Remember Me - Lesley Pearse [154]
Mary certainly wasn’t one of them. She had more in common with the debtors, who sat disconsolately in small groups, bitterly ashamed of the events which had brought them into prison, all hope and spirit gone.
Yet the shiny red ribbon in Mary’s dark hair, which was a little incongruous when her dress was so shabby and stained, suggested that the indomitable spirit which had kept her alive through so much hardship was still there, even if subdued for now. She’d asked boldly if he was prepared to defend her four friends too. When he’d stated that he felt it was only her cause he could fight, she’d turned away as if the interview was over.
‘Then I cannot accept your help,’ she’d said finally. ‘We are all in this together, they are my friends, and I will not abandon them.’
It was inconceivable to Boswell that anyone in such desperate straits would put friendship before her own life. He pleaded with her, explained that he could win her case as public sympathy would be on her side because of her children. What he also thought, but couldn’t admit, was that he saw her trial as a kind of showcase for his talents. He wanted it to be emotionally charged, he saw himself making a dramatic and heart-rending closing speech. But if he had to defend the four men too, all of whom were probably dubious characters, the sympathy he’d built up for Mary would be very much diluted.
‘I have nothing left now but those four friends,’ she said simply. ‘We have been through hell together, and they are like brothers to me. I’ll take my chances with them.’
‘Do you think they would do the same for you?’ he asked her. ‘I think not, Mary, each one of them would do anything to save his own skin, regardless of what happened to you.’
‘Maybe,’ she sighed. ‘There was a time when my own survival counted for more than anything else on this earth. But that’s in the past. I don’t value it very highly any more.’
James was impressed by her sense of honour, but he supposed she’d lost her common sense along with her spirit.
‘Just how are you going to restore her spirit, Bozzie?’ he asked himself, tipping his hat to a pretty maid walking with an elderly chaperone.
He paused and turned to look back at the girl, noting her tiny waist, the pert bow on the bustle of her pink gown and her bonnet trimmed with daisies. Veronica and Euphemia, his two older daughters, had many such gowns and bonnets, and nothing cheered them more than new ones. Perhaps Mary would begin to hope again with something pretty to wear?
The air in the small cell in Newgate was tense, the four men staring at Mary with cold, suspicious eyes.
‘Don’t look at me that way,’ she said indignantly. ‘The only reason I didn’t tell you of his visit was because he can’t help us.’
The men had come back to the cell late in the afternoon and they were all very drunk. Had they been sober she would probably have told them about the visit from Mr Boswell, but while they slept off the drink she came to the conclusion that there was nothing to be gained from such a disclosure. Mr Boswell only wanted to help her, not them, and if she told them that they’d only be hurt.
Unfortunately she hadn’t realized that a visitor from outside would attract so much attention and speculation among both prisoners and gaolers. By the time the men sobered up and went back to the tap-room, it seemed the whole prison was talking about the lawyer gentleman who’d called on her.
‘What scheme are you cooking up?’ James burst out, his lean face flushed with anger.
‘There is no scheme,’ Mary retorted. ‘Spinks brought him here, he was curious about us all, but not interested enough to defend us.’
‘You let a lawyer come and go without getting me?’ James roared at her. ‘I could have made him interested.’
Mary shrugged. ‘When you were drunk? He would have been even less inclined to help us.’
‘I can hold my drink, talk anyone round, drunk or sober,’ James snarled. ‘I’ll wager you didn’t even try to persuade him. You might welcome