Delphi Complete Works of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (Illustrated), page 237
“Is this case defended?” asked Mr. Melrose.
“Yes, your worship,” said Summerway Jones. “May I, before it opens, make an objection?”
“If you think it worth while, Mr. Jones.”
“I beg to respectfully request your ruling before the case is proceeded with. My client is not a vagrant, but a respectable member of the community, living in his own house, paying rates and taxes, and on the same footing as every other citizen. He is now prosecuted under the fourth section of the Vagrancy Act of 1824, which is styled, ‘An Act for punishing idle and disorderly persons, and rogues and vagabonds’. The Act was intended, as the words imply, to restrain lawless gipsies and others, who at that time infested the country. I ask your worship to rule that my client is clearly not a person within the purview of this Act or liable to its penalties.”
The magistrate shook his head.
“I fear, Mr. Jones, that there have been too many precedents for the Act to be now interpreted in this limited fashion. I will ask the solicitor prosecuting on behalf of the Commissioner of Police to put forward his evidence.” A little bull of a man with side-whiskers and a raucous voice sprang to his feet.
“I call Henrietta Dresser.”
The elder policewoman popped up in the box with the alacrity of one who is used to it. She held an open notebook in her hand.
“You are a policewoman, are you not?”
“Yes, sir.”
“I understand that you watched the prisoner’s home the day before you called on him?”
“Yes, sir.”
“How many people went in?”
“Fourteen, sir.”
“Fourteen people. And I believe the prisoner’s average fee is ten and sixpence.”
“Yes.”
“Seven pounds in one day! Pretty good wages when many an honest man is content with five shillings.”
“These were the tradespeople!” cried Linden.
“I must ask you not to interrupt. You are already very efficiently represented” said the magistrate severely.
“Now, Henrietta Dresser,” continued the prosecutor, wagging his pince-nez. “Let’s hear what occurred when you and Amy Bellinger visited the prisoner.”
The policewoman gave an account which was in the main true, reading it from her book. She was not a married woman, but the medium had accepted her statement that she was. He had fumbled with several names and had seemed greatly confused. The name of a dog — Pedro had been submitted to him, but he had not recognised it as such. Finally, he had answered questions as to the future of her alleged daughter, who was, in fact, no relation to her, and had foretold that she would be unhappy in her marriage.
“Any questions, Mr. Jones?” asked the magistrate.
“Did you come to this man as one who needed consolation? And did he attempt to give it?”
“I suppose you might put it so.”
“You professed deep grief, I understand.”
“I tried to give that impression.”
“You do not consider that to be hypocrisy?”
“I did what was my duty.”
“You saw no signs of psychic power, or anything abnormal?” asked the prosecutor.
“No, he seemed a very nice, ordinary sort of man.”
Amy Bellinger was the next witness. She appeared with her notebook in her hand.
“May I ask, your worship, whether it is in order that these witnesses should read their evidence?” asked Mr. Jones.
“Why not?” queried the magistrate. “We desire the exact facts” do we not?”
“We do. Possibly Mr. Jones does not,” said the prosecuting solicitor.
“It is clearly a method of securing that the evidence of these two witnesses shall be in accord,” said Jones. “I submit that these accounts are carefully prepared and collated.”
“Naturally, the police prepare their case,” said the magistrate. “I do not see that you have any grievance, Mr. Jones. Now, witness, let us hear your evidence.”
It followed on the exact lines of the other.
“You asked questions about your fiance? You had no fiance,” said Mr. Jones.
“That is so.”
“In fact, you both told a long sequence of lies?”
“With a good object in view.”
“You thought the end justified the means?”
“I carried out my instructions.”
“Which were given you beforehand?”
“Yes, we were told what to ask.”
“I think,” said the magistrate, “that the policewomen have given their evidence very fairly and well. Have you any witnesses for the defence, Mr. Jones?”
“There are a number of people in court, your worship, who have received great benefit from the mediumship of the prisoner. I have subpoenaed one woman who was, by her own account, saved from suicide that very morning by what he told her. I have another man who was an atheist, and had lost all belief in future life. He was completely converted by his experience of psychic phenomena. I can produce men of the highest eminence in science and literature who will testify to the real nature of Mr. Linden’s powers.”
The magistrate shook his head.
“You must know, Mr. Jones, that such evidence would be quite beside the question. It has been clearly laid down by the ruling of the Lord Chief Justice and others that the law of this country does not recognise supernatural powers of any sort whatever, and that a pretence of such powers where payment is involved constitutes a crime in itself. Therefore your suggestion that you should call witnesses could not possibly lead to anything save a wasting of the time of the court. At the same time, I am, of course, ready to listen to any observations which you may care to make after the solicitor for the prosecution has spoken.”
“Might I venture to point out, your worship,” said Jones, “that such a ruling would mean the condemnation of any sacred or holy person of whom we have any record, since even holy persons have to live, and have therefore to receive money.”
“If you refer to Apostolic times, Mr. Jones,” said the magistrate sharply, “I can only remind you that the Apostolic age is past and also that Queen Anne is dead. Such an argument is hardly worthy of your intelligence. Now, sir, if you have anything to add . . .”
Thus encouraged the prosecutor made a short address, stabbing the air at intervals with his pince-nez as if every stab punctured afresh all claims of the spirit. He pictured the destitution among the working-classes, and yet charlatans, by advancing wicked and blasphemous claims, were able to earn a rich living. That they had real powers was, as had been observed, beside the question, but even that excuse was shattered by the fact that these policewomen, who had discharged an unpleasant duty in a most exemplary way, had received nothing but nonsense in return for their money. Was it likely that other clients fared an better? These parasites were increasing in number, trading upon the finer feelings of bereaved parents, and it was high time that some exemplary punishment should warn them that they would be wise to turn their hands to some more honest trade.
Mr. Summerway Jones replied as best he might. He began by pointing out that the Acts were being used for a purpose for which they were never intended. (“That point has already been considered!” snapped the magistrate.) The whole position was open to criticism. The convictions were secured by evidence from agents-provocateurs, who, if any crime had been committed, were obviously inciters to it and also participants. The fines obtained were often deflected for purposes in which the police had a direct interest.
“Surely, Mr. Jones, you do not mean to cast a reflection upon the honesty of the police!”
The police were human, and were naturally inclined to stretch a point where there own interests were affected. All these cases were artificial. There was no record at any time of any real complaint from the public or any demand for protection. There were frauds in every profession, and if a man deliberately invested and lost a guinea in a false medium he had no more right to protection than the man who invested his money in a bad company on the stock market. Whilst the police were wasting time upon such cases, and their agents were weeping crocodile tears in the character of forlorn mourners, many of her branches of real crime received far less attention than they deserved. The law was quite arbitrary in its action. Every big garden-party, even, as he had been informed, every police fete was incomplete without its fortune-teller or palmist.
Some years ago the Daily Mail had raised an outcry against fortune-tellers. That great man, the late Lord Northcliffe, had been put in the box by the defence, and it had been shown that one of his other papers was running a palmistry column, and that the fees received were divided equally between the palmist and the proprietors. He mentioned this in no spirit which was derogatory to the memory of this great man, but merely as an example of the absurdity of the law as it was now administered. Whatever might be the individual opinion of members of that court, it was incontrovertible that a large number of intelligent and useful citizens regarded this power of mediumship as a remarkable manifestation of the power of spirit, making for the great improvement of the race. Was it not a most fatal policy in these days of materialism to crush down by law that which in its higher manifestation might work for the regeneration of mankind? As to the undoubted fact that information received by the policewomen was incorrect and that their lying statements were not detected by the medium, it was a psychic law that harmonious conditions were essential for true results, and that deceit on one side produced confusion on the other. If the court would for a moment adopt the Spiritualistic hypothesis, they would realise how absurd it would be to expect that angelic hosts would descend in order to answer the questions of two mercenary and hypocritical inquirers.
Such, in a short synopsis, was the general line of Mr. Summerway Jones’s defence which reduced Mrs. Linden to tears and threw the magistrate’s clerk into a deep slumber. The magistrate himself rapidly brought the matter to a conclusion.
“Your quarrel, Mr. Jones, seems to be with the law, and that is outside my competence. I administer it as I find it, though I may remark that I am entirely in agreement with it. Such men as the defendant are the noxious fungi which collect on a corrupt society, and the attempt to compare their vulgarities with the holy men of old, or to claim similar gifts, must be reprobated by all right-thinking men.
“As to you, Linden,” he added, fixing his stern eyes upon the prisoner, “I fear that you are a hardened offender since a previous conviction has not altered your ways. I sentence you, therefore, to two months’ hard labour without the option of a fine.”
There was a scream from Mrs. Linden.
“Good-bye, dear, don’t fret,” said the medium, glancing over the side of the dock. An instant later he had been hurried down to the cell.
Summerway Jones, Mailey and Malone met in the hall, and Mailey volunteered to escort the poor stricken woman home.
“What had he ever done but bring comfort to all?” she moaned. “Is there a better man living in the whole great City of London?”
“I don’t think there is a more useful one,” said Mailey. “I’ll venture to say that the whole of Crockford’s Directory with the Archbishops at their head could not prove the things of religion as I have seen Tom Linden prove them, or convert an atheist as I have seen Linden convert him.”
“It’s a shame! A damned shame!” said Malone, hotly.
“The touch about vulgarity was funny,” said Jones. “I wonder if he thinks the Apostles were very cultivated people. Well, I did my best. I had no hopes, and it has worked out as I thought. It is a pure waste of time.”
“Not at all,” Malone answered. “It has ventilated an evil. There were reporters in court. Surely some of them have some sense. They will note the injustice.”
“Not they,” said Mailey. “The Press is hopeless. My God, what a responsibility these people take on themselves, and how little they guess the price that each will pay! I know. I have spoken with them while they were paying it.”
“Well, I for one will speak out,” said Malone, “and I believe others will also. The Press is more independent and intelligent than you seem to think.”
But Mailey was right, after all. When he had left Mrs. Linden in her lonely home and had reached Fleet Street once more, Malone bought a Planet. As he opened it a scare head-line met his eye:
IMPOSTOR IN THE POLICE COURT.
—— —— —— -
Dog Mistaken for Man.
WHO WAS PEDRO?
Exemplary Sentence.
He crumpled the paper up in his hand.
“No wonder these Spiritualists feel bitterly,” he thought “They have good cause.”
Yes, poor Tom Linden had a bad Press. He went down into his miserable cell amid universal objurgation. The Planet, an evening paper which depended for its circulation upon the sporting forecasts of Captain Touch-and-go, remarked upon the absurdity of forecasting the future. Honest John, a weekly journal which had been mixed up with some of the greatest frauds of the century, was of the opinion that the dishonesty of Linden was a public scandal. A rich country rector wrote to The Times to express his indignation that anyone should profess to sell the gifts of the spirit. The Churchman remarked that such incidents arose from the growing infidelity, while the Freethinker saw in them a reversion to superstition. Finally Mr. Maskelyne showed the public, to the great advantage of his box office, exactly how the swindle was perpetrated. So for a few days Tom Linden was what the French call a “succés d’execration.” Then the world moved on and he was left to his fate.
8. In Which Three Investigators Come Across A Dark Soul
LORD ROXTON had returned from a Central American heavy game shooting, and had at once carried out a series of Alpine ascents which had satisfied and surprised everyone except himself.
“Top of the Alps is becomin’ a perfect bear-garden,” said he. “Short of Everest there don’t seem to be any decent privacy left.”
His advent into London was acclaimed by a dinner given in his honour at the ‘Travellers’ by the Heavy Game Society. The occasion was private and there were no reporters, but Lord Roxton’s speech was fixed verbatim in the minds of all his audience and has been imperishably preserved. He writhed for twenty minutes under the flowery and eulogistic periods of the president, and rose himself in the state of confused indignation which the Briton feels when he is publicly approved. “Oh, I say! By Jove! What!” was his oration, after which he resumed his seat and perspired profusely.
Malone was first aware of Lord Roxton’s return through McArdle, the crabbed old red-headed news editor, whose bald dome projected further and further from its ruddy fringe as the years still found him slaving at the most grinding of tasks. He retained his keen scent of what was good copy, and it was this sense of his which caused him one winter morning to summon Malone to his presence. He removed the long glass tube which he used as a cigarette-holder from his lips, and he blinked through his big round glasses at his subordinate.
“You know that Lord Roxton is back in London?”
“I had not heard.”
“Aye, he’s back. Dootless you’ve heard that he was wounded in the war. He led a small column in East Africa and made a wee war of his own till he got an elephant bullet through his chest. Oh, he’s done fine since then, or he couldn’t be climbin’ these mountains. He’s a deevil of a man and aye stirring up something new.”
“What is the latest?” asked Malone, eyeing a slip of paper which McArdle was waving between his finger and thumb.
“Well, that’s where he impinges on you. I was thinking maybe you could hunt in couples and, there would be copy in it. There’s a leaderette in the Evening Standard” He handed it over. It ran thus:
“A quaint advertisement in the columns of a contemporary shows that the famous Lord John Roxton, third son of the Duke of Pomfret, is seeking fresh worlds to conquer. Having exhausted the sporting adventures of this terrestrial globe, he is now turning to those of the dim, dark and dubious regions of psychic research. He is in the market apparently for any genuine specimen of a haunted house, and is open to receive information as to any violent or dangerous manifestation which called for investigation. As Lord John Roxton is a man of resolute character and one of the best revolver shots in England, we would warn any practical joker that he would be well-advised to stand aside and leave this matter to those who are said to be as impervious to bullets as their supporters are to common sense.”
McArdle gave his dry chuckle at the concluding words.
“I’m thinking they are getting pairsonal there, friend Malone, for if you are no a supporter, you’re well on the way. But are you no of the opeenion that this chiel and you between you might put up a spook and get two racy columns off him?”
“Well, I can see Lord Roxton,” said Malone. “He’s still, I suppose, in his old rooms in the Albany. I would wish to call in any case, so I can open this up as well.”
Thus it was that in the late afternoon just as the murk of London broke into dim circles of silver, the pressman found himself once more walking down Vigo Street and accosting the porter at the dark entrance of the old-fashioned chambers. Yes, Lord John Roxton was in, but a gentleman was with him. He would take a card. Presently he returned with word that in spite of the previous visitor, Lord Roxton would see Malone at once. An instant later, he had been ushered into the old luxurious rooms with their trophies of war and of the chase. The owner of them with outstretched hand was standing at the door, long, thin, austere, with the same gaunt, whimsical, Don Quixote face as of old. There was no change save that he was more aquiline, and his eyebrows jutted more thickly over his reckless, restless eyes.
“Hullo, young fellah!” he cried. “I was hopin’ you’d draw this old covert once more. I was comin’ down to the office to look you up. Come in! Come in! Let me introduce you to the Reverend Charles Mason.”
