to the judge. ‘Your Honour, I propose that Mr Werth did not see anything of use at all. Few of us could, unless we had quite marvellous eyesight. And Mr Werth's eyesight is not strong. He may have thought he saw something. He may have been caught up in the excitement of the story. But he did actually see nothing and so his evidence that he saw Mr de Witt push Mrs de Witt over the cliff must be entirely discounted.

‘It happens, when one is part of great trials, that one makes mistakes, one is caught up in the excitement, but actually what one recalls is not correct. And without that evidence, we have nothing but some hearsay about an unhappy marriage, in which, as I have proved, there has been no suggestion of violence.

‘Mr de Witt may not have been the most attentive husband. Or they may have been very happy. We have had nothing but a succession of circumstantial accounts. As I said I suspect, with the exception of His Honour, many of us gentlemen here have given way to the occasional shabby impulse when it comes to the
treatment of our dearest wives. Mr de Witt was indeed guilty of keeping his marriage a secret, but that is hardly a sin, and I might remind you all that Mrs de Witt also chose to keep it a secret.

‘Mr de Witt and Mrs de Witt were very unwise to go near the edge. That is the foolishness of the young. They have indeed paid the highest price for their foolishness. She is dead, he is on trial. But, Your Honour, ladies and gentlemen of the jury, he is no murderer and there has clearly been no crime.'

There was the sound of a mass rush as the journalists in the gallery ran out, pushing past everyone, stamping on feet, flinging themselves forward, seized by immediacy, every face looking-forwards, quick and directed to file the story.

FORTY-ONE

London, March 1926

Celia

‘To us!' Arthur said, holding up his glass of champagne. ‘To the family!'

It was three weeks after the trial. Already Celia had forgotten the day when she and Emmeline had walked out of the court – and Arthur had followed behind them. It was a blur, a painfully bright blur.

‘Don't speak to the papers,' Mr Bird advised, as they were bundling out of the building. ‘However much money they offer you.' So they didn't. Arthur came back with Celia and Emmeline and stayed a few nights, then took his own flat.

After two days of coverage on the trial, the newspapers moved to a different story and the pages were full of discussion about arguments in the House of Lords.

‘Thank you, ladies,' Mr Bird had said, shaking hands after court. It was all over. And yet Celia couldn't believe it. ‘You'll be in shock for a while,' Mr Bird had said. She woke up every morning, thinking about the trial – then realising it was over. Everyone knew Arthur was innocent. He was a free man.

‘To the family!' Emmeline raised a glass, her hand shaky. They were in the Ritz, supposedly to celebrate Arthur's freedom. Celia thought how strange it was. During the trial, she would have done anything to see Arthur free, to be sitting next to him in a restaurant. Now, there was something strange and dissatisfying about it. The words they said didn't work, came out clumsy and wrong. Rudolf was ill and confused, drooped silently over his plate, eating
slowly. He and Verena had taken a car up from Stoneythorpe, but still the journey had been difficult and too slow – and now Verena was fretting about the expense. Arthur was taking them out. ‘Have anything you like!' he said, waving his hand across the menu. Rudolf and Verena couldn't, though, they looked at the thing miserably, made sure, Celia noted, to choose the most inexpensive dishes. Emmeline looked sick and pale and Mr Janus stared into space, distracted – occasionally coming out to shake his head at the excess of it all. ‘This cost a whole year's wages,' he said to Celia, pointing to a bottle of wine. ‘Don't they understand it's disgraceful?'

He coughed loudly every time a waiter walked by. ‘How much do you think they get paid? A pittance, I imagine, to smile and serve us like lackeys. We need a world in which there are no servants. No restaurants. These places make us into infants, sitting here waiting to be fed. No one fought for more
restaurants
, did they?'

The Ritz didn't look like it was closing any time soon. The chandelier glittered over the cream marble tables and ornate wallpaper. Every table was occupied with men and women eating and drinking together, young and old, all rich. The women wore beautifully embroidered short gowns in a variety of colours – blush peach, pale yellow, mint. Celia and Emmeline looked dowdy.

Celia's mind was full of the last time she'd been in the Ritz, drinking with Jonathan during the war. Then the room had whirled and glittered around her. Now it looked much bigger and even a little dreary, the curtains too short, and none of the women she saw had the beauty of those girls from back then. Perhaps she had invented it all, she thought. Jonathan had gone off to Edinburgh, some sort of business. He'd come to say goodbye to the children before he left. ‘Please write,' he'd said. ‘Even if it's only short.'

And none of them fitted in, either. Arthur might have, before prison, but now he looked thin and old, trying too hard, a bad actor pretending to laugh. It had touched him, Celia thought, those months in prison, stuck in that place with all those guards and goodness knows who. She wondered again what they'd done to him there, if the other men had hit him, attacked him because
he was rich or, even worse, because he was a man who hadn't fought. She'd tried to ask him, the day of the verdict.

‘It was fine, little sister,' he said, shrugging. ‘Glad to be out, that's all.'

She'd asked him about the other men, the food, were there
rats
? But he batted her away. ‘I'm a new man now. That's all in the past. I don't want to dwell on it.'

She tried to go over the trial, the horror of it, how they'd been so worried, but he shook his head again. ‘I'll think about all that on my death bed. Right now, it is time to look to the future. I have a new life now.'

And he did, she supposed it was true. He was rich now. It was almost awful to think it but he was rich, very much so. The Deer-hurst estate had released half of Louisa's money, were trying to hold on to the other half because the marriage had been ‘irregular'. But Mr Pemberton said it was not going to work. Arthur and Louisa had been married and so the money was his. There was no one else for it to go to, really, except some sort of distant cousin on Louisa's father's side, who Mr Pemberton thought wouldn't put up too much of a fight.