CHAPTER 24

And still the notebooks pile up in the Blacks’ front room. Kathleen can estimate the number of signatures by multiplying the number of notebooks by the number of pages by the lines in each notebook. Notebooks x pages x lines = 12,000. More and more just keep arriving. Signatures from the church, from the marketplaces where they ran a book, from the pubs, most of all from the mills. There is her own Jennymount Mill, but her fellow workers know others in different mills. Inside of a week these twelve thousand signatures have arrived, supporting the petition seeking clemency for Albert Black.

In the night, Kathleen lies awake, her eyes scratchy from tiredness, until she can’t stand it any longer, and she inches herself out of the hollow of the bed. Bert groans in his sleep and throws an arm out as if to stop her, but she’s hell-bent on counting the notebooks again. She needs to check through and see if any have been crossed out, or lines missed, or someone hasn’t put their address. It feels the same as if she were counting votes in an election. Every vote for the life of her son must count. They are running out of time. The notebooks have to be delivered to Mr Clifton Webb who is about to visit Belfast.

She wonders, over and again, what is happening inside the head of her boy. He has written her the strangest letter, telling her of his conversion to the Roman Catholic faith. There must be some reason for it, but she hasn’t worked that out. Or maybe this is to do with the state of his mind that he is talking guff. She hasn’t told Bert about this letter.

In New Zealand, a railway worker called John Vermeulen stabs another man by the name of Dick Lucas on a Hamilton dance floor, enraged because Lucas is dancing with his girlfriend. He inflicts four knife wounds. Lucas doesn’t die. But he might have, people mutter, and there is an unease in the air. Vermeulen is required to take out a prohibition order, and undertake not to attend a dance for a period of time, and not to carry a knife. Otherwise, he goes on with the business of keeping the trains running on smooth track.

In London, the colourful and passionate-hearted publisher, Victor Gollancz, heads a four-thousand-strong rally in Hyde Park, demanding the abolition of the death penalty. He tells the crowd that it is unnecessary, morally unjustified and inconsistent with the self-respect of a civilised and Christian country. YES, the people shout in unison, ABOLITION. He quotes the words of an American abolitionist who has declared the penalty arbitrary, haphazard, capricious and discriminatory. DOWN WITH THE DEATH PENALTY, shout the crowd, as they strain to shake the hand of Gollancz. He is hoisted high on shoulders.

Kathleen thinks that Mr Gollancz probably doesn’t know about her Albert, but Mr Webb will surely know about Gollancz. Will it make any difference? When she thinks about it in her terrace house, in the fastness of the Belfast night, it occurs to her that Mr Gollancz is a Labour man, and she thinks Mr Webb might not be sympathetic to his views. She has never thought much about politics, she hasn’t had the time, what with working in the mill and caring for her sons and their father and making ends meet and all of that. It’s more a case of who kicks with which foot, the left or the right, and the distances between the Irish people in general that have preoccupied her, not the goings-on in places across the sea. Now she is doing her homework. Since she has been told, in effect, not to go to New Zealand, she has asked a lot of questions, called on the editors of the newspaper, and asked them what they know of who’s in and who is out in New Zealand, what attitudes are held and by what parties. What she hears is not encouraging. Why is she not surprised that Mr Webb has been and gone without seeing her? But she cannot be ignored, she believes. For by now she has delivered the letters to Mr Warnock, who, she understands, has passed them on to the New Zealand High Commissioner. And there is the letter she has written to the Queen. Surely someone will take note of that.

In Wellington, Ralph Hanan is meeting with Jack Marshall. Hanan, the draper’s son from Invercargill, and Marshall, a Wellington man through and through. He knows how the city works, its intrigues and secrets. He is also a chess player. The two Honourable Ministers of the Crown sit discussing the implications of hanging. A secretary has brought in a tray bearing a silver teapot, cups and saucers, a plate of scones and a little Royal Albert dish of raspberry jam. There is a choice of butter or whipped cream. ‘A special little treat I asked Bellamy’s to provide,’ Marshall remarks. Hanan has waved away the scones, and perhaps this is a mistake. He takes a cup of tea with a dash of milk. Marshall drops jam thoughtfully on his scone.

‘Jack, you know why I’m here,’ Hanan begins. ‘I’ve just heard the news about Black’s appeal.’

‘Well, not good news for him, I’m afraid.’ Marshall’s voice is as smooth as the butter in its dish. ‘I’ve sent a telegram to Webb this morning so he can let the mother know.’

‘We still have the chance to do something for Black when the Executive Council meets. As a government we can advise the Governor-General to stop this going ahead.’

‘Really, Ralph, we’ve gone over this more times than enough. Why on earth should we overturn the views of five judges? Our very top men.’

‘Your men. Mr Holland’s men.’

‘That’s enough. I won’t listen to this.’

‘Look, you must know as well as I do the arguments being made abroad. Surely you can’t deny that the death penalty in this country is haphazard. You’ve got Horton locked up for a truly vicious rape and murder alongside Black, who might or mightn’t have intended to kill his victim. You can’t hang Horton, because there wasn’t a death sentence in play, but you can hang Black. It doesn’t make sense. The penalty in this country has been enforced and suspended, then abolished, then reinstated and suspended again. All since 1935. It depends on which government’s in power. It’s too important to be decided on a whim.’

‘I resent that,’ Marshall says. ‘My beliefs are not a whim. In fact, Horton’s situation is surely worse than that of Black. It seems inhumane to me that a man be locked up in Mount Eden prison for the rest of his natural life. That seems like torture.’ His voice is quivering with anger.

‘I see. Well, Jack, if you mean that, I guess we’re looking at what’s humane and what’s not from different points of view. I’m ready to respect that, but it doesn’t change where I stand.’

‘We must have deterrents to murder in place.’

‘But the hangings that have happened over the past five years haven’t deterred the more recent murders.’

‘So we should have hanged Horton?’

‘No, that’s not what I said.’ Hanan’s voice is impatient. ‘Look, murderers are often indifferent to death. Look at those who kill themselves before their sentence can be carried out. And there’s some murderers who simply don’t think of the consequences between their action and what will happen later.’

‘Like your Mr Black?’

‘He’s not my Mr Black. Although I’m not convinced he’s a murderer. But yes, I’d say that the death sentence was the last thing he had in mind in that cafe. I believe that essentially he is a young man of good character.’

‘What is character, Ralph? It’s been said that character is the sum of a man’s habits. Have you studied this man’s habits?’

Checkmate. Hanan pauses, gathering himself for a fresh argument.

‘I don’t agree with anything you’re saying, Minister,’ Marshall says, ‘but perhaps you’ll be happier if I tell you that I’ve ordered some evaluations of Black to see whether or not he’s a suitable candidate for the hangman’s noose. Well, there are certain pressures. As you know very well or you wouldn’t be here. It might illuminate the discussions we have when the Executive Council meets. The Governor-General has to be able to account for our decisions when he next meets Her Majesty.’

Hanan walks out of the room, along the pale-green corridors of Parliament, beneath its archways and cornices, its stained-glass windows and high ornate ceilings, until he comes to the public gallery that looks down on the debating chamber. It is empty now, but in the afternoon it will fill with Government and Opposition members. He will take his seat there in one of the high-backed chairs that stand in rows on the dark-green carpet with its fleurde-lis pattern. He is looking down at that space and wonders what he would be thinking if he were a member of the public sitting here later in the day. What would be expected of him? And he knows the answer. He would expect the politicians to be honest with one another, but most of all to their own selves. He is not sure how long he will live. The old war wound haunts him, his lungs fit to burst some days. Whatever happens, however long he is given, he must find a way to change those things that he believes to be wrong.

‘Dear Peter, Here I am again as happy as can be. “Oh Oh!” What jolly good company. Sorry Peter, I hope you will forgive my sudden burst of enthusiasm. One goes a bit potty in here now and again so I guess I just write how I feel. I say, you have not told me much about your girlfriend — I mean, is she tall, fat, thin, strong, or something out of a vision? Oh sorry, I apologise for all that trash, my pen has a habit of running away sometimes. But I do want to know.

‘I am pretty busy at the moment, getting visits from psychologists, psychiatrists and what-not from the Department of Justice in Wellington. Of course, all this comes up in the Executive Council that is, or should I say, my last thread of hope. I expect that is why they won’t let you visit me till that lot pushes off. I think they will be finished with me by Saturday. I shall write after that and let you know what’s cooking. It was no great shock to me when my appeal failed, for I sort of expected what the verdict would be. As you probably know, Peter, I have never taken religion more seriously since I came in here. I can tell you, it has helped me to get through this without cracking up under the strain. I owe a lot to you, too, for having given me the strength to keep my chin up.

‘Another thing, some people don’t know when they are going, but me, I have a firm pointer. Maybe I should be afraid, but for the life of me, I can’t. I guess that’s God’s comfort to me.

‘I will write again in a couple of days’ time. God bless you, your friend Albert.’