ARTHUR. So. Any questions?
JEAN. No, Arthur. You’ve explained it all with utter clarity.
ARTHUR. You understand it all? The gap between the sets of letters? The point about the handwriting?
JEAN. Yes, Arthur. I do understand the point about / the handwriting.
ARTHUR. You see why I’m so concerned about the matter of / the hairs?
JEAN. It’s certainly clear you are concerned about the hairs.
ARTHUR. Because, you see, / if they are –
JEAN. But there’s two things that I want to ask.
ARTHUR. Anything.
JEAN. I should very much like to meet this young man of yours.
ARTHUR. You did…
JEAN. Properly, I mean.
Slight pause.
ARTHUR. I’m sure he would be honoured and delighted.
MAUD has arrived to see GEORGE. She is taking off her hat and gloves.
GEORGE. He took the letters.
MAUD. Yes.
GEORGE. Including…
MAUD. All the letters. Oh, and Father congratulated him on a book.
GEORGE. Has Father read…?
MAUD. I think it was a book by someone else.
Back to ARTHUR and JEAN.
ARTHUR. And now I must set off / to Staffordshire.
JEAN. Did you say he’s a Parsee?
ARTHUR. His father is, by origin…
JEAN. And what do they believe? Are they Hindoos?
ARTHUR. No, interestingly, they are Zorastrians. A notably progressive religion, particularly in relation to the place of women in society, though oddly wedded to astrology. Their ceremony of purification is, to our eyes, neither ceremonial nor particularly / pure –
JEAN. But I suppose the beliefs and rites of any faith can look strange to outsiders.
ARTHUR. Christ’s blood and body in a cup and on a plate.
JEAN. And your… spiritualism.
ARTHUR. Yes.
To GEORGE and MAUD.
MAUD. So are you comfortable?
GEORGE. Miss Goode looks after me most conscientiously. Would you like for me to ask her to make tea?
GEORGE hasn’t answered the question MAUD really asked; but she gestures ‘no’. To ARTHUR and JEAN.
ARTHUR. I prefer to call it ‘spiritism’. I wasn’t sure that you approved.
JEAN. I had always understood it to be hostile to Church teaching.
ARTHUR. What we are doing is to take the essence of the great religions, which is the continuing life of the spirit, and to render it provable.
JEAN. Arthur, I wish I was coming with you.
ARTHUR. Really?
JEAN. Yes.
ARTHUR turns to JEAN. A moment, then:
ARTHUR. You know, when I was sitting on the train to Birmingham, with Woodie, I imagined driving up there to Great Wyrley, with you at my side, the two of us, like man and wife.
JEAN. You know, it could be so.
ARTHUR. But the problem, obviously, was the car.
JEAN. The car?
ARTHUR. It is vital I work incognito. Imagine if I showed up in the Wolseley.
JEAN. Well, of course.
She goes and kisses him. To GEORGE and MAUD.
GEORGE. Did he say why he is doing this?
MAUD. He wants to right a mighty wrong.
ARTHUR and JEAN.
ARTHUR. What was your second question?
JEAN gestures ‘it doesn’t matter’. As ARTHUR strides out on his mission:
So, to arms! To present the honourable Chief Constable, not with guesswork, but with evidence! Not with beliefs but proofs!
JEAN is alone. To GEORGE and MAUD.
GEORGE. The problem is, I’m not sure he understands the nature of a legal proof.
MAUD. What do you mean?
GEORGE. He says ‘know’ when he means ‘believe’.
MAUD. Our father says ‘know’ when he means ‘believe’.
GEORGE. Precisely.
GEORGE, JEAN and MAUD go out.
ARTHUR. Dinner was delicious.
ANSON. Glad to hear it.
ARTHUR. Particularly the whiting.
ANSON. I told Blanche not to go on and on about your books.
ARTHUR. Well, she did as she was told.
ANSON. Myself, I am not what you would call a literary fellow. That your police officers are inadequate is obviously necessary to your stories. In the real world, however… I shall not be issuing my constables with violins and my inspectors with cocaine.
ARTHUR. You have read my analysis?
ANSON. I have.
ARTHUR. And?
ANSON. A deplorable business, it has to be said. A series of mistakes. It could all have been / nipped in the bud –
ARTHUR. Whose ‘mistakes’ exactly did you have in mind?
ANSON. Doyle, really. The wife’s family. It was the uncle, wasn’t it? His niece insists on marrying a Parsee – can’t be persuaded out of it, and what does he do? Give the fellow a living here.
Pause.
ARTHUR. Yes, I agree with you. The introduction of a coloured clergyman into such a… backward parish, was bound to cause a regrettable situation.
ANSON. And that’s not to mention half-caste children.
ARTHUR. As you say.
ANSON. And, yes, I have read your ‘analysis’. And while I admire your tenacity and passion, I propose to keep your – amateur speculations to myself.
Pause.
ARTHUR. My what?
ANSON. I understand from Blanche it is your practice always to begin with the conclusion. You cannot know what path to travel till you know the destination.
ARTHUR. Yes, in fiction.
ANSON. Well, exactly. And you have described, in your… analysis, how, when you first met Edalji – in a hotel lobby, I believe – you observed him for a while and concluded he was innocent.
ARTHUR. As you concluded he was guilty.
ANSON. Not on the basis of an intuition.
ARTHUR. You made the boy a target from the start.
ANSON. I tried to warn him and his father of the consequences of persisting in the criminal path on which he had set out.
ARTHUR. So you think George Edalji sent letters denouncing himself?
ANSON. Among many other letters, yes.
ARTHUR. And, in your view, was the ringleader of a gang who dismembered animals?
ANSON. ‘Gang’ is a newspaper word.
ARTHUR. And, in your view, his father, a minister of the Church of England, perjured himself to give his son an alibi?
ANSON. Doyle, may I ask, do you have a son?
ARTHUR. Yes, but I wouldn’t perjure myself on his behalf.
ANSON. Then imagine this instead. A Parsee father, putting loyalty to his Parsee family above loyalty to a land not his own. He wants to save his son’s skin, Doyle. His skin.
ARTHUR. And in your view the mother also / perjured –
ANSON. Doyle, you keep saying ‘in my view’. ‘My view’ is the view of the Staffordshire Constabulary, the justices of the Quarter Sessions, and a properly sworn English jury. I attended every day of the trial, and I can assure you of one thing. The jury did not believe the father’s evidence.
ANSON makes his final pot. If he misses, he might offer Arthur the last shot. Arthur demurs.
Game.
ARTHUR shakes his hand.
ARTHUR. Anson, we are not talking of some butcher’s boy, but of a professional Englishman, a solicitor, known as an author of a book on railway law.
ANSON. Then the greater his misdemeanour, and the more proper the penalty imposed.
ARTHUR. Seven years penal servitude.
ANSON. That is why sentencing is for the court, not for us. But, even so…
ARTHUR. What, ‘even so’?
ANSON. Sir Arthur, this young man whose case you’ve taken up – is not in all senses what you think.
ARTHUR. Oh, no?
ANSON. There were matters that did not come out in court…
ARTHUR. Doubtless, forbidden by the rules of evidence.
ANSON. Between ourselves, Doyle, there were rumours…
ARTHUR. There are always rumours.
ANSON. He had lent money carelessly to friends, there was even talk of bankruptcy…
ARTHUR. The Parsees are well known for their generosity.
ANSON. So, suddenly, he’s a Parsee?
ARTHUR. Well, clearly, he did not go bankrupt.
ANSON. Sir Arthur, I applaud your – your romantic streak. But the fellow’s been released. What’s the point of seeking to whip up popular opinion? You want the Home Office to look at it again. They’ve looked at it a hundred times. You want them to set up a committee. What makes you think it will give you what you want?
ARTHUR. We shall get a committee. We shall gain a free pardon. We will establish George Edalji is completely innocent…
ANSON. Completely innocent?
ARTHUR. Completely.
ANSON. Doyle, let me tell you this. In my time I’ve seen people who were probably guilty found innocent, and people who were most likely innocent found guilty. But in all such cases, I assure you, the victim is seldom as straightforward as his defenders would like.
ARTHUR. What do you mean?
ANSON. As I say. You come across George Edalji, in a hotel lobby. You observe his posture, and you come to a conclusion. Let me put this to you. Edalji’s expecting you. He knew you would observe him. He arranged himself accordingly.
ARTHUR. I must assure you, that in our oculist’s professional / opinion –
ANSON. My point is that you want him to be completely innocent. A perfect victim. And in my experience, no one is completely perfect, or completely innocent. They may be found not guilty, but that’s not the same at all.
ARTHUR. Yes, well. Leaving that aside…
ANSON. So do I take it / you agree –
ARTHUR. You believe that a successful young solicitor, having shown no sign of a violent nature, goes out one night and attacks a pony in a most wicked and violent fashion. I ask you simply: why?
ANSON is refilling his and ARTHUR’s glasses.
ANSON. Ah, ‘why’. You’re the one with the paid imagination, Doyle.
ARTHUR. Look. Here we are, two men, behind closed doors, enjoying a frame of billiards and a glass or two of an excellent Napoleon. We can speculate. You accept the family was subject to considerable harassment, if not persecution?
ANSON. The young men of Staffordshire are far from saints.
ARTHUR. So they take up the poison pen.
Both men are now seated.
ANSON. Or rather, George Edalji had good reason to hate Wyrley and its residents. Or thought he did.
ARTHUR. So he took it out on livestock?
ANSON. Of course, you’re from the city. A cow or horse is more than livestock. It’s a livelihood. Call it – an economic target.
ARTHUR. You think George thought he was being persecuted by the colliery?
ANSON. No, I think that, here’s a young man, stuck at home, with a grudge against the district, to which he feels a cut above. He finds himself in debt. Everything he’s ever worked for in his life is threatened with collapse.
ARTHUR. And so?
ANSON. So… perhaps he runs mad. Some tendency to evil in the blood…
ARTHUR. He is half-Scottish. As am I.
ANSON. But the other half, Parsee. Which you are not.
ARTHUR. Oh, I see. So to which half do you / ascribe…
ANSON. Doyle, you surely understand what I am saying. It’s the mixing of the blood. Why does society abhor the half-caste? Because his soul is torn between the impulse to civilisation and the tug of barbarism.
ARTHUR. So, what? George Edalji slits horses’ bellies because of something that his ancestors in Persia did five centuries ago?
ANSON. And that’s not to speak of the other thing.
ARTHUR. What other thing?
ANSON. Doyle, you’re a man of the world. You have medical training too, as I recall.
ARTHUR. I do.
ANSON. Your friend is thirty years old. And unmarried.
ARTHUR. As are many young men of his age.
ANSON. And likely to remain so.
ARTHUR. Especially after what you did to him.
ANSON. And no sport, had you noticed that? The great manly English games – cricket, football, boxing – all quite foreign to him. Archery.
ARTHUR. You expect a man with a myopic of eight dioptres to play cricket?
ANSON. Ah, the eyesight. Yes. I think you practised in opthalmology.
ARTHUR. For a short while, yes.
ANSON. And no doubt you examined cases of exophthalmos.
ARTHUR. Not a great number. To tell the truth, / I had few –
ANSON. But you will know that it is commonly associated with an unhealthy degree of sexual drive.
ARTHUR. Nonsense.
ANSON. It is commonly reported by those who deal with a certain class of criminal.
ARTHUR. Balderdash.
ANSON. And then we need to consider the curious sleeping arrangements at the vicarage.
ARTHUR. Which prove his innocence.
ANSON. From the age of ten, he sleeps in his father’s room.
ARTHUR. What, are you suggesting – something dastardly / occurred –
ANSON. No, the opposite. I’m suggesting nothing happened in that room. The dog did not bark, if you’ll forgive me.
ARTHUR. Then what the blazes / are you saying?
ANSON. From the age of ten, a boy sleeps in the same locked room as his father. Through puberty and into manhood, night after night. He is a solitary boy, and then a solitary man. He is never seen in female company. Yet he has, we must presume, normal appetites and urges. We are men, Doyle, who understand this side of things. How the choice lies between carnal self-indulgence, or a healthy diversion from base urges into manly sport. Edalji is prevented from the former and chose to spurn the latter.
ARTHUR. Are you suggesting…
ANSON. Clearly, he was a good student, a loyal son, who prayed in his father’s church and worked hard at his practice. By day he is a professional Englishman. But then, by night, every so often, he yields to something else. Something vicious and barbaric, something deep down in the blood, which is not of England or of Englishness at all.
ARTHUR. It is… pure speculation.
ANSON. You asked me to speculate. And my speculation, based on much experience, is that a continued period of sexual frustration, year after year after year, can turn a man’s mind. He can end up worshipping strange gods, and performing strange rites too. You must know this, Doyle.
ARTHUR. Pure / spec –
ANSON. Which is, I am convinced, why twenty-nine hairs from a mutilated horse’s flank were found on George Edalji’s clothing. Yes, I know you have another explanation. But as you might imagine I incline to mine. As has everybody else who has addressed this case in any depth. Apart from the convicted man, his family and you.
ARTHUR says nothing.
Well, perhaps it’s time to turn in. Breakfast is at eight, if that suits?
ARTHUR waves.
Some believe the Green Hall to be haunted. But that may not trouble you.
ARTHUR. The spirits of the dead do not trouble me. Indeed, I welcome them. Goodnight.
A pause. ANSON realises that ARTHUR is not going to go.
ANSON. I’m sure that Sherlock Holmes’ creator is not frightened of the dark. Even if, in this case, he will not recognise the darkness lurking deep within the human soul.
He goes out.
ARTHUR. ‘The darkness lurking deep within the soul.’ Indeed!
He is about to switch out the lamp, when he hears the scream of a dying horse.
GEORGE. Apparently, it was not in every sense a satisfactory encounter.
MAUD. No?
GEORGE. Even though the whiting was delicious.
MAUD. They had dinner?
GEORGE. He says that Captain Anson is a disgrace to his profession.
MAUD. So he is.
GEORGE. The visit changed Sir Arthur’s whole view of the case.
MAUD. Why’s that?
GEORGE. He had not identified ‘the real darkness’.
MAUD. What darkness?
GEORGE. Of what. In what, I suppose. ‘The human soul.’
ARTHUR. ‘Speculation.’ He said my evidence was nothing more than ‘speculation’. ‘Amateur speculation’!
JEAN. So, what will you do?
ARTHUR. I’ll tell you what I won’t do. Anson thinks I’m proposing sending my findings to the Home Office, to gather dust. I shall publish them, as widely as it’s possible to do. I shall offer them to the Daily Telegraph.
JEAN. The Telegraph…
ARTHUR. And, furthermore, I shall make Captain Anson’s position on the case – well, not so much his position, as his prejudice – clear as a bell.
JEAN. Arthur…
ARTHUR. If he wants my ‘speculations’, he shall have them.
JEAN. Arthur, dear…
ARTHUR. He shall have them in the courts, if he desires. And he may well find his professional future is not as he imagines when… Yes, what?
JEAN. Arthur, do I take it you have changed your mind?
ARTHUR. I beg your pardon?
JEAN. When you explained the case to me, you said your friend had been victimised by the lower ranks of the police force. On the grounds of backwardness and prejudice.
ARTHUR. Indeed I did.
JEAN. A prejudice you did not imagine would be shared by Captain Anson. Being, as you said, ‘an English gentleman’.
ARTHUR. Yes, certainly, that was / my instinct –
JEAN. But clearly, you have changed your mind.
Slight pause.
ARTHUR. I have. It’s my belief that his dislike imbued the whole force, like a darkening stain, leading them to concentrate their whole attention on the parson’s son, and none at all on the other possibilities.
JEAN. And for what reason?
ARTHUR. Because his father wasn’t just a parson.
JEAN. Then you have your mission, Arthur.
Slight pause.
ARTHUR. Yes.
JEAN. And obviously, your future course is clear.
ARTHUR. I think so.
JEAN. You think the police force manufactured evidence against your friend.
ARTHUR. I do.
JEAN. And ignored the evidence against others.
ARTHUR. Whom he dismisses as ‘the unsaintly youths / of Staffordshire’…?
JEAN. So, to prove that, you must find that evidence. Not least because, presumably, the most conclusive evidence of George’s innocence – and for your case against the police – would be someone else’s guilt.
Pause.
ARTHUR. Yes. Yes.
Slight pause.
And we are getting closer to the author of the letters, and thus to the real culprit. But, yes, you’re right. It is high time to focus on that question.
(Building himself up.) And if I can prove the real culprit was lurking under Anson’s nose… that he has ignored that evidence, for reasons we have now identified… Imagine.
JEAN. Well, indeed.
ARTHUR. What course would be open to him but to do the decent thing at last?
JEAN. Exactly.
ARTHUR. I mean, resign.
JEAN. Of course. And on the matter of ‘the decent thing’…
ARTHUR. Of course. It is high time you met him properly. Mr Edalji, Miss Leckie. We must engineer that at the earliest opportunity.
JEAN. Arthur.
He turns back.
Arthur, for me it is high time…
ARTHUR. Full steam ahead!
ARTHUR heads off quickly across the stage.
JEAN. …I ceased to be Miss Leckie.
ARTHUR (pointing at the piles). So. Two young adults, and a boy. One of the adults, malicious, full of himself, Mr Cocky.
WOODIE (about the letters). Sir Arthur…
ARTHUR. He of ‘the daredevil face’, ‘as fleet as a fox’ and ‘as sharp as sharp can be’. We assume, an assiduous reader of a certain low class of boys’ adventure story. Secret oaths, intrigues.
WOODIE. There’s a couple of / things you might want –
ARTHUR. Then there’s the religious maniac. ‘I long to be rolling in the burning lake of hell.’ ‘I am God, I am God Almighty’, signed ‘God Satan’.
WOODIE. One is a telegram from Harry Charlesworth…
ARTHUR. And we have the boy. Exceedingly foul-mouthed.
WOODIE. And a rotten speller.
ARTHUR. Did you say a telegram?
WOODIE (handing it over). Yes. From Harry Charlesworth. I imagine he’s located / the man who –
ARTHUR (back to the letters). But the point is, that they obviously collaborated. So what is clearly a God Satan letter’s followed on the same page by the rude drawings of the boy.
WOODIE (with the other letter). Now, speaking of rude letters…
ARTHUR. And there’s some that could be any of ’em. ‘Who pinched those eggs on Wednesday night?’ Sounds like the boy. But ‘I don’t think they would hang me but send me to sea’. ‘Would hang me’? Future conditional?
WOODIE. If you remember, I suggested / that it might…
ARTHUR (noting the telegram as he speaks). So what are they? Three young men, together. In a factory, or business? Or three members of one family.
(Waving the telegram.) Who on earth is Frederick Wynn?
During the following, FrederickWYNN appears elsewhere on the stage, at a table with several empty pint glasses and one half-full one. He is ‘a lanky young man with a celluloid collar and frayed cuffs’.
WOODIE. He’s the boy – he was the boy – who was accused of spitting at an old woman on Walsall Station platform. Which accusation he blames on another boy, called Speck.
ARTHUR. Not to be confused with the philandering Norwegian.
WOODIE. We can meet him in The Rising Sun at Hednesford should we care to do so. You were very interested in the boy Speck at the time.
ARTHUR. Yes, until we found he wasn’t on the Walsall school rolls.
WOODIE. But even so…
ARTHUR. A school that teaches Milton. ‘The burning lake of hell.’
WOODIE. Well, obviously, a lot of schools / teach Paradise Lost.
ARTHUR. And, ‘obviously’, the key. The starting point of the whole / business –
WOODIE. Sir Arthur, I think you should read this.
ARTHUR takes the letter, looks at the handwriting on the envelope, looks at the ‘Mr Cocky’ pile, back at the letter and then to WOODIE, who nods. ARTHUR opens the letter and reads.
ARTHUR. ‘Honoured Sir. A line to tell you we are narks of the detective and know Edalji killed the horse and wrote those letters. But I know from a detective that if you find Edalji guilty’ – g-i-l-t – ‘after all, they will make you a lord next year. Is it not better to be a lord than to run the risk of losing kidneys and liver.’
ARTHUR looks at WOODIE.
WOODIE. He has a point, Sir Arthur.
ARTHUR. So he’s still out there.
WOODIE. Seemingly.
ARTHUR (reading on). ‘No use trying to lay it on others. It is Edalji and it will be proven for he is not a right sort nor… (Turns page.) … they was no education to be got at Walsall. Ha ha ha.’
He folds the letter.
Mr Cocky, I’ll be bound. And Speck or no Speck, Frederick Wynn was at Walsall School.
WOODIE. Shall I write to Harry Charlesworth?
ARTHUR. Of course, it sometimes happens that you only have to change one element, and the whole thing slots right into place.
WOODIE. As you have proved on numerous occasions.
ARTHUR’s trying to find a letter, disrupting the piles.
ARTHUR. Something in a letter.
WOODIE. Yes, Sir Arthur?
ARTHUR. Something in a letter, which we read today.
ARTHUR finds a letter.
WOODIE. We read a lot of letters / today, Sir Arthur…
ARTHUR. ‘As fleet as a fox.’ ‘As sharp as sharp.’ ‘With eagle eyes.’ Where have we heard something like that before?
WYNN. Speck.
ARTHUR. Yes.
WYNN. Yer after me a-telling you ’bout Speck.
Slight pause.
ARTHUR. Mr Wood will be back in a moment.
ARTHUR sits.
WYNN. Well, as I say. I were at school with him. He were always bottom of the class. Always in bother. Sets a rick on fire one summer. One evening, I were on the train with Brookes – his father got some letters too, an’ all – when Speck comes running into the compartment, straight to the window, and sticks his head straight through the glass, smashing it to bits. And then he laughs. Just like a maniac.
ARTHUR. What happened next?
WYNN. Well, a couple of days later, the railway police arrives and says we’re going to be charged, with breaking of the window, like. And we both says it’s Speck as done it, which he do, so he has to pay for it.
ARTHUR. And what was his response to that?
WYNN. What happened were that Brookes’ pa started getting letters saying as how Brookes and me spat on an old girl at Walsall Station.
ARTHUR. And you think Speck wrote that letter, as revenge?
WYNN. Can’t see who else.
ARTHUR. And did you ever see this letter?
WYNN. Nar. But he were always in some kind of trouble.
WOODIE comes in with a tray: a pint for WYNN, his own stout, and ARTHUR’s whisky.
ARTHUR. And what became of him? Speck?
WYNN eyes the pint.
If he was always in such trouble?
WYNN leans over to the pint, which ARTHUR picks up and withholds.
Because I have to tell you, Mr Wynn, there’s a problem with your story.
WYNN. Oh, ar?
ARTHUR. It does rely on your having been to Walsall School.
WYNN. I do go to Walsall School.
ARTHUR. Along with Brookes?
WYNN. Ar.
ARTHUR. And with Speck?
WYNN. Him too.
ARTHUR. Then I wonder, how do you account for the fact that Mr Mitchell the headmaster assures me there’s not been a boy of that name in the school in the past twenty years.
WYNN. No Speck?
ARTHUR. No Speck.
WYNN. Not for twenty year.
ARTHUR. Or ever.
WYNN. Course, I might be stringing you along.
ARTHUR. Indeed. Or there might be another explanation.
WYNN. So there might.
A battle of wills. Finally, ARTHUR puts the pint down in front of WYNN. WYNN drinks, then.
Speck weren’t his name.
ARTHUR. I see.
WYNN. Just what we calls him.
ARTHUR. Why?
WYNN. Because he’s like a little feller, like a speck.
ARTHUR. A nickname.
WYNN. Ar.
WOODIE. And what was his real name?
WYNN (trying to remember). His real…?
ARTHUR. I think, Woodie, it might turn out to be Sharp.
Slight pause.
WYNN. Sharp?
ARTHUR. Sharp.
Slight pause.
WYNN. Might be.
ARTHUR. Who went off to sea, from Liverpool? Returning after seven years?
WYNN. I did hear he went to sea. Not sure when he came back.
ARTHUR. And his first name?
WYNN. Well, there was an older boy called Wally Sharp.
ARTHUR. His elder brother?
WYNN. I dunno.
ARTHUR gets briskly to his feet, puts out his hand.
But I think I might know somebody as does.
Pause.
Particularly if I might request a favour.
ARTHUR (nods to the bar). Woodie.
WOODIE is about to go and buy WYNN another drink.
WYNN. No, not that.
Pause.
ARTHUR. So, what?
WYNN. I don’t suppose you knows much of this part of England.
ARTHUR. No, but I am gaining its acquaintance.
WYNN takes a package from a small haversack.
WYNN. I works as a house-painter, like, Sir Arthur, and it don’t leave me that much time. But in the evening I’ve another occupation.
ARTHUR. Oh?
WYNN. This in’t summat I tells everybody, like.
ARTHUR. Um…
WYNN (putting the package in front of ARTHUR). I don’t suppose you might take a look at this.
Slight pause. A little gingerly, ARTHUR opens the package. It’s a manuscript.
I mean, I don’t pretend it’s of a standard to compare… But I’d much appreciate your judgement. And any helpful tips you might have, as to seeing it in print.
ARTHUR takes the manuscript.
ARTHUR. Of course.
WYNN. It’s a kind of – sketches of Black Country life. I’d thought of calling it Vignettes.
ARTHUR. Well? Well?
WOODIE. Well what, Sir Arthur?
ARTHUR. ‘I think it might turn out to be Sharp.’
WOODIE. That was on the nail, and no mistake.
ARTHUR. And how? How did I work that out?
WOODIE. A mystery to me.
ARTHUR. He told us! In the letter boasting that they’d never catch him. ‘Eagle eyes.’ ‘Fleet as a fox.’ And ‘as sharp as Sharp can be’.
They stop. Pause.
WOODIE. So he might have been called ‘Fleet’.
ARTHUR. And the school roll. Don’t you remember? The headmaster’s letter. ‘Nothing between “Sharp” and “Sutton”.’
WOODIE. Well I never.
ARTHUR. And going off to sea?
WOODIE. In fact, Sir Arthur…
ARTHUR. The first Greatorex letter. ‘I don’t think they would hang me but send me to sea.’
WOODIE. Aha.
ARTHUR. And I’ll warrant there’s not a reference to the sea in any of the previous letters.
WOODIE. There you are.
ARTHUR. And that he sailed from Liverpool?
WOODIE. You have me there, Sir Arthur.
ARTHUR. Think, Woodie, think. The last hoax. Offering the entire contents of the vicarage for auction. Where was it placed?
WOODIE (after a moment). I’m sorry.
ARTHUR. The Blackpool Echo.
Slight pause.
Blackpool! And the nearest port to Blackpool?
WOODIE. I’d imagine that might turn out to be Liverpool.
ARTHUR. Of course! (In triumph, he can afford magnanimity.) In fact, you know, I think the sea was your idea.
WOODIE. Oh, was it?
ARTHUR. Sure of it. Good man.
WOODIE. Ah, well. Even the other person sometimes has a good idea.
ARTHUR. ‘The other person’?
WOODIE. Oh, you know, Sir Arthur. The one who never understands before the end. The one who tells the stories.
ARTHUR (bemused). Watson?
WOODIE (mock-finger-snapping moment). That’s it. Watson.
Slight pause.
ARTHUR. Woodie, are you teasing me?
WOODIE. Teasing? I wouldn’t know how to begin.
ARTHUR looks at WOODIE quizzically. He decides to drop it. They have arrived at GREATOREX’s tack room.
GREATOREX. Good journey?
WOODIE. Mr Greatorex. This is Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.
GREATOREX. I know. Most honoured, to be sure.
His hands are not clean enough to shake.
I’m afraid that Mrs Greatorex is out. Otherwise I’d offer you…
ARTHUR. It’s no matter. You know we are seeking to reopen the case of George Edalji.
GREATOREX. And you know I were caught up in it in a way.
ARTHUR. I know that the police received a letter, supposedly written by your son, ‘confessing’ to being part of the horse-ripping gang, and naming George Edalji as another member.
GREATOREX. But that’s not why you’re here.
ARTHUR. No.
Pause.
We’re here to ask about – young Sharp.
GREATOREX. Wally?
ARTHUR. No.
GREATOREX. So, Royden, then.
ARTHUR. Exactly.
GREATOREX. You don’t seem too sure.
ARTHUR. I didn’t… quite know, which was which. For instance, which was the one who went to sea?
A moment. GREATOREX stops what he’s doing.
GREATOREX. Wally and Royden was sons of my tenant farmer, Peter Sharp. Royden were the wild one. Wally were more strange than wild.
ARTHUR. They were both at Walsall School?
GREATOREX. Yes, though Royden were expelled. I became involved when Peter realised that he was dying, and he asked if I’d be Royden’s trustee. Which seemed the decent thing to do. Unfortunately…
ARTHUR. Yes?
GREATOREX. I did my best. But he was uncontrollable. Thieving, smashing things… In the end, I told him he had two choices. Either I’d stop his allowance and report him to the police, or he could go to sea.
ARTHUR. We’re aware of which he chose. And he sailed from Liverpool, in late December 1895?
GREATOREX. Yes.
ARTHUR. And how long was he at sea?
GREATOREX. Well, for once, he stuck at something. Got a third mate’s certificate. Then he came home.
WOODIE. That’s – in ’03.
GREATOREX. Correct.
WOODIE. That’d be the gap.
ARTHUR. And Wally, the elder brother. You said that he was strange?
GREATOREX. Yes.
ARTHUR. In what way?
GREATOREX. Not of this world. I can’t be more precise.
ARTHUR. Religious? Any signs of mania?
GREATOREX. Not that I’m aware of.
ARTHUR. But there might have been.
GREATOREX. There’s a lot of mania about.
ARTHUR. And, let me guess: did they have a younger brother? Perhaps a foul-mouthed boy?
GREATOREX. No. Not at all.
Slight pause.
ARTHUR. I see. And where do they live now?
GREATOREX. Royden, in his father’s house. Much changed, though. Married, for a start.
ARTHUR. And Wally?
GREATOREX. Went off to South Africa.
WOODIE. And might you have an address for him there, Mr Greatorex?
GREATOREX. I might have done.
ARTHUR. I’m sure we… for your trouble…
GREATOREX. But he died, November last.
ARTHUR. I see. A pity.
GREATOREX. Surely.
WOODIE. You said that Royden Sharp was apprenticed. In what occupation?
GREATOREX. Yes, I reckoned you might ask me that. And what kind of ship he worked on.
ARTHUR (with a glance of annoyance at WOODIE). Well?
GREATOREX. He were apprenticed to a butcher. And he were on a cattle ship, his second time at sea.
Pause.
ARTHUR. And so you suspect them of the letters and the maimings.
GREATOREX. Well, I can believe some of the letters.
ARTHUR. And the maimings?
GREATOREX. Didn’t say that.
ARTHUR. Even so.
Pause.
GREATOREX. Sir Arthur. Might I ask you summat?
ARTHUR. Yes?
GREATOREX. What’s your ambition out of this?
ARTHUR. What do you mean?
GREATOREX. I mean, guilty or not guilty, the parson’s son’s released. The horse is dead. No one’s writing no more letters.
ARTHUR. So?
GREATOREX. So you might consider leaving be.
ARTHUR. And let a manifest injustice stand?
Pause.
GREATOREX. Ar, well. Thought you’d say that.
ARTHUR. So I would hope.
GREATOREX. And I hopes I been of help.
ARTHUR. You have. But I have one more thing to ask you. You are aware that withholding evidence pertinent to a criminal case is an offence at law? A serious offence?
Slight pause.
GREATOREX. Who says as I’m withholding evidence?
ARTHUR. You do.
GREATOREX. How?
ARTHUR. By how you responded to my question.
Pause.
GREATOREX. I weren’t withholding. Just not volunteering.
ARTHUR. Even so.
Pause.
GREATOREX. Well, it were three years back.
Slight pause.
When Mrs Greatorex were passing the Sharps’ house and called in. And she and Royden started talking, all about the maimings – well, they was the sole topic at the time.
ARTHUR. And what happened then?
GREATOREX. Well, Royden said as he got something she might like to see.
ARTHUR. Oh, yes?
GREATOREX. And after a while, he goes off to the meat safe in the pantry and gets out an instrument.
ARTHUR. ‘An instrument.’
GREATOREX. Yes, she described it to me. The blade were about so long. (A foot.) And it folded into a casing, like a giant pocketknife. Not a farm instrument, she thought. But the blade were the frightening thing. It had a kind of curve on it. And the curved bit was wicked sharp.
WOODIE. It sounds like a horse lancet. Which he may have stolen from the cattle ship?
GREATOREX. Well, I don’t know that.
ARTHUR. And what did he say, about the instrument?
GREATOREX. He said: ‘This is what they use to kill the animals.’
Pause.
ARTHUR. And did she think he meant, ‘an instrument like this’? Or that this was the instrument itself?
GREATOREX. Don’t think she asked. He didn’t say.
ARTHUR. And may I ask, did Mrs Greatorex tell anyone about this?
GREATOREX. She didn’t tell me at the time.
ARTHUR. I repeat the question.
GREATOREX. She said, she thought he were just boasting.
ARTHUR. ‘Boasting’?
GREATOREX. After all, ‘animals’ could mean the cattle on the ship. And he’d hardly show it her if he’d done it himself.
ARTHUR. Well, yes, but / he was…
GREATOREX. And, sure, he’d been a bit wild.
ARTHUR. ‘A bit’?
GREATOREX. But when he came back, he settled down. And if she told the police, they’d make up a case and do him for it, guilty or not guilty.
ARTHUR. As they did for Edalji.
GREATOREX. You could say, that makes her point.
ARTHUR. Mr Greatorex, a man was sent to prison for seven / years because –
GREATOREX. Sir Arthur. You weren’t here.
ARTHUR. And if I had been / here?
GREATOREX. There were hysteria. Rumours flying round. It were this person or that person. Talk of pagan sacrifices. Particularly when they started threatening to move on to young girls. Like you, Mrs Greatorex didn’t have so much regard for the Staffordshire Constabulary. And I think that, as you’re bothered ’bout George Edalji, she were bothered ’bout the same thing happening to Royden Sharp. Which might have ended up with two innocents in jail instead of one.
ARTHUR. Of course, there was an obvious difference between George Edalji and Royden Sharp.
GREATOREX. What, you mean he was a parson’s son and Royden was a butcher?
ARTHUR. He was a parson’s son of Parsee origin.
Pause. GREATOREX shrugs.
WOODIE. And the weapon? Has Mrs Greatorex seen it again?
GREATOREX. I haven’t asked her. As I say, she only told me recently. In confidence, between a man and wife.
Pause.
ARTHUR. Mr Greatorex, I must thank you for your confidence.
GREATOREX. ‘Even so.’ You’d be best off leaving well alone.
GREATOREX disappears.
ARTHUR. Well, there it is.
A whistle and a train starts to move.
WOODIE. We’ve missed our train.
ARTHUR. No, we haven’t. That’s the Stafford line. The wrong direction.
WOODIE. But it seems you’re headed in the right direction.
ARTHUR. I’d say that we’ve arrived.
Pause.
WOODIE. Hard to get over, really. Yesterday, we knew almost nothing. Or rather, you’d made a few deductions. But now it seems that we know everything. All in a day.
ARTHUR. Yes. It’s hard not to feel a little disappointed.
WOODIE. Is it?
ARTHUR. After all, I’ve written it enough times. It’s not meant to happen by following simple steps. It’s meant to seem utterly insoluble until the very end. And then you unravel it with one glorious deduction, something entirely logical yet quite astounding, and you feel a sense of… whoosh.
WOODIE. Which you don’t.
ARTHUR. Now? No.
WOODIE. Well, if you’ll permit a simpler soul to feel a sense of / whoosh…
ARTHUR. So all we need is proof.
WOODIE. I thought we had proof.
ARTHUR. What, the pattern of the letters? Where’s the foul-mouthed boy? Because he’d been a butcher and he was on a cattle ship? Because he showed a horse lancet to Mrs Greatorex?
WOODIE. Well, yes, and his history…
ARTHUR. All inference and circumstantial. Not one shred of proof.
WOODIE. Well, I suppose…
ARTHUR. Without the lancet.
Pause.
WOODIE. Well, if he’s got any sense, he’ll have thrown it in the river.
ARTHUR. If he’d had any sense, he wouldn’t have shown it to Mrs Greatorex.
WOODIE. You mean, it might still be in the meat safe?
ARTHUR. Exactly.
Pause.
WOODIE (growing realisation). Um…
ARTHUR. Which is why you and Harry Charlesworth are going to stumble across it. And secure it.
WOODIE. ‘Stumble’?
ARTHUR. Stumble.
WOODIE. And when you say ‘secure’…
ARTHUR. I mean, take into your possession.
WOODIE. What?
ARTHUR lowers his voice.
ARTHUR. Frankly, it would be better if I didn’t know too much. One of you might distract him in a public house. While the other…
WOODIE. Oh, right. And may I ask if you’ll stand bail for me?
ARTHUR. I will stand witness to your character.
The STATIONMASTER calls.
STATIONMASTER. 5.17 to Birmingham! Calling at Bloxwich, Birchalls and Walsall!
ARTHUR. And there’s my train.
WOODIE. Your train?
ARTHUR. No time like the present.
WOODIE. Sir Arthur, I’m not sure Harry Charlesworth will be up for this.
ARTHUR. Then can I suggest you ally yourself with Frederick Wynn. You can tell him I am finding his Vignettes quite charming. Particularly the pen portraits of eccentric local characters.
WOODIE. You haven’t opened his Vignettes. You’ve no idea if there’s portraits of eccentric local characters.
ARTHUR. There always are.
ARTHUR is about to go, but then has a thought. He takes a cylinder from his bag and hands it to WOODIE.
STATIONMASTER. All aboard! Train leaving!
ARTHUR. This might be helpful. Should you find yourself in the house at night.
He strides out.
STATIONMASTER. All aboard for the stopping train to Birmingham!
WOODIE. But, Sir Arthur…
WOODIE stands, looking off. Then he shrugs.
Well. I better be off ‘stumbling’, then.
WYNN. Mr Wood. I guess it’s over here.
The flashlight veers wildly.
WOODIE. Where?
WYNN. Careful. You’ll be seen through the window.
WOODIE. Where’s the meat safe?
WYNN. Give the flashlight here.
Almost a scuffle as WOODIE gives the flashlight to WYNN.
Now, I guess that’ll be the pantry.
A door suddenly opens. A shaft of moonlight, and the shadow of a man across the stage. WYNN switches the flashlight off.
SHADOW. Who’s there? Molly? Anybody there?
A dog barks and a horse neighs.
Merry! Leave him be!
The door shuts. The flashlight goes on, quickly pointing three ways.
WYNN. Did you say a meat safe?
WOODIE. That’s right.
WYNN. There.
ARTHUR. George. I’m so sorry. We were detained.
GEORGE (not expecting to see JEAN, a little flurried). Sir Arthur.
ARTHUR. This is Miss Jean Leckie.
JEAN (hand out). We met momentarily before.
GEORGE (shakes her hand). I’m very pleased / to see you.
ARTHUR. We were, um… shopping.
JEAN. No, Arthur, you were talking.
ARTHUR. I was talking to a shopkeeper. He’d seen action in South Africa, as have I, and it was only civil to enquire / if he had –
JEAN. Mr Edalji, Arthur has told me all about his mission. I have been deeply angered by the injustice you have suffered.
GEORGE. I’m very grateful for your… being angry.
JEAN. It’s intolerable that such a thing can happen in this country.
GEORGE. Yes. Although I… yes.
JEAN. I am so heartened that there is at last good news.
GEORGE. Um…
ARTHUR. Uh…
JEAN (taking the parcels from ARTHUR). But now, perhaps, I should press on.
ARTHUR snaps his fingers, and the DOORMAN comes to assist.
ARTHUR (about the parcels). Are you sure you…
JEAN. I will take a cab.
ARTHUR (aboutone particular parcel). In fact, that isn’t…
JEAN. No, of course.
ARTHUR keeps the parcel.
I’m very pleased to see you, Mr Edalji.
She kisses ARTHUR on the cheek.
My dear.
She goes out, with the DOORMAN and the parcels.
ARTHUR. We are… Miss Leckie and I…
GEORGE. Yes.
ARTHUR (drink). Do you want a…?
GEORGE. No. No, thank you. What is the good news?
ARTHUR. Right.
He gestures to GEORGE to sit.
There is more news of Royden Sharp.
GEORGE. Yes, as I wrote, I’m afraid I don’t remember / ever having met –
ARTHUR. Item one. School report. 1891: lower first form, sixteenth out of sixteen. Unsatisfactory, untruthful. Detected cheating. Frequently absent without leave.
GEORGE. Yes, as I say…
ARTHUR. Midsummer 1892. Form one, eighth out of eight, idle and mischievous, caned daily, falsified schoolfellows’ marks, removed from school. Oh, and forged letters.
GEORGE. Well.
ARTHUR. That is, midsummer 1892. And what happened in December that year?
GEORGE. Of course, / that was –
ARTHUR. A large key, belonging to the school from which Royden Sharp had been ignominiously expelled, was placed upon your doorstep.
GEORGE. Yes.
ARTHUR. So what do you think of that, Chief Constable? Inspector? Gentlemen of the jury?
GEORGE. Well…
ARTHUR. And if that won’t convince the Staffordshire Constabulary, or even the twelve good men and true of the Court of Quarter Sessions, then I venture to suggest it will persuade the three good men and true of the recently appointed Home Office Committee of Inquiry.
GEORGE. What?
ARTHUR. Which has been appointed by the Home Secretary to report into the case.
Pause.
GEORGE. But… But that’s extraordinary.
ARTHUR. I’d say, singular.
GEORGE. But, a committee of inquiry…
ARTHUR. This will not be all plain sailing, George. Even if they come out for us. They’ll bring it out in the recess, or on a Friday afternoon.
GEORGE. But even so, this is a mighty vindication / of your efforts.
ARTHUR. Tush. Now, on the matter of young Royden Sharp –
GEORGE. The wrong you sought to right is righted.
Slight pause.
ARTHUR. Well, if you like.
Slight pause.
But there is much still left to do.
GEORGE. Of course.
ARTHUR. On the matter of young Sharp, I propose submitting a new dossier.
GEORGE. I’m sorry that I can’t remember him. I think there was a Sharp, but that would be his elder brother. But, certainly, I have no notion of why either brother might wish to harm me.
ARTHUR. Really? Really, George?
Pause.
GEORGE. Sir Arthur, I am aware that you consider race prejudice a factor in this case. But I’m afraid I can’t agree. We were not the only family in receipt of malicious correspondence. What evidence is there that anyone has acted against me out of prejudice? To dislike someone you have first to know them. And then, perhaps, you blame your dislike on some oddity of theirs, such as the colour of their skin. But as I say, Sharp does not know me.
ARTHUR. Captain Anson did not know you.
GEORGE. Didn’t you say, race prejudice would be foreign to his nature, as an English gentleman?
ARTHUR. I did. But, then, I had not met him.
GEORGE. And even if Sharp hated me, for whatever reason, why should he take it out on livestock?
ARTHUR. You’ve read my statement?
GEORGE. You think he was influenced by ‘dark, barbaric forces’.
ARTHUR. Yes.
GEORGE. Sir Arthur, it’s not that I wish to seem anything but immensely grateful to you. Particularly today. But perhaps, you’ll understand, as a solicitor…
ARTHUR. You require proof.
GEORGE. Yes.
ARTHUR puts the parcel on the table before GEORGE.
What’s this?
ARTHUR gestures to GEORGE. GEORGE opens the parcel, gingerly. He finds the horse lancet.
Um, I…
ARTHUR. It opens out.
GEORGE. In which / direction?
ARTHUR. Perhaps it’s best, if I… Part of it is very ‘sharp’.
He opens out the horse lancet.
GEORGE. What is this?
ARTHUR. It’s a horse lancet.
GEORGE. And may I ask, where you…?
ARTHUR. In the bottom of a meat safe.
GEORGE. Where?
ARTHUR. In the house of Royden Sharp.
GEORGE. And how…?
ARTHUR. You could say, it was stumbled on.
GEORGE. ‘Stumbled’?
ARTHUR. Just in case, hearing I was on his trail, he might have dumped it.
Pause.
GEORGE. And have you confronted him?
ARTHUR. No, I have not. Yet.
Pause.
GEORGE. Sir Arthur, I cannot possibly express the gratitude I feel to you. But, still –
ARTHUR (snapping the lancet shut). This is not about your blasted grati –
He cuts himself.
Dammit. Ow.
GEORGE. Sir Arthur…
ARTHUR. Do you have a handkerchief?
GEORGE. Yes, of course I…
GEORGE gives the handkerchief to ARTHUR.
ARTHUR. Thank you.
GEORGE (as ARTHUR wraps his hand). Are you sure I shouldn’t…
ARTHUR. Quite sure. So, ‘But still’?
Pause.
GEORGE. I was convicted on circumstantial evidence.
Slight pause.
ARTHUR. And?
GEORGE. Like this – exhibit.
ARTHUR. George, I believe this ‘exhibit’ is / the weapon –
GEORGE. My father thinks I am a martyr to a cause.
ARTHUR. Whereas?
GEORGE. Whereas I have always felt… the laws of England…
ARTHUR. Oh, yes. Invincible, immutable, incorruptible.
GEORGE. They have granted me – you – a committee of inquiry.
ARTHUR (wrapping the lancet, with some difficulty). I have warned you not to expect too much.
GEORGE. But even so.
ARTHUR. George, the club of which you think the rules are perfect has denied you pardon and redress for three years.
GEORGE. And now it has resolved to right / that wrong.
ARTHUR. Because, however hard you try, it will never judge you an ‘official Englishman’.
Pause. GEORGE can’t speak.
A club against whose manifest imperfections I shall continue to campaign. Whether or not that makes me like your father.
He picks up the parcel and strides away, quickly. Once in the lobby, he cries:
Why won’t you see? Why won’t you open up those damn binoculars!
GEORGE sits, his head in his hands. Seeing ARTHUR’s exit, the DOORMAN appears.
DOORMAN. Is there anything I can do, sir?
GEORGE (shakes his head). No.
GEORGE stands and goes over to the entering MAUD.
MAUD. George? What’s the matter?
GEORGE. ‘What’s the matter’? I have been disgracefully impolite and ungrateful to a man who has put months and months of toil into my case.
Pause.
MAUD. Oh, George, why?
GEORGE. Of course I’ve read his articles, many many times. His many judgements – that I had been a most distinguished student, that I was shy and nervous…
MAUD. Why wouldn’t you be / nervous?
GEORGE. I was not a particularly distinguished student. Frankly, I don’t think I’m especially shy.
MAUD. You can be shy.
GEORGE. But that’s not the main thing.
MAUD. And what’s that?
GEORGE. His case against the boy he thinks responsible. A case based on a stolen object, which is, as a consequence, completely worthless as a piece of evidence.
MAUD. What is this object, / George –
GEORGE. Otherwise he relies on guesswork. Notably, the guess that whoever stole the key also wrote the letters and that the author of the letters is the author of the crime. The presumption that sent me to prison for three years.
GEORGE turns his head and bites his lip. MAUD says nothing.
You see, what happens in the stories is that Sherlock Holmes works it all out, and hands the villains over to the police with their guilt already proved.
MAUD. Usually from their own mouth.
GEORGE. He never once has to stand up in the witness box and prove his theories to a jury. And I think, I fear, that what Sir Arthur’s done is marched into a field where the real culprit’s footprints might be found, and he’s trampled all over them with several different pairs of boots. And thereby, he’s destroyed the case against Royden Sharp. And thereby, the case for me. And it’s all the fault of Sherlock Holmes.
ARTHUR. Just as I predicted! Published on the Friday of the Whitsun holiday weekend!
JEAN (sympathetically). Oh, Arthur.
ARTHUR. Right.
JEAN. But still, what does it say?
ARTHUR. Ha! Listen to this!
JEAN. I am listening, Arthur.
ARTHUR. ‘The Assistant Chairman of the Quarter Sessions, who presided at the trial, when consulted about the conviction, reported that he and his colleagues were strongly of the opinion that the conviction was right.’
JEAN. Well, they would say that, wouldn’t / they?
ARTHUR. ‘These circumstances make us hesitate very seriously before expressing dissent from a conviction so arrived at, and so approved.’
JEAN. ‘However.’
ARTHUR. What? Oh, yes.
Enter MAUD to GEORGE.
MAUD. What does it say?
GEORGE. I’ve just got to the ‘however’.
ARTHUR. ‘There was considerable feeling in the neighbourhood at the time.’
GEORGE. ‘The police were naturally extremely anxious to arrest someone.’
ARTHUR. ‘The police had both begun and carried on the investigation for the purpose of finding evidence against Edalji.’ There, it was said, quite openly and quite officially!
GEORGE. Then there’s a ‘but’.
ARTHUR. But the jury ‘considered their verdict for a considerable time’ – consider, consider –
GEORGE. ‘and we think’ –
ARTHUR. Oh, rather than ‘consider’ – ‘that they must be taken to have held that Edalji was the writer of the letters’. ‘Be taken to have held’!
MAUD. What do they say?
ARTHUR. ‘We have ourselves carefully examined the letters, and compared them with the admitted handwriting of Edalji, and we are not…’
MAUD. What do they say, George?
ARTHUR. ‘…we are not prepared to dissent from the findings at which the jury arrived.’
GEORGE. They think… they seem to think…
ARTHUR. They think he wrote the letters.
JEAN. What?
MAUD. What?
ARTHUR. However, the fact he wrote the letters – as if that is remotely plausible – ‘doesn’t mean he also committed the outrages’. Oh, that’s very white of them.
MAUD. They think you wrote the letters?
ARTHUR. So. ‘We think it quite likely that they are the letters of an innocent man, but a wrong-headed and malicious…’
MAUD. How can they think you wrote the letters?
GEORGE hands the report to MAUD.
ARTHUR. Is this – novella – protected by parliamentary privilege? Can we not sue these people?
JEAN. Arthur, it’s dreadful that they’ve shown your evidence such disrespect.
ARTHUR. ‘But…’
MAUD. George.
ARTHUR. ‘But in our opinion…’
MAUD. George, they say…
ARTHUR. ‘…the conviction was – ’
MAUD. George, they cannot agree with the verdict of the jury.
ARTHUR. ‘ – unsatisfactory.’
GEORGE. But?
ARTHUR. Ha!
MAUD. Their view is that ‘it would not have been warranted for the Home Office previously to interfere’.
JEAN. What does that mean, Arthur?
MAUD. George, how can that be right?
ARTHUR. It’s all balderdash.
GEORGE. It isn’t right.
ARTHUR. Piffle!
JEAN. Arthur, do calm down, please.
GEORGE. Give it me.
MAUD hands GEORGE the report.
ARTHUR. Blether!
JEAN. Why don’t you smoke your pipe.
GEORGE. ‘On the one hand, we think the conviction ought not to have taken place.’
ARTHUR. In front of a lady? Never!
GEORGE. ‘…total ruin of his professional career…’
JEAN. Well, I’ll happily make an exception.
GEORGE. ‘…difficult for him to recover his position…’
JEAN. If you’ll just calm down a little.
GEORGE. ‘On the other hand…’
ARTHUR. ‘…being unable to disagree with what we take to be the findings of the jury, that Edalji was the writer of the letters – ’
GEORGE. ‘ – we cannot but see that he has to some extent brought his troubles on himself.’
ARTHUR. No, no, no, no, no!
JEAN. Arthur, please.
GEORGE. So, the Home Secretary’s conclusion…
ARTHUR. Nothing on Anson. Nothing on Royden Sharp. ‘Fullest and most anxious considerations.’ I should think so!
JEAN. Arthur, what – ?
GEORGE. Free pardon.
JEAN. A free pardon?
ARTHUR. Yes. Free pardon.
MAUD. George.
He lets the report drop. She kneels and holds his hands.
ARTHUR. ‘But I have also come to the conclusion that the case is not one in which any grant of compensation can be made.’
GEORGE. Yes, but.
JEAN. But…
MAUD. George.
JEAN. So, Arthur, what does this – ?
ARTHUR. Mean? It means this. In the old days, you were either innocent or guilty. A simple enough system, tried and tested down the centuries. As from today, there’s a new concept: guilty and innocent. On the one hand, innocent; on the other, guilty. George Edalji, a pioneer in this regard.
JEAN. So, it’s a compromise.
ARTHUR. No, it’s hypocrisy! It’s blether! Balderdash!
JEAN. Arthur, light your pipe.
ARTHUR. Caught a fellow smoking a pipe in front of a lady once. I took it from his mouth, snapped it in two, and threw the pieces at his feet.
JEAN. But Mr Edalji will be able to return to work as a solicitor?
ARTHUR. And every potential client who can read will think he denounced himself for a crime he didn’t do.
JEAN. But perhaps it will be forgotten. As you say, it’s the holiday weekend. Perhaps they’ll only remember the free pardon.
ARTHUR. Not if I have anything to do with it!
JEAN. You mean, you’re going on?
ARTHUR. Of course I’m going on. I gave George Edalji my word. I gave you my word.
JEAN. Arthur, you said you were going to get George Edalji a pardon. And you’ve got it.
ARTHUR. Jean, please stop being reasonable with me.
JEAN. You’d like me to be unreasonable with you?
ARTHUR. I would shed blood to avoid it.
JEAN. But ‘on the other hand’?
ARTHUR. There is no other hand.
JEAN. You gave George Edalji your word.
ARTHUR. I mean, there is no other hand with you.
Slight pause.
JEAN. What do you mean?
To GEORGE and MAUD. GEORGE picks up the report.
GEORGE (reads). ‘…a wrong-headed and malicious man, indulging in a piece of impish mischief, pretending to know what he may know nothing of.’
MAUD. Free pardon.
MAUD goes out. GEORGE lays the report down. He stands, takes off his jacket and tie. Back to ARTHUR and JEAN.
JEAN. What do you mean?
ARTHUR. I mean, with you, there is but one hand. It is the only thing in my life that seems – entirely – simple.
JEAN. ‘Simple.’
ARTHUR. Yes.
JEAN. And right?
ARTHUR. I beg your pardon?
JEAN. Does it seem right? Knowing what we know to be the truth? Knowing that whatever may be thought, or be believed, we know that we are innocent? And if so, do we get a pardon? Do we get our pardon, now?
Slight pause.
ARTHUR. Yes. Yes, we do.
Pause.
And with full compensation.
JEAN stands and kisses ARTHUR. He kisses back.
JEAN. Full steam ahead?
ARTHUR. Full steam ahead.
JEAN. I shall hold you to that promise, Mr Doyle.
ARTHUR looks a little surprised. Then he smiles, takes JEAN’s hand and they go out together. Simultaneously, MAUD enters to GEORGE with a morning coat and tie. She is dressed up, in her plain style, as she was at the beginning of the play. During this, she helps GEORGE change into wedding clothes.
MAUD. He wrote to you?
GEORGE. Apparently, the Home Office has informed him they will be too occupied to afford his correspondence any more attention.
MAUD. But the newspapers are still referring to the case. And calling for a Court of Criminal Appeal. Which you will have brought about.
GEORGE. Not only me.
MAUD. But surely, your case will be cited. In the textbooks of the future.
GEORGE. Possibly.
MAUD. ‘The Court of Criminal Appeal was originally created as a result of the case of one George Edalji…’
GEORGE. ‘…of numerous miscarriages of justice…’
MAUD. ‘…of which the case of Mr Edalji was one.’
A moment. GEORGE is finishing off his tie.
GEORGE. And I am readmitted to the roll.
MAUD. Which is all you really wanted.
GEORGE. Which is all I really wanted.
MAUD. Yes.
WOODIE. Mr Edalji? I’m Alfred Wood.
GEORGE. I beg your pardon?
WOODIE. We met at the hotel.
GEORGE. Of course, I…
WOODIE. And your sister, at Great Wyrley.
MAUD. Mr Wood.
WOODIE (to MAUD, gestures to his and GEORGE’s morning suit). Sir Arthur’s a great one for getting people to dress up.
MAUD. Of course, we’d no idea he’d mention…
GEORGE. After all, it is I who am indebted to Sir Arthur.
WOODIE. All this, it almost makes one want to tie the knot oneself.
GEORGE. It does?
WOODIE. Leastwise, ‘in general principle’.
Slight pause.
GEORGE. I’m sorry, I…
WOODIE. Whereas Sir Arthur thinks that if one’s going to enter in the wedded state, it’s best to do so in particular. As he himself has. Obviously.
GEORGE. I beg your pardon?
WOODIE. Likewise. Your sister is the nark.
GEORGE. I see.
WOODIE (whispers to GEORGE). Never quite seen the point of nuptials myself. Except from the hygienic point of view.
GEORGE. I… what?
WOODIE. Now, who should I point out to you? That’s J.M. Barrie, you know, Admirable Crichton, Peter Pan. And that is – this is – Mr Jerome K. Jerome.
The forty-eight-year-old Jerome K. JEROME enters, sees GEORGE, and approaches.
Three Men in a Boat. Idle Thoughts of an Idle Fellow.
JEROME. Mr Edalji. It’s always good to meet a fellow who’s prepared to stand up for the right.
JEROME shakes GEORGE’s hand.
GEORGE. I’m honoured, naturally.
For a moment, GEORGE thinks that JEROME is MEEK.
JEROME. After all, the third day’s always best for the defence.
GEORGE. Uh…
Sir George PARKER, Canadian, forty-five, has entered with sixty-year-old, Irish, BramSTOKER.
JEROME. Now, have you met Sir George Parker? Parker, come and meet the hero of the hour.
GEORGE. I wouldn’t say…
WOODIE (briefing GEORGE). Canadian. Member of Parliament.
PARKER. Ah, Mr Edalji.
WOODIE. Ours, oddly.
PARKER. I must express my heartfelt gratitude.
WOODIE. And his sister, Maud…
GEORGE. What for?
PARKER (taking GEORGE’s hand and pumping it). In the House, you have provided us with considerable sport, and the government with great embarrassment.
GEORGE. I’m sure I never…
Once again, GEORGE thinks he sees someone else.
PARKER. But, then. You’re a so-li-ci-tor.
STOKER comes over to GEORGE.
GEORGE. I’m very grateful to all those who… uh…
JEROME. Ah, Stoker, meet George Edalji.
WOODIE (briefing GEORGE). Bram Stoker. Theatre manager.
STOKER. A privilege.
PARKER. And novelist.
STOKER (hand out to GEORGE). That all seems remarkably convenient.
PARKER. Just don’t let him near your neck.
GEORGE is baffled.
STOKER. Why did you say you weren’t surprised when we arrested you?
PARKER. Because your father’s a Hindoo?
GEORGE. I, um… My father’s actually…
MAUD. George?
Luckily, the resplendent JEAN sweeps over.
JEAN. Why, there you are.
STOKER. Lady Doyle, congratulations.
JEAN. Mr Stoker, and Sir George. I will need a little time, I fear, to grow used to being…
She lets it hang. STOKER and PARKER take the hint.
STOKER. Lady Doyle.
PARKER. Of course.
They nod and leave, WOODIE following.
JEAN. I’m so pleased both of you could come.
GEORGE. Lady Doyle, Sir Arthur’s words…
JEAN. Not least as it allows me to express my heartfelt thanks.
GEORGE. Well, we weren’t sure what you might require…
JEAN. No, I don’t mean that, whatever it might be. Although we’re very grateful.
Slight pause.
I mean, that it is partly down to you that this happy day has happened, when it has, and how it has. So I am grateful to you, to an extent you cannot know. And it is quite right that you are here.
Enter ARTHUR.
GEORGE. I am…
JEAN. Arthur, I was attempting to have a quiet word with your guests.
ARTHUR. My dear, you cannot claim exclusive rights on them. And if we are not to miss the boat train…
JEAN. …then I’d say you have five minutes, Arthur.
A moment. ARTHUR gives a nod, to indicate he’d like to be alone with GEORGE. JEAN refers to a feature on her dress, the horseshoe made of white heather.
Perhaps you’d like to help me get my horseshoe off, Miss Edalji.
MAUD allows herself to be escorted away.
ARTHUR. Well, George. Readmitted to the roll.
GEORGE. Sir Arthur, when you said – that there was no one you were prouder to see here than I…
ARTHUR. I meant it. Not least, as I owe you an apology.
GEORGE. You owe me an apology?
ARTHUR. I did not pursue your case in the way you would have wished.
GEORGE. Sir Arthur…
ARTHUR. I tried to turn it into a cause célèbre.
GEORGE. With considerable success…
ARTHUR. I wanted to expose a national stain. What you wanted was to clear your name, and to return to work as a solicitor.
GEORGE. Which is, of course, exactly / what you –
ARTHUR. Not to be a martyr to the cause of race equality. Not to change the law. But to return to normal. To the life you had before. The life of… an official Englishman.
GEORGE. Well, yes.
MAUD enters. She holds the heather horseshoe.
But, in a sense, I do… I do, now, understand –
ARTHUR. What do you understand?
MAUD. Sir Arthur, I’m to tell you, ‘it’s time up’.
ARTHUR. What do you understand?
GEORGE. Well, that –
MAUD. Immediately.
ARTHUR. Of course.
(To GEORGE.) Paris, Dresden, Venice, Egypt. But you don’t know that.
GEORGE (not really following). Of course not.
ARTHUR (to MAUD). And no more do you.
Slight pause. He shakes GEORGE’s hand.
George.
ARTHUR goes quickly out.
GEORGE. Where have you been?
MAUD. I helped her change for the departure.
GEORGE. What, she goes away in different clothes?
MAUD. Oh, George.
GEORGE. What did she say?
MAUD. I think she wanted somebody to talk to.
GEORGE. So?
MAUD. Apparently, the first thing he remembers seeing is the body of his grandmother.
GEORGE. Yes. He told me that.
MAUD. She says… Sir Arthur needed to conduct a mission. He needed to destroy a dragon. So he could lay it at her feet.
GEORGE. A dragon?
MAUD. Captain Anson. The police.
GEORGE. ‘The darkness lurking in the human soul.’
MAUD. Which you don’t think is really there.
Slight pause.
He was a child who wants to see. And once he’s seen, for everybody else to see the same.
GEORGE. While I… was never taught to see things any larger than they initially appear.
Slight pause.
Or, never wanted to.
Suddenly, ARTHUR and JEAN hurry across the stage, followed by JEROME, PARKER, STOKER and WOODIE. JEAN wears the clothes MAUD helped her put on at the beginning of the play.
THE THRONG (variously). There they are!
They’re heading to the back stairs.
Which way?
Are they going in the Wolseley?
Quick! You can see them through the window!
Where?
And the THRONG has gone.
GEORGE. I can’t… too many people.
MAUD puts a chair in front of him. He climbs up on it.
I didn’t bring my spectacles.
MAUD opens her bag and takes out a pair of binoculars, which she hands to GEORGE.
Binoculars.
MAUD. Yes, George. Binoculars.
At the back we see Arthur and Jean, in a swirl of confetti, waving. GEORGE raises the binoculars to his eyes.
So, then. What can you see?
Blackout.
The End.