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Breeland did not hesitate. “No.” His gaze was unflinching.
Rathbone had not meant to look at the jury, but in spite of himself he did. He saw the coldness in their faces. They believed Breeland, but they did not like him for it. In some subtle way he had enlarged a gulf between himself and Merrit. Her loyalty was to him; his was to his cause. It was not what he had said which jarred; it was the manner in which he said it, and perhaps it was also what he did not say.
“Have you any idea how the watch came to be in Tooley Street?” Rathbone asked.
“None at all,” Breeland responded. “Except that it was not dropped by either Miss Alberton or myself. She arrived at my apartments at about half-past nine, and remained there with me until we both left a little before midnight, when the note came from Shearer that Mr. Alberton had changed his mind and was willing to sell the guns to the Union after all. Then we left together and went to the Euston Square station, and from there to Liverpool.” He summed up the entire story in a few sentences, leaving Rathbone less to draw from him than he had intended, but it was spontaneous and spoken with such force that perhaps it was better than a carefully guided response would have been.
“Were you surprised by the note from Shearer?” Rathbone began, then was aware of Deverill rising to his feet. “I apologize, my lord,” he said quickly. “The note that purported to come from Shearer?”
“I was amazed,” Breeland conceded.
“But you did not doubt it?”
“No. I knew the justice of my cause. I believed that Alberton had at last realized it himself, and that the issue of freedom from slavery was far greater than the business dealings, or the reputation for honor, of any one man. I admired him for it.”
There was total silence in the room. Rathbone felt as if a kind of darkness had descended over him. He drew in his breath with difficulty. Breeland had in a few moments laid bare his philosophy and shown them an indifference to the individual which was like a breath of ice, a road whose end could not be known.
Rathbone looked at the jury and saw that they did not yet perceive the fullness of what Breeland had said, but Deverill did. Victory was in his eyes.
Rathbone heard his voice in the high-ceilinged room as if it were someone else’s, echoing strangely. He must continue, play it out to the very last word.
“Did you show the note to Miss Alberton?”
“No. I had no reason to. It was important to pack up my few belongings and leave as quickly as possible. He had allowed us very little time to get to the Euston Square station.” Breeland was quite unaware of there having been any change. Nothing was altered in him, not the set of his shoulders, his hands gripping the rail, the confidence in his voice. “I told her what it said, and she was overjoyed … naturally.”
“Yes … naturally,” Rathbone repeated. Detail by detail he took Breeland through the ride to the station, a description of the place, of the guards, of Shearer himself, of the train and all the passengers in the carriage they shared. It coincided with Merrit’s description so honestly he began for a moment to feel hope again. All the events and people were recognizable as the same she had seen, and yet with a sufficiently different perception, a different use of words, that it was clear they were not copied from each other, or rehearsed.
He even noticed a couple of jurors nodding, candor in their expressions, acceptance. Perhaps they too had made the journey from Euston to Liverpool and knew the truth of what Breeland was saying.
In the afternoon he took him more briefly through the voyage across the Atlantic and his short stay in America.
Deverill interrupted to ask if any of this was relevant.
“I do not doubt, my lord, that Mr. Breeland bought the guns for the Union army, or that he believes unequivocally in its cause. It is not difficult to see why any man might wish to abolish slavery in his own land, or any other. Nor do we doubt that he fought at Manassas, probably bravely, as did many others.” He lowered his voice. “That he would pay any price whatever for Union victory is only too tragically clear. That he should sacrifice others to it is the substance of our charge.”
“It is not my aim to prove that,” Rathbone argued, knowing he was telling less than the truth, and that Deverill knew it also. “I wished to show that his treatment of Miss Alberton was always honorable and quite open, even when Monk and Trace were in Washington, because he knew he was innocent of any crime and had no cause to fear them.”
Deverill smiled. “I apologize. You were so far from it I had not realized that was your aim. Please continue.”
Rathbone was foundering, and they both knew it. But he could not now retreat. He took Breeland through his confrontation on the battlefield with Monk and Trace, and his acceptance of returning to England.
“You offered no resistance?”
“No. Many men can fight the physical battle in America,” Breeland answered. “Only I can answer here for my actions, and fight the moral cause by persuading you here in England that our cause is just and our behavior honorable. I bought guns openly and paid a fair price for them. The only person I deceived was Philo Trace, and that is the fortune of war. He would expect it of me, as I would of him. We are enemies, even if we treat each other politely if we chance to meet in London. We are not barbarians.”
He cleared his throat. “I am not afraid to answer for my acts before a court of law, and I wish you to think of my people as the just and brave men they are.” He lifted his chin slightly, staring straight ahead of him. “The time will come when you will have to choose between the Union and the Confederacy. This war will not cease until one side has destroyed the other. I will give everything I have, my life, my freedom if necessary, to ensure that it is the Union that wins.”
Rathbone looked up at Merrit and saw the flash of pride in her face, and that it cost her an effort. He thought he also saw a deepening shadow of loneliness.
There was a very slight murmur of applause from somewhere in the back of the court, instantly hushed.
Deverill’s smile widened, but there was also a flicker of uncertainty in it. He wanted the jury to think he was confident, perhaps that he perceived something they did not. It was a game of bluff and double bluff.
Rathbone could play it too. At the moment it was all he had.
“I cannot imagine that there is any man here who does not share your sentiments,” he said very clearly. “It is not our war, and we grieve for your country, and we hope profoundly that some better solution may be found than the slaughter of armies and the ruin of the land. We have no desire to take the freedom of an innocent man who is serving his people in such a cause.” He bowed very slightly, as if the battle against slavery were the question at issue.
His achievement was short-lived. Deverill rose to cross-examine Breeland, swaggering very slightly into the center of the floor. He began with a broad, dramatic gesture.
