Cain His Brother

Chapter 10

After he had finished his evidence, Monk left the court. There was nothing he could accomplish there, and his own inner fear drove him to pursue the truth about Drusilla Wyndham. It was no longer a matter of what she could do to ruin his reputation and his livelihood, it was the question within himself as to what manner of man he was that she wished to, even at such a cost to herself.

She had accused him of assaulting her, of trying to force himself upon her.

Was it possible that although he had certainly not done so this time, on some occasion in the past he had?

The thought was repulsive to him. He could not imagine any pleasure whatever in taking a woman against her will. It would seem a degrading performance to both parties, devoid of tenderness or dignity and with no communication of the mind, nothing shared beyond the most rudimentary physical contact, and afterwards the shame and the regret, and the sense of futility.

Had he really done such a thing?

Only if he were then a completely different man.

But the fear plagued him, waking him in the night with a choking in the throat and a sudden coldness. Perhaps the fear was as bad as a reality? On leaving the Old Bailey he went straight to find Evan. He must see the records for himself, even if he had to be smuggled into the police station after hours, as a witness or a suspect, so he could read the files of all his old cases which had ended in the ruin or death of anyone.

Again he had to wait for Evan. He paced back and forth, unable to sit down, his muscles jumping, his mind tormenting him with frustration.

The desk sergeant looked at him with a certain pity.

“Yer look right tore up, Mr. Monk,” he observed. “If it's real urgent, like, I can tell yer were Mr. Evan is.”

“I should be most grateful,” Monk added. He tried to smile at the man, but he knew it ended as a grimace, his lips pulled over his teeth.

“Twenty-five Great Coram Street, just orff Brunswick Square. Know where that is I 'spec'?”

“Oh, yes.” It was opposite Mecklenburg Square, where they had found the body of the man he had so nearly killed before the accident. He could not ever forget that. “Yes, I do, thank you.” The man's name flashed into his mind. “Parsons.”

The sergeant's face lit with a smile. He had not realized that Monk remembered him.

“Welcome, sir, I'm sure.”

Monk raced out and caught a hansom at the end of the street, swinging himself up and shouting the address at the driver as he threw himself into the seat.

He was then obliged to wait standing in the icy wind in Great Coram Street while Evan concluded his business, but when he emerged he saw Monk and recognized him instantly, perhaps because men dressed as he was seldom stood idly on pavements in late February.

“I found it!” he said triumphantly, striding across towards him, hunching his shoulders and pulling his greatcoat collar higher, shivering a little, but his face radiated success.

Monk felt a kind of breathlessness, a hope so painful it almost choked him.

He swallowed before he could speak.

“Found it?” He dared not even make it plain he meant the reference to Drusilla, in case it was not. He might have meant merely something concerning his present investigation. It was hard for Monk to remember there were other matters, other crimes, other people's lives.

“Well, I think it is,” Evan qualified it very slightly, moving smartly away from the curb as a brougham clattered by. “The name Buckingham is there.”

He touched Monk on the arm and turned to walk against the wind along Great Coram Street towards the square with its bare trees outlined against the sky. “The reason it took me so long to find,” he went on, “was that it wasn't a capital case at all, only an embezzlement, and not of very much.”

Monk said nothing. His footsteps rang on the cold stone. It made no sense, at least not so far.

“A Reginald Sallis embezzled some funds from the church,” Evan continued the tale. “A matter of about twenty pounds or so, but it was reported to the police and investigated. It was unpleasant, because the money was from an orphans' fund, and suspicion fell on a lot of people before the case was proved.”

“But it was proved?” Monk said urgently. “We didn't get the wrong man?”

“Oh no,” Evan assured him, keeping pace. “It was definitely the right man.

Good family, but a bit of a rake. Apparently very handsome, or at least had a fine way with women.”

“What makes you say that?” Monk asked quickly. They had turned into the square and were walking across the grass towards Landsdowne Place and the Foundling Hospital, which lay ahead of them. They must skirt around it to Guildford Street.

“The evidence of his involvement was rather carefully concealed by two young ladies, both of them apparently in love with him,” Evan replied. “Or more accurately, one of them felt very deeply, the other, her sister, was merely flirting.”

“This doesn't explain anything!” Monk said desperately, brushing past a Hussar in uniform. “A romantic rivalry between sisters, a petty embezzlement for which a young rake got… what? A year? Five years?”

“Two years,” Evan answered, his face suddenly tight and his eyes full of pity. “But he died of gaol fever in Coldbath Fields. He wasn't a particularly pleasant young man, he robbed the charitable funds of the church, but he didn't deserve to die alone in prison for it.”

“Was that my fault?” Monk felt the same wrench of pity. He had seen the Coldbath Fields prison and would not have wished it on any living thing. He could remember the cold that ate into the bones, the damp of the walls as if they were forever weeping, the smell of mold and sour places that are never open to the air. One could taste the despair in it. He could close his eyes and see the men, shavenheaded, in the backbreaking exercises of passing the shot, endlessly, pointlessly moving cannon balls from one place to another, around in a ring, or the treadmill, the cages graphically known as the “cockchafers.” The enforced silence beat in his ears, where all human exchange was forbidden.

“Was that my fault?” he demanded again with sudden violence, stopping Evan by grasping his arm so he winced and was forced to swing around to face him.

“It was your doing,” Evan said without deviating his gaze at all. “But the man was guilty. The sentence was the judge's to give, not yours. What Drusilla Buckingham could not forgive you for, I should imagine, was that you used her to catch Sallis. You told her he was betraying her with her own sister, Julia. In rage and hurt she gave you what you wanted.” Monk felt the cold bite into the core of his body. He was no longer aware of his feet on the pavement or the carriages coming and going along Guildford Street, the clink of harness.

“And was he?”

“I don't know,” Evan answered him. “There's nothing to suggest it.” Monk let out his breath slowly. He hated the misery in Evan's eyes, the refusal to excuse him, but he had no argument. He felt the same revulsion for himself. The man might have been guilty, but why had he pushed the hurt so far? Was it worth using a woman's jealousy to betray her lover to the Coldbath Fields, for a few pounds from the church funds, albeit the poor box?

He wouldn't do it now. He would let it go. The shame would be enough. If the vicar knew, even if Drusilla knew in her heart, was that not all it really needed?

“It's past,” Evan said quietly. “You can't undo it. I wish I knew how to stop her now, but I don't.”

“I didn't recognize her,” Monk said sincerely, as if it meant something.

“I spent hours with her, and nothing returned in my memory at all.”

Evan started to walk again and Monk kept up with him.

“Nothing!” Monk said desperately.

“It's not so surprising.” Evan looked straight ahead of them. “She's changed her name, and it was several years ago. Fashions are different now.

I daresay she altered her appearance somewhat. Women can. It was a very trivial offense, to our eyes, but it was a scandal at the time. Sallis was trusted, and the romance came out too. Both girls' reputations were ruined.”

All sorts of thoughts boiled up inside Monk, excuses that died before they were formed, self-disgust, remorse, confusion. None of it found easy words, and perhaps they were better unsaid anyway.

“I see.” He kept pace with Evan, their footsteps making a single sound on the pavement. “Thank you.”

They crossed Guildford Street and turned down Lamb's Conduit Street. Monk had no idea where they were going, he was simply following, but he was glad it was not Mecklenburg Square. He had too many nightmares already.

That evening Drusilla Wyndham, as she was now known, attended a musical soiree at the home of a lady of fashion. She had dressed with great care, to set off her considerable beauty, and she fully expected to create an effect. She swept in, head high, skin glowing with the inner triumph which burned in her mind, the knowledge that the cup of revenge was at her lips, the first taste on her tongue.

And she did create an effect, but it was far from the one she had intended.

A gentleman who had always shown her gallantry looked at her with alarm, and then turned his back as if he had suddenly seen someone else he must speak with immediately.

She did not take it seriously, until Sir Percy Gainsborough also effected not to have seen her, when he quite plainly had done.

The Honourable Gerald Hapsgood positively spilled his champagne in his urgency to avoid her, apologized in alarm to the lady next to him, and then in most unbecoming haste, trod on the edge of her gown and only saved his balance by catching hold of Lady Burgoyne.

The Duchess of Granby gave her a stare which would have frozen cream.

Altogether it was a most unpleasant evening, and she went home early, confused and very put out, not having said a word of what she had meant to.

Rathbone entered the courtroom of the Old Bailey for the third day of the trial with little more confidence than he had had in the beginning, but his resolution undiminished. He had hoped the police might find Angus's body, since they had turned their full efforts towards it, but he had always known it was an outside chance. There were so many other possibilities, and Caleb's defiance of Monk in the Greenwich marshes should have warned him.

He had said they would never find Angus.

Looking at Caleb as he stood in the dock while the judge entered and took his place at the bench, and the last whispering ceased, Rathbone saw the jeering triumph in him again, the violence so close beneath the surface. Every angle of his body suggested arrogance.

“Are you ready to proceed, Mr. Rathbone?” the judge inquired. Was that a faint shred of pity in his face, as if he believed Rathbone could not win?

He was a small man with a lean, weary face, full of lines that had once been pugnacious, but were now too tired for the effort.

“Yes, may it please the court, my lord,” Rathbone responded. “I call Albert Swain.”

“Albert Swain!” the usher repeated loudly. “Call Albert Swain!”

Swain, large, awkward and mumbling so badly he had to repeat almost everything, told how he had seen Caleb on the day of Angus's disappearance, bruised, his clothes badly torn and stained. Yes, he thought it was blood.

Yes, his face was bruised and swollen and his cheek gashed. What other wounds were there? He could not say. He had not looked.

Did Caleb appear to limp, or carry himself as if some limb were paining him?

He did not remember.

Try harder, Rathbone urged.

Yes, Caleb had limped.

Upon which leg?

Swain had no idea. He thought it had been the left. Or the right.

Rathbone thanked him.

Ebenezer Goode rose to his feet, toyed with the idea of demolishing the man, and decided it would be impolite. Cruelty seldom paid, and it was against his nature.

And, surprisingly, having made his statement, the witness could not be shifted from it. He had most definitely seen Caleb Stone looking as if he had been in a fight, and that was no mistake. He would not be pushed further. He would not retreat. He drew no conclusions. He was perfectly certain it was the right day. He had earned two shillings, and redeemed his blanket from the pawnbrokers. That was not an event to forget.

He was rewarded by a nod from the judge and a sad pursing of the lips from the foreman of the jury.

“Ah, indeed,” Goode conceded. “Thank you, Mr. Swain. That is all.”

Rathbone called his final witness, Selina Herries. She came very much against her will and stood in the witness stand clutching the railing, stiff-backed, her head and neck rigid. She was dressed in drab clothes, a plain stuff dress of respectable cut, modest at neck and sleeve, and she had a shawl wrapped around her so that one could only guess at her waist.

Her bonnet hid a great deal of her hair. Nevertheless, her face was fully visible, and nothing could detract from the strength and the spirit in the high cheekbones, the bold eyes and generous mouth. In spite of the fact that she was afraid, and desperately unwilling, she stared straight at Rathbone and awaited whatever he should say.

In her seat on the public benches Genevieve turned slowly, reluctantly, and gazed at her. In some faint way this was her mirror image. This was the woman who loved the man who had killed Angus. Their lives were opposite.

Genevieve was a widow, but Selina stood on the brink of bereavement too, and perhaps a worse one.

Rathbone, looking from one to the other, could see an uncrossable gulf between them, and yet a spark of the same courage and defiance gave both faces the same fierce warmth.

He could not help also looking at Caleb. Would the sight of Selina waken anything in him of regret, of understanding not only of Genevieve's loss, but of what he too was about to pay in retribution? Was there anything of human passion or need or gentleness in the man?

What he saw as Caleb leaned over the rail, balancing his manacles on the wood, was utter despair, that absolute absence of hope which knows defeat and makes no struggle at all.

Then in the public benches Lord Ravensbrook moved, and Caleb caught sight of him, and the old scalding hatred returned, and with it will to fight.

“Mr. Rathbone?” the judge prompted.

“Yes, my lord.” He turned to the witness stand. “Miss Herries,” he began, standing in the center of the open space of the floor, his feet a little apart, “you live on Manilla Street, on the Isle of Dogs, is that so?” “Yes sir.” She was not going to commit herself to anything whatsoever that she did not have to.

“Are you acquainted with the accused, Caleb Stone?”

Her eyes did not flicker. Certainly she did not look across at Caleb.

“Yes sir.”

“How long have you known him?”

“'Bout…” She hesitated. “Six, seven years, I s'pose.” She swallowed nervously and ran her tongue over her lips.

“Six or seven years is quite close enough.” Rathbone smiled, trying to reassure her. “Approximately how often do you see him?” Her face clouded and he hastened to help. “Every day? Or once a week, perhaps? Or once a month?”

“ 'E comes and goes,” she said guardedly. “Sometimes le's around fer two or free days, then 'e'll be gorn again. Mebbe gorn for weeks, mebbe back sooner. I'm reg'lar.”

“I see. But over the years, you have come to know him well?”

“Yer could say-”

“Is he your lover, Miss Herries?”

Her eyes slid to Caleb, then away again quickly.

There was no readable expression in his face. A juror frowned. Someone in the crowd sniggered.

“May I rephrase the question?” Rathbone offered. “Are you his woman?”

Caleb grinned, his green eyes bright. It was impossible to read his thoughts, or even whether his tense, almost wolfish expression was amusement or unworded threat.

Selina's chin came up a fraction. She avoided meeting the glance of anyone in the crowd beyond Rathbone.

“Yeah, I am.”

“Thank you for your candor, ma'am. I think we may take it that you do know him as well as anyone may be said to?”

“I s'pose.” She remained careful.

There was almost silence in the room, but one or two people stirred. This was of little interest. She was acknowledging the obvious.

Rathbone was aware of it. She was his final witness, and his last chance.

But for all her fear of the court, she would not willingly betray Caleb.

Not only were her emotions involved, and whatever memories she might have of moments of intimacy, but if he were to be found not guilty, then his vengeance would be terrible. Added to that, she lived on the Isle of Dogs; it was her home and they were her people. They would not look with tolerance on a woman who sold out her man, whether for gain or from fear for herself. Whatever price the law exacted for loyalty, the punishment for disloyalty must be worse. It was a matter of survival.

“Have you met his brother Angus as well?” Rathbone asked, his eyebrows raised.

She stared at him as she would a snake.

“Yeah.” It was a qualified agreement, made reluctantly. There was warning in her voice that she would go little further.

Rathbone smiled. “Mr. Arbuthnot has testified that you called at his place of business and saw him on the day of his disappearance. Is he correct?”

Her face tightened with anger. There was no way out.

“Yeah…

“Why?”

“WOt?”

“Why?” he repeated. “Why did you call upon Angus Stonefield?”

“ 'Cos Caleb told me ter.”

“What passed between you?”

“Nuffinkl”

“I mean what did you say to him, and he to you?”

“Oh. I don' 'member.” It was a lie, and everyone knew it. It was there in the low mumble from the onlookers, the slight shaking of the heads of the jurors, the quick shift of the judge's eyes from Selina to Rathbone.

Selina saw it too, but she assumed she had beaten Rathbone.

Rathbone pushed his hands into his pockets and looked at her blandly.

“Then if I were to say that you gave him a message that Caleb wished to see him urgently, that day, and wished him to go immediately to the Folly House Tavern, or the Artichoke, you would not be able to recall differently?”

“I…” Her eyes blazed with defiance, but there was no way out. She was loath to entrap herself by argument, or excuses which might rebound on her again. She had been caught once.

“Perhaps that has stirred your memory?” Rathbone suggested, carefully ironing all the sarcasm out of his voice.

She said nothing, but he had scored the point, and he knew it from the jury's faces. Once she had established that she was prepared to evade, or even lie, to protect Caleb, it would prejudice anything she might say in his defense.

“Did you see Angus Stonefield later that day, Miss Berries?” Rathbone resumed.

She said nothing.

“You must answer the question, Miss Berries,” the judge warned. “If you do not, I shall hold you in contempt of court. That means that I can sentence you to prison until such time as you do answer. And of course the jury are free to take any meaning they will from your silence. Do you understand me?”

“I saw 'im,” she said huskily, and swallowed hard. She stared straight ahead of her, her head rigid so she could not, even in the corner of her eye, see Caleb leaning over the railing of the dock, his eyes on her.

Rathbone affected interest, as if he had no idea what she was going to say.

Now there was total silence in the room.

“At the Folly House Tavern,” she said sullenly.

“What was he doing?”

“Nuffink.”

“Nothing?”

“ 'E were standin' around, waitin' fer Caleb, I s'pose. That's Were I told ' im ter be.”

“Did you see Caleb arrive also?”

` No.”

“But he told you earlier that he intended to be there?”

“Not that time special. That's where 'e said Angus were to go for 'im always. Same place. I didn't even see 'em together, an' I never saw 'em quarrel, an' that's the truth, whether yer believe me or not!”

“I do believe you, ma'am,” Rathbone conceded. “But did you see Caleb later on that day?”

“No, I didn't.”

One of the jurors shook his head, another coughed into his handkerchief.

There was a rustling in the public benches.

Rathbone turned away from the witness stand, and his glance caught Ebenezer Goode's and saw him smile ruefully. The case still hovered on the knife's edge, but however unwillingly, Selina's evidence might be all it needed to topple it against Caleb. Goode had very little with which to fight, and they both knew it. It would be a desperate gamble to call Caleb himself.

Even Goode could not know what he might say. There was a recklessness in the man, a well of emotion too dangerous to tap.

Rathbone turned the full circle before he faced Selina again. His eye caught Hester, near the front of the crowd, and beside her, Enid Ravensbrook, looking pale and tense. Her face was strained with pity and the terrible waiting for the evidence to unfold as they came nearer and nearer to the moment when the hatred and jealousy of years must finally explode in murder. Caleb had already left home when she had married Ravensbrook, but she must still have inherited some feeling for him, sensitive to her husband's long involvement, to all he had given, the years of struggle and finally the failure.

Certainly she knew both Angus and Genevieve, and was only too familiar with their loss.

Milo Ravensbrook sat on the other side of her, his face so pale he seemed bloodless, his dark eyes and level brows like black gashes on gray-white wax. Could a man see a more hideously painful revelation than that one child had killed the other? He would be left with nothing.

And yet from the moment that Angus's bloodstained clothes had been identified, was there anything else they could have done, any other course to follow?

Enid turned to him, her expression a mixture of anguish and almost an expectation of hurt, as if she already knew he would reject such intimacy, yet she could not help offering herself. She put her hand on his arm. Even from where Rathbone stood, he could see how thin her fingers were. It was only three and a half weeks since she had passed the crisis of her illness.

Ravensbrook remained frozen, as if he was not even aware of her.

There was silence in the room.

Rathbone looked again at Selina.

“Miss Herries, when did you see Caleb again? Consider your answer very carefully. An error in judgment now could cost you very dearly.”

Ebenezer Goode half rose to his feet, then decided an objection would achieve nothing. The question had been too carefully worded to be considered a threat. He sank back.

In the crowd someone dropped an umbrella, rustled for an instant, then left it where it lay.

“Miss Herries?”

Selina stared at Rathbone and he remained fixed on her gaze, as if he could see into her brain, read her fears and weigh them one against another. The judge moved his hands, then refolded them.

“Next day,” Selina said almost inaudibly.

“Did he mention Angus?”

“No…” Her voice was a whisper.

“Will you please speak so we may hear you, Miss Herries?” the judge directed.

“No.”

“Not at all?” Rathbone pressed.

` No.

“He didn't say that he had met him?”

` No.”

“And you didn't ask?” Rathbone allowed his eyebrows to shoot up. “Did you not care? You surprise me. Was it not the money for the rent of your home which Angus was to bring? Surely that was a matter of the utmost importance to you?”

“I took the message,” she said flatly. “Wot else weren't up ter me ter ask.”

“And he didn't tell you? Reassure you, for example? How boorish. Perhaps he was in too foul a temper.”

This time Ebenezer Goode did rise.

“My lord, my learned friend is making suggestions for which he has had no grounds, and they are the merest speculation…”

“Yes, yes,” the judge agreed. “Mr. Rathbone, please do not lead your witness with such remarks. You know better than that. Ask your question and have done.”

“My lord. Miss Herries, was Caleb in a bad temper when you saw him again?”

“No.”

“Just a little hurt?”

“Hurt?” she said suspiciously.

“Stiff! Bruised?”

“Yeah, well…” She hesitated, weighing how far she dare lie. Her glance slid once towards Caleb, then quickly away again. She was frightened, weighing one danger against another.

Rathbone was sorry for her, but he could not relent. There were facets of his professional skills he did not enjoy.

It would be overdoing it to draw the jury's attention to her dilemma. They had seen Caleb's face. They knew her position. Better to allow them to deduce it than to patronize them, risk having them think he was too eager.

“I do not ask you to tell us how he obtained any injuries he may have received, Miss Herries,” he helped her. “If you do not know, simply say whether he was injured in any way, or not. You are surely in a circumstance to know. He was your lover.”

“'E were 'urt, yeah,” she conceded. “But 'e didn't say 'ow, an I don't ask.

There's lot's o' fights in Lime'ouse an' Blackwall. Fights any night, an' most days. Caleb often got 'urt, but 'e never killed no one, far as I know.” Her chin came up a fraction. “Not that anyone got the best of 'im neither.”

“I can well believe it, ma'am. I have heard suggestions he is a very powerful man with an excellent skill in defending himself, and considerable physical courage.”

She stood a little straighter, her head high.

“That's right. No one beats Caleb Stone.”

Her pride caught him with a knife stab of pity, and he knew, almost without letting his eyes stray to the jury, that it was also the last fragment needed to tip the thin balance of belief towards conviction.

“Thank you, Miss Herries.” He turned to Goode. “Your witness, sir.” Goode rose slowly, as if he were tired, uncurling his long legs. He ambled across the open space of the floor and stopped before the witness stand, looking up at her.

“Ali, Miss Herries. Allow me to ask you a few questions. They will not take long.” He smiled at her dazzlingly. From the look in her face she may well have found that more unnerving than Rathbone's elegance. “Nor prove painful,” he added.

“Yeah.”

“Excellent. I'm most obliged.” He tucked his thumbs under the armholes of his waistcoat beneath his gown. “Did Caleb tell you why he was prepared to ask his brother for money, considering the feeling between them? Or indeed, why his brother was willing to give it?”

“No, 'e don't tell me things like that. I'nt my bus'ness. Angus always gave 'im money, if 'e wanted it. Guilt, I reckon.”

“Guilt for what, Miss Herries? Was Angus responsible for Caleb's misfortune?”

“I dunno,” she said sharply. “Mebbe 'e was! Mebbe 'e poisoned the old man's mind agin' Caleb. 'E were all goody-goody. Butter wouldn't melt in 'is mouf. 'Ow do I know what 'e felt? I jus' know 'e came any time Caleb sent for 'im.”

“I see. And was Angus at all apprehensive when you gave him Caleb's message?”

“Wot?”

“I apologize. Did he seem to you to be worried or fearful? Was he reluctant to go?”

“No. Well… I s'pose 'e didn't want ter leave his bus'ness. But he never did. That ain't 'ard t'understand'oo'd waana leave a nice warm office uptarn ter go ter some public 'ouse on the Isle of Dogs?”

“No one, indeed,” Goode agreed. “But beyond that natural reluctance, he was as usual?”

“Yeah.”

“And he had often met with Caleb before?”

“Yeah.”

“He did not, for example, offer to give you the money, to save himself the journey to Limehouse, and in fact the necessity to see Caleb at all?”

“No.” She did not add anything further, but there was surprise in her face, as well as antagonism.

Goode hesitated, seemed to consider a further question, then discard it.

Rathbone had a sudden flash of intuition as to what it was. He determined to ask it himself on reexamination. Goode had led the way for him. “And when you saw Caleb the day after?” Goode resumed. “He made no reference to Angus, is that right?”

“Yeah. 'E din't say nuffin' at all abaht 'im.” Her face was pale; Rathbone was sure she was lying. He looked across at the jury and saw reflected in their faces exactly what he felt. No one believed her.

“Do you know if he killed his brother, Miss Herries?” Goode's voice cut across the silence.

There was a gasp of indrawn breath around the room.

Caleb let out a short cry of derision, almost like a bark.

“No,” Selina said, shaking her head from side to side, as if to be rid of something that caught at her. “No, I don't know nuffin' like that, an' you got no right to say as 'e did!”

“I'm not saying it, Miss Herries,” Goode assured her. “I am doing my utmost to persuade these gentlemen here”-he waved his hand in the general direction of the jury-”that there is no proof whatever even that Angus is dead-no absolute proof at all-let alone that they can hold his brother responsible for it! There are a dozen other possibilities as to where Angus Stonefield may be-and why!”

Rathbone stood up.

The judge sighed. “Mr. Goode, this is not the time to address the jury, either directly or indirectly, as you well know. If you have any further questions for this witness, please put them to her. If not, then allow Mr.

Rathbone to redirect, if he so chooses.”

“Of course.” Goode bowed with formal, if rather ostentatious courtesy, and returned to his seat. “Mr. Rathbone.”

Rathbone faced Selina. He smiled. “You just confirmed to my learned friend that Caleb had often met with Angus before, and you were aware of this. You also said that on the occasion we are specifically referring to, the last day on which Angus Stonefield was ever seen, that Caleb was not in a temper any different from usual.”

“Yeah.” She had already admitted as much, and it seemed a favorable thing to acknowledge.

“Yet he sent for his brother, and his brother dropped all his matters of business, and came-to a public tavern on the Isle of Dogs-so far as you know, simply to pass over money, which since it was for your rent, he could easily have given to you. And as you say, who would willingly leave a warm office in the West End, to-”

The judge did not wait for Goode. “Mr. Rathbone, you are retracing old ground. Please, if you have a point, come to it!”

“Yes, my lord. I do have a point, indeed. Miss Herries, you are telling us that for Caleb to send for his brother, for him to come, and for Caleb to be bruised, stiff, injured, scarred, perhaps bleeding in places, but nonetheless jubilant, having won a fight, was a perfectly normal pattern of behavior for him. And you have also said no one beats Caleb Stone. That `no one' must include his unfortunate brother, who has not been seen since!

Only his bloodstained clothes have been found on the Isle of Dogs!” Selina said nothing. Her face was as white as the paper on which the court clerk wrote.

In the dock Caleb Stone started to laugh, wildly. It soared in pitch and volume until it seemed to fill the room and reverberate from the wooden paneling.

The judge banged his gavel and was ignored-it was no more than an instrument beating time to the uproar. He demanded silence, and no one even heard him. Caleb's hysterical laughter drowned out everything else. The gaolers grabbed at him, and he flung them off.

In the gallery journalists scrambled over each other to get out and grab the first hansom to race to Fleet Street and the extra editions.

Enid rose to her feet amid the clamor, looking one way, then the other. She tried to speak to Ravensbrook, but he ignored her, staring at the dock as if transfixed. He did not seem to see what was in front of him, the frenzy and the farce, only some terrible truth within him.

The judge was still banging his gavel, a sharp, thin, rhythmic sound without meaning.

Rathbone waved his hands to indicate that Selina Herries might be excused.

She swiveled around and descended the steps to the floor, her head always turned towards Caleb.

Finally the gaolers overpowered him and he was led down. Some semblance of order was restored.

Red-faced, the judge adjourned the court.

Outside in the corridor Rathbone, considerably shaken, ran into Ebenezer Goode, looking shocked and unhappy.

“Didn't think you could do it, my dear fellow,” he said with a sigh. “But from the jury's faces, I would wager now that you'll get a conviction.

Never had a client been so hellbent on his own destruction.”

Rathbone smiled, but it was a gesture of amiability, not of any pleasure.

His victory would bring a professional satisfaction, but it was curiously devoid of personal triumph. He had thought Caleb Stone totally despicable.

Now his feelings were less clear. The force of his instability, the awareness of his emotions in the room, even though he had not yet spoken, became tangled in his judgments, and he found himself awaiting his testimony with far less certainty of the outcome than Goode.

Lord and Lady Ravensbrook were standing a few yards from them. She looked ashen, but determined not to give way. She was supported by her husband.

Hester must have been temporarily dismissed, perhaps to summon the car- riage.

Ravensbrook did not hesitate to interrupt.

“Goode! I must speak with you.”

Goode turned politely, and then he saw Enid. His expression altered instantly to one of amazement and concern. Apparently he had not met her, but he surmised who she was.

“My dear lady, you must still be far from recovered. Please permit me to find you some more comfortable place to wait.”

Ravensbrook recognized his own omission with a flicker of anger, and introduced them hastily. Goode bowed, not taking his eyes from Enid's face.

In the circumstances the quality of his attention was a compliment, and she smiled, in spite of herself.

“Thank you, Mr. Goode. I think I shall wait in my carriage. I am sure Miss Latterly will return in a few moments, and I shall be quite all right until then. It is very kind of you to think of it.”

“Not at all,” he assured her. “We cannot permit you to stand, even until your carriage should come. I shall fetch a chair.” And so saying, he ignored Ravensbrook and Rathbone, marched some ten yards away, and returned carrying a large wooden chair, which he placed near the wall, and assisted Enid into it.

The matter dealt with, Ravensbrook turned to Goode again, ignoring Rathbone, although he could not have failed to know who he was.

“Is there any hope?” he said bluntly. His face was still stiff and blurred with shock.

Rathbone moved a step away, in courtesy, although he was not beyond earshot.

“Of finding the truth?” Goode raised his eyebrows. “I doubt it, my lord.

Certainly not of proving it. I daresay what happened to Angus will always be a matter of surmise. If you mean what will the verdict be, at present I think a conviction of some sort is not unlikely, although whether it will be murder or manslaughter I would not venture to say.” He took a deep breath. “We must first hear Caleb's story. That may now be different from earlier. He has heard evidence which may prompt him to speak more openly of the meeting with his brother.”

“You intend to call him?” Ravensbrook's body was rigid, his skin like paper. “Do you not fear he will damn himself out of his own mouth, if he has not already done so? I ask you in compassion not to. If you leave it as it is, plead a quarrel which got out of hand, on his behalf, then the jury may return manslaughter, or even less, perhaps only the conceding of a death.” Hope flickered boldly in his dark eyes. “That would surely be in the best interests of your client. He is quite apparently insane. Perhaps the only place for him is Bedlam.”

Goode considered it for several moments. “Possibly,” he conceded, pulling down his brows, his voice very quiet. “But the jury is not well disposed towards him. His own behavior has seen to that. Bedlam is not a place I would send a dog. I think I must give him the opportunity to tell the story himself. There is always far less likelihood of the jury believing it if he will not tell it himself.”

“Rathbone will destroy him!” Ravensbrook accused in a sudden flair of temper. “He will lose control of himself again if he is pressed, and he is frightened. Then he'll say anything, simply to shock.”

“I will make the judgment when I have spoken with him,” Goode promised.

“Although I am inclined to agree with you.”

“Thank God!”

“Of course it is his decision,” Goode added. “The man is being tried for his life. If he wishes to speak, then he must be allowed.”

“Cannot you, as his legal adviser, protect him from himself?” Ravensbrook demanded.

“I can advise him, that is all. I cannot deny him the opportunity to speak in his own defense.”

“I see.” Ravensbrook glanced at Rathbone's profile. “Then I think he has very little chance. Since I am his only living relative, and once he is convicted I may have no further opportunity to speak with him, I would like to see him, alone. Today, at least, he is still an innocent man.”

“Of course,” Goode agreed quickly. “Would you like me to arrange it for you?”

“I shall seek your help if it is necessary,” Ravensbrook answered. “I am obliged for your offer.” He glanced at Rathbone, then at Enid on her chair.

She looked at him in a long, curious, pleading gaze, as if there were a question she did not know how to frame.

If he understood, there was no reflection of it in his expression or in his bearing. He did not offer any further explanation.

“Wait for me in the carnage,” he told her. “You will be more comfortable there. Miss Latterly will be back in a few moments.” And without anything further, he took his leave, walking rapidly towards the stairs down to the cells.

Some twenty minutes later Rathbone was outside on the entrance steps to the street, talking to Monk, who had just arrived. Ebenezer Goode came striding down, his hair flying, his face ashen. He pushed past a clerk, almost knocking the man off his feet.

“What is it?” Rathbone said with a sudden upsurge of fear. “What's happened, man? You look terrible!”

Goode seized him by the arm, half turning him around.

“He's dead! It's all over. He's dead!”

“Who's dead?” Monk demanded. “What are you talking about?”

“Caleb,” his voice was hoarse. “Caleb is dead.”

“He can't be!” Rathbone knew even as he said it that it was stupid. He was trying to deny reality, because it was ugly and he did not want to believe it.

“How?” Monk asked, cutting across Rathbone. “What happened? Did he kill himself?” He swore viciously, clenching his fist in the air. “How could they be so damnably stupid? Although I don't know why I care! Better the poor devil does it himself than drag it out to the long torture of a judicial hanging. I should be glad.” He said the words between his teeth, hard and guttural. “Why can't I Rathbone looked from Monk to Goode. The same conflicting emotions tore inside him. He should have been grateful. Caleb had in effect confessed.

Rathbone had succeeded. The Duke of Wellington's words rang in his ears about the next most terrible thing to a battle lost being a battle won.

There was no taste of victory whatever.

“It wasn't suicide,” Goode said shakily. “Ravensbrook went in to see him, as he asked. Apparently Caleb was concemed he was going to be found guilty.

He said he wanted to write a statement. Perhaps it was a confession, or an indication of something, who knows? Ravensbrook came out for a quill and a paper for him. He took them back in. Apparently the quill was poor. He found his penknife to recut it…”

Rathbone felt sick, as if he knew the words before they came.

“Caleb suddenly lurched forward, seized the knife, and attacked Ravensbrook,” Goode said, his eyes going from Rathbone to Monk, and back again.

Rathbone was startled. It was not what he had thought after all.

“They fought,” Goode went on. “Poor Ravensbrook is cut quite badly.” “God help him,” Rathbone said quietly. “That was not the ending I wanted, but perhaps it is not the worst. Thank you, Goode. Thank you for telling me.”