For the Defence: Dr. Thorndyke by R. Austin Freeman

Author:R. Austin Freeman
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: For the Defence: Dr. Thorndyke
ISBN: 9780755128617
Publisher: House of Stratus
Published: 2013-01-04T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter Ten

Gaol

As Andrew took his place in the dock at the police court, he looked around him with a sort of dull, impersonal curiosity. He had never been in a police court before and had but a vague idea as to the nature of the proceedings that were conducted in such places. First, he noted the persons present. Of those whom he knew, the one who instantly caught his eye was his accuser, Mrs Kempster; and as he looked commiseratingly at her pale, haggard face and the restless hands that were incessantly clasping and unclasping themselves, he realized the truth of the inspector’s remarks. It was easy to see that she would have given a good deal to be able to undo the knot that she had tied.

Sitting beside her on the same bench was the red-headed man; and, now that he saw them together, the likeness between them which he had detected at the morning’s meeting was still more noticeable. From them his eyes wandered to the inspector and the two officers who had arrested him and, passing quickly over the background of mostly squalid strangers who had loafed in to look on, he looked lastly at the magistrate, a wooden-faced elderly man of a pronounced legal type.

The proceedings were opened by a senior police officer, apparently a superintendent. He began by intimating that he was proposing only to produce evidence of arrest and identification and that he would ask for a remand to enable the necessary evidence to be obtained and the witnesses notified. Then he went on to give a general outline of the case; to which Andrew listened with profound interest, having, up to this time, only the most obscure notion as to what he was accused of.

“This,” said the superintendent, “is a prosecution under the False Personation Act. The prosecutors are the Griffin Insurance Society, but it has not been possible for them to be represented on this occasion. The facts of the case are, in broad outline, as follows:

“In February, 1919, the accused, Anthony Kempster, came to live as a boarder with Mr and Mrs Francis Redwood at Colchester. Francis Redwood was a retired builder who had given up his business on account of bad health. He was more or less an invalid, and, in addition, he suffered from an aneurism, from which it appeared certain that he would die in the course of a year or two. He had saved a little money, on which he lived, but his means were very small and he took a boarder to eke them out. In view of his bad health, and especially of the aneurism, he had some time previously made a will, leaving the little property that he had to his wife and making her sole executrix.

“When the accused had been living with them about a month, he began to urge Mrs Redwood to insure her husband’s life, pointing out how very little provision there was for her under the will. But, of course,

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