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Goode called Corriden Wade, who reluctantly, pale-faced, his voice barely audible, admitted that Rhys’s injuries could not have produced the blood described on his clothes. Not once did he look up to the dock, where Rhys sat motionless, his face twisted in an unreadable expression, a mixture of helpless bitterness and blazing anger. Nor did Wade appear to look towards the gallery, where Sylvestra sat next to Eglantyne, both of them watching him intently. He kept his eyes undeviatingly on Goode, confirming that the events of the night of Rhys’s father’s death had rendered Rhys incapable of communication, either by speech or by writing. He was able only to nod or shake his head. Wade expressed the deepest concern for Rhys’s well-being and would not commit himself to any certainty that he would recover.
Goode hesitated, as if to ask him further as to his knowledge of Rhys’s personality, but after the vaguest of beginnings, he changed his mind. There was nothing for him to prove but the facts, and to explore the growth of motive only opened the way for Rathbone to suggest insanity. Goode thanked Wade and returned to his seat.
Rathbone took his place. He knew Wade was as sympathetic a witness as he would get, apart from Hester, whom he could find no excuse to call. And yet he had nothing to ask Wade which would not do more harm than good. He needed something from Monk as desperately as he ever had, and he did not even know what to hope for, let alone to seek or to suggest. He stood in the middle of the floor feeling alone and ridiculous. The jury was waiting for him to say something, to begin to fight back. He had done nothing so far except make a gesture about the blood, one which he knew no one believed.
Should he ask Wade about the deterioration of Rhys’s character, and lay grounds for a plea of insanity … at least in mitigation? He thought that was what Sylvestra wanted. It was the only defense which was comprehensible for such an act.
But it was not a defense in law, not for Rhys. He might be evil, acting from a different set of moral beliefs from anyone else in this crowded room, but he was not insane in the sense that he did not understand either the law or the nature of his acts. There was nothing whatever to suggest he suffered delusions.
“Thank you, Dr. Wade,” Rathbone said with confidence he was far from feeling. “I believe you have known Rhys most of his life, is that correct?”
“I have,” Wade replied.
“And been his physician, when he required one?”
“Yes.”
“Were you aware of there being a serious and violent disagreement with his father, and if so, over what subject?”
It was a question which Wade would find extremely difficult to answer in the affirmative. If he admitted it, it would seem incompetent that he had not done anything to forestall this tragedy. It would seem like wisdom after the event, and Sylvestra would see it as a betrayal, as indeed so might some of the jury.
“Dr. Wade?” Rathbone prompted.
Wade raised his head and stared at him resolutely.
“I was aware of a certain tension between them,” he answered, his voice stronger, full of regret. “I thought it the normal resentment a son might have for the discipline a father naturally exerts.” He bit his lip and drew in a deep breath. “I had no idea whatever it would end like this. I blame myself. I should have been more aware. I have had a great deal of experience with men of all ages, and under extreme pressure, during my service in the navy.” A ghost of a smile touched his mouth and then vanished. “I suppose closer to home, in people for whom one has affection, one is loath to recognize such things.”
It was a clever answer, honest and yet without committing himself. And it earned the jury’s respect. Rathbone could see it in their faces. He would have been wiser not to have asked, but it was too late now.
“You did not foresee it?” he repeated.
“No,” Wade said quietly, looking down. “I did not, God forgive me.”
Rathbone hesitated on the brink of asking him if he thought Rhys insane, and decided against it. No answer, either way, could help enough to be worth the risk.
“Thank you, Dr. Wade. That is all.”
Goode had already established the violence of the fight and the fact that Leighton Duff and Rhys had been involved, and there was no reason to suspect anyone else’s being there. He called the Duff household servants, deeply against their will, and obliged them to testify to the quarrel the evening of Leighton Duff’s death and to the time both men had left the house. At least he spared Sylvestra the distress of testifying.
All the time Rhys sat propped up in the dock, his skin ashen pale, his eyes seeming enormous in his haggard face, a prison warder on either side of him, perhaps more to support than to restrain him. He did not look capable of offering any resistance, let alone an attempt to escape.
Rathbone forced himself to put the thought of his client out of his mind. He must use intelligence rather than emotion. Let anyone else feel all the compassion they could, his brain must be clear.
The
re seemed no way of casting the slightest doubt, reasonable or unreasonable, on Rhys’s physical guilt, and he was struggling without a glimmer of hope to think of any mitigation.
Where was Monk?
He dared not look at Hester. He could imagine too clearly the panic she must be feeling.
Through the afternoon and the next day Goode brought on a troop of witnesses who placed Rhys in St. Giles over a period of months. Not one of them could be cast doubt upon. Rathbone had to stand by and watch. There was no argument to make.
The judge adjourned the court early. It seemed as if there was little left to do but sum up the case. Goode had proved every assertion he had made. There was no alternative to offer, except that Rhys had been whoring in St. Giles and his father had confronted him, they had quarreled and Rhys had killed him. Goode had avoided mentioning the rapes, but if Rathbone challenged him that the motive for murder was too slender to believe, then he would undoubtedly bring in the beaten women, still bearing their scars. He had said as much. It was only Rhys’s desperate condition which stayed his hand. Fortune had already punished him appallingly, and the conviction for murder would be sufficient to have him hanged. There was no need for more.
Rathbone left the courtroom feeling he had been defeated without offering even the semblance of a fight. He had done nothing for Rhys. He had not begun to fulfill the trust Hester and Sylvestra had placed in him. He was ashamed, and yet he could think of nothing to say which would do Rhys the slightest service.
Certainly he could harass witnesses or object to Goode’s questions, his tactics, his logic, or anything else; but it would serve no purpose except to give the effect of a defense. It would be a sham. He knew it; Hester would know it. Would it even be of comfort to Rhys? Or offer him false hope?
