by Anne Perry
Obediently a large bailiff appeared, buttons gleaming, and forced his way through the rows to where Louisa still sat, face blazing white. With no ceremony, no graciousness at all, he half pulled her to her feet and took her, stumbling and catching her skirts, back along the row and up the passageway out of the court.
Maxim started to his feet, then realized the futility of doing anything at all. It was an empty gesture anyway. His whole body registered his horror of her and the destruction of everything he had thought he possessed. His only concern was for Valentine.
The judge sighed. “Mr. Rathbone, have you anything further you feel it imperative you ask this witness?”
“No, my lord.”
“Mr. Lovat-Smith?”
“No, my lord.”
“Thank you. Valentine, the court thanks you for your honesty and your courage, and regrets having to subject you to this ordeal. You are free to go back to your father, and be of whatever comfort to each other you may.”
Silently Valentine stepped down amid rustles and murmurs of compassion, and made his way to the stricken figure of Maxim.
“Mr. Rathbone, have you further witnesses to call?” the judge asked.
“Yes, my lord. I can call the bootboy at the Furnival house, who was at one point a drummer in the Indian army. He will explain why he dropped his linen and fled when coming face-to-face with General Carlyon in the Furnival house on the evening of the murder … if you believe it is necessary? But I would prefer not to—I imagine the court will understand.”
“We do, Mr. Rathbone,” the judge assured him. “Do not call him. We may safely draw the conclusion that he was startled and distressed. Is that sufficient for your purpose?”
“Yes, thank you, my lord.”
“Mr. Lovat-Smith, have you objection to that? Do you wish the boy called so that you may draw from him a precise explanation, other than that which will naturally occur to the jury?”
“No, my lord,” Lovat-Smith said immediately. “If the defense will stipulate that the boy in question can be proved to have served with General Thaddeus Carlyon?”
“Mr. Rathbone?”
“Yes, my lord. The boy’s military record has been traced, and he did serve in the same immediate unit with General Carlyon.”
“Then you have no need to call him, and subject him to what must be acutely painful. Proceed with your next witness.”
“I crave the court’s permission to call Cassian Carlyon. He is eight years old, my lord, and I believe he is of considerable intelligence and aware of the difference between truth and falsehood.”
Alexandra shot to her feet. “No,” she cried out. “No—you can’t!”
The judge looked at her with grim pity.
“Sit down, Mrs. Carlyon. As the accused you are entitled to be present, as long as you conduct yourself appropriately. But if you interrupt the proceedings I will have to order your removal. I should regret that; please do not make it necessary.”
Gradually she sank back again, her body shaking. On either side of her two gray-dressed wardresses took her arms, but to assist, not to restrain.
“Call him, Mr. Rathbone. I will decide whether he is competent to testify, and the jury will put upon his testimony what value they deem appropriate.”
An official of the court escorted Cassian as far as the edge of the room, but he crossed the small open space alone. He was about four feet tall, very frail and thin, his fair hair neatly brushed, his face white. He climbed up to the witness box and peered over the railing at Rathbone, then at the judge.
There was a low mutter and sigh of breath around the court. Several of the jurors turned to look where Alexandra sat in the dock, as if transfixed.
“What is your name?” the judge asked Cassian quietly.
“Cassian James Thaddeus Randolf Carlyon, sir.”
“Do you know why we are here, Cassian?”
“Yes sir, to hang my mother.”
Alexandra bit her knuckles and the tears ran down her cheeks.
A juror gasped.
In the crowd a woman sobbed aloud.
The judge caught his breath and paled.
“No, Cassian, we are not! We are here to discover what happened the night your father died, and why it happened—and then to do what the law requires of us to deal justly with it.”
“Are you?” Cassian looked surprised. “Grandma said you were going to hang my mother, because she is wicked. My father was a very good man, and she killed him.”
The judge’s face tightened. “Well just for now you must forget what your grandmother says, or anyone else, and tell us only what you know for yourself to be true. Do you understand the difference between truth and lies, Cassian?”
“Yes of course I do. Lying is saying what is not true, and it is a dishonorable thing to do. Gentlemen don’t lie, and officers never do.”
“Even to protect someone they love?”
“No sir. It is an officer’s duty to tell the truth, or remain silent, if it is the enemy who asks.”
“Who told you that?”
“My father, sir.”
“He was perfectly correct. Now when you have taken the oath and promised to God that you will tell us the truth, I wish you either to speak exactly what you know to be true, or to remain silent. Will you do that?”
“Yes sir.”
“Very well, Mr. Rathbone, you may swear your witness.”
It was duly done, and Rathbone began his questions, standing close to the witness box and looking up.
“Cassian, you were very close to your father, were you not?”
“Yes sir,” he answered with complete composure.
“Is it true that about two years ago he began to show his love for you in a new and different way, a very private way?”
Cassian blinked. He looked only at Rathbone. Never once had he looked up, either at his mother in the dock opposite, or at his grandparents in the gallery above.
“It cannot hurt him now for you to tell the truth,” Rathbone said quite casually, as if it were of no particular importance. “And it is most urgent for your mother that you should be honest with us.”
“Yes sir.”
“Did he show his love for you in a new and very physical way, about two years ago?”
“Yes sir.”
“A very private way?”
A hesitation. “Yes sir.”
A sound of weeping came from the gallery. A man blasphemed with passionate anger.
“Did it hurt?” Rathbone asked very gravely.
“Only at first.”
“I see. Did your mother know about this?”
“No sir.”
“Why not?”
“Papa told me it was something women didn’t understand, and I should never tell her.” He took a deep breath and suddenly his composure dissolved.
“Why not?”
He sniffed. “He said she would stop loving me if she knew. But Buckie said she still loved me.”
“Oh, Buckie is quite right,” Rathbone said quickly, his own voice husky. “No woman could love her child more; I know that myself.”
“Do you?” Cassian kept his eyes fixed on Rathbone, as if to prevent himself from knowing his mother was there, in case he looked at her and saw what he dreaded.
“Oh yes. I know your mother quite well. She has told me she would rather die than have you hurt. Look at her, and you will know it yourself.”
Lovat-Smith started up from his seat, then changed his mind and subsided into it again.
Very slowly Cassian turned for the first time and looked at Alexandra.
A ghost of a smile forced itself across her features, but the pain in her face was fearful.
Cassian looked back at Rathbone.
“Yes sir.”
“Did your father go on doing this—this new thing, right up until just before he died?”
“Yes sir.”
“Did anyone else, any other man, ever do this to you?”
There
was total silence except for a low sigh from somewhere at the back of the gallery.
“We know from other people that this is so, Cassian,” Rathbone said. “You have been very brave and very honest so far. Please do not lie to us now. Did anyone else do this to you?”
“Yes sir.”
“Who else, Cassian?”
He glanced at the judge, then back at Rathbone.
“I can’t say, sir. I was sworn to secrecy, and a gentleman doesn’t betray.”
“Indeed,” Rathbone said with a note of temporary defeat in his voice. “Very well. We shall leave the subject for now. Thank you. Mr. Lovat-Smith?”
Lovat-Smith rose and took Rathbone’s place in front of the witness stand. He spoke to Cassian candidly, quietly, man to man.
“You kept this secret from your mother, you said?”
“Yes sir.”
“You never told her, not even a little bit?”
“No sir.”
“Do you think she knew about it anyway?”
“No sir, I never told her. I promised not to!” He watched Lovat-Smith as he had watched Rathbone.
“I see. Was that difficult to do, keep this secret from her?”
“Yes sir—but I did.”
“And she never said anything to you about it, you are quite sure?”
“No sir, never.”
“Thank you. Now about this other man. Was it one, or more than one? I am not asking you to give me names, just a number. That would not betray anyone.”
Hester glanced up at Peverell in the gallery, and saw guilt in his face, and a fearful pity. But was the guilt for complicity, or merely for not having known? She felt sick in case it were complicity.
Cassian thought for a moment or two before replying.
“Two, sir.”
“Two others?”
“Yes sir.”
“Thank you. That is all. Rathbone?”
“No more, thank you, for now. But I reserve the right to recall him, if it will help discover who these other men are.”
“I will permit that,” the judge said quickly. “Thank you, Cassian. For the moment you may go.”
Carefully, his legs shaking, Cassian climbed down the steps, only stumbling a little once, and then walked across the floor and disappeared out of the door with the bailiff. There was a movement around the court, murmurs of outrage and compassion. Someone called out to him. The judge started forward, but it was already done, and the words had been of encouragement. It was pointless to call order or have the offender searched for.
“I call Felicia Carlyon,” Rathbone said loudly.
Lovat-Smith made no objection, even though she had not been in Rathbone’s original list of witnesses and hence had been in the court all through the other testimony.
There was a rustle of response and anticipation. But the mood of the crowd had changed entirely. It was no longer pity which moved them towards her, but pending judgment.
She took the stand head high, body stiff, eyes angry and proud. The judge required that she unveil her face, and she did so with disdainful obedience. She swore the oath in a clear, ringing voice.
“Mrs. Carlyon,” Rathbone began, standing in front of her, “you appear here on subpoena. You are aware of the testimony that has been given so far.”
“I am. It is wicked and malicious lies. Miss Buchan is an old woman who has served in my family’s house for forty years, and has become deranged in her old age. I cannot think where a spinster woman gets such vile fancies.” She made a gesture of disgust. “All I can suppose is that her natural instincts for womanhood have been warped and she has turned on men, who rejected her, and this is the outcome.”
“And Valentine Furnival?” Rathbone asked. “He is hardly an elderly and rejected spinster. Nor a servant, old and dependent, who dare not speak ill of an employer.”
“A boy with a boy’s carnal fantasies,” she replied. “We all know that growing children have feverish imaginations. Presumably someone did use him as he says, for which I have the natural pity anyone would. But it is wicked and irresponsible of him to say it was my son. I daresay it was his own father, and he wishes to protect him, and so charges another man, a dead man, who cannot defend himself.”
“And Cassian?” Rathbone enquired with a dangerous edge to his voice.
“Cassian,” she said, full of contempt. “A harassed and frightened eight-year-old. Good God, man! The father he adored has been murdered, his mother is like to be hanged for it—you put him on the stand in court, and you expect him to be able to tell you the truth about his father’s love for him. Are you half-witted, man? He will say anything you force out of him. I would not condemn a cat on that.”
“Presumably your husband is equally innocent?” Rathbone said with sarcasm.
“It is unnecessary even to say such a thing!”
“But you do say it?”
“I do.”
“Mrs. Carlyon, why do you suppose Valentine Furnival stabbed your son in the upper thigh?”
“God alone knows. The boy is deranged. If his father has abused him for years, he might well be so.”
“Possibly,” Rathbone agreed. “It would change many people. Why was your son in the boy’s bedroom without his trousers on?”
“I beg your pardon?” Her face froze.
“Do you wish me to repeat the question?”
“No. It is preposterous. If Valentine says so, then he is lying. Why is not my concern.”
“But Mrs. Carlyon, the wound the general sustained in his upper inside leg bled copiously. It was a deep wound, and yet his trousers were neither torn nor marked with blood. They cannot have been on him at the time.”
She stared at him, her expression icy, her lips closed.
There was a murmur through the crowd, a movement, a whisper of anger suddenly suppressed, and then silence again.
Still she did not speak.
“Let us turn to the question of your husband, Colonel Randolf Carlyon,” Rathbone continued. “He was a fine soldier, was he not? A man to be proud of. And he had great ambitions for his son: he also should be a hero, if possible of even higher rank—a general, in feet. And he achieved that.”
“He did.” She lifted her chin and stared down at him with wide, dark blue eyes. “He was loved and admired by all who knew him. He would have achieved even greater things had he not been murdered in his prime. Murdered by a jealous woman.”
“Jealous of whom, her own son?”
“Don’t be absurd—and vulgar,” she spat.
“Yes it is vulgar, isn’t it,” he agreed. “But true. Your daughter Damaris knew it. She accidentally found them one day …”
“Nonsense!”
“And recognized it again in her own son, Valentine. Is she lying also? And Miss Buchan? And Cassian? Or are they all suffering from the same frenzied and perverted delusion—each without knowing the other, and in their own private hell?”
She hesitated. It was manifestly ridiculous.
“And you did not know, Mrs. Carlyon? Your husband abused your son for all those years, presumably until you sent him as a boy cadet into the army. Was that why you sent him so young, to escape your husband’s appetite?”
The atmosphere in the court was electric. The jury had expressions like a row of hangmen. Charles Hargrave looked ill. Sarah Hargrave sat next to him in body, but her heart was obviously elsewhere. Edith and Damaris sat side by side with Peverell.
Felicia’s face was hard, her eyes glittering.
“Boys do go into the army young, Mr. Rathbone. Perhaps you do not know that?”
“What did your husband do then, Mrs. Carlyon? Weren’t you afraid he would do what your son did, abuse the child of some friend?”
She stared at him in frozen silence.
“Or did you procure some other child for him, some bootboy, perhaps,” he went on ruthlessly, “who would be unable to retaliate—safe. Safe from scandal—and—” He stopped, staring at her. She had gone so white as to
appear on the edge of collapse. She gripped the railing in front of her and her body swayed. There was a long hiss from the crowd, an ugly sound, full of hate.
Lovat-Smith rose to his feet.
Randolf Carlyon let out a cry which strangled in his throat, and his face went purple. He gasped for breath and people on either side of him moved away, horrified and without compassion. A bailiff moved forward to him and loosened his tie roughly.
Rathbone would not let the moment go by.
“That is what you did, isn’t it, Mrs. Carlyon?” he pressed. “You procured another child for your husband. Perhaps a succession of children—until you judged him too old to be a danger anymore. But you didn’t protect your own grandson. You allowed him to be used as well. Why, Mrs. Carlyon? Why? Was your reputation really worth all that sacrifice, so many children’s terrified, shamed and pitiful lives?”
She leaned forward over the rail, hate blazing in her eyes.
“Yes! Yes, Mr. Rathbone, it was! What would you expect me to do? Betray him to public humiliation? Ruin a great career: a man who taught others bravery in the face of the enemy, who went to battle with head high, never counting the odds against him. A man who inspired others to greatness—for what? An appetite? Men have appetites, they always have had. What was I to do—tell people?” Her voice was thick with passionate contempt. She utterly ignored the snarls and hisses behind her.
“Tell whom? Who would have believed me? Who could I go to? A woman has no rights to her children, Mr. Rathbone. And no money. We belong to our husbands. We cannot even leave their houses without their permission, and he would never have given me that. Still less would he have allowed me to take my son.”
The judge banged his gavel and called for order.
Felicia’s voice was shrill with rage and bitterness. “Or would you have had me murder him—like Alexandra? Is that what you approve of? Every woman who suffers a betrayal or an indignity at her husband’s hands, or whose child is hurt, belittled or humiliated by his father, should murder him?”
She leaned over the rail towards him, her voice strident, her face twisted. “Believe me, there are a lot of other cruelties. My husband was gentle with his son, spent time with him, never beat him or sent him to bed without food. He gave him a fine education and started him on a great career. He had the love and respect of the world. Would you have me forfeit all that by making a wild, vile accusation no one would have believed anyway? Or end up in the dock—and on the rope’s end—like her?”