A Breach Of Promise Part 31

"Tell me about the day in court," she asked at length. "Describe it for me as if you wanted me to draw it for you, knowing I wasn't there. Treat it as if I had never been in a court before. Don't leave out anything you saw."

There was no point in it, but he obliged. He told her what the room was like, where everyone sat, how they were dressed and what function they filled. She listened intently, even though most of it was already familiar to her.

"And the adjournment?" she asked. "What happened then?"

He laughed abruptly. "Keelin came out of the courtroom and stood a little to the left of the doorway talking to Rathbone for a few minutes. Then Rathbone left with Sacheverall to go and argue again. I don't know where they went, only that it was entirely fruitless."

"How long were they gone?" she interrupted, looking hopeful.

He shook his head. "About ten minutes, maybe fifteen. But Keelin didn't eat or drink anything, nor did she go to the cloakroom. She was there in the hall all the time, in full public view."

"Alone?" she persisted, refusing to give up.

"Yes . . ." He pictured it vividly, it seemed so unnecessarily, publicly hurtful. "Except that Delphine went over to her with a packet, spoke to her for a moment, then when Keelin held up her hands, Delphine opened the packet and tipped it out into her cupped palms. It was jewelry she had given Zillah. They were dusty ..."

"Dust?" Hester said slowly.

"Possibly powder ... I don't know."

"But something?"

"Yes ... why? It wasn't anything edible. Delphine did not pa.s.s her anything she could eat or drink-just the jewelry. She tipped it out so she could itemize each piece and make Keelin acknowledge that she had received it all back--count out each item."

"What did Melville do then?" Hester was leaning forward now.

"She put the jewelry in her inside pocket," he continued. "She looked . . . wretched ... as if she had been kicked."

Hester winced. "And then what?"

"Then Rathbone came back, spoke to Keelin for a few moments, and they returned to court."

Hester sat for a while thinking silently. It did not seem to make any sense. Monk thought of the afternoon session, the tension and despair. He could picture Keelin Melville safely next to Rathbone, her face tense, the light reflecting in her clear eyes, which were almost the color of aquamarine. Her skin was very fair, spattered with freckles, her features fine but with a remarkable inner power. It was the face of a visionary. And her hands were beautiful too, strong and slender, perfectly proportioned ... except that she bit her nails-not badly, but enough to make them too short. It seemed to be in moments of greatest anxiety. He could recall her hands in her mouth when ... Hands in her mouth!

"She bit her nails!" he almost shouted, leaning towards Hester and clasping her hand where it lay on the table, turning it over. "She bit her nails!"

"What?" She looked startled.

He rubbed his fingertips along the tabletop, then put them to his lips.

"The powder..." she breathed out the words. "If that was the belladonna, then she put it to her lips ... into her mouth. Her hands were covered in it from the jewelry!"

"Would it be enough?" He barely dared ask.

"It could be..." she said slowly, staring back at him. "If it were pure ... to act within a few hours. Especially if she ate nothing." Her voice rose a little, getting more urgent. "She didn't wash her hands after touching the jewelry?"

"No. She went straight back into court. I don't imagine at that point she would think of such a thing . .. still less of a taste."

"I don't think it tastes unpleasant," she answered. "Children sometimes eat the fruit by mistake."

"Does it kill them?" he asked.

"Yes, it does, usually. And this would be concentrated."

"Where would she have got it?" He tried to keep the sense of victory out of his voice, but it was there in spite of him.

"An herbalist, or even distill it herself," she replied, not taking her eyes from his.

"There won't be berries this time of the year."

"You don't need the berries. Any part of it is poisonous... berries, flowers, roots, leaves, anything at all!"

Monk clenched his fist. "That's it! That's how she did it! By G.o.d, she's clever! Now, how can we prove it?" He sat back on the chair. He was warm at last, and very comfortable in Gabriel's shirt and trousers. He felt elated. He knew the truth! And Keelin Melville had not killed herself. She had not died in drowning despair, surrendering. It had not even been directly his, or Rathbone's, failure which had been responsible.

"Is she buried yet?" Hester asked. "Perhaps if they haven't washed her hands ... under the nails ..."

"Yes," he answered before she finished. "They buried her." The words hurt. "As a suicide ... in unhallowed ground. Even Wolff was not permitted to be there."

"G.o.d won't care," she said with unwavering conviction. "But without her hands to look at... what about the suit she wore? Do you think we could see that? Or did they bury her in it?" There was finality in her voice, as if she expected the answer even before he gave it.

"I don't know, but I expect they did bury her in it. Why would they be bothered to change it? And Delphine took the packet back. She was careful enough for that."

"What about the jewelry itself?" she asked, but without hope.

"It wouldn't prove anything much, except to us," he replied. "Only that she had belladonna in the same pocket... not that anyone else put it there. Delphine would simply say that Melville had a packet of belladonna powder in her pocket and it burst or came undone. We couldn't prove otherwise- even if we knew it!"

"Then I don't think we can prove it," Hester said slowly.

"Not-not prove it? We've got to!" He was outraged. It was monstrous! Unbearable! Delphine Lambert had abandoned two tiny children to the cruelty of strangers-two vulnerable, damaged children who needed her even more than most. Then she had murdered the most brilliant, dazzling, creative architect of the age, all to further her own comfort and ambition, and to find a good marriage for her adopted daughter-whether she wanted it or not. Appearance had been everything, beauty, glitter-as shallow as the skin. The pa.s.sion and hope and pain of the heart beneath had been thrown away. He could not let himself think it could all just happen and no one could call for any accountability, any justice, any regret at all. All kinds of arguments raged through his head, and even as he thought of each one, he knew it was no use.

"Can we?" Hester asked, her face puckered. She had not known Keelin Melville; she had not even been at court this time, as she had in most of the other cases he had cared about deeply. It was strange, and he realized now he had missed her. But Gabriel Sheldon was tied inextricably to it, because Martha Jackson was part of his household, part of Perdita's life, and because he too knew what it was like to be disfigured, to know his face, the outer part of him everyone saw and judged him by so easily, filled people with revulsion, even with fear. He was an outcast of the same kind, a victim of a world where sight ruled so much. Hester understood it.

And she understood Keelin Melville, a woman fighting to succeed in a world where men made all the rules and judged only by the yardstick of their own preconceptions, not by reality of courage or skill or achievement. She had seen others sacrificed to it, and eventually crushed.

"We must!" he said fiercely, leaning farther forward. "We must find a way."

"It's all gone," she pointed out, her mouth tight, her eyes sad. "Will they dig her up again, do you suppose?"

He had to be honest. There was not the slightest chance, not on the belief he had now. No one would want to consider it, to raise such a hideous possibility, face the suit for criminal libel if they were wrong.

"No."

She looked at his empty plate. "Do you want some more soup?"

"No! I want to think of a way to prove what happened to Keelin Melville and find some justice for those two abandoned and unloved children!" He sighed. "And I want some kind of vengeance ... some balancing of the scales."

She sat in silence for a while again, cupping her chin in her hands.

He waited, searching for an answer in his mind, going over the details of the case, all the questions and answers. He was warm, physically comfortable, but exhaustion was creeping over him and he was finding it harder and harder to concentrate.

The door opened and Martha came in carrying a tray with fresh tea on it. Her eyes were bright and calm and there was a glow in her cheeks. She set the tray down on the table, smiling at him. She was almost too full of emotion to find words.

"Mr. Monk ... I-I can't..." She shook her head. "I just don't know how to say what you've done for me. You're ... the best man I know. I never truly thought it was possible ... but you found them. I wish I could give you more...." She was clearly embarra.s.sed, feeling nothing she had was sufficient reward for him.

"I don't need any more payment, Miss Jackson," he said without even having to think about it. "You already gave me sufficient for all my expenses." That was not quite true, but close enough.

She hesitated.

"Except the tea," he added.

She remembered and poured it immediately. It was steaming and fragrant.

"Are they all right?" he asked.

"Oh, yes," she murmured, nodding. "Oh, yes ... they will be. Everyone's very good. Finding them clothes and boots and so on. Tillie gave Phemie one of her dresses, and Agnes found one for Leda, and a petticoat with frills on it. Sarah gave them both stockings." She blinked hastily. "And she was looking for sheets and blankets for them, and deciding which room would be best. Put them in together, in case they get lonely, or frightened in a new place. And then Miss Perdita came down and she was so nice to them." She said it as if she hardly dared believe it was true. "She said they could stay here all the time."

Monk smiled back at her. "I know."

She hesitated only a moment longer, then excused herself and turned back to the kitchen and the excitement again.

Monk sipped his tea gratefully.

"I wonder what would have happened if Samuel Jackson hadn't died...." Hester said thoughtfully.

"They would have lived ordinary, uncomfortable lives, laughed at by their peers, and possibly found service of some sort," he answered. "Possibly not. He would have loved them, perhaps taught them to read and write. But he did die, so it makes no difference now. We can't undo that. They'll be all right here." He said it with a.s.surance, thinking of the kindness in the kitchen already, everyone trying to help, willing to give of their own few possessions.

"That's not what I meant." Hester was frowning, hardly listening to him. "They would have been laughed at, wouldn't they? I mean, it would have been hard for them, for their family ... for Dolly Jackson."

"Of course. But she's done very well indeed. She's a wealthy woman in society, beautiful, respected, has a husband who loves her and a beautiful daughter no one knows is not hers, except us."

"Exactly," she agreed, looking at him.

"Hester... ?" A thought began in his mind.

"What did he die of?" she asked softly.

"Bleeding . .. bleeding in the stomach."

"What caused it?"

"I-I don't know. Illness?" His mouth was suddenly dry.

"How convenient for Dolly Jackson," Hester said, looking at him very steadily.

He put his cup down. His hands were clumsy, stiff. "Poison?"

"I don't know. But I want to know. Don't you?"

"Yes .. . and I'm going to find out."

"I'm coming with you. . .."

"I don't know that I-I don't know what..." he began.

"I can help." Her face was set in immovable determination. "We'll start tomorrow. When I tell Gabriel he'll insist." She stood up.

"I'm not sure you should. We may be wrong."

She looked at him with eyes wide, her mouth twisted in a mixture of urgency and anger. "We'll need money. I haven't any. Have you?"

"No." He was too tired to argue. And anyway, she was right.

"Then it's settled. I'll go and talk to Gabriel about it, and he'll give us some. We'll start tomorrow morning-early!" She wrinkled her nose at him, and she went out of the room with a swish of skirts, held high. He heard her heels light and rapid along the corridor.

They did start out very early the following day. By half past eight on a bl.u.s.tery spring morning they were in a hansom on the way east and south to Putney. Gabriel had been generous with all he could spare, his only regret being that he was not yet well enough to come with them, and an acute awareness that his disfigurement might prove a hindrance. Meeting strangers was a difficulty he had yet to overcome. It would always be painful. No matter how many times he did it, for them it would always be the first time. The horror and embarra.s.sment would be new.

Now Monk and Hester were sitting side by side in the hansom bowling along at a smart pace through the elegant streets of Chelsea, with the river glinting in the light. To the left lay Battersea Reach, curving away from them. They would pa.s.s the gas works and go along the Kings Road with Eel Brook Common to the right. Beyond that was Parsons Green and the Putney Bridge to the south. It was a very long journey.

There was so much to say, and yet he was uncertain where to begin. From Tavistock Square, where he had picked her up, she had told him how Leda and Phemie were this morning, and how changed they seemed already, with clean clothes, washed hair and good food. They were still terrified, expecting each moment to wake up and discover it was all a cruel dream. But they did seem to understand quite a lot, if spoken to slowly and in simple words. The thing that was most apparent was their affection for each other-and their awe and wonder at the thought that Martha actually liked them, rather than simply wished to use them. They flinched if approached too quickly, and it might take some time before they understood that food would be given them regularly and did not need to be stolen or defended.

They were moving away from the river. The street was busy with early traffic, other hansoms, several private carriages. This was an affluent area. Four perfectly matched bays went past at a brisk pace, pulling a magnificent coach, footmen in livery riding behind.

"Where shall we begin?" Hester asked, staring ahead of her. "It all happened twenty years ago. Who will still be there now?"

"Some of the neighbors," he answered. "A doctor must have been called. There'll be a death certificate."

She frowned. She was sitting very straight, her hands in her lap. She looked a little like a governess. She was angry and nervous, afraid they would not succeed. He knew her so well. Anyone else might have thought her rather prim, but he knew she was boiling with emotion, all kinds of fears and furies at the pain and the injustice, and their helplessness to reach it.

"I suppose we could find that," she replied without looking at him.

He was watching her face profiled against the light of the window. What was she thinking about the whole business of beauty and the notion of young women being too plain to be acceptable, or loved at all, because they were not considered marriageable? Phemie and Leda were disfigured. But what about Zillah Lambert? She was now unmarriageable, in her mother's eyes, because two men in a short s.p.a.ce of time had been attracted to her and then at the last moment withdrawn. Perhaps society would discount Keelin, knowing the truth now. But what about Sacheverall? Did it make any difference that he was a shallow, selfish opportunist who had not loved her, only her position and her money? Would she find Hugh Gibbons again? He had not even told Hester about that!

"When she was very young, Zillah had a great romance with a man called Hugh Gibbons," he said aloud.

Hester looked at him with surprise.

He realized his remark seemed to come from no previous thought or word.

"I only say so because he never lost touch with her-I mean, he never forgot her," he amended. "He might still care for her very much. And she obviously thinks of him with kindness. I remember her smile when she spoke of him."

"You mean she might marry him?" she asked.

"Well... it is possible."

She turned back towards the window. "Good."

He looked at her and could not read her expression. Had he sounded as if marriage were so important? Zillah, at least, would not be left behind by happiness, social acceptability, living out her days dependent upon other people or earning her own living, pitied by her more fortunate sisters.

That was not what he had meant.