Yet from what she had observed since he and his devastatingly beautiful wife and their six children aged seven to twelve had descended upon Langston House like a small plague of locusts, he was no more extraordinary than any of the other members of the family. If anything, he was the least flashy of the clan, for although he eschewed his clerical collar, he wore only the most subdued of garments—all black, down to his waistcoat, with a plain white shirt and cravat—and rarely raised his voice, even when his siblings got into a heated argument, which was not uncommon. Yet there was absolutely no doubt that everyone, from the viscount down to the youngest of the children, considered him the de facto, if not the legal, head of the family. When Walter ventured an opinion, he was heeded.
What she had not completely understood before now was why.
Although there was nothing but kindness in his voice, Laura felt an immediate desire to confess all her sins. But what was her sin, exactly? Waiting for the post was hardly a transgression. “Oh?” she murmured, trying to cover for her sudden and inexplicable contrition. “Why did you think that?”
Her brother-in-law glanced at the wall clock that hung above the sideboard on the opposite side of the large room. “Because it is almost half eleven. What are you expecting to come in the mail?”
She couldn’t suppress her gasp of surprise at the accuracy of his guess. “How did you know?”
His smile was warm and sharpened his resemblance to her husband. “I pay attention to what is going on around me. In fact, you could call paying attention my vocation. And I have deduced from what I have observed of your comings and goings that you wish to be on hand when the post arrives.”
“And if I do?” she retorted.
He held up his hands in a pacifying gesture. “Then I want to help you in any way I can.”
“What is it about awaiting a letter that suggests I need help?”
“By itself, nothing,” he admitted. “But the fact that you seem anxious to intercept whatever communication you are expecting before anyone else, including Geoffrey, might see it gives me cause for…concern.”
Laura swallowed guiltily. Walter Langston was too observant by half. Strangely, however, she detected not a shred of censure in his voice. He just seemed to genuinely care that something was troubling her and wanted to offer her the opportunity to unburden herself. And it was that honest interest in her well-being that broke the dam.
It all came tumbling out. The letter she’d written to Macomb. Her hope that he would respond with information that would help prove Geoffrey’s innocence. Her fear that the letter might never arrive or that it would arrive too late or that—worst of all—it would contain information that convicted him rather than clearing him. Given all the uncertainties, how could she tell Geoffrey what she had done? If she did, he might pin his hopes, as she had already done, on something that would never come to pass. Not only that, but how could she let him discover, by accident and without warning, a letter that might actually be his downfall rather than his deliverance? He had enough burdens to carry as it was. She wanted to shoulder at least one of them for him. After all, there was so little else she could do. The court wouldn’t even let her testify to the condition in which she’d found him or to the fact that Macomb had shown no sign of recognizing Geoffrey when they’d met at church. How would it help him to be just as hopeful and fearful of receiving the anticipated letter as she was?
Her throat was thick and her eyes hot by the time she finished the story. “Please,” she implored, wringing her hands, “you mustn’t tell him. If the letter never comes, then surely it’s better if he never knows there was even a chance. And if it does but contains something that could do him harm, well then…” She let the sentence trail off.
“Then it will never see the light of day,” he finished for her, nodding. He placed a hand over hers, which were still clasped tightly together. “Don’t worry. Your secret is safe with me. I think you’re right that knowing will do my brother no good until there is good to be done. And I am a vicar. Keeping secrets is practically the description of my job.”
Laura released a shuddering breath and blinked away the threatening tears. “Thank you,” she said. “I realize now that I desperately needed to tell someone.”
Just then, the knock on the front door that signaled the delivery of the afternoon post sounded. After exchanging glances, her brother-in-law nodded at her, and she exited the dining room to intercept the footman before he delivered the mail to other members of the family.
Once again, she was disappointed. There was still no letter from Macomb.
But at least now she understood why Geoffrey thought so highly of his brother.
* * *
The court martial opened the following Monday morning with a great deal of pomp and ceremony.
The British government was not keen to have it known that the loss at Plattsburgh might be at least partially due to a turncoat in its own ranks, and thus, members of the general public and press were excluded from the trial. Laura had feared she might have to sit through the proceedings alone, but it turned out that members of the House of Lords and certain diplomats were permitted to attend. This meant both her brothers-in-law, Nash and Conrad, as well as Thomas Pearce, were allowed into the gallery.
All the judges on the panel who would decide Geoffrey’s fate held a rank of colonel or higher, and most were clearly no longer fit for active duty. Bewigged and festooned with medals and ribbons, the twelve officers ranged from one man so stooped and frail with age that he looked as though a heavy breath might topple him to a fellow who must be a good thirty years younger but walked with a cane and had an empty right sleeve pinned to his chest.
Once the panel had been seated, Geoffrey, clad in his dress uniform and carrying a sword, entered through a side door, accompanied by two soldiers as guards. He was called to answer to two counts, one of treason and one of desertion. The leader of the panel, who Laura learned was referred to as the judge advocate, was Brigadier Acton. He asked how Geoffrey pleaded. His response, of course, was not guilty. After entering his plea, he placed his sword on a table in the center of the court room floor and marched to stand next to Mr. Bellamy.
Once these formalities had been dispensed with, the prosecutor made his opening statement, promising he would demonstrate that Lieutenant Colonel Geoffrey Langston had committed both crimes of which he was accused and might have done so because he had fallen in love with an American woman. Laura felt numerous eyes fall upon her at this statement but stared straight ahead as though unperturbed by the accusation.
Mr. Bellamy then rose and, in a rolling baritone, proclaimed his client was not guilty of any of the charges, the case against him was pure hearsay and conjecture, and there was not a shred of hard evidence to support any of the prosecution’s claims. “If a man can be convicted of a crime as serious as treason on the mere say-so of an officer who by his own admission did not even witness the actual crime take place,” Bellamy concluded, glancing pointedly at all the uniformed officers in the room, “then not a man Jack of you is safe from the firing squad if one of your fellows takes it into his head to accuse you.”
Laura had to stifle the impulse to leap to her feet and applaud. Thomas gave her arm a gentle squeeze to indicate that he, too, recognized a point had been scored.
The first witness was not Major Shelley but Colonel Edmund Yates, an aide to General Prévost who had been privy to the planning of the Plattsburgh campaign. The purpose of his testimony, Laura deduced, was to set the stage for the conclusion that the British strategy had been sound, and their numbers more than adequate to overwhelm the pitiful American force arrayed against them. Given these factors, the only possible reason for the failure of the British Army to win the day was that the manner and timing of their campaign had been betrayed to the enemy.
The man who stepped into the witness box was as medium a person as Laura had ever beheld. He was of medium height, medium build, and medium age—in his thirties, by her
best guess. His hair was a medium brown color, and his facial feature were of middling attractiveness. The only thing not utterly average about him was the pitch and volume of his voice—high for an adult male, slightly nasal, and quite carrying.
Once Yates was sworn in, the prosecutor—who held the military rank of colonel in addition to being a solicitor and had the misfortune of bearing the surname of Hickinbottom—began his line of questioning by asking about the preparations for the battle, including the attempt to coordinate the launching of the ground offensive to coincide with the naval attack on Lake Champlain. This portion of the testimony dragged on for some time and, because she knew next to nothing about military strategy, Laura found it both quite dull and quite useless. She wasn’t sure what the point of all this detail was.
That was, until the prosecutor asked, “And was Lieutenant Colonel Langston present at the meetings during which the general mapped out his strategy?”
“Yes, sir,” Colonel Yates responded without hesitation. “As the leader of a battalion, he was required to attend all such meetings.”
“So he would have known that the plan was to coordinate the land attack with the naval attack and when that would happen.”
“Certainly.”
“I see. Thank you, Colonel Yates.” Hickinbottom began to turn away and then, in a gesture that was clearly premeditated, turned back, a finger raised as though he had just remembered something. “One more thing. What was the last of these meetings attended by Langston?”
“The one on the evening of September ninth.”
“And the date and time of Captain Downie’s planned attack was discussed at this time?”
The colonel’s head bobbed. “Absolutely.”
The prosecutor nodded to Colonel Yates and then pivoted to bow respectfully toward the judges. “I have no more questions for this witness.”
Hickinbottom sat down, and Mr. Bellamy stood up.
“Now, Colonel Yates, could you tell me how many other officers were present at these strategy meetings?”
The man blinked. “Well, all the officers of the rank of major or above. Plus a few aides of lower rank like me.”
“How many would that be? Roughly.”
“About twenty most times, I suppose.”
Bellamy nodded, the tail of his white wig bobbing up and down in a manner that made him look even more like a bulldog than he already did. “So, at least fourteen other men were privy to the information about the timing and manner of the attack. Including you.”
Yates blanched. “Aye, but I didn’t tell the Americans.”
“I apologize, colonel. I did not mean to imply you did.”
No, thought Laura, but Bellamy certain meant to imply he could have. Clever.
“Tell me,” her husband’s solicitor continued, “was Major Shelley amongst the officers who attended these meetings?”
“He’s a major, so yes,” Yates replied, his tone implying he thought the question was stupid and Bellamy was an idiot.
A little wave of amusement rippled through the gallery.
“My apologies. You did say that before, didn’t you?” The solicitor turned to the bench. “I am finished with this witness.”
For the first time since the hoped-for letter from Macomb had failed to arrive, Laura experienced a burst of optimism. Nash Langston had not exaggerated Rupert Bellamy, Esq.’s skill. The man might look more like a criminal than his clients, but he was smart. Already, he was poking holes in the prosecution’s theory of the crime and inserting reasons to doubt. Perhaps that would be enough to prevent a conviction.
It might have to be. With every day that passed, she became more and more certain that no other form of deliverance was coming.
Chapter Twenty-Five
When Major Martin Shelley wafted into the courtroom like a bad smell, Geoffrey maintained a tight lid on his composure. Bellamy had warned him that exhibiting even the subtlest sign of antipathy toward his former second-in-command and accuser would be detrimental to his defense.
“Do not react,” Bellamy had counseled. “Do not frown. Do not glare. Do not even smile as if to be friendly. Keep your face as neutral as you possibly can when Shelley is in the room. Any emotion you demonstrate will be read by the judges as possibly motivated by guilt, and we cannot have that.”
So Geoffrey sat in his stiff-backed chair, his posture straight but relaxed, and thought about socks. It was difficult to have any strong feelings about socks, one way or the other. They were simply utilitarian—good for the purpose they served and of absolutely no value otherwise.
Only when Shelley stepped into the witness box and took the oath did Geoffrey spare the other man a disinterested glance. The major looked just as Geoffrey remembered: tall and fit with dark hair that was just beginning to gray at the temples and a tanned, narrow face whose most prominent feature was the beaky nose that had earned him the nickname of The Snout. To Geoffrey’s amusement, Shelley hated the sobriquet and had repeatedly demanded the men stopped using it, but to no avail. As soon as he was out of earshot, he was The Snout again. As usual, Shelley’s smirk as he surveyed his surroundings aimed for confident but missed and hit smug instead.
Bellamy kicked Geoffrey’s ankle under the table.
Socks, damn it!
Colonel Arthur Hickinbottom began by asking Shelley to describe, in his own words, the events of the night of September the ninth, 1814.
Who else’s words did the prosecutor think Shelley might use?
Shelley began by recounting the squabble that had erupted between two of the enlisted men over the results of a dice game. One of the soldiers accused the other of weighting the dice and was refusing to pay his bet. Egged on by their fellow soldiers, who were bored and restless, the disagreement came to blows. Shelley’s account of the incident matched Geoffrey’s own recollection in every particular.
It was true that no good deed went unpunished.
“The lieutenant colonel severely undermined my authority with the men by interfering. I would have got it under control if he’d given me the chance. Instead, he made the men disperse, imposed his own punishments, and ushered me to the medic like an injured child.”
The prosecutor held up his hand to stop Shelley’s narrative. “And how is this incident relevant, in your mind, to what happened later and the charges against Langston?”
Geoffrey had been wondering the same thing and waited for Shelley’s response with interest.
Bellamy kicked him under the table again.
“It wasn’t what he did so much as what he said. You see, he told the lads that he understood they were restless and out of sorts, but it wouldn’t be long before the war would be over and we could all go home.”
That too was accurate, though Geoffrey had forgotten the moment until just now. He didn’t remember his exact words, but Shelley’s version was close enough. There was also absolutely nothing remarkable about his having said them, which was likely why that part of the encounter had slipped his mind. He’d pacified the men under his command with some version of those words hundreds of times over the course of the years, assuring them that whatever situation they were currently in, it wouldn’t last forever. And he’d given such reassurances in Shelley’s earshot on at least a dozen times previous to the incident in question.
“Why did you find that significant, Major Shelley?”
“Well, at the time, I didn’t particularly. It was only in light of what happened later that his words seemed…a little too prophetic. After all, at that point, the plan was to take and hold Plattsburgh and then continue to advance into Vermont. If we’d succeeded, the war—or at least our battalion’s part in it—certainly wouldn’t have been over any time soon.”
Hickinbottom nodded. “Thank you for clarifying that, Major. Please go on.”
“Following that incident, the officers ate dinner together, and then we assembled in the field tent to discuss the fact that the attack was going to have to be put back at least one more day
because the winds weren’t right for the fleet. Prévost was in a foul mood at the delay, but said come hell or high water, we were going to attack on the eleventh. The plan was to split up and have part of the army attack the American fleet from land while the rest of us would ford the river and box the American army in from the other side. After that, we all dispersed to our own tents.
“Now, I like to have a walk around camp to make sure everything is in order before I retire for the night, so I left my tent again around eleven o’clock.”
Not scowling at this statement was an effort of will. It was such a blatant falsehood that Geoffrey had to dig his fingernails into his palms to keep from jumping to his feet and calling Shelley a liar. Geoffrey went out every night and walked the camp. Nothing that would have prevented Shelley from doing his own nightly inspection as well, of course, but never once in the six months Shelley had been under Geoffrey’s command had he encountered the major doing any such inspections. If it was something Shelley “liked” to do, as he had just claimed, then they would have run into one another at least a few times, but such an event had never once occurred.
“Our battalion was set up on the east end of the campsite,” Shelley continued. “The moon was up, and even though it was only a quarter, there was enough light that I decided to walk down to the river. Just to have a peek across, you know? And who should I see headed in the same direction but Lieutenant Colonel Langston himself. And when I say he was headed that way, I mean he was walking very purposefully and briskly right toward the river, right where there is a spot shallow enough to ford easily.
Sleeping with the Enemy: Lords of Lancashire, Book 4 Page 19
