William Monk 05 - The Sins of the Wolf

the time, and no interest,” Quinlan went on in a clear, relentless voice. “Now I fear I may have witnessed something very terrible, andmy failure to grasp its meaning has cost Miss Latterly the most dreadful experience imaginable, to be charged with the murder of her patient and tried for her life.”
    Argyll looked flushed, almost stunned.
    “I see,” he said with a choking voice. “Thank you, Mr. Fyffe. That must have been very difficult for you to reveal, prejudicing your own family as it does. The court appreciates your honesty.” If there was sarcasm in his mind, it barely touched his lips.
    Quinlan said nothing.
    Gilfeather rose immediately to cross-examine. He attacked Quinlan, his accuracy, his motives, his honesty, but he failed in all. Quinlan was quiet, firm and unshakable; if anything, his confidence grew. Gilfeather quickly realized his position was only damaged by pursuing it, and with only one bitter, angry movement, he resumed his seat.
    Rathbone could barely contain himself. He wished to tell Argyll a hundred things about his summing up, what to say, above all what to avoid. It was simple. To play on emotion, the love of courage and honor, not to overplay the reference to Miss Nightingale, but he had no opportunity, and on reflection, perhaps that was best. Argyll knew it all.
    It was masterful; all the emotion was there, but concealed, latent rather than overt. He led them by their own passions, not his. When he sat down there was no sound in the room except the squeak as the judge sat forward and ordered the jury to retire and consider its verdict.
    Then began the longest and the briefest time conceivable, between the moment when the die is cast and that when it falls.
    It was one desperate, unbearable hour.
    They filed back, their faces pale. They looked at no one, not at Argyll or Gilfeather, and what brought Rathbone’s heart to his mouth, not at Hester.
    “Have you reached your verdict, gentlemen?” the judge asked the foreman.
    “We have, my lord,” he replied.
    “Is it the verdict of you all?”
    “It is, my lord.”
    “How do you find the prisoner, guilty or not guilty?”
    “My lord, we find the case not proven.”
    There was a thunderous silence, an emptiness ringing in the ears.
    “Not proven?” the judge said with a lift of incredulity.
    “Yes, my lord, not proven.”
    Slowly the judge turned to Hester, his expression bitter.
    “You have heard the verdict, Miss Latterly. You are not exonerated, but you are free to go.”

11
    “W
HAT DOES IT MEAN?”
Hester asked intently, staring at Rathbone. They were in the sitting room of the lodgings Callandra had taken while in Edinburgh for the trial. Hester was to stay with her at least for this night, and the reconsideration could be made in the morning. Rathbone was sitting in a hard-backed chair, too charged with emotion to relax in one of the spacious softer ones. Monk stood by the mantelshelf, half leaning on it, his face dark, his brows drawn down in concentration. Callandra herself seemed more at ease. She and Henry Rathbone sat opposite on the sofa silently.
    “It means that you are neither innocent nor guilty,” Rathbone replied, pulling a face. “It is not a verdict we have in England. Argyll explained it to me.”
    “They think I am guilty, but they are not really quite sure enough to hang me,” Hester said with a catch in her voice. “Can they try me again?”
    “It means they think you’re guilty, but they can’t damned well prove it,” Monk put in bitterly. He turned to Rathbone, his Up curled. “Can they try her again?”
    “No. In that respect it is the same as a verdict of not guilty.”
    “But people will always wonder,” Hester said grimly, her face very pale. She was perfectly aware of what it meant. She had seen the expressions of the people in the gallery, even those who were truly uncertain of her guilt. Who would hire as a nurse a woman who might be a murderess?The fact that she also might not was hardly a recommendation.
    No one answered immediately. She looked at Monk, not that she expected comfort from him, but possibly because she did not. His face would reflect the worst she would find, the plain and bitter truth.
    He stared back at her with such a blazing anger that for a moment she was frightened. Even during the trial of Percival in the Moidore case, she had never seen such a barely controllable rage in him.
    “I wish I could say otherwise,” Rathbone said very softly. “But