City of Spades - By Colin MacInnes Page 0,80

that’s what Vial will want him to say, but he won’t be able to put it so plain himself. It wouldn’t be etiquette, not for a barrister. Dirty work of that nature’s left to us solicitors, who really win the case by preparing it properly outside the court – that is, if it’s the sort of case that can be won.’

Mr Zuss-Amor bared all his teeth at me. I got up and shook his hand. ‘Thank you, Mr Zuss-Amor, you’ve made things wonderfully clear.’

He also rose. ‘They need to be,’ he said. ‘Trials are all a matter of tactics. I don’t know what happened, or if anything did happen, between that boy and that girl, any more than I suppose you really do. But believe me, when you listen to all the evidence in the court, you’ll be amazed to see how little relation what’s said there bears to what really occurred, so far as one knows it. It’s one pack of lies fighting another, and the thing is to think up the best ones, and have the best man there to tell them for you so that justice is done.’

He opened the frosted door and let me out.

SECOND INTERLUDE

‘Let Justice be done (and be seen to be)!’

The trial of Johnny Macdonald Fortune took place in a building, damaged in the Hitler war, which had been redecorated in a ‘contemporary’ style – light salmon wood, cubistic lanterns, leather cushions of pastel shades – that pleased none of the lawyers, officials or police officers who worked there. The courts looked too much like the boardrooms of progressive companies, staterooms on liners, even ‘lounges’ of American-type hotels, for the severe traditional taste of these professionals; and all of them, when they appeared there, injected into their behaviour an additional awesome formality to counteract the lack of majesty of their surroundings.

On the morning of the trial, Mr Zuss-Amor had a short conference with Mr Wesley Vial. In his wig and gown, Mr Vial was transformed from the obese, balding playboy of the queer theatrical parties he loved to give at his flat near Marble Arch, into a really impressive figure; impressive, that is, by his authority, which proceeded from his formidable knowledge of the operation of the law, his nerves of wire, his adaptable, synthetic charm, his aggressive ruthlessness, and his total contempt for weakness and ‘fair play’. Mr Zuss-Amor, by comparison, seemed, in this décor, a shabby figure – like a nonconformist minister calling on a cardinal.

‘Who have we got against us?’ said Mr Zuss-Amor.

‘Archie Gillespie.’

‘As Crown counsel in these cases go, by no means a fool.’

‘By no means, Mr Zuss-Amor.’

The solicitor felt rebuked. ‘What was your impression of our client, Mr Vial?’

‘Nice boy. Do what I can for him, of course – but what? The trouble with coloured men in the dock, you know, is that juries just can’t tell a good one from a bad.’

‘Can they ever tell that, would you say?’

‘Oh, sometimes! Don’t be too hard on juries.’

‘We’ll be having some ladies, I believe.’

‘Excellent! He must flash all his teeth at them.’ Mr Vial turned over the pages of the brief. ‘There was nothing you could do with this Muriel Macpherson woman?’

‘Nothing. I even went out and saw her myself. She’s very sore with our young client, Mr Vial. Frankly, I think if we had called her, we’d have found ourselves asking permission to treat her as a hostile witness.’

‘“Hell hath no fury,” and so on. On the other hand, Gillespie tells me he’s not calling the sister Dorothy. Very wise of him. He’s relying on police evidence – which, I’m sorry to say, will probably be quite sufficient for his purpose.’

‘Pity you couldn’t have had a go at the woman Dorothy in the box, though, Mr Vial …’ The solicitor’s eyes gleamed.

‘Oh, best to keep the females out of it, on the whole. I’ll see what can be done with the two officers. I’ve met the Inspector in the courts before … always makes an excellent impression. Looks like a family man who’d like to help the prisoner if he could: deeply regrets having to do his painful duty. I don’t think I know the Detective-Constable …’

‘A new boy in the CID. Very promising in the Force, I’m told. Man of few words in the box, though. Difficult to shake him, I think you’ll find.’

Mr Vial put down the brief. ‘And yet, you know, it should be possible to shake them.’

‘If anyone can do it, you can.’

‘I didn’t