Part 20 (2/2)

”Not he,” said Rolfe confidently. ”Our case is too strong.”

”You've got a lot of circ.u.mstantial evidence, but a clever lawyer will pull it to pieces. Circ.u.mstantial evidence has hung many a man, and it will hang many more. But a jury will hesitate to convict on circ.u.mstantial evidence when it can be shown that the conduct of the prisoner is at variance with what the conduct of a guilty man would be. I don't bet, but I'll wager you a box of cigars to nothing that Holymead gets Birchill off.”

”It's a one-sided wager, but I'll take the cigars because I could do with a box of these,” said Rolfe. ”You might as well give them to me now, Mr. Crewe.”

”No, no,” said Crewe with a smile. ”Put a couple in your pocket now, because you won't win the box.”

”Of course, I understand, Mr. Crewe, why you say Birchill is the wrong man. You feel a bit sore because we have beaten you. I would feel sore myself in your place, and I don't deny that we got information that put us on Birchill's track, and therefore it was easier for us to solve the mystery than it was for you.”

”I'm not a bit sore,” said Crewe. ”I can take a beating, especially when the men who beat me are good sportsmen.” He bowed towards Rolfe, and that officer blushed as he recalled how Inspector Chippenfield and he had agreed to withhold information from Crewe and try to put him on a false scent.

”I wish you'd tell me what you consider the weak points of our case against Birchill,” asked Rolfe.

”Your case is based on Hill's confession, and that to my mind is false in many details,” said Crewe. ”Take, for instance, his account of how he came into contact with Birchill again. This girl Fanning, after a quarrel with Sir Horace, came over to Riversbrook with a message for Hill which was virtually a threat. Now does that seem probable? The girl who had been in the habit of visiting Sir Horace goes over to see Hill. No woman in the circ.u.mstances would do anything of the sort. She had too good an opinion of herself to take a message to a servant at a house from which she had been expelled by the owner, who had been keeping her. How would she have felt if she had run into Sir Horace? It is true that Sir Horace left for Scotland the day before, but it is improbable that the girl who had quarrelled with Sir Horace a fortnight before knew the exact date on which he intended to leave. And how did Hill behave when he got the message? According to his story, he consented to go and see Birchill under threat of exposure, and he consented to become an accomplice in the burglary for the same reason. Sir Horace knew all about Hill's past, so why should he fear a threat of exposure?”

”Hill explained that,” interposed Rolfe. ”He pointed out that, though Sir Horace knew his past, he couldn't afford to have any scandal about it.”

”Quite so. But could Birchill afford to threaten a man who was under the protection of Sir Horace Fewbanks? Would Birchill pit himself against Sir Horace? I think that Sir Horace, knowing the law pretty thoroughly, would soon have found a way to deal with Birchill. If Hill was threatened by Birchill, his first impulse, knowing what a powerful protector he had in Sir Horace Fewbanks, would have been to go to him and seek his protection against this dangerous old a.s.sociate of his convict days. According to Hill's own story, he was something in the nature of a confidential servant, trusted to some extent with the secrets of Sir Horace's double life. What more likely than such a man, threatened as he describes, should turn to his master who had s.h.i.+elded him and trusted him?”

”I confess that is a point which never struck me,” said Rolfe thoughtfully.

”Now, let us go on to the meeting between Hill and Birchill,” continued Crewe. ”This girl Fanning, discarded by Sir Horace, because he'd discovered she was playing him false with Birchill, is made the ostensible reason for Birchill's wis.h.i.+ng to commit a burglary at Riversbrook, because Birchill wants, as he says, to get even with Sir Horace Fewbanks. Is it likely that Birchill would confide his desire for revenge so frankly to Sir Horace's confidential servant, the trusted custodian of his master's valuables, who could rely on his master's protection--the protection of a highly-placed man of whom Birchill stood admittedly in fear, and whom he knew, according to Hill's story, was una.s.sailable from his slander? What had Hill to fear, from the threats of a man like Birchill, when he was living under Sir Horace Fewbanks's protection? All that Hill had to do when Birchill tried to induce him, by threats of exposure of his past, to help in a burglary at his master's house, was to threaten to tell everything to Sir Horace. Birchill told Hill that he was frightened of Sir Horace Fewbanks, the judge who had sentenced him.

”Then Birchill's confidence in Hill is remarkable, any way you look at it. He sends for Hill, whom he had known in gaol, and whom he hadn't seen since, to confide in him that it is his intention to burgle his employer's house. He rashly a.s.sumes that Hill will do all that he wishes, and he proceeds to lay his cards on the table. But even supposing that Birchill was foolish enough to do this--to trust a chance gaol acquaintance so implicitly--there is a far more puzzling action on his part. Why did he want Hill's a.s.sistance to burgle a practically unprotected house? I confess I have great difficulty in understanding why such an accomplished flash burglar as Birchill, one of the best men at the game in London at the present time, should want the a.s.sistance of an amateur like Hill in such a simple job.”

Rolfe looked startled.

”Hill says he wanted a plan of the house and to know what valuables it contained.”

Crewe smiled.

”And has it been your experience among criminals, Rolfe, that a burglar must have a plan of the place he intends to burgle, and that to get this plan he will give himself away to any man who can supply it? A plan has its uses, but it is indispensable only when a very difficult job is being undertaken, such as breaking through a wall or a ceiling to get at a room which contains a safe. This job was as simple as A B C. And besides, as far as I can make out, Birchill knew--the girl Fanning must have known--that Sir Horace would be going away some time in August and that the house would be empty. Did he want a plan of an empty house? He would be free to roam all over it when he had forced a window.”

”He wanted to know what valuables were there,” said Rolfe.

”And therefore took Hill into his confidence. If Hill had told his master--even Birchill would realise the risk of that--there would be no valuables to get. Next, we come to Sir Horace Fewbanks's unexpected return. According to Hill's story, he made some tentative efforts to commence a confession as soon as he saw his employer, but Sir Horace was upset about something and was too impatient to listen to a word. Is such a story reasonable or likely? Hill says that Sir Horace had always treated him well; and according to his earlier statement, when he permitted himself to be terrorised into agreeing to this burglary, he told himself that chance would throw in his way some opportunity of informing his master. And he told you that Birchill, mistrusting his unwilling accomplice, hurried on the date of the burglary so as to give him no such opportunity. Well, chance throws in Hill's way the very opportunity he has been seeking, but he is too frightened to use it because Sir Horace happens to return in an angry or impatient mood.

”Let us take Birchill's att.i.tude when Hill tells him that Sir Horace has unexpectedly returned from Scotland. Birchill is suspicious that Hill has played him false, and naturally so, but Hill, instead of letting him think so, and thus preventing the burglary from taking place, does all he can to rea.s.sure him, while at the same time begging him to postpone the burglary. That was hardly the best way to go about it. Let us charitably a.s.sume that Hill was too frightened to let Birchill remain under the impression that he'd played him false, and let us look at Birchill's att.i.tude. It is inconceivable that Birchill should have permitted himself to be rea.s.sured, when right through the negotiations between himself and Hill he showed the most marked distrust of the latter. Yet, according to Hill, he suddenly abandons this att.i.tude for one of trusting credulity, meekly accepting the a.s.surance of the man he distrusts that Sir Horace Fewbanks's unexpected return from Scotland on the very night the burglary is to be committed is not a trap to catch him, but a coincidence. Then, after drinking himself nearly blind, he sets forth with a revolver to commit a burglary on the house of the judge who tried him, on Hill's bare word that everything is all right.

Guileless, trusting, simple-minded Birchill!

”Hill is left locked up in the flat with the girl; for Birchill, who has just trusted him implicitly in a far more important matter affecting his own liberty, has a belated sense of caution about trusting his unworthy accomplice while he is away committing the burglary. The time goes on; the couple in the flat hear the clock strike twelve before Birchill's returning footsteps are heard. He enters, and immediately announces to Hill and the girl, with every symptom of strongly marked terror, that while on his burglarious mission, he has come across the dead body of Sir Horace Fewbanks--murdered in his own house. Mark that! he tells them freely and openly--tells Hill--as soon as he gets in the flat. Allowing for possible defects in my previous reasoning against Hill's story, admitting that an adroit prosecuting counsel may be able to b.u.t.tress up some of the weak points, allowing that you may have other circ.u.mstantial evidence supporting your case, that is the fatal flaw in your chain: because of Birchill's statement on his return to the flat no jury in the world ought to convict him.”

”I don't see why,” said Rolfe.

Crewe fixed his deep eyes intently on Rolfe as he replied:

”Because, if Birchill had committed this murder, he would never have admitted immediately on his returning, least of all to Hill, anything about the dead body.”

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