The bailiff was beside the table.

"Mr. Sacheverall is waiting for you, Sir Oliver. I'll take you to him, if you come with me."

"Do you want to withdraw?" Rathbone demanded, still facing Melville. "I can't make that decision for you. I don't know what Sacheverall will find or what these witnesses may say."

"Neither do I!" Melville said jerkily. "But I am not going to marry Zillah Lambert." He closed his eyes. "Just do what you can...." His voice cracked and he turned away.

Rathbone had no choice but to go with the bailiff and meet with Sacheverall, not knowing what he could salvage of the chaos he had been thrown into. Except that if he were honest, he had not been thrown, he had leaped, more or less open-eyed. His own lack of thought had earned him this.

Sacheverall was half sitting on the bare table in the small room set aside for just this sort of meeting. He did not stand when Rathbone came in and closed the door. His fair eyebrows rose quizzically.

"Ready to retreat?"

Rathbone sat in one of the chairs and leaned back, crossing his legs. He realized he disliked Sacheverall, not because he was losing—he had lost cases before, to adversaries he both liked and admired—but for the way in which Sacheverall savored the misfortune this would bring to Melville, and his own part in making it happen. The prosecutor was not serving justice but some emotion of his own. Rathbone resented giving him anything.

"If you mean ready to capitulate, no, I'm not. If you mean discuss the situation, then of course. I thought I had already made that plain in asking for an adjournment."

"For God's sake, man!" Sacheverall said with a half laugh. "You're beaten! Give in gracefully and I won't call my witnesses who can place Wolff and Melville together in the most intimate and compromising circumstances. Of course the man doesn't want to marry!" His voice was rich with scorn. "He's a homosexual.... I'll use the politest word I can for what he does." His expression made all too evident what manner of word was running through his mind.

"You can use whatever word is natural to you," Rathbone answered with a sneer he did not bother to hide. "You have no reputation to guard in here."

Sacheverall flushed. Perhaps he was more aware than he showed that he was awkward beside Rathbone, clumsy, inelegant, that his ears were too large.

"If you think I won't drag it up, you are mistaken!" Sacheverall said angrily. “I will! Every sordid detail necessary to prove my client's case and claim the damages she's due. Melville will end in prison... which is where he belongs."