Rumpole and the Primrose Path by Rumpole; the Primrose Path

Author:Rumpole; the Primrose Path
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Published: 2012-02-01T18:12:49+00:00

Good name in man and woman, dear my lord,

Is the immediate jewel of their souls:

Who steals my purse steals trash; 'tis something, nothing;

T'was mine, 'tis his, and has been slave to thousands:

But he that filches from me my good name

Robs me of that which not enriches him,

And makes me poor indeed.

These words, spoken by him whom Mr Justice Graves called 'The man Iago', ran through my mind as I took the short walk from Equity Court to Pommeroy's Wine Bar. Fleet Street was crowded with people leaving work, waiting in bus queues or hurrying to the tube station. There were secretaries laughing together, last-minute shoppers, men taking arms to steer each other into the pub opposite the Law Courts. Soft, misty rain was falling, so the newspaper seller under the archway into the Temple was covering up his male-interest magazines with plastic sheets. I looked into so many faces and wondered what secrets lay hidden, what private acts or memories called out for protection. Unwise love affairs, probably, small dishonesties, perhaps, minor betrayals, without a doubt, but I didn't imagine many private lives featured murder, treason or other serious crimes. And then I wondered how many of the men scurrying for the train, or back-slapping their way into saloon bars, would be seriously upset by the publication of a photograph of themselves with a bra around their ears. There would, after all, be nothing much they could do about it. Breach of confidence cases for the protection of privacy are a luxury reserved for the rich. You'd have to be as well heeled as Sir Mike before you could bring a case.

The words of Iago and accompanying thoughts had brought me to the door of Pommeroy's, and as I stepped up to it there was a small flash of light in the surrounding dampness and I saw a girl with red hair, wearing a blue anorak, point a camera at me. Was I to be snapped like a starlet arriving at a film premiere? Was tomorrow's headline going to be 'Horace Rumpole arrives at Pommeroy's Wine Bar'? It was all extremely puzzling, but as the girl closed her camera and hurried away, and as I moved rapidly towards my first glass of Château Thames Embankment, I thought no more about it.

•

I had taken my bottle of just tolerable claret to a table in a corner of Pommeroy's, and was flicking through the Evening Standard, which seemed short of any article entitled 'Horace Rumpole: is he the Greatest Living Defender?', when I saw Liz Probert downing a vodka in the company of Mervyn Lockward, Queer Customer, a tall, languid, human-rights barrister, who occupied alternative Chambers in the Euston Road and refused, on principle, to appear for landlords, police officers and employers or any male person accused of a sexual offence. He seemed, as usual, delighted to find himself in his own company and was looking down his nose at Liz with the sort of patronizing smile which he wore, sometimes with fatal results, when addressing juries.

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