have saved herself even on the brink of disaster? She seems to have acted like a boy pushing his tin soldier inch by inch towards the edge of the table, just to see what will happen.
It's Bovill's turn again. "I would like to enter into evidence something found with the appointment book," he says, almost pleasurably. "A folded strip of paper containing what have been identified as fragments of moss and heather, marked Yours ever, A."
Helen's veil is suddenly sticking to her wet face.
"While, as my learned friend has been at some pains to emphasize, initials are subject to interpretation, I would put it to the gentlemen of the jury that in this particular case, A. can only mean the co-respondent, Colonel David Anderson."
She heaves silently. Fragments of moss and heather. From that hill above Valetta, that afternoon kissing in the bushes. The fragments are hers, hers alone, nobody's but hers. And yet they'll be filed away somewhere in the bowels of this medieval building, by faceless men, and she'll never get them back.
"And last but by no means least," says Bovill, "a letter—perhaps a draft or copy—found in the respondent's desk, which will remove any remaining doubts as to the nature of the relations between the respondent and the co-respondent."
People sit up straight, shush each other as Bovill starts to read.
Sunday, September 23
It has taken me two days to compose this letter.
Surely, before you formed an engagement you were bound in all honour to tell me of the changed state of your heart . . .
As he recites her words with monkish precision, Helen tries to shut her ears. She's on the hillside above the harbour, sun warming the heather and moss under her skirts, salty breeze in her hair.
"Although the letter contains no names, nor even initials," concludes Bovill, "to men of the world such as yourselves, gentlemen of the jury, it will clarify that for two years, Mrs. Codrington and Colonel Anderson have been on terms of declared, illicit affection. And although the letter contains no evidence of carnal actions, as such, you will bear in mind that when a married woman so abjectly surrenders her heart, it is a very short step indeed to the surrender of her person."
A skinny man hops up and turns out to be Dr. Swabey, for the corespondent. Helen's neck prickles. "My Lord, I submit that this letter does in no wise tell against my client, Colonel Anderson," he says squeakily. "No proof has been offered that it was written to, posted to, or received by him, or that it has any bearing on his character at all."
A wintry smile from Judge Wilde. "The learned counsel is quite right in point of law, but not in point of common sense. The jury are free to interpret the letter in such a way as to conclude that Mrs. Codrington committed adultery with your client."
Swabey's mouth opens and shuts. "Even if they do," he maintains, "my duty is to create a reasonable doubt as to whether my client committed adultery with Mrs. Codrington."
A gale of laughter goes up, and Swabey's frown deepens.
"Very well, Doctor," says the judge, deadpan. "Gentlemen of the jury, if you find it plausible that a woman may have carnal relations with a man without him having such relations with her, then I direct you, in considering Colonel Anderson's guilt or otherwise, not to take this letter into consideration."
More hilarity, which the men of law pretend to ignore.
***
Few comes to her at Eccleston Square in the evening.
"I do hope you and Mr. Hawkins realized that Mrs. Watson's testimony was a heap of rubbish?" she demands.
The old man sighs. "Many of her stories did have the ring of yellow-jacket fiction, but they'll still have had their effect on the jury. As it happens, what interested Hawkins most was her emphasis on your powers of imagination."
Helen is open-mouthed. "You mean—when the creature claimed I deluded myself into thinking that every man I met was in love with me?"
"Mmm. Hawkins believes this could work to your advantage, if he were to reshape your defence somewhat along those lines."
Helen lets herself lean back into the sofa's padded embrace. "I'm entirely bewildered."
"Please don't take offence, Mrs. Codrington. Desperate times, desperate measures, eh?"
She stares him down.
"Hawkins says, what if he were to present you as an unhappy woman whose fancy has a tendency to run away with her? A woman who in fact has never gone further than the mildest coquetting, but who in her dreams