Trial and Error Page 33

  Mr Chitterwick took another breath of relief. “That is excellent. This is most important information about the watch. I can’t think why you never remembered it before. Still, you’ve told me now and it isn’t too late. I’ll have a search put in hand at once, under proper safeguards.”

  “Yes, do,” said Palmer with a slight smile. “I shall be very grateful. It may turn out lucky that I remembered at last. But you know I was almost in a daze that evening.”

  “Of course, of course,” beamed Mr Chitterwick. “Most satisfactory. Exactly. Er—your wife sent her love, yes, and expects you home very soon now. Quite so.”

  He turned to the warder and intimated that he was ready to go, calling on Mr Todhunter on the way.

  12

  That very same afternoon Mr Chitterwick, Sir Ernest Prettiboy (determined as usual to be left out of nothing), a detective sergeant and a detective constable began a search of the front gardens in Riverside Road and Harringay Road. The search began at a quarter past two, and by five o’clock it was completed, in a rough, preliminary way. No wrist watch had come to view.

  “He says he threw it into a front garden,” said Mr Chitterwick, obviously much distressed. “He’s quite sure he did.”

  “Yes, but where?” asked Sir Ernest acutely.

  “He can’t remember. He says he was in a kind of daze. Well, we may have missed it. On the other hand . . .”

  “Yes?”

  “Well, he says he took a bus in Persimmon Road. The bus stop, we can see, is a hundred yards ahead of this corner. The houses here have front gardens too.

  “Quite possible,” agreed Sir Ernest. “Eh, Sergeant? It’s worth having a try in Persimmon Road too?”

  “If you think it advisable, sir,” agreed the sergeant without enthusiasm.

  It was in the third garden from the corner that the watch was found, under the winter leaves, very dirty and grimed and its strap covered with mildew. That it was the watch they were looking for was not in question, for inside the front cover was the faintly scratched inscription “V from J.” It was the sergeant himself who found it, and Mr Chitterwick was vehement in his praise of such brilliant sleuthing.

  The hands of the watch stood at two minutes to nine.

  “You were right, sir,” said the sergeant to Mr Chitterwick with respect. “This about lets Mr Palmer out, and that’s a fact. Pity it didn’t turn up earlier.”

  “It would have saved many people a great deal of trouble, expense and unhappiness,” pronounced Sir Ernest.

  Mr Chitterwick said nothing. He was not sure that Sir Ernest was right.

  13

  As was only fair, Mr Chitterwick was given the privilege of breaking the news to Mr Todhunter the next morning. He was further able to pass on an item of news which he had had from Sir Ernest before leaving home.

  Mr Todhunter took the news calmly. “What a damned fool not to have remembered before!” he observed disgustedly. “I might still have been in Japan instead of this bloody hole.”

  For all his primness in some respects Mr Todhunter was singularly addicted to the use of this foolish adjective.

  “And I have it from Sir Ernest,” bubbled Mr Chitterwick, “that Palmer’s release can now be only a matter of hours. You haven’t seen the papers this morning. They have the whole story. I—er—thought it only right to ensure that they should have it. And they’ve done it justice. No government could possibly stand out against such a storm.”

  “Well, thank goodness I can have a bit of peace at last,” mumbled Mr Todhunter acidly. He relented. “You’ve done very well, Chitterwick,” he added kindly.

  Mr Chitterwick looked like a spaniel who has been patted on the head. The ecstatic writhing of his plump little body on its chair was exactly like an attempt to wag a tail.

  14

  That afternoon Palmer was released, unconditionally. A statement to this effect issued by the Home Office added handsomely that new evidence had completely dispelled any doubts that may have remained concerning his complicity in the crime. (Only one obscure periodical bothered to point out subsequently that the new evidence did nothing of the sort and might have been a cunning plant on Palmer’s part to prove the alibi; and in any case nobody cared.)

  That same evening the home secretary bowed to the storm and resigned. In a short statement in the House the prime minister, who had quite approved his colleague’s firmness in private, administered a final public kick to that colleague’s retreating posterior.

  When told the news, Mr Todhunter showed no emotion.

  “Serves him right,” he pronounced judgment. “The man was a bloody fool.”

  15

  In this way Mr Todhunter’s last week on earth was a peaceful one. Outside, the agitation for his reprieve had lost impetus and the government, sensing as much, were able to put up a good show of iron determination.

  Inside, Mr Todhunter expressed a wish to see no more visitors and said a final and grateful farewell to Sir Ernest, Mr Chitterwick and young Mr Fuller. At last he was able to take things easily, and he meant to do so.

  What happened to him now did not matter. Availing himself therefore of the earlier permission, he even got up once or twice to walk in his dressing gown and pyjamas very slowly round the exercise yard in the April sunshine on the arm of a warder. On these occasions no other convict of course was in sight. Mr Todhunter was incommunicado.

  He spent many hours writing and was able to complete the series of articles he had planned in the dock upon a trial, sentence and condemned cell from the prisoner’s own point of view, and only regretted that he was unable to include an account of an execution from the same unusual angle. There were plenty of interesting and pithy comments to be made upon the working of the British judicial system, and altogether Mr Todhunter felt that he had done an important job not too badly. A note from Ferrers to tell him of the world-wide interest which was being caused by the publication of these articles in the London Review made Mr Todhunter cackle with pleasure.

  For the rest, he spent his time mostly in chatting with his warders. It amused him that everything he told them even remotely concerning the crime had to be written down by one or the other of them in a notebook; but in return, when Fox was out of the way, Birchman continued to tell him interesting anecdotes about previous distinguished inhabitants of the cell. Both Mr Todhunter and Birchman were sorry that their acquaintance had necessarily to be such a short one.

  As the time for the execution drew on Mr Todhunter was touched to see what an object of solicitude he had become. The governor would stay and chat in the friendliest manner, the chaplain was ready to come at any minute and stay as long as wanted, the doctor was determinedly cheerful.

  “Does an execution bother you much?” Mr Todhunter asked the governor one day, and received an affirmative reply as emphatic as it was unofficial.

  “Loathe ’em! Horrible. Perfectly barbarous, in most cases, though they are sometimes justified. But it’s a ghastly responsibility for us officials. It upsets the prisoners, worries the staff. . . . . I dread them. Never sleep for a couple of nights beforehand.”

  “Please,” said Mr Todhunter, distressed, “don’t bother on my account. I used to suffer from insomnia myself. I should be most disturbed to hear that I’d cost anyone a night’s sleep.”

  16

  On the morning on which he was to die Mr Todhunter woke soon after seven o’clock. He had slept well and, observing his own reactions, was interested to find that he felt quite calm except for a certain mild excitement of anticipation. Mr. Todhunter had in fact by this time arrived at the conclusion that he did not mind dying. In fact he rather looked forward to it. The idea of imminent death had been with him so long that it would be a relief to get the preliminary of dying over and done with. Also, death seemed such a magnificent rest, and Mr Todhunter had grown very tired of his inefficient body. (Mr Todhunter’s doctor would have been delighted had he known what his patient had at last come to feel.)

  He atte
nded with his usual interest to the last ceremonies; but when the chaplain, hearing that he was awake, hurried over, Mr Todhunter asked him sincerely to keep off the subject of religion. He was ready to die, he was at peace with all men; and that, considered Mr Todhunter, was enough.

  He asked in a thoughtful way after the hangman, who, as Mr Todhunter knew, had passed the night in the prison, and expressed the hope that he had slept well. He also remarked that he was disappointed not to have been told when that gruesome official was taking his usual surreptitious peep at him on the previous evening for the purpose of estimating the amount of drop required, for he would have been pleased to stand up and offer him every facility for making a correct guess.

  The doctor, who paid a visit to the cell just before eight o’clock, secretly marvelled that his patient was standing the strain so well. He could hardly believe it when Mr Todhunter assured him that he was feeling no strain at all.

  By his own special request the warders in charge of him on the last tour of duty were Birchman and Fox. They were a great deal more upset than Mr Todhunter himself.

  At breakfast, when he ate his bacon and eggs and drank two cups of excellent coffee, Mr Todhunter remarked with mild surprise:

  “The condemned man partook of a hearty breakfast. Dear, dear. So one really does. Well, why not? I enjoyed that very much.”

  After it he asked for and was given a cigarette, which he smoked with relish, his first for many months.

  “They say one loses the taste,” he remarked to Fox. “It’s not true. This cigarette is exceedingly pleasant.”

  Soon after eight the governor came, very ill at ease.

  “All right, Todhunter?”

  “Perfectly, thank you. I’m not,” said Mr Todhunter with a sudden cackle, “going to collapse with nerves, if that’s what you mean.”

  “You can have a glass of brandy—er—later, if you want one, you know.”

  “My doctor’s forbidden me spirits,” regretted Mr Todhunter and cackled again. “It might prove fatal, you know, and then you’d be responsible.”

  The governor tried to smile, but it was not a very successful effort. He waved the warders out of the cell.

  “Now look here, we all hate this—well, I can’t say as much as you do, I’m afraid, but you know how we feel. And I just want to tell you that you must look on it more as an operation than—than anything else. It’s absolutely painless, and once the executioner comes in it’s only a matter of seconds. I’m sure you’ll be brave, and . . . oh, damn it, you know what I mean.”

  “I do indeed,” said Mr Todhunter earnestly. “And I’m exceedingly grateful to you. But please don’t distress yourself. I’m not worried at all.”

  “I really don’t believe you are,” said the governor wonderingly. He hesitated. “Well, there it is. We all hoped the other thing would get you first, but it hasn’t. So we’ve just got to go through with it. . . . I’ll come back with the others, the sheriff and so on, you know, at nine o’clock.”

  “Certainly,” said Mr Todhunter amicably.

  He sat down at the table and wondered whether there was really nothing else that ought to have gone into his will. It seemed queer that it was too late to alter it if there was.

  “Dear me,” said Mr Todhunter, “I feel as if I were catching a train and had got to the station too early. How do they usually fill up the last half hour, Birchman?”

  “Well, sir, they often write letters,” suggested the warder uneasily.

  “That’s a good idea,” said Mr Todhunter. “I’ll write to a friend of mine.”

  He sat down and wrote a short letter to Furze; but after he had explained that he could not explain his feelings because he had none beyond a sort of expectant emptiness, there was nothing more to say. So he thanked Furze again for all he had done and found that a bare five minutes had been consumed.

  “Are all the other convicts locked in their cells now?” he asked suddenly. Birchman shook his head. “No, we don’t do that now. They’ll be mostly in the workshops and so on, on the other side.”

  Mr Todhunter nodded and yawned. He had dressed this morning, for the first time for nearly a month. They were his own clothes for a man is not hanged in convict dress.

  “Well, we’d better have a game of something,” he said languidly. “Dear me, I never expected to be bored this morning, but I am. Just bored. How very odd. Can you explain it?”

  “Yes,” said Fox. “It’s because you’re not afraid.”

  Mr Todhunter looked at him in surprise. “I never knew you were a psychologist, Fox. But you’ve hit the nail on the head, I think. This waiting is just like any other waiting because I don’t mind what’s coming. In fact it’s not even as bad as waiting in the dentist’s room. I wonder if many of the others have felt like this?”

  “Not many, I dare say,” said Birchman, putting the cards on the table. “What would you like to play?”

  “Bridge,” said Mr Todhunter promptly. “It’s the only game after all. I wouldn’t at all mind a final rubber. Can we get the chaplain to make a fourth?”

  “Shall I ask him to come back?” suggested Fox, though a little doubtfully. Mr Todhunter had got rid of the chaplain soon after breakfast, afraid that he might become intense if given his head. Mr Todhunter was sufficiently public school to have a dread of intensity.

  “Call him,” Mr Todhunter nodded.

  Fox went to the door and spoke to someone who must have been waiting outside.

  Within two minutes the chaplain was in the cell. Whether he approved or not of Mr Todhunter’s method of spending his last minutes on earth, he was a good fellow and said nothing. They cut for partners, and Fox dealt.

  Mr Todhunter picked up his hand and cackled. There was a grand slam in spades in it.

  He got the grand slam.

  At two minutes to nine there was the sound of footsteps along the concrete passage outside.

  “They’re here,” said the chaplain in a low voice.

  He looked at Mr Todhunter, then suddenly leaned across the table and gripped his hand.

  “Good-bye, Todhunter,” he said. “I know you dislike sentiment, but I’d like to say this. I’m humbly glad to have know. you. Whatever you’ve done, you’re a better man than me.”

  “Do you really think so?” said Mr Todhunter, astonished and gratified too.

  As the cell door opened he stood up. To his pleasure and somewhat to his surprise, his heart did not seem to be beating any faster than usual. He glanced at his hands: they were quite steady.

  A little procession entered the cell: the governor, the deputy governor, the doctor and two strangers. Of the strangers one, Mr Todhunter knew, must be the sheriff; the other. . .

  The other detached himself, a squat, powerful man, and came forward at a quick shuffle. He held things at which Mr Todhunter looked with curiosity.

  “It’ll be all over in a few seconds, old man,” said the executioner in kindly tones. “Just put your hands behind your back.”

  “One minute,” said Mr Todhunter. “I’m intensely interested. May I see these—what do you call them? Pinioning straps?”

  “Now, don’t make things difficult, old man,” begged the executioner. “We’ve no time, and—”

  “Let him see them,” interrupted the governor abruptly.

  The executioner hesitated, and Mr Todhunter had an opportunity to look at the light strap he was holding.

  “Much less cumbersome than I’d thought,” he commented. His curious gaze travelled up to the executioner’s face. “Tell me,” he said, “has anyone ever hit you on the chin when you came in here to do this job?”

  “Why no,” said the executioner. “They usually—”

  “Well,” said Mr Todhunter, “here’s one you won’t forget,” and with all his strength he drove his bony fist at the other’s face.

  It caught the man full on the chin and knocked him backwards onto the floor. Mr Todhunter fell on top of him.

  Instantly all was hubbub
. The warders leapt forward, the executioner picked himself up.

  But Mr Todhunter did not move.

  The doctor dropped on his knees and felt hurriedly under Mr Todhunter’s waistcoat. Then he looked up at the governor and nodded.

  “He’s gone.”

  “Thank God,” said the governor.

  EPILOGUE

  Mr Chitterwick was lunching with Furze at the Oxford and Cambridge Club.

  It was just a week after Mr Todhunter’s death, and Furze was telling Mr Chitterwick of the letter he had received from him.

  “He felt no fear, I’m certain. But why should we, after all? Death isn’t terrifying. It’s only our imaginations that make it so.”

  “I hope he had an easy passing,” muttered Mr Chitterwick, “He was a fine man, and he deserved one, I would like to know just what happened in the cell.” It had been stated in the newspapers that Mr Todhunter had never been hanged; he had died from natural causes while resisting the executioner.

  Furze, who always knew any official secret, told him.

  Mr Chitterwick was delighted.

  “How very characteristic,” he crowed. “He must have intended it all the time. Dear me, I feel so privileged to have been able to help him.”

  Furze looked at his guest.

  “Yes, you did help him, you and Sir Ernest Prettiboy. But one can’t blame Sir Ernest. He did it unconsciously.”

  “Wh-what do you mean?” asked Mr Chitterwick nervously.

  Furze laughed. “It’s all right. You needn’t be alarmed. But I think we’d better have this out.”

  “Have what out?”

  “Why,” said Furze frankly, “the fact that both of us know perfectly well that Todhunter never killed the Norwood woman.”

  It was Mr Chitterwick’s turn to stare.

  “You know that?”

  “Of course. I’ve know it since halfway through the trial. How long have you known it?”

  “Since . . . since he began to manufacture evidence,” said Mr Chitterwick guiltily.

  “When was that?”

  “The day we first met Sir Ernest in his garden.”