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“I will. Yes. Now I had better see what I can do for him. Thank you.”
At last he went and she was left alone. She swung around to Rhys and started immediately. There was no time to be lost. They could return with a doctor any moment. There was no way on earth she could explain what she was doing, if she were mistaken. It would probably ruin her, even if she were right but could not prove it.
She pulled open his trousers and his underclothes, revealing his body as far as his thighs. There were no bandages at all, no plasters, no lint, no adhesives. There was only the most fearful bruising, as if he had been repeatedly kicked and punched. Sick in her stomach, she rolled him over to lie on his face and began the examination which would tell her what she needed to know, although the slow trickle of blood even now, and the purplish and torn flesh, was enough.
It took her only moments. Then, with shaking hands, fumbling, fingers stiff, she pulled the clothes back up and rolled him over, almost knocking him off the narrow bench. She tried to fasten his trousers, but she had them crooked and they would not reach. She snatched his jacket and threw it over him just as his eyes fluttered open.
“Rhys!” She choked on the word, the anguish inside her spilling out, her throat aching, her hands trembling and clumsy.
He gasped, drawing in his breath. He was fighting her, trying to lash out, force her away.
“Rhys!” She clung onto his arms, above the splints, her fingers digging into his flesh. “Rhys, I know what happened to you! It’s not your fault! You are not the only one! I’ve known soldiers it happened to, brave men, fighting men!”
He started to shake, trembling so violently she could not keep him still, even holding him in her arms. The fierceness of his anger shook her too. He sobbed, great racking, desperate cries, and she rocked back and forth, her arms around him, her hand stroking his head.
It was not until she had been doing so for several minutes, time she could not count, that she realized she could hear him. He was weeping with a voice. Something in his despair, in the fall, or in the knowledge that she knew, had returned his speech.
“Who was it?” she said urgently. “You must tell me.” Although she was certain, with an aching coldness, that she knew. There was only one explanation as to why no one had known before, why Corriden Wade had not told anyone, not told her or Rathbone. It explained so much: Rhys’s fear, his cruelty and rejection of his mother, his silence. She remembered with a sick pain the bell removed to the dresser, out of his reach.
“I’ll protect you,” she promised fiercely. “I’ll see that the warders are with you all the time, or I will be, every moment, I swear. Now tell me.”
Slowly, in agonized and broken words, in a whisper as if he could not bear to hear it himself, he told her of the night his father died.
The door burst open and Corriden Wade came in, bag in his hand, his face haggard, his eyes dark and furious. The two warders were just behind him, looming awkwardly.
“What are you doing, Miss Latterly?” Wade demanded, staring at Rhys’s white, strained face and wild eyes. “Leave me to my patient, please. He is obviously deeply distressed.” He turned to the warders. “I shall need clean water, several bowls of it, and bandages. Perhaps Miss Latterly can go and obtain those. She will be aware of my needs—”
“I think not,” Hester said abruptly, moving to stand between Rhys and Wade. She looked at the warder. “Please will you fetch Sir Oliver Rathbone, immediately. Mr. Duff wants to make a statement. It is imperative you do this with all possible speed. I am sure you understand the urgency … and the importance.”
“Mr. Duff cannot speak,” Wade said with contempt. “This tragedy has obviously unnerved Miss Latterly, not surprisingly. Perhaps you had better take her out, see if you can—”
“Fetch Sir Oliver!” Hester repeated loudly, facing the warder. “Go!”
The man hesitated. The doctor’s authority he understood. He would always obey a man before a woman, any woman.
“Fetch my lawyer,” Rhys said hoarsely. “I want to make a statement before I die.”
The blood drained from Wade’s face.
The warder gasped. “Go get ’im, Joe,” he said quickly. “I’ll wait ’ere.”
The other warder turned on his heel and obeyed.
Hester stood without moving.
“This is preposterous,” Wade began, moving as if to push his way past, but the warder took him by the shoulder. Medicine was beyond him, but dying statements he understood.
“Let go of me!” Wade commanded furiously.
“I’m sorry, sir,” the warder said stiffly. “But we’ll wait for the lawyer afore we start any treatment on the prisoner. ’E’s well enough for now. The nurse ’ere saw ter ’im. You jus’ stand ’ere patient, like, an’ as soon as the lawyer’s done ’is bit, you can treat all yer need.”
Wade opened his mouth as if to argue and saw the futility of it. He stood as if trapped, waiting for a moment to escape.
Rhys looked at Hester.
She smiled back at him, then turned and remained facing Wade and the warder. She felt sick with disillusion.
The minutes ticked by.
