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Rathbone shrugged, yielding the point. “Then what?”
Brancaster let out his breath slowly. “Hatred.”
Rathbone was startled and then seized with a coldness inside.
“Of whom?”
“Of you,” Brancaster replied. “There may be other incentives. I still have no idea what’s really behind this whole thing. As we keep saying, we can only conclude he was paid, but we have no idea why, or by whom.”
“We shouldn’t have to prove that to get a verdict,” Rathbone answered, but he wished he felt more certain of it. He did not argue that Pryor had no personal hatred of him. He simply had not realized it was so deep. The man’s vanity was more easily wounded than he thought, his visions of glory too bright.
“And Lydiate,” Brancaster continued. “He was forced into taking the investigation in the beginning, and perhaps also into conducting it a certain way. But he’s not a fool. He couldn’t have missed so much.”
Rathbone felt the weight of this case settle even more heavily on him, as if he were hemmed in on every side. He looked at Brancaster, seeing in him also the signs of weariness, fear, even surrender.
Brancaster smiled bleakly, as if Rathbone had spoken it aloud. “It could cost us dear,” he said softly.
“Cost you,” Rathbone pointed out. “I have no office, and I’m honestly not sure what chances I have of being allowed back in the future. I wish I could take the risks for you, but I’ve denied myself that.”
Brancaster gave a short bark of laughter. “I’ve always admired you. I even wanted to be like you. It rather looks as if I still do. I’m following this to the end. Give me the papers on York.” He put out his hand.
Rathbone passed the case to him, yielding it reluctantly, even though it was what he had come to do. He was giving control of it to someone else, along with what was left of York’s reputation, and the silence that might save at least something of it for Beata.
WHEN THE TRIAL RESUMED about two hours later, Brancaster rose to his feet. His body was tense. He looked utterly different from the man Rathbone had left in his chambers a little after eight.
“My lord,” Brancaster began before Pryor had a chance to call his first witness of the day.
Rathbone stiffened also, feeling his breath catch in his throat. Why was Brancaster speaking already? It was inappropriate to introduce the evidence on York in this way. He should have spoken to Antrobus first, privately. What was the matter with him?
Antrobus raised his eyebrows and held up his hand to silence Pryor, who was now also on his feet, his face set in anger.
“This had better be important, Mr. Brancaster,” Antrobus warned.
Rathbone even considered standing as well, then realized with a sick knot in his stomach that he had no more right or power here than any other person sitting in the gallery. This was the real bitter cost of his action in the Taft case, and he had brought it upon himself. Now all
he could do was sit here in silence and watch Brancaster lose the biggest case of his life. He had given away his own weapons, and lost all the good he could have done.
“It is, my lord,” Brancaster said quietly. “And I apologize for doing this at such short notice, but I received vital news only this morning, or I would have presented it to you, and to the defense, at a more fortunate time.”
“My lord,” Pryor protested, “this is preposterous! The prosecution is desperate and is putting on an ill-considered and—”
“Mr. Pryor!” Antrobus said sharply. “Am I the only one here who is unaware of what Mr. Brancaster is going to say?”
Pryor was caught on the wrong foot. “No, my lord … I … I am speaking of his melodramatic …” He stopped. Antrobus’s stare would have turned a glass of water to ice.
Rathbone buried his face in his hands, and no one took the slightest notice of him.
“Mr. Brancaster?” Antrobus’s voice was polite and knife-edged.
Brancaster swallowed. “Yes, my lord. I have a new witness who has just come forward. Unfortunately illness prevented his being aware of the value of his information, but his testimony explains all those aspects of the tragic sinking of the Princess Mary that have confused the issue until now.”
Pryor threw his hands up in disgust. “For heaven’s sake! This exhibition of—of gamesmanship is absurd, and offensive! Two hundred people died in—”
“Four hundred people were murdered!” Brancaster shot back at him. “And British justice was held up to ridicule, like blind men chasing each other in the dark!”
“Two hundred!” Pryor snapped. “For God’s sake, man, sober up! You are behaving like something out of a seaside farce!”
Antrobus glared at him. “I know you are an ambitious man, Mr. Pryor, but you will not yet usurp my place in this court. I decide what is evidence and what is not.”
