I later retrieved a knife from a cabinet inside the bedchamber, which appeared to have been wiped clean, containing not a trace of blood on it. There were cold ashes in the grate. I was handed other items by the housekeeper: a receipt for arsenic made out in the name of the prisoner; a jar which had been found beside the prisoner’s pallet, in the maids’ bedroom upstairs, which appeared to contain a human foetus.

I found a book in the cabinet also. Paradise Lost, written by Mr John Milton. I produce the jar, the knife, the book, &c. I took the prisoner to the watch-house that morning before she was transported to Newgate. She said not a word, neither at the watch-house, nor the whole time she was being transported.

The Old Bailey

7 April 1826

Chapter Forty

Here we are, then.

Jessop, prosecuting. Stout, thin-lipped, the kind of face that would look solemn at his own wedding. I shiver. The room so vast, so crowded with the heat and smells of all those bodies, yet cushioned quiet by all the marble and velvet and brass. The sword hanging above the judge’s head. The light coming spit-clear and yellow through the arched windows. Jessop swings towards the jurors, who stare like cats. He wags his jowls. He’s told them about the School-house, and they’ve pretended shock, though gaming and whoring are the vices that feed off men like them, which is why there are a hundred prostitutes in London for every wife. He’s shown them the jar, the foetus. He’s reminded them that I was woken in my mistress’s bed, that I had blood on my hands when I was woken, yet claim I can’t remember how it got there.

‘You will hear from Mrs Linux, the housekeeper at Levenhall. She’ll speak to the prisoner’s character –’

You leap to your feet. ‘My Lord, need I remind my friend that my client’s character is not to be entered into? He should know better.’

Jessop grins – small white teeth buried in his fleshy cheeks, like sugar cubes in a bun – and saunters down one end of the barristers’ table. ‘Of course, My Lord, of course. The rule hasn’t shifted for many years, though I see the custom of hesitating to interrupt one’s opening is wobbling on its feet.’

The judge chuckles and Jessop spins on his heel as if even his gown is smirking, flying up around his shins. ‘The only words the prisoner spoke that night regarding the whole dreadful affair were, “I can’t remember.” How convenient. It would be a first in my experience ‒ indeed, it would be a first in English law ‒ were it to be so easy for a murderess to reach safe harbour simply by scrubbing clean her own devious mind.’ He snaps the lapels of his black gown across his chest. ‘There’s the evidence, gentlemen. I daresay it needs only half of it to make the case. The prisoner was a woman from a god-forsaken place, but Mr Benham took her in anyway, gave her safe harbour. She was turned out for thieving, but she crawled back, bent on revenge, and murdered him, and his wife.