Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 77, No. 4. Whole No. 451, March 25, 1981

The Hand of God by Christianna Brand

Constable Bill Evans saw the whole thing clearly — saw Jellinks run down and kill Evans’ own daughter and grandchild. He could have put the blame on Jellinks, an unpopular ex-con. But Evans was an honest witness. He had “to do what’s right.” He had to tell the truth. It was not Jellinks’ fault...

They could scarcely believe their ears. “He was driving quite slow?”

“Well, not fast, Sergeant. I can’t say that. And a country road, very little traffic—”

“Constable Evans — Jellinks here, he says himself that he was driving fast.”

“Not all that fast,” said Jellinks quickly.

“He’s confused,” said Constable Bill Evans. “Shocked, I daresay, doesn’t know what he’s saying.” Natural enough, he added, his big, strong, middle-aged face gone so white and pudgy now in the evening light. Jellinks having just run down — just killed — a girl and her little kid.

“For God’s sake, Bill — your girl and her little kid. Your daughter.”

“That’s right,” Evans said woodenly and moved apart, suddenly, and stood with clenched hands, his back turned to them.

Jellinks seized the opportunity. “You heard what he said. Driving quite slow, he said, and him a copper. And he ought to know!”

“Perhaps it’s him that’s shocked and confused,” said the sergeant.

“Well, I thought you were driving fast,” said a woman, coming forward. A couple of cars had drawn up, and a small group of on-lookers stood wretchedly around. “He passed me ten miles back, going at the rate of knots.”

“I could’ve slowed down later,” said Jellinks, growing from wary to a little cocky.

“Yes, well... Just come out of the Pig and Whistle, Jellinks, had you?” said the sergeant. “At closing time.”

“Yes, I had. I come out of the Pig and Whistle most nights of my life at closing time,” said Jellinks. “But I wasn’t drunk, I never get drunk, they’ll tell you so — and you’ve done all your breathalysing.”

“And for once it was not a stolen car?”

“I’ve shown you all the humph, haven’t I? It’s me own car. All right, so it was stolen originally, getting away from that job on the shoe shop. But I bought it after I’d done my time. Made a pretty good mess of it, but I could patch it up myself. So I went, honest, to the owner and he was glad enough to get rid of it.”

“And you had the proceeds of the till to pay for it?”

“I’d done me stint for that,” said Jellinks, shrugging.

The sergeant stood, waiting. Two constables were nosing about the road — looking at the car, the tracks, making notes, taking names and addresses. He watched them but he knew his men — they were efficient and thorough; he could safely leave it all to them. And Bill Evans was under control again and had turned back to him. “We went into that, Sergeant, when Constable Jones turned up — it’s Jellinks’ own car. And he’s right about the breathalyser too. Just under the margin.”

“I know the score,” said Jellinks.

“You’d have to,” said the sergeant, “wouldn’t you? — driving the way you do and for the reasons you do.” And to Evans, “So he took the bend okay?” Passing cars had obscured the tiremarks in the road, swinging out to avoid the group gathering around the scene of the accident.

“That’s right, yes.” The attendants had closed the ambulance door with a slam, and more to distract him than anything else, the sergeant suggested, “Just run through it once again for me, before we get to the station. If you can manage it,” he added compassionately, looking at the sick white face watching the ambulance with its pathetic burden driving away.

“That’s all right, Skip. Well, like I told you, I was on my bike, just at the end of my beat. I knew I’d meet them, our Jenny and the baby, coming back from the Other Granny’s. The Other Granny, that’s what we call her. Lives just down the road — on her own she is now, since her Tom married our Jenny and moved in with me and the missis.”

“Yes — so?” said the sergeant, gently interrupting; he knew all about Bill and Bill’s missis and Tom and Jenny and the baby; and the Other Granny too. The officers were all local men.

“Yes, well he — the car — was coming up behind them. Came round the bend — not fast, I can’t say he was going too fast. But...” He made a huge effort. “They saw me coming. The little one — she ran forward to meet me, ran into the road, and her mother went after her to catch her.” He looked at Jellinks steadily. “I got to say it,” he said.

It was beginning to get to Jellinks. He looked ill now in the evening light. But he clutched greedily at salvation. “Okay, well, you’ve heard him. I was going slow enough, the kid ran into the road and the girl after her — it wasn’t my fault.”

“And you stopped at once. You weren’t driving on?”

“The... well, the jolt like, that stopped me—”

“Two jolts,” said Evans with murder in his voice.

“—and anyway, there he was, biking towards me. I had to stop. Well, I mean I’d’ve stopped anyway, of course I would.”

“Something like this happened to you once before — and you didn’t.”

“Nobody was hurt that time. What would I stop for?” said Jellinks.

“But this time you had to?”

“I didn’t have to. I could have... well, there you are, you see!” he said, improvising triumphantly. “I could’ve driven straight on, couldn’t I? Run him down on his bike and driven straight on and no one the wiser. But I didn’t, did I? I had nothing to be afraid of. He says himself, I was driving quite slow, the kid run across in front of me.” But the triumph died and he looked at Bill Evans uneasily. “You’re not going to go back on that in court and say anything different? Don’t you try anything of that, mate! I’ve got friends—”

The sergeant looked from the white face, set and stern, to the narrow white weasel-face, vicious in self-defense. He said slowly, “Well, that’s a good thing, Jellinks — you hang on to them. I think you’re going to need them from now on — need all the friends you’ve got.”

There was a good deal of confusion in the coroner’s court, opinions of the minor witnesses varying, as such opinions tend to do. The car was — was not — going fast. They had lain here — lain there — the two pitiful dead bodies. The child’s little push-chair had been all smashed up — in the center of the road — on the grass at the verge. The mother had been wheeling the baby — had been leading her, holding her little hand. But Evans stood in the box, four-square, ashen-faced, hands horribly shaking but — positive.

“As honest a witness,” said the coroner, summing it all up, “as it’s been my privilege to listen to in all my experience. The constable saw the whole thing from beginning to end. He tells his story clearly, he says frankly that the driver was not to blame. Other witnesses may be confused by shock but Evans is a trained observer and trained in reporting his observations; and none of you will suppose that he could be biased in favor of the driver who had run down his daughter and her child. There can be only the one verdict — accidental death.”

And outside the court he sought out P.C. Evans and with deep respect shook his hand. “You set us all an example, Evans,” he said, “of absolute honesty. You’ve earned our admiration and our thanks.”

“I have to do what’s right, sir,” said Evans, and, expressionless, he moved away.

And the weeks passed and the evenings drew in and dark fell early. Pitch-dark, that night weeks later when the landlord threw Jellinks out of The Pig and Whistle a good hour before closing time. Pitch-dark with only the lights of the pub shining across the blackness of the country road.

The landlord stood in the doorway. “And don’t bloody come back! I’m sick of having to chuck you out, you’re wrecking my custom here.”

But there wasn’t that much doing in a small wayside pub and Jellinks drank spirits these days and rang up quite a packet on the till before it was time to get rid of him.

“I don’t want to refuse him altogether, Sam,” the landlord said to one of his regulars who, with a friend, was on the way out. “He pays. But what’s got into him these days, I don’t know. Never used to overdo it the way he does now. Most nights he spent in here—”

“Most nights he spent in the jug,” said Sam. “In and out like a yo-yo. Chuck a brick in a window, grab a handful and make a getaway—”

“Getaway seems not just the word,” said the friend, laughing.

“Still, it’s true. Whenever he was out — well, he was in. In the Pig, I mean. But I never saw him tight, never.” The two men started together down the steps. “My opinion — he’s scared of something.”

“He’s the chap that ran down some girl and a child?”

“That’s right. Her father, Evans — resident copper, he is — Evans saw it happen. But he still gave evidence — villain wasn’t going too fast, all the rest of it. He could easy have said he was, but he didn’t. Stood up there in court — I could scarcely believe my ears—”

They could scarcely believe their ears. “Not going fast?”

“No, Sergeant, not fast at all.”

A different officer this time, new in the division. “But he must have been, to catch the man a wallop like that!” He threw out a hand toward the dark hump in the center of the road. “He’s dead.”

“His own fault. We both saw it,” said Sam earnestly, “me and Jim here, coming down the steps. Tight as a tick he was. I was saying so to Jim, tight as a tick.”

“Reeling all over the road,” said Jim. “You couldn’t miss him.”

“What do you mean? — you couldn’t miss him.”

“You couldn’t help hitting him,” said Jim. “That’s all. What else?”

“And that’s your story too, Constable Evans? He reeled out in front of your car?”

You could see the fingers tighten, the slight recoil. But Evans said evenly, “That’s right. My story, like you say.”

“I don’t mean to offend you,” said the sergeant. “I don’t mean that. But... these two gentlemen — they’re friends of yours?”

“Never set eyes on him in my life,” said Jim, “whatever it is you’re suggesting.”

“Not a friend of his?”

“No, I am not. And not a liar either.”

“All right, well, I’m sorry.”

“He drove round the bend doing — thirty, forty — not more. The landlord had told the other chap to clear out—”

“All according to cocker, Sarge,” said the landlord righteously. “I don’t have to serve a customer that’s drunk. And Jellinks is drunk every night, and every night I chucks him out. Right, Sam?”

“To the great relief of all,” said Sam.

“So you didn’t like the man?”

“Nobody liked the man,” said Sam. “Not unless they was fond of snakes. But that doesn’t mean I’d stand and watch him murdered in front of my eyes, and me and my mate tell lies about it. Evans was driving regular, Jellinks was staggering around, and that was the end of it.”

“And the end of Jellinks.”

“That’s right,” said Constable Evans. “And am I sorry for it? No, I’m not.”

“No,” said the new sergeant thoughtfully. He suggested, but tentatively — they seemed to be a touchy lot round here — “You just happened to be driving this way?”

“Yes,” said Bill tonelessly. “Up to the cemetery.”

“At nine o’clock at night?”

“Night or day, it makes no odds to me. I go when I’m off duty.” And now the tone of his voice did question: any objection?

“To visit your daughter’s—” The sergeant broke off. “Yes, I know about that. I understand.”

“Yes, well... That’ll save me explaining then, in so many words, that I drive out to the cemetery to say my prayers by the grave of my girl, lying in her coffin there, with her baby in her arms.” And he jerked the toe of his solid, black, hobnailed boot toward the figure, laid out now, by the side of the road. “Killed by — him.”

“Of course. Yes, I know. I heard about it. But it was an accident. You yourself gave evidence — the car was not driven too fast, the child ran across his path—”

“That’s right. Just like tonight. An accident. Car not driven too fast. But—”

“—the man reeled across your path.” The sergeant thought it over. “A coincidence. Extraordinary coincidence, Constable — you’d have to agree to that?”

“Oh, I do,” said Constable Evans, poker-faced.

“And yet—”

In the brightness shining across from the pub, lighting up the small group standing there facing one another, tense and still, the men were lifting the stretcher into the ambulance; the hush was absolute as the throbbing of the engine died away into the night. The sergeant could begin herding them all off down to the station now.

And yet— And yet—

“The accident to your daughter, Evans, and her baby — you were the only witness, isn’t that so?”

“Me and that — me and the driver, yes.”

“Yet you gave evidence that certainly saved him from a prison sentence. And now—”

“And now he’s dead. A second accident,” said Evans.

“Coincidence,” said the sergeant again. He thought it all over quietly. Extraordinary. But coincidences did happen. And what else—? He could ferret around, he could inquire, but how much would that tell him? A man driving on a routine journey. A man reeling drunkenly across his path. Two unbiased witnesses on the spot, seeing it all happen. Collusion? — only collusion could offer any other explanation.

But these were not people to get together to hatch up a plot — to plan, to carry out a thing like this; and one of them was, in fact, a “foreigner” — anyone from across the county border was a foreigner here; he could check but he knew he would find it was true — the second witness was a stranger to them all.

Coincidence: it had to be. Fate. The Hand of God.

The sergeant, a religious man, took off his cap, standing there looking down at the pool of blood, dark on the roadway, where a man had died — run down by the man whose child the victim himself had run down a few weeks before.

“The Hand of God,” he said. “Some of us might call it Fate. I call it the Hand of God.”

The Other Granny — she was a fly old bird. Grannies come in different ages but this Granny had had a long family, with Bill Evans’ son-in-law at the tail end of it: she was old. They all met at Evans’ home on the day of the inquest and drank a quiet cup of tea to celebrate his exoneration from blame in the accident to Jellinks. An extraordinary coincidence, the coroner had said, echoing the sergeant’s words on that earlier night; but Fate, that was all you could call it, blind Fate.

And Fate was what they were calling it at home, over their cups of tea. “Everyone knows Bill gave his evidence honest and true, when he might have said a wrong word and got that villain what he deserved. Not that you could say anything else, love. We know that. You had to say it.”

“Yes, I did,” said Bill.

“Well, I don’t know that I could have done it,” said young Tom. “Not stood there and let him off scot-free, when he’d surely have got a stretch for it. I got to respect you, Dad, honest.” Unless, he added, with one of the few smiles he had smiled since his pretty young wife and their baby had died, his pa-in-law might have been saving it up — for this?

“Don’t talk silly!” said the old lady. “How could Bill know that Jellinks would be staggering about the road that hour of night? It wasn’t closing time, was it? And just as he happened to be driving by; all sorts of odd times he goes up to — well, we all know where he was going, poor old Bill, same as all of us goes. And that Jim What’s-his-name coming out with Sam, the exact right minute to see it happen. Fate it was, the Coringer said so, and he was right. Fate. Retribution, that’s the big word for it and just Fate that our Bill was the one to hand it out.” And she got up and stretched her old bones and said if Bill would be a dear now and run her home—

“I’ll take you, Mum, in the side-car.”

“No, you won’t, Tom, thanks all the same. I’ll go with Bill. That side-car of yours — no, thanks! I’m a bit too fly for that.”

And a bit too fly for Police Constable Evans too. Sitting beside him, nice and comfortable in the car. “Well, it’s all over, Bill, my dear. And you’ll feel better, now it’s done.”

“What’s done?” said Bill, his grip tightening on the steering wheel.

“Like I said — retribution. What they’re all calling Fate. And let ’em,” said the old lady. “Then everyone’s happy. That’s best.”

“Fate and retribution — aren’t they the same thing?”

“No, they’re not,” she said. “And you know it. None better. Fate you can’t control, can you? Retribution you can.”

“God helps them that helps theirselves,” he said.

“He wasn’t going slow, was he? Police after him or not, he drove like a demon, always did. Came blinding round that bend, didn’t he? And you’d have said so. But when it come out that it was his own car, not stolen, no need for him to be driving fast — well, then it was going to be his word against yours, and you her Dad and the baby’s Grandad. With a doubt like that in their minds they’d never have dished him out a long sentence, they couldn’t. And what was a few months to that one? In and out of prison like a jack-in-the-box, his home away from home. That wasn’t going to be any punishment, that wasn’t going to be enough. You were going to have to take it into your own hands.”

They had come to her gate; it wasn’t very far — Jenny had been walking it that evening, pushing her baby in the pram. “She never did run into the road, did she? — poor little love. In the push-chair, like some of them gave evidence, only they all contradicted one another. In the push-chair — why would her mum be walking her home, that time of night? He came round the corner, didn’t he, driving like a maniac, as always; took the bend too sharp and just — just mowed them down.”

Two tears trickled down her withered old cheeks; she made no attempt to wipe them away, they were welcome there. Her thin fingers, noded like bamboo, rested on Evans’ heavy hand gripping tightly now on the steering wheel.

“You’re safe with me, Bill. Nobody else will know. But I saw her go off with the baby in the push-chair, didn’t I? So I realized. You’re not so green as you’re cabbage-looking, old Bill, are you? — and you thought quick and acted quick; and all I’m saying is, right or wrong, you’re safe with me.”

“I made up my mind,” he said. He had switched off the engine; the car stood, an oasis of warmth and privacy, at the little gate. “All in a minute I made up my mind and I never changed it again and I haven’t changed it now. I had to make him pay, and anyone who couldn’t understand that — they didn’t see my pretty ones die; they didn’t hear them die.”

“He’s paid,” she said. “With his life.”

“And with every hour to the end of his life,” said Bill. “You should have seen his face when I said that he was driving slow. What’s he up to, he was thinking to himself, he knows I wasn’t driving slow. And then when I said about — about the baby running to meet me, running out into the road! She was in her pram, he knew she’d been in her pram, Jenny was wheeling her in the pram, right on the verge, on the grass. So why was I saying different, why was I saving his neck? He was frightened then. But what was he to say? I’d got him trapped, hadn’t I — he couldn’t contradict me. Whatever way he played it, I’d got him trapped.”

“That’ll be why he took the drink so much?”

“That’s right. I couldn’t know what way it would take him, I just had to wait and hope that the chance would come. I wouldn’t want to get copped for it; for myself, I didn’t care — you can understand that, old lady, can’t you? — but there was the missis, and your boy, too, I wouldn’t want more pain for him. But Jellinks started drinking hard and I knew that was going to be a help — night after night, drinking himself silly to shut out the fear of the threat — he knew some threat was there and there was nothing he could do about it. Short of confessing to perjury, short of admitting to have killed them through reckless driving, what was he to do?”

“He might have done that in the end. Rather have gone to prison.”

“Even Jellinks wouldn’t like the sort of sentence that would have got him, him having perjured himself and all. And it wasn’t the first accident he’d had and he hadn’t stopped for the last one. But like you say, he might do it — I had to go careful. So I watched him. Night after night — the missis thought I was out alone somewhere, brooding. Well, so I was; but I was watching him. Out by the pub, sitting quiet in my car, watching out of the darkness, under the trees. Till I knew exactly, as time went by, how long he’d last before they chucked him out. And then one night, when things were right, I’d cop him. And so I did.”

“All planned?”

“Like I said,” he said. “And nothing left to chance.”

“It was chance them two being there to witness it, Bill. You couldn’t judge what time they’d come out.”

“I didn’t have to judge it,” he said. “I arranged it.”

“Now, come on, Bill!”

“I’m the copper round here,” he said, “aren’t I? I know what goes on. I know old Sam works night shifts — on duty ten o’clock. I know he calls in at The Pig on his way to work. I know what time he leaves to get to the job.”

“You couldn’t know he’d have a stranger with him?”

“I knew all right, don’t you worry. I arranged it.”

“All right, old clever chops,” she said with mock resignation. “You arranged for old Sam to come out of the pub just at the minute that Jellinks would reel out in front of your car, bringing a stranger with him for — what do they call it?”

“Unbiased witness.”

“You arranged it?”

“This is my manor,” he said again. “I know what goes on. I knew that Sam’s mate, Jamie, off duty for a week—”

“You arranged that too, I daresay?”

“That’s right,” he said, “Poor old Jamie — brought him in at last for poaching.”

“Bill, you never!”

“He had it coming to him. Lucky to get away with it for so long.” “Till you needed him.”

“Till I didn’t need him on the night shift with Sam. They’d have to bring in a temporary. And like I say, I know. I knew he was being sent in from the other factory, I knew he was coming in by the eight forty, stopping outside The Pig. I knew Jim was meeting him there and having a pint with him before they went off to work. It was just a matter of waiting till the time coincided exactly, them following Jellinks out immediately. And that night it did, as I knew very soon it must. That wasn’t chance, Gran, that wasn’t luck. That was good judgment.”

“Yes, good judgment.” But wasn’t that for God, really? Was it for mere man to hand out judgment — to hold trial, to find guilty, to sentence, to execute? She said, following her own line of thought, “After all, Bill, this was not murder.

He didn’t intend to kill them.” “He didn’t care whether he did or not,” said Bill. “That was good enough for me.”

“Well...” she said doubtfully. “But you’re not God, are you, love? The Hand of God, they’re calling it.” She mused over it. “The Hand of God. Mind you, I’ll say not another word about it, not even to you. But... wouldn’t some people say you should have left it, Bill? Just left it to Him, put your hand into the Hand of God.”

“And so I did, my old dear,” he said, leaning across to unwrap the warm rug from about her ancient legs and then lead her into the cottage. “So I did. But just to make certain, I gave it a bit of a tug.”