Rathbone looked at Sylvestra Duff. She was so white she looked barely alive. Eglantyne Wade sat with her head bowed forward, her face covered by her hands. Only Fidelis Kynaston moved. She still held Sylvestra, moving very slightly back and forth. She seemed to be saying something to her, bending close to her. Her expression was tender, as if in this last agony she would bear some of it for her, share both their burdens.
“Have you anything further to add, Sir Oliver?” the judge said, breaking the silence.
“No, my lord,” Rathbone answered. “If anyone has doubts, I will have further medical evidence obtained, but I would very much rather not subject Mr. Duff to any more pain or distress than he has already suffered. He has sworn a statement as to what happened in Water Lane the night of his father’s death. No doubt there will be further trials at which he will be required to testify, which will be ordeal enough, should he recover sufficiently both his health and his balance of mind. In the meantime, I am willing to rest on Miss Latterly’s word.”
The judge turned to Ebenezer Goode.
Goode rose to his feet, his face grave. “I am familiar with Miss Latterly’s nursing experience, my lord. If she will verify for the court upon what she bases her judgment, apart from Mr. Duff’s word, I will abide by that.”
The judge turned to Hester.
With a bare minimum of words, very quietly to a silent court, she described the bruising and the tearing she had seen, and likened it to other such injuries she had treated in the Crimea, and what the soldiers themselves had told her.
She was thanked and excused. She returned to the body of the court feeling too numb with pity to be more than dimly aware of the press of people near her. She did not even move immediately when she felt a man close to her and an arm around her.
“You did the right thing,” Monk said gently, holding her with surprising strength, as if he would support her weight. “You could not change the truth by concealing it.”
“Some truths are better not known,” she whispered back.
“I don’t think so, not truths like this. They are only better learned at certain times and in certain ways.”
“What about Sylvestra? How will she bear it?”
“Little by little, a day at a time, and by knowing that whatever is built upon now will last, because it stands on reality, not on lies. You cannot make her brave; that is something no one can do for someone else.” He stopped, still holding her close.
“But why?” she said almost to herself. “Why did they risk everything to do something so … pointless?” And even as she said it remarks of Wade’s came back to her, with utterly different meaning now, remarks about nature refining the race by winnowing out the unfit, the morally inferior. And she remembered Sylvestra’s stories of Leighton Duff’s love of danger in his steeplechasing days, the excitement of risks, the elation of having taken a chance and beaten the odds. “What about Kynaston?” she whispered to Monk.
“Power,” he replied. “The power to terrify and humiliate. Perhaps the righteous image he created for his pupils’ parents was more than he could endure. We’ll probably never know. Frankly, I don’t care. I’m a damned sight more concerned for the families they leave to struggle on … for Sylvestra and Rhys.”
“I think Fidelis Kynaston will help,” she replied. “They will help each other. And perhaps Miss Wade too. They all have something appalling to face.
“Perhaps they will go to India?” she thought aloud. “All of them, when Rhys is better. They couldn’t stay here.”
“Maybe,” he agreed. “Although it is amazing what you can face, if you have to.” He would tell her about Runcorn some other time, later on, when they were alone and it was more appropriate.
“They’d like India,” she insisted. “There is a great need for people out there who know something about nursing, especially women. I read it in Amalia’s letters.”
“Do they know anything about nursing?” he asked with a smile.
“They could learn.”
He smiled more widely, but she did not see it.
The jury declined to retire. They returned a verdict of not guilty.
Hester slid her hand into Monk’s and leaned even closer to him.
For Simon, Nikki, Jonathan, and Angus
BY ANNE PERRY
Published by The Random House Publishing Group
The Sheen on the Silk
FEATURING WILLIAM MONK
The Face of a Stranger
A Dangerous Mourning
Defend and Betray
A Sudden, Fearful Death
The Sins of the Wolf
Cain His Brother
Weighed in the Balance
The Silent Cry
A Breach of Promise
The Twisted Root
Slaves of Obsession
Funeral in Blue
Death of a Stranger
The Shifting Tide
Dark Assassin
Execution Dock
The Cater Street Hangman
Callander Square
Paragon Walk
Resurrection Row
Bluegate Fields
Rutland Place
Death in the Devil’s Acre
Cardington Crescent
Silence in Hanover Close
Bethlehem Road
Highgate Rise
Belgrave Square
Farriers’ Lane
The Hyde Park Headsman
Traitors Gate
Pentecost Alley
Ashworth Hall
Brunswick Gardens
Bedford Square
Half Moon Street
The Whitechapel Conspiracy
Southampton Row
Seven Dials
Long Spoon Lane
Buckingham Palace Gardens
THE WORLD WAR I NOVELS
No Graves as Yet
Shoulder the Sky
Angels in the Gloom
At Some Disputed Barricade
We Shall Not Sleep
THE CHRISTMAS NOVELS
A Christmas Journey
A Christmas Visitor
A Christmas Guest
A Christmas Secret
A Christmas Beginning
A Christmas Grace
A Christmas Promise
Anne Perry is the bestselling author of two acclaimed series set in Victorian England: the William Monk novels, including Execution Dock and Dark Assassin, and the Charlotte and Thomas Pitt novels, including Buckingham Palace Gardens and Long Spoon Lane. She is also the author of the World War I novels No Graves As Yet, Shoulder the Sky, Angels in the Gloom, At Some Disputed Barricade, and We Shall Not Sleep, as well as seven holiday novels, most recently A Christmas Promise. Anne Perry lives in Scotland. Visit her website at www.anneperry.net.