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Caty’s hands felt strange and clumsy in the white gloves Hope had tied on for her, so similar to the gloves she had tied on for Elma the night she disappeared. “Soon after, he began to pay attention to Margaret Clark, till about the twentieth of the eighth month, when she went into the country. About two days after her absence, Gulielma asked me—”

“If you will pardon me.” Colonel Burr stepped forward. He wasn’t glowing in silk like General Hamilton. His frock coat was of sober black. Somehow, the black-and-white perfection of his tailoring made him even more sinister. “This, Your Honors, is a clear case of hearsay testimony, and does not come within any of the exceptions within the book.”

Caty looked to Mr. Colden, mute with confusion. How was she meant to respond to this?

Mr. Colden was already advancing on the bench. “Your Honors will agree that in the case of a person deceased—”

Colonel Burr was there before him. “No one seeks to deny that the declarations of a deceased person may be sometimes received as evidence against a prisoner, but as the assistant attorney general well knows, that rule applies only when such statements are made in the moments after the fatal blow—not several months before,” Colonel Burr said drily. “Unless he can show that Gulielma Sands was in apprehension of death as early as August? Such statements are only admissible in the deceased’s final moments, when he must be supposed to be under an equal solemnity as an oath.”

Mr. Colden rallied. “Your Honor, Miss Sands is no longer here to speak on her own account—because she was most cruelly and foully murdered.”

Mr. Livingston unfolded himself from his seat. “Objection.”

“Anyone with conscience should object to the murder of a young girl. Your Honor will surely agree that this is one of those cases where such evidence must be admitted upon necessity.” Mr. Colden seized triumphantly on one of the books on his table. “I refer, of course, to State Trials 487 and 488, Leeche’s cases, Bacon 563, and Skinner’s Reports.”

Caty had no idea what he was talking about, but it sounded suitably impressive.

The attorneys for Levi Weeks, however, were less impressed. “Are we to acknowledge the authority of the English courts, when we have so lately secured our independence from their yoke?” Brockholst Livingston mused. “State Trials has no precedential effect here, and even if they had, my colleague would do well to refresh his recollection of them. The case of Leech articulates the exact opposite principle than that contended by the prosecution.”

Mr. Colden began thumbing through the pages. “Your Honor, if you look at Skinner . . .”

“This question,” said Colonel Burr, stepping in front of Mr. Livingston, “is larger than the case at hand. Our nation is a young one, as are our courts. What we determine today sets a pattern not just for the evidence in this case but for thousands—nay, hundreds of thousands—of cases to come. We must not let expedience blind us to the needs of the law.”

They’ll try to trick you, Mr. Colden had warned Caty. But this was something different entirely. Caty felt useless, helpless. She’d thought she was ready for any challenge they’d toss at her but she’d never imagined they’d use the law to brick shut her mouth, to stop her saying anything at all.

“To reply specifically to those cases raised by the assistant attorney general, the witness in the first case to which he referred was suffered to proceed without interruption and no point was made to the court respecting it.” Colonel Burr smiled pleasantly at Mr. Colden, who was paging through his book with increasing agitation, grabbing at little slips of paper. “As to the second case, it was in the court of sessions in Scotland, and cannot be considered any authority here.”

He bowed to the judges and stepped back.

“The testimony,” said Justice Lansing, “is ruled inadmissible. Mrs. Ring, you may proceed, but without reference to whatever Elma may have said to you, only what you yourself said and observed.”

“But—” Caty didn’t know what to say.

Mr. Colden looked pleadingly at her. “You were telling us of what happened when Margaret Clark went to the country.”

Caty wet her dry lips, trying to remember the words she’d rehearsed and rehearsed with Mr. Colden, now with a great hole cut out of the middle of them. “After Margaret Clark had gone to the country a few days, Levi became very attentive to Elma, to whom I mentioned it, and she did not deny it. She and Levi were left together with my husband either the tenth or eleventh of the ninth month.”

General Hamilton bounced up. “Which room did Elma sleep in while you were in the country?”

What did that have to do with anything? “In the front room on the second story.”

Elma had slept in so many rooms while Caty was away.

“After I had been absent about four weeks, I received a letter from my husband, desiring me to come home as he was very lonesome.” It was hard to keep the bitterness from her voice, to say it matter-of-factly, as if it were what it seemed. “I at first determined to return immediately, but I always thought Levi a man of honor, and that he did not intend to promise further than he intended to perform; therefore I stayed two weeks longer, and I came home six weeks to the day.”

“What was their conduct like upon your return?” Mr. Colden prompted.

“I saw an appearance of mutual attachment—but nothing improper. During her indisposition, he paid her the strictest attention and spent several nights in the room, saying he did not like to leave her with Hope, my sister, fearing she might get to sleep and neglect her. And in the night he wanted to go for a physician, but I discouraged him, thinking she would get better by morning.”

And she had! They needn’t look at her like that, as though she’d been neglectful. She’d been trying to protect Elma, to hide her shame. If someone had helped Aunt Lizzy as she’d helped Elma, Aunt Lizzy might have been married now, in her own household.

And there would have been no Elma to seduce Caty’s husband and destroy her peace.

The noises had escalated. People were standing and pointing. Caty felt the hair on the back of her neck prickle.

Caty raised her voice over the murmurs of the crowd. “One night, after she had got much better, choosing to sleep alone, she went to bed, and, as I suppose, Levi was gone also.”

Behind her, she could hear heavy, labored breathing and smell the familiar mix of wool and sweat and her own homemade soap that belonged only to Elias.