William Monk 11 - Slaves of Obsession

evennow she does not abandon. But murder is a deed he cannot walk away from with impunity. We shall show him so!” And he turned to Rathbone with an inviting gesture of his hand. “But please give us your best efforts to try … when the court reconvenes tomorrow.”

11
    M
ONK WAS ANGRY
on the witness stand, but once the court had adjourned for the day and the heat of antagonism had died down, his feelings were different. Hester had gone with Judith Alberton. Casbolt had been there also, but perhaps a sense of decorum had prevented him from remaining too close to her.
    The other, far uglier thought came unbidden—that perhaps he was beginning to suspect that Alberton himself had been involved in the sale of the extra five hundred guns to the pirates, and had been betrayed by them, and he could not bear Judith to know it. He did not want to face having to lie, nor did he know enough to tell her beyond doubt. Perhaps Alberton had intended that she should never know.
    How much does one protect the people one loves? What is protection, and what is stifling, denial of their right to be themselves, to make their own choices? He would bitterly have resented such protection himself. He would have felt it belittled him and made him less than equal.
    The sun was fading a little in the street, but the air was still hot from the day. The slanted light was hazy and the dust rose in clouds from the dry cobbles.
    Monk had looked at Breeland from the witness-box and wondered what he felt, what emotions there were under his cold exterior. He had never been able to read him except perhaps on the battlefield at Manassas. There his passion, his dedication and his disillusion had all been naked. But hewas an acutely private man. He seemed driven to speak of his ideals to rid America of slavery, but whatever more personal, human emotions he felt he could not show. It was almost as if his fire were all in the mind, nothing in the heart or the blood.
    Was it actually an evasion of real feeling, a way of making sure the object of his passion never asked of him anything he could not govern, direct, guard from hurting him?
    Love was not like that. No choice could be made between the giving and the taking. He saw that in Philo Trace’s eyes as he looked at Judith Alberton. Trace held no hope of receiving anything from her more than friendship, and perhaps he would not have withdrawn his help from her if she had refused even that. Whether he could have escaped from it was irrelevant. He had not tried to. There was no meanness of spirit in him, no self-regarding, at least where she was concerned.
    But was Monk thinking of Philo Trace or what he himself had learned of love?
    He crossed the street and continued walking. He passed a muffin seller, barely aware of her.
    He had never intended to love Hester. He had realized very early in their acquaintance that she had the power to hurt him, to demand of him a depth of commitment he had no intention of giving. All the life he could remember he had avoided such a loss of his freedom.
    And he had lost it anyway. She had effectively taken it from him, whether he wished it or not.
    That was not true. He had chosen to embrace the fullness of living, instead of playing on the edge and lying to himself that he was retaining control, when all he was doing was abstaining from experience, running away from himself.
    He despised cowardice as much as he did self-deception.
    He hailed the next hansom and gave the driver his address in Fitzroy Street. He could not go back on his decision, whatever it cost.
    He had been home for nearly an hour when Hester came in. She looked tired and frightened. She hesitated even beforeshe took off her jacket. It was linen, of the dusty blue-gray she liked so well. Her eyes searched his anxiously.
    He knew what disturbed her, more even than her fear for Judith or Merrit Alberton. It was his evasion over the last few days, the distance he had opened between them. He must bridge it now, whatever the result.
    “How is she?” he asked. The words were trivial. He could have asked her anything. What mattered was that he met her eyes.
    She saw the difference. It was almost as if he had touched her with the old intimacy. Something inside her warmed like a flower opening.
    “She is frightened for Merrit,” she answered. “I hope Oliver can make as powerful an argument as Deverill did. I wish Breeland would reach out to Merrit. She looks so alone there.” Again it was not the