Cain His Brother - Anne Perry [175]
There was utter silence, not even an indrawn breath of disbelief. It was as if life in the room were suspended. Enid was ashen-faced, Genevieve paralyzed.
Finally the coroner spoke.
“Mr. Rathbone, are you suggesting that Lord Ravensbrook intentionally killed Caleb Stone?”
“I am suggesting that it is a possibility, sir.”
Goode closed his eyes and leaned back in his seat, anguish written all over his face.
Two spots of color touched Milo Ravensbrook’s cheeks, but he neither moved nor spoke.
Selina Herries bit her knuckles and stared at Rathbone. “In God’s name, man, for what conceivable reason?” the coroner asked.
The door opened at the back of the court and Monk came in, drenched with rain, tousled and exhausted for lack of sleep, but accompanied by an elderly man and a stout woman in black.
Rathbone felt weak with relief. His voice trembled as he answered the coroner.
“I will call witnesses to answer that question, sir. I shall begin with the Reverend Horatio Nicolson, of Chilverley, with your permission.”
The coroner hesitated. He looked around the room, saw the wide-eyed faces, the anticipation, the journalists who were still present sitting with pencil in hand, faces bright with eagerness. He could not disallow it.
“I shall stop you if for one instant there is irrelevance, or any attempt at unsubstantiated attack!” he warned. “Be very careful, Mr. Rathbone, very careful indeed! I will have no one’s good name taken lightly.”
Rathbone bowed his head in acknowledgment and called Horatio Nicolson to the witness stand.
Slowly, with deep regret and obvious embarrassment, the Reverend Nicolson mounted the witness stand and took the oath.
Rathbone began by establishing precisely who he was so that the court might understand his importance.
“So you knew Lord Ravensbrook and his family quite well at the time Angus Stonefield came to Chilverley?” he asked.
“Yes sir,” Nicolson answered, his face grave.
“Did you come to know Angus?”
“Yes. I tutored him in Latin, beginning when he was about eight, I believe. He was an excellent student, intelligent, willing and quick to learn. A most agreeable boy, so thoughtful and well mannered.” He smiled at the memory, in spite of himself. “My wife was especially fond of him. She worried about him. He was quite often ill, you know, and at times seemed very withdrawn.” His voice dropped a little. “There was a sadness in him, especially when he was very young. Most rational, I suppose, having lost both his parents at such an early age.”
“Did he continue to be such an excellent student, Mr. Nicolson?” Rathbone asked.
Nicolson’s face pinched with grief.
“No. I am afraid he became very erratic. At times he was excellent, his old self. And then there would be occasions when I would hardly see him for several weeks.”
“Do you know the reason for this?”
Nicolson drew in a deep breath and let it out in a silent sigh. “I asked, naturally. Lord Ravensbrook confided in me that he had become most recalcitrant at times, hard to discipline, and on occasion even openly rebellious.”
There was a faint rustling in the room. No one was yet interested. Nicolson’s head lifted. “Although I must say in his defense that Lord Ravensbrook was a hard man to please.” He spoke as if he had not seen Ravensbrook in the room, nor did his eyes move towards where he sat, stiff and pale. “He was handsome, charming and talented himself,” Nicolson continued. “And he expected those in his own family to come up to his standards. If they did not, he was harsh in his criticism.”
“But Angus was not, strictly speaking, his own family,” Rathbone pointed out. “Except distantly. Was he not the child of a cousin?”
Nicolson’s face tightened, touched with a deep pity. “No sir, he was the illegitimate son of his younger brother, Phineas Ravensbrook. Stonefield was the young woman’s name, which was all he was legally entitled to. But he was Ravensbrook by blood.”
Rathbone heard the murmur of surprise around the room, the indrawn breath.
The coroner leaned forward, as if about to interrupt, then changed