Slade gave me a bitter smile; he perceived my ambivalence. “The blood of those men is still on my hands. And they aren’t the only ones I’ve betrayed.”
A cadence of foreboding drummed inside me. “The British agents? But you told me you weren’t a traitor.”
“I didn’t give their names to the secret police, but I might as well have signed their death warrants.” Slade described how he’d worked as an informant for the Third Section while spying on the Russian government. He told me the story of the men and the firing squad in Butyrka Prison. “I used to meet with them on occasion, to share news. Wilhelm Stieber must have followed me to a meeting, although I never saw him-I swear, the scoundrel has a cloak of invisibility. He must have caught one of our agents, then tortured him into admitting he was a British spy and exposing the rest of us. I didn’t know what had happened until it was too late to save them. All I could do was run for my own life.”
I hope my retelling of his story has conveyed what Slade had experienced. When he described the wild chase through the Kremlin and living as a fugitive in Moscow, I felt as harrowed as if I’d gone through it all myself. “How did you escape?”
“By an accident of fate.” He told me how he’d been ambushed on his way out of Moscow and the four men who’d tried to murder him had been killed by the secret police. “They were British agents, my comrades, disguised as Russians. I figured that my superiors had discovered that my fellow spies had been caught. They blamed me, and they’d sent the agents to deliver me to justice. But I didn’t know for sure until you told me what Lord Eastbourne said.”
“Why did you let your superiors think you were dead?” I asked. “Why didn’t you tell your side of the story?”
“I did,” Slade said, “after I came back to England. A friend in Russia smuggled me into Poland. The Polish people don’t like Russia, which has taken over their country. Some were glad to give me food and shelter and money and teach me their language. I went on to Amsterdam, then stowed away on a ship and landed in England this past April. I wrote to Lord Palmerston at the Foreign Office, explaining what had happened. I warned him about Stieber, Kavanagh, and the invention. But I didn’t trust Palmerston enough to meet him face to face or tell him where to send a reply to my letter. So I don’t know whether he received it.”
“I’m certain he didn’t,” I said, recalling our conversation at Osborne House.
“At any rate, I doubted that I could walk into the Foreign Office, turn myself in, and expect my problems to be straightened out,” Slade said. “All I could do was proceed with my plan to search for Niall Kavanagh. And I wanted revenge on Wilhelm Stieber.”
I’d known that Slade was a man of strong passions, but I’d never seen the full power of his hatred until now. Stieber had better pray to God that he and Slade never met again.
“My quest led me to Katerina.” Slade spoke with such sorrow that I felt a stab of jealousy. “While I was in Whitechapel, looking for Stieber, I learned that she was his informant. I struck up an acquaintance with her and persuaded her to work for me.”
I envisioned him using his charms on her, engaging her affections. I couldn’t bear the images that my mind conjured up.
“I knew it was dangerous for her. I knew what Stieber would do to her if he found out. But I was like a speeding train that can only go in the direction that its track is laid. I killed her as surely as if I’d plunged a knife into her heart.” Slade clenched his hand and pantomimed stabbing. The rage in his voice underscored the violence of his words. “Katerina’s murder is another death I’m responsible for. And my actions have also put you in trouble with the law.”
My emotions were in turmoil. My horror at the carnage he’d left in his wake now reverted to fury at Slade. If he wanted to add me to the list of people he’d harmed, he should accept responsibility for his most egregious crime against me. “You say you love me; you purport to be sorry I’ve been charged with murder. If you really care for me, then why did you take Katerina as your mistress?”
“I did not,” Slade said, adamant.
“Couldn’t you have obtained her cooperation without making love to her?” I was too beside myself to use politer words.
“I never made love to her,” Slade insisted.
“You’re forgetting that I saw you with Katerina, that night at the theater. I saw you kiss her.” My voice quavered at the memory. “You didn’t even care if I saw.”
“I kissed Katerina precisely because I wanted you to see.”
“What?” This was cruel torment. “Why?”
“To protect you.” Slade rushed to explain: “When I came out of the theater with Katerina and you suddenly appeared, I wanted to rush to you, seize you in my arms, and never let you go. But I couldn’t.” Agony glazed his eyes. “You looked so beautiful and innocent. I couldn’t touch you, lest you be contaminated.”
Slade held up his hands and regarded them as if they were smeared with filth from his sins. “I had to drive you away. So I climbed in the carriage with Katerina, and even though she and I weren’t on intimate terms, I kissed her.” He smiled glumly; he rubbed his cheek. “You didn’t see it, but she slapped me. I resisted my urge to look back at you. I couldn’t bear to see the look on your face. I hated to leave you, but it was for the best.”
He leaned closer, his eyes shining fiercely in the remains of the daylight. “Now I’ve told you everything. Now that you know the worst, do you still love me? Will you still have me?”
My heart urged me to cry, yes! My love for Slade was as ardent as ever. I was humbled by his belief that he no longer deserved me, and moved by his wish to protect me. But as blind as love can be, my mind couldn’t ignore the fact that eight people were dead and Slade deserved at least some of the blame, no matter that he’d done everything he’d done in service to his country and I believed he was a good man at heart.
“I see you hesitate,” Slade said. “At the risk of driving another nail into my coffin, I must remind you that I’m a fugitive. I can’t wed you in church, lest I be caught and arrested. If you choose to be with me, it would be on the lam, without the benefit of clergy.”
Once more I found myself walking the same path down which I’d sent Jane Eyre. She’d had to choose whether to live with Mr. Rochester in sin or flee and retain her honor. Now I faced my own crossroads. Slade was a criminal in the eyes of the law, and although I had stepped outside the law in order to find him, I was bound by convention. My love couldn’t stand against my bred-in-the-bone belief in the sanctity of marriage. Choosing to be with Slade meant estranging myself from everyone else who mattered to me. I must renounce him or lose my family, my friends, and my virtue. My choice must be the same as I’d made for Jane.
Slade’s face took on a look of triumph blended with devastation. “I see that I’ve succeeded in destroying whatever regard you had for me. You are offended because I made you such an insulting proposition. You despise me now.”
Of course I did not! Yet I was so upset that I couldn’t find words to explain my decision or lessen his guilt and misery. I could hardly believe that our positions had reversed-that I was the object of his unrequited love, or so he thought.
“You should go,” Slade said. He wasn’t Mr. Rochester, who’d begged Jane to stay even though it would compromise her. He was a stronger man, with higher moral standards.
I realized that my path must diverge from Jane’s: running away wouldn’t save me from disgrace. “I’m not leaving.”
Slade looked at me as if he thought he’d heard incorrectly.
“Not until I prove I’m innocent and exonerate you,” I clarified. I didn’t admit that I wasn’t ready for us to part even though we must. Now that I had found Slade, I could not immediately give him up, and I had ample justification for delaying. “I can’t go home while I’m in as much trouble with the law as you are.”
“Damn your obstinacy!” Slade burst out, venting his emotions in anger. “Just how do you intend to clear both our names?”
I was silent: I had no idea. I’d plotted my course up until this point, but no further. Alas, I was like a heroine in a novel whose author did not know how to bring the story to a satisfying conclusion.
“Are you hoping to turn Niall Kavanagh over to the police and say he’s the Whitechapel Ripper?” Slade said, incredulous and scornful. He was trying to offend me and thus drive me away. “And after that, track down Wilhelm Stieber, drag him before Lord Palmerston, and make him confess that he, not I, was responsible for the deaths of the British agents?”
