“What’ll he think?”
The lawyer raised his eyebrows. “I don’t know what he’ll think. He’ll certainly assume that your explanation is not forthcoming because you know very well that it wouldn’t assist your case. And if he thinks any further, I suppose he’ll class you with the thirsty and prudent undesirable who carries a flask in his pocket wherever he goes.”
“And he’ll send me down?”
“Wait. The time is late in the evening—ten-twenty-five. That is the hour when those who do get drunk may be most easily encountered. You have a smash—which ought to have been avoided. You smell of liquor. Real evidence of liquor, recently consumed, is found. The police say you were drunk. If you were on the Bench, would you accept the accused’s unsupported statement that he was sober?”
“Frankly, I don’t think I should.”
“Add to all this two scandalously irrelevant facts, which, because the Magistrate is human, will be constantly present to his mind. One is that of late the crater of public indignation upon the subject of drunken drivers has been in violent eruption: the other is that at the present moment there are hundreds of thousands of people who are simply living for an opportunity of demonstrating that there is one law for the poor and another for the rich.”
“And he’ll send me down?”
“I think he will have no alternative.”
Lord Pembury laced his fingers and put them behind his head.
“Can’t be helped,” he said. “I’ve nothing to say.”