It made him hesitate for a moment. “I … I believe the only way I can best serve my client is by knowing as much of the truth as I can,” he said slowly. “You may find it hard to believe it was Rupert Cardew who killed her, but if it was-and it is possible-it would not only gain an acquittal for Arthur Ballinger, but it would restore his reputation, without which he is ruined.” He hesitated again, seeking a way of saying what he had to more gently. There was none. “And I appreciate that an acquittal for Ballinger means that Monk was wrong, and you cannot separate your emotions from that. I wouldn’t ask you to.”
“It’s loyalties again,” she said with a twist of irony in her smile. “Yours is to Ballinger, because he is Margaret’s father. Mine is against him, because that would make William wrong. But it’s hardly the same depth of importance, is it?” It was not a question so much as a reproof. “Do you think I would see an innocent man hanged rather than have my husband shown up in a mistake? What would that make me? Or him?”
“Nor would I see a guilty man go free because he is my father-in-law,” he responded.
“He is your client,” she corrected him. “That binds you to give him the best defense you can, unless you actually know that he is guilty. Then you would have a problem with which I could not help you. But you don’t know that, or you wouldn’t be here asking me about Hattie.”
“Don’t chop logic with me, Hester,” he pleaded. “You don’t know who is guilty either, or you would have told Monk and it would be all finished, except for the sentencing.”
A sudden, deep compassion filled her face. He did not immediately understand it. Then he realized what his own words had been-“all finished, except for the sentencing,” not “except for the trial.” Some part of him feared that Ballinger was guilty, and she had seen that.
“I have to know, Hester,” he said, his throat dry. “He wants to testify. I need to know what to prepare for. Can’t you understand that?”
“Oh.” There was a finality in her voice, an intensity of emotion that made him suddenly afraid.
“What is it?” he said. “You know how she went. You would have insisted on finding out. Tell me.”
Her face was pale, her eyes terribly, blazingly direct. He knew that whatever the truth was, it was going to hurt one of them. The only question was which one, and how much.
“Margaret took her to the door,” Hester said quietly. “There she met another woman, who was well spoken and wore ordinary clothes, at least an ordinary shawl, but had excellent-quality and most unusual leather gloves, hand-tooled with a little design above the wrist.”
Rathbone felt as if he had been punched. The shock left him without breath. “It can’t be,” he said after a moment regaining his voice. “You must be wrong. Who said Margaret took her to the door? Someone is lying.”
“It was Margaret herself, Oliver. She doesn’t deny it. She was afraid Rupert Cardew had paid Hattie to lie for him, and she wanted to prevent her from doing that.”
He shook his head, refusing to believe it. “But Hattie was strangled and put in the river!” He was almost shouting. “You can’t imagine that Margaret had any hand in that. It isn’t possible.”
Hester touched him, just gently, a hand on his arm. He could feel the slight warmth of her through the fabric of his jacket. “Of course I don’t think she had any willing or knowing part in it,” she agreed. “She took Hattie to the door and persuaded her to leave. Someone else met her there. I would guess it was Gwen, but I can’t be certain. That second woman took her to a house in Avonhill Street in Fulham, less than a mile from Chiswick.”
“Somewhere she would be safe,” he said quickly. “She must have left it herself, and run into one of Parfitt’s men. Margaret couldn’t know that would happen.”
“Of course not,” Hester agreed, but there was no light in her face, no relief from the sadness. “And the landlady said a man was with her. He called himself Cardew.”
“And you weren’t going to tell me?” he said incredulously. “You just said you have no duty of loyalty to anyone, only to the truth.” That was definitely an accusation. It was hard to believe Hester, of all people, to be such a hypocrite. And she hadn’t had to tell him of her loyalties: she had just proved where they lay by keeping the information about Cardew quiet. He felt more deeply betrayed than he had thought possible. He realized with a jolt of surprise how profoundly he had still cared for Hester, perhaps idealized her. It brought a sting to his eyes and his throat. Too much that he loved was melting under his hand, and slipping away.
“Do you really believe that Margaret and Gwen were working in cooperation with Rupert Cardew to murder the one witness who could have saved him, and thus condemned their father?” she asked.
“No, of course not! They …” He stopped.
“Yes? They what?” She waited.
“Perhaps she wasn’t going to save him?” he replied. “Maybe Cardew paid her to lie, and she wouldn’t go through with it. He realized that, and that’s why he killed her.”
“With Margaret’s help?” Hester’s eyebrows rose in disbelief, but there was no triumph in her face. “And Gwen’s? Can you imagine what Winchester will make of that idea on the stand?”
She was right. It was unbelievable.
“Did you really want to know that, Oliver?” Her voice broke into his nightmare. “If you did, then I apologize for not telling you. I made a wrong judgment, and I’m sorry. I know that you have to act honestly. I thought it would be impossible for you if you knew that.”
He felt dizzy, as though the room were whirling around him. She was right-of course she was right. But he did know now. The terrible thing was that he could believe it. He remembered Margaret’s face as she looked at her father. She obeyed him without thought, without judgment. He was part of the life she had always known, the fabric of her beliefs, the order in everything.
That was natural. Perhaps Henry Rathbone was the cornerstone of Rathbone’s own life. He could not think of any values, any thought or idea that they had not shared with each other over the years. Their trust was so deep, it had never needed expressing. It was as sure as sunrise; it was the safety that reassured all other doubts, so he never feared an endless fall.
“Oliver?”
He heard her voice, but it was a moment before he could recall himself to the present, the small room in the clinic, the bed with the clean sheet on it, and Hester looking at him.
“What are you going to do?” she asked anxiously.
“I don’t know. I really don’t know. I suppose you are certain of all this?”
“Yes.” Her voice was gentle. “Margaret told me herself, when I faced her with it. She didn’t evade it. She didn’t say it was Gwen, though. That I deduced by going out and asking people in the streets. I found a peddler who saw Hattie with another woman, and described her. I found the hansom they took to Fulham, right to the house. I took the same cab to the same house, and spoke to the woman who owns it. There might be one chance in a hundred that I’m wrong. It was another woman who looked just like Hattie, at the same time on the same day. And another Mr. Cardew rented the place for her. And our Hattie turned up dead later that day, in the river just a mile away.”
“One chance in a hundred?” he said bitterly. “Perhaps in a million.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Did this landlady see Cardew’s face?” It was a desperate last throw. Rathbone knew how he sounded even asking.
“No. He stood well back in the shadows, and he had a heavy coat on, and a hat. He could have been anyone.”
He could think of nothing to say, nothing that eased the increasing pain inside him.
“Thank you … I …”
Hester shook her head. “I know. Winchester won’t call me, and you shouldn’t. I can’t testify to anything firsthand. Do whatever you feel is the right thing.”
“The right thing!” The words escaped with a wild bitterness. “For God’s sake, what is that?”
“Do you believe Ballinger is guilty?” she asked.
“I don’t know. I honestly don’t know. I suppose I fear it. It will be a kind of hell if he is.” He meant it: he was not exaggerating the horror he saw in his own imagination.
She looked at him steadily. “Would you have Rupert Cardew hanged to save him, because he is your family and Rupert isn’t? If you would, Oliver, then what is the law worth? What if Lord Cardew felt the same way, and would have anyone else hanged, guilty or innocent, as long as his own son didn’t have to face himself and his deeds? Would you accept that? Is that really what you believe-one law for your family, another for anyone else?”
