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mantelpiece?’
    â€˜I don’t think so. I didn’t really look.’
    â€˜And two bullets had been fired, Mr Rumpole.’ Our solicitor spoke as though explaining the basic facts of the case to someone who could never be as sharp as himself. ‘The expert evidence tells us that.’
    â€˜Yes, I know it does. What I want to ask you,’ I tried to speak to Simon Jerold as though we were alone in the room, ‘is, did you wipe your fingerprints off the gun and the magazine?’
    â€˜I never did that.’
    â€˜What are you suggesting, Rumpole?’ Again my leader didn’t sound altogether pleased by my interruption. ‘Who says they were wiped off?’
    â€˜Forensic science report,’ I said, and Bernard, the young office boy, supplied the reference. ‘Page 56 of the depositions. ’
    Wystan looked it up reluctantly and then rebuked me. ‘The gun and magazine had evidently been wiped. There were no fingerprints of any sort.’
    â€˜Exactly!’ I told him.
    â€˜In any event, everyone had seen our client holding the gun. What would have been the point of his wiping off his own fingerprints?’
    â€˜That was the question I felt sure you’d want to ask,’ I told Wystan, hoping I sounded respectful.
    â€˜Well, Jerold. Did you wipe the handle of the gun to remove fingerprints?’
    â€˜No, sir. Never.’
    â€˜That’s your answer, Rumpole. I know you were trying to help.’ Then Wystan turned to the client with what I supposed he thought were consoling words. ‘Mr Rumpole, Jerold, is, like yourself, a young man. But you’re not to worry. Mr Rumpole will be a great help to me by taking a full note of the evidence. But all the questions will be asked by me and I will, of course, make the final speech to the jury on your behalf. Now, does that set your mind at rest?’
    Simon Jerold didn’t look as though his mind was at rest. He gazed at me as though I had asked a new question which might, just possibly, supply some sort of chink of light in the darkness which surrounded him. But Wystan hadn’t entirely finished with young Simon, and he seemed, at last, ready to sound a more positive note.
    â€˜As far as your father’s case is concerned -’ Wystan looked up to the ceiling as he spoke, as though seeking inspiration from heaven - ‘it would help if he had threatened you again, perhaps attacked you when you got up to get water from the kitchen. We might, might we not, Mr Barnsley Gough, go for provocation?’
    â€˜Seems about the only thing we could go for. I agree with Mr Wystan,’ our sharp solicitor told Simon.
    â€˜It would only reduce murder to manslaughter, of course. But we might avoid the worst consequence.’ Wystan seemed shy of mentioning the great obscenity, hanging by the neck.
    â€˜I’ve put this to you, Simon, haven’t I? That he attacked you and that’s why you shot him?’ Barnsley Gough had been, apparently, one step ahead of my leader.
    â€˜He couldn’t have attacked me.’ Simon sighed, as though tired of explaining a simple fact. ‘He was dead. And I never shot him, never!’ Was this a client, I wondered, who refused to tell a lie even in the hope of saving his life?
    â€˜Mr Wystan,’ Barnsley Gough was persistent, ‘is only suggesting what might have happened.’
    â€˜Well, it didn’t!’ Simon was equally persistent. ‘I’m quite sure of that.’
    â€˜What will happen,’ Wystan gave us his idea of a smooth solution to a difficult problem, ‘is that we shall listen to all the evidence about the party and the medical evidence. We really don’t need to challenge any of it. And then, when the time comes for him to give evidence, our client may have a clearer memory of the events of that terrible night. In the fullness of time.’
    At which Simon only repeated, ‘I never shot him.’ And