The Fall of Chance (22 page)

Beau indeed. “But Pearson promised he’d let her know,” Unt insisted.

“So what if he did? Doesn’t mean she can get away from work: some poor child might be bleeding in her arms. She can’t very well up and leave saying she’s off to visit her husband, can she?”

“I suppose not,” Unt admitted.

“Too right,” Tulk grunted, “So I’ll tell you what. I’m going to lock down for the night while you get some shut-eye. If a young lady comes calling, I’ll wake you and let her in - any young lady, if you like, heh, heh.”

Unt smiled at the feeble joke. “Thank you.”

“There!” The old man cackled in triumph as the stove took light. He went back to his desk, poured some sour whisky in a tin mug and took it over to Unt. “Get that down you and when you’re done, get your head down. You’ve got one hell of a day in the morning.”

*              *              *              *

Crystal didn’t call that night but when Unt awoke, he found himself more anxious to see his Defender than his wife. It was the smell of cooking that had woken him and before he’d even sat himself up, the beadle was coming over with bacon, eggs and a pot of black coffee.

“There, don’t say I don’t do nothin’ for you,” he grunted as he slipped the breakfast through the feeding hatch.

Unt thanked him and wolfed them down. He was mopping up the yolk with his final bit of bacon when there was a quiet knock at the door.

“I’m coming, ain’t I?” Tulk grumbled as the knock was hesitantly repeated.

When the door opened, Crystal stood there. He was almost disbelieving. He’d given himself to the assumption it was Ostin. Part of him was disappointed that it wasn’t the Defender - he needed a strategy right now - but the greater part of him was happy and relieved.

When he saw her standing there, cheeks touched to colour by the early morning crisp and eyes full of worry, he realised there was beauty in the world he’d already started to miss.

“Well, there’s no doubting who you are. You must be Mrs Unt,” Tulk greeted her warmly.

“Crystal,” she introduced herself, “May I see him?”

“Of course, my dear,” he ushered her in, “There’s few give me as much peace as your husband here.”

Crystal seemed not to hear this last bit. As soon as she was past the beadle she slipped swiftly across the cabin to Unt’s cell.

Her eyes were wide with worry and lined with that watery film that could turn to tears at a moment’s notice. Whether they were for him or herself, Unt couldn’t know.

“Oh, Unt!” she gasped. It seemed like she would say more but didn’t know what to say. Or maybe it was that she didn’t know what to say first. She gripped the bars with her hands and he wrapped his fingers over hers. They looked directly at each other and it all suddenly felt like a problem shared.

“You came,” he said. Folded into his relief was an undercurrent of accusation for her delay.

“I’m sorry I wasn’t here earlier,” she said, “I was working. Pearson tried to deliver the message but they turned him away so he went to my mother’s and told her.”

“She didn’t pass it on?”

Crystal looked pained. “She did,” she said, “but she begged me to stay with them and not come. It was late when I’d finished so I agreed to stop the night but when I woke up this morning, I knew I couldn’t stay away.”

Unt was angered at the interference from Landress and worried at the implication that Crystal had almost heeded her. He was too weary to dwell on it, though. Ultimately, he was thankful Crystal had come at all.

“Thank you,” he voiced the thought.

They stood there, awkwardly. Crystal looked at the bottom of the bars. “Is it true, then?” she asked at last.

Unt shrugged, “That I saved those girls? Yes.”

“And you let Bulton take the credit?”

“Yes.”

Crystal said nothing further for a while. Unt watched the trickle of creases appear and disappear through her brow as she worked her way through the network of cause and effect that followed from that single lie. It was like pool balls cannoning around a table: the first effects were obvious, then the interplay of rebounds made it more difficult to fathom, but ultimately, all of it came from that initial impact.

Somewhere in among her sequence of thought was the point where Unt’s actions intersected her own life. That was the point where she was torn from her lover and thrown into the life she hadn’t welcomed.

“Did you know you would benefit?” she asked him.

“How could I?” said Unt, “I could never have predicted what would happen.”

He could have added that the chain of events that trapped her with him were far too improbable to plan. Or, he could have reminded her that a place in the Council had never entered his dreams. She had entered them, of course, but saying that would hardly help right now. In the end, he said no more. His point was clear enough without muddying the water.

“Whose idea was it?” she asked.

Was she looking to absolve him? Whatever, he wouldn’t allow Bull to be caught up in this mess and be ruined by it too.

“Mine,” he answered truthfully, “Mine and mine alone.”

“Bulton didn’t give you a nudge?”

Unt smiled sadly. “Bull doesn’t have the foresight to think that far ahead. I only wanted to help him and thought he might as well benefit from it.”

Suddenly, Crystal was stern. “Unt, don’t ever repeat that.”

“What?” he asked, recoiling from her intensity.

“Never say what you thought or what you were feeling,” she told him. “Don’t even admit to doing it. If we’re going to beat this, you can’t acknowledge any form of conscious thought.”

When she saw his reaction she softened her voice but not her words. “The Council doesn’t care about why you did it, they only care that the rule was broken. The human reason
why
doesn’t come into it. In fact, it’s dangerous.

“They want to stop people’s desires interfering with our lives so any intent, good or bad, can only make things worse. Our best hope is to deny you thought about it at all. Just say it was an accident and leave it at that.”

If Unt hadn’t been holding onto the bars, he might have fallen to the floor. He was astounded by her unexpected care, by the surprising way she spoke of this as their combined problem. He was also impressed by the weight of her argument.

“My Defender thinks I should plead guilty.”

She was stunned. “You’re not going to protest your innocence?”

“I did it,” he said.

“But you didn’t
mean
to, did you?” Crystal stressed.

“What does that matter?”

“Everything! You can enter a plea of Innocent of Intent.” She studied Unt’s frown. “You’re Defender didn’t explain this?”

“No,” Unt felt like a child, “What’s ‘Innocent of Intent’?”

Crystal put a hand on top of his. “There are three possible pleas you can enter: Guilty, Innocent and Innocent of Intent. Innocent of Intent is when you admit you did it but you either couldn’t help it or weren’t aware of it.”

“Ostin didn’t say anything about that.”

“Ostin’s your Defender?”

“Yes.”

“He hasn’t committed you to anything yet, has he?” Crystal spoke earnestly.

“He told me to think about it overnight.”

“He’s coming back this morning? Then I’ll stay and wait for him. We’ll get you out of this.”

Unt wanted to ask her why she was doing this but doing so seemed ungracious. She might be doing it because it was her duty or it might be because she cared. The important thing was that she was helping.

Just then, Tulk shuffled over onto Crystal’s shoulder. “Where are my manners, my dear?” he said. “Would you like let in so you can have a seat?”

Crystal looked at the bars like she hadn’t seen them. “Oh, thank you,” she said, favouring Tulk with her regal smile.

Tulk let her in and left the door open. Crystal went in and sat on the bed beside him. She put a hand on his thigh. They didn’t know what to say from that point. It was like Crystal was visiting him at his sickbed. Or his deathbed.

“They’re saying the trial’s going to be this morning,” Crystal spoke to fill the void.

“Where did you hear that?”

“My mother heard it last night from a neighbour.”

So the rumour had spread across town, then. There was no hope of a quick trial keeping things quiet. “Your mother’s neighbour’s not wrong,” he said.

“You’d think the man could be here in good time,” she said. Unt had never seen Crystal angry. It was a strange honour that it was on his behalf.

They sat in silence for a few minutes when there was a second knock at the door. Tulk got up and admitted Ostin.

The Defender did a double-take when he saw Crystal. He stood there, blinking, like he couldn’t fathom her presence there. In the end, he seemed to dismiss it as an unsolvable riddle and entered the cell.

“Unt, how are you this morning?” he asked, offering his grey hand. When Unt had shaken it, he looked around as though trying to figure where to sit.

“Here, take my place,” said Crystal, getting up. Ostin didn’t even protest for politeness’ sake, he just plonked himself down in the warm patch she’d created and left her standing over them.

“Ok,” he said, “I received word this morning that the trial is to begin at eleven. It’s just after nine now so that gives us plenty of time to get your plea sorted.”

Plenty, thought Unt.

“Now,” Ostin continued, “Have you decided to enter a guilty plea?” He flicked a glance at Crystal as though wary of this unexpected apparition.

Crystal took that as her cue to speak. “We wanted to explore the option of pleading Innocent of Intent,” she told him.

Ostin looked at Unt as though seeking an explanation. “This is my wife, Crystal,” he introduced her.

“Defender Ostin.” Ostin rose to shake her hand and quickly retreated back beside Unt. He sucked air through his teeth. “Innocent of Intent, you say?”

“It’s my understanding that in your last discussion you didn’t explore this option.” Crystal was imperious.

Ostin scratched between his shoulders. He looked at Crystal, then at Unt as though deciding who he should respond to. “That’s an option, to be sure,” he settled on Unt, “but it carries the same risk that we discussed.”

“But that’s exactly what Unt is,” said Crystal. “Innocent of Intent.”

Ostin looked annoyed. “If we don’t win this thing the judges tend to look harder on these cases than a straight plea of innocence. Then you’ve got to consider the fact you’re one of their own. Councillors are supposed to be above reproach and frankly, you’re pissing on their reputation. They won’t take kindly to that.”

“Or maybe that could help us,” said Crystal, “They won’t be in a hurry to convict him if it tarnishes their image.”

“You’re putting a lot of faith in their intent,” said Ostin.

“And you’re putting a lot of doubt in it,” Crystal fired back.

“If I’m convicted, what happens to my position?” asked Unt. This time, it was his turn to wonder who to direct the question at.

“They won’t want you as a Councillor. You’ll probably be redeployed to another Order,” Ostin got in first.

“They can’t redeploy him,” said Crystal. “It’s never been done before.”

“No Councillor’s ever admitted to cheating the system either,” laughed Ostin nasally. “He falsified his way in there so they’ll argue they can chuck him out. At the end of the day, these are Councillors: they can change the rules as they go.”

“Would they swap me with someone?” Unt was thinking of Rob.

Ostin huffed. “Who knows? They might go back and work out the whole Fall but that would be a logistical nightmare. My guess is they’d add the post into next year’s Fall and give you a new posting when you get out of prison.”

“How would it affect our marriage?” Unt asked Ostin. He couldn’t face saying those words to Crystal.

Ostin hissed. “Difficult to say,” he said and flicked a shifty glance between the two of them. “Has it been, er, consummated?”

Crystal was looking out the window. “Yes,” replied Unt.

“Any issue?” asked Ostin.

“Issue?”

“Children,” he explained.

“We’ve been married less than two months.”

“Of course! Don’t mind me,” Ostin tittered to himself. “Well, I’ve never heard of a marriage being annulled before. You’ve consummated it, which is good, but unless the two of you are expecting, there's no family unit to split up. It might boil down to what Crystal wants.”

Crystal turned back from the window. Unt cursed himself for opening the floor to temptation. What she wanted was Rob. They might have started to build the foundations of a real relationship but given the chance, would she cast Unt aside for him? Probably. The question then was, would she still help him?

“If we win, it doesn’t matter,” she spoke to both of them with a different meaning for each. “Unt has to fight it. He can’t just let himself be condemned for a mistake.”