‘No, he didn’t,’ she responded, although she knew it was a losing battle. ‘If you were listening to me at all, you would have heard me tell you that Commander Monk is my husband. He was informed of the crime by officers of the law. Where is your warrant for arresting Mr Rand?’

  Art took it out of his pocket and showed her, keeping it far enough away that she could not reach for it.

  As soon as she saw it she knew it was genuine. The man may have acted unprofessionally, but perhaps he had children himself, and was thinking of the three that Rand had used, and come close to destroying. Perhaps also he had never lost anyone to disease of the blood, or death from haemorrhage in giving birth, or from a violent injury. It all depended so much on what you felt bone-deep in personal terror or loss, and on what you understood.

  Whatever Art had known, or not, he was right to arrest Rand, at least in the law, and that was all he was answerable to.

  Rand knew it, too. Like a man moving in his sleep, he held out his wrists for the manacles. He walked away between the policemen with only one glance backwards at Hester. He looked confused, even frightened, as if he did not understand.

  Was he guilty of having killed Adrienne Radnor, and had seen it as a necessary act, in order to protect his work? Therefore it was not a crime, in his own opinion.

  Or was it not he who had killed her at all, but someone else?

  Rathbone heard of Rand’s arrest and charge with a sense of dismay. And yet he had every reason to be pleased. The man was guilty of having kidnapped Hester and imprisoning the three Roberts children, even if the law could not prove it. Rathbone had not for an instant doubted Hester’s word, even if he was aware that she had a respect for Rand’s work, if not for his methods. And in spite of all that had happened, she was back working at the hospital where she would probably see him every day.

  That much he realised that he understood perfectly. A lawyer defended people accused of appalling crimes, whatever their own opinion of innocence or guilt. He had been wrong more than once, although had he been right every time that would not alter the principle.

  Nevertheless, when Ardal Juster asked him to call at his chambers, Rathbone went only because he owed Juster that courtesy. After their disappointment over the previous prosecution, and the complete shambles in which it had ended, for Juster to call on Rathbone again was more than courteous, it was generous.

  ‘Looks as if we have a second chance at it,’ Juster said as Rathbone sat down in the comfortable chair opposite the desk in Juster’s chambers. He smiled ruefully. ‘Although I have a feeling you are going to tell me again that you don’t think the case against Rand is a very good one.’

  ‘I haven’t heard it,’ Rathbone replied. He clearly hoped that he was mistaken in his scepticism.

  ‘We have motive, means and opportunity.’ Juster leaned forward across the desk in his enthusiasm. ‘He can’t account for his whereabouts for most of the probable time of the murder.’

  Rathbone began as devil’s advocate immediately. ‘Seems it was apparently the middle of the night; neither could I. Could you?’

  ‘What?’ Juster looked startled, as if Rathbone had accused him of something.

  Rathbone smiled. ‘Most men who do not sleep in the same bed as a wife cannot prove their whereabouts at two or three o’clock in the morning. Did anyone see Rand, or a man who could have been Rand, in the neighbourhood?’

  ‘Not so far,’ Juster conceded. ‘No one at all has been seen, but quite clearly someone had been there. The woman didn’t strangle herself.’

  ‘You make a nice argument for a jury,’ Rathbone agreed. ‘Is there anything at all to indicate that it was Rand? Something he left there? Something found in his home, his office, his laboratory? Mud-stained clothes? A footprint in the ground? Mud on his boots?’

  ‘Miss Radnor was found in the ditch beside the road,’ Juster said impatiently. ‘There would be no occasion for her killer to go off into the ditch himself. And he had the means. She was strangled. Any man of average strength with two hands could have done it. And before you ask for more than that, she put up no struggle. There is plenty of evidence of that in the state of her clothes, and her body. She did not run, and she did not fight until the last few moments, when she realised what he had already begun to do. It was no stranger who followed her or crept up on her. There is plenty of evidence, which, if properly presented, can lead to no other conclusion.’

  ‘Could she have had a lover who quarrelled with her?’ Rathbone was still testing the case, looking for the arguments the defence would use.

  ‘I’ve looked for one, but found nothing at all to suggest she has had a suitor of any kind in the last three or four years. In fact, since her father’s health began to fail, and he didn’t travel so much but stayed at home, she has been constantly at his side.’

  ‘A secret lover?’ Rathbone persisted.

  Juster gave a sharp little laugh. ‘Secret from Bryson Radnor? What do you think are the chances of that? He controlled her life. That I can call abundant evidence to prove, if I have to.’

  ‘It begins to look like a better case,’ Rathbone agreed, and saw Juster’s immediate satisfaction. ‘Don’t want it too much,’ he warned, his voice gentler.

  Juster faced him squarely, his dark eyes bright. ‘And you are precisely the man to warn me about taking short cuts with the law, or allowing my own sense of what is right or wrong to guide my actions, ignoring the niceties of the legal system.’

  Rathbone knew exactly what he meant, and the barb had been a long time in coming. Indeed, he was surprised, considering how harsh he had been with Juster, that it had been so long.

  ‘Of course I am,’ he agreed with painful honesty. ‘I have done what I am warning you not to do, and paid the price for it. You, of all men, know that. Is it a pattern of behaviour you wish to emulate?’

  Juster blushed. ‘Actually, I would very much like to emulate both your skill and your passion,’ he said with sudden humility. ‘But if I don’t learn from the price you paid for that, then I am a fool. I mean to prepare this case against Hamilton Rand with the utmost care, diligence not only in every detail, but in all the moral and emotional aspects as well. And I would be profoundly grateful if you would help me, for the sake of justice, if not for the excitement of the battle.’

  He leaned across the desk again, keen face earnest. ‘You and I know that Rand kidnapped Hester Monk because she was useful to him, and because if he left her behind, she would tell people what he was doing. But whether she wishes to press charges or not, there is no question what he did to those children.’

  Rathbone started to speak.

  Juster held up his hand. ‘I know! I know . . . we could not prove that the money he gave the parents was payment to get himself off any subsequent charge of kidnapping the children. And the parents, poor devils, needed it far too badly to admit to knowing much. It stood between them and the starvation of their children. They would rather have food and be thought to sell their children than keep their reputation and watch the smallest ones cry from hunger until they haven’t the strength to cry any more. God help me, so would I! My point, Sir Oliver, is that we know the man is evil. He escaped us before because of Radnor’s dramatic entrance. After that even an eye witness couldn’t have got us a conviction. People are terrified of disease or injury where a victim bleeds to death. He holds out the hope of a cure. You can’t win over hope. But this is different. This is the wilful and deliberate murder of a young woman—’

  ‘Why?’ Rathbone interrupted again. ‘Why did he kill her? You have to provide that motive! If you haven’t got an eye witness and you haven’t got physical evidence, then you must have an overpowering reason.’

  ‘Because now that her father is well again, she doesn’t need Rand any more,’ Juster pointed out. ‘We don’t know what else she learned when she was in that cottage. She wasn’t locked up like Hester. She was there of her own will, and when Rand and Hester were caring for Radnor, she had the run of the house. She had to. What did she learn when she was there, that now she could tell anyone?’

  ‘Such as what?’ Rathbone asked, but the idea was too powerful to dismiss.

  ‘Where the bones came from that Monk and his man dug up in the orchard, for example,’ Juster suggested quietly. ‘They were human bones. Some were very small . . . the bones of children.’

  ‘They could have been anybody.’ Rathbone tried to keep his voice level, reasonable, but the horror and the pity strained him beyond control. They were somebody’s children, whatever they died of. Why were they not in a churchyard, a grave in hallowed ground, like other dead children of the village?

  Juster saw his face, and he did not waste words on answering.

  ‘Will you help me?’ His mouth twisted in that odd, wry smile of his. ‘To keep me within the law, if nothing else!’

  Rathbone sighed. ‘I suppose I’d better do that. I owe you a debt of considerable gratitude. I would certainly like to see Rand put away, but fairly.’

  Juster nodded. That was good enough.

  The second trial of Hamilton Rand opened to a courtroom so packed that no one could move in the gallery without jostling his neighbour. People stared at the witness box or the judge, Patterson again, because there was no room to turn their backs to stare across at the jury. Still less was there room to crane their necks to look up at the dock where Hamilton Rand sat between two gaolers. He seemed to be looking beyond the court to some distant sight that only he could see.

  He was charged this time with the murder of the woman who had been his co-defendant in the previous trial when both were charged with kidnap, and – by default – been found not guilty.

  Juster began his prosecution very carefully, laying the scene piece by piece, as Rathbone had counselled him to do. He opened by calling as his first witness the man who had found the body while riding his horse early in the morning. The animal had smelled something that had disturbed it and had stopped in the middle of the road, unwilling to go on.

  The man described his actions, and what he had found. He had then ridden back at some speed to ask a neighbour’s assistance to guard the body, and send for the police. He had not touched the dead woman, except to assure himself that she was cold, and beyond human help.

  Counsel for the defence was a man named Lyons, who had fading red hair, and who was in fact far older and wiser than he looked. Rathbone knew him only by repute, but he had a considerable respect for him. He was not surprised when Lyons declined to distress the witness by asking him for any further and unnecessary details.

  The police evidence was exactly what everyone expected. The surgeon was brief, as if he disliked describing the dead woman, now unable to defend herself, from the somewhat prurient interest of the public. He spoke of her with the slight euphemisms he might have used were he speaking of someone still alive.

  Juster found it annoying. It blunted the edge of what had been done to her. Rathbone could see it clearly in his face.

  ‘Don’t,’ he warned very quietly.

  ‘He’s making it almost as if she weren’t really hurt!’ Juster hissed the words between clenched teeth. ‘She didn’t lie down in the ditch and go to sleep. She fought for her life when she realised he was trying to kill her! I’ve got to make the jury see—’

  Rathbone tightened his grip on Juster’s arm until he winced.

  ‘No you haven’t! He’s made her seem human! He’s left her dignity intact rather than allowed you to speak of her as a piece of evidence in the case. He’s inviting the jury to see a real woman, one to protect, not exploit. Use it, Juster. Use it!’

  ‘Mr Juster?’ Patterson asked politely. ‘If you have no further questions for this witness, perhaps you would oblige me by allowing Mr Lyons to conclude?’

  ‘Thank you, my lord,’ Juster said with a slight nod. ‘I think the police surgeon has given us an excellent medical account of the tragic death of this young woman, at the beginning of her own life, after her selfless devotion to her father in his long illness. I don’t think we need disturb her peace with anything further.’

  Lyons’ face was a picture of distaste as he rose to his feet. He knew precisely what Juster had achieved and was not fool enough to earn the jury’s disfavour by harassing the surgeon for more detail. He made his question brief.

  ‘Was there anything in the poor woman’s injuries to indicate the height or weight of her attacker, or anything else about him?’ he asked.

  ‘No, sir, except that he was far stronger than she was,’ the surgeon replied. ‘And he had the advantage of surprise,’ he added.

  ‘She was unaware of his approach?’ Lyons asked, raising his eyebrows.

  ‘No, sir. From the positioning of his hands on her throat, as I think I said before, she was facing him. She did not expect him to attack her.’

  ‘So it would be reasonable to suppose that he was someone known to her, and trusted by her?’

  ‘It would.’

  ‘Thank you. I have nothing further.’

  Other professional testimony such as that of the police, who had conducted various parts of the investigation so there could afterwards be no detail misinterpreted, took up the afternoon. The following morning when they continued, the courtroom was so crowded doors had to be closed half an hour before the trial recommenced.

  Juster called Hester Monk. He intended keeping Radnor himself until last. Anything Hester failed to do to engage the jury’s sympathy, Radnor was certain to do. Juster felt confident, which was clear from the grace of his step as he walked out into the open space and faced the witness stand. It was in the smooth ease of his voice when he spoke.

  ‘I am sorry to have to put you through this ordeal again, Mrs Monk,’ he said. ‘This time I hope we will have a less unfortunate outcome.’ He smiled very slightly, facing the witness stand and the jury, not the gallery. This might be a superb performance, but there was only one audience that mattered, those who would deliver the verdict. Rand’s life depended upon this, and – in a larger sense – justice itself and the belief that in the end it prevailed.

  ‘Mrs Monk,’ Juster began, ‘I know that you have given evidence before on a great many of the things that I will ask you, but remember that to this jury, it is all new. Have patience with me.’

  It was not a question and she did not answer. Rathbone thought she looked pale, and very tired, even touched by grief. She might be the perfect witness, better even than Radnor, since he had to be emotional about his daughter’s death. Indeed, it would be conspicuous if he were not.

  ‘Mrs Monk,’ Juster continued, ‘will you tell the court briefly how you came to know Mr Rand, and Miss Radnor?’

  Hester was very brief indeed, as if she had rehearsed it in her mind, but did not leave out anything essential.

  ‘I took a temporary post as night nurse at the annexe of the Greenwich Royal Naval Hospital. A friend from my nursing days in the Crimea had to take leave because of illness. I said I would fill her place as long as necessary, if I was satisfactory to Dr Magnus Rand, who is in charge of the annexe. During my service there I had occasion to meet Mr Hamilton Rand, who is a research chemist. Miss Adrienne Radnor came in when her father was admitted as a patient.’

  ‘And what was your duty?’ Juster asked.

  ‘To assist Mr Rand and Dr Rand in Mr Radnor’s treatment.’

  ‘Why you?’ Juster affected interest, as if he did not already know.

  Rathbone glanced at the jurors. Most of them were leaning a little forward, waiting for the reply.

  Hester answered without the slightest change of expression in her face.

  ‘Because I have more experience in serious injury involving great loss of blood than most nurses have.’

  ‘Indeed? Why is that?’

  Hester answered very briefly, describing her time in the Crimea as an army nurse, sometimes actually on the battlefield.

  Juster did not have to pretend his admiration. The battles and their losses were still sharp in public memory, and the name of Florence Nightingale was known everywhere. Many people had family or friends who had fallen at Balaclava, Inkerman, or the Alma.

  Rathbone had heard this before, but it still gave him a shiver of horror, pity, fury for the incompetence, pity for the terrible losses.

  There was not a man in the jury who did not listen to Hester with awe now. Lyons would be a fool to attack her, whatever she said.

  ‘Did you know what these treatments were going to be, before you began?’ Juster asked.

  ‘No.’

  ‘And when you did?’

  She hesitated for several moments.

  In the body of the courtroom no one moved.

  ‘I could see the enormous potential.’ Hester chose her words with almost painful care. ‘If it worked it would result in the saving of more lives in the future than we could ever guess. Thousands, tens of thousands of people. Not just soldiers in war but people in any kind of accident – industrial, railway trains – women with difficult births, and of course all sorts of diseases of the blood. There is no end to what could be achieved.’ There was a very slight flush to her face and her knuckles were white where she gripped the rails of the witness stand.

  Juster nodded slowly, not wanting to break the spell before he had to.

  ‘So he is a hero?’ he said at last.

  ‘A flawed one,’ she said quietly.

  Now the jury were straining to catch every word.

  ‘Why?’ Juster pressed her.

  ‘Because of the means he used to obtain the blood he gave to Mr Radnor.’ She shook her head and lowered her eyes. ‘There is always cost to experiment. Success is not certain, or it is no longer an experiment. But those who pay the price must do it knowingly, and willingly.

  ‘Mr Radnor was willing?’

  She stared at Juster. ‘Of course he was. He had no choice: he would have died without the treatment. But the children whose blood Mr Rand used were too small to have choice. And their parents had no idea what was going to be done. It is beyond the imagination of most of us.’