Death of a Stranger (35 page)

Garstang grunted, but a look of satisfaction smoothed out his features a little. He did not consider himself susceptible to flattery, in which he was profoundly mistaken.

“I shall do my best,” Garstang said, straightening his lapels a trifle and assuming an expression of readiness.

Rathbone hid a smile, but he was tense. Even his movements lacked their usual grace. “Thank you. Mr. Garstang, you were at your window on the night of Miss Harcus’s death. Would you please remind us of the reason for this?”

“Certainly.” Garstang nodded. “My sitting room is opposite her rooms, and very slightly below, the stories of the house in which my apartment is situated being a foot or two less in height. I heard a noise, as if someone were crying out. In case that were so, and they were in need of assistance, I went to the window and drew the curtains so that I might see.”

“Just so,” Rathbone cut across him. “Now, would you tell us exactly what you did see, as precisely as if you were painting a picture? Please do not tell us what you believed or have since heard that it was. I realize that this is difficult, and takes a very exact and literal mind.”

“Oh… really…” Fowler groaned.

Garstang shot a look of acute dislike at him. He felt insulted, cut short and dismissed before he had even begun.

“Please, Mr. Garstang,” Rathbone encouraged. “It is of the utmost importance. Indeed, someone’s life is at stake.”

Garstang assumed an attitude of intense concentration and held it until the court was silent, then he cleared his throat and began.

“I saw a dark shape on the balcony opposite. It seemed to heave and change outline violently, and to move from the open doorway across towards the edge. It surged back and forth for several moments, I cannot tell how long because I was horrified by the prospect of the tragedy about to happen.”

“Why was that?” Rathbone said.

“You asked me to be literal,” Garstang said crossly. “I described to you exactly what I saw, but it was perfectly obvious to me that it was two people struggling with each other, one intent upon hurling the other off the balcony onto the stones beneath.”

“But you did not see two separate figures?” Rathbone asked.

“I did not. They were locked in mortal combat.” Garstang’s voice was schoolmasterly, as to a particularly stupid child. “If he had even once let go of her she might have escaped him, and we should not be here to see justice done after the event.”

“Let us remember that we are here to see justice done,” Rathbone reminded him. “Not to exercise our personal feelings. You have described what you saw very precisely so far, Mr. Garstang. Did you see a figure go off the balcony and actually fall?”

“Yes, of course I did. That is when I left the window and ran out of the room and down the steps to see if I could help the poor woman, or on the other hand apprehend her murderer,” Garstang replied.

Rathbone held up his hand. “Just a moment, Mr. Garstang. I am afraid I need you to be more precise than that. I apologize for what must be distressing to any decent person. I assure you I would not do it were there any other way.”

Fowler stood up. “My lord, this witness has already told us in overlong detail what he saw. My learned friend is flattering-”

“I am not flattering the witness at all, my lord!” Rathbone cut across. “Mr. Garstang may be the only man who observed exactly what happened and is capable of telling us not what he has since concluded but what actually was.”

“If you do not have a point, Sir Oliver, I shall not indulge you again!” the judge warned. “Proceed, but be brief.”

The relief in Rathbone was visible even from where Hester sat, but she had no idea why. She could see nothing whatever changed. She glanced at Monk, and saw equal confusion in his face.

Rathbone looked up at Garstang. “Mr. Garstang, you saw her go off the balcony. You are sure it was she who went off?”

There was a moment of silent incredulity, then a rush of sound, a babble, disgust, laughter, anger.

Garstang stared at him, disbelief giving way to a slow, terrible memory.

The noise in the room subsided. Even Fowler sank back into his seat.

Monk craned forward.

Hester sat with her hands clenched.

“I saw her face…” Garstang said hoarsely. “I saw her face as she fell… white… she was…” He shuddered violently. “She was between murder… and death.” He put both hands up to his eyes.

“I apologize, Mr. Garstang,” Rathbone said gently and with sudden sincerity that was like a warmth in the room. He was speaking for an instant only to Garstang, not the court. “But your evidence is the key to the whole, terrible, tragic truth, and we all thank you for your courage of the mind, sir. You have saved a man’s life today.”

Fowler stood up and swiveled around as if looking for something that was not there.

Rathbone turned to him and smiled. “Your witness, Mr. Fowler.”

“For what?” Fowler demanded. “He has said nothing! What on earth does it matter that he saw her face? We all know it was she who fell!” He looked at the judge. “This is preposterous, my lord. Sir Oliver is making a farce out of a tragedy. Whether he is legally in contempt of court or not, morally he is.”

“I am inclined to agree,” the judge said with apparent reluctance. “Sir Oliver, you have certainly caught our attention, but you have proved nothing. I cannot allow you to continue in this manner. We have the public in our courts in order that they may see that justice is done, not as a form of entertainment. I shall not allow you to yield any further to the temptation to become a performer, in spite of your obvious talent in that direction.”

There was a murmur of nervous laughter around the court.

Rathbone bowed as if contrite. “I assure you, my lord, I shall shortly show how the fact that Mr. Garstang saw her face is of the utmost importance.”

“Are you questioning her identity?” the judge said with amazement.

“No, my lord. If I may call my next witness?”

“You may, but this testimony had better be relevant or I shall hold you in contempt, Sir Oliver.”

“It will be, my lord, thank you. I call the Reverend David Rider.”

Hester heard Monk’s gasp of indrawn breath and saw him lurch forward in his seat.

Margaret turned to stare at Hester, and then at Monk, the question in her face. Hester looked at her helplessly.

The court watched in silence as the vicar climbed the steps up to the witness-box, his hands gripping the rail as if to steady his balance. He looked tired, but worn out by emotion rather than any physical effort. His skin was pale and puffy around the eyes, and he looked back at Rathbone as if there was some profound understanding between them of more than grief, some overwhelming burden of knowledge which they shared.

Rider swore to his name, his occupation and his residence on the outskirts of Liverpool.

“Why are you here, Mr. Rider?” Rathbone asked gravely.

Rider spoke very quietly. “I have been wrestling with my conscience ever since Mr. Monk came to see me over a week ago, and I have come to the conclusion that my greater obligation is to tell that part of the truth that I know regarding Katrina Harcus. My duty to the living is too great to deny in order to protect the dead.”

There was a slight rustle of movement in the court, and then total silence.

Hester looked across at Dalgarno, as did several of the jurors, but they saw only complete confusion.

“You knew Katrina Harcus?” Rathbone asked.

“From her birth,” Rider replied.

Fowler shifted in his seat in apparent discomfort, but he did not interrupt.

“Then I presume you also know her mother?” Rathbone said.

“Yes. Pamela Harcus was my parishioner.”

“You say was,” Rathbone observed. “Is she now dead?”

“Yes. She died some three months ago. I… I am glad she did not live to see this.”

“Indeed, Mr. Rider.” Rathbone bowed his head in acknowledgment of the tragedy of it. “Did you also know Katrina Harcus’s father?”

“Not personally, but I knew of him.” Then, without waiting for Rathbone to ask, he added, “His name was Arrol Dundas.”

Monk let out an involuntary cry, and Hester reached out and put her hand on his arm, feeling the muscles hard underneath her touch.

The judge leaned forward. “Is this the same Arrol Dundas who was convicted of railway fraud sixteen years ago, Sir Oliver?”

“Yes, my lord.”

“Let me understand you,” the judge continued. “Was she his legitimate daughter or illegitimate?”

Rathbone looked at Rider in the witness-box.

“Illegitimate, my lord,” Rider replied.

“What has that to do with her death?” Fowler demanded. “We all know that illegitimacy is a stigma that ruins lives. The sins of the fathers are visited upon the children whether we wish them to be or not, but it is irrelevant to her death, poor creature. It excuses nothing!”

“It is not offered as an excuse,” Rathbone said tartly. He turned back to Rider. “To your knowledge, was Katrina aware of her father’s identity?”

“Most certainly,” Rider replied. “He provided handsomely for both Pamela Harcus and her daughter. He was a wealthy man and not ungenerous. She knew both him and his colleague, who apparently regarded her as if she were his niece.”

“He was a man her father’s age, I presume?” Rathbone said.

“As closely as I could judge,” Rider agreed.

“But in spite of this her father could not legitimize her,” Rathbone went on.

Rider looked even more unhappy. He moved his weight slightly, and his hands, swollen-jointed, gripped the railing of the box. It was obvious that he still struggled with revealing such information, which in his view was private and painful.

Hester looked at Monk, seeing in his face the crumbling of disillusion, the fighting for memory, hunting for any bright shards to redeem the darkness that was closing in. She ached for something to help him, but there was no shelter or balm for the truth.

“He could have,” Rider said so quietly that the silence became even denser as everyone strained to catch his words. “It was perhaps a dishonorable thing to do. His wife was in no way at fault. To leave her in her middle years would be barbarous… a breaking of the covenant he had made in his marriage. But it would not have been impossible. Men do put away their wives. With money, and lies, it can be achieved.”

“But Arrol Dundas did not?”

Rider looked wretched. “He intended to. He was very torn. His wife had no children. Pamela Harcus had given birth to one, and might have had more. But he had a protégé, a young man whom he regarded almost as a son, who in the end persuaded him not to. I daresay it was for Mrs. Dundas’s sake.”

Monk was so white Hester was afraid he was going to faint. He seemed scarcely to be breathing and was oblivious of her fingers gripping his arm. She did not even glance at Margaret.

“Do you know his name?” Rathbone repeated.

“Yes… it was William Monk,” Rider replied.

Monk very slowly put his hands up to his face, hiding it even from Hester. Rathbone did not turn, but he could not have been unaware of the effect the words would have.

“I see,” he said. “And do you know if either Pamela Harcus or Katrina was aware of who stopped their financial comfort, and far more than that, their honor, their legitimacy, their social acceptance?”

“Katrina was only a child, perhaps seven or eight years old,” Rider answered. “But Pamela was aware, that I know for certain. It was she who told me, but I did verify it for myself. I spoke to Dundas.”

“Did you try to change his mind?”

“Of course not. All I said was that he should be certain to make financial arrangement for them in the event of his death. He swore to me that he had already done so.”

“So they were financially supported after he died?”

Rider’s voice dropped until it was almost inaudible. “No sir, they were not.”

“They were not?” Rathbone repeated.

Rider gripped the railings. “No. Arrol Dundas died in prison, for a fraud I personally do not believe he committed, but the proof at the time seemed unarguable.”

“But his will?” Rathbone argued. “Surely that was executed according to his decisions?”

“I imagine so. The provision for Pamela and Katrina must have been a verbal one, perhaps to protect the feelings of his widow. She may have known of them, or she may not, but since a will is a public matter, it would be deeply hurtful for them to be mentioned,” Rider replied. He looked down at his hands. “It was a written note, or so he told me. A personal instruction to his executor.”

“Who was?” Rathbone stared at him, not for an instant turning towards the gallery where Monk sat white-faced and rigid.

“His protégé, William Monk,” Rider said.

“Not the colleague to whom you referred earlier?” Rathbone asked.

“No. He trusted Mr. Monk uniquely.”

“I see. So all the money went to Dundas’s widow?”

“No. Not even she received more than a pittance,” Rider answered him. “Dundas was a rich man at the time of his trial. When he died a few weeks later he had barely enough to provide a small house and an annuity for his widow, and that ceased upon her death.”

There was a low rumble of anger in the room. Several people turned and glared at Monk. There were ugly words, catcalls.

“Silence!” the judge shouted, banging his gavel with a loud crack of wood on wood. “I will not have this unseemly noise in here. You are to listen, not to make judgments. Any more of this and I shall clear the court.”

The sound subsided, but not the anger in the air.

Hester moved closer still to Monk, but she could think of nothing to say. She could feel the pain in him as if it were communicable, like heat.

On the other side of her, Margaret put her hand gently on Hester’s. It was a generous moment of friendship.

“Then unless someone else assisted them, I assume that Pamela and Katrina Harcus lived in extremely straitened circumstances after Dundas’s death?” Rathbone asked relentlessly.

“Extremely,” Rider agreed. “I am afraid there was no one else to assist them. Her aunt, Eveline Austin, was also dead by this time.”

“I see. Just one more thing, Mr. Rider. Would you be good enough to describe Katrina Harcus for us, if you please?”