William Monk 07 - Weighed in the Balance

life, is a pain I do not think I can bear. I am beside myself with grief.
    “ ’If she does not withdraw absolutely, and confess she was intoxicated or mad, I shall have to take her to court. I shall loathe every second of it, but I have no choice. I will not have Friedrich spoken of so—I will not have our love defiled. To my everlasting grief and loneliness, I could not save his life, but I will save his reputation as the man I loved and adored above all others. I will not, I will not have the world suppose I betrayed him.
    “ ’I remain your indebted friend, Gisela.’ ”
    She let the paper rest on the railing and looked up at Harvester, her face white, struggling to keep her composure.
    No one was looking at her; almost every eye was on Gisela, even if all they could see was her profile. Several women in the gallery sniffed audibly, and one juror sat staring fixedly and blinking rapidly. Another blew his nose unnecessarily hard.
    Harvester cleared his throat.
    “I think we can safely assume that Princess Gisela was deeply distressed by this turn of events, and it caused her even greater pain above that which she already suffered in her bereavement.”
    Lady Wellborough nodded.
    Harvester invited Rathbone to question the witness.
    Rathbone declined. He heard the rustle of surprise from the gallery, and his eye caught the movement of a juror and the disbelief in his face. But there was nothing at all he could do. In such a desperate situation anything he said would only give Lady Wellborough the opportunity to repeat her evidence.
    The judge adjourned the court for luncheon, and Rathbone strode past Harvester and went immediately to the private room where he could speak to Zorah alone, almost dragging her with him, leaving the ugly mutters or grumbles of the crowd as the gallery was cleared.
    “Gisela did not kill Friedrich,” he said the moment the door was closed. “I have no evidence to make your charge even seem reasonable, let alone true! For heaven’s sake, withdraw now. Admit you spoke out of emotion and were mistaken—”
    “I was not mistaken,” she said flatly, her green eyes calm and perfectly level. “I will not abandon the truth simply because it has become uncomfortable. I am surprised that you think I might. Is this the courage in the face of fire which earned you an empire?”
    “Charging into the enemy’s guns may make you a name in history,” he said acidly. “But it is an idiotic sacrifice of life. It’s all very poetic, but the reality is death, agony, crippled bodies and widows weeping at home, mothers who never see their sons again. It is more than time you stopped dreaming and looked at life as it is.” He heard his voice growing higher and louder and he could not help it. He was clenching his fists until his muscles ached, and without being aware of it, he chopped his hand up and down in the air. “Did you not hear that letter? Didn’t you look at the jurors’ faces? Gisela is a heroine, the ideal of their romantic imagination! You have attacked her with a charge you cannot prove, and that makes you a villain. Nothing I can say is going to change that. If I counterattack it will make it worse.”
    She stood quite still, her face pale, her shoulders squared, her voice low and a little shaky.
    “You give up too easily. We have barely begun. No sensible person makes a decision when he has heard only one side of a story. And sensible or not, the jury is obliged to wait and hear us as well. Is that not what the law is for, to allow both sides to put forward their case?”
    “You have no case!” he shouted, then instantly regretted losing his self-control. It was undignified and served no purpose whatever. He should never have allowed himself to become so uncontrolled. “You have no case,” he repeated in a calmer voice. ’The very best we can do is present evidenceindicating that Friedrich was murdered by someone, but we cannot possibly prove it was Gisela! You will have to withdraw and apologize sooner or later, or suffer the full punishment the law may decide, and it may be very high indeed. You will lose your reputation …”
    “Reputation.” She laughed a little nervously. “Do you not think I have lost that already, Sir Oliver? All I have left now is what little money my family settled on me, and if she takes that, she is welcome. She cannot take my integrity or wit, or my beliefs.”
    Rathbone opened his mouth to argue, and then conceded the total