The Quality of Mercy - By Barry Unsworth Page 0,72

Ashton, a great pleasure to see you again.” Kemp lowered his head over her hand.

Not entirely unexpected, however, Ashton had time to think as he smiled a little and waited for introductions. These came, and the two men inclined their heads.

The meeting, the sight of each other at such close quarters, was for both of them something in the nature of a shock, both having formed judgments of the other that now turned out to need revising. Kemp had set Ashton down as a sentimental sort of fellow, probably given to preaching and hand-wringing, not on close terms with the realities of life. He found himself looking at a face that was ascetic but far from meek, at eyes that were closely observant and penetrating. Ashton, in his turn, instead of the coarse-grained trader he had been expecting to find, saw a face that was acquainted with pain and bewilderment, whatever the striving for an arrogance that would conceal this.

Ashton could find no immediate words, and Jane too was silent, both feeling that some reference to the previous day’s judgment should be made, both fearing to sound a note of triumph. There were the strains of the orchestra falling from above, there was a hubbub of voices and a bustle of movement about them, but Jane felt caught in a web of silence and unease. She sought for something to say. The music, perhaps; it was a piece by Haydn they were playing now …

It was Kemp, however, who broke the silence and in a way that was totally unexpected.

“I would not wish you to think,” he said, looking squarely at Ashton, “that the lawyer representing me yesterday was acting on my instructions when he singled you out and made personal remarks about your plans to prosecute the case further.”

“I am very glad to hear you say so,” Ashton said. “Since he was representing your interests directly and no one was representing mine—in fact, I had no direct interest in the case—it was natural to suppose that his outburst was part of some tactic previously agreed upon.”

“No, nothing of the sort.” Kemp raised his head and spoke with more emphasis now, as if he had been contradicted. “I would not descend to that,” he said. “If I cannot win by fair means, I would not wish to win at all.”

Ashton nodded, not really believing this, not really believing it was true of himself. Fairness was not a fixed value; it depended on the nature of the end to be served. “Well, it does you credit,” he said.

“The fellow went far beyond his instructions,” Kemp said. “I believe he lost his temper, as a matter of fact. I shall on no account employ him again. I hold him partly responsible for the unfavorable judgment we received.”

Ashton made no immediate reply to this. It was clear to him that despite the assurances of probity and fair dealing, Kemp still believed he was in the right, would always believe so; he had been angry to see his lawyer obscure this fact by antagonizing the judge. Something of this anger had come into his eyes as he spoke, eyes that were long and narrow, very dark, with a singular intensity of regard. He had worn the same look when the jury returned their verdict. Ashton had noted it, as he had noted the triumphant smiles of Van Dillen and his associates seated not far away. He had thought it due to the sting of defeat, but it seemed now that Kemp believed he had been dealt with unjustly.

After the initial greeting he had not looked at Jane again, as if the necessity of making things clear, removing any suspicion of underhand dealing, were of paramount importance to him. In fact it was suspicion on Jane’s part, not Ashton’s, that he wished to remove. Ashton was an opponent, and he had never had much care for the feelings and opinions of opponents. But that Jane Ashton should think ill of him, should think him capable of such contriving, that was a very different matter.

And Jane, with the pleasurably heightened perceptions that come from a growing interest in the mind and person of another, knew that he was speaking to her, knew with the kind of certainty that needs little in the way of evidence that the reason he did not look at her was that he wanted to do so very much, that he had dwelled long upon her and had arranged this meeting. She