decided not to add any more.
She passed close to him on her way out, but only smiled briefly as she reached the door. “Thank you for the tea.” And she was gone, and the silence washed in again, surrounding him with loneliness.
The following morning the message came from Newgate Prison that Arthur Ballinger wanted to see him, urgently. Rathbone had no choice but to go. He was duty-bound as Ballinger’s lawyer, apart from the fact that Ballinger was Margaret’s father, and a man condemned in a matter of days to be hanged. Less than two weeks were left. Rathbone could not even imagine how that would feel.
He dreaded finding the previously bluff and rather arrogant Ballinger now a pathetic ghost of himself. Would he be frightened of death now? Surely a priest was the only one who could help him?
Would he plead for Rathbone to find some way, any way at all, to save him from the rope? That would be embarrassing, even repulsive, and Rathbone would wish for any form of escape from that. He might even feel nauseated. His throat was tight and his stomach was churning already.
The hansom ride was all too brief. The prison gates opened and clanged shut behind him. He made all the usual civil remarks, and followed the prison guard down the narrow corridors to Ballinger’s cell. Did the place smell of human fear and despair, or was it his imagination?
The huge iron key turned in the lock. The door opened with a faint squeak of hinges, and Rathbone was facing Arthur Ballinger. The floor was black, draining the light from the room. The whitewashed walls made everything ghostly, giving back a dead reflection of the air and the glimpse of sky outside.
Behind him the door was shut and locked.
After everything that had happened, what on earth was there to say? How could they speak as normal? It would be absurd.
“What can I do for you?” Rathbone said simply. To ask Ballinger how he was would be farcical.
“Appeal, of course,” Ballinger replied.
He did not look as crushed as Rathbone had expected. Rathbone should have been relieved. He would avoid the revulsion of weeping, begging, the sight of a man robbed of every dignity. And yet looking at Ballinger’s face-his bright, angry eyes-he wondered if it was madness he was seeing. But perhaps insanity was the only refuge left to him. How should he answer?
Ballinger was waiting.
“On what grounds?” Rathbone played for time. Had the verdict really snapped Ballinger’s hold on reality? He looked afraid, but not panicky, not wild-eyed, and certainly not confused. “I’ve reviewed the case-of course I have- but I can see no legal errors, and there is certainly no new evidence.”
“I don’t care on what grounds,” Ballinger answered, coming a step closer to him.
Rathbone was aware of a sense of physical fear. Ballinger was a big man, broad and heavy. He was going to be hanged in two weeks anyhow-what had he to lose? Did he also blame Rathbone for his conviction? Sweat broke out on Rathbone’s body, and his stomach knotted. His mind raced.
“Can you tell me something with which to plead for clemency?” he said, surprised how steady his voice sounded. “So far you have claimed that you are not guilty, but if Parfitt attacked you, there might be some way of making his death a matter of self-defense.”
“And say I’m guilty?” Ballinger responded angrily. “Haven’t you got any bloody sense at all? If I killed Parfitt, then obviously I killed Hattie Benson as well. What excuse do I give for that?”
Rathbone felt the heat burn up his face. Ballinger was right; it had been a stupid suggestion, given without thought.
“I need the verdict reversed, not some pathetic plea for clemency,” Ballinger went on. “Prove Rupert Cardew killed Parfitt, because he was blackmailing him and he couldn’t pay anymore.”
Rathbone was cold. The room could have been walled with ice. The man he saw in front of him was a stranger.
“Did you kill Parfitt?” he asked.
“Of course I did!” Ballinger snapped. “But the verdict was only on balance of probability. You could still make it look like Cardew. Clearly the same person killed the girl as well, so I’d be free of both charges.”
Now Rathbone was shivering. It was a nightmare. He must be at home, asleep uncomfortably, and he would wake up. All this would disappear.
Ballinger took another step toward him.
“I can’t,” Rathbone said grimly, refusing to move backward. “There are no grounds for appeal.”
“Then make some, Oliver.”
Rathbone said nothing. This was ridiculous. He could understand desperation. He had seen it many times before, even refusal to acknowledge the fact of one’s own death. But it was usually an insane hope, not a demand for something of which there was no possibility. And Ballinger had seemed anything but a weak man.
“Don’t stand there in self-righteous horror,” Ballinger said sharply. “You know nothing about it. Parfitt was filth, a parasite on human depravity.”
“I know that,” Rathbone replied. “And if I could have mitigated your killing him, I would have. But I will not blame someone else for it.”
“You think Rupert Cardew is so worth saving?” Now Ballinger’s voice was a snarl, his face ugly with contempt. “He’s another kind of parasite-useless, worthless, utterly selfish. Not even an honest passion of vice. Just bled his father dry, then when he was in trouble, turned on his friends.”
“His friends being the other men who used those wretched children, and were blackmailed for it?” Rathbone asked.
“Weak, cruel cowards of men,” Ballinger said with contempt. “Bored with the ease of their lives and looking for a little danger to sharpen the appetite. I’ve seen it all before. I didn’t create their vice, I merely fed it, and profited-and for a damned good reason.”
In spite of his revulsion, Rathbone was curious.
“A good reason?” His voice grated as he said it.
Ballinger’s face twisted. “Sometimes your stupidity astounds me! You live in your safe, prudish little world, posturing as if you fight evil, and letting it pass by under your nose because you won’t break the rules and risk your own neck. You don’t look because you don’t want to see-”
Rathbone tried to interrupt, but Ballinger ignored him, his voice harsh. He was sweating in spite of the cold, and his physical presence dominated the room.
“I told you I stopped pollution of the river by that damn factory. How the hell do you think I got Garslake to reverse the judgment on appeal? He’s Master of the Rolls, head of the entire civil appeal system, and half his friends own factories like that.”
Suddenly Rathbone was horribly afraid. Sickening thoughts swirled in his mind.
“At last …” Ballinger breathed out slowly. “How would you influence men like that, Oliver? They have all the money they can imagine, all the power, all the deference, the respect, the glory. You can’t bribe them, and they don’t need to listen to reason, or mercy. But by God in heaven, they need to listen to the threat of exposure! I have pictures of Lord Justice Garslake that would make your stomach heave. And he’ll make the right damn decisions, or I’ll ruin him, and he knows it.”
Rathbone could think of nothing to say. Words fell over themselves in his mind, and all were inadequate for the understanding and the horror that filled him.
“Think!” Ballinger shouted at him. “Think of a way to appeal, Oliver. Because I have very vivid and explicit photographs, far more than the few you saw in court, of a large number of gentlemen performing acts that are not only obscene, but are with children. Some of these gentlemen are of excellent family, and hold high offices in law and government. One or two are even close to the queen. If something unfortunate should happen to me, such as my death, other than of disease or old age, these photographs will fall into someone else’s hands, and you do not know who they are or what they would do with them. You would not like that, because they may not use them as judiciously as I have. They are very, very sharp weapons indeed. So regardless of what you feel about me, you will see to it that I remain alive and in good spirits.”
Rathbone was so appalled, he could not speak. He started at Ballinger as if he had risen out of the ground like some hellish apparition, and yet was so horribly, passionately human. It all made sense, the temptation, the logic, the rage, and the success.
