A Breach Of Promise Part 13

"So now is the time to have courage," Hester pointed out. "Imagine how much worse soldiers must feel at the order to charge. What is the worst that can happen to you? Your husband will think less of you? You will still have all your arms and legs. You will not bleed or-"

"That's enough!" Athol said sharply. "You exceed yourself, Miss Latterly!"

Perdita gulped and then swung around very deliberately and glared at him.

"She is quite right! I am going up to see Gabriel. Please don't wait for me. I don't know when I shall be down." And without stopping to see his response, or Hester's, she marched out of the room and they heard her feet cross the hall floor, sharp and determined.

"Have some whiskey," Monk suggested to Athol, although it sounded like an offer. He felt enormously proud of Hester, as if he had had some part in her actions, which was absurd. But they were friends, closer in ways than many a man and wife. They had shared extraordinary triumphs and disasters; they knew each other, both the best and the worst. He trusted her above anyone else. There was a way in which friendship was the deepest and the best of bonds.

Athol took the whiskey and drank it, then poured himself another. He did not think to offer Monk one. It was not rudeness, he was simply too lost in his own perplexity.

Hester turned to Monk. She had not the slightest idea what had been going through his mind or his heart.

"Do you still care to discuss the case which concerns you?" she asked as if they had only just left the subject a few moments ago.

He did not. There was really nothing to say. But on the other hand, he did not want to leave yet.

"If you can spare the time, I should," he answered.

"Certainly." She turned to Athol. "I shall be upstairs if I am needed, Mr. Sheldon, but I think I will not be, at least until bedtime."

"What? Oh. Yes, I think you have done quite enough for one day." He was displeased, and he intended her to know it.

Monk watched her closely and saw no sign of embarra.s.sment or doubt in her face.

She led the way out of the room and up the stairs to the small sitting room she shared with the gaunt lady's maid, Martha Jackson. They sat in the deep, chintz-covered armchairs and he told her about his fruitless search for information which might help Rathbone, mentioning that apparently Melville had studied abroad, because no one in England knew of him until about five years ago. He also told her the story of Barton Lambert and the unnamed lord who had been involved with the flawed building plans.

None of it mattered insofar as he expected her to offer any helpful remark; it was simply good to clear his own thoughts by putting them into words, and he was comfortable sitting with her.

It was almost an hour later when Martha Jackson came in. At first Monk was annoyed. It was an intrusion. But she was an agreeable woman. There was an honesty to her which pleased him, and he sensed the quiet courage to bear sorrow without complaint that seemed marked in the lines of her face. There was no bitterness in her mouth, no self-pity.

It was Hester who raised the subject of Martha's brother's children and their deformities-and the fact that no one now knew their whereabouts.

"How long ago?" Monk asked, turning to Martha.

"Twenty-one years," she replied, the hope she had allowed for a moment dying out of her eyes. She had been living in the past, telling him about it, talking as if it were only recently, when it was still possible to do something. Now it was foolish even to think of it.

He was startled. Samuel would have been an elder brother. It was a hard thing. He felt for her as he watched her tired face with the grief washing back into it and the realization of pain lost in the past, irretrievable now, children who could not be found, helped or given the love which had been missed too long ago.

He looked quickly at Hester. She was watching him steadily, her eyes so direct he had the feeling she was seeing his mind and his heart as clearly as anyone else might have seen his outward features. Surprisingly, it was not an intrusion and he did not resent it in the slightest.

What he resented was the fact that he would let her down.

He could not do what she wanted, and he knew it as exactly as if he had heard the words.

Martha looked down at her hands, knotted in her lap. Then she made herself smile at Monk. "It wouldn't matter even if I could find them," she said quietly. "What could I do to help? I couldn't take them then, and I couldn't now. I just wish I knew. I... I wish they knew that they had somebody ... that there was someone who belonged to them, who cared."

"I'll look into it," Monk said quietly, knowing he was a fool. "It may not be impossible."

Hope gleamed in Martha's eyes. "Will you?" Then it faded again. "But I have very little money saved...."

"I don't think I can succeed," he said honestly. "And I wouldn't charge for failure," he lied. He avoided Hester's eyes although he could feel her gazing at him, feel the warmth as if it were sunlight, hot on his cheek. "Please don't hope. It is very unlikely. I'll simply try."

"Thank you, Mr. Monk," Martha said as levelly as she could. "It is very good of you ... indeed."

He stood up. It was not good at all, it was idiotic. Next time he saw Hester, he would tell her just how ridiculous it was in the plainest terms.

"Save your thanks till I bring you something useful," he said rather less generously. He felt guilty now. He had done it for Hester, and he would never be able to help this woman. "Good day, Miss Jackson. It is past time I was leaving. I must report to Sir Oliver. Good night, Hester."

She stood up and moved closer to him, smiling. "I shall accompany you to the door. Thank you, William."

He shot her a glance which should have frozen her and seemed to have no effect whatever.

Chapter 6.

Rathbone went into court on Monday morning with not a sc.r.a.p more evidence than he had possessed on the previous Friday afternoon. He had spoken with Monk and listened to all he could tell him, but it offered nothing he could use. Thinking of it now, he had given Monk an impossible task. It was foolish of him to have allowed himself to hope, but sitting at his table in the half-empty courtroom, he realized that he had.

The gallery was filling only slowly. People were not interested. They had no feeling that the case was anything but the rather shabby emotional tragedy Sacheverall had made it seem and, to be frank, Rathbone had been unable to disprove. If Melville were hiding any excuse, no whisper of it showed.

Rathbone looked sideways at him now. He was sitting hunched forward like a man expecting a blow and without defense against it. There seemed no willingness to fight in him, no anger, even no spirit. Rathbone had seldom had a client who frustrated him so profoundly. Even Zorah Rostova, equally determined to pursue a seemingly suicidal case, had had a pa.s.sionate conviction that she was right and all the courage in the world to battle her cause.

"Melville!" Rathbone said sharply, leaning forward to be closer to him.

Melville turned. His face was very pale, his eyes almost aquamarine colored. He had a poet's features, handsome yet delicate; the fire of genius in him was visible even in these miserable circ.u.mstances, a quality of intelligence, a light inside him.

"For G.o.d's sake," Rathbone urged, "tell me if you know something about Zillah Lambert! I won't use it in open court, but I can make Sacheverall speak to his client, and they might withdraw. Is it something you know and her father doesn't? Are you protecting her?"

Melville smiled, and there was a spark of laughter far behind the brilliance of his eyes. "No."

"If she's worth ruining yourself over, then she won't let you do this," Rathbone went on, leaning a little closer to him. "As things are, you can't win!" He put his hand on Melville's arm and felt him flinch. "You can't avoid reality much longer. Today, or tomorrow at the latest, Sacheverall will conclude his case, and I have nothing to fight him with. Just give me the truth! Trust me!"

Melville smiled, his shoulders sagging, his voice low. "There is nothing to tell you. I appear to have given you an impossible case. I'm sorry."

He got no further because Sacheverall came across the floor, looking at them with a faint curl to his lips, his head high, a swagger in his walk. He was even more satisfied with himself than he had been when they adjourned. He sat down in his chair, and the moment after the clerk called the court to order. It was still half empty.

McKeever took his place.

"Mr. Sacheverall?" he enquired. His face was almost devoid of expression, his mild blue eyes curious and innocent. If he had come to any conclusions himself he did not betray them in his manner.

Sacheverall rose to his feet. He was smiling. There was satisfaction in every inch of him. Even his floppy hair and protruding ears seemed cavalier, a mark of individuality rather than blemishes.

"I call Isaac Wolff," he said distinctly. He half turned towards Melville, then resisted the temptation. It was a sign of how sure he was of himself. Rathbone recognized it.

"Who is Wolff?" he said under his breath to Melville.

"A friend," Melville replied without turning his head.

"Of whose? Yours or Lambert's?"

"Mine. Lambert has never met him, so far as I know." His voice was so soft Rathbone had to strain to hear it.

"Then why is Sacheverall calling him?" Rathbone demanded. Sacheverall was not bluffing. He showed that in every inch of his stance, his broad shoulders, the angle of his head, the ease in him.

"I don't know," Melville answered, lifting his eyes a little to watch as a tall man with saturnine features walked across the open s.p.a.ce of the floor and climbed the steps of the witness-box. He faced the court, staring at Sacheverall. His eyes seemed black under his level brows, and his thick hair, falling sideways over one temple, was as dense as coal. It was a pa.s.sionate, compelling face, and he stared at Sacheverall with guarded dislike. No one could mistake that he was there against his will.

"Mr. Wolff," Sacheverall began, relishing the moment, "are you acquainted with Mr. Killian Melville, the defendant in this case?"

"Yes."

Rathbone looked across at the jury to see their reaction. There was a stirring of interest, no more. They were inexperienced in courtroom tactics. They did not understand Sachev-erall's confidence and were only half convinced of it.

"Well acquainted, sir?" Sacheverall's voice was gentle and he smiled as he spoke.

A flicker of annoyance crossed Wolff's eyes and mouth but he did not allow it into his words.

"I have known him for some time. I do not know how you wish me to measure acquaintance."

Sacheverall held up his hand in a broad gesture. "Oh! But you will, Mr. Wolff, you will. It is precisely the point I am coming to. Give me leave to do it in my own way. How did you meet Mr. Melville?"

The judge glanced towards Rathbone, half inviting him to object that the question was irrelevant. Rathbone knew there was no point in doing so. To challenge would only show Rathbone's desperation. He shook his head momentarily and McKeever looked away again.

"Mr. Wolff?" Sacheverall prompted. "Surely you recall?"

Wolff smiled, showing his teeth. "It was some years ago, about twelve. I'm not sure that I do."

It was not the answer Sacheverall had wished. Rathbone could tell that from the sharp way he moved his arm back. But he had opened the way for it himself.

"Was it a social occasion, Mr. Wolff, or a professional one?"

"Social."

"You have recalled it, then?"

"No. We have no professional concerns in common."

Rathbone rose to his feet, more as a matter of form than because he thought it would actually affect Sacheverall's case. The tension was becoming palpable. Beside him at the table, Melville was rigid.

"My lord..."

"Yes, yes," McKeever agreed. "Mr. Sacheverall, if you have a point to this, please come to it. Mr. Wolff has conceded that he is acquainted with Mr. Melville. If there is something in that which bears upon his promise to marry Miss Lambert, then proceed to it."

"Oh, a great deal, my lord," Sacheverall said impa.s.sively. "I regret to say." He swung around to face the witness-box. "Are you married, Mr. Wolff?"

"No."

"Have you ever been?"

"No."

McKeever frowned. "Mr. Sacheverall, I find it hard to believe that this is indeed your point."

"Oh, it is, my lord," Sacheverall answered him. "I am about to make it." And disregarding McKeever, he swung back to Wolff, on the stand. "You live alone, Mr. Wolff, but you are not a recluse. In fact, you have a close and enduring friendship, have you not... with Mr. Killian Melville?"

Wolff stared back at him unflinchingly, but his face was set, his eyes hard.

"I regard Mr. Melville as a good friend. I have done for some time."

Rathbone knew what Sacheverall was going to say next, but there was no way in which he could prevent it. Any protest now would make it worse, as if he had known it himself and therefore it must be true. He felt hollow inside, a strange mixture of hot and cold.

"Is that all, Mr. Wolff?" Sacheverall raised his eyebrows very high. "Would you not say an intimate friend, with all the subtle and varied meanings that word can carry? I use it advisedly."

There was a hiss of indrawn breath in the gallery. One of the jurors put his hand to his mouth, another shook his head, his lips compressed into a thin line. A third was pale with anger.

McKeever cleared his throat but said nothing.

Rathbone looked at Melville. His eyes were hot with misery and his fair skin was flushed. He was staring straight ahead. He refused absolutely to look back at Rathbone.

"You may use what word you like, sir," Wolff replied steadily, his voice thick. "If your implication is that my relationship with Killian Melville is of an unnatural kind, then you are mistaken." There was a rush of sound in the gallery, exclamations, sudden movement, a cry of disgust. A journalist broke a pencil and swore. "The acts lie in your imagination, and nowhere else," Wolff continued more loudly to be heard. "I am under oath, and I swear to that. I have never had an intimate relationship with another man in my life, nor can I imagine such a thing." This time the noise was louder, sharper voices. Someone shouted an accusation, another an obscenity.

McKeever banged his gavel angrily, commanding silence.

"I do not expect you to admit it, Mr. Wolff." Sacheverall did not appear disconcerted. He gave a very slight shrug as he walked a few paces away and then swiveled on his heel and suddenly raised his voice accusingly. "But I shall call witnesses, Mr. Wolff! Is that what you want, sir? Never doubt I will, if you force me to! Admit your relationship with Killian Melville, and advise him, as your friend, your lover, to yield in this case." He said the word lover lover with infinite disgust, his lips curled. "Stop defending the indefensible! Do not put it to the test, sir, because I warn you, I shall win!" with infinite disgust, his lips curled. "Stop defending the indefensible! Do not put it to the test, sir, because I warn you, I shall win!"

Melville sat as if frozen. His face was ashen white and the freckles stood out like dark splashes. He did not take his eyes from Wolff, and the pain in him was so powerful Rathbone could all but feel it himself. He was unaware for seconds that his own hands were clenched till his nails gouged circles in his palms.

The courtroom p.r.i.c.kled with silence.

Isaac Wolff stood perfectly motionless. His look towards Sacheverall was scorching with contempt. A man less arrogant would have withered under it, would have faltered in self-doubt, instead of smiling.

"If it is your intention to attempt to blacken my name, or anyone else's, through calling people up to this stand to say whatever it is they wish, then you will have to do so," Wolff said very carefully, speaking slowly, as if he had difficulty forming the words and keeping his voice steady. "That is a matter for your own concern, not mine. I am not going to admit to something which is not true. I have already sworn that I have never had an intimate relationship with another man, only with women." There was a buzz of t.i.tillation and embarra.s.sment at the use of such frank words.

"I cannot and will not alter that statement, whatever threats you may make," Wolff went on. "And if you persuade someone to forswear or perjure themselves, that is your responsibility, and you are a great deal less than honest, sir, if you try to make anyone believe the answer, for that lies with me."

Sacheverall pushed his large hands into his pockets, dragging the shoulders of his coat.

"You force me, sir! I do not wish to do this to you. For heaven's sake, spare yourself the shame. Think of Melville, if not of yourself."

"By admitting to a crime of which neither of us is guilty?" Wolff said bitterly.

Rathbone rose to his feet. "My lord, may I ask for an adjournment so I may speak with my client and with Mr. Sacheverall? Perhaps we can come to some understanding which would be preferable to this present discussion, which is proving nothing."

"I think that would be advisable," McKeever agreed, reaching his hand towards the gavel again as there was a murmur of disappointment in the gallery and several of the jurors muttered, whether it was in agreement or disagreement, it was not possible to say. "Mr. Sacheverall?" He did not wait for the answer but a.s.sumed it. "Good. This court is adjourned until two o'clock this afternoon."