[Sir John Fielding 06] - Death of a Colonial by Bruce Alexander

Author:Bruce Alexander [Alexander, Bruce]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction, Action & Adventure, Mystery & Detective, General, Traditional, Historical, Thrillers, Suspense
ISBN: 9780425177020
Google: JO4OAAAACAAJ
Amazon: 0399145648
Barnesnoble: 0399145648
Publisher: Putnam Adult
Published: 1999-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

“Let me be frank, Sir John,” said the Lord Chief Justice. “What I do not understand, have not understood, and I suspect will never be able to understand, is this: If we assume that the Laningham claimant is an impostor, as I believe we must, how could his own mother have been deceived by him? I suspect that she could only have been bribed to acknowledge him as her son.”

“Oh,” said Sir John, “I think not, and had you met her, as I did, you would know that she could not be bought. The woman may have been foolish, but she was at least honest.”

“So you say, but a bribe is not necessarily put forward in quid-pro-quo fashion. It is perhaps more often offered with a wink and a nudge. The briber may say to the potential bribe-taker, ‘With your cooperation, this great bounty will be mine, and when it is, I shall set you up in grand style! You will live as royalty!’ Now, there, Sir John, you see? No specific action is requested, nor is a price named. I doubt that one who couched his request and offer in terms so general could be convicted — at least not in my court—yet a bribe nevertheless.”

“I call that no bribe at all,” said Sir John, “and for the reasons you have just stated — and particularly not if such a speech were delivered from one who claimed to be a son to his putative mother. Indeed it would be his duty to improve her state when it was in his power to do so.” The magistrate paused, evidently to give greater weight to what he then added: “I do not, however, believe that is why she recognized the claimant as her son.”

“You do not?” said the Lord Chief Justice rather gruffly. “What, then, would you say? “

“I would ask you to look upon the situation of the Widow Paltrow. She had been left little on which to end her days, and so she took that little with her to end them in Bath. She knew it to be a place of beauty in which some vestige of the old grace still prevailed. Merely to stroll in Bath for a single morning provided more interest and amusement than she might find during a month in Laningham, which was precisely why she had left what had been her home for so many years. Yet in only a few years she might have become somewhat dissatisfied with her situation. Visitors to the town came and went. They offered opportunities only for conversation. Friends were difficult to find. In fact, during her years in Bath, she made only one — and that was her landlady. Margaret Paltrow was lonely, growing old, and was losing her sight. She had little to look forward to but her death.”

“Imagine such a woman in such a state,” urged Sir John. “Now try to imagine her feelings when into her life came, quite of a sudden, a young

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