“You knew, didn't you?” she said aloud. “You knew it that night!”
“No I didn't.” Damaris's voice was fiat, almost without expression, as if something in her were already destroyed.
“Yes you did. You knew Peverell was doing it too, and to Valentine Furnival. That's why you came down almost beside yourself with horror. You were close to hysterical. I don't know how you kept any control at all. I wouldn't have- I don't think-”
“Oh God-no!” Damaris was moved to utter horror at last. “No!” She uncurled herself so violently she half-fell off the settee, landing awkwardly on the ground. “No. No, I didn't. Not Pev. How could you even think such a thing? It's-it's-wild-insane. Not Pev!”
“But you knew.” For the first time Hester doubted. “Wasn't that what you discovered when you went up to Valentine's room?”
“No.” Damaris was on the floor in front of her, splayed out like a colt, her long legs at angles, and yet she was absolutely natural. “No! Hester-dear heaven, please believe me, it wasn't.”
Hester struggled with herself. Could it be the truth?
“Then what was it?” She frowned, racking her mind. “You came down from Valentine's room looking as if you'd seen the wrath of heaven. Why? What else could you possibly have found out? It was nothing to do with Alexandra or Thaddeus-or Peverell, then what?”
“I can't tell you!”
“Then I can't believe you. Rathbone is going to call you to the stand. Cassian was abused by his father, his grandfather-I'm sorry-and someone else. We have to know who that other person was, and prove it. Or Alexandra will hang.”
Damaris was so pale her skin looked gray, as if she had aged in moments.
“I can't. It-it would destroy Pev.” She saw Hester's face. “No. No, it isn't that. I swear by God-it isn't.”
“No one will believe you,” Hester said very quietly, although even as she said it, she knew it was a lie-she believed it. “What else could it be?”
Damaris bowed her head in her hands and began to speak very quietly, her voice aching with unshed tears.
“When I was younger, before I met Pev, I fell in love with someone else. For a long time I did nothing. I loved him with… chastity. Then-I thought I was losing him. I-I loved him wildly… at least I thought I did. Then…”
“You made love,” Hester said the obvious. She was not shocked. In the same circumstances she might have done the same, had she Damaris's beauty, and wild beliefs. Even without them had she loved enough…
“Yes.” Damaris's voice choked. “I didn't keep his love… in feet I think in a way that ended it.”
Hester waited. Obviously there was more. By itself it was hardly worth repeating.
Damaris went on, her voice catching as she strove to control it, and only just succeeding. “I learned I was with child. It was Thaddeus who helped me. That was what I was talking about when I said he could be kind. I had no idea Mama knew anything about it. Thaddeus arranged for me to go away for a while, and for the child to be adopted. It was a boy. I held him once-he was beautiful.” At last she could keep the tears back no longer and she bent her head and wept, sobs shaking her body and long despairing cries tearing her beyond her strength to conceal.
Hester slid down onto the floor and put both her arms around her, holding her close, stroking her head and letting the storm burn itself out and exhaust her, all the grief and guilt of years bursting its bounds at last.
It was many minutes later when Damaris was still, and Hester spoke again.
“And what did you learn that night?”
“I learned where he was.” Damaris sniffed fiercely and sat up, reaching for a handkerchief, an idiotic piece of lace and cambric not large enough to do anything at all.
Hester stood up and went to the cloakroom and wrung out a hand towel in cold water and brought it back, and also a large piece of soft linen she found in the cupboard beside the basin. Without saying anything she handed them to Damaris.
“Well?” she asked after another moment or two.
“Thank you.” Damaris remained sitting on the floor. “I learned where he was,” she said, her composure back again: She was too worn out for any violent emotion anymore. “I learned what Thaddeus had done. Who he had… given him to.”
Hester waited, resuming her seat.
“The Furnivals,” Damaris said with a small, very sad smile. “Valentine Furnival is my son. I knew that when I saw him. I hadn't seen Valentine for years, you see, not since he was a small child-about Cassian's age, or even less. Actually I so dislike Louisa, and I didn't go there very often, and when I did he was always away at school, or when he was younger, already in bed. That evening he was at home because he'd had measles. But this time, when I saw him, he'd changed so much-grown up-and…” She took a deep, rather shaky breath. “He was so like his father when he was younger, I knew…”
“Like his father?” Hester searched her brains, which was stupid. There was no reason in the world why it should be anyone she had even heard of, much less met; in fact, there was every reason why it should not. Yet there was something tugging at the corners of her mind, a gesture, something about the eyes, the color of hair, the heavy lids…
“Charles Hargrave,” Damaris said very quietly, and in-standy Hester knew it was the truth: the eyes, the height, the way of standing, the angle of die shoulders.
Then another, ugly thought pulled at the edge of her mind, insistent, refusing to be silenced.
“But why did that upset you so terribly? You were frantic when you came down again, not quiet shaken, but frantic. Why? Even if Peverell found out Valentine was Hargrave's son-and I assume he doesn't know-even if he saw the resemblance between Valentine and Dr. Hargrave, there is no reason why he should connect it with you.”
Damaris shut her eyes and again her voice was sharp with pain.
“I didn't know Thaddeus abused Cassian, believe me, I really didn't. But I knew Papa abused him-when he was a child. I knew the look in his eyes, that mixture of fear and excitement, the pain, the confusion, and the kind of secret pleasure. I suppose if I'd ever really looked at Cass lately I'd have seen it there too-but I didn't look. And since the murder I just thought it was part of his grief. Not that I've spent much time with him anyway-I should have, but I haven't. I know about Thaddeus, because I saw it once… and ever after it was in my mind.”
Hester drew breath to say sometiring-and nothing seemed adequate.
Damaris closed her eyes.
“I saw the same look in Valentine's face.” Her voice was tight, as if her throat were burned inside. “I knew he was being abused too. I thought it was Maxim-I hated him so much I would have killed him. It never occurred to me it was Thaddeus. Oh God. Poor Alex.” She gulped. “No wonder she killed him. I would have too-in her place. In fact if I'd known it was he who abused Valentine, I would have anyway. I just didn't know. I suppose I assumed it was always fathers.” She laughed harshly, a tiny thread of hysteria creeping back into her voice. “You should have suspected me. I would have been just as guilty as Alexandra-in thought and intent, if not in deed. It was only inability that stopped me-nothing else.”
“Many of us are innocent only through lack of chance- or of means,” Hester said very softly. “Don't blame yourself. You'll never know whether you would have or not if the chance had been there.”
“I would.” There was no doubt in Damaris's voice, none at all. She looked up at Hester. “What can we do for Alex? It would be monstrous if she were hanged for that. Any mother worth a damn would have done the same!”
“Testify,” Hester answered without hesitation. “Tell the truth. WeVe got to persuade the jury that she did the only thing she could to protect her child.”
Damaris looked away, her eyes filling with tears.
“Do I have to tell about Valentine? Peverell doesn't know! Please…”
“Tell him yourself,” Hester said very quietly. “He loves you-and he must know you love him.”
“But men don't forgive easily-not things like that.” The despair was back in Damaris's voice.
Hester felt wretched, still hoping against all likelihood that it was not Peverell.
“Peverell isn't'men,' “ she said chokingly. “Don't judge him by others. Give him the chance to be all-all that he could be.” Did she sound as desperate and as hollow as she felt? “Give him a chance to forgive-and love you for what you really are, not what you think he wants you to be. It was a mistake, a sin if you like-but we all sin one
