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The morning began as the one before had, a breakfast of bread he could barely swallow and tea that was revolting. He took it all, to steady himself. He could not allow his nerves to betray him now.
Even so, he was sure his legs were shaking as he walked across the open floor to climb up the steps to the witness stand. Certainly he had to grip the railing to keep his balance. How ridiculous he would look if he fell down the stairway. Worse than that, he might injure himself, break an ankle. He would be vulnerable enough in prison without having broken bones.
But the humiliation of being carried off, unable even to testify, would be the worst. Was Beata York here today? He did not want to know. Would he look for Henry Rathbone’s face in the gallery? He was not even certain about that.
He had reached the top of the steps and held onto the rail, taking the Bible in his other hand and swearing on it to tell the truth.
What was the point of that? Didn’t accused men usually lie? Wasn’t that somewhat taken for granted? He could tell the truth as exactly and honorably as he wished, and most of the people here would still think him a liar.
He must look at Brancaster and concentrate. This was his only chance. The rest of his life depended on what he said now.
Brancaster was standing in front of him, looking up, his face intensely serious.
“Sir Oliver,” Brancaster began. “You have heard Mr. Wystan suggest that there might be a number of obscene photographs similar to the one of a witness in the trial of Abel Taft, a trial over which you presided. Do you know if indeed there are other such photographs?”
Rathbone cleared his throat. It was so tight he gulped before he could find his voice.
“Yes. There are nearly three score that I know of.”
“Really? So many. How do you know of them?”
“I … I have them.” How bold and ugly that sounded.
There was a rustle of movement in the gallery, gusts of breath let out, murmurs of disgust.
“I see,” Brancaster pursed his lips. “Do you know who is in them?”
“Not all of them. Of course, the one I gave Mr. Warne in the Taft trial, and one or two others.”
“How is it that you don’t know who is in all of them, if you own them?” Brancaster tried to look curious and succeeded only in looking wretched.
No one objected or interrupted, though York was drumming his fingers on the bench.
“I looked at them once,” Rathbone replied, remembering the incident with revulsion. “I should have destroyed them then, but I did not.”
“Why not?” Brancaster asked.
Ra
thbone thought back. “I recognized some of the faces. I was … stunned, horrified. As Mr. Wystan suggested, there are among the abusers men of great power and privilege. The man who possessed them before I did used them-at first to force those men into doing the right thing, saving lives rather than destroying them. I thought I might do the same. That was a mistake. Such power corrupts more than I realized. And-” He stopped abruptly. Was he telling the whole truth? Did he really wish he had destroyed them all? After all, he had done some good with them. Exactly as Arthur Ballinger had done, in the beginning. It was Ballinger’s final revenge: to make Rathbone into what he himself had become. Exquisite. If he were somewhere in a hell of his own and could see this, he would be savoring it. There was a perfect irony to it.
“You were going to say …?” Brancaster pressed him.
“And I am not immune,” Rathbone said bitterly.
“You spoke of a previous owner,” Brancaster observed. “Who was it? And how did you come to own them?”
York looked sharply at Wystan, but Wystan did not move.
Rathbone realized with a flood of amazement that Wystan intended Brancaster to uncover this story. He had perceived a greater purpose than merely convicting Rathbone of having transgressed the law in the trial of Taft. There was a greater issue at stake. Had that been Brancaster’s game all along? If so, it was dangerous, but perhaps brilliant.
“Sir Oliver?” Brancaster prompted. “However unpleasant the truth, and whoever it implicates, this matter is too grave to remain secret any longer. It is not your own innocence you are protecting, or that of any other individual. The honor and integrity of all our institutions is at stake. Perhaps it would not be too extreme to say it is the core of justice itself, for which you have fought all your professional life, at no matter what cost to yourself. Over and over again you have risked your reputation to defend those whom others had condemned or abandoned.”
Wystan stirred in his seat.
Brancaster knew he would be allowed no more latitude.
Rathbone knew it also.
