His eyes searched her face to read her reaction, afraid she would be shamed for him. But he saw only grave interest.
“And yet the hatred was so palpable in the air,” he went on. “I was afraid the man could not receive a fair hearing in that court. I tried—believe me, Vespasia, I lay awake many nights during that time, turning it over and over in my mind, but I never found any specific word or act I could challenge.” He looked down for a moment, then up again. “Pryce was excellent, he always is, and yet he never exceeded his duty. Barton James, for the defense, was adequate. He did not press hard—he seemed to believe his client was guilty, but I don’t think one could have found an attorney in England who did not. It …” He seemed almost to hunch inside himself a little and Vespasia was keenly aware that the memory of it still caused him pain. But she did not interrupt.
“It was so … hasty,” he continued, picking up his wineglass and turning it by the stem in his fingers. The light shone brilliant through the red liquid. “Nothing was omitted, and yet increasingly I had the feeling that everyone wished Godman to be found guilty as rapidly as possible, and to be hanged. The public required a sacrifice for the outrage that had been committed, and it was like a hungry animal prowling just beyond the courtroom doors.” He looked up at her suddenly. “Am I being melodramatic?”
“A trifle.”
He smiled. “You were not there, or you would understand what I mean. There was a rawness in the air, a heat of emotion that is dangerous when one is trying to pursue justice. It frightened me.”
“I have never heard you say such a thing before.” She was startled. It was unlike the man she remembered, at once more vulnerable, and yet, in a curious fashion, also stronger.
He shook his head. “I have never felt it,” he confessed. His voice dropped lower and was full of surprise and pain. “Vespasia, I seriously considered committing one injudicious act myself, so as to provide grounds in order that the whole thing could be tried again before the justices of appeal, without the hysteria, when emotions were cooler.” He breathed in deeply and sighed. “I tortured myself wondering whether that was irresponsible, arrogant, dishonest. Or if I simply let it all proceed was I a coward who loved the pomp and the semblance of the law more than justice?”
With another man she might have leaped to deny it, but it would have made their conversation ordinary; it would have set a distance between them that she did not wish. It would be the polite thing to say, the obvious, but not the more deeply truthful. He was a man of profound integrity, but his soul was as capable of fear and confusion as any other, and that he should have slipped and given in to it was not impossible. To suggest it was would be to desert him, to leave him, in a particular way, desperately alone.
“Did you ever reach an answer you knew was true?” she asked him.
“I suppose it is all about ends and means,” he said thoughtfully. “Yes—one truth is that you cannot separate them. There is no such thing as an end unaffected by the means used to obtain it.” He was watching her face. “In effect I was asking myself if I would intentionally nullify a trial because there was a passion and a haste about it of which I personally did not approve. You understand, I did not think Aaron Godman was innocent, nor do I think so now. Nor did I think that any of the evidence offered was tainted or perjured. It was simply that I felt the police had acted more in emotion than in impartial duty.”
He stopped for a moment or two, perhaps uncertain if he should continue. “I was perfectly certain Godman had been beaten while in custody,” he said at last. “He was bruised and lacerated when he appeared in court, and the wounds were too fresh to have occurred before his arrest. There was an air of both outrage and urgency which had nothing to do with the seeking of truth, nor the proof of it. And yet Barton James did not refer to it. I could not prejudice his defense by raising the matter myself. I did not know the explanation of it, nor do I now. It is assumption on my part.”
“Beaten by whom, Thelonius?”
“I don’t know. The police, or his jailers I assume, but it is conceivable they were self-inflicted, I suppose.”
“What about the appeal?” she asked.
He began to eat again. “It was raised on grounds of evidence not fully explained—something to do with the medical examination of the body. The doctor concerned, Humbert Yardley, had first stated that the wounds were deeper than could be accounted for by the farrier’s nails that the prosecution stated were used, not only to nail him afterwards to the stable door, but actually to kill him—with a piercing wound to the side. Thank God he was dead when he was crucified!”
“You mean Godman might have used some other weapon?” She was confused. “How does that affect the verdict? I don’t understand.”
“No other weapon was ever found either in Farriers’ Lane or anywhere near it,” he explained. “And the people who saw him come out of the lane with blood on his clothes were quite definite he had no weapon with him. And he had nothing of that nature on him when he was arrested, or in his lodgings.”
“Could he not have disposed of it?”
“Of course—but not between the stable yard and the end of the alley where he was observed on the night of the murder. The alley lay between the sheer walls of buildings. There were no places to conceal anything at all. Nor was anything found in the yard itself.”
“What did the judges of appeal say to this?”
“That Yardley was uncertain, and later under examination did not deny that a long farrier’s nail might have caused the fatal injury.”
“And that was all?” She was curious, troubled.
“So I believe,” he answered. “They dealt with it quickly, and ruled that in every particular the trial verdict was correct, and should stand.” He shivered. “Aaron Godman was hanged three and a half weeks later. Since then his sister has attempted to have the matter raised again, and failed. She wrote to members of Parliament, to the newspapers, published pamphlets, spoke at meetings and even from the stage. Always she failed, unless, of course, Mrs. Stafford is correct, and Samuel Stafford was intending to reopen the case before his death prevented him.”
“There seems little reason,” she said quietly. She looked up at him, meeting his steady, clear eyes. “Are you quite sure he was guilty, Thelonius?”
“I have always thought so,” he replied. “I hated the manner in which the investigation was conducted. But the trial was correct, and I don’t see that the judges of appeal could have found differently.” His brow furrowed. “But if Stafford had learned something between then and his death, then possibly—I don’t know …”
“And if not Aaron Godman, then who killed Blaine?” she asked.
“I don’t know. Joshua Fielding? Devlin O’Neil? Or someone we know nothing about as yet? Perhaps we shall know more if we learn who killed Samuel Stafford, and why. It is an extremely ugly matter; every answer is tragic.”
“There are seldom any answers to murder which are not. Thank you for having been so frank with me.”
His body relaxed at last, his shoulders easing and the tension, the doubt, softening from his smile.
“Had you imagined I should prevaricate with you? I have not changed so very much as that!”