‘My first duty,’ said Carswell, when he had finished his short introduction, ‘is to tell you why we think this case is one of murder at all. I am well aware that a coroner’s inquest was held on the remains of the deceased at which a verdict of suicide was returned, and I must make clear why we have rejected that finding and come to a very different conclusion.
‘But before going on to do so, I want to point out that this reversal of opinion contains no criticism whatever either of the coroner or of his jury. I believe, and I am sure that it will be generally admitted, that on the evidence put before them, they could have reached no conclusion other than they did. But since then much fresh evidence has been obtained, and it is upon these new facts that our revised opinion has been founded.
‘It is legitimate, however, to point out that even at the time of the inquest, certain difficulties in accepting the theory of suicide did exist. These were four in number.
‘First, there was the character of the deceased. Of all those who knew him and whose testimony was heard, not one believed that he was the kind of man to commit suicide. All agreed that it was not in his nature. Not conclusive, of course, but having some weight when considered with the other facts.
‘Second, though the late Reginald Platt was in straitened financial circumstances, he had just carried through a deal which would certainly have increased his resources. Had the deal failed, the motive for suicide would have been much more apparent. But the deal had succeeded and the deceased must have known that his financial affairs would be easier in the future. This knowledge would rule out financial stringency as a motive for suicide.
‘The third difficulty was that he had apparently expected to return to Bristol on the Sunday, having written to say so not only to his uncle and employer, but also to his landlady. These letters might no doubt have been sent as a blind, had the deceased intended to disappear and restart life elsewhere, the possibility of which was at that time considered. But a would-be suicide would have no reason for sending them.
‘Lastly, all those who had seen the deceased on that Saturday evening of his death bore witness to the fact that he was in good spirits and a perfectly normal frame of mind, so much so that the idea of suicide seemed definitely unlikely to them.
‘Now these difficulties were not overlooked by the coroner. He put them very fairly in his address to the jury. But at that time the difficulties in the theory of murder seemed to be even greater. In fact they seemed to be overwhelming. What they were is not of importance to this inquiry and I am not going to mention them except to say that the chief was that no motive for murder could be established.
‘But two facts were not known then that are known now. The first is that the difficulties of the suicide theory are so great as virtually to exclude it. The second is that a most powerful motive for the deceased’s murder existed, and further, that a person who had that motive in the strongest degree was on board the steamer on that tragic Saturday night. That person is the young man who now stands in the dock, John Wolff Penrose.’
A cold shiver passed over Pam. It was beginning! This was the sort of thing she had been steeling herself to hear unmoved. She knew it must come, but now that it was coming it didn’t sound any the less awful for having been foreseen. Oh, that fatal scene in Ferris’s cottage on the Saturday morning! If only that hadn’t happened! If only Jack had turned up a minute later: twenty seconds later! He would then have seen nothing. He would not have knocked Platt down, and none of this awful trouble would have followed.
But she was missing Carswell’s speech.
‘Now, to understand what ultimately took place, it will be necessary for us to go back nearly a year. I regret, members of the jury, inflicting all this detail upon you, but unfortunately it is necessary.
‘Somewhere about the beginning of the present year a young man named Frederick Ferris made a wonderful chemical discovery. I needn’t trouble you with just how it came to be made. Mr Ferris, who is here, and will be called as a witness, will no doubt tell you. He was then a technical assistant to Messrs Currie and M‘Master, the analytical chemists of Howard Street. He interested a Mr Edward M‘Morris, a fellow-assistant, who is also here, in his discovery, and both of them saw that if certain improvements could be made in their process, the results might prove extremely profitable.’
Carswell then went on to describe in detail the gradual evolution of the process from the two men’s decision to follow up the discovery, to the agreement with Wrenn Jefferson to send a representative to Hillsborough to report on the process. He was a past-master in the art of presenting a thesis. His rich tones, his quiet though assured manner, his simple yet vivid phrases, and his tacit suggestion that his hearers were being privileged in receiving highly confidential information, all made his statement seem utterly convincing. Not only were his Lordship and the jury giving it their undivided attention, but those in the body of the court were obviously intensely interested. For Pam, interested was not the word. She hung on the barrister’s phrases as if Jack’s fate and her own were dependent on what he should say.
‘The representative,’ Carswell continued, ‘whom Mr Jefferson decided to send across to make the preliminary report was Mr Reginald Platt, the man whom we say that the prisoner murdered. This is the man who disappeared from the Ulster Sovereign and upon whose body the inquest at Groomsport was held. However, I’ll come to that in due course.
‘This Reginald Platt, the deceased, was a nephew by marriage of Mr Jefferson’s, the senior partner of the firm, and that gentleman, who is here, will tell the unhappy young man’s history. Platt was,’ and Carswell went on to tell it himself: the man’s birth, his bringing up, his joining the Wrenn Jefferson firm, his life in Bristol, his debts and his circumstances generally. ‘This then,’ he summarised, ‘was the man who crossed to Belfast on Monday night, the 2nd of September last, to report on the petrol scheme.
‘But unhappily, Mr Platt was not the type of man who should have been selected for any such purpose. He was in fact unworthy of the confidence which had been placed in him. Mr Platt was present at the preliminary interview between Mr Ferris, the prisoner, and Mr Jefferson. He quite appreciated the enormous fortune that might be involved, and some idea of transferring the balance of it to his own pocket must even then have struck him. Now I shall ask you to consider these dates. On Wednesday the 28th of August, five days before he crossed to Belfast, Mr Jefferson told Platt that he would be sent over. On that same evening Platt wrote to a Mr Mitchell of Surbiton, saying that he was on a really good thing, and could Mitchell see him at his home on the following Sunday afternoon to discuss it? This Mr Mitchell, who also is here and will give evidence, is the head of Messrs Wrenn Jefferson’s chief rival firm, a London firm. Mitchell replied to Platt that he would see him, and on Sunday, the 1st September, Platt went from Bristol to Surbiton and had an interview with Mitchell in the latter’s private house. At that interview Platt offered the process to Mitchell. Platt’s idea was obviously to steal the secret when he was in Ireland, but Mr Mitchell will tell you that he didn’t understand this, but believed that Platt had already made a deal for it with Mr Ferris and the prisoner. With the details of the negotiations between Platt and Mitchell you are not concerned. It is neither Platt nor Mitchell who are on trial. It is sufficient to say that an agreement was entered into between the two by which Platt would have supplied the process and Mitchell would have worked it, to their mutual profit.
‘That as I have said, was on Sunday, 1st September, and that evening Platt went back to Bristol so as to turn up at the office on Monday morning. On Monday night he crossed to Belfast, going down to Hillsborough on Tuesday evening. From Wednesday to Saturday he carried out his investigations, and in connection with those investigations I must direct your attention to two points.
‘The first was that Platt was not shown the method by which the petrol was rendered inert, but only the fact that it was so altered. The apparatus was carefully screened behind metal plates, and the formulæ was locked in Ferris’s safe. Mr Ferris will tell you that it would have been impossible for anyone to have learned how the process was carried out without first removing those plates, and seeing the papers from the safe. There were however but few essential papers, only four quarto sheets in all.
‘The second point was that Platt spun out his inquiry for four days, Wednesday to Saturday inclusive, whereas according to the evidence you will hear, he could easily have done all that was required in a single day. The reason for this is not far to seek. We say that it was to enable him to obtain an opportunity of stealing the process.
‘For that he did steal it is certain. On that last Saturday of his visit he left the cottage, where he had been with the others of the party, shortly after noon, with the ostensible purpose of returning for lunch to the hotel in Hillsborough where he was staying. He did not return there. Instead evidence will be put before you that he went to Lisburn and there sent a telegram to Mitchell in which he said that he had “got the goods” and would hand them over at Mitchell’s house in Surbiton on the following afternoon, Sunday, on certain previously mentioned conditions.’
Though from the preliminary hearing Pam knew pretty well what was coming, it seemed to her that the case was now being put with much more force and completeness than on that first occasion. Carswell had not then been present, and the junior who had taken his place had not had his senior’s weight and authority. Now things were going to be more dangerous, more difficult to meet. All depended on Coates, and to Pam, Coates was an unknown quantity.
‘Now,’ continued Carswell, ‘I would ask you to consider the effect this theft would have on the members of the party. They had put in, or Messrs Ferris and M‘Morris had put in, an almost heartbreaking amount of work on the scheme. These two had also put in all their money. They had given up their jobs to it at a time when unemployment was terribly severe. They were looking forward to a rich reward of their work. But what about that reward now?
‘They must have realised, if they knew of the theft, that their hopes of any advantage from their work were gone. Not only would there be no vast fortune, but there would be no money at all. Moreover they would be left penniless and out of a job, if not in actual debt.
‘But you will say, and very properly, that we are not here to consider hypothetical cases as to what Messrs Ferris and M‘Morris might or might not have felt had they known of the theft. Whatever they may have known or not known, it is obvious that neither of them killed Reginald Platt, as it has been proved that at the time the man was thrown from the Ulster Sovereign, somewhere down Belfast Lough, both gentlemen were at Hillsborough. But I would ask you to consider the effect the news of the theft would have had on the prisoner, if he had learnt of it.
‘In the first place there would be in his case, as in that of the two other men, the most profound disappointment at the sudden change in his outlook. There would be the loss of a vast fortune, and I would ask you to bear in mind the fact that for some time the prisoner had been counting on getting this huge sum and making his plans accordingly. That, I say, would in itself affect him very powerfully.
‘But in his case there was a second consideration which may have been, and probably was, even more powerful still. He was engaged to be married, as I have said, to Miss Pamela Grey. But, and this is what I ask you to note, an early marriage was dependent on obtaining money from the petrol scheme. Before that was thought of, the engagement had been looked upon as one which might drag on for a very considerable time.
‘Imagine the prisoner now on that Saturday night, always supposing that he knew of the theft. His work in connection with the affair was lost, the fortune that he was expecting had disappeared, his marriage must be postponed indefinitely. And there was more in it than that: much more. Miss Grey would be disappointed too. The girl he loved so dearly would suffer as he would himself. And with a man of the character of the prisoner, I submit that, bad as the disaster would be for himself, his anguish at Miss Grey’s sufferings would be infinitely greater.
‘But all this misery, poverty and disappointment which threatened himself, his fiancée and his friends could easily be prevented. If Platt were only out of the way everything would once again be happy, not only for himself, but for others. A terrible temptation—assuming the accused knew of the theft. And to that point I will come in a moment or two.
‘But before I do so just think how extremely easy the murder would have been for the prisoner. The deceased was a small man of rather weak physique, as you will be told in evidence. You can see for yourselves that the prisoner is a powerfully built man. They were both travelling alone on the Ulster Sovereign. What could have been easier than for the prisoner to have enticed Platt out on to the deck on that fatal passage, and there to have held a chloroform pad over his mouth till he was rendered insensible, finally throwing the body overboard? Remember that it was a wet night, when the decks would be deserted. And the fact that no chloroform was found in the remains does not in any way invalidate this suggestion. Evidence will be put before you that immersion in water for the time in which Platt’s body was immersed, would carry away every trace that might have remained.
‘As you must have observed, I am now merely trying to show you that the murder of the deceased by the prisoner would have been possible. Before I state the reasons why we consider him guilty, I must mention one matter which may have had considerable bearing on the affair. I mention this with the utmost regret, as I am aware it must give pain which I would be only too thankful to avoid. The point is this:
‘On the Saturday morning an incident occurred at Hillsborough, trifling in itself, but as I said, weighty because of its probable consequences. The party were to meet at Mr Ferris’s cottage, and when Miss Grey arrived she found Messrs Ferris, M‘Morris and the deceased already there. The prisoner had not yet arrived. Messrs Ferris and M‘Morris had occasion to go to another room, and then Platt had the audacity to seize Miss Grey in his arms and attempt to kiss her. As it happened, just then the prisoner entered. He saw his fiancée struggling to escape from Platt’s arms. Very naturally—I do not think any of us can blame him—he rushed forward and with a quick blow knocked Platt down. The others, hearing the scuffle, ran in and got Platt away to another room. There, it is only fair to say, he apologised, and the matter dropped.
‘I do not wish, members of the jury, to make too much of this incident, and I do not suggest that it formed the prisoner’s motive for the murder. But I do submit that the recollection of that scene some twelve hours earlier would have tended to overcome any physical reluctance he might have had to the actual carrying out of the crime. To that extent it may have been a contributory factor.’
Pam breathed slightly more freely as Carswell reached this conclusion. This was what she had been so much dreading, and now that it was over, it had not been so bad. Indeed she was becoming slightly more reassured as Carswell went on. They hadn’t proved, either at the preliminary hearing or here, that Jack had known of the theft of the process. And they never could prove it, because it was false. And if they didn’t prove this, the whole of their plausible case fell to the ground. Yes, she thought, things were not looking so badly.
But as Carswell went on, her growing complacency received a rude shock.
‘After these somewhat rambling remarks, necessary to give you the required resumé of the case, I must now put before you the reasons why we believe that the prisoner and no other is guilty of this crime.
‘And first, why are we sure that the deceased’s death was not, after all, suicide?
‘There are first the four points already mentioned. These are now strengthened, strengthened overwhelmingly, by the deal with Mitchell. Just consider it. Platt had accomplished what he came over to Ireland to do; he had stolen the process, and he was now taking it to the man who had promised to buy it, at tremendously advantageous terms for Platt. Platt in fact believed that he was about to become an extremely wealthy man, perhaps a millionaire. There is not much suggestion of suicide in this. Still, however, this is a matter of inference rather than direct proof.
‘But there is direct proof that the death was not due to suicide. We have seen that Platt had stolen the process and must have left Ireland with a copy of the four sheets of formulæ in his possession. I needn’t repeat the proof of that. No other explanation of his wire to Mitchell that he had got the goods is possible. And we may be certain that he was taking the sheets with him. He would never have let them out of his own custody or sent them to Mitchell, as this would have been to surrender his bargaining power and to place himself helpless in his accomplice’s hands. But—and here is a point of the first importance—no such papers were found on the body. They must therefore have been removed from it. That, I submit, proves conclusively that the deceased was murdered to obtain those papers and to prevent knowledge of the process from being lost to its rightful possessors.
‘But this fact that the papers had been removed from the body not only proves the death was not suicide, but it also proves something more. It proves beyond doubt or question that the murderer knew of the process and knew of Platt’s theft.
‘Now let us make a list of all the people who could possibly have had this information. There was Mr Ferris, Mr M‘Morris, Miss Grey, Mr Whiteside, Mr Mitchell, the accused and one other whom I will mention directly. The most careful research has failed to reveal any others. These persons themselves have been unable to suggest any others. There are, in point of fact, no others. Let us further see where each of these persons was on the fatal Saturday night and the Sunday following.
‘Mr Ferris was at Hillsborough. Mr M‘Morris was at Hillsborough. Miss Grey was at Hillsborough. Mr Whiteside was at Carnalea. Mr Mitchell was in Surbiton. But where was the prisoner? The prisoner was on the Ulster Sovereign with Reginald Platt.
‘Now here I particularly wish to call your attention to another point. The prisoner had, or tried to have, some direct dealings with the deceased after the ship left Belfast. Evidence will be put before you that he asked the purser for the number of Platt’s cabin. His own cabin steward will tell you that about eleven-fifteen he saw him coming out of Platt’s cabin. Further, this same steward will tell you that some fifteen minutes later, about eleven-thirty, he saw him again. This time he was going into his own cabin, but the point I wish you to notice is that he was wearing a waterproof and that the waterproof was glistening with fresh rain. That is to say, the prisoner was on deck about eleven-thirty. And evidence will be put before you, from the place in which the body was found and the run of the tides, that Platt must have been thrown overboard just about eleven-thirty. What, I shall later ask you to consider, was the prisoner doing on the deck at that hour on that wet night?
‘I said there was one other person who might have known something of the affair. This was an acquaintance of Mitchell’s who crossed by the same steamer. The police however, have gone carefully into the case of this man, and they are satisfied that he could have had nothing to do with the affair. I mention him merely for completeness and accuracy. At the same time all known information about this man, Herd, is at the disposal of the defence, should they desire to obtain it.’
Pam was by this time experiencing a dreadful revulsion of feeling. Horrible doubts filled her mind. Had the secret been stolen? If so, did the others know? Did Ferris? Did M‘Morris? She remembered that she had never wholly trusted either of them. Did Jack know? Had Ferris and M‘Morris denied their knowledge in order to help Jack now? Oh, ghastly!
Then once again Pam felt ashamed of herself. If Jack had known, he would have said so. Whatever he might or might not do, he would never be party to a deliberate and continuous lie.
‘This then,’ Carswell continued, ‘is the case against the prisoner. Let me summarise it in a word. The deceased had stolen the process and was on his way to sell his booty for a high figure. Therefore he did not commit suicide. Accident was out of the question. Therefore the case is one of murder. The prisoner had an overwhelming motive for his death. Of all those who in part shared that motive, the prisoner alone had the opportunity of carrying out the crime. He could have done so with the greatest ease. He was looking for the deceased on the Ulster Sovereign, and was on the deck in the rain at the estimated time of the crime. Moreover, no one else is known or can be suggested who could possibly have been guilty.
‘Admittedly the prisoner was not seen to commit the crime, nor can the fact that he knew that Platt had stolen the process be established by direct proof. But in a murder case I need not remind you that direct proof of the accused’s guilt is seldom available. Here as in other cases you have to weigh the evidence, and upon that evidence come to a conclusion. If you consider that there is no reasonable doubt that the prisoner committed the crime, you will have no option but to bring in a verdict of guilty. On the other hand, if you feel that, tried by the ordinary standards of everyday life, there is a real and reasonable doubt of his guilt, you will of course bring in a verdict of not guilty. I will now call my witnesses.’
Carswell sat down, and his junior, Mr Adair, immediately rose and called ‘Frederick Ferris.’ Sundry policemen echoed the cry and Ferris stepped into the witness box and was sworn.
Led sympathetically by Adair, Ferris described his discovery and the gradual working out of the process, first in Belfast and then at the cottage at Hillsborough. He told of the entry of Jack, Pam and Mr Whiteside into the affair and of the negotiations with Wrenn Jefferson, of the visit of Platt and of his seeing him to the boat on the Saturday night. Very unwillingly he told of the row between Jack and Platt, and stressed the fact that Platt had apologised, that Pam had accepted the apology, and that the affair had blown over immediately. Ferris was an important witness, as he was able to testify to almost the whole of the facts to be established, and his examination lasted till the court adjourned for lunch.
Pam contrived to flash another smile of encouragement to Jack before he disappeared from the dock, though she felt she wanted for herself all the encouragement she could get. Once out of the building she eagerly plied Irwin and Coates with questions. How did they think things were going? Was it worse than they had feared? What were their hopes? She was sorry to make a nuisance of herself, but she must know.
‘It’s only what we expected,’ Coates returned. ‘We know Carswell’s a good man. But wait till our turn comes. Keep up your heart: Penrose’ll be all right.’
In spite of the assurance Pam was quite unable to banish her despondency. At lunch she could not eat, though she was thankful for the coffee which came after it.
Back in court, Ferris returned to the witness box and Coates rose to deliver the first blow for the defence. He, like Carswell, had the knack of insinuating to the jury that he was giving them secret and quite invaluable information for themselves alone, which would place them in a privileged position above all other persons. The suggestion tended to produce a sympathetic hearing, and Coates used his advantage to the full.
He began in a quiet friendly way by repeating certain of the questions which had already been asked by Adair. Then gently he slid on to new ground.
‘Tell the jury, Mr Ferris, just what precautions were adopted to prevent a possible theft of the process?’
Ferris had already given the answer broadly, but now he was pressed into details. He described more fully the metal screens covering the converter pole pieces and swore that Platt had never been allowed an opportunity of removing them. There were only two copies of the formulae in existence, one of which was in the strong room of his, witness’s, bank, and the other was locked in his safe. He declared that during the critical period he had taken out neither. No one else, moreover, could have obtained them, as the bank would have required his personal application before giving up the copy they held; and as for his own copy, he had not even opened the safe during Platt’s visit. Coates then turned to the question of the witness’s keys, and Ferris swore he had not allowed them out of his possession while Platt was in Ireland. It would have been impossible, he declared, for Platt to have obtained possession of them, either to use directly or to copy. ‘Besides,’ he concluded, ‘wasn’t I in the house myself during all Platt’s free time, and wouldn’t I have heard him if he had tried to get in?’
‘Then,’ went on Coates still in his quiet friendly voice, ‘if all that is true, how do you explain the fact that the process was stolen?’
‘I can’t explain it at all,’ Ferris returned emphatically, ‘and what’s more, I don’t believe it ever was stolen.’
Coates shook his head as if mildly shocked. ‘I’m afraid, Mr Ferris, we can’t listen to that. I am not asking for your beliefs, though if your beliefs are founded on definite facts, you may tell us the facts.’
‘Well,’ said Ferris, ‘I can do that easy enough. I don’t believe it was stolen, for the simple reason that it couldn’t have been. Neither Platt nor anybody else could have got at it.’
Coates now changed his tactics. He tried to break Ferris down on the point, suggesting all kinds of ways in which Platt might have burgled the cottage. But Ferris only grew more and more dogmatic. He pointed out the defect in each of Coates’ suggestions, and repeated his declaration that the thing just couldn’t have been done. It was not till afterwards that Pam learnt that the whole scene of question and answer had been rehearsed beforehand.
The remainder of the cross-examination was more perfunctory. Ferris admitted that he knew little about Platt and therefore could not speak with any certainty as to whether he was or was not depressed on the fatal Saturday evening. A few points of this kind were brought out, but Pam thought that none of them were important. And Adair in his re-examination seemed to her only to repeat his former questions.
M‘Morris was the next witness, but he had not much to add to Ferris’s statement, and except for obtaining corroboration, neither counsel took much trouble with him.
Then came Mr Whiteside’s turn. He told of his entry into the affair, again doing little more than corroborating what Ferris had already said. Brennan cross-examined in both these cases.
Jefferson was examined as to Platt’s career and mission to Ireland. Once more his evidence largely paralleled Ferris’s, but Coates cross-examined him in considerable detail about the deceased’s position in Bristol. He brought out strongly his straits for money, and the serious position in which he found himself immediately prior to his visit to Ireland.
‘Did you notice any abnormality in the deceased’s manner about the time of, or prior to, the visit of Mr Ferris and the prisoner to Bristol?’ Coates went on.
‘No, I don’t know that I did.’
‘Do you mean by that that his manner was just as usual?’
‘Yes, I think so.’
‘Yes, Mr Jefferson, but are you sure? Was it normal or was it not normal?’
‘It was normal.’
‘Did you know at that time of his critical financial position?’
‘No, not till afterwards.’
‘And there was nothing in his manner that suggested he was undergoing this mental strain?’
‘No, I noticed nothing.’
Coates nodded and paused as if to underline the statement to the jury.
‘Now another question. Did you inform the deceased that he would make some money out of this petrol business?’
‘No, I did not.’
‘So that he didn’t know that he’d get anything out of it?’
‘He would have guessed it.’
‘Now, not your opinions, please. You discussed the affair with him and you said nothing to let him suppose he’d get a penny?’
‘No, not directly.’
‘Did you do so indirectly?’
Jefferson hesitated. ‘No, I assumed he would know it himself.’
‘Neither directly, nor indirectly did you give him the slightest hint. Thank you, Mr Jefferson, that’s all.’
Mitchell was then called. He made a very poor figure in the box. His evidence was in accordance with Carswell’s statement, but it did not carry conviction. Brennan, it seemed to Pam, was perfunctory in his cross-examination and did not obtain any useful admissions. Mitchell seemed extraordinarily apprehensive, and his relief, when he was told he could stand down, was little short of abject.
But though his statement carried no conviction, it did not for that reason help Jack’s cause. Rather indeed it had the opposite effect. Mitchell’s object was so clearly to show he did not know, and could not have known, that the process was stolen, that it amounted to a tacit admission that he had been perfectly well aware of the fact. After listening to Mitchell hesitating and stammering in the box, no doubt could possibly remain that he knew that Platt had gone over to steal it, that Platt had stolen it, and that he himself had intended to become the receiver of the stolen goods.
Pam’s own examination proved less trying than she had anticipated. Carswell dealt with her gently and sympathetically. He simply asked her for a plain statement of the Saturday morning episode. She gave it and almost at once he thanked her and sat down.
Coates himself cross-examined and with equal gentleness. When the episode was over, had Platt apologised? Quite. Had she then expressed a desire that the affair should be forgotten? She had. Had further conversation and negotiation then taken place with Platt, just as if nothing had happened? Quite so. Would he be correct in suggesting that before they left the cottage the affair was virtually as if it had never been? He would—quite.
‘Now tell me, Miss Grey,’ Coates went on, ‘did you drive the prisoner in to the boat?’
‘I did.’
‘During that drive was there any further conversation about the episode? I don’t want you to repeat it, but was there any?’
‘There was.’
‘Did you make any request of the prisoner?’
‘I did.’
‘What was the nature of that request?’
‘I asked him to see Mr Platt on board and have a drink to show there was no ill will.’
‘You asked him to see Mr Platt on board and to have a drink to show there was no ill will. Quite so. Did he agree to do so?’
‘He did.’
‘Did he give you a definite promise?’
‘He did.’
Coates sat down and Carswell rose once more. Again he was polite and friendly. He asked but few questions and only one of them Pam found a little awkward.
‘You said just now that when you left the cottage that Saturday morning the affair between the prisoner and Platt was virtually as if it had never been? That is correct?’
‘It is.’
‘Then if so, why were you so anxious for a fresh reconciliation on the boat?’
Pam hesitated. ‘It wasn’t to be a fresh reconciliation,’ she declared. ‘It was simply a sort of confirmation of what had happened already.’
‘Did the prisoner agree to look up the deceased upon your first request, or had you to ask him more than once?’
‘As soon as he realised I was in earnest he agreed without further requests.’
‘Not quite an answer to my question, Miss Grey. How many times did you ask him before he realised you were in earnest?’
‘Oh, I don’t know. A couple of times, perhaps three.’
‘Two or three times. Quite. He wasn’t in fact very willing to do what you asked?’
‘I think he was.’
‘Come now, Miss Grey, if he had been willing wouldn’t he have done it at the first time of asking?’
‘He didn’t think it was necessary, but he was quite willing.’
‘And you don’t think his hesitation was due to the former reconciliation not having been complete?’
‘Of course not.’
Carswell paused for a moment as if uncertain whether to press his point, then suddenly he nodded and sat down.
With relief Pam returned to her seat. It had been bad, but not so bad as it easily might have been.
Several minor witnesses were then called. Mr M‘Bratney and Thompson, the purser and cabin steward on the Ulster Sovereign, respectively, gave the testimony which might have been expected from them. M‘Gonigle, the master of the Groomsport smack, told of the recovery of the body and Dr M‘Gowan described its condition. Dr Anderson gave general medical evidence. Sergeant M‘Clung explained certain of his activities. A representative from the bank confirmed Ferris’s statement about the packet deposited in their strong room. Post office representatives proved the telegraph and telephone messages. One or two other persons were called to give more or less technical evidence on certain points, but Pam did not think their testimony either important or interesting.
When the last witness for the prosecution had been examined, a discussion took place as to whether the court should adjourn. Finally the judge decided that though it was rather early it would be better not to divide the defence. Jack therefore disappeared from the dock, his Lordship left by his private door and the proceedings were over for the day.
Pam was luckier than she had been on the preceding night. She was more exhausted than she realised and she fell asleep directly her head touched the pillow and did not wake in the morning till Mrs Grey knocked at the door. Somehow on this next morning things did not look so black as on the day before and Pam was ready to face the court with less apprehension. For one thing she knew the worst. The dreadful fear of the unknown was over. And today she would listen to the arguments on Jack’s behalf instead of against him. For another, the morning was fine and bright and unconsciously her spirits reacted to the sunshine. Happier than she had hoped to be, Pam climbed into the car with Mr Penrose to face the second day of the hearing.