William Monk 19 - Blind Justice

sin almost as terrible as stealing their lives?
    What does a good, simple man suffer if he is betrayed by the servants of the God he trusted? Who does he turn to then?
    The law. And if the law not only allows the injustice to stand but also permits him to be mocked by his peers and ridiculed by those who have robbed him, who then can he turn to?
    One by one Rathbone looked through the photographs. Perhaps his memory had led him astray and Drew was not here, only someone who looked a bit like him. Then there was no dilemma.
    He was halfway through and the sights in front of him were vile enough to turn his stomach. He could not imagine subjecting an animal to the pain and humiliation these children endured. It was some comfort to know that Jericho Phillips had died hideously, in terror. But that was only revenge; it did not undo what had happened.
    If Drew were among these pictures, was that justification for Rathbone to punish him? No, of course it wasn’t.
    Should he have handed over all the photographs as soon as he had them from Ballinger’s estate? No. Too much of society would collapse under the weight, and the horror, of what they revealed. There were pictures of prominent men in this small, heavy box—judges, members of Parliament, of the Church, high society, the army and navy. All were weak men, but perhaps some were guilty of only one drunken excursion into this cesspit of indulgence, a moment they would deeply and painfully regret for the rest of their lives. Did they deserve to be ruined?
    Then there it was in his hands, a clear, completely unmistakable photograph of Robertson Drew. It was as he had remembered, Drew staring at the camera, defying it to curb his pleasure.
    Rathbone could not look at the child’s face.
    He separated the photograph from the others, moved it to the front of the pile and put them all away. He closed the lid of the box and locked it again. He replaced it where it had been in the safe, completelyconcealed. He hid the key, also in a place he believed no one would look, in plain sight, and yet unrecognizable.
    He was sweating, and yet he was cold.
    He took the brandy decanter and poured himself a stiff drink, then stood by the window with the curtains undrawn and gazed at the evening breeze stirring the branches of the trees. In the last light the leaves fluttered and turned, one moment pale, the next shadowed.
    He had never felt more alone.
    He finished the brandy and put his glass down again. He had not tasted it; it could have been cold tea.
    What was the right thing to do?
    Not to act is to condone what is happening, tacitly even to become part of it. He alone had the power to act—he had the photograph.
    Later, he lay awake, alone in the big bed, battling with himself. Should he intervene or not? What was the brave thing to do? What was the honorable thing?
    Whatever he did it was a decision both he and others would have to live with for the rest of their lives.
    By morning, tired, head aching, he had still reached no definite conclusion.

CHAPTER
5
    W HEN THE TRIAL OF Abel Taft resumed the following morning, Blair Gavinton rose to his feet and straightaway recalled Robertson Drew.
    Rathbone sat on his high, carved judge’s seat slightly above the body of the court. He felt as if he had sand in his eyes, and his mouth was as dry as wool. The photograph was seared so deeply on his mind it might as well have burned a scorch mark onto his retina.
    The jury, to his right, sat in two rows. They looked refreshed. Perhaps they were no longer struggling with decisions. Drew’s testimony could have made up their minds for them. Taft was an innocent man, the victim of misfortune and the distress and malice of lesser people, followers who could not keep up the pace of his Christian charity. It was a nice comfortable answer. They would all feel happier with it, sorry for Bicknor and Sawley, especially sorry for John Raleigh, but essentially identifying with Drew—as Gavinton had intended.
    Rathbone watched Drew as he climbed the steps and took his placein the witness box again. Was he still the same man inside who had raped that child in front of the camera? Or had he repented of that, perhaps bitterly and with tears of horror and remorse, even secretly paid what penance he could? Was his joining of Abel Taft’s Church an act of contrition, a plea for God’s mercy as regards his past?
    And if it were, or were not, had Rathbone any right to judge the man for it, and exact the