Unraveled (2 page)

Miranda clenched her hands together and bit her lip. She could only hope he would not examine her so closely.

“Turner,” the mayor said, “this is the petty sessions. We’ve no authority to consider a charge of arson at a summary conviction.”

“Quite right,” Lord Justice said. “Nor was arson charged in the indictment. But we can dismiss the case and commit him until the Assizes. I’ve heard enough testimony to have him charged when next the grand jury meets.”

It wasn’t Magistrate Turner’s looks that had earned him the sobriquet “Lord Justice.” In the two years before he’d become a magistrate, the petty sessions had convicted every man but one who had stood before them. In Turner’s first six months in office, he’d let more than a dozen people go, claiming the crimes had been unproven. But he wasn’t kind; far from it. He punished the guilty with harsh efficiency.

The
Lord
part came about because his brother was a duke. But they called him
Justice
because he was as cruel—and as kind—as the weather. You never knew what you were going to get, and no complaint would change the result.

Billy Croggins licked his lips. “Lord Justice. Please. Have mercy.”

The man shook his head. “The proper form of address is ‘Your Worship.’”

Croggins frowned.

“In any event,” Lord Justice continued, “if the house had truly caught fire, you might have killed your daughter and your grandchildren.” He paused and looked round the room.

He stole the breath from his audience, packed a thousand years of expectation into those bare seconds. If this had been a performance, Miranda would have applauded the perfection of his timing. But this was no play, put on for public amusement. This was real.

Lord Justice looked back at the defendant. He spoke quietly, but his words carried in the waiting silence. “I
am
having mercy, Mr. Croggins. Just not on you. Not on you.”

Miranda shut her eyes. She’d done this before—stolen down to the hearings at the Patron’s behest and delivered testimony designed to prevent the conviction of a particular defendant. The other magistrates never doubted the testimony of a genteel young lady.

But Turner asked questions. He listened. He heard the things you didn’t intend to say. She’d spoken before him only once—the first time she’d testified, well over a year ago. It was the only time she had actually witnessed the crime in question. He’d wrung every last drop of truth from her then.

She surely couldn’t afford Magistrate Turner’s brand of mercy today.

“I’ll conduct the examination,” Turner said. “Palter—hold Mr. Croggins.”

A blighted silence reigned in the hearing room, broken only by the shuffling of feet.

“Call the next case,” the mayor muttered.

Beside her, the clerk began to speak. As he did, Lord Justice’s gaze traveled over the spectators. His eyes briefly rested on Miranda. It was only in her imagination that they narrowed. Still, she shivered.

Under Lord Justice’s voluminous black robes, he might have been fat or slender. He might have had tentacles like a cuttlefish, for all she knew. His long white wig made his features seem thin and severe. Perversely, all that black and white made him appear almost young. That couldn’t be the case. A man had to be ancient to deal justice as he did without flinching.

Don’t lie to this man.
The instinct seemed as deep as hunger, as fierce as cold. But if she walked away now, she’d lose the protection she so desperately needed. And Robbie… It didn’t bear thinking about. One didn’t say
no
to the Patron’s requests. Not even when justice threatened.

She’d received her orders less than two hours before. She was to speak on Widdy’s behalf, to make sure that he wasn’t convicted.

She didn’t know
why
. She was never told why. But she’d asked, once, in a fit of lunacy, and she’d never forgotten the answer the Patron’s man had given her.

In Temple Parish, justice belongs to the Patron, not the magistrates.

An officer was shuffling about, bringing to the front… Oh, yes. It was Widdy this time.

At the front of the room, the boy looked fragile and scared. The harsh life of a street-urchin in Temple Parish had broken him long ago. She doubted Widdy’s release mattered except as a symbol, proof that the Patron was more powerful than the law.

She listened attentively as the baker who was prosecuting the case—a florid-faced gentleman by the name of Pathington—railed against Widdy specifically, and all small scourges upon honest sellers in general. The urchin looked confused and desperate against that onslaught.

When the baker had completed an exaggerated recounting of crime, infamy, and a missing half-loaf of bread, it was Lord Justice who turned to Widdy. “What is your name, young master?”

Widdy swallowed. “Widdy.”

There was a pause. The clerk next to Miranda wrote the word, then looked up. “I beg your pardon, Your Worships. Is that his Christian name or his surname?”

Widdy looked beleaguered.

“Well?” the mayor said. “Speak up. Is that short for something?”

“Yes?” Widdy shifted his feet uneasily.

A faint chuckle rose from the onlookers.

“Well, what for?”

“I don’t know. Me mam called me Widdy, back when.”

“And what is your mother’s name?”

Widdy looked away.

“Well, boy,” the magistrate in the lopsided wig thundered, “what is your mother’s name?”

Widdy shrunk in on himself. “People called her ‘Spanky.’”

The laughter rang out again, darker and just a little more cruel.

Lord Justice cast a quelling glance over the room. “What did she do?”

“She’s dead,” Widdy replied earnestly. “But she used to drink gin.”

The hearing room erupted at that. Lord Justice didn’t even crack a smile. “Do you have work? A place to stay?”

“I sweep streets, sometimes. I hold horses, when gentlemen go into the shops. That’s my favorite. Sometimes, I deliver billy-dos.”

“Billy-dos?” The mayor’s mouth quirked up.

“For ladies,” Widdy explained earnestly. “When they don’t want their words to be seen.”

Skew-wig reached over and nudged the mayor’s elbow. “I believe the boy is referring to
billets-doux.”
His mouth twitched in a self-satisfied smile.

Lord Justice cut his eyes briefly in their direction, and did not join in their merriment. “Did you take the bread?”

“No, sir. It wasn’t mine.”

“That’s what they all say,” Skew-wig said, shaking his head. “It’s his word against a respectable business-owner. I believe the man who
doesn’t
carry billy-dos about.”

That was as good an entry cue as any. Miranda took a deep breath, expelling all her fears. Then she reached out and tapped the clerk again. The man jumped, spattering ink, and then caught her eye. She pointed at Widdy, and the man coughed once more.

“Your Worships,” the clerk said, “there is a lady here who claims to have witnessed the whole affair.”

“Where is she?” the mayor asked.

The clerk jerked his head at Miranda. She felt as if she’d been thrust onstage: every eye in the room trained on her. She went from cold to too-hot. Still, as she pushed to her feet, she also felt a hint of excitement for the performance.

“Your Worships.” The girl she was playing might have that slight tremor to her hands. She would drop her eyes from the intensity of Lord Justice’s gaze. “I saw the events in question. This boy merely watched.” Her words felt almost mushy in her mouth. She pitched her accent somewhere between aristocratically smooth and street-wary, with an added touch of broad country. She needed to hover on the brink of respectability. In this gown, she’d never manage wealthy.

Nobody said anything, so she kept her eyes on the floor. How many people had stood here like this, hoping for the best? A bead of sweat collected on her forehead. After a few moments—seconds really, although it felt an age—she dared to lift her eyes.

Lord Justice watched her, unblinking, one hand on his chin. If there’d been a hint of softness in his manner toward Widdy, it had evaporated at her appearance. Next to him, his colleague frowned in puzzlement.

It would be a mistake to let the stretching silence drive her to speak. That way lay babbling, and too much revelation altogether. She dropped her chin and contemplated the floor instead.

Lord Justice spoke first. “You saw the entire thing.” It wasn’t quite a question, the way he said it. Still, she bobbed her head in response.

Beside her, the clerk shuffled his feet. “Should she be sworn in?”

Lord Justice gave a negative wave of his hand. “What is your name?”

“Whitaker,” Miranda said. “Miss Daisy Whitaker.”

Her day-gown was serviceable muslin, one that a countrified girl might wear. He’d already taken note of her accent. He glanced to either side of her, and then scanned the room before raising one eyebrow.

“You are here unaccompanied,” he commented.

“My father is a farmer. A gentleman farmer. He’s here for market, and brought me along to town. It’s my first time.” Miranda ducked her head. “I didn’t think it was wrong to come. Was it?” She glanced up once more through darkened lashes, and willed him to see a headstrong girl from Somerset. Someone not used to being chaperoned at all times. Someone who might walk through fields by herself at home. She wanted him to see a foolish chit, so innocent that she believed going out alone in the city was no different than traipsing down a dusty lane.

“I had to come,” she added softly. “He was just a child, Your Worship.”

Lord Justice examined her a minute longer—as if she were a mouse, and he the owl about to swoop down and gobble her whole. “Where do you and your father stay?”

“The Lamb Inn.”

His gaze cut away from her. “Mr. Pathington, in what manner did Master Widdy remove the loaf of bread from your premises?”

The baker who’d made the accusation jerked his head up. “I—well—that is to say, I did not precisely
see
him take it. But there was no one else about. I saw him; I turned away for the barest of instants. I turned back, and the loaf was gone. Who else could it have been?”

Lord Justice tapped his fingers against the bench. “Precisely how bare was your instant?”

“Pardon?”

“Estimate how long you stood with your back turned. What were you doing?”

“Counting change for a half-crown, Your Worship.”

Magistrate Turner looked up and away, as if in calculation. “As much as a half-minute, then. You want me to punish this boy, who had no bread on him when he was apprehended, because you did not watch your storefront?”

Pathington flushed red. “Well, Your Worship, I wouldn’t put it precisely like that—”

Lord Justice turned to face the other magistrates. “In my opinion, the charges have not been proven. Gentlemen?”

“Here now,” the mayor said, “Miss…uh, the miss over here has not delivered her testimony.”

Turner’s lips compressed. “No,” he said shortly. “But there is no need to hear it, as it is duplicative of what we can determine by reason. The lady—” he glanced sharply at Miranda “—need not expose herself.”

“You cannot be serious, Turner. Maybe the boy didn’t steal this particular loaf of bread,” the mayor said. “But surely he is guilty of
something
. Skulking about bakeries, carrying billy-dos. We can’t just let him go.”

Lord Justice turned to the mayor. Miranda had that sensation once again—that he could have been on a stage, so clever was his timing.

“How curious,” he finally offered. “Here I thought our duty was to decide if the charges before us could be proven. I recall the indictment most particularly, and yet I don’t remember seeing this boy charged with the illegal carrying of letters.”

The mayor flushed and looked away. “Suit yourself, Turner. If you insist on letting the rabble run free, I suppose I can’t stop you.”

A small smile touched Lord Justice’s lips. “You heard the man. Master Widdy, you are free to go.”

Miranda held her shoulders high, not daring to gasp. Still, relief flooded through her. Thank God. He’d not seen through her. This time, she’d scarcely had to talk with him. She’d survived. She felt as if she’d landed that double backflip atop a moving horse, and she could not keep from grinning.

But just as the babble in the room was beginning to grow, Lord Justice held up one hand.

“Miss…” He paused. “Whitaker, you said?” His lip curled.

Miranda’s apprehension returned in full force. “Yes, Your Worship?”

“The Lamb Inn is through the market. A woman shouldn’t walk down those mobbed streets unaccompanied. There are cutpurses loose. And worse.”

“If I leave now, Your Worship, I’ll be back before my father returns.”

He drummed his fingers against the oak bench. “I’ll see you to your lodgings, if you’ll wait a few minutes in the anteroom.”

Oh God. What a ghastly proposition. “Your Worship. I sh-shouldn’t take you from your duties.”

He sighed. “We are in complete accord on that point. Nevertheless.”

Before she had a chance to argue, he signaled and the clerk struck the gavel. The waiting crowd rose to its feet, and the magistrates stood as well. Miranda wanted to run. She wanted to shriek. But she didn’t dare draw attention to herself—not here, not with constables and magistrates both close by.

The clerk hopped to his feet and ran to open the rear door. The other judges turned and marched out of the room, one in front of the other.

Turner was the last of the three to leave, his black robe swirling about him as if he were some kind of dark angel. But the clerk held the door open even after Lord Justice passed through, as if waiting for one last judge. And sure enough, from under the bench, a dog pushed to its feet and headed for the door. Miranda hadn’t seen it before; it must have lain quietly on the floor for the duration of the session.

The animal, a bit higher than her knee, was a mass of gray-and-white fur. It followed on Turner’s heels, as stately and ageless as its master. It paused when it reached the doorway, and looked back. She couldn’t even see its eyes through all that fur. Still, it felt as if the creature were marking Miranda, ordering her to wait until Lord Justice could see to her. She shivered, once, and the creature turned away.