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Dr. Smithson: Obviously not if she was under constant supervision.
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Golding: My lord.
Judge (with a slight smile and an air of knowing what’s coming): Yes, Mr. Golding?
Golding: Well — yes, indeed, my lord. I merely beg to remind the jury of what your Lordship has already laid down. The defendant is not on trial for concocting lethal capsules and I submit that the evidence we have just heard is irrelevant. I have no questions to put to Dr. Smithson.
Judge (to Smithson): Thank you, Dr. Smithson. You may go if you wish.
Dr. Smithson: Thank you, my lord. (He leaves the witness box.)
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Judge: What do you say to this, Mr. Golding? Do you object?
Golding: My lord, I can find no conceivable reason for this procedure, but—I do not object.
Judge (after a moment’s pause): Very well, Mr. Defense Counsel. Go back to the witness box, please, Dr. Swale.
(Dr. Swale takes the stand.)
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Dr. Swale: I do.
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Dr. Swale: Yes.
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Dr. Swale: I am not a pathologist, but I would expect it to be correct.
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Dr. Swale: I have had no experience of potassium cyanide, but yes, I would, of course, expect Dr. Smithson to be right.
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Dr. Swale: Yes.
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Dr. Swale: So I understand.
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Dr. Swale: I have already deposed that I said it should be destroyed.
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Dr. Swale: It was. I have already said so.
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Dr. Swale: By Mrs. Ecclestone and myself. In their incinerator.
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Dr. Swale: Quite.
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Dr. Swale: No. I was simply concerned to get rid of it.
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Dr. Swale: Perhaps it might have been better. But the circumstances of the dog’s death—their description of its symptoms and its appearance so strongly suggested a convulsive poison such as cyanide—I really didn’t think.
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Dr. Swale: No experience in practice but naturally during the course of training I did my poisons.
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Dr. Swale (a slight pause): I believe so.
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Dr. Swale (less cool): Yes, of course I am.
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Dr. Swale: Yes. All right. I simply said “I believe so” as one does in voicing an ordinary agreement. I know so, if you prefer it. She is a vegetarian.
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Dr. Swale: Not “in the habit” of doing so. I sometimes used to drop in on Fridays to swop crosswords with the Major.
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Dr. Swale: He used to leave his crossword out for me. I visit The Hermitage private hospital on Fridays and it’s close by. I did sometimes — quite often — drop in at The Elms.
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Dr. Swale: Certainly. For a cup of tea.
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Dr. Swale (contemptuously): If you can call it that.
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Dr. Swale: An example of small-town lying gossip dished out by a small-town oaf.
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Dr. Swale: Clearly, since it concerns me, to the suggestion that I went to the house for any other purpose than the one I have given.
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Dr. Swale: I would have thought it was obvious that they are those of a mentally disturbed spinster of uncertain age.
Miss Freebody (sharply): Libel! Cad! Murderer!
(The Judge turns and stares at her. The Wardress admonishes her. She subsides.)
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Dr. Swale: No, thank God.
(Laughter)
Usher: Silence in court.
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Dr. Swale (after a pause): I expect so.
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Dr. Swale: I’m not in the habit of leaving it in the car.
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Dr. Swale: You don’t want an inventory, do you? The bag contains the normal impedimenta of a doctor in general practice.
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Dr. Swale: I’m not in the habit of using my case as a shopping bag.
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Golding: My lord, I do most strenuously object.
Dr. Swale: This is intolerable. Have I no protection against this sort of treatment?
Judge: No. Answer.
Dr. Swale: No. I do not and never have carried butcher’s meat in my bag.
(Defense Counsel sits.)
Judge (to Golding): Mr. Golding, do you wish to re-examine?
Golding: No, my lord.
Judge (to Swale): Thank you, doctor.
Dr. Swale: My lord, may I speak to you?
Judge: No, Dr. Swale.
Dr. Swale: I demand to be heard.
Judge: You may do no such thing, you may—
Dr. Swale (shouting him down): My lord, it is perfectly obvious that counsel for the defense is trying to protect his client by throwing up a series of infamous suggestions intended to implicate a lady and myself in this miserable business.
Judge (through this): Be quiet, sir. Leave the witness box.
Dr. Swale: I refuse. I insist. We are not legally represented. I am a professional man who must be very gravely damaged by these baseless i
Judge: For the last time I warn you—
Dr. Swale (shouting him down): I had nothing, I repeat, nothing whatever to do with the death of the Ecclestones’ dog (Judge gestures to Usher), nor did I tamper with any of the meat in the safe. I protest, my lord. I protest.
(The Usher and a police constable close in on him and the scene ends in confusion.)
(Gwendoline Miggs is sworn in on the stand. She is a large, determined-looking woman of about sixty.)
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Miggs: Yes.