“Jerrold did not take his life!” Jack protested.
“Can you put your opinion before that of such a man as Sir Houston?” asked Tennant dubiously.
“He had no motive in committing suicide.”
“Ah! I think your opinion will rather alter, that is, if the prosecution reveals to you the truth. He had, according to my information, every motive for escape from exposure and punishment.”
“Impossible!” declared Jack Sainsbury, standing defiant and rather amused than otherwise at the ridiculous charge brought against him. “Dr Jerrold was not a man to shrink from his duty. He did his best to combat the peril of the enemy alien, and if others had had the courage to act as he did, we should not be faced with the scandalous situation—our enemies moving freely among us—that we have to-day.”
Inspector Tennant—typical of the slow-plodding of police officialdom, and the careful attention to method of those who have risen from “uniformed rank”—listened and smiled.
Upon the warrant was a distinct charge against the young man before him, and upon that charge he centred his hide-bound mind. It is always so easy to convict a suspect by one’s inner intuition. Had Jack Sainsbury been able to glance at the file of papers which had culminated in his conviction, he would have seen that only after Jerome Jerrold’s death had the charge of war-treason been brought against him. There was no charge of espionage, because, according to the Hague Convention, nobody can technically be charged as a spy unless the act of espionage is committed within the war zone. England was not then—because Zeppelin raids had not taken place—within the war zone. Hence nobody could be charged as a spy.
“Mr Sainsbury, I think there is nothing more to say to-night,” Tennant said at last. “It is growing late. I’ll see that your message is sent to Fitzjohn’s Avenue by telephone. They will see you in the morning regarding your defence. But—well, I confess that I’m sorry that you should have said so much as you have.”
“So much!” cried the young man furiously. “Here I am, arrested upon a false charge—accused of being a traitor to my country—and you regret that I dare to defend a man who is in his grave and cannot answer for himself! Are you an Englishman—or are you one of those tainted by the Teuton trail—as so many are in high places?”
“I think you are losing your temper,” said the red-tape-tangled inspector of the Special Branch—a man who held one of the plums of the Scotland Yard service. “I have had an order, and I have executed it. That is as far as I can go.”