‘None of it is true?’
‘None that need concern you.’
‘There was no marriage at the Fleet?’
‘There was—an “escapade”; but it was after my marriage to you.’
‘Then your marriage to me—?’
‘Was legal. I am your wife.’
‘And Prince Anton of Brunswick—?’
‘Was neither my husband nor my lover, my lord.’
‘I see.’ He was silent for a while, then he raised his head and looked her in the eyes. ‘I do not believe you,’ he said.
‘You do not believe me?’ She stared at him, utterly incredulous. ‘You do not believe me?’
‘I do not believe you. You have lied to me, to my absolute knowledge, in one particular—why not in all?’
‘Why not, indeed!’ cried the Duchess, eagerly: eagerly thrusting in on them. For a moment she had glimpsed that young-girl look and feared it might weaken him. She gave her high hoot of laughter. ‘Next she will be claiming that the boy is your heir. Why not?’
‘Why not?’ She had straightened herself up again in the carriage, had fallen again into her own lovely, studied, studiously un-studied pose; she raised her head, her eyes flashed once again their old, scornful blue. ‘As her Grace of Witham says—who sits like God in judgement upon us here—“why not?” You ask me for the truth, my lord, here before all these people you ask me for the truth: and then you tell me you do not believe me, you tell me what I say is lies.… Very well, then, let us add another lie to the lies: I have never to this moment claimed one flicker of recognition from you for my son—but now here before all these people whom you have permitted to sit in judgement upon me and my—lies—I declare him, I declare him upon my most solemn oath, to be your heir.’ She shrugged. ‘As the Duchess says—why not?’
‘Sophia!’ implored Christine, frantically whispering. ‘Come away! How can you say these things?—for God’s sake let us go.…’
‘Nonsense, be quiet, I know what I’m doing, Christine.’
‘But it’s wrong, it isn’t fair; Sophia, if you persist—’
‘Be quiet,’ said Sapphire; she caught the slender wrist in her own small, strong hand, forcing it down as though it were Christine’s will that her own strong will forced into acquiesence; and called out, coolly, ‘I do not hear you repudiate the claim, my lord?’
‘His lordship is speechless at its audacity,’ said the Duchess.
‘He has, however, a ready mouthpiece in your Grace.’
‘I need no mouthpiece,’ said Lord Weyburn, steadily, ‘utterly to repudiate the claim.’
‘Upon what grounds?’ The blue eyes flashed on him now, suddenly afire with a sort of malicious fun. ‘Upon what grounds, my lord?’
‘The grounds are obvious enough,’ said the Duchess. ‘Half the world can testify that he swore he would marry you, yet never would hold you in his arms: the other half, that he left you at the door of the church and has not seen you since.’
Sapphire laughed outright. ‘Ah—that’s all your ladyship knows!’
The Duchess swung round, startled. ‘Does this mean, my lord—?’
‘It means nothing. If she is my wife, it is in name only: the boy is not my son.’ He repeated it aloud, steadily and slowly. ‘My private affairs are my concern and mine only: but I agree that my title and estate are a part of society and that if I claim my place in society, I must abide by its laws. I repeat, therefore, and I will do so whenever such a claim is made: if she is my wife, she is my wife in name only—her son is not my son.’
(‘Sophia, you know it is true, come, leave it … Sophia, I shall tell my cousin, if you persist—’
‘Be quiet, Christine: if you speak now, I will kill you! You don’t understand. I’ll explain, I’ll explain later on.…’)
She rose up suddenly in the carriage, steadying herself with one hand on the curving, enamelled rim of the door and stood looking down at him over the heads of the people, over the painted carriage between them with its flutter of ribbons and plumes; and he looked back at her with cold grey eyes. ‘Very well, my lord: then this is war between us. So let it be. I have asked nothing of you, all these years, but the name you thrust upon me when you wagered over me like a stable groom over his horse or his dog: I have taken nothing from you but the means to support such a name—since I bore it—as I should. But now you would trick me out of the name, as you tricked me into it—you and this whole yelling, belling pack you hunt with; and this time I’ll not be tricked, this time you’ve a quarry to deal with grown wise in your ways, not the poor young hunted thing that I once was, alone at the mercy of your hearts of petrified stone.… This time I’ll fight you back, my lord.’ She eyed him steadily. ‘Do you tell these people here that since our marriage day you have not seen me?—have not been alone with me?’
‘Upon one occasion,’ he said, ‘I was alone with you.’
‘Two months after our marriage: on August the first, to be precise—when we were alone together for some hours?’
‘I had an interview with you that evening, yes; at my London house.’
‘And during that interview—repented the vow you made?’
‘Only such part of it,’ he said coldly, ‘as had made you—in name—my wife.’
‘You did not upon that occasion take me in your arms?’
‘I did not upon that occasion, madame, to make an end of this—consummate my marriage with you; and since there has been no other occasion, your son cannot be my son and is not my heir.’
‘Very well,’ said Sapphire. ‘Then we know where we stand. For I say that upon that occasion the marriage was consummated; and that I am your wife and Nicholas, my son, is your son—and is your heir.’ And she gave him a smile of devilish brilliance over the heads of the people and said, sweetly: ‘And you may go to law about it, my lord, and you’ll find that the law of England is this: that a man may not seek to prove the illegitimacy of a child born to his own wife. So lie for lie—and one of us is lying—lie for lie, my lord, I win!’ And she bowed to him, smiling her own derisive smile again, bowed to the Duchess and the ladies and the gentlemen, her white hand pink-tipped as a lily with the pressure upon the supporting rim of the door; and sat down composedly and settled her dress to her satisfaction and felt for the safety of an earring and returned her hands to the cosy comfort of her small fur muff; and called to the coachman in accents that this time brooked no misunderstanding or delay, ‘Drive on!’
But Charles Weyburn already was riding furiously across the green grass, scattering the Sunday morning parties of strollers in a thunder of unconsidering polished hooves: not having waited to see the carriage go.
And two months later, in what came to be called the Sapphire Gallery of Witham House, the “court” convened: that court that was no legal court, to try, by a law that was no law of England nor anything but the law of the narrow society in which they lived, the issue between Sophia, daughter of the late James Devigne, resident in Venice; and Charles, Baron Weyburn of Starrbelow.… The Trial by Society of Sophia, née Devigne, whom men called Sapphire and Sapphire-of-Starrbelow, and sometimes Starr Sapphire: but could no longer safely call Lady Weyburn. To settle the burning question of the day: on that night of August 1st, 1754—yes—or no?
ELEVEN
The trial of Sapphire Weyburn was held in the Blue Gallery of Witham House as has been said: and, as has been said, it had need to be the largest room in Town, for, God knows, everyone in Town was there.
His Grace the Duke of Orrell on the bench—an old man, learned in the law, who might have had more sense, you’d think, than to lend himself to such a travesty of law as this. For the prosecution, Sir Henry Kidd, smarting still from the injuries of those other days. In the jury-box, twelve good men and true, recruited from the London streets, scrubbed, clad, entertained, promised reimbursement at the end, if they would without bias listen and pronounce a verdict—it would add a fillip of excitement, it was felt, to have at least some ele
ment of doubt as to what that verdict would be. As witnesses—half the social world, agog to give evidence of those far-off, half-remembered, oft-talked-over days. For the defence …
For the defence—only the accused herself: Starr Sapphire, Lady Weyburn of Starrbelow, age something under thirty, hair gold, eyes blue, skin smooth and creamy coloured as a pullet’s egg, form slender, supple, disciplined to mannered grace: dressed proudly in formal magnificence, wearing the splendid jewels of her husband’s house, no longer a frightened, friendless girl but a woman, cool, disdainful, faintly amused: undaunted and unafraid. She stood at one end of the long, pale, pinky-brown mahogany table shimmering with its high polish beneath the famous chandeliers. At the other end of the table, Lord Weyburn, not looking towards her, wearing black in mourning for his cousin Christine’s death, eight weeks ago. All round the great room, chairs banked in built-up rows almost to the ceiling: seated on his dais before the high, carved, marble mantelpiece, the Judge.…
He looks like an old sheep, thought Sapphire to herself.
Footman-ushers hushed the court to silence. The Duke opened a great book lying flat on the table before him, peered at it vaguely, dived into a pocket for his snuff-box, took snuff, closed the box with a snap: and as though the snap had broken a string of silence held taut within him, began to speak. ‘My lords, ladies, gentlemen of the jury.…
‘My lords, ladies and gentlemen, we are assisting today at perhaps the most extraordinary trial ever to have taken place: a trial, of course, without legal significance, held not before His Majesty’s legal judges and according to the laws of this country, but before judges set up by the social world in which we, all here present, live and move; and in accordance with the laws of that society. Failing any possibility of solution in our courts of law, the case now comes before us, assembled here—by common arrangement and with the consent and agreement of both parties.…’
Lady Weyburn, coming slowly to her feet, adjusting with a careful hand the great sweep of her dress, silencing the old sheep’s bleating with the simple, cool nonchalance, the practised dignity of her arising. ‘With—respect—my lord Duke: in my case with neither agreement nor consent.’
‘Your ladyship’s presence here presupposes consent.’
‘I am present, my lord, under protest. I wish to state plainly at the outset that I regard this enquiry as nothing but a frivolous diversion for the entertainment of the gossip-mongers: and that I come here only in obedience—as I have ever been obedient—to my husband’s express commands.’
‘As to these charges, madame …’
‘As to these charges, to make short work of it they are, I take it, four in number. First, that my marriage to Lord Weyburn was not consummated and that therefore I lie in saying that my son, Nicholas, is his lordship’s heir: to this I reply that, upon one occasion only, the marriage was consummated and—and for this I will fight to my dying breath—the boy is Lord Weyburn’s heir. Secondly, that after my marriage I conducted myself wantonly, and my son is the child of any of half a dozen gentlemen then about Town: that he was so fathered, I totally deny. Thirdly, and alternatively, that before my so-called marriage to Lord Weyburn I had been secretly married to another—to Prince Anton of Brunswick; and therefore my marriage to Lord Weyburn was null: this also I totally deny. And fourthly, that to prevent the truth of these matters from becoming known, I have now murdered the only person who might have inner knowledge and could give testimony against me here: namely, the Countess of Frome, my best and only friend.’ She was silent for a moment; silent, standing with bent head, in the greater silence of the great room where for a moment even the flutter of fans was still.
When she spoke again, it was in a new voice with—false or true—a new sadness, where before only defiance had been; a new bitterness where there had been only a cool, half-humorous disdain. ‘As to this last charge, ladies and gentlemen—if any so dares call himself while he yet condescends to lend his presence to this vulgar travesty, this mockery of justice—as to this last charge, I say, it is so monstrous that I shall not trouble to deny it. The law of the land has considered preferring it against me and, from lack of proof, evidence—even, I dare say, enough suspicion—abandoned it: it is not for you, therefore, to revive it, and to it I shall make no answer, I shall not reply to any examination on this score. In such matters as affect Lord Weyburn’s honour, I shall—under protest and at his command—be at your service: but I warn you in advance that I do not acknowledge your court, I shall not be bound by any verdict of yours. As to the death of my friend, I shall not answer: for the rest, my marriage to Lord Weyburn was valid, it was subsequently consummated: and the boy is his legitimate heir.’ She sat down, unsmiling, not triumphant, cool and quiet: and gave her whole attention to the arrangement of her dress, the disposition of her hands, the angle at which she held her fan. His Grace turned a page in his great book and while the court broke its rapt silence, seethed, resettled, fell silent again in eager anticipation, pretended to read.…
The Duke of Orrell:
‘My lords, ladies and gentlemen—gentlemen of the jury: her ladyship has put before you most succinctly the charges against her and declared her repudiation of these charges: a duty more commonly devolving upon counsel, but we are not now in a legal court and need not follow legal court procedure.…’ (No, indeed!—vain to have expected any witness to volunteer evidence if he had understood that it would mean exclusion from all these excitements until his turn came: precedent had been abandoned therefore, the rules of evidence had been thrown to all the winds: and witnesses for and against the accused now eagerly packed the front benches, listening, as in no legal court of law would have been permitted, to the testimony of those who came before them.) ‘And from what Lady Weyburn has said, gentlemen, one thing will be clear to you—that the main issue here to be tried (and all others are subsidiary to it) is the legitimacy of the boy, Nicholas, now passing under the name of Nicholas Weyburn, and his right to inheritance of the barony and estates of the Weyburns of Starrbelow.
‘Very well. Now, by the laws of England, gentlemen, it is impossible for a man to seek to prove, by his own evidence, that a child born to his wife, in wedlock, is not his own child. His only resource is to look for other people to prove the illegitimacy for him.…’ His old sheep-face looked into the sheep-faces of the twelve stolid jurymen, sitting ill-at-ease on their double row of chairs, looking dumbly back at him. ‘Do you understand so far?’
The jurymen did not understand at all. There was muttering among them. ‘Wot we don’t see, moi lord,’ said their leader, at last, ‘is ’ow any other man can prove a woife’s a woife, better nor a man hisself.’ His face broke into a broad grin and he spluttered into his hand. His colleagues grinned also or, according to temperament, eyed her ladyship, hung their heads and went very red.
The Duke looked down his long nose. ‘Let me try to make it clear. Suppose a man says that a child born to his wife cannot, for physical reasons, be his own—the law is this, that he may not offer evidence himself to this effect. But if he can find someone to prove, for example, that he was absent for, say, five years, in the middle of which period the child was born—why, then, you see, that other man may prove for him that the child was not his. Or let a priest come forward to say that before the man took the wife to church, she was married already—why then, again, the priest proves the man’s case for him. It is to try to discover such outside witnesses to the illegitimacy of the boy, Nicholas, that Lord Weyburn has agreed to this enquiry, to which her ladyship holds such strong objection: not, of course, proposing to rely in law upon our verdict, but trusting to some fact coming to light in the course of the enquiry upon which he may be able to go to law.…’ He paused and took snuff, eyeing them warily: the jury dully eyed him back. He said: ‘Lord Weyburn?’
Lord Weyburn upon his feet: very proud and cold, not looking at her ladyship, not looking at anyone, fixing his eyes upon the great book, his voice kept resolutely clipped and unemo
tional. ‘I declare simply that, in accordance with the vow I publicly made before my marriage, Lady Weyburn remained my wife—if she was indeed my wife, and not already married—in name only: and therefore the boy is not my son and is not my heir.…’
Lord Greenewode sat with Sir Francis Erick and Red Reddington, his ankle, emaciated to the thickness of a broom-handle by the slow progress of the disease that long had racked him, crossed painfully on a bony, silk-clad knee. ‘Well, well, it seems that between us we have fathered a splendid boy.’ He said over his gaunt shoulder, ‘And you, my Lord Warne, are you not a fourth door to which this poor babe has been laid?’
‘A fifth, if you count the German princeling: and Lord Franks would have made up six—with, perhaps, as some have thought, more pretensions than most of us. ’Tis true, her ladyship sported a pair of red buckles.…’
‘I disbelieve it utterly,’ said Pardo Ryan. ‘I deny it.’
‘Aye, yes, and you also, Sir Pardo. Were you not there when the aunt was robbed of her wig and complexion?—and now we stand all accused of robbing the niece of something more!’
‘We should form a new society,’ said Francis Erick, laughing, ‘to succeed the old Circle, alas so short-lived. The Fathers of Nicholas—he is welcome, God knows, to any inheritance of mine.’ He nudged his next-door neighbour in the ribs. ‘Eh, Red? You’re rich: you’ve no brat of your own to endow.’
Squire Reddington lounged with his chin on his breast, his short legs out-thrust before him. He opened one glazed eye, glanced sleepily at the straight back of Lady Weyburn, sitting composed and upright in the tall chair ahead of him, and closed it again. ‘Let him sleep,’ said Francis Erick. ‘He’s drunk.’
‘I am stone cold sober,’ said Reddington, his eyes still closed, ‘and with my two bare hands I’ll twist off the head of any man who says otherwise.’
‘You—are—drunk,’ said Sir Pardo, promptly, winking at the others, whispering loudly and clearly into his ear.
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