Page 107 of A Sunless Sea (William Monk 17)

He relaxed and his face flooded with relief. “I got it from a tosher,” he said proudly. “I done errands fer ’im. ’E let me ’ave it.”

Suddenly he looked embarrassed and his gaze slid away from hers. “I said it were for me ma. Is that all right?”

Now it was she who felt the warmth wash up her face. “It’s … it’s more than all right,” she told him as she carefully put the chain around her neck and fastened the clasp. She saw his eyes shine with pleasure, and she couldn’t resist reaching down and hugging him gently.

“In fact it couldn’t be better,” she added, releasing him before he could feel uncomfortable. “We have a couple of things for you, when William comes down.”

“I got summink for ’im too,” Scuff said, reassuring her.

“I’m sure you have,” she replied. “Are you ready for porridge? We’ve got a very special, busy day ahead.”

“How long is it Christmas?” he asked, seating himself at the table.

“All day, actually until the middle of the night,” she answered. “Then it’s Boxing Day, and that’s a holiday, too.”

“Good. I like Christmas,” he said with satisfaction.

CHAPTER 22

On Tuesday the trial reopened with Coniston looking considerably more relaxed, as if the end of a long and weary journey were almost reached. There was something in his face that could even have been sympathy for Rathbone.

Pendock brought them to order very quickly.

“Have you a witness, Sir Oliver?” he asked.

“Yes, my lord,” Rathbone replied. “I call the accused, known as Dinah Lambourn.”

Pendock looked slightly startled, as if he considered it a mistake, but he made no comment.

Dinah was brought down from the dock. Carefully, her whole body trembling, she climbed the steps to the witness stand, gripping the rails as if she was afraid of falling. Indeed, she might have been. She looked ashen; her face seemed to have no blood beneath the alabaster skin.

Rathbone walked out into the center of the court and looked up at her. How long would he have to keep her here? He must speak with Winfarthing before he put him on the stand. Any lawyer who did less than that was a fool. He trusted Hester, but he still needed his own preparation.

“You lived with Joel Lambourn for fifteen years as his wife?” he asked, his voice a little strained.

“Yes,” she replied.

“Did you ever marry him?”

“No.”

“Why not?” It seemed a brutal question, but he wanted the jury to understand her and be in no doubt whatsoever that she had always known of Zenia Gadney.

“Because he was already married to Zenia, his wife from before we met,” she answered.

“And he did not put her aside in order to marry you?” He tried to put surprise into his voice without cruelty, but it was impossible. He winced at the sound of it.

“I didn’t ever ask him to,” she replied. “I knew Zenia had had a bad accident and the pain had caused her to become addicted first to alcohol, and then to opium. She finally recovered from the gin, but never completely from the opium. There was a time when the one thing she clung to, and which saved her from suicide, was the fact that Joel did not abandon her. I loved him, I always will. I would not ask him to do something he believed to be cruel and wrong. I wouldn’t want him to be a man who wished to.”

“And was it not wrong to live with you, then?” he asked but only because he knew Coniston would if he did not.

“He didn’t ask me to live with him,” she replied. “I chose to. And yes, I suppose society would say that was wrong. I really don’t care ver

y much.”

“You don’t care for right and wrong, or you don’t care what society thinks of you?” Rathbone asked.

“I suppose I care,” she replied with the ghost of a smile. “About society, I mean. But not enough to give up the only man I ever loved. We offended propriety, or we would have done, had they known. But we hurt no one else. Perhaps even they would not have cared a great deal. Thousands of people have mistresses or lovers. Thousands more make use of women of the street. As long as it is private, no one minds very much.”