Ben shook the man’s hand. “Dane, may I introduce to you Stephen Crispin Spearing Esquire, barrister for the Duke of Burscough.”
Jenny stiffened, staring at the red-headed man with his odd, dancing eyes. This was the man who would facilitate Burscough’s ruin of her.
“Spearing, the Duke of Wakefield,” Ben finished.
Stephen Spearing gave a formal nod of his head. As far as Jenny could tell, it was a respectful and proper acknowledgement of Dane’s rank. Then he smiled. “I saw you at the club a few nights ago, did I not? That silly contretemps in front of the door. You were taking Jessup on, head first. Brave of you, your Grace. Jessup was a sergeant major. A good one, I’m told. Once he took a hill, he never gave ground.”
Dane cleared his throat. “I think yours was the winning argument,” he said dismissively.
“Perhaps. We’ll never know unless we quiz Jessup on it. I suspect he won’t feel kindly toward you until this bother is done, however.”
“Bother?” Dane repeated, sounding affronted. “You’re speaking of my family, Spearing.”
Spearing’s smile faded. His gaze met Dane’s. “Yes, I am,” he said slowly. “I do apologize. For me, it is just work, you see. The carriage of justice and all that. Absorbing and important work, yet work, just the same.” He gave a small smile, then bowed deeply, a much more formal gesture. He straightened and restored his white wig with a tug. “Give me a good battle, Davies,” he said over his shoulder as he walked away. “It makes the day far more interesting!”
Jenny watched the man stride down the corridor, his assistant following him with hurried steps.
“He was…friendly,” Sharla murmured, sounding surprised.
“He is the opposing barrister, not an enemy,” Ben told her.
Jenny didn’t speak. Spearing was the enemy. He was doing this to her and Jack, on Burscough’s behalf.
Ben nudged Dane in the side. “Where did your thoughts just wander, then?”
Dane stirred. “Oh…nowhere.” He glanced at Jenny, then shook his head. “Nothing,” he repeated to Ben.
Ben glanced at Spearing, who was a small figure among many more, down at the public end of the corridor. “It occurs to me,” he said slowly, “that we do not do enough socializing within the law profession, Sharla. Perhaps, when this is all over, we should invite Spearing to dinner.”
Sharla smiled. “That would be a very interesting evening,” she said. “You should arrange a suitable date, Dane.”
Dane looked acutely uncomfortable. “That is out of the question,” he said shortly.
“Then I will invite him,” Ben said.
Jenny realized that Sharla was containing her smile, shaking with good humor.
Dane was staring down the corridor once more. “If you must,” he told Ben. “Only, not for my sake. I have given up on such matters.”
“You have given up on socializing, Dane?” Sharla asked him.
“I have given up on hope,” he said. Then he stirred and looked at her directly. “Pay no mind. We have more important worries than my bad mood.”
Ben’s gaze met Sharla’s. Her smile grew warm and happy.
Jenny felt a jolt down to her toes as she recognized the joy in her expression. Sharla had found a way to happiness. Where had Jenny gone wrong?
* * * * *
Present day: The Court of Common Pleas, Westminster Hall, Palace of Westminster, London. March 1867. Thursday.
Sharla and Dane both kissed her cheek and left Jenny sitting in the tiny antechamber attached to the court itself, to wait to be called to the stand. A few minutes later, Ben appeared. He wore the same type of black gown and wig that Stephen Spearing had been wearing, which looked odd against his black hair and beard.
“I thought I should warn you,” Ben said. “Everyone is here, sitting in the gallery.”
“Everyone?”
“Elisa and Vaughn, Will, Peter, all my family, too—those who are in England at the moment. Lilly and Jasper. Cian and Daniel, the twins, and Lisa Grace, Natasha and Raymond.” He shrugged. “I don’t remember seeing Neil, although Blanche and Emma are there.”
Jenny’s heart sank. “Oh…” She didn’t know if she was pleased everyone would witness everything that would be said about her right along with the public, or not.
Ben took her hand. “It might take a while for you to be called. Spearing will bring you out the soonest he can, for your diary is their source of proof and he’ll want to verify it at the first possible moment. There is still a great deal of fuss to get through before he can do that, though. You must be patient.”
“Is…Burscough there?”
Ben hesitated. “He isn’t in the room. He’s a witness, too, Jenny. He’ll be tucked away somewhere.”
Relief touched her.
Ben gave her fingers another small squeeze and left.
It took two hours for the call to come. A bewigged footman opened the door to the tiny room and glanced at her.
“Me?” Jenny asked.
“Yes, your Grace.”
Jenny smoothed down the polished black gaberdine she wore. Sharla had insisted she borrow the dress, and also the tatted lace and cameo at her neck. Jenny had resisted. Her pride would not let her accept them. Ben had resolved the dilemma quickly. “You must impress upon everyone, especially the judge, that you are a lady and above reproach,” he said. “Your appearance will say that even as you are forced to speak of other things. Wear the dress, Jenny.”
She followed the footman along the length of the narrow corridor, then up an equally narrow flight of stairs. At the top, the footman opened a small door and stepped aside, holding it open for her. From beyond came the murmurs and shuffles of a large number of people.
Jenny took a deep breath and stepped through. There were three more steps, then a tiny square platform surrounded by thick wooden rails.
The witness box.
She made herself step up into the box.
The court had very high ceilings with windows at the top. The far back wall was lined with the tiers of the public gallery. Jenny couldn’t help but glance up. The first face she saw was Mama Elisa’s. Elisa gripped the railing in front of her, her smile tremulous.
Jenny’s gaze ran the length of the gallery. There everyone was, just as Ben had warned her. Even Jack’s mother was there. Lady Victoria looked grim and strained.
Jack was missing, of course. Her heart squeezed.
Other people in the gallery all whispered to each other, their gazes raking over her.
There were many men standing and sitting in the area beneath the gallery. Many held pens over paper. They would be recording the proceedings. There were others whose function she could not begin to guess. All of them were looking at her.
Jenny turned to face the center of the court. There were two large tables there and Ben sat behind one. Stephen Spearing stood behind the other, his hand on his hip. Both of them studied her, too.
Jenny glanced to her left. High up and behind a bench, sat the judge. He seemed to watch her accusingly, too.
A band of tension built across her chest, making her shoulders hunch in. A whole, very large room of people and all of them were looking at her. Judging her. Oh, this was far worse than Ben said it would be!
“Your Grace?” Spearing said.
Jenny pulled her attention back to him. “Yes,” she said. Her voice was weak.
“For the benefit of the court, you confirm that you are Gwendolyn Violet Moore Wardell, a founding born in 1844 and taken in by the Wardell family in 1848?”
“Yes.”
“You agree that you married the Duke of Burscough in 1863, of your own free will, after the calling of bans which prompted no protest?” Spearing did not look down at the pages spread before him.
“Yes,” Jenny said again.
The judge sat forward, as if his attention had been pricked.
Spearing reached for and picked up her journal, which had been sitting on the table in front of him
, among the papers. “This is your diary, your Grace?”
“It looks as though it is my journal,” she said cautiously.
Spearing smiled. “Would you like to examine it more closely?” He moved over to the witness stand and held the book up toward her.
Jenny didn’t want to move. She certainly didn’t want to bend and reach for the book over the top of the thick bannister and railings that enclosed the witness stand. Movement would draw attention to her and there was already far too much attention focused upon her.
Spearing gave her a small smile and lifted the book higher.
Jenny took it and rested it on the top of the bannister and opened it and let the pages ruffle through her fingers, then handed it back. “Yes, that is my journal.” She moved away from the railing as far as the tiny box would allow, without tripping down the steps behind her.
Her heart thudded unhappily. Her hands were damp.
Spearing nodded. “Thank you, your Grace.” He carried the book back to the table and dropped it with a soft thud and turned to face her once more. The hand came back to his hip. The other hand rested on the leather volume. “Within this diary are entries that describe repeated assignations of a romantic nature—”
The gallery made an ooooh sound.
Spearing paused, glancing at them. When he turned back, Jenny saw his eyes roll with quick impatience, that none in the gallery would see, for his back was turned to them. “Assignations of a romantic nature with one John Gladwin Lochlann Mayes, Baron Guestwick and heir to Marquess of Laceby.”
The sound the gallery made this time was louder. Jenny flinched. Some of the noises they made sounded disapproving and there was a vicious edge of glee to their reaction.
“Your Grace?” Spearing prompted.
Jenny worked her throat. It was tight with pressure and ached. “Did you ask a question, Mr. Spearing?”
Someone in the gallery tittered.
There were three men sitting at a table, all of them drawing busily. One of them smiled. She could see on the parchment in front of him that he was drawing a picture of her. That was the picture that would be used in the newspapers.
Her heart lurched and her belly swooped and swung.
Spearing gave a short nod. “I will ask the question more directly, your Grace.” Again, he pressed his fingers to the leather book. “You have accurately represented the true events you describe in this diary?”
Jenny threaded her hands together and squeezed. “Oh, I do so wish they were true!”
There was a concerted gasp from the gallery.
Ben’s eyes widened, although he remained still upon his chair.
Spearing’s hand dropped from his hip. “You are asserting the events you have reported in your diary are not true, your Grace?”
“That isn’t a diary, Mr. Spearing. To call it a diary would be to intimate that the events in it are true recordings of history.”
“Your Grace, a moment ago, when I gave you the diary and you looked inside, you agreed that the diary was yours.”
“Actually, Mr. Spearing, what I said was that the volume you rest your fingers against is my journal.”
Spearing paused. His eyes were narrowed.
The judge cleared his throat. “Could the court reporter please read back what her Grace said in regard to the book?”
One of the men busily scribbling upon long foolscap pages got to his feet, a sheet in his hands. “The Honorable Mr. Spearing asked, ‘This is your diary, your Grace?’ Her Grace, the Duchess of Burscough replied, ‘It looks as though it is my journal.’”
The gallery shifted and muttered once more.
“To which Mr. Spearing asked, ‘Would you like to examine it more closely?’. Her Grace, the Duchess of Burscough replied, ‘Yes, that is my journal.’”
The reporter sat down once more and picked up his pen.
Spearing looked down at his feet, gathering his thoughts. His clear eyes lifted to examine her. “I caution you, your Grace, to consider your words carefully. You are saying that the diary—the journal is not a true recording of events that took place over the last four years?”
Jenny wished she’d had the foresight to bring a fan. She felt overheated. Her head throbbed and her cheeks burned. She made herself concentrate. “I only wish the events were true, for that would make me a most happy woman.”
The noise from the gallery this time was loud and long.
“Silence!” the judge roared.
Spearing barely waited for the gallery to contain itself. He moved toward the stand. “Then, everything in this journal is fiction, your Grace?”
Jenny saw the trap he was laying for her. She smiled. “Of course not! I have a very large family, Mr. Spearing, and there is always something happening in London during the season. You asked about the events I related in the journal regarding Baron Guestwick, to which I regretfully admit are purely the product of my imagination.”
“You made them up,” Spearing said flatly.
There was a low-grade buzzing from the gallery, not enough to make the judge shout at them again, yet he did frown.
Ben’s hand, where it rested on the table in front of him, curled into a fist. He still did not move or interject.
“It is peculiar that the only fiction in your journal, your Grace, is that which involves Lord Guestwick.”
“Why is that peculiar?” Jenny demanded. “Who would not wish to be more closely associated with Lord Guestwick?”
Spearing’s lips parted. Then he gathered himself and said shortly, “Why is that, your Grace?”
Jenny could see the newspaper reporters were all bent over their notebooks, writing rapidly.
She looked at Spearing. “As you pointed out, Mr. Spearing, Lord Guestwick is the heir to the Marquess of Laceby. His family is a great one, descendant from kings and reckoning their lineage back to the origins of England itself. Lord Guestwick himself is a great man—he is tall and handsome and strong—”
The titters from the gallery sounded again. Jenny ignored them and went on, hoping that Spearing would not interrupt her until she was finished. If he did, she might not have the courage to continue down this path, for now she was speaking simple truth and baring her soul to a room full of strangers, which for her was harder than lying. “There is much to admire about Lord Guestwick,” she said. “Not just his appearance and physical prowess, which is considerable. Did you know, Mr. Spearing, that Lord Guestwick is not content simply to live upon the income from his family’s estate? All his life he has strived to improve the world and add to society. He is a member of the Royal Society of Engineers and his expertise is eagerly sought by mining companies across England. He was the only engineer to see the true weakness of the Holmswood tin mine in Lancashire. That mine collapsed not more than six weeks later.”
Ben scrambled to his feet, looking as though he had been jerked to them by invisible strings. “Your Grace!” His voice lifted, to interrupt her.
Jenny looked at him.
“The Holmswood tin mine belonged to your husband’s family, did it not?”
Jenny opened her eyes the way Spearing had done. “Why yes…” She hesitated. “Is that why my husband persecutes such an honorable and hard-working man?”
“Your honor, may I request that the Duchess’s question be ignored?” Spearing demanded of the judge.
The judge stroked his chin. “I am afraid, Mr. Spearing, that you began this line of enquiry. You cannot now protest that you don’t like where it has led you.” He looked at Jenny and it seemed to her that he was not scowling as deeply as he had been when she first entered the room. “Go on, your Grace.”
Jenny couldn’t bring herself to look at Spearing directly anymore. His expression of incredulity, carefully hidden from the gallery, was unsettling. She kept her gaze on the space between his table and Ben’s. “My husband is not in favor of attending the London season—”
“Not even to meet his responsibilities as a member of the House of Lords?” Be
n interjected.
Spearing sighed.
“My husband prefers to stay in Lancashire,” Jenny replied. “While I am more accustomed to the London season. I have a rather large family, while my husband is the last of his. The Burscough manor is empty and quite dull.” She made herself pout. “I suppose I grew bored.”
“You did not find the compensations of marriage an adequate diversion, your Grace?” Ben asked. He was steering her now he had recovered from his surprise.
“If there had been compensations, then perhaps I might have been adequately diverted,” Jenny replied.
This time, the gasp of shock from the gallery was loud and uniform.
Jenny pressed her hand to her cheek, as if she was finding the conversation uncomfortable, yet was bravely speaking the truth, anyway. Which was, in fact, how she felt. Demonstrating her feelings where strangers could see them was an added discomfort.
“Jack has always been a dashing man,” Jenny added.
“Excuse me…who is Jack?” Spearing asked.
“Lord Guestwick.”
“You and Lord Guestwick are intimate enough use pet names?” Spearing demanded.
“Good lord, no!” Jenny said, looking shocked. “Only in the pages of my journal would I dare to use such familiarity. That is where I dreamed of a…a more fulfilling life, you see. Lord Guestwick is such a good man—an honorable gentleman, whom everyone in London likes. It was easy to imagine how much more fulfilling my life would be with such a man in it.”
The gallery’s reaction was loud enough that even the newspaper reporters turned to look at them. The judge shouted until the room grew quiet once more. “Contain yourselves, ladies and gentleman,” he warned them, “or I will order the gallery closed for the duration of the trial.”
The threat was enough. The gallery grew utterly silent.
Spearing no longer touched the leather book. He lifted a hand back to his hip and considered her. “Did you ever communicate these intimate wishes of yours to Baron Guestwick, your Grace?”
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