In Newgate Street a long queue of people waited for admission to Old
Bailey on the day the trial was to begin. They were inspected by two fat
policemen to decide whether they appeared respectable enough to be
entitled to a free seat at the entertainment in Number One Court. When
the doors opened at 10.15 a.m. the first batch of them were admitted, but
on reaching the top of the stairs, where they were inspected by a
sergeant, they were informed that all the seats in the gallery of Number
One Court had been filled, but that he would graciously permit them to go
to Numbers Two, Three, Four, or Five Courts. Those who were not satisfied
with this generosity could get out the way they had come in and be quick
about it. What the sergeant did not explain was that so many people with
social influence had applied to the presiding judge for permission to be
present at the trial that it had been found necessary to reserve the
gallery for them as well as most of the seats in the body of the court.
Fashionably-dressed ladies and well-groomed men drove up to the main
entrance of the Old Bailey in motors and taxi-cabs. The scene was as busy
as the scene outside a West End theatre on a first night.
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