Revenge in a Cold River (12 page)

This was where Beata's father had made his money, lots of it. She had tried to put it from her memory, but it came back now like an incoming tide. For Aaron and Miriam it was a far shorter time ago. For the guests, Finch and Walbrook, it was a land only of the imagination.

Beata spoke to Miriam now, in this gorgeous room, as if the time between had melted like snow, leaving only the small traces of one winter behind.

She began by admiring the room, which was easy to do. Then she noticed one of the paintings, and recognized the place.

“San Juan Capistrano!” she said with pleasure. She felt the color coming to her cheeks. That was where she had fallen in love with the priest. It seemed like a hundred years ago. Had she ever really been so young?

Miriam laughed and walked over to stand beside her.

“Long time ago, wasn't it?” she said quietly. “Do you think back on those times?”

Beata looked sideways at her for an instant, and saw tears in her eyes.

Then the moment of pain vanished, and they spoke a little too brightly of other things, until they were joined by Aaron, Lord Justice Walbrook, and Dr. Giles Finch and moved to the dining room for dinner. All the formalities were observed, the condolences, the polite remarks about Ingram York and how he would be missed, what an ornament he had been to the judiciary. It was all very gracious, and predictable. Beata made the right replies and hoped she did it with dignity.

Did anybody believe it?

Dr. Finch had also noticed the painting of Mission San Juan Capistrano, and asked, once they were seated, if the mission was near San Francisco.

Aaron explained that it was also on the Californian coast, but many hundreds of miles south, much farther toward Mexico. The conversation turned to the gold rush, to the fortunes made and the changes that had occurred so very swiftly. Buildings came down overnight. Yesterday's paupers had become today's giants of wealth, of industry, of land and ultimately of government. It was contrasted with England, where most wealth and privilege passed from generation to generation.

“We've had our changes,” Dr. Finch remarked. “But they were a long time ago.”

Aaron smiled. “The Norman Conquest?” he said wryly.

“Oh, since then,” Finch answered him with a shrug. “The Reformation. Catholic first and Protestant martyrs, then the other way round, back and forth between Henry the Eighth, Bloody Mary, then Elizabeth. And of course later the Civil War. Charles the First, and the ship money, taxes, divine right of kings, and so forth. And after him, Oliver Cromwell and the Puritans. Rather grim for my taste. No sense of humor. I don't know how anyone has the courage to survive without that. And then the Restoration, Charles the Second, all at the other extreme.”

“Maybe we're due for another upheaval,” Lord Justice Walbrook suggested with a very slight smile. “Unfortunately, I doubt it will be from the discovery of gold.”

“The discovery of gold has its disadvantages,” Miriam said quietly. “A lot of sudden fortunes made, but a lot of deaths as well, violent deaths of men still young. And poverty alongside the wealth.”

Beata looked at her curiously. She caught the moment's pain in her voice, the huskiness in it as she hurriedly controlled it again.

Finch was regarding her with interest. Had he caught the emotion as well, or did he just look at her as most men looked at a beautiful woman, and feel an edge of passion?

Miriam looked down at something on the table and smiled very slightly, almost in apology. “Aaron lost his cousin Zachary before the gold rush really began. They were more like brothers. Zack was one of the best men I ever knew.” Her voice dropped a little lower. “He died defending an old man from a beating by a crowd of drunkards. They lynched the drunkards, but that didn't bring Zachary back. Actually I don't think they even tried them. Just…strung them up in a tree. Not that there was any doubt that they were guilty…”

Everyone else was looking at Miriam, but Beata turned and looked at Aaron. Then instantly she regretted it. She saw a sudden, overwhelming sense of loss in his face, as if the grief were still new even now. She felt intrusive to be there, never mind to have observed it.

Why on earth had Miriam mentioned it? And in front of other people they barely knew? How could she be so insensitive?

“And I lost my first husband,” Miriam went on. Now her voice was tight with her own pain. “He was…killed also…”

“I'm so sorry,” Finch and Walbrook said almost together.

Again Beata looked at Aaron, and this time his expression was unreadable to her. She remembered hearing the news of her own first husband's death, and the sense of shock and sudden emptiness it brought. It had happened up in the foothills somewhere where the gold claims had no security, where there was no law and very little in the way of community. Miriam's first husband, Piers Astley, had been Aaron's most trusted lieutenant, a man with almost everyone's respect. Maybe that was what got him killed.

But who knew what he was like when the doors were closed and there was no one watching except his wife? They were all sitting here around this rich and elegant table in London, exquisitely dressed, dining on the best food in the land. They ate with silver cutlery from porcelain plates, and drank the best wine from cut-crystal glasses. They discussed the endowment of a university chair in memory of Ingram York—High Court judge, wife beater, and a man of violent and twisted sexual appetites.

For a moment Beata felt her gorge rise as if she were going to be sick. Then she controlled it, sipped her wine, and looked down at her plate so no one could meet her eyes.

They were talking about Zachary Clive and what a fine man he had been. Aaron's voice was warm with the emotion of the memory of Zack's integrity, his generosity of spirit, the things he loved and made him laugh.

Beata looked at Miriam, and saw tears in her eyes. What had happened? And why did any of it matter so passionately now?

It was not until the last course was served that the subject returned again to Ingram York.

Finch turned to Beata. “It must be extremely difficult for you to think of such a thing so soon, Lady York,” he said gently. “But there are many arrangements to be made, if it is to be effected within the next year. All we wish from you is your permission to endow a chair in your late husband's name. We feel it would be a most fitting tribute to his memory, and of far more use to society than a marble bust, or some other tangible memorial or engraving. We are very fortunate that Mr. Clive has offered the sort of financial backing that makes it possible.”

“Indeed,” she said in agreement. “We have more than enough statues and plaques. I have no idea why Mr. Clive should be so generous, but I am most grateful.” She looked at Aaron, smiling to rob the words of any implied criticism. “I was not aware that you even knew my husband.”

Aaron smiled back at her. It was candid, genuine, and disarming. “I didn't, Lady York. I read some of his judgments, going back several years. I want to endow a chair because I believe in the wisdom of the law, and the lucidity of it. When mixed with mercy it has the power to defend us all from anarchy, industrial or civil. I have no influence on the law myself. I deal in land and international trade. Far better I do this in the name of an eminent judge whose name is held in wide respect, and who unfortunately had recently died.”

He glanced at Miriam, then back again at Beata. “I wish two professors to be appointed who will treat the law as a high ideal, with the strength of a great sword that has been hammered out of white-hot metal, and annealed in the pure ice water of logic and impartiality. I hope that you will think that a worthy thing to do for the future and a fitting tribute to your husband, so his memory may last and bear fruit in future years.”

Miriam moved very slightly in her seat, as if she had cramped a muscle.

Beata wanted to look at her, and dared not.

“No one could have a more excellent memorial,” she replied. What else could she say? That Ingram was totally unworthy of it? That perhaps he had once been a good jurist? The last thing on earth she wanted to do was make his private obscenities public! The lie would have to be lived to perfection if she were to keep any dignity at all. She had a right to privacy; indeed she needed it if she were to survive.

She forced herself to meet Aaron Clive's gaze and make herself smile at him. “It is a wonderful thing to do. Forgive me if I am overwhelmed.”

“Of course,” he said gently, moving his hand onto the white linen of the tablecloth to touch her. “I'm sorry it is so hasty. I should have left you time to mourn, and then asked you, but I want to do it as soon as possible. Perhaps even for the new academic year, if that is within reach?” He turned to Finch.

“I see no reason why not,” Finch replied. “With Lady York's approval?”

“You have it, and my gratitude,” she replied.

Miriam rose to her feet, looking at Beata. “Then shall we leave the gentlemen to their port? We could take tea in the withdrawing room, and perhaps a few chocolates? Do you still care for chocolates? Truffles? I have some from Belgium. I always think they are the best, don't you?”

Twenty years vanished and Beata recalled perfectly sitting with Miriam in the home she had lived in in San Francisco, watching the wind ruffle the bay and seeing the shadows chase one another over the water. They had had a box of chocolates between them. In between laughing and talking, and sharing secrets, they had eaten all but a few of them. It brought those wild and yet oddly innocent days back as if they had been last week.

Beata rose also, steadying herself for a moment against the table, and then turned to Miriam. “I still love them just as much.”

The withdrawing room was warm, and extremely pleasant because there were only the two of them. Had there been others, Beata would not have felt it suitable to come this soon after Ingram's death. Mourning was not really a choice, and as such it was a miserable time. The last thing some people wish is continuing to wear drab clothes so you look as wretched as you feel, and sit about in a house with mirrors turned to the wall. There was nothing whatever to do but contemplate your aloneness, and write a few unnecessary letters. She would much rather have been busy, even if it were only with some manual tasks such as arranging flowers or mending the finer linens where embroidery needed restoring.

Oliver Rathbone had often spoken to her of Hester Monk's clinic in Portpool Lane, and now when Miriam asked her how she meant to fill her days, she answered honestly.

“I would rather scrub floors than do nothing at all. Perhaps I shall find something worthy to do.” She used the word with self-mockery, and yet she actually meant it. What was anyone, without purpose?

Miriam's eyes widened with interest. “Really? You can hardly scrub your own floors! Where did you have in mind?” There was laughter in her eyes, which she was trying to conceal. Had she already read Beata so well? They had known each other twenty years ago, but that had been in another world, thousands of miles away, and in another age.

“A woman I don't know personally, but about whom I have heard much, keeps a clinic for women off the street, who are injured or ill….”

Miriam shrugged and shook her head. “She sounds frightful! Does she stop for prayers every hour, and preach to them of virtue?”

“Good heavens!” Beata nearly laughed. “I don't think so. She used to be an army nurse in the Crimea, and I have heard that she is highly opinionated. I would doubt that virtue, to her, means abstinence. It is far more likely to mean courage, compassion, and the integrity to be brutally honest, first with yourself and then with others, and never to run away just because you are exhausted or afraid.”

“Then I deserve to be fed a large portion of humble pie,” Miriam said, reaching for another chocolate and pushing the box toward Beata.

Beata also took another. They really were very good.

The conversation continued pleasantly, a mixture of memories and current interest. Without being aware of exactly how it happened, Beata found herself telling Miriam about Oliver Rathbone, and about William Monk. In answer to Miriam's questions, she described what she knew of him, which was mostly what Oliver had said.

Miriam listened with great interest as if it were important to her, not simply a subject of courtesy. Or possibly it was merely to take Beata's mind off her recent loss. It was a relief to be able to speak of someone else, of interesting things that had not emotionally involved her. She described Monk as vividly as she could, painting a picture in words for Miriam, based mostly on Oliver's description of Monk's nature, his persistence, and his skill in deduction.

“He sounds formidable,” Miriam said with pleasure. “There was a chase of an escaped prisoner near Aaron's warehouse on the river a few days ago. Four of them ended up in the water, one fugitive, one customs officer, and two Thames River Police. From what Aaron told me, it was a fearful event, a disaster. The fugitive escaped, the customs man drowned, and the two policemen were left to do the explaining. But Aaron told me one of the police was the commander. I think he said his name was Monk. Could that be he? Apparently he was the one who jumped in and pulled the customs man out of the water, but couldn't save him even so.”

“That sounds like him,” Beata agreed.

Miriam shook her head, smiling. “Not everyone would jump into the Thames in November to save anyone from drowning. He sounds most interesting—in fact a little like a young man I remember in San Francisco, years ago. Lean and very strong, dark hair and a clever face, all bones, and a sense of humor that was quick and very dry. I liked him, although he frightened me a little.” She looked at the rich folds of the curtains, as if into another world. “I had the feeling that when he made up his mind to do something, nothing on earth would stop him. He left after a year or so, and I never knew what happened to him. It couldn't be the same man, could it?” She looked back suddenly at Beata.