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“I don’t know how much detail you wish me to tell,” he began, then had to stop and clear his throat.
“All that is necessary for the court to understand is the nature of the photographs, and how it is that you possess them,” Brancaster instructed.
There was no escape. The truth must be told publicly. Rathbone could see Margaret in the gallery, well toward the front. She was here to watch his humiliation, the end of the career she thought he had placed before honor or loyalty. He could not protect her from the facts anymore.
When he began, his voice was surprisingly steady.
“There was a club created by a man of very comfortable means,” he said. “So far as I know he did not indulge in obscene pastimes himself, but he understood the excitement some men feel when they deliberately expose themselves to intense danger. The photographs I have mentioned were the initiation rite to this particular club. It was in a way a safeguard to each member; a way to ensure no one spoke about the obscenities being practiced by all of them.”
No one moved. No one even attempted to interrupt him.
He took a deep breath and swallowed hard. His mouth was dry. Then he continued. “They were also a perfect tool for blackmail. The man who created the club told me that the photographs were never used merely to extort money, and I believed him. It was always about power. He said that the first time he used one, it was to oblige a senior judge to rule on a case in such a way that a factory owner would be forced to stop the effluent from his works polluting the drinking water of a large number of poor people who were becoming diseased, even dying, as a result.” Again he took a deep breath. He felt as if his pounding heart was shaking his whole body. “At first I was repulsed by the idea of such blackmail, no matter the ultimate outcome. Then I thought of the children dying of the poison in the water, and the factory owner’s refusal to sacrifice some of his profit to clean it up.” His voice was growing stronger, the pain inside him easing. “I wondered-if I had the same power, would I refuse to use it and let the children die? Would it be better to cost many innocent people their health, merely to keep my hands clean of such methods?”
There seemed to be not even a breath drawn in the room.
“He chose to use the weapon he had,” Rathbone said. “I do not blame him for that.”
There were murmurs now, voices in the gallery.
“That was the only specific example he gave me, but he said there were others like it,” Rathbone continued. “I did look up that case, and the judgment. He was speaking the truth. The industrialist he mentioned had steadily refused to yield until the judgment went against him. I also know the photograph existed because I have seen it.”
“That is very frightening indeed,” Brancaster said grimly. “But it does not explain how you come to have these photographs now.”
“I was still horrified,” Rathbone went on. He knew there was no escape now. It was far too late. “I participated in the closure of the two different clubs involved. The whole situation included the murder of a man who ran one of them, a man named Mickey Parfitt. It was investigated by the police. The man was of the dregs of humanity, but murder is still a crime, no matter who the victim or who the offender.”
He looked at last at Margaret, and saw her staring back at him. Her face was twisted in anger and so white she seemed bloodless. There was no going back now.
“Sir Oliver …” Brancaster prompted him again.
“The man accused of the murder was prosecuted,” Rathbone resumed. He was finding it difficult to speak. His mouth was so dry it was blurring his words. “I was asked to defend him, and to begin with I believed him innocent. Then another person was also murdered, a young woman who was no more than a witness. It soon became clear that her death was planned by this man, in order to keep her from testifying. But I still did all I could to defend him, because that was my duty before the law, no matter what my own feelings. I tried everything I could think of, but I failed. He was found guilty, and sentenced to be hanged.”
Brancaster did not move or speak. No one in the entire court seemed to do more than breathe.
“He asked me after the sentence was handed down to visit him,” Rathbone went on. His voice suddenly sounded loud in his own ears. “I did so. That was when he told me of the existence of scores more photographs. He said that if I did not find a way to save him from the rope they would fall into the hands of someone he trusted, and the blackmail would go on. I would have no power to stop it, and the foundations of everything we value would be undermined. He told me there were judges; government ministers; bishops; leaders of industry, science, and the army and navy; even distant members of the royal family involved, if not captured in the pictures themselves.”
Rathbone felt again the desperation with which he, Hester, and Monk had searched everywhere they could think of for those damned photographs.
“And you found them?” Brancaster asked in the total silence that followed.
“No,” Rathbone replied. “I went back to plead with him, and … and I found him murdered in prison.” The horror of that scene crept over his skin again like an infestation of lice. “It … it made me realize just how wide and how deep this circle of corruption went. The police never found out who killed him.”
“But you did not find the photographs?” Brancaster’s voice cracked as he spoke.
“No,” Rathbone answered. “That was the bitter irony. They found me. The man had left them with his solicitor, left them to me in his will, to be delivered to me as a final punishment for not having saved him.”
Brancaster smiled bitterly. “And this man you refer to-that would be your father-in-law, Arthur Ballinger?”
“Yes,” Rathbone said huskily. “It would.”
In her seat in the second row, Margaret sat like stone, as if she would never move again.
Rathbone would have spared her that. But there was nothing he could do. The reality was there in the courtroom like something alive, unstoppable.
“Thank you, Sir Oliver,” Brancaster said with a sigh. He turned to Wystan.
Wystan rose to his feet stiffly.
“It paints a very clear picture, my lord. I imagine Mr. Brancaster will be calling other witnesses to verify your story. For the sake of many people who may be implicated, I would like to reserve my questions until that has been done.”
