Arthur & George

George had asked what Campbell wanted, but Markew said he did not know. George had been deciding what to do, and also wondering what his fellow passengers were making of the exchange, when Markew had adopted a hectoring tone and said something like – no, not like, for the exact words now came back to George. Markew had said, ‘Oh, come on, Mr Edalji, can’t you give yourself a holiday for a single day?’ And George had thought, actually, my good man, I took a holiday a fortnight ago this very day, I went to Aberystwyth with my sister, but if it is to be a question of holidays then I shall take my own advice, or that of my father, above that of the Staffordshire Constabulary, whose behaviour in recent weeks has hardly been marked by the greatest civility. So he had explained that urgent business awaited him at Newhall Street, and when the 7.39 drew in, left Markew on the platform.
    George went through other exchanges, even the most trivial, with the same scrupulousness. Eventually, he slept; or rather, he became less aware of the peephole’s scrape and the constable’s intrusions. In the morning, he was brought a bucket of water, a lump of mottled soap, and a bit of rag to serve as a towel. He was allowed to see his father, who had brought him breakfast from the Vicarage. He was also allowed to write two brief letters, explaining to clients why there would have to be some delay in their immediate business.
    An hour or so later, two constables arrived to take him to the magistrates’ court. While waiting to set off, they ignored him and talked over the top of his head about a case that evidently interested them much more than his. It concerned the mysterious disappearance of a lady surgeon in London.
    ‘Five foot ten and all.’
    ‘Not too hard to spot, then.’
    ‘You’d think, wouldn’t you?’
    They walked him the hundred and fifty yards from the police station, through crowds whose mood appeared to be mainly one of curiosity. There was an old woman shouting incoherent abuse at one point, but she was taken away. At the court Mr Litchfield Meek was waiting for him: a solicitor of the old school, lean and white-haired, known equally for his courtesy and his obduracy. Unlike George, he did not expect a summary dismissal of the case.
    The magistrates appeared: Mr J. Williamson, Mr J.T. Hatton and Colonel R.S. Williamson. George Ernest Thompson Edalji was charged with unlawfully and maliciously wounding a horse, the property of the Great Wyrley Colliery Company, on August 17th. A plea of not guilty was entered, and Inspector Campbell was called to present the police evidence. He described being summoned to a field near the Colliery at about 7 a.m. and finding a distressed pony which subsequently had to be shot. He went from the field to the prisoner’s house, where he found a jacket with bloodstains on the cuffs, whitish saliva stains on the sleeves, and hairs on the sleeves and breast. There was a waistcoat with a saliva patch. The pocket of the jacket contained a handkerchief marked SE with a brownish stain in one corner, which might have been blood. He then went with Sergeant Parsons to the prisoner’s place of business in Birmingham, arrested him, and brought him to Cannock for interrogation. The prisoner denied that the clothing described to him had been what he was wearing the previous night; but on being told that his mother had confirmed this to be the case, had admitted the fact. Then he was asked about the hairs on his clothing. At first he denied there were any, but then suggested he might have picked them up by leaning on a gate.
    George looked across at Mr Meek: this was hardly the tenor of his conversation with the Inspector yesterday afternoon. But Mr Meek was not interested in catching his client’s eye. Instead he got to his feet and asked Campbell a few questions, all of which seemed to George innocuous, if not positively friendly.
    Then Mr Meek called the Reverend Shapurji Edalji, described as ‘a clerk in holy orders’. George watched his father outline, in a precise way but with rather long pauses, the sleeping arrangements at the Vicarage; how he always locked the bedroom door; how the key was hard to turn, and squeaked; how he was a very light sleeper, who in recent months had been plagued with lumbago, and would certainly have woken had the key been turned; how in any case he had not slept beyond five in the morning.
    Superintendent Barrett, a plump man with a short white beard,