The Raven's Seal

by Andrei Baltakmens

  In his moments of lucidity, he was pierced by thirst and by the spasms of the illness. His thirst scorched his mouth, and yet he could not give over shivering. His weakness appalled him. Mrs. Myron was often there, as she had been on occasions in his childhood, and for this he was thankful, and yet he could not disengage from puzzling over some connection with her that he had grievously neglected, and this confusion shamed him inexpressibly. Often, he saw William, who sometimes dozed in the chair, or recorded something in a notebook at the table, and looked on with a worried smile. Once, he drowsily recognised Mr. Ravenscraigh, leaning against the cell door and regarding him gravely. And betimes Cassie was there also, and because it was her touch that most soothed him and that he most longed for, it was her devotion that shamed him most.

  All fever-thoughts are partial thoughts, and therein lies their peculiar horror. Adrift among so many fragments, a word, a touch, a softening gesture alone could quiet him. Yet, eventually, the mind grows weary of its own disorder, and as a sleeper in the realm of nightmare strives for wakefulness and at last perceives that the storm, the crowd, the thunder of cannons, were but the rain beating upon the window, so Grainger came, by degrees, to sustain himself again by real things.

  He reached forward and took Cassie’s hand in his own as she sat nearby.

  “Forgive me,” he said, in a whisper, for his voice was very faint.

  “Forgive what?” said she.

  “I have doubted even you, the fairest and best of girls. In such moments, I have held you to blame, though you have been truer than any other. I fear I have misused you. I have been vain, and I have indulged in intolerable self-pity.”

  “Well! That is a long list of offences,” she said with a smile. “I hope you remember some of it when you are better.”

  “I shall strive to make amends, but—”

  “Hush. Do not explain. Rest and get stronger.”

  He closed his eyes and, listening to the faint, far toll of bells and the remote hubbub of the city, fell into a lighter sleep.

  MR. BENSEY, save for a scar above his ear and a fine tremor that occasionally affected his left side, had largely recovered from his attack, attended sometimes by Cassie and sometimes by the stationer’s widowed sister, who hired herself out as a nurse. His memory of the events of that afternoon and the two men who had assaulted him was never repaired. His description was never other than vague. Captain Grimsborough had been able to determine only that the stationer had been called away on business, and the shop-boy had fled and hid himself when the two men jovially threatened to set the paper-stock to the match.

  Mr. Bensey had become somewhat more timorous in the aftermath, with the habit of scrutinising the faces of strangers in the streets and other public places and then shying away from them. His fine legal copperplate, so highly regarded on Battens Hill, never entirely regained its former ease.

  One Sunday afternoon, coming from a visit with Bensey, Cassie encountered three of her sisters sitting glumly on the steps of their lodgings, leaning their heads together in a perfect tableaux of grief and despair. The eldest, Violet, looked up as her sister approached.

  “Whatever’s the matter?” said Cassie, more vexed than concerned.

  “It is Toby,” said Violet, with grim satisfaction. “He has finally ruined us all.”

  “Indeed,” said Cassie, with a coolness that further disconcerted her sisters.

  But as she went up the short steps, she discovered her mother within, slumped over the table, with her eyes red-rimmed from weeping, and two of her little brothers clinging piteously to her mother’s skirts, whimpering in sympathy. Mrs. Scopes, known to Cassie from cold mornings at the pump in Sessions Lane, was comforting her mother, while Silas himself was hobbling with gloomy persistence up and down the length of the family estate.

  “Oh, it’s you, is it?” Silas greeted her, with a manner both dour and dismissive that quite perplexed her.

  “What is it?” cried Cassie. “What has happened?”

  Mrs. Redruth drew a long breath and clutched at her friend’s arm. It was Mrs. Scopes who replied: “Your Toby has been took up!”

  “Taken up? By who—where? Father, what has happened?”

  Silas, with a sweep of his hand which almost tottered him, growled, “He has been brought up on charges. He will stand before the bench.”

  “Where is he?”

  “Where think you?” snapped Silas. “He has been hauled up to the Bells.”

  By now, several persons passing by in the yard and coming upon Cassie’s sisters, had formed their own opinions on the situation, and leaning in at the door (and one lad at the window) communicated these conclusions:

  “He is sure to be hanged,” said one woman.

  “He will be branded,” said the boy, hissing and pressing his forearm.

  “It is a fine thing, to be sure,” began Silas grimly, “for an honest man to have his son arrested by the beadle and brought up for thieving, and a daughter who is partial to a murderer. Aye, ’tis no wonder Toby had gone down the wrong path, when his sister daily makes the acquaintance of prisoners and felons. A fine example that sets before a lad, for all her airs and graces!”

  The injustice and folly of this charge stopped even Cassie’s retort, but no matter, for her mother was calling, and she went at once to her side. Mrs. Redruth took Cassie’s hands in her own. Her hands were thickened and roughened by years of labour, while Cassie’s, still strong and sure, were smooth as a maid’s.

  “You are a good girl,” said Mrs. Redruth. “An honest, loyal child. Do not doubt it.”

  “Hush, Mother,” said Cassie. “We will bring him out. I shall go straight back to Mr. Bensey. He knows all the clerks. He will find out the cause.”

  “My dear,” said Mrs. Redruth, drawing her closer. “Your prisoner—Mr. Grainger—he is an upright man, an honourable man.”

  “He has been unwell. He has borne many shocks. But he is a kind man, a good man.”

  “He must be a friend to our Toby. If he has any place or power in the Bells, he must look over our boy.”

  “He will do that, Mother. I swear it.”

  “I am glad! You care for him, and I will hazard that he cares for you. My fine girl! How could he not? I am glad of it now! Let him be a friend to our Toby in that dreadful place!”

  With a groan, Silas Redruth lowered himself into the chair by the hearth. His crutch fell to the floor. “Aye,” he said. “I see it clearly. You have been of service to this man, and he can help us. Nay—but you are an honest girl for all that. That much is plain. Mayhaps the boy is lost to us. Perhaps I spoke too soon. But we have our daughter still. She is too trusting!—But I hold her honest.” And with that flourish, Silas lapsed into a glum silence.

  Presently, the children were called in, the steps cleared, the door and window closed, and while the interlopers went on to new entertainments, a pensive, silent supper was served, and even the youngest children were subdued.

  Cassie’s heart was darkened. A will such as hers is spurred by that which opposes it, and she had nursed Mr. Bensey and waited on Grainger through the prison-fever, and seen it clear, before she could turn to her own disappointments. Yet she was daunted anew, for despite his folly and misdeeds, his surliness and secrecy, she had regarded Toby as a fellow conspirator in her case. He had assisted her at many turns and held her confidences, and now it seemed that his path was also addressed to the Bellstrom, as if the gaol were to consume all those she cared for. To walk free, passing by her own cunning and dissembling, schooled in the lies and dangers around her, and yet to see all her true hopes and inclinations buried in the prison—the thought was like the closing of gates and bars about her.

  THADDEUS GRAINGER rose from a light sleep. It was a bright, clear morning, but cool, for the summer had passed, and autumn and winter hung upon their balance and whispered of their slow and certain changes. He sensed the earliness of the hour, and that he was alone, as he had not been for a long time. All traces
of fever and weakness were gone, and though his strength had not fully returned, he felt indescribably lightened. He heaved up surely from the bed, and as the turnkey passed on his morning round, he called for hot water.

  In the shaving-mirror, he appraised his face—somewhat coolly. He had grown leaner yet, and all traces of his old complacency were utterly withered away. There sat lines upon his brow, and about his eyes, the traces of his struggles with many fever-phantoms, and among his dark hairs he perceived strands of grey that could only grow more populous as the years advanced.

  “Your enemy is here,” he said to his image, in a tone that mixed such raillery and seriousness, such grimness and humour, as that unseen enemy had best mark well. “Your enemy is within these very walls. You know it, and yet you cannot name him. Very well. You are for the hunt now. Only for the hunt.”

  So he spoke and resumed in silence. So he shaved, dressed, and strolled out to the clamour of the prison yard.

  CHAPTER XXII.

  The Rogues’ Tribunal.

  FEW ADAGES ARE as destructive to moral order and public safety as that nice observation that men and women will obey a law not when they fear its punishments but because they comprehend its justness. Make the courts harsh and advertise the horror of the gallows, runs this line of argument, and you should not one whit diminish crime if the people do not perceive the fairness of your code. A repugnant conclusion, when all the champions of the subject see plainly that only the terror of stern correction mitigates the blind criminality of the commons. For, evidently, crime is nourished not by injustice but grows in fearlessness. Yet, if the terror of correction were the only restraint, how is it that, among those already subject to the hardest correction, there was yet a haphazard and uncertain justice? For among the criminals of the Bellstrom, their own crude courts were inviolable, and the Thieves’ Code was stronger than all the acts of Parliament.

  This venerable institution was known as the Rogues’ Tribunal. It convened two or three times between the sessions (for the justice of the unjust is exceedingly swift), where all the inmates of the Bells might have their complaints heard and their wrongs redressed. Grainger had attended one or two, and lately, for he was regarded as fair though strangely humoured, advised a few of the petitioners whose plight had taken his interest, but he had never spoken before it, until his first client was presented to him.

  GRAINGER WAS WALKING, as was now his habit, beneath the arches, but the earliness of the hour and desertion of the yard, combined with the stirring of many small tasks within the prison, made for a curious sense of isolation. He beheld a familiar figure crossing the yard, and with an eager step made directly for it. It was Cassie Redruth—but after a moment he checked himself, and a look of vexation played upon his features, for behind her advanced the shuffling figure of her brother, Toby.

  “Cassie!” exclaimed Grainger. “Miss Redruth—to be sure. I did not think to see you here at this hour.”

  She unbound the fine shawl that covered her head. “My mistress is asleep, still. With luck, she will not call me for many hours.”

  “I am infinitely glad to see you, at any time, but—” here he glanced at Toby, and a look of perplexity, caution, even dislike, came across him again—“what is the matter?”

  “It is Toby,” she returned. He glimpsed all her passionate loyalty in her next words: “You must stand by him.”

  Toby, grown to his full height, bony about the shoulders, lank-haired, and ragged, affecting ease yet locked in shackles, did not seem a great object to stand by. He did not meet Grainger’s sharp stare.

  “Come,” murmured Grainger, taking Cassie by the arm, “let us walk this way.”

  They went slowly beneath the arches. The boy slouched after them.

  “Mr. Grainger,” began Cassie, looking down, “I hesitate to ask anything of you.”

  “No,” he corrected. “Never hesitate.”

  “But Toby has need of your protection and advice.”

  Grainger had little care and good reason to be distrustful of Toby Redruth. A grain of suspicion, dissolved in the loss of Mr. Kempe’s confession, tainted his view of the boy, and the web of prison rumour had strengthened rather than diminished this mistrust. But he said nothing of this, for the woman beside him was unwavering in her faith in her brother.

  Instead he said, “I know something of it. He has allied himself with wicked men and antagonised others within these walls.”

  “Then you know they call him a thief—the sort of thief who will steal from his fellow prisoners.”

  “If it is proved against him, all the Bellstrom will turn the heel on him. He will be an outcast, invisible and unheard. In such a case, I could not help him.”

  “But it is not proved,” she urged him.

  “No,” said he steadily, “it is not proved.”

  They reached the end of the row and turned to walk again the other way. Moisture dripped from the eaves, and the stones were dark with damp. Toby glowered at Grainger, but seemed reluctant to come any closer, and sidled away as they passed.

  “Mr. Grainger,” began Cassie. “Thaddeus. I do not presume on what is between us.”

  Her arm was entwined in his, but he stopped and turned to her. His voice was bleak and steady. “What is between us cannot be altered. It is the one treasure of my misregarded life. But it will lead only to waste and hopelessness while I am a prisoner here. For your sake, I beg you, forgive me and attach nothing to it.”

  She looked down. “You would cast me aside?”

  “No. Never. Never think that. But I would have you free when I cannot be.”

  She raised her head, and her old fierceness was steadier. “I am never freer than when I choose my devotions.”

  He had her hand folded in his still. “Very well, then. What is between us is unchanged, but never think that you presume to call upon my most earnest regard and service.”

  Cassie gestured to the boy, who edged closer. “Toby is a fool and a ruffian and not worth one jot of the pain and trouble he has caused his family, but we have been through a thing or two together, and he has always stood faithful to my side of things, and I appeal to you because I do not think you are such a man as will look away and see an injustice done, if you can help it, even in here.”

  “Very well,” said Grainger, with a sigh. “Toby, your sister has persuaded me. What do you say?”

  “I didn’t do it,” Toby burst out. “Those as say I did are liars. But they will show me the heel if the tribunal is against me.”

  “Then we will persuade them otherwise,” said Grainger coolly.

  And Cassie kissed his cheek, while the boy looked away with a savage scowl.

  “I SEE THAT YOU are to make a representation before one of our most curious and lasting institutions,” said Mr. Ravenscraigh to Grainger, as they were both taking the air in a melancholy corner of the yard.

  “I will have that interesting honour,” said Grainger.

  Mr. Ravenscraigh rubbed his dry hands together, for there was a briskness in the air. “Have a care. I think I may say, without prejudice, that the boy has, in a short time in these lodgings, made no very admirable reputation for himself. He is boastful, disrespectful, and a sneak and a liar.”

  “I thought he had some allies.”

  “He is part of a gang, no doubt. They all are. But each gang has many enemies, and this lad has gone out of his way to goad them.”

  “You think he will impair my reputation!”

  “I think that you have—how may I say it?—a personal interest in this lad that may obscure the merits of his case.”

  Grainger looked aside at Ravenscraigh, who showed no sign of ill-will but rather a sincere concern. His own expression was a mystery; he had long since perfected the prisoner’s blank mask of indifference.

  “The boy comes of an honest family,” said Grainger, “and his sister’s faith in him is compelling.”

  “Alas,” said Ravenscraigh, folding his hands, “an excellent famil
y is not always a surety of an excellent character.”

  They parted then, for Ravenscraigh had business in the lodge, but Grainger, left behind, tilted his head and surveyed the stained stones of the yard as though they were parts of a great and compelling puzzle. “Indeed,” said he, musing, “no surety of character at all.”

  THE TAP-ROOM was no less a sink of vice on this occasion than any other, where drinking, whoring, and gaming were pursued with the fervour of those who have little else with which to invest their time, but there was a particular air of concentration about the hearth, for the Rogues’ Tribunal was in session. Three great chairs were drawn up behind a table that crossed the old, cold castle fireplace, and the rest of the tap-room looked on this spot, under the glare of a wintry sun. In the middle lounged Daniel Cleaves, picking at his teeth with a silver pin, like a new-coined prince come to the throne. The lean youth, with but a scrap of a man’s beard on his chin, was now the vicious and remorseless captain of a highway gang. To his right sat Gabriel Sholto, Dirk Tallow’s highest lieutenant and one of those who had tormented Grainger during his first years in the Bells. In the last chair sat Mr. Ravenscraigh, as composed as ever. Several minor matters, debts owed in gambling, a dispute over a slattern’s earnings, had been settled to the satisfaction of the mob, but Danny Cleaves was striking the table with his tin tankard, and the tap-room drew across its carousing and bickering the semblance of order.