Have you ever thought about what fiction is? Probably, such a question may seem surprising: and so everything is clear. Every person throughout his life has to repeatedly create the works he needs for specific purposes - statements, autobiographies, dictations - using not gypsum or clay, not musical notes, not paints, but just a word. At the same time, almost every person will be very surprised if he is told that he thereby created a work of fiction, which is very different from visual art, music and sculpture making. However, everyone understands that a student's essay or dictation is fundamentally different from novels, short stories, news that are created by professional writers. In the works of professionals there is the most important difference - excogitation. But, oddly enough, in a school literature course, you don’t realize the full power of fiction. So using our website in your free time discover fiction for yourself. The Middle Temple Murder by J. S. Fletcher (ebook voice reader txt) 📖
- Author: J. S. Fletcher
Book online «The Middle Temple Murder by J. S. Fletcher (ebook voice reader txt) 📖». Author J. S. Fletcher
“The fun is going to begin,” muttered Spargo.
The Treasury representative looked from Aylmore to the Coroner and made a jerky bow; from the Coroner to Aylmore and straightened himself. He looked like a man who is going to ask indifferent questions about the state of the weather, or how Smith’s wife was last time you heard of her, or if stocks are likely to rise or fall. But Spargo had heard this man before, and he knew many signs of his in voice and manner and glance.
“I want to ask you a few questions, Mr. Aylmore, about your acquaintanceship with the dead man. It was an acquaintanceship of some time ago?” began the suave, seemingly careless voice.
“A considerable time ago,” answered Aylmore.
“How long—roughly speaking?”
“I should say from twenty to twenty-two or three years.”
“Never saw him during that time until you met accidentally in the way you have described to us?”
“Never.”
“Ever heard from him?”
“No.”
“Ever heard of him?”
“No.”
“But when you met, you knew each other at once?”
“Well—almost at once.”
“Almost at once. Then, I take it, you were very well known to each other twenty or twenty-two years ago?”
“We were—yes, well known to each other.”
“Close friends?”
“I said we were acquaintances.”
“Acquaintances. What was his name when you knew him at that time?”
“His name? It was—Marbury.”
“Marbury—the same name. Where did you know him?”
“I—oh, here in London.”
“What was he?”
“Do you mean—what was his occupation?”
“What was his occupation?”
“I believe he was concerned in financial matters.”
“Concerned in financial matters. Had you dealings with him?”
“Well, yes—on occasions.”
“What was his business address in London?”
“I can’t remember that.”
“What was his private address?”
“That I never knew.”
“Where did you transact your business with him?”
“Well, we met, now and then.”
“Where? What place, office, resort?”
“I can’t remember particular places. Sometimes—in the City.”
“In the City. Where in the City? Mansion House, or Lombard Street, or St. Paul’s Churchyard, or the Old Bailey, or where?”
“I have recollections of meeting him outside the Stock Exchange.”
“Oh! Was he a member of that institution?”
“Not that I know of.”
“Were you?”
“Certainly not!”
“What were the dealings that you had with him?”
“Financial dealings—small ones.”
“How long did your acquaintanceship with him last—what period did it extend over?”
“I should say about six months to nine months.”
“No more?”
“Certainly no more.”
“It was quite a slight acquaintanceship, then?”
“Oh, quite!”
“And yet, after losing sight of this merely slight acquaintance for over twenty years, you, on meeting him, take great interest in him?”
“Well, I was willing to do him a good turn, I was interested in what he told me the other evening.”
“I see. Now you will not object to my asking you a personal question or two. You are a public man, and the facts about the lives of public men are more or less public property. You are represented in this work of popular reference as coming to this country in 1902, from Argentina, where you made a considerable fortune. You have told us, however, that you were in London, acquainted with Marbury, about the years, say 1890 to 1892. Did you then leave England soon after knowing Marbury?”
“I did. I left England in 1891 or 1892—I am not sure which.”
“We are wanting to be very sure about this matter, Mr. Aylmore. We want to solve the important question—who is, who was John Marbury, and how did he come by his death? You seem to be the only available person who knows anything about him. What was your business before you left England?”
“I was interested in financial affairs.”
“Like Marbury. Where did you carry on your business?”
“In London, of course.”
“At what address?”
For some moments Aylmore had been growing more and more restive. His brow had flushed; his moustache had begun to twitch. And now he squared his shoulders and faced his questioner defiantly.
“I resent these questions about my private affairs!” he snapped out.
“Possibly. But I must put them. I repeat my last question.”
“And I refuse to answer it.”
“Then I ask you another. Where did you live in London at the time you are telling us of, when you knew John Marbury?”
“I refuse to answer that question also!”
The Treasury Counsel sat down and looked at the Coroner.
THE NEW WITNESS
The voice of the Coroner, bland, suave, deprecating, broke the silence. He was addressing the witness.
“I am sure, Mr. Aylmore,” he said, “there is no wish to trouble you with unnecessary questions. But we are here to get at the truth of this matter of John Marbury’s death, and as you are the only witness we have had who knew him personally—”
Aylmore turned impatiently to the Coroner.
“I have every wish to respect your authority, sir!” he exclaimed. “And I have told you all that I know of Marbury and of what happened when I met him the other evening. But I resent being questioned on my private affairs of twenty years ago—I very much resent it! Any question that is really pertinent I will answer, but I will not answer questions that seem to me wholly foreign to the scope of this enquiry.”
The Treasury Counsel rose again. His manner had become of the quietest, and Spargo again became keenly attentive.
“Perhaps I can put a question or two to Mr. Aylmore which will not yield him offence,” he remarked drily. He turned once more to the witness, regarding him as if with interest. “Can you tell us of any person now living who knew Marbury in London at the time under discussion—twenty to twenty-two or three years ago?” he asked.
Aylmore shook his head angrily.
“No, I can’t,” he replied.
“And yet you and he must have had several business acquaintances at that time who knew you both!”
“Possibly—at that time. But when I returned to England my business and my life lay in different directions to those of that time. I don’t know of anybody who knew Marbury then—anybody.”
The Counsel turned to a clerk who sat behind him, whispered to him; Spargo saw the clerk make a sidelong motion of his head towards the door of the court. The Counsel looked again at the witness.
“One more question. You told the court a little time since that you parted with Marbury on the evening preceding his death at the end of Waterloo Bridge—at, I think you said, a quarter to twelve.”
“About that time.”
“And at that place?”
“Yes.”
“That is all I want to ask you, Mr. Aylmore—just now,” said the Counsel. He turned to the Coroner. “I am going to ask you, sir, at this point to call a witness who has volunteered certain evidence to the police authorities this morning. That evidence is of a very important nature, and I think that this is the stage at which it ought to be given to you and the jury. If you would be pleased to direct that David Lyell be called—”
Spargo turned instinctively to the door, having seen the clerk who had sat behind the Treasury Counsel make his way there. There came into view, ushered by the clerk, a smart-looking, alert, self-confident young man, evidently a Scotsman, who, on the name of David Lyell being called, stepped jauntily and readily into the place which the member of Parliament just vacated. He took the oath—Scotch fashion—with the same readiness and turned easily to the Treasury Counsel. And Spargo, glancing quickly round, saw that the court was breathless with anticipation, and that its anticipation was that the new witness was going to tell something which related to the evidence just given by Aylmore.
“Your name is David Lyell?”
“That is my name, sir.”
“And you reside at 23, Cumbrae Side, Kilmarnock, Scotland?”
“I do.”
“What are you, Mr. Lyell?”
“Traveller, sir, for the firm of Messrs. Stevenson, Robertson & Soutar, distillers, of Kilmarnock.”
“Your duties take you, I think, over to Paris occasionally?”
“They do—once every six weeks I go to Paris.”
“On the evening of June 21st last were you in London on your way to Paris?”
“I was.”
“I believe you stayed at De Keyser’s Hotel, at the Blackfriars end of the Embankment?”
“I did—it’s handy for the continental trains.”
“About half-past eleven, or a little later, that evening, did you go along the Embankment, on the Temple Gardens side, for a walk?”
“I did, sir. I’m a bad sleeper, and it’s a habit of mine to take a walk of half an hour or so last thing before I go to bed.”
“How far did you walk?”
“As far as Waterloo Bridge.”
“Always on the Temple side?”
“Just so, sir—straight along on that side.”
“Very good. When you got close to Waterloo Bridge, did you meet anybody you knew?”
“Yes.”
“Mr. Aylmore, the Member of Parliament.”
Spargo could not avoid a glance at the two sisters. The elder’s head was averted; the younger was staring at the witness steadily. And Breton was nervously tapping his fingers on the crown of his shining silk hat.
“Mr. Aylmore, the Member of Parliament,” repeated the Counsel’s suave, clear tones. “Oh! And how did you come to recognize Mr. Aylmore, Member of Parliament?”
“Well, sir, in this way. At home, I’m the secretary of our Liberal Ward Club, and last year we had a demonstration, and it fell to me to arrange with the principal speakers. I got Mr. Aylmore to come and speak, and naturally I met him several times, in London and in Scotland.”
“So that you knew him quite well?”
“Oh yes, sir.”
“Do you see him now, Mr. Lyell?”
Lyell smiled and half turned in the box.
“Why, of course!” he answered. “There is Mr. Aylmore.”
“There is Mr. Aylmore. Very good. Now we go on. You met Mr. Aylmore close to Waterloo Bridge? How close?”
“Well, sir, to be exact, Mr. Aylmore came down the steps from the bridge on to the Embankment.”
“Alone?”
“No.”
“Who was with him?”
“A man, sir.”
“Did you know the man?”
“No. But seeing who he was with. I took a good look at him. I haven’t forgotten his face.”
“You haven’t forgotten his face. Mr. Lyell—has anything recalled that face to you within this last day or two?”
“Yes, sir, indeed!”
“What?”
“The picture of the man they say was murdered—John Marbury.”
“You’re sure of that?”
“I’m as certain, sir, as that my name’s what it is.”
“It is your belief that Mr. Aylmore, when you met him, was accompanied by the man who, according to the photographs, was John Marbury?”
“It is, sir!”
“Very well. Now, having seen Mr. Aylmore and his companion, what did you do?”
“Oh, I just turned and walked after them.”
“You walked after them? They were going eastward, then?”
“They were walking by the way I’d come.”
“You followed them eastward?”
“I did—I was going back to the hotel, you see.”
“What were they doing?”
“Talking uncommonly earnestly, sir.”
“How far did you follow them?”
“I followed them until they came to the Embankment lodge of Middle Temple Lane, sir.”
“And then?”
“Why, sir, they turned in there, and I went straight on to De Keyser’s, and to my bed.”
There was a deeper silence in court at that moment than at any other period of the long day, and it grew still deeper when the quiet, keen voice put the next question.
“You swear on your oath that you saw Mr. Aylmore take his companion into the Temple by the Embankment entrance of Middle Temple Lane on the occasion in question?”
“I do! I could swear no other, sir.”
“Can you tell us, as near as possible, what time that would be?”
“Yes. It was, to a minute or so, about five minutes past twelve.”
The Treasury Counsel nodded to the Coroner, and the Coroner, after a whispered conference with the foreman of the jury, looked at the witness.
“You have only just given this information to the police, I understand?” he said.
“Yes, sir. I have been in Paris, and in Amiens, and I only returned by this morning’s boat. As soon as I had read all the news in the papers—the English papers—and seen the dead man’s photographs I determined to tell the police what I knew, and I went to New Scotland Yard as soon as I got to London this morning.”
Nobody else wanted to ask Mr. David Lyell any questions, and he stepped down. And Mr. Aylmore suddenly came forward again, seeking the Coroner’s attention.
“May I be allowed to make an explanation, sir?” he began. “I—”
But the Treasury Counsel was on his feet, this time stern and implacable. “I
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