The Inheritance

SEVENTEEN

The courtroom was full of people but entirely silent as Silas slowly maneuvered himself up the long aisle from the entrance door to the witness box. The only noise was the sound of his crutches hitting the parquet floor as he made his way past the press box and the barristers’ table. Gerald Thompson wore a solemn expression, but inside he felt a glow of satisfaction. Everyone had their eyes fixed on the injured man. He was an object of sympathy even before he’d opened his mouth to speak.

Silas grimaced with pain as he settled himself into the chair that had been specially provided for him beside the witness box, but the truth was that he had been lucky. Ritter’s bullet had not inflicted any lasting damage, and the doctors had assured him that he would walk again before too long. In the meantime, he was under strict instructions not to put his injured foot to the ground. And Silas was no fool. He knew the value of his injury as well as the prosecutor. Lying in his hospital bed, he had felt the finger of suspicion moving inexorably in his direction. Inspector Trave had made no effort to hide his disbelief when he came to take the alibi statement. But Silas knew that it didn’t matter what the policeman thought as long as he could get the jury on his side.

He approached his evidence with a determination that had been completely absent the first time around. He kept his eyes up and didn’t hesitate when he gave his answers. Jeanne Ritter was dead, and he was not going to let himself be pulled down by her bitter ghost.

“Tell us how you got your injury, Mr. Cade,” asked Thompson, understanding the need to satisfy the jury’s obvious curiosity at the outset.

“I was shot in the foot by Reginald Ritter. We were in the library of my father’s house. He’d have killed me if Inspector Trave hadn’t shot him first.”

“Why did he shoot you?”

“Because he’d found out that I’d been seeing his wife. It sent him crazy. He killed her in their bedroom before he came after me.”

“Before her death, Mrs. Ritter told this court that she saw a figure dressed in your hat and coat cross the courtyard to the front door of the manor house, just before the shouting started on the night of the murder. Did you do that, Mr. Cade?”

“No, I did not,” said Silas, emphasising each and every word. “I never went into the courtyard that night.”

“Where were you, then?”

“I was with Sasha Vigne. Upstairs in her room. We were in a relationship together.”

“Now, you will recall that when you gave evidence before you said you were in your own room. Not Miss Vigne’s.”

They had come to the part of Silas’s evidence that Thompson had prepared most carefully. But he kept his voice even and methodical, as if he was dealing with a mundane part of the prosecution case that the jury did not need to worry about too much. Silas, however, could not hide his nervous anxiety.

“Yes, I lied,” he said eagerly. “I shouldn’t have, but I did. Sasha wanted to keep our affair a secret. She has a Catholic mother, and I didn’t see any harm in saying that I was in my room rather than hers. After all, it had nothing to do with what happened on the other side of the house.”

“That’s not for you to say,” interrupted the judge angrily. “Perjury is a serious offence. Not something to be taken lightly. Mr. Thompson, you must make the police aware of this matter.”

“I certainly will, my lord,” said the prosecutor, who was secretly resolved to use all his influence to ensure that no action was taken against the elder Cade brother, if he could only secure the conviction of the younger one.

“Do you know of any reason why Mrs. Ritter would’ve said you were in the courtyard if you weren’t, Mr. Cade?” he asked, turning back to his witness.

“Because she found out about Sasha. It’s the only possible reason.”

“Yes, I see. Now, you should know that the jury has already heard evidence this morning from Detective Constable Clayton about a conversation that he had in the cafeteria, which was overheard by Mrs. Ritter just before she gave her evidence. The officer talked about certain photographs of Miss Vigne which were taken by yourself without her knowledge. Did you take those photographs, Mr. Cade?”

“Yes. I’m not proud of it. But Sasha knows about them now and she’s forgiven me,” said Silas, lowering his head as if in contrition. “I didn’t think she would, but she has.”

“Yes, thank you, Mr. Cade.” Thompson sat down. He knew that, injured or not, Silas was never going to look good. He’d admitted perjury and confessed to being a voyeur. But that didn’t make him guilty of murder. Mrs. Ritter had a powerful reason to lie about Silas on the day she gave her evidence, and Sasha Vigne would support Silas’s alibi. Nothing had happened to change the main picture. Silas’s character defects didn’t take the gun or the key out of his brother’s hand. That was what mattered when all was said and done.

John Swift got slowly to his feet. Now that he at last had the green light from his client to accuse Silas of the murder, to run the case as he had wanted to from the outset, it was difficult to know where to begin. And he wished that Silas wasn’t sitting down. It didn’t play well to the jury to attack a witness whose head was level with his waist, particularly when that witness had been shot in the foot less than a week before.

“I want to take you back to the day when you were last in this courtroom, Mr. Cade,” he began, speaking in an apparently friendly tone. “It was last Wednesday, and you were sitting in the public gallery. I don’t know if any of the members of the jury saw you like I did. Perhaps not. You were at the back, after all, near the exit, and you didn’t stay for all the evidence.”

Silas watched the defence barrister intently, but he remained silent, determined to say nothing until he had to. The judge was less patient.

“You’re here to cross-examine the witness, Mr. Swift, not to give evidence yourself,” he said, in a tone of angry rebuke. “Now what’s your question?”

“It’s simply this, my lord,” said Swift, keeping his eyes fixed on Silas. “Why did you leave the court in the middle of Mrs. Ritter’s evidence, Mr. Cade? Was it something she said that upset you?”

“I left because I knew I had to tell the truth about where I was when my father was killed. I couldn’t lie about it anymore.”

“Why not? You’d done so up to then. You’d lied to the police and to this court. Why not carry on lying?”

“Because Jeanne was practically accusing me of murdering my father. I had to defend myself.”

“You needed an alibi?”

“I needed to tell the truth.”

“Then why didn’t you ask to see a policeman? Inspector Trave was in court. He could’ve taken a further statement from you. That would’ve been the proper thing to do, wouldn’t it?”

“I don’t know. Maybe. I was upset at the time. I needed to explain to Sasha why I couldn’t keep our relationship a secret anymore. I wanted her to understand why we had to tell the truth about where we were that night.”

“Come on, Mr. Cade. Are you really asking this jury to believe that you snuck out of this court and drove all the way down to Moreton in the fast lane because you were concerned for Miss Vigne’s feelings?”

“I wanted to do what was right.”

“No, you didn’t. You wanted her to give you an alibi that would take you out of the courtyard. And out of your father’s study as well. Because that’s where you went that night after you saw your brother leave. Isn’t that right, Mr. Cade?”

Swift had raised his voice as he accused Silas of the murder, but Silas held his gaze, and his voice remained firm and clear as he denied it.

“No, I was never in my father’s study,” he said. “I swear it.”

“Just like you swore last time you were in the witness box that you were alone in your room.”

“That was to protect Sasha.”

“From what?”

“Her mother. She didn’t want anyone to know that she was sleeping with me.”

“And you’re seriously telling this court that you were so worried about Sasha’s Roman Catholic mother that you were prepared to commit perjury to stop her finding out about you and her daughter.”

“Yes.”

“Perjury is a serious offence, Mr. Cade. You can go to prison for it. You knew that already though, didn’t you? You didn’t need his lordship to tell you.”

“I knew it was wrong to lie. I did it because Sasha asked me to, and I didn’t think that it mattered that much. It had nothing to do with my father’s death whether I was in my room or Sasha’s.”

“Unless you were in neither,” said Swift with a smile. “Mrs. Ritter said you were in the courtyard.”

“She made that up because she was jealous of me.”

“She loved you. That’s why she hung up your hat and coat in the hall. To cover for you.”

“I wasn’t wearing them.”

“The maid, Esther Rudd, saw her hanging them up.”

“No. What Esther Rudd saw was an opportunity to get at me after I dismissed her.”

“She’s got a grudge against you, in other words?”

“Yes.”

“Just like the late Mrs. Ritter?”

“Yes.”

“Are you still having an affair with your father’s personal assistant?” asked Swift, changing tack without warning.

“No, we ended it soon after my father died.”

“I see. And how long before your father’s death did you start sleeping together?”

“A month. Maybe two. I’m not sure exactly.”

“But the photographs of Miss Vigne seized from your room were taken only two weeks before the murder. That’s what you told the police when they asked you about them.”

“Well, then, that must be right.”

“Good. Perhaps then you could explain to this jury why you felt the need to take long-distance photographs of Miss Vigne through her bathroom window, if you were already enjoying carnal knowledge of her in her bedroom.”

Silas didn’t answer. His cheeks flushed red and his eyes performed a rapid circuit of the courtroom until they ended up fixed on the judge, who looked like the personification of moral outrage.

“Come on, Mr. Cade,” he said angrily. “Answer the question.”

“It’s hard to say,” said Silas, in an almost inaudible voice. “It’s just that I found taking the photographs exciting. I shouldn’t have, but I did.”

“Speak up,” said Murdoch, looking down at Silas like he was some insect specimen that he’d just skewered on the end of a fork.

“I found it exciting,” repeated Silas, raising his voice a little. “Looking at her when she didn’t know I was looking. I’ve always found that exciting.”

“It’s not exciting. It’s disgusting,” said the judge with finality.

“Yes,” said Silas softly. “I know.”

“You’re a photographer by trade, Mr. Cade. Isn’t that right?” asked Swift, turning to a new page in his notes.

“Yes.”

“But I understand you’ve closed your shop in Oxford.”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“I don’t need to do it anymore.”

“Because of all the money you’ve inherited from your father?”

“That’s right,” said Silas defiantly.

“But you wouldn’t have got any of that if he’d lived long enough to see his solicitor, would you?”

“No. But neither would Stephen.”

“Except that he’s not going to get any of it if he’s convicted. It’ll all go to you then, won’t it?”

“I suppose so,” said Silas slowly. “But that’s not my fault.”

“No. Unless, of course, you planned the whole thing. From start to finish.”

“Don’t be ridiculous.”

“But is it so ridiculous? After all, you’re the one who’s been pulling the strings in your family for a long time now.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Don’t you? Well, let’s go back to the blackmail letter addressed to your father that you opened. It was you who insisted on reading it to your brother, and then, just a few weeks later, you were the one who got him up in the middle of the night to eavesdrop on your father and Sergeant Ritter while they were making their plans to kill Mr. Carson.”

“Stephen had a right to know.”

“Maybe. But it certainly mattered to you that he did. And then every time he went to confront your father, you hung back.”

“I couldn’t face it. I’ve already told you that.”

“Yes. But wasn’t that rather convenient for you? Stephen ended up out in the cold, while you stayed home taking photographs of your father’s manuscript collection.”

“I’m not saying what I did was right,” said Silas slowly. “Or that my father was a good man. But I didn’t have to quarrel with him if I didn’t want to. I had a choice just like Stephen.”

“Of course you did. But what were your motives in making that choice, Mr. Cade? Was it that you hoped to get Stephen disinherited while he was out of the way, so that you’d get everything when your father died? He was a sick man, after all.”

“I didn’t think about that. I didn’t want him to die. And it was me who persuaded Stephen to go back when I heard my father hadn’t got long to live. Why would I have done that if I wanted to cut my brother out?” asked Silas, suddenly confident, as if he felt he’d won the argument.

But Swift was ready with his answer. “Because your first plan hadn’t worked,” he said. “Your father was in the clutches of Reg Ritter, and you’d found out he was going to disinherit you as well as Stephen.”

“Stephen had a right to know what he was going to do.”

“Yes. But it was the same pattern as before, wasn’t it?”

“What pattern? I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Yes, you do. You were pushing Stephen all the time behind the scenes-delivering letters, arranging visits. But yet you never stuck your head up above the parapet with your father. Not once.”

“I didn’t push Stephen to do anything.”

“Oh, yes, you did. You practically drafted his letter to your father.”

“I helped him write it. There’s nothing wrong with that.”

“Maybe not. But then you just happen to see the entry in your father’s diary about seeing his solicitor. Blackburn. Three o’clock. You remember that, Mr. Cade?”

“Of course I do. But I didn’t just happen to see it. Both Stephen and I agreed that it was important to watch what our father was doing, given what I’d heard him say to Ritter.”

“About the will?”

“Yes.”

“Well, you were certainly the one for the job, weren’t you? Always reading people’s mail and listening at their windows in the middle of the night. You led your brother along every inch of the way, telling him he was the one who should talk to your father, because you were adopted and he wouldn’t listen to you.”

“That’s true. He wouldn’t have.”

“Do you understand what I’m putting to you, Mr. Cade? You inflamed your brother to just the right level and then you kept him there. Until you were ready to arrange his final meeting with your father.”

“I didn’t arrange it. Stephen did.”

“But you told him to ask for it. Because you realised that you’d run out of time. You had to get rid of your father before he saw his solicitor, and you needed someone to take the blame.”

“No,” protested Silas angrily, but Swift ignored him.

“And who better than your brother?” he went on relentlessly. “You hated him because he took your place. Once he was there, you could never forget that you were adopted, that you were second best.”

“I wasn’t second best,” said Silas. Tears had welled up in his grey eyes and his knuckles were white from clutching the sides of his chair.

“You felt you were, though,” countered Swift. “He took your mother away from you, after all. And you hated him for it, didn’t you?”

“No. I loved him. He’s my brother.”

“You’re lying, Mr. Cade,” said Swift, relaxing suddenly. “You set your brother up for your father’s murder so that he’d be the one who paid for it and you’d inherit everything: the house, the art, the car, the money. The whole shooting match.”

“Damn you. Damn you to hell,” shouted Silas, finally losing his temper in the face of Swift’s taunts.

But the barrister ignored him. He hadn’t finished yet. “You waited for Stephen to leave the study that night, and then you walked in there quite calmly and shot your father in the head. Maybe the fact that he wasn’t your real father made it easier. But anyway, you only needed one bullet because you were already a very good shot, and you’d been practising. Hadn’t you, Mr. Cade?”

“No. I bloody well hadn’t. I don’t even own a fucking gun.”

Silas looked like he had plenty more to say, but the judge didn’t give him the opportunity. “Control your language, young man,” he said, almost spitting out the words. “Do you hear me? Any more swearing and I’ll hold you in contempt. This is a courtroom, not some bar.”

“I’m sorry,” said Silas, biting his lip. He had tried to get up from his chair as he answered Swift’s last question and had inadvertently put pressure on his injured foot. Now he was breathing deeply, trying to control the pain. Beads of sweat stood out on his pale face.

“You didn’t expect your brother to come back into the study when he did,” said Swift, resuming his attack. “But you kept your nerve. You waited behind the curtains while he picked up your gun and you slipped out just before he started shouting. It was just bad luck that there was a full moon and your mistress happened to be looking down into the courtyard when you went over to the front door.”

“I didn’t. I was nowhere near the courtyard.”

“So you say, Mr. Cade. So you say.”

But Silas wasn’t prepared to leave it at that. Something in him rebelled against the lawyer’s self-assurance.

“It’s not just me who says it,” he shouted across the court. “It’s Sasha Vigne as well. And you didn’t accuse me of murdering my father when I came here before. Why not, if that’s what you and Stephen believed. Why not?”

“I’m not here to answer your questions, Mr. Cade,” said Swift quietly. “It’s you who must answer mine.”

“And I have. But they’re not my prints on the key and they’re not my prints on the gun. They’re my brother’s. My bloody murdering brother,” said Silas, pointing toward Stephen in the dock. Silas was crying now, and his voice had broken.

“That’s enough,” said the judge, banging his table hard with his fist. “I’ve already warned you about your behaviour, sir. Any more and I’ll put you in the cells. Do you understand me? Have you any more questions, Mr. Swift?” he asked, turning to the barrister.

“No, my lord,” said Swift. He’d got what he needed from Silas. There was nothing to be gained by any further exchanges.

All in all, the cross-examination had gone even better than he’d hoped, Swift thought, as he sat back in his chair, allowing himself to mentally unwind. He’d known he’d be able to show the jury that Silas was a liar and a pervert who had both motive and opportunity to kill his father. The evidence was there for all these allegations, and Silas couldn’t deny it. The bonus was that Silas had finally cracked and lost his temper. That had been the missing ingredient up to now. Without it the jury might not believe that Silas had the stomach for the crime. And now they might. And might was enough-enough for a verdict based on reasonable doubt.

But that outcome depended on Stephen’s not cracking himself when it came his turn to give evidence. Because God knows he’d had motive and opportuntity too. And, as Silas had said, Stephen’s prints were on the key and the gun. Swift glanced behind him at his client. Stephen’s fists were clenched around the rail of the dock and his eyes were bright with anger as his brother limped past him down the aisle. He’d have to control himself in the witness box if he was to have a chance. And yet he was so headstrong and there was no barrister in the business better at riling a witness if he wanted to than Thompson. And Tiny would have the judge on his side as well. Swift felt his own fists clenching involuntarily as he glanced up at Old Murder sitting so self-righteously up on his dais.

Briefly Swift reconsidered the possibility of not calling his client. Stephen didn’t have to give evidence after all, but he was desperate to do so, and, in all conscience, Swift didn’t feel able to keep him out of the witness box. The prosecution case was too strong. That was the trouble. It needed an answer. But giving an answer opened Stephen up to Thompson, waiting like a hawk on the other side of the court, circling over his prey.

Swift drummed his fingers on his table, trying in vain to find an outlet for his frustration. He was damned if he called his client, and damned if he didn’t. That was the truth. He needed a drink, he thought suddenly. A double or even a triple whisky. And another after that as well.