A Matter for the Jury by Peter Murphy

right?’
    â€˜Yes.’
    Arnold leaned back, reached down into his briefcase, which he had placed on the floor beside his chair, and took out the gold chain and cross, reluctantly yielded to him earlier by the sister of the man he now had to question.
    â€˜All right. Now, Billy, I wish to ask you some questions about this gold cross and chain. I got it from Eve when DI Phillips and I were at your house today with PC Willis. Eve told me that you had given it to her on Tuesday. Is that correct?’
    â€˜I found it.’
    Arnold nodded encouragingly.
    â€˜That’s what Eve told us.’
    â€˜I thought it would look nice on Eve. It’s pretty.’
    â€˜It is pretty,’ Arnold agreed. ‘Where did you find it, Billy?’
    Billy frowned, as if concentrating hard on the question.
    â€˜Where did I find it?’
    â€˜Yes. Where?’
    Billy gave an apparently careless shrug.
    â€˜Down by the lock, I expect. That’s where I generally find things.’
    Arnold held the cross a little closer to him.
    â€˜Let’s see if we can do a little better. I would expect you to remember exactly where you found this. It was just a few days ago, and I daresay it’s not every day you come across something as pretty as this, is it? Try a bit harder, Billy. Where did you find it?’
    Billy looked at the cross, then suddenly away across the room.
    â€˜It was at the lock,’ he replied. ‘On the bank, just up from the lock gate.’
    â€˜How did you notice it? It was just lying there, was it?’
    â€˜I expect so. I remember seeing something shiny…’ Billy’s concentration seemed to desert him for a moment.
    Oh, ’ tis my delight on a shiny night…
    â€˜Go on, Billy,’ Arnold was saying. ‘You saw something shiny. Then what?’
    Billy seemed to come back.
    â€˜I saw it shining in the grass and I picked it up. That was it. I took it home and asked Eve if she liked it. She said she did, so I gave it to her.’
    â€˜So, it was definitely down by the lock, which means you found it on this side of the river?’
    â€˜Yes.’
    Arnold nodded. He paused for some time to allow Phillips to catch up with his notes.
    â€˜Did you think of handing it in at the police station at all? I mean, it says it’s 22 carat gold. It’s really heavy, isn’t it? Didn’t you think it might be valuable?’
    A shrug again.
    â€˜I didn’t really think about it.’
    Arnold waited, silent.
    â€˜Look, I find stuff by the river all the time. If I took everything I find to the police station, I wouldn’t have any time left to work the lock, would I?’
    Billy smiled, as if he had scored a point. Arnold returned the smile.
    â€˜Of course, you couldn’t hand everything in, Billy. We all understand that.’ He held the cross up to the light. ‘Still, even leaving aside the value, whoever it belonged to would be upset to lose something like this, wouldn’t she? Did you think about that at all?’
    â€˜Not really.’
    Arnold pulled the cross and chain towards him and it disappeared into his briefcase as quickly as it had appeared. He rummaged among the papers he had placed on the table until he found a photograph. He pushed it across the table to Billy.
    â€˜All right. Well. Let me ask you about something else. Do you recognise the boat in this photograph?’
    Billy snorted contemptuously.
    â€˜She’s moored up by Holywell Fen, she is,’ he said authoritatively. ‘But she wouldn’t be, not if I had my way.’
    â€˜Oh?’ Arnold asked. ‘And why would that be?’
    With another snort, Billy pulled the photograph towards him and looked at it closely.
    â€˜She’s a hazard,’ he replied. ‘Look at her. She’s a big craft to be moored there. She never runs any lights. You can’t see her in the dark, or in the fog. Someone is going to ram her one of these