The Payment

by Michelle E Lowe

  For twenty solid minutes, the prosecutor dictated Pierce’s whole “villainous” past, which was full of thievery, smuggling, hustling, and escapes. The prosecutor then added that the jury should not even consider sending him to a penal colony, for Pierce had already escaped from that once before. Matthew eventually came around to the train robbery and then to the most serious charge—the attack on Queen Victoria.

  “And that is why I humbly request Pierce Landcross be given a sentence that even he cannot escape from—death!”

  His theatrical showmanship drew a gasp from some of the sods in the stands. He bowed as if he had just finished his greatest performance and took his seat.

  Pierce nervously looked over at his barrister, who sat with a look of amazement on his chubby face.

  “Wow,” Euan whispered barely loud enough for Pierce to hear. “He is quite good.”

  Pierce could not believe what he had just heard.

  “Counselor Wood,” said the judge. “Your opening statement.”

  When the judge spoke to him, he sounded scornful. In Pierce’s opinion, he ought to have counted his blessings in not having the likes of Euan as a son-in-law.

  Euan stood and muttered under his breath, “I’ll do my best.”

  Pierce rolled his eyes while gritting his teeth.

  “Thank you, Your Honor,” the defense attorney said. “Gentlemen of the jury, my client isn’t on trial for the things for which he has been exonerated by the Queen herself.”

  Not a bad opening line, Pierce thought hopefully.

  “You heard the judge. Mr. Landcross stands accused of railway robbery and high treason.”

  Bugger.

  The fool stammered nervously through an ill-conceived statement that he blatantly threw together while the other lawyer was speaking. Shortly after he began, Pierce set his elbows on the railing of the dock and planted his face in his hands. Nobody objected to him doing it, and so he just stayed that way until the twit stopped speaking.

  “A-and that is why I beg you, gentlemen of the jury, to spare Mr. Landcross’s life,” he concluded. “Th-thank you.”

  Both Pierce and the judge sighed deeply.

  “Your first witness, Mr. Beckham,” Magistrate Spencer said.

  The scarecrow’s chair legs scraped against the floor as he stood.

  “Thank you, my lord. I call to the stand Lord Darius Javan.”

  Pierce lifted his head and straightened up in time to watch Darius walk by. The Persian glared back and Pierce narrowed his eyes at him. Darius strolled over to the witness box next to the judge’s bench and stood there. After he swore an oath to be truthful, he sat down and waited.

  “My lord,” the prosecutor said, folding his hands behind him. “Could you please give the court your full name?”

  “Darius Rafael Javan.”

  “Where are you originally from, and when did you immigrate to Great Britain?”

  “I was born in a small village in Carmania. When I was thirteen, my family left to live here.”

  “You were a soldier, yes?”

  “Indeed. At seventeen, I joined the British Army and fought in both the Third Anglo Maratha and in the First Ashanti War.”

  “And now you govern Britain’s southwest territories, correct?”

  “Yes.”

  “How do you know the accused, Mr. Landcross?”

  “I was appointed by Queen Victoria to hunt for him after he tried to steal her necklace. I caught him in France and brought him back to England.”

  “What happened after you brought him here?”

  “He escaped. He was saved by a vampire.”

  The lawyer showed little surprise, which meant he already knew this, just like anyone else who had read Clover’s novels.

  “Vampire, you say? We can see the kind of company that Mr. Landcross keeps,” Counselor Matthew Beckham dictated loudly to the whole room. “What happened after he escaped?”

  “He went to London to break his parents out of Newgate Prison,” Darius explained.

  This drew a few sympathetic looks Pierce’s way.

  The prosecutor who was out for blood, though, knew how deep to cut in order to get it. “And when he did, he caused thousands of pounds in damages and was responsible for the release of hundreds of dangerous criminals.”

  Darius nodded. “Yes.”

  Pierce understood—even if his numbskull defense barrister didn’t—that the prosecutor was sticking to certain details and asking all the right questions in order to avoid the jurymen from ruling in Pierce’s favor. This crafty counselor had a knack for stacking damning evidence against him.

  “Why did Her Majesty offer him a pardon?”

  “We had recaptured his parents,” Darius explained. “Landcross offered to trade himself for their freedom. When he did, we decided to grant him a second chance.”

  “And there was a clause to this pardon, was there not?”

  “Indeed. He was not allowed to return to England.”

  “And he failed to uphold his end of the bargain. Am I right, Lord Javan?”

  “Correct,” Darius answered, disgruntled.

  “And shortly after he returned to the very country he was forbidden to return to, what happened?”

  “I received a message through my teleprinter that he had been involved in an attempted train robbery.”

  A light muttering washed over the crowd. The magistrate treated it as if it were a thunderous storm of conversation and banged his gavel.

  “Order! Order in the court! If I don’t have order, I will empty this courtroom. Do you hear me?”

  The room quickly became as silent as the grave—which was pretty much where Pierce was headed for with the sort of questions Matthew was asking.

  The counselor smirked. “And we have witnesses to verify that they saw Mr. Landcross on the train on the night of the robbery,” Matthew told the jurymen. He addressed Darius. “He tried thieving a train. Then what did he do?”

  “Landcross fled to London.”

  “And then what?” the prosecutor pressed.

  “He went to the Circle Theater.”

  “Where you, and many others, saw him inside Her Majesty’s box seat during the shooting, yes?”

  “Correct.”

  By this time, Pierce had thought of plenty of defenses that his subpar attorney could use.

  “Psst!” Pierce hissed to a clerk nearest him. “Psst! Oi, you there.”

  The clerk who was trying to keep up with the trial eventually turned his head to him.

  “Can I have a few sheets of paper and a pen, mate?” Pierce whispered.

  His actions did not go unnoticed.

  “Mr. Landcross,” the magistrate exclaimed. “What is the meaning of this? Clerk, what did the prisoner say to you?”

  “He requested paper and a pen, my lord.”

  “What for, Mr. Landcross?” the magistrate demanded.

  Everyone’s attention turned to him.

  Pierce swallowed thickly before answering, “To jot down some inquiries of my own for Lord Javan, milord. After all, my attorney doesn’t seem to know dung from defense.”

  A roar of laughter erupted from the spectators. Ol’ Spencer was none too happy about the abrupt cheeriness. He slammed his gavel and demanded order once again. When the room had calmed, the judge glared at Pierce so dreadfully, it wiped the amused grin right off his face. He feared his request would be denied.

  “Mr. Landcross, this is your first warning about causing a disturbance in my court, do I make myself clear?”

  Pierce had no choice but to act respectfully. “Yes, milord. What I meant is that my lawyer is very ill-prepared and has little information regarding my case. He didn’t even know my plea. I’m only asking to provide my side of things and ask questions to help in my defense.”

  The judge considered him and then said at length, “Given the fact that I agree with you about Counselor Wood’s lack of competence, and that this trial has come up rather quickly, I shal
l allow it. Clerk, give him paper and a pen.”

  The clerk handed three sheets and an extra fountain pen over to a guard, who then handed everything to Pierce. The moment Pierce had the items, he began writing. His injured knuckles from the fight with Volker still stung beneath the bandages.

  “Proceed, Mr. Beckham,” ordered the judge.

  “Gladly, my lord.” To Darius, Matthew asked, “What happened after the attack?”

  “A man from the audience shot and killed the actress, Frederica Katz.”

  Pierce paused from his writing. Pain plucked at his heart. Hearing her name and the details of her murder nearly brought him to his knees. However, he remained strong, for he was in a fight for his life. Regardless of the odds stacked against him, he wasn’t going to stand by and let it all collapse around him. He started writing again.

  “What did Mr. Landcross do after the shooting?”

  “He chased after the murderer,” Darius said. “I followed him out and eventually found Landcross in a train factory, where I took him into custody.”

  “Going back to the attack, do you have any assumptions as to why Mr. Landcross would want to do Her Majesty harm?”

  “It is unclear at this time, but I believe he is part of a group caught up in the revolutionary wave, and they somehow persuaded Landcross to assassinate our queen in an effort to start a war.”

  “That is a hefty accusation, my lord.”

  “Not an accusation. Merely an assumption,” Darius corrected him. “However, it is not so farfetched an idea.”

  The corner of the prosecutor’s thin lips rose. “No, Lord Javan. It is not.” He turned his chin up to the magistrate. “No further questions, my lord.”

  Pierce rushed to finish his questions for Darius. The judge was ready to get on with the trial.

  “Counselor Wood,” said Judge Spencer. “Your witness. Are you prepared?”

  Euan rose from his seat and began to answer just as Pierce finished writing.

  “Aye! He is!” he exclaimed, holding up the list.

  The judge glowered at him. Pierce slapped a hand over his mouth while holding the paper up in his other.

  He lowered his hands and restated more calmly, “Aye, milord. Quite ready.”

  He handed the list to a guard, and he gave it to his lummox of a lawyer. Euan scanned the text and smiled gleefully. That gave Pierce a glimmer of hope.

  “Counselor,” the magistrate demanded.

  “Erm, yes, my lord. My apologies.” To Darius, he said, “Lord Javan, who was it that presented the Royal pardon to the defendant, Mr. Landcross?”

  “I did.”

  “And what did you say to him when you gave him the pardon?”

  “That it was my regret,” Darius answered.

  A burst of low laughter came from the crowd. It only took the judge looking his or her way to shut everyone up. Darius’s response confused Euan. He looked to Pierce as if to ask what he should do next. Christ, why the hell did he ever become a defense counselor?

  “Go on,” Pierce whispered anxiously.

  “Uh, wha-what did you say after that?”

  Darius paused a beat before answering, “That the Queen saw something in him. And when he was willing to surrender himself for his parents, I saw it, as well. I told him he was an honorable man.”

  Euan read off the next question. “And that is why you allowed him to leave your home after he arrived on your doorstep only a few days ago, correct?”

  The spectators muttered to themselves. With a contemptuous sigh, Matthew leaned back in his chair. Pierce squinted at Matthew and gave the bugger a sardonic grin.

  “I suppose,” Darius answered at length.

  “So, he did come to your house?” Euan pressed.

  “He did.”

  “And you saw him?”

  “We had lunch.”

  “You had lunch . . . together? My, that sounds like you welcomed him with open arms.”

  “I wouldn’t put it like that,” Darius insisted.

  “And despite him trespassing in this country, you allowed him to leave scot-free. You felt he was not a threat, did you not?”

  The questions weren’t meant to attack Darius but were more of a way of getting him to rethink Pierce’s guilt. If Pierce could get Darius to look past his own anger, perhaps it would give him cause to investigate a little harder.

  “It was poor judgment on my part, I will admit,” Darius proclaimed.

  To this, Pierce’s idiot lawyer responded, “Erm, don’t you mean something along the lines of ‘because you knew he wasn’t a threat?’”

  Pierce wasn’t even an barrister and yet realized the error. He made a chopping motion across his neck to get him to stop talking.

  “Objection, Your Honor!” Matthew protested. “The defense is leading the witness.”

  Pierce slapped a hand to his forehead.

  “Objection granted,” the judge consented to no one’s surprise. “Counselor Wood, this is your only warning about this.”

  Pierce slid his hand down his face and saw his lawyer’s horrified expression. It wouldn’t have surprised Pierce if the wanker had soiled himself.

  “Y-yes, my lord,” the ninny stammered.

  “Continue,” the magistrate ordered.

  “Th-thank you, Your Honor. Erm . . .” He pushed his spectacles up the bridge of his nose as he scanned the questions. “Right, skipping ahead.”

  No, don’t bloody skip ahead, Pierce thought grimly.

  “Moving on to the night at the Circle Theater. What actually occurred?”

  The bastard had allowed himself to be rattled. There were other things to address and to ask Darius, and the git had just skipped over them!

  “Her Majesty had requested I join her for the play. She had confided to me that she had a bad feeling that something would happen. Her instincts proved accurate. As the first act played out, gunmen shot down the guards outside. The other two guards went out into the corridor, only to be gunned down themselves. That was when men entered.”

  “Were any of them Mr. Landcross?” Euan asked.

  “No. I shot one attacker, and he fell back against his accomplice, who then caught him and pushed the wounded man at me. He and I struggled, and we both fell over the balcony railing.”

  “So, you went over. Therefore, you did not actually see Mr. Landcross attacking the Queen, correct?”

  “I did not, no. She was wounded, though.”

  “Do you know how she got wounded?”

  “I do not. I was preoccupied with the struggle.”

  Euan glanced at the paper. The next question he asked was if Darius thought it was possible the man he was fighting with had pushed her during the struggle. A vital question, for Victoria’s head wound could be viewed as an accident. Yet the twit seemed to overlook it and said, “Erm, right. What happened then, Lord Javan?”

  If Pierce could have reached the cocker, he’d have wrapped the chains of his shackles around his bleedin’ throat and pull.

  “I heard two more shots as I hung from the balcony and shortly thereafter, Landcross looked over the ledge. He was in disguise and spoke to me with a French accent.”

  “In disguise? Are you sure it was him?”

  “Without a doubt.”

  “Did he say anything to you?”

  That wasn’t one of Pierce’s questions. He wanted Euan to point out that the second man was shot shortly after Pierce peered over the balcony. No one else alive had been holding a gun, so who else could have killed the bloke?

  Stick to what I wrote down, you cunt!

  “I called for him to help me and he told me he needed to see to the Queen. Soon afterward, a man gunned down Mrs. Katz.”

  “What then?”

  “I was pulled up by a couple of Good Samaritans. That was when I saw the Queen against the wall.”

  “Was she conscious then?”

  “She was. A woman tending to her claimed she was fine. She then advised me to go after the man—mean
ing Landcross—who attacked her.”

  Pierce knitted his eyebrows together. When he left the box seat, the only women there were Penelope and that older lady. Penelope would not have told Darius that he was the attacker. Perhaps the older woman had?

  “Do you know anything about this man . . . ?” Euan checked the paper. “. . . Mr. . . . um . . . Volker Jäger? The man who supposedly killed the actress?”

  “His body was apparently crushed under a train inside the factory,” Darius explained. “I have been told that the workers have not yet been able to lift it.”

  “Do you know anything about him, though?”

  “My lord,” the prosecutor interjected. “The death of this murderer has no bearing on this trial. May we stick with what is purely relevant to the case?”

  That made Pierce’s blood run hot. Volker was linked to Freya and was, therefore, part of the attack at the theater. Shining more light on them both might cause those who was holding his life in their hands to dig a little deeper.

  “I agree,” said the judge. “Mr. Wood. Finish this up.”

  There was more, but once again, the blasted fool caved. “Uh. No further questions, my lord.”

  “Lord Javan,” the magistrate said. “You may step down.”

  “My lord,” the prosecutor spoke up. “May I ask Lord Javan a couple more questions?”

  Pierce didn’t like the sound of that.

  “Very well, Mr. Beckman,” the judge said.

  Matthew addressed Darius. “Lord Javan, during your struggle, you didn’t see the Queen hurt, yes?”

  “I was preoccupied. That is correct.”

  “So, for all you know, she was completely fine when you went over.”

  “Perhaps.”

  “And after you climbed over, what did you see?”

  “The Queen was on the floor, bleeding.”

  “Kindly repeat once more to the court what Mr. Landcross said to you before the actress was shot.”

  Pierce nearly dropped dead on the spot.

  Darius sighed. “That he must see to the Queen.”

  The crowd muttered to themselves and the jurymen took down their notes.

  The prosecutor glared at Pierce with a demure smile. “No further questions, Your Honor.”

  That blasted question his twat of a lawyer had tossed out had turned around to bite Pierce on the arse. Darius left the witness box, and as he walked by Pierce, they both glared hatefully at each other.