A Breach of Promise

Sachev-erall concluded.

'Of course not!' Lambert responded. 'No one was surprised! It was as night follows day.'

'Quite so.' Sacheverall smiled sadly. He pursed his lips, frowning as he looked up at Lambert. 'Arrangements were made for the wedding?'

'Yes. Announcement in the Times. All society knew.' Lambert pronounced the words sharply, showing his pain and perhaps a certain feehng of alienation, as if he were only too aware of the whispers and the amusement which would be enjoyed at his family's expense.

'Naturally,' Sacheverall murmured. 'And then what happened, Mr. Lambert?'

Lambert squared his shoulders. 'Melville broke it off,' he said quietly. 'No reason. No warning. Just broke it off.'

'It was Killian Melville, not your daughter?' Sacheverall stressed, anger plain in his voice.

Rathbone looked at Melville, and he was sitting forward, one hand to his lips, biting his nails.

'It was.' Lambert's face showed the strain. He was being publicly humiliated. He refused to look at anyone in the gallery. Rathbone was sharply aware of how much better it would have been for everyone if Zillah Lambert had consented to be the one to break the betrothal, regardless of whether she wished to or not. Apparently she had simply not believed Melville meant what he said.

Although, of course, Rathbone had only Melville's word for it that he had actually tried to approach her. Perhaps he had failed in courage when it came to the moment.

'Have you any idea whatever what caused Mr. Melville's extraordinary behavior, sir?' Sacheverall asked, his fair eyebrows raised, his whole stance conveying bewilderment.

'No idea at all,' Lambert said, shaking his head. 'Can't begin to understand it. Makes no sense.'

'Not to me,' Sacheverall agreed. 'Unless there are things we do not know about Mr. Killian Melville____________________'

Rathbone rose to his feet.

Sacheverall waved at him airily. 'Your witness, Sir Oliver.' He smiled, knowing he was almost invulnerable, and returned to his seat.

Rathbone felt somehow wrong-footed. He had never opposed Sacheverall across a court before. He knew his reputation, but somehow he had underrated him. His plain, rather foolish-looking face was deceiving. The quality of his voice should have warned him.

He walked to the middle of the open space surrounded by the lawyers' positions, the witness-box, the judge and the high double row of jurors. He looked up at Barton Lambert. Apart from his own respect for the man, he knew better than to antagonize him. The jurors were already by nature and inclination in sympathy with him.

'How do you do, Mr. Lambert,' he began. 'I am sorry for the circumstance which brings us together again. I need to ask you a few questions about this affair, in order to clarify it and to do my duty by my client.'

'I understand, sir,' Lambert said graciously. 'That's why we're here. Ask away.'

Rathbone acknowledged this with a nod of courtesy.

'During this time that Mr. Melville called frequently at your home, sir, was he employed by you to design and oversee the construction of buildings you had commissioned?'

'He was.'

'And he was friendly with all your family?'

'Not the way you're putting it, sir,' Lambert argued. 'You're trying to say he was equally friendly with all of us, and that's not so. He was civil and pleasant to Mrs. Lambert. He was always pleasant with me, but he would be, wouldn't he?' He raised his eyebrows. 'I was his patron in his profession- his employer, in a sense. He'd have been a fool to be less than polite to me.' But his eyes avoided Melville as he spoke. 'Not that I didn't think he liked me, mind; and I liked him. Well-spoken, intelligent, decent-thinking young man, I thought him. But it is my daughter he spent time with, laughed and talked with, shared his ideas and his dreams with, and no doubt all of hers too.'

His face was full of the sharpness of the regret and the sense of betrayal he felt. 'I can see them clear in my mind's eye even as I stand here, heads bent together, talking and laughing, looking in each other's eyes. You can't tell me he wasn't courting her, because I was there!' His look defied Rathbone, or anyone, to contradict him.

Rathbone had nothing to fight with, and he knew it. It angered him more than he had expected that all this distress could have been avoided. The rows of avid faces in the gallery need never have witnessed these people's humiliation. Their private quarrels and griefs should have remained exactly that, known only to their own circle. It was no one else's concern. He hated what he was doing, what they were all doing here. The whole forced performance of grooming every young woman for marriage and parading her before what amounted to the market, judging her human worth by her marriageability, was offensive.

'Mr. Lambert,' he said, rather more brusquely than he had meant to, 'when did Mr. Melville ask you for your daughter's hand in marriage?'

Lambert looked startled.

Rathbone waited.

'Well… he didn't,' Lambert admitted. 'Not in so many words. He should have, I grant you. It was an omission of good manners I was willing to overlook.'

'Possibly it was an omission of good manners,' Rathbone agreed. 'Or possibly it was an omission of intent? Is it possible he was very fond of Miss Lambert, but in a brotherly way, rather than as a suitor, and his affection was misinterpreted… with the best of intentions, and in all innocence?'

'By a man of our age, perhaps, Sir Oliver,' Lambert said dryly. 'Although I doubt it. A man of Melville's years does not normally feel like a brother towards a handsome and good-natured young woman.'

There was a faint titter around the room, almost like the rustle of leaves.

Rathbone kept his composure with difficulty. He did not like being taken for Lambert's age-and was startled by how much it offended him. Lambert must be at least fifty.

'There are many young ladies I admire and find pleasant company,' he said rather stiffly, 'but I do not wish to marry them.'

Lambert said nothing.

Rathbone was obliged to continue. He was not serving Melville's cause.

'So Mr. Melville did not ask you for your daughter's hand, and yet it was assumed by you all that he wished to marry her, and arrangements were made, announcements were given and so forth. By whom, sir?'

'My wife and myself, of course. We are the bride's parents.' Lambert looked at him with raised eyebrows. He had a very broad, blunt face. 'That is customary!'

'I know it is,' Rathbone conceded. 'I am only trying to establish that Mr. Melville took no part in it. It could have been conducted without his awareness of just how seriously his relationship with Miss Lambert was being viewed.'

'Only if he was a complete fool!' Lambert snorted.

'Perhaps he was.' Rathbone smiled. 'He would not be the first young man to behave like a fool where a young lady is concerned.'

There was a burst of laughter in the gallery, and even the judge had a smile on his face.

'Is my learned friend saying that his client is a fool, my lord?' Sacheverall enquired.

'I rather think I am,' Rathbone acknowledged. 'But not a knave, my lord.'

The judge's bright blue eyes were very wide, very innocent. The light shone on the bald crown of his head, making a halo of his white hair.

'An unusual defense, Sir Oliver, but not unique. I hope your client will thank you for it, should you succeed.'

Rathbone smiled ruefully. He was thinking the same thing. He turned to Lambert again.

'You say, sir, that the breaking of the betrothal came without any warning at all. Was that to you, Mr. Lambert, or to everyone?'

'I beg your pardon?' Lambert looked confused.

'Is it not possible that Mr. Melville, when he realized how far arrangements had progressed, spoke to Miss Lambert and tried to tell her that matters had proceeded further than he was happy with, but that she did not tell you that? Perhaps she did not believe he was serious, or thought he was only suffering a nervousness which would pass with time?'

'Well…'