A Sunless Sea (44 page)

“No. Does it make any difference?”

“You’re a hard bitch!” Agatha said between her teeth.

“I’m a nurse,” Hester corrected her. “That means I’m a realist … like you.”

Agatha snorted, was silent for a few moments, then straightened her huge shoulders. “Well, come on then! By the sound of it, you ’aven’t got time ter waste!”

Hester relaxed and smiled at last, then turned for the door.

A
LVAR
D
OULTING KNEW AS
soon as he saw Agatha what they had come for. He shook his head, backing into the room as if there were a form of escape in the stacks of shelves behind him.

Agatha stopped and her raw-boned hand clasped Hester so hard it bruised the flesh of her arm. She had to bite her lip not to cry out.

“You don’t ’ave ter do it,” Agatha said to Doulting.

“If you don’t, Dinah Lambourn will hang,” Hester told him. “And Joel Lambourn’s report will never be seen. In particular the part about opium needles. There’ll still be people addicted, whatever we do, but if it’s made illegal, there’ll be fewer. It’s time to decide what you want to do … to be.”

“You don’t ’ave ter!” Agatha said again. Her face was pale, her voice strained. Her fingers were like a vise on Hester’s arm.

Doulting looked from one to the other of them as the seconds ticked by. He seemed beaten, as if he could no longer fight. Perhaps he knew there was nothing left that he could gain, except the last shred of the man he used to be.

“Don’t stop me, Agatha,” he said quietly. “If I can find the courage, I’ll do it.”

“You’ll testify that you told Joel Lambourn about the addiction that taking opium by needle causes, and he included it in his report?” Hester said it clearly. “And you’ll tell them what it’s like, and how it affects those it captures?”

Doulting looked at her and very slowly nodded.

She did not know whether she dared believe him. “Thank you,” she whispered. “I’ll tell Sir Oliver Rathbone.”

He sank back against the bench, turning to Agatha.

“I’ll get you enough,” she promised rashly, yanking at Hester’s arm. “Come on. We done enough ’ere.” She looked at Doulting again. “I’ll be back.”

R
ATHBONE SAT IN
M
ONK
’
S
kitchen, untouched tea steaming gently in front of him. There were pastries cooling on a rack, sweetmeats ready for Christmas.

“Are you certain?” Rathbone pressed, looking at Monk, then at Runcorn. “Is the evidence absolutely irrefutable?”

Hester nodded her head. “Yes. Dr. Winfarthing will come first, then
Alvar Doulting. They’ll confirm that Joel Lambourn came to Winfarthing, who told him about the selling of opium and needles, and then Doulting will tell the court that Lambourn came to him, and repeat what he told him. Lambourn put it in his report. That was why he was killed. If they made it illegal to take opium that way, the sellers would lose a fortune. It was worth murdering Lambourn for, and Zenia Gadney.”

“And hanging Dinah Lambourn,” Runcorn added grimly.

“Then who actually killed Lambourn?” Monk asked.

“The seller of opium pure enough to inject without killing people, and the needles to do it,” Hester said quietly. “Or someone he paid. Morally, it’s him.”

“Who? Barclay Herne?” Rathbone asked, looking from one to the other of them.

This time it was Monk who answered him. “Possibly, but from what we can tell, he hasn’t the sort of money such a trade would bring. Apart from the bestiality of it, it’s too dangerous to do for small reward.”

“Then who? Sinden Bawtry? My God, that would be appalling,” Rathbone exclaimed, the full enormity of it burgeoning to fill his imagination. “Word is that he’s about to fill a very high cabinet post. If that’s possible, then no wonder Joel Lambourn was desperate to expose him. He could have had the power to stop that provision from being included in the Pharmacy Act.” He took a deep breath, his tea still ignored. “But Bawtry and Herne were dining at the Atheneum that night. There are witnesses. And that was miles away, on the other side of the river.”

“Is Herne involved?” Rathbone asked doubtfully. “Organizing everything for Bawtry? For a suitable reward afterward?” He could not see Barclay Herne with the fire or the courage to do anything dangerous, or requiring that kind of ruthless and passionate greed, unless he was an addict, too. He remembered the confidence one day, and the pasty skin and nervousness the Sunday he had called unexpectedly. “We can’t afford a mistake. If I say something I have to be right and be able to prove it—at least as probable, even if not certain,” he finished.

Runcorn bit his lip. “That isn’t going to be easy. The judge may not
know what he’s defending, but he’s been told there’s something. He may think it’s to do with England’s reputation, and nothing more personal than that, but I dare say his future’s dependent on keeping it quiet.”

“I’m damned sure of it,” Rathbone agreed. He turned to Hester. “Are you certain this Agatha Nisbet will turn up? And what about Doulting? He could be drugged out of his senses, or dead in an alley by then.”

They all looked at Hester, faces tense, bodies stiff.

“I don’t know,” she admitted. “We can only try.”

“We haven’t much to lose,” Rathbone said to all of them. “As it is now, they’re going to find Dinah guilty. I have no one else left to put on the stand. She’s lied to me before, and I’m not sure if she knew anything at all about what Lambourn found out. I don’t think her belief in him is going to be enough to change this outcome.”

He looked at Hester. “Do you believe this Agatha Nisbet?”

She did not hesitate. “Yes. But it won’t be so easy with Alvar Doulting. She’ll bring him if he’s all right, but she won’t force him. You may have to string it out at least another day. I’ll help her to get him as strong as we can.”

“I’ve no one else,” Rathbone told them.

“Then you must call Dinah,” Hester said, her voice uncertain, a little husky. “Immediately after Christmas.”

The more Rathbone heard of what Hester had learned, and the further disclosures it threatened, the more certain he was that both Coniston and Pendock knew at least of the existence of a scandal that they had been warned must be kept a secret, even at the cost of hanging a woman without exhausting the last possibility that she was innocent. Who else was addicted to the pervasive poison? Who else’s fortune relied on its sale?

He looked across at Monk. It was a gamble. They were all painfully aware of it.

“I’ll speak to Dinah,” he said. He had not had time to talk to her since the revelation that she had never actually been Lambourn’s wife. “But we’ve got to provide an alternative better than some shadowy form of an opium seller we also can’t name.”

Monk glanced at Hester, then back at Rathbone. “I know. We won’t
stop trying to prove who’s behind it. But we need time. Can you stretch it out another day?”

Rathbone wanted to say yes, but he doubted it. If he could not, and the court could see that he was increasingly desperate, asking questions to which they all knew the answer, Coniston would object that he was wasting the court’s time, and Pendock would very justifiably uphold him. Most important, the jury would know he had no defense left, or else he would have used it.

They could very reasonably try to close the case on Tuesday to keep what was left of the Christmas season clear.

Hester was frowning. She had seen the indecision in his eyes.

“Call Dr. Winfarthing on Tuesday, after Dinah,” she suggested.

“Are you certain about him?” he asked.

She gave a very slight shrug. “Can you think of anything better?”

“I can’t think of anything at all,” he admitted. “Are you certain he won’t say anything damning, even unintentionally?”

“Almost,” she said.

“And this woman, Nisbet?” He realized when he heard the harshness in his voice how deeply afraid he was that in his own sense of loss and disillusion he would let Dinah Lambourn down, and she would pay with her life.

Hester smiled. “There are no certainties. We’ve been here before. We play the best hand we have. We’ve never been certain of winning. That’s not the way it is.”

He knew she was right; he was simply less brave than he used to be, less certain of the other things that mattered. Or maybe at the heart of it, he was less certain of himself.

R
ATHBONE WENT BACK ACROSS
the river by ferry, perversely enjoying the hard, cold wind in his face, even the discomfort of the choppy water. There seemed to be a lot of traffic in the Pool of London today, big ships at anchor waiting to unload cargo from half the ports on earth, lighters carrying freight down from the waterways inland, up from the sea, ferryboats weaving in and out, even a River Police boat making its way over to St. Saviour’s Dock. Everyone seemed to be working twice as
hard, hurrying along the streets, laden with parcels, calling out good wishes, making ready for Christmas.

On the northern side he alighted and paid his fare. Then he walked quickly to the Commercial Road and caught a hansom back toward the Old Bailey, and the prison where Dinah Lambourn was housed.

Before he faced her he stopped at a quiet inn and had a large luncheon of steak and kidney pudding, with oysters and a thick suet crust, and a half bottle of really good red wine. He was too worried for the richness or the flavor of it to please him, but afterward he felt warmer and had a renewed sense of determination. A great deal of this was fueled by anger within himself that he was so nearly beaten.

He had thought hard about what to say to Dinah, and as he walked the last couple of hundred yards he made his final decision. At the prison he gave the jailer all the necessary information, identifying himself for the umpteenth time, as if they did not know him.

He was escorted along to the familiar stone cell where he waited alone until they brought Dinah to him. She looked thinner and even paler than the last time he had seen her here, as if she knew the fight was over, and she had lost. He felt the guilt of failure like a wound deep in his gut.

“Please sit down, Mrs. Lambourn,” he said. Then, as she lowered herself into the chair opposite him, he sat down also. He realized, watching her awkwardness, that she was stiff with fear.

“I have just been speaking with Mr. Monk,” he told her. “He and Mr. Runcorn have discovered many things about Dr. Lambourn, all of them bearing out what you yourself have told me. However, I cannot raise your hopes more than a little, because we have no proof that will stand up in court. To call those people who might be of help will be a very great risk, and I need to be certain that you understand that.”

“You’ve found people?” There was a sudden, wild, infinitely painful leap of hope in her face, her eyes almost feverishly brilliant.

He swallowed hard. “People who may not be believed, Mrs. Lambourn. One is a doctor who is, I am told, something of a renegade. The other is a self-proclaimed nurse running an unofficial clinic for dockworkers in the Rotherhithe area. She says that Dr. Lambourn consulted
her when he was gathering information about the uses and dangers of opium. So far we have nothing whatever to substantiate what she says, and she is hardly a reputable person. However, she did tell these things to Dr. Lambourn, and as a result he then sought out others, who said the same things.”

Dinah was confused. “To do with opium? I don’t understand.”

“No, not merely to do with opium. That is the point. What she says is to do with the new invention of a hollow needle, and a syringe that can deliver pure opium directly into the blood. It is very much more effective for dealing with pain, but also it can create an addiction to opium that is terrible in its effects.” He grimaced. “A brief heaven, bought at the price of a life of hell afterward.”

“What does that have to do with Joel?” she asked. “Or with poor Zenia’s death? All Joel was reporting on was the need to label the quantity and dosage of opium in patent medicines.”

“I know,” Rathbone said gently. “We think he found out about the syringe and its effects by accident, and included it in his report. If that were so, then it might well have made its way into the Pharmacy Act; then sale in that way would probably be made illegal.”

“If it is as terrible as you say, then it has to be made illegal,” she said slowly, understanding filling her eyes, and then horror.

He nodded. “They destroyed the report, but in case he had told anyone, such as you, for example, he had to be discredited as well.”

Her eyes widened. “They killed him, so he couldn’t repeat it,” she said in a hoarse whisper.

“Yes.”

“And poor Zenia?”

“That was probably as you said, to get rid of you, and anything you might have been told.”

“Who is the doctor you spoke of?”

“Dr. Winfarthing? I don’t know him. Mrs. Monk says Dr. Lambourn consulted him. I want to question him mostly to hold the court’s attention until Monk can persuade Agnes Nisbet, the woman who runs the clinic, to come forward and testify. That might take a whole day. In fact I need to call someone on Tuesday morning immediately after Christmas
and Boxing Day, until Winfarthing can be spoken to and forewarned, in fairness, that the prosecution will try to discredit him on the witness stand.”

“And then he might not testify?” she said shakily.

“Apart from being unfair, it might be very much against our interest to have him testify before I have had the opportunity to find out exactly what he will say, and possibly what to avoid asking him. Don’t forget, Mr. Coniston will have the chance to question him after I do. I think you have seen enough of Coniston to know that he will give Winfarthing, or anybody else, a very hard time indeed. He’ll try everything he knows to destroy his credibility, even his reputation, if he can.”

He lowered his voice, trying to be as gentle as he could. “It is not only your life or freedom that may rest on the outcome of this case. If you are not guilty, then someone else is.”

“I don’t know who.” She closed her eyes and the tears escaped under her lids. “Don’t you think I would tell you if I did?”