The Drop

A few weeks ago I had the chance to practice a technique in which I was becoming rusty - The Drop. Years ago we often used suspended committals to prison as a way to loosen the wallets of recalcitrant finees. The Drop is the art of telling the man in the dock that you are committing him to prison, and then timing to a split second the words 'however this will be suspended....' - usually after putting the top back on your pen and taking off your glasses.
I was able to do it twice in one day. The first was a fine defaulter who had paid not a penny in seven years, and the second an offender who was just - and only just - on the safe side of the decision to suspend. It's a bit theatrical, but in these cases it got money out of the first chap, and put, I sincerely believe, the fear of god into the second.