Scold's Bridle

'Because we gave her our word we wouldn't. Why on earth do you think Jack went out tonight if we could have told the police everything?'

Keith held up his hand to forestall the Inspector. 'Any objections to switching off the tape while I confer with my client?'

The other man eyed him for a moment then consulted his watch. 'Interview with Dr. Blakeney suspended at 3:42 a.m.' He spoke abruptly, then pressed the 'stop' button.

'Thanks. Now, will you explain something to me, Sarah?' Keith murmured plaintively. 'Why did you drag me all the way down here if neither you nor Jack will listen to a word I say?'

'Because I'm so bloody angry, that's why. They should be grateful to Jack; instead they're condemning him.'

'The Inspector's paid to make you angry. That's how he gets his results, and you're making this very easy for him.'

'I object to that remark, Mr. Smollett. I am paid, among other things, to try and get at the truth when a criminal offence has occurred.'

'Then why don't you stop bull-shitting,' suggested Keith amiably, 'and deal in straightforward fact? I can't be the only one here who's bored stiff with all these idiotic threats of criminal prosecution. Of course you can charge Mr. Blakeney if you want to, but you'll be a laughingstock. How many people these days would have bothered to go in and do what he did with only a and a torch as protection?' He smiled faintly. 'We're a non-involvement society these days, where heroism is confined to the television screens. There was a case the other day where a woman was sexually assaulted by two men in full view of several taxi-drivers at a taxi rank, and not a single one of them lifted a finger to help her. Worse, they wheeled up their windows to block out her screams for help. Should I infer from your attitude towards Mr. Blakeney that that is the sort of behaviour you approve of in our so-called civilized society?'

'Vigilante behaviour is just as dangerous, Mr. Smollett. For every case of non-involvement you cite, I can cite another where rough justice has been meted out on innocent people because a lynch mob decides arbitrarily who is or is not guilty. Should I infer from your attitude that you approve of the kangaroo-court approach to justice?'

Keith acknowledged the point with a nod. 'Of course not,' he said honestly, 'and had Mr. Blakeney taken a private army with him I'd be on your side. But you're on very thin ice describing him as a lynch mob. He was one man, faced with an impossible decision-to act immediately to stop the rape or to abandon the girl to her fate while he drove off to summon assistance.'

'He would never have been there at all had he and his wife not conspired together to withhold the information about Miss Lascelles. Nor for that matter would Hughes and his gang have been able to subject the young lady Mr. Blakeney rescued to the terror she was put through, for the simple reason that they would all have been under lock and key charged with the rape of Miss Lascelles.'

'But Miss Lascelles has told you categorically that she would have been too frightened to say anything to the police, assuming the Blakeneys had reported what she told them. She lives in terror of Hughes carrying out his threat to rape her again the minute he's set free, and there's no guarantee, even now, that she-or tonight's victim-will find the courage to give the evidence in court that will convict him. Your best bet, quite frankly, is Jack Blakeney's testimony. If he remains strong. which he will, Ruth will gain courage from his example. and if the other girl and her parents are made aware of just what they owe him, then she, too, may find the courage to speak out. By the same token, if you insist on pursuing these charges against Blakeney, then you can kiss goodbye to any co- operation from two terrified young women. Quite reasonably they will conclude that justice is on Hughes's side and not on theirs.'

The Inspector shook his head. 'What none of you seems able to grasp,' he said irritably, 'is that if we fail to charge Mr. Blakeney we make the prosecution case against Hughes so much harder. His defence will have a field day in court pointing up the contrast between police leniency towards the admitted violence of a middle-class intellectual and police harshness towards the alleged violence of an unemployed navvy. Hughes was outside the van, remember, when the rape was taking place, and he's sitting there now claiming he had no idea what was going on. The lad who was raping the girl when your client burst into that van is only fifteen, a juvenile, in other words, who can be sentenced to detention but not to custody in an adult prison. The oldest boy there, if we exclude Hughes, is eighteen and his age will be taken into account at his trial. At the moment, they're all shell-shocked and fingering Hughes as the instigator and prime mover, but by the time they come to trial it will have become a bit of harmless fun that was the girl's idea and which Hughes knew nothing about because he had wandered off for a walk along the beach. The worst of it is, Mr. Blakeney will have to testify to that in court because he saw him doing it.' He rubbed his tired eyes.

'It's a mess, frankly. God knows if we will ever succeed in bringing a conviction. Without clear evidence of intent I can see Hughes getting off scot-free. His MO is to manipulate youngsters into doing his dirty work while be stands aloof and collects the money, and once these boys realize how short their sentences are going to be because the law is relatively powerless against juveniles, they'll stop grassing him up. I'm so confident of that, I'd lay my last cent on it.'

There was a long silence.

Sarah cleared her throat. 'You're forgetting the girls,' she said. 'Won't their evidence carry weight?'

The Inspector's smile was twisted. 'If they're not too frightened to testify, if they don't collapse under cross- examination, if their stealing isn't used by the defence to blacken their characters, if the speed with which they were prepared to spread their legs for Hughes doesn't lose them the sympathy of the jury.' He shrugged. 'Justice is as fickle as fate, Dr. Blakeney.'

'Then release him now and be done with it,' she said coldly. 'I mean, let's face it, it's going to be a damn sight easier to fill your productivity quota by prosecuting Jack than by having to put the counselling effort into bringing thieving little tarts up to scratch. Perhaps you should ask yourself why none of these girls felt confident enough to come to the police in the first place?' Her eyes narrowed angrily as she answered her own question. 'Because they believed everything Hughes told them, namely that he would always be acquitted, and they would always be left to fend for themselves. He was right, too, though I'd never have guessed it if I hadn't heard it from you.'

'He'll be charged and hopefully he'll be held on remand, Dr. Blakeney, but what happens at trial is out of my hands. We can do our best to prepare the ground. We cannot, unfortunately, predict the outcome.' He sighed. 'For the moment, I have decided to release your husband without charge. I shall be taking advice, however, which means we may decide to proceed against him at a later date. In the meantime, he will be required to remain at Mill House in Long Upton and, should he wish to travel anywhere, he must advise Detective Sergeant Cooper of his intentions. Is that clear?'