"It is necessary," he assured her. "Otherwise I cannot proceed.”
Reluctantly she fell back, her face still filled with uncertainty, her eyes moving from Rathbone to Hester.
"I shall see he is not distressed more than is absolutely necessary in order to learn what we must," Hester promised.
"Do you really think…" Sylvestra began, then faltered. She was afraid. It was stark in her eyes, afraid of the truth. She hesitated on the brink of telling Rathbone not to seek it. She turned to Hester.
Hester smiled at her, pretending she did not understand, and walked to the door.
She led Rathbone upstairs and aft era knock on Rhys's door, merely as a courtesy, she led him in.
"Rhys, this is Sir Oliver Rathbone. He is going to speak for you in court.”
Rhys stared at her, then at Rathbone. He was lying on his back, propped up on pillows as she had left him, his splinted hands on the covers in front of him. He looked frightened and stiff.
"How do you do," Rathbone said with a smile and an inclination of his head, as if Rhys had replied quite normally. "May I sit down?”
Rhys nodded, then looked at Hester.
"Would you pre ferme to leave?" she asked. "I can go next door and you can knock the bell off if you need me.”
He shook his head immediately and she could sense his anxiety, his loneliness, his feeling almost of drowning under the weight of confusion inside him. She retreated to the corner of the room and sat down.
"You must be honest with me," Rathbone began quietly. "Everything you tell me will remain in confidence, if you wish it. I am bound by law not to act other than in your interests, as long as I remain honest myself. I cannot lie, but I can and will keep anything secret, if that is what you wish.”
Rhys nodded.
"The same applies to Miss Latterly. That is her bond as well as mine.”
Rhys stared at him.
"Do you know what happened the night your father was killed?”
Rhys winced and seemed to shrink within himself, but he did not move his eyes from Rathbone's face, and he nodded slowly.
"Good. I know you can indicate only "yes" or "no". I shall ask you questions and if you can answer them so, then do. If you cannot, then wait, and I shall re-word it." He hesitated only a moment. "Did you go with your friends, Arthur and Duke Kynaston, to the area of St.
Giles, and when there use the services of prostitutes?”
Rhys bit his lip, and then nodded, a dull flush of pink in his cheeks.
His eyes remained steady on Rathbone's face.
"Did you at any time injure any of these women, fight with them, even accidentally?”
Rhys shook his head violently.
"Did either Arthur or Duke Kynaston do so?”
Rhys remained still.
"Do you know if they did or not?”
Rhys shook his head.
"Did you also go with them to Seven Dials?”
Rhys nodded very slowly, uncertainly.
"You want to add something?" Rathbone asked. "Did you go often?”
Rhys shook his head.
"Only a few times?”
He nodded.
"Did you injure any women there?”
Again he shook his head, sharply, his eyes angry.
"Did your father go with you?”
Rhys's eyes widened in amazement.
"No," Rathbone answered his own question. "But he knew you went, and he did not approve?”
Rhys nodded, a bitter smile twisting his mouth. There was rage in it and hurt and a blazing frustration. He tried to speak, his throat muscles knotting, his head jerking forward.
Hester started up from her chair, then realised she must not interrupt.
She might protect him for the moment, and damage him for all the future. Rathbone must learn all he could, however painful.
"Did you quarrel about it?" Rathbone continued.
Rhys nodded slowly.
"Here at home?”
He nodded.
"And when you went to St. Giles the night of his death?”
Again the sharp, violent movement of denial, and the jolt forward as if he would laugh, had he the power.
"Did you quarrel about something else?”
Rhys's eyes filled with tears and he banged his broken hands up and down on the bedclothes, his body locked in an inner pain far worse than the sickening jolting of the bones.
Rathbone turned to Hester, his face white.
She moved forward.
"Rhys!" she said sharply. She sat down on the bed and took hold of his wrists, trying to force him to be still, but his muscles were clenched so hard she could not. He was stronger than she had expected, and his whole body was caught in the emotion. "Rhys!" she said again, more urgently. "Stop it! You'll move the bones again. I know you think you don't care, but you do! Please…”
He unclenched his hands slowly, and the tears spilled over his cheeks.
He stared at her, then turned away, and she saw only the back of his head.
"Rhys," she said firmly. "Did you kill your father?”
There was a long silence. Neither Hester nor Rathbone moved. Then slowly he turned back to her and shook his head, his eyes intent on her face.
"But you know who did?" she pressed.
This time he refused to answer even by a look.
She turned to Rathbone.
"All right, for now," he conceded, standing up. "I will consider what to do. Try to rest and recover as much as you can. You will need your strength when the time comes. I will do everything I can to help you, that I promise.”
Rhys looked at him without blinking and Rathbone looked back for a long moment, then with a slight smile, not of hope but only of a kind of warmth, he turned and left the room.
Outside on the landing he waited until Hester had joined him and closed the door.
"Thank you," she said simply.
"I may have been a little rash," he acknowledged with a tiny shrug, his voice so low she could only just hear him.
Her heart sank. For a moment she had allowed herself to hope. She realised just how much she trusted him, how deep her confidence ran that he could accomplish even the impossible. She had not been fair to lay such a burden on him. She had seen people do it to doctors, and then they had struggled under the weight of impossible hope, and then the despair which followed, and the guilt. Now she had done the same thing to Rathbone, because she wanted it so much for Rhys.
"I am sorry," she said humbly. "I know there may not be anything to be done.”
"There'll be something," he replied with a tiny frown between his brows, as if he were puzzled. "I am confused by him. I went in persuaded by circumstance and evidence of his guilt. Now that I have spoken to him, I don't know what to think. I am not even sure what other possibilities there are. Why will he not answer as to who killed his father, if it was not him? Why will he not say what they quarrelled over? You saw his face when I asked!”
She had no suggestions to give. She had lain awake and racked her brains night after night searching for the same answers herself.
"The only thing I can imagine is that he is defending someone," she said quietly. "And the only people he would defend are his family or close friends. I cannot see Arthur Kynaston doing this, and his only family here is his mother.”
"What do you know of his mother?" he asked, glancing towards the hall below them as he heard footsteps crossing it and fading away in the direction of the baize door through to the servants' quarters. "Is it conceivable she has done something for which Rhys is willing to suffer even this to protect her?”
She hesitated. At first she had thought to deny even the possibility.
She could recall far too vividly Rhys's anger with Sylvestra, the joy he had taken in hurting her. Of course he could not be protecting her!
Then she realised that neither love nor guilt were always so clear. It was possible he loved and hated her at the same time, that he knew something which he would never betray, but that he still despised her for it.
"I don't know," she said aloud. "The more I think of it, the less sure I am. But I have no idea what.”
He was looking at her closely. "Haven't you?”