Trial by Desire (32 page)

Climbing over the stile into the pasture was even harder than struggling uphill. He slipped on the last rung of the descent, and his bad leg slammed into the ground on the other side. His hands grabbed the splintered wood of the fence rail, just as his limb twisted underneath him. He barely kept from toppling over. Instead, he grasped the post and breathed in.

He could do this.

He could do this.

And perhaps the only reason he was muttering that he could do this in the gray of near dawn was that he couldn’t. The world swayed dizzily about him, even as he clung to the fence. He had no notion of balance any
longer. He wasn’t sure which direction was forward. His mind was fuzzing around the edges, everything turning to uniform gray with the pain.

He wasn’t capable of taking another step. It really couldn’t get any worse.

And then, in the darkness of the night, he heard a sound. The stamping of hooves. A challenge, from an animal frightened because its sleep had been interrupted.

Stay away,
that noise proclaimed.
I am a dangerous stallion.

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

K
ATE COUNTED
close to a hundred unfamiliar faces in the courtroom just before eleven the next morning. Word of the trial must have spread overnight. Perhaps the drunkard had not been so drunk. Or more likely, the sergeants who had been on duty the previous day had boasted of the coming spectacle.

Most of the people in the room Kate could identify only by function. The back two rows were taken up by men, pencils at the ready. Gossip-columnists, caricature artists, no doubt all determined that
his
version of the most sensational trial to grace the police magistrate’s bench would appear in the evening paper. No doubt they would reach their verdict before the magistrate’s gavel even took up the matter.

Kate sat for them, properly polite, her spine straight, her stance relaxed. Nobody would write that she was in tears, or that she’d broken down under the weight of the matter. No doubt there was another set of wagers running about her in the gentlemen’s betting books, and she’d not give those idiots the satisfaction of showing fear.

Besides that, in the front rows sat several people she knew very well.

The Marquess of Blakely and his wife sat on the left. Lord Blakely watched Kate intently. He was not frowning
at her—which was a good start. He was peering at her, as if there were something to see.

He sat close to his wife, both of them meticulously dressed in sober attire. But their faces told the story of a sleepless, troubled night.

For once, Kate knew precisely how Lord and Lady Blakely felt.

In the police courts, Harcroft himself was the one who had to prosecute the case. Even with the jury and the crowded courtroom, she could not count on him to tell the truth. In fact, with half of London guaranteed to learn of this through the gossip rags, it was rather a given that he would lie. Despite—or perhaps because of—that, Harcroft looked as if he had slept the sleep of the innocent. If Kate hadn’t already hated him, she would have despised him now.

Beyond that first row sat a smattering of people Kate knew quite well—Lady Bettony, Lord Worthington—and some she knew by sight and name only, from one of the million
ton
parties.

If they’d cleared away the oaken magistrate’s bench and thrown in an orchestra, this courtroom could have been mistaken for a ball.

But of all the hundred souls packed into this room, not one of them was her husband. She glanced toward the entrance for the seventeenth time. When she did so, she held her chin high, as if she were a lady expecting a morning call.

But, of course, she was. Where was Ned? He’d been riding alone at night. Anything could have happened to him. He might have broken his neck, could have been
set upon by footpads. If she’d been thinking clearly the previous evening, she would have insisted that someone accompany him. As if Ned would have brooked any
assistance.

Kate met Lord Blakely’s eyes across the crowded courtroom again. And for a second, it was as if all of her greatest fears were coming true. He looked at her, and she could imagine what he was thinking. He was castigating her for not telling him, cursing her for letting him waste his time, shaming her for those days of silence while he searched. He could not be thinking kindly of her.

To her surprise, he gave her one simple nod.

The magistrate entered. A jury was sworn. But instead of looking somber at the prospect of deciding her fate, the men exchanged tight smiles, as if to celebrate their luck, to be deciding one of the most talked-of affairs in all of London. Their apparent glee didn’t make Kate feel better about the likelihood of justice.

And then Harcroft began to speak. In the weeks since his wife’s disappearance, Harcroft had actually done an incredible job of scouring up information—better than Kate had expected. He had brought witnesses—the Yorkshire nursemaid’s husband, who brought along the note sent from the agency Kate had used to find her.

Then there was testimony from the stagecoach workers, who testified that Kate had met the nursemaid upon her arrival in London; a statement from one of her grooms, who’d conveyed Kate and an infant in a carriage to Berkswift. Finally, there was a seamstress who’d testified about parcels ordered by Lady Harcroft, but delivered on Kate’s orders to Kate’s house.

Kate had done her best to hide her traces, but once the eye of suspicion had fallen on her, her tracks were indelibly marked. She’d have been convinced of her own guilt, given that evidence.

And by the eyes of the jurors, they agreed with that assessment. After the first fifteen minutes of testimony, not one of them would meet her gaze. They had already come to a decision. She could not even blame them. She
was
guilty. She
had
stolen Harcroft’s wife. She’d just done it for a very good reason.

With that tide of evidence damning her, there was almost no reason for her to speak. Still, it was half eleven when the magistrate motioned Kate forward.

Magistrate Fang eyed her uneasily. He could not
want
a lady convicted, but Kate knew how suspicious the evidence seemed. That he appeared nervous was a good sign—he would be looking for ways to interpret the evidence he’d heard to exonerate her, to avoid any difficulties her father or her cousin might cause.

Finally, he sighed and began questioning her. “Lady Kathleen, did you hire Mrs. Watson as a nursemaid?”

Nothing but the truth would do. “Yes, Your Worship.”

He bit his lip and looked about, still looking for an escape. “And did you do so because you had a child of your own?” he asked hopefully.

“No, Your Worship.”

More silence. Magistrate Fang rubbed his wig. “Perhaps it was a sister you were assisting?”

“I have no sisters,” Kate answered.

“A favored servant?”

“No.”

He had just stripped Kate of any possible legitimate reason for hiring the woman. The magistrate almost pouted, and then folded his arms on the bench. “For whom, then, did you hire the nursemaid?”

With Ned absent, Kate’s only choice was to tell the truth. The question was how much of it she would have to tell before he arrived. Kate shook her head in confusion. “For Louisa, of course. Lady Harcroft. I thought we had already established that, Your Worship.”

A soft susurrus of surprise spread through the courtroom at those words.

The magistrate frowned. “And where is the nursemaid at present?”

Kate gave him a sunny smile. “I imagine she is with Lady Harcroft, although it has been some time since I last saw either of them.”

The jurors had lifted their heads at Kate’s cheerful words. She was not cringing or ducking her head. She was speaking in a pleasant tone. In short, she was not speaking as if she were a guilty woman. Kate was waltzing precariously close to the edge of the cliff. Still, she forced herself to look Harcroft in the eyes and smile.

He looked away first. A tiny victory, that, but it seemed as if an extra ray of sunshine cut through the gloom in Queen Square.

“Where,” the magistrate asked her, “is Lady Harcroft?”

“Oh, I couldn’t
possibly
say,” Kate replied.

Another murmur from the crowd, this one louder.

“You can’t say, or you won’t?” Harcroft moved toward
her. She didn’t have to pretend to shrink from him. Standing above her, tall as he was, he seemed dark and menacing. Precisely how she wanted everyone to remember him.

“Lady Kathleen,” he growled, “must I remind you that you’ve pledged yourself to tell the
whole
truth?”

Kate looked up, widening her eyes in pretend innocence. “Why, I am telling the truth! I truly
can’t
say. I believe Lady Harcroft is in transit at this moment.” At least, she hoped she was—unless something terribly untoward had happened to Ned. “Of course, as she’s not with me in London, and I’ve not had a post from her, I can’t say for sure.”

Harcroft folded his arms and glared at her. “If you hired her nursemaid and abducted her, you know her whereabouts. Divulge them, Lady Kathleen.”

“She’s in a carriage.” Kate smiled brightly. “Or—maybe she is not. It is so hard to say. If I could see her now, surely I could say where she was.”

He frowned at that bit of stupidity. “The prisoner,” he said tightly, “is mocking the honor of this court—of
you,
Your Worship, in front of all of London.
Demand
that she tell where my wife is. Demand it now.”

The magistrate reached for a handkerchief and dabbed at the sweat that trickled down his forehead. “Lady Kathleen?” he asked faintly.

At those words, the courtroom doors opened on the far edge of the crowd. As they did, a blast of midmorning sun spilled into the room. Dust motes sparkled in the sudden light, suspended in air. Then two figures, dark
silhouettes against that sunlight, appeared. Kate went breathless with hope.

They moved into the room. Ned was in front. He moved slowly, deliberately placing each foot, as if every step had meaning. He paused, resting one hand on the bench.

That incandescent warmth she felt, seeing him for the first time that morning, was barely marred by the utter filth of his attire. Her husband was dirty, missing a cravat, and his trousers were ripped at the knee. Louisa came up beside him. In stark contrast to Ned’s ragged clothing, she wore a dove-gray traveling dress, its edges trimmed in falls of black lace. She seemed poised, as she never had before in her husband’s company.

One of the earnest young reporters in the back row lifted his head at the draft of air—but he only glared at the entering company before bending back down to scribble on his paper.

“Lady Kathleen?” the magistrate asked. “Are you saying you can’t tell me where Lady Harcroft’s wife is?”

Kate smiled sunnily. “No, Your Worship.
Now
I can.”

Harcroft leaned toward Kate, his fingers curled, as if he could claw the knowledge from her. He was so intent on Kate that he did not hear the footsteps behind him, proceeding up the aisle.

“Is it necessary for me to do so, Your Worship?” Kate asked.

“It would be advisable,” Magistrate Fang said dryly.

Kate raised her hand gracefully. “She’s right there,” she said, pointing at Louisa.

Half the room stood, all at once. The judge banged his gavel to no avail a first time, and then louder. But it was only when he shouted a threat to have them all carried away that everyone subsided in their seats. In comparison with that roar, the silence that followed was so absolute Kate could hear the scritch of the reporters’ pencils against foolscap.

As for Harcroft… A thousand emotions seemed to flit across his face. Fear. Triumph. Concern. And then, as Louisa did not move forward down the aisle toward him, a hint of anger. He drew himself up.

A week ago, Louisa had curled into a ball, thinking of the possibility of confronting her husband. Kate could see Ned place his hand on Louisa’s shoulder. Louisa didn’t flinch.

Harcroft strode down the aisle toward her. When he was a few feet in front of her, he reached for her. But Louisa looked up. She squared her shoulders. And then without the slightest trace of uncertainty, she met his eyes.

Kate wanted to cheer. The earl stopped where he was.

“Where have you been?” He glanced about, as if searching for a hidden spring gun.

“Don’t you recall?” Louisa gave a little laugh. “I’d made plans to go to Paris. I was shopping.”

The moment of silence stretched in the courtroom, as hair-raisingly electric as the second before lightning struck. Kate could feel that energy, the back of her neck tingling in awareness.

“Shopping?” Harcroft repeated weakly.
“Shopping?”

“Oh, yes. You don’t suppose I would leave for another reason, now, do you?”

Louisa gazed at him.

He was the first to look away. He looked to the back of the room—at the cadre of reporters, their pencils poised to record every word he spoke. Kate could see the visible calculation in his face. Harcroft was beloved of society.

Everyone
thought he was perfect. He could no more announce his true thoughts to this room than he could fly.

“Ah.” He rubbed his head. “Shopping. Perhaps you forgot to mention.” His voice took on a darker tone. “I’ll see you home, then.”

“Oh, I’m not going with you, Harcroft. Not today.”

Every person in the room turned avariciously to Harcroft, waiting to see his reaction to that impertinence.

Harcroft whirled to face the magistrate.

“You see? Lady Kathleen has persuaded my wife to refuse me already. Clap her in chains!”

“Oh, Harcroft,” Louisa said with a sigh. “Do be rational. I made the decision not to accompany you home on my own. Do you really suppose I would be
happy
that you tried to toss my dearest friend into gaol, simply because you couldn’t remember my traveling plans?”

He looked dumbstruck. “I—”

“Your Worship,” Louisa continued. “The only person who is keeping me from my husband is…my husband. If anyone is to be clapped in chains, I suggest it be him.”