A Place Called Freedom - Ken Follett [99]
Mack hurt all over, but his head was the worst. There was a lump at the back that was crusted with blood. He felt hopelessly gloomy. He had failed in every way. He had run away from Heugh to be free, yet he was in jail. He had fought for the coal heavers’ rights and had got some of them killed. He had lost Cora. He would be put on trial for treason, or riot, or murder. And he would probably die on the gallows. Many of the people around him had as much reason to grieve, but perhaps they were too stupid to grasp their fate.
Poor Esther would never get out of the village now. He wished he had brought her with him. She could have dressed as a man, the way Lizzie Hallim did. She would have managed sailors’ work more easily than Mack himself, for she was nimbler. And her common sense might even have kept Mack out of trouble.
He hoped Annie’s baby would be a boy. At least there would still be a Mack. Perhaps Mack Lee would have a luckier life, and a longer one, than Mack McAsh.
He was at a low point when a warder opened the door and Cora walked in.
Her face was dirty and her red dress was torn but she still looked ravishing, and everyone turned to stare.
Mack sprang to his feet and embraced her, to cheers from the other prisoners.
“What happened to you?” he said.
“I was done for picking pockets—but it was all on account of you,” she said.
“What do you mean?”
“It was a trap. He looked like any other rich young drunk, but he was Jay Jamisson. They nabbed us and took us in front of his father. It’s a hanging offense, picking pockets. But they offered Peg a pardon—if she would tell them where you lived.”
Mack suffered a moment of anger with Peg for betraying him; but she was just a child, she could not be blamed. “So that was how they found out.”
“What happened to you?”
He told her the story of the riot.
When he had done she said: “By Christ, McAsh, you’re an unlucky man to know.”
It was true, he thought. Everyone he met got into some kind of trouble. “Charlie Smith is dead,” he said.
“You must talk to Peg,” she said. “She thinks you must hate her.”
“I hate myself for getting her into this.”
Cora shrugged. “You didn’t tell her to thieve. Come on.”
She banged on the door and a warder opened it. She gave him a coin, jerked a thumb at Mack and said: “He’s with me.” The warder nodded and let them out.
She led him along a corridor to another door and they entered a room very like the one they had left. Peg was sitting on the floor in a corner. When she saw Mack she stood up, looking scared. “I’m sorry,” she said. “They made me do it, I’m sorry!”
“It wasn’t your fault,” he said.
Her eyes filled with tears. “I let you down,” she whispered.
“Don’t be silly.” He took her in his arms, and her tiny frame shook as she sobbed and sobbed.
Caspar Gordonson arrived with a banquet: fish soup in a big tureen, a joint of beef, new bread, several jugs of ale, and a custard. He paid the jailer for a private room with table and chairs. Mack, Cora and Peg were brought from their ward and they all sat down to eat.
Mack was hungry, but he found he had little appetite. He was too worried. He wanted to know what Gordonson thought of his chances at the trial. He forced himself to be patient and drank some beer.
When they had finished eating, Gordonson’s servant cleared away and brought pipes and tobacco. Gordonson took a pipe, and so did Peg, who was addicted to this adult vice.
Gordonson began by talking about Peg and Cora’s case. “I’ve spoken with the Jamisson family lawyer about the pick-pocketing charge,” he began. “Sir George will stand by his promise to ask for mercy for Peg.”
“That surprises me,” said Mack. “It’s not like the Jamissons to keep their word.”
“Ah, well, they want something,” Gordonson said. “You see, it will be embarrassing for them if Jay tells the court he picked Cora up thinking she was a prostitute. So they want to pretend she just met him in the street and got him