Acceptable Loss

by Anne Perry

  “Have you ever made a deliberate mistake?” she asked, as if turning the thought over in her mind.

  “No.” He smiled bitterly. “Not deliberate. Many accidental. Would an appeal court know the difference?”

  “Possibly,” she granted. “But unless you were totally incompetent, it wouldn’t make them grant a new trial, would it? Anyway, what good would a new trial do? They’d only come to the same decision, except that someone else would be representing Ballinger, probably less well, and certainly with less dedication. It isn’t reasonable, Oliver. Don’t try arguing with her. You won’t win, because she isn’t listening. She is terrified. Everything she is and believes is slipping out of her grasp.”

  “I’m still here,” he said simply. “She just doesn’t want me. I’ve done everything I can to save Ballinger. I failed. But I think I failed because he’s guilty.”

  “She’ll realize that in time.”

  He knew in that moment, with an overwhelming grief, that he was not sure he would ever see Margaret with the same tenderness and trust, even if eventually she did accept the truth.

  “She has made it a condition,” he said aloud.

  “A condition? For what?” Hester looked puzzled.

  “If I do not manage to appeal for her father, Margaret will leave me, go back to comfort and care for her mother.” Now that he’d said it, it was real, not just a nightmare hovering around him like a covering darkness. And yet the house was unbearable. They walked around each other, icily polite. He came to bed late. She was either asleep or pretending to be. He did not speak. It was over a week since they had touched each other, even in the smallest gesture. It was infinitely worse than being alone.

  Hester was looking at him, her face a little pinched with anxiety. “And if you could manage to think of some way of bringing about an appeal, which you would still lose, because the evidence is the same, then she would forgive you?” she asked.

  He started to answer, and then realized that he did not know.

  “She is grieving, Oliver.” Hester answered her own question. “She is in too much pain and confusion to listen to reason. She wants a way out of the truth. At least part of her knows she will have to accept it one day, but now she can’t face it. She wants you to rescue her from it, and she blames you because you can’t.”

  “She’s not a child!” he said with a flare of his own confusion and loss. “The truth of it is that she has to choose between her father and me, and she chooses him, guilty or not.” Saying it was like cutting his own flesh. “You wouldn’t have done that. You would always choose Monk.”

  “I don’t know what I would choose,” she said honestly. “I haven’t had to. There’s part of all of us that chooses the most vulnerable, the one who needs us most, because we can’t live with the guilt of turning our backs on them.”

  “Are you thinking of Scuff?”

  “I don’t think so. He would never expect me to sacrifice anything for him. I’m not sure he would even understand the idea, although he would do it himself, without thinking.”

  “That’s what Margaret wants from me, loyalty without thinking.”

  “If you love someone, you do not ask them to destroy the best in themselves,” she answered. “Love also means the freedom to follow your own conscience. If you can’t be true to yourself, you don’t have much left to give anyone else.” Again she touched his arm through the cloth of his jacket. “Don’t give in to temptation because it would be more comfortable for you, in the short term. She needs you to be the best in yourself. In time she will be glad of it.”

  “Do you think so?” Rathbone was asking for the answer he wanted to hear.

  “I hope so,” was all she could say.

  He looked at her steadily, thinking that she possessed a kind of beauty he had not really appreciated before. Her face was too angular, but there was an intense gentleness in it he saw only now. She was awkward at times, too quick; far too clever; her honesty was sometimes painful to receive; but there was a generosity of spirit he needed; and always, always there was courage.

  She blushed very slightly and stood up.

  “Give her time,” she said again. “And perhaps it would be better not to tell her I called.” She hesitated, then decided not to add any more.

  She passed close to him on her way out, but only smiled briefly as she reached the door. “Thank you for the tea.” And she was gone, and the silence washed in again, surrounding him with loneliness.

  ———

  THE FOLLOWING MORNING THE message came from Newgate Prison that Arthur Ballinger wanted to see him, urgently. Rathbone had no choice but to go. He was duty-bound as Ballinger’s lawyer, apart from the fact that Ballinger was Margaret’s father, and a man condemned in a matter of days to be hanged. Less than two weeks were left. Rathbone could not even imagine how that would feel.

  He dreaded finding the previously bluff and rather arrogant Ballinger now a pathetic ghost of himself. Would he be frightened of death now? Surely a priest was the only one who could help him?

  Would he plead for Rathbone to find some way, any way at all, to save him from the rope? That would be embarrassing, even repulsive, and Rathbone would wish for any form of escape from that. He might even feel nauseated. His throat was tight and his stomach was churning already.

  The hansom ride was all too brief. The prison gates opened and clanged shut behind him. He made all the usual civil remarks, and followed the prison guard down the narrow corridors to Ballinger’s cell. Did the place smell of human fear and despair, or was it his imagination?

  The huge iron key turned in the lock. The door opened with a faint squeak of hinges, and Rathbone was facing Arthur Ballinger. The floor was black, draining the light from the room. The whitewashed walls made everything ghostly, giving back a dead reflection of the air and the glimpse of sky outside.

  Behind him the door was shut and locked.

  After everything that had happened, what on earth was there to say? How could they speak as normal? It would be absurd.

  “What can I do for you?” Rathbone said simply. To ask Ballinger how he was would be farcical.

  “Appeal, of course,” Ballinger replied.

  He did not look as crushed as Rathbone had expected. Rathbone should have been relieved. He would avoid the revulsion of weeping, begging, the sight of a man robbed of every dignity. And yet looking at Ballinger’s face—his bright, angry eyes—he wondered if it was madness he was seeing. But perhaps insanity was the only refuge left to him. How should he answer?

  Ballinger was waiting.

  “On what grounds?” Rathbone played for time. Had the verdict really snapped Ballinger’s hold on reality? He looked afraid, but not panicky, not wild-eyed, and certainly not confused. “I’ve reviewed the case—of course I have—but I can see no legal errors, and there is certainly no new evidence.”

  “I don’t care on what grounds,” Ballinger answered, coming a step closer to him.

  Rathbone was aware of a sense of physical fear. Ballinger was a big man, broad and heavy. He was going to be hanged in two weeks anyhow—what had he to lose? Did he also blame Rathbone for his conviction? Sweat broke out on Rathbone’s body, and his stomach knotted. His mind raced.

  “Can you tell me something with which to plead for clemency?” he said, surprised how steady his voice sounded. “So far you have claimed that you are not guilty, but if Parfitt attacked you, there might be some way of making his death a matter of self-defense.”

  “And say I’m guilty?” Ballinger responded angrily. “Haven’t you got any bloody sense at all? If I killed Parfitt, then obviously I killed Hattie Benson as well. What excuse do I give for that?”

  Rathbone felt the heat burn up his face. Ballinger was right; it had been a stupid suggestion, given without thought.

  “I need the verdict reversed, not some pathetic plea for clemency,” Ballinger went on. “Prove Rupert Cardew killed Parfitt, because he was blackmailing him and he couldn’t pay anymo
re.”

  Rathbone was cold. The room could have been walled with ice. The man he saw in front of him was a stranger.

  “Did you kill Parfitt?” he asked.

  “Of course I did!” Ballinger snapped. “But the verdict was only on balance of probability. You could still make it look like Cardew. Clearly the same person killed the girl as well, so I’d be free of both charges.”

  Now Rathbone was shivering. It was a nightmare. He must be at home, asleep uncomfortably, and he would wake up. All this would disappear.

  Ballinger took another step toward him.

  “I can’t,” Rathbone said grimly, refusing to move backward. “There are no grounds for appeal.”

  “Then make some, Oliver.”

  Rathbone said nothing. This was ridiculous. He could understand desperation. He had seen it many times before, even refusal to acknowledge the fact of one’s own death. But it was usually an insane hope, not a demand for something of which there was no possibility. And Ballinger had seemed anything but a weak man.

  “Don’t stand there in self-righteous horror,” Ballinger said sharply. “You know nothing about it. Parfitt was filth, a parasite on human depravity.”

  “I know that,” Rathbone replied. “And if I could have mitigated your killing him, I would have. But I will not blame someone else for it.”

  “You think Rupert Cardew is so worth saving?” Now Ballinger’s voice was a snarl, his face ugly with contempt. “He’s another kind of parasite—useless, worthless, utterly selfish. Not even an honest passion of vice. Just bled his father dry, then when he was in trouble, turned on his friends.”

  “His friends being the other men who used those wretched children, and were blackmailed for it?” Rathbone asked.

  “Weak, cruel cowards of men,” Ballinger said with contempt. “Bored with the ease of their lives and looking for a little danger to sharpen the appetite. I’ve seen it all before. I didn’t create their vice, I merely fed it, and profited—and for a damned good reason.”

  In spite of his revulsion, Rathbone was curious.

  “A good reason?” His voice grated as he said it.

  Ballinger’s face twisted. “Sometimes your stupidity astounds me! You live in your safe, prudish little world, posturing as if you fight evil, and letting it pass by under your nose because you won’t break the rules and risk your own neck. You don’t look because you don’t want to see—”

  Rathbone tried to interrupt, but Ballinger ignored him, his voice harsh. He was sweating in spite of the cold, and his physical presence dominated the room.

  “I told you I stopped pollution of the river by that damn factory. How the hell do you think I got Garslake to reverse the judgment on appeal? He’s Master of the Rolls, head of the entire civil appeal system, and half his friends own factories like that.”

  Suddenly Rathbone was horribly afraid. Sickening thoughts swirled in his mind.

  “At last …” Ballinger breathed out slowly. “How would you influence men like that, Oliver? They have all the money they can imagine, all the power, all the deference, the respect, the glory. You can’t bribe them, and they don’t need to listen to reason, or mercy. But by God in heaven, they need to listen to the threat of exposure! I have pictures of Lord Justice Garslake that would make your stomach heave. And he’ll make the right damn decisions, or I’ll ruin him, and he knows it.”

  Rathbone could think of nothing to say. Words fell over themselves in his mind, and all were inadequate for the understanding and the horror that filled him.

  “Think!” Ballinger shouted at him. “Think of a way to appeal, Oliver. Because I have very vivid and explicit photographs, far more than the few you saw in court, of a large number of gentlemen performing acts that are not only obscene, but are with children. Some of these gentlemen are of excellent family, and hold high offices in law and government. One or two are even close to the queen. If something unfortunate should happen to me, such as my death, other than of disease or old age, these photographs will fall into someone else’s hands, and you do not know who they are or what they would do with them. You would not like that, because they may not use them as judiciously as I have. They are very, very sharp weapons indeed. So regardless of what you feel about me, you will see to it that I remain alive and in good spirits.”

  Rathbone was so appalled, he could not speak. He started at Ballinger as if he had risen out of the ground like some hellish apparition, and yet was so horribly, passionately human. It all made sense, the temptation, the logic, the rage, and the success.

  “And don’t bother to look for them,” Ballinger went on. “You will not find them—not in two years, let alone two weeks.” He smiled. “The judiciary, in particular, would suffer. So you had better find some way to see that my conviction is overturned, whatever you have to do to bring that about. I don’t think I have to explain it for you, but if necessary, I can, and I will. There will be more than just me asking you for rescue, or blaming you, should you fail.”

  Rathbone had thought the nightmare could get no worse, and now it had doubled, tripled.

  “Why did you kill Parfitt?” he asked. It hardly mattered; he was just curious. “Was he growing greedy? Or threatening to bring the whole thing down himself?”

  “No, there was nothing wrong with Parfitt,” Ballinger said quite casually, almost as if it were by the way, no more than incidental. Then suddenly his voice filled with intense emotion and he stared at Rathbone unblinkingly. “But I have to keep this power. There is so much still to be done, not just about pollution, but slum clearances, child labor …” His eyes were brilliant, feverish, watching Rathbone’s every flicker of expression. “What can you do, Oliver, with all your brilliant arguments in court? Can you move those men one inch from their comfort and their power?”

  Rathbone did not bother to reply—the question was rhetorical. They both knew he could do nothing.

  “I can,” Ballinger went on. “But I knew that Monk would never let it go. He believed I was behind Jericho Phillips, and he was determined to get me hanged. Parfitt’s death, in the same trade, would draw him like a magnet. If he hanged Rupert Cardew for it, wrongly, it would finish him in the police forever.”

  “God almighty!” Rathbone swore incredulously. “It was to get Monk?”

  “No, you fool!” Ballinger snarled with sudden savagery. “It was to save me. Monk is like a rat: he would never let go. I don’t intend to spend the rest of my life looking backwards over my shoulder to see what new plan he has to ruin me.”

  “And poor Hattie was going to testify that she stole Cardew’s cravat and gave it to … whom? Someone of yours?”

  “Tosh Wilkin, if it matters.”

  “No, not really.” Rathbone knew the moment he said it that Tosh would not have the photographs.

  “Find a way, Rathbone,” Ballinger said between his teeth. “You have too much to lose if you don’t.”

  Rathbone did not move. His limbs felt heavy, his chest as if there were a tight band around it.

  “Don’t stand there like a damn footman,” Ballinger said with a sudden blaze of fury. “You haven’t got time to waste!”

  Wordlessly Rathbone turned and banged on the door to be released.

  HESTER HAD COME HOME from the clinic a little earlier than usual, but Monk was barely through the door when Rathbone arrived at Paradise Place. He looked so ashen, Hester was frightened for him. His hollow eyes and the dragging lines of his face made it clear that he was almost at the end of his strength. She offered him tea immediately, and went to put the kettle on without waiting for his answer. Also without asking him, she put in a stiff dash of brandy.

  When she returned with it already poured out in a large kitchen mug, Rathbone was sitting next to the fire in Monk’s usual seat, and he was still shivering. Monk sat on a hard-backed chair.

  Hester put the tray down on the table between them, with Rathbone’s mug nearest to him, and then she looked at Monk. His face was pale too, and the line
s in it were more than those of tiredness.

  Monk gestured to her chair, opposite Rathbone, and she sat obediently.

  “Ballinger has photographs,” Monk said simply. “They’re with somebody who’ll make them public if Ballinger is hanged. We don’t know who’s in them, but what they’re doing is obvious. Ballinger said they’re all kinds of people: in government, judiciary, business, even the royal household. He blackmails them, not for money but for power, to bring about the reforms he believes are just. At least that’s what he told Rathbone. Any of that might be true, or might be lies, but we can’t afford to take the risk.”

  “He wants me to mount an appeal.” Rathbone looked at her. “That’s the condition for his silence. But I can’t. There are no grounds.”

  For a moment Hester was stunned. It was monstrous. Then the more she thought of it, the more it made sense. It might all be true. It would be a passionate and almost understandable reason for all he had done. She could see the temptation. If she had had such power to use in the reform of nursing, she would have played with the idea, and please God, discarded it, but perhaps not? But, then, it could also be a brilliant way of defending himself, because they could not afford to ignore him.

  “I’m surprised he trusted someone else with the pictures. How do you know they are all together, with one person?” Hester asked.

  Rathbone stared at her, horror in his face.

  “I’m sorry,” she said quietly. “But I wouldn’t give everything to one person, would you?”

  “Oh, God!” he said in utter wretchedness. There was no hope in his voice.

  “You are certain that Ballinger killed Parfitt? It was not one of Parfitt’s other victims who did it?” Monk asked.

  “Oh, yes. He told me as much.” A painfully bitter smile touched Rathbone’s lips. “Actually, he did it to ruin you, get you off his trail forever. He meant you to go after Rupert Cardew, and then he would have proved him innocent, at the last moment, carried Lord Cardew’s everlasting gratitude, and seen you off the force with your reputation shattered. Nothing you said about him after that would have been listened to. Even evidence would have been disregarded.”