Chapter Six #4
There was a hung moment. Toby shut his eyes. He felt the realisation settle on to his parents. David cleared his throat. ‘You mean to say that your written version is . . . skewed, in Kit’s favour?’
Theo stood abruptly. ‘Forgive me. I shouldn’t have come.’
She rushed from the room, and Toby went after her.
‘Theo, wait!’ he called, and she froze.
He took her shoulders, turned her to face him. ‘Theo, please. Without your word against Joanna’s . . . don’t you see?’
Tears flooded her eyes. ‘You saw what happened at the Town Hall, Toby! I can’t do it!’
‘You mean you are afraid to, and too cowardly to try!’
Her fingers went to her necklace again. He fought the urge to slap her hand away from it.
‘The magistrate knew I was lying, don’t you understand? People always do! If I do not speak, if I do not give myself away, then my written statement will stand.’ She stared up at him, beseeching. ‘If I go, I will make it worse. Ask anything else of me, Toby! Anything but that!’
‘There is nothing else!’
‘I . . . I begged the doctor to lie. I asked him outright to allow for some other cause of Missy’s death—’
‘But don’t you see? You were there, Theo. Nothing matters except your word against Joanna’s!’
She shook her head wretchedly, but he refused to allow it.
‘Practise. Rehearse what you will say. Rehearse how you will answer to anything you might be asked. Summon the courage, Theo! It’s a simple enough thing to do.’
‘Toby, please—’
‘You must do this. You must. They will believe you. You were Missy’s friend as well as Kit’s, and you are the more respectable by far. They will believe you, if you say it was an accident!’
Theo’s head drooped. She swayed again, just like at the Town Hall, and Toby realised that she meant it.
She would not speak at the trial. He took a sharp breath: her refusal was causing an actual physical pain somewhere near his heart.
He felt betrayed, and realised that he’d thought Theo would do anything for him.
He’d thought she loved him – had known it, in fact.
That sudden feeling at the castle, when he’d yearned to kiss her .
. . But he’d been wrong. About all of it.
‘If you do not . . .’ He struggled to finish the sentence. His head was roaring. He didn’t know what he would do. ‘If you do not, then you were never a friend. Not to Kit, and not to me.’
Toby had never been sure how well Kit understood time.
He seemed to have kept a young child’s view of it – either something was happening right now, or it wasn’t happening.
He didn’t appear to differentiate between something due in five minutes, five hours, or five weeks.
And yet, as the trial date approached, Kit grew more agitated.
Restlessly pacing his cell, unable to keep still even when they brought him his favourites – jam sandwiches and shortbread fingers.
Toby wondered if some of the officers were goading him about the upcoming trial, but Constable Philpott didn’t think so.
They’d all grown fond of Kit, he said; even Constable Hickey, who didn’t like anyone much.
With a sinking feeling, Toby could only suppose Kit understood his situation better than they realised.
His suspicion was confirmed as he got up to leave after visiting on the second of October, three days before Kit was due to be moved to Dorchester.
Kit had fidgeted throughout the visit, his face twitching even though Toby had been careful not to mention anything about it.
Lord Paxton-Nevis had arrived, and all was running to schedule; Kit’s would be the first case heard, and the only charge of murder on this assize.
‘Has Mr Cornwallis been to see you?’ Toby asked, wondering if that were the cause.
Kit shook his head rapidly.
‘Kit – come and sit down, calm down. Steady the breathing, remember?’
He did a few himself, to lead the way, exaggerating the slow inhalation, the even slower exhalation. But Kit surged to his feet again, pacing from one corner of the cell to another.
‘I don’t want to go there!’ Kit said. ‘Not even to ride on the train. I don’t want to go, and be hanged!’
Toby closed his eyes. He went to stand in front of Kit, putting his hand on the back of his neck and pulling him closer until their foreheads touched. Breathing in Kit’s unwashed hair and the sourness of his unbrushed teeth; the same softly animal smells he’d always had.
‘They aren’t going to hang you, Kit.’ Toby’s voice didn’t sound like his own.
‘But they might! They might!’
‘They won’t, Kit.’
‘Do you promise?’
‘Kit . . .’
But Toby couldn’t promise. The words wouldn’t come.
‘We all know you didn’t mean to hurt her,’ he said instead. ‘You’ll be home soon. Please don’t worry. I need you to be brave. Be very brave, and do as you are asked, and leave the rest to me.’
They stood with their heads together for as long as Kit could tolerate it, and when he broke away to pace again Toby kept his eyes shut, because he hated the world and everything in it, and he didn’t know what to do.