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He thanked her again, and Oliver Rathbone rose to his feet and walked forward with almost feline grace.
“Mrs. Sandeman, your memory is much to be commended, and we owe a great deal to your accuracy and sensitivity.”
She gazed at him with sharpened interest. There was an element in him which was more elusive, more challenging and more powerful than O’Hare, and she responded immediately.
“You are most kind.”
“Not at all, Mrs. Sandeman.” He waved his hand. “I assure you I am not. Did this amorous, greedy and conceited footman ever admire other ladies in the house? Mrs. Cyprian Moidore, for instance? Or Mrs. Kellard?”
“I have no idea.” She was surprised.
“Or yourself, perhaps?”
“Well—” She lowered her eyelashes modestly.
“Please, Mrs. Sandeman,” he urged. “This is not a time for self-effacement.”
“Yes, he did step beyond the bounds of what is—merely courteous.”
Several members of the jury looked expectant. One middle-aged man with side whiskers was obviously embarrassed.
“He expressed an amorous regard for you?” Rathbone pressed.
“Yes.”
“What did you do about it, ma’am?”
Her eyes flew open and she glared at him. “I put him in his place, Mr. Rathbone. I am perfectly competent to deal with a servant who has got above himself.”
Beside Hester, Beatrice stiffened in her seat.
“I am sure you are.” Rathbone’s voice was laden with meaning. “And at no danger to yourself. You did not find it necessary to go to bed carrying a carving knife?”
She paled visibly, and her mittened hands tightened on the rail of the box in front of her.
“Don’t be absurd. Of course I didn’t!”
“And yet you never felt constrained to counsel your niece in this very necessary art?”
“I—er—” Now she was acutely uncomfortable.
“You were aware that Percival was entertaining amorous intentions towards her.” Rathbone moved very slightly, a graceful stride as he might use in a withdrawing room. He spoke softly, the sting in his incredulous contempt. “And you allowed her to be so alone in her fear that she resorted to taking a knife from the kitchen and carrying it to bed to defend herself, in case Percival should enter her room at night.”
The jury was patently disturbed, and their expressions betrayed it.
“I had no idea he would do such a thing,” she protested. “You are trying to say I deliberately allowed it to happen. That is monstrous!” She looked at O’Hare for help.
“No, Mrs. Sandeman,” Rathbone corrected. “I am questioning how it is that a lady of your experience and sensitive observation and judgment of character should see that a footman was amorously drawn towards your niece, and that she had behaved foolishly in not making her distaste quite plain to him, and yet you did not take matters into your own hands sufficiently at least to speak to some other member of the household.”
She stared at him with horror.
“Her mother, for example,” he continued. “Or her sister, or even to warn Percival yourself that his behavior was observed. Any of those actions would almost certainly have prevented this tragedy. Or you might simply have taken Mrs. Haslett to one side and counseled her, as an older and wiser woman who had had to rebuff many inappropriate advances yourself, and offered her your assistance.”
Fenella was flustered now.
“Of course—if I had r-realized—” she stammered. “But I didn’t. I had no idea it—it would—”
“Hadn’t you?” Rathbone challenged.
