Mike Shayne Mystery Magazine, Vol. 34, No. 3, February 1974

The Clock Watchers by Herbert Harris

Three minutes they had given him to cause a murderer to face the gallows. Could he use them to good effect?

Even if Charles Dainby had not been a psychologist, he would have known that Norman Sellor had poisoned his aunt, Mrs. Freedel.

Sellor had the brand marks of greed, rottenness, a heart without mercy.

Dainby had said to the girl he hoped to marry, old Mrs. Freedel’s secretary-companion “You know, Janet, they were right to arrest the old lady’s nephew. He was desperately in need of the legacy. He poisoned his aunt all right.” He shook his head knowingly.

Janet had nodded, fighting back her tears. “I know. I’m quite sure he did it too.”

“You were fond of old Mrs. Freedel?”

“Yes. She was so kind and trusting. She trusted Norman. He’s not going to get away with it, is he?”

Dainby looked grim. “The defence has the weakest possible case. They can only argue on trivial technicalities. Not that these aren’t important sometimes.”

It had taken Norman Sellor three minutes — the three minutes he had spent alone with the frail old lady in her room — to mix that fatal dose of barbiturate.

Sellor hadn’t known that Charles Dainby — calling for Janet, who happened to be out — was in the house, had seen him go into Mrs. Freedel’s room and emerge a little later.

Sellor had not quite concealed his shock at seeing Dainby, his momentary flush of guilt And there had been that fame attempt to divert the suspicion which he knew would shortly come winging inevitably in his direction.

“Just looked in on the old girl. She swallowed some of her pills and went straight off. I was only in there a minute.”

At least three minutes. This was the unshakable fact — but only he, Dainby, knew it.

Alfred Bittner, counsel defending Sellor, rose with aggressive determination — a big man, in love with histrionic effect.

Bittner knew that the case for the defence was as flimsy as tissue paper, that microscopic detail had to be magnified into dramatic proportions.

“Mr. Dainby, you have told the court that the accused was in his aunt’s room for three minutes?”

“Perhaps a little more. But about three minutes.”

“About three minutes?” Counsel, wearing a malevolent smile, studiously flicked back his gown. “You didn’t time it by your watch, then?”

“No.”

“Mr. Sellor has stated emphatically he was in that room for so short a time that he could not possibly have done what he is accused of doing — one minute, in fact.”

“I’m sorry to say he is lying,” said Dainby.

“But you could have been mistaken in your assessment of the time? When you are waiting for your young lady, time crawls by slowly, does it not?”

“I’m saying he was in the room for three minutes.”

“Are you seriously telling us, Mr. Dainby, that you can gauge the difference between a minute, or two minutes, or three minutes?”

“I think so, yes.”

“You are a sort of human egg-timer?”

Dainby allowed himself a faint smile as the court tittered.

The defending counsel spun round to face the judge. “With your lordship’s permission, I should like to test this witness’s ability to make accurate assessments of time.”

Counsel for the prosecution interjected: “My learned friend appears to be wasting it!”

The judge stared impassively at the Crown’s representative, a somewhat impudently complacent man. “Perhaps you will allow me to be the best judge of whether the defence is presenting its case in the proper manner.”

“My most humble apologies, my lord.”

The judge, tight-lipped, addressed Alfred Bittner: “Kindly proceed with the experiment you have in mind.”

The defence counsel bowed. “Thank you, my lord.” He turned to the witness, conscious of the tiny glow of triumph inside him, of the rapt interest of the jury.

“On the wall behind you, Mr. Dainby, is a large clock — visible to the members of the jury but not to yourself.

“Would you be so kind as to place your left hand behind your back, so that you cannot consult your watch, and indicate by raising your right hand when you consider that three minutes have elapsed.”

The judge put in: “One must consider the possibility of the witness counting the seconds. I suggest, therefore, that after giving your signal for witness to commence, you continue with other questions you may wish to put in your cross-examination.”

“As your lordship pleases.” Alfred Bittner faced the man in the witness box. “Perhaps you will kindly indicate when three minutes have elapsed, beginning now.” He raised his hand.

“In the meantime, Mr. Dainby, would you be good enough to tell us what else the accused said to you after you had seen him emerge from his aunt’s room?”

There was an oppressive, expectant hush in the court, save for the drone of the question and answers of the two principal players now holding the stage. The seconds and minutes passed with the slowness of a paralytic centipede.

At length, in the middle of a complicated question, Dainby raised his hand and said quietly “The three minutes are up.”

The counsel for the defence glanced at the clock and scowled. He caught the eye of Charles Dainby, who sat, arms folded, smiling at him, saying with malicious eyes: “Hoist with your own petard, I think.”

The room was still.

The judge, studying the large pocket watch which lay in front of him, had made it three minutes exactly. He looked at defending counsel. “Have you completed your cross-examination of this witness?”

Alfred Bittner crossly adjusted his wig. “Yes, m’lud.”

Afterwards, to Janet, Dainby said. “When I used the term ‘about three minutes,’ I meant just that — about three minutes. I don’t profess to be a human egg-timer, as that lawyer put it.”

“But if you aren’t how did you do it? By counting or something?”

She allowed herself a smile, her first real smile for weeks. Sellor had been tried, found guilty, and the terrible strain of the questioning and the trial was past.

“Counting?” Dainby returned her smile. “Have you tried to count while questions are fired at you? No. I’ll let you into a small secret... About a little experiment in psychology — which you might expect from a psychologist.”

“The jury could see the clock but I couldn’t. And the jury watched the clock. One had only to study their eyes.”

“You see, darling... when they stopped looking at the clock and looked at me, they were telling me — just as if they had shouted it — that the three minutes were up”