William Monk 09 - A Breach of Promise

receive reparation from him for the slight to her honor and her reputation.
    Rathbone looked across to where she sat beside her father. Her expression was completely unguarded. Disbelief and confusion were so naked those next to her were for once ashamed to stare. She barely understood what had been suggested. Rathbone doubted she was familiar with much of the intimacy of normal love, let alone that between man and man. Most girls of her age and station learned little before their wedding nights. He felt profoundly sorry for her. She sat rigid, staring straight ahead as if at some disaster she could not tear herself from. He had seen such wide, fixed eyes and unmoving lips when he had had to tell people of unexpected deaths, or that a case was lost and they would face a fearful sentence. In that moment he had no doubt at all that Zillah had truly loved Melville, whether he was aware of it or not. However blindly, for whatever reason, it was a terrible wrong he had done her.
    He looked at Barton Lambert beside her. His expression was completely different. His skin was red with anger and frustration. He turned one way then another, ignoring his wife, who was speaking quietly to him, her cheeks also flushed. Had either of them any idea what they had done to their daughter? Had they allowed their anger, their ambition, their intellectual understanding of the injury Melville had inflicted upon her toobscure any sensitivity or imagination to her inner world? She might have to live with the turmoil of thought and the pain of loss, of having been deceived and misled, of wondering what she had done to produce the wrong, or why she had failed to see it.
    He wondered briefly, and pointlessly, if Sacheverall had actually spoken to Lambert as he had asked. He thought not. Sacheverall was still relishing his victory, standing, smiling very slightly, surveying the jury, avoiding the judge’s eye.
    McKeever adjourned the court, announcing that they would resume again the following morning, when Rathbone could put forward the case for the defense.
    There was a scramble to leave the public gallery. No doubt journalists would be weighing what they would say and composing it in their minds as they snatched cabs back to Fleet Street. Rathbone could imagine, but nothing that came to his mind would show a shred of compassion and very little reticence. Killian Melville was a well-known figure; so was Barton Lambert. Zillah was young and pretty. There would be plenty of interest.
    Rathbone looked at Melville, who straightened his back slowly and lifted his face. He looked appalling, as if he felt so ill he might faint. It was impossible to begin to imagine what he must be feeling.
    “I think we should leave,” Rathbone said to him quietly. “We cannot speak here.”
    Melville swallowed with difficulty. “There’s nothing to say,” he answered between dry lips. “I never meant to hurt Zillah … or Isaac. And I seem to have done both. Zillah will recover. She will be all right.” He screwed up his face as if feeling a physical pain deep inside his body. “What will happen to Isaac? Will he be ruined? Will they try to send him to jail?”
    This was no time for false hope for Wolff or for Melville himself. Sacheverall’s face should have swept any such delusions away.
    “They may. If it is prosecuted there is really very littledefense. It is something people don’t usually bother with—if no one under the age of consent is involved and no nuisance is caused by acts in public.”
    Melville started to laugh, quietly, but with a wild desperation that warned it would turn to weeping any moment.
    For once Rathbone did not even consider propriety, or even what his professional reputation would suffer. He put his hand on Melville’s shoulder and gripped him hard, even prepared to support him physically if necessary.
    “Come,” he ordered. “The least we can do is offer you a little privacy. They’ve had their pound of flesh; let us deny them the pleasure of carving it off and watching the blood.” And he half hauled Melville to his feet, pulling him through the press of people, elbowing them out of his way with uncharacteristic roughness.
    Out in the hallway, Melville straightened up. “Thank you,” he said shakily. “But I am composed now. I shall be … all right.”
    He looked appalling. His skin was flushed and his lips dry. But his eyes were unflinching, and there was a kind of wild, black humor in them. He still knew