In Pursuit of the English - Doris Lessing [84]
Counsel, his exasperation checked only by the thought of the fees he was earning out of this ridiculous feud, made a helpless gesture and retired to the window to try and regain his temper. The lawyer tried to explain to Flo, for at least the tenth time, the processes of justice. She kept repeating, ‘But he’s not on our side, sir,’ while the lawyer patted her arm and said: ‘There, now, it’s all right.’
Then Counsel and lawyer attacked Dan, in an attempt to make him lie consistently. But Dan imagined they objected to the lies themselves, and at every point where his conscience troubled him, he began shouting justification, so that for the second time Counsel retired to the window to smoke and fume.
So far the witnesses had not been questioned; what was the use of satisfactory witnesses if the two main complainants could not be made to sound convincing? At last the lawyer, hot, anxious and amused, came to Rose, and said: ‘Perhaps you could explain to them?’
Rose faced Flo and Dan and said: ‘Now see here. You’re just being plain silly. You don’t have to get upset. It’s like this – they don’t mind your telling lies, see …’
‘Who’s telling lies?’ shouted Dan belligerently, while the two legal gentlemen exchanged ambiguous glances.
‘Oh, shut up,’ said Rose. ‘Can’t you listen? These two gentlemen here are trying to help you.’
‘Are they, dear?’ said Flo doubtfully.
‘Now listen. What you’ve got to do is to tell the same lies at the same time, see?’ She looked for encouragement to the men, who had turned their backs in order to leave the thing in her far more capable hands.
Meanwhile the old couple, who had finished conferring with their Counsel, sat in the next room through a half-opened door and could hear every word that was being said.
Rose continued: ‘What’s the use of Flo saying she lets the old people use the bathroom if Dan says he locked the door to keep them out?’
‘We didn’t do no such thing,’ said Flo virtuously, and Rose lost her temper and shook her by the shoulders.
‘You said so in your statement.’
‘Did I. dear?’ said Flo, ready to cry again.
‘Now listen. What you’ve got to do is to say that the dirty old things make such a mess in the bathroom and, anyway, she’s got filthy sores all over her legs.’
‘But she has,’ said Flo sullenly.
There was a parrot-like screech from the next room; Flo and Dan glared; the old people glared back; Counsel and the lawyer still had their backs turned.
‘That’s what I said, isn’t it?’ said Rose. ‘You was protecting your tenants from disease, see? And every time they went into the bathroom, they made a mess, and you had to clean up after them, they made a mess on purpose, and you thought the old lady’s sores might be dangerous to other people.’
The legal gentlemen, standing side by side and gazing out of the window, permitted themselves to nod encouragingly. Point by point. Rose framed their case for them, shaking Dan and Flo into silence whenever they opened their mouths.
‘Understand now?’ she concluded. By now she felt quite sure of herself, ‘What you’ve got to get into your heads is this,’ was her summing up, ‘All this law business isn’t anything to do with right or wrong, see? You’ll just get everybody confused if you start thinking so silly. Nobody cares what really happened. All they want you to do is to tell a good tie and stick to it afterwards.’
The lawyer coughed,