The Fall of Chance (23 page)

“What do you want to do, Unt?” Ostin asked him.

Unt couldn’t bring himself to look up. “I can’t go to prison,” he said. “I want to plead Innocent of Intent.”

Ostin knew he was defeated. “Guilty in deed but not in mind, eh?” he laughed his watery laugh and patted Unt’s leg. His palm was already sweaty and left a damp imprint on his trousers. “Unt my boy, I always make it a policy to listen to my wife and I think you’re right to do so here.”

“You know I wasn’t keen on going the full Innocent route but Innocent of Intent? I think we can manage that. The essence of the case against you is that you tried to beat the system. The Councillors will forgive anything but that.

“But if you can present yourself as the naïve, wide-eyed boy who didn’t realise what he was doing, you’re giving them an easy excuse to absolve you. Can you manage that?”

“I can,” said Unt firmly.

“Excellent,” said Ostin, “Now we only need roll for it.”

“Roll for it?” Unt frowned.

“Oh, yes,” replied Ostin. “This is just like real life. We don’t just get to choose our case, we have to decide by rolling for it.”

“Then what have we been discussing?” Unt demanded.

Ostin delved into his satchel and came up with a small green card. “This,” he said, “is your Plea Card. I fill it in with your options, weigh the scores according to our preference and then you roll. Understand?”

Unt nodded cautiously.

“Good,” said Ostin, “Now, the law requires that all options are present on the card, even if it’s a plea we don’t want to use. What I’m proposing then is that we enter a plea of innocence on a double one. Does that sound good to you?”

Again, Unt nodded.

“Now, our remaining two options are a full and open admittance of guilt and an admittance of guilt without intent. I think we should go for the second option between three and nine and keep the first option for a score of ten or more.”

“Make it twelve,” said Crystal.

“How about eleven or more?” countered Ostin.

“Twelve,” said Crystal. “Unt’s already told you, he can’t bear the thought of conviction.”

“Alright,” said Ostin resignedly, “twelve it is.” He started filling out the card in scratchy handwriting. His tongue flicked the side of his mouth as he wrote.

“Ok, Unt,” he said when he was done, “We’re ready. Do you have your dice with you?”

In reply, Unt took his fist out of his pocket and opened his fingers to reveal his dice.

“In your own time, then,” said Ostin.

Unt cast the dice on the floor. One landed resting on the metal at the bottom of the bars. The other rebounded back toward the cot, went between the two men and stopped just short of going fully under.

The score on the bar showed six, the one by their feet showed two.

“Eight,” said Ostin, writing the score on the card, “Guilleless-guilt it is!” He slipped the completed card into his satchel and rose to leave.

Unt decided to ask the other question that had been playing on his mind. “Do you know who made the accusation?”

Ostin shrugged, “My understanding is that they’ve given him or her anonymity. If that will be all, I’ll see you later.” He spared no time in leaving.

Crystal stayed standing. “Thank you,” he said to her.

She stepped over and put a hand on his head. “It’s what I’m here for.”

Her touch was reassuring but his mind was restless. He couldn’t help wondering if he’d done the right thing. This situation had Lasper’s touch all over it. He wouldn’t give Unt an easy ride. If he was going to prove his innocence he would have to fight for it but the worst of it was, deep down, he didn’t feel innocent.

“You should go,” he said to Crystal.

She looked unwilling but asked “Would you like me to fetch you anything from home?”

“I won’t be here long but a change of clothes would be nice,” he said.

“I’ll fetch you toiletries and some paper and ink,” she said. “If you come up with any ideas, you can jot them down.”

Her list made, she got up to leave. That left them with a final awkward moment: the kiss goodbye. It was duty, not passion that demanded it and neither knew what to do. They settled for a peck on the lips.

It was a nothing gesture but as Crystal was leaving, she looked back from the front door and smiled. It was the first true smile she’d given him and in that instant, Unt was reminded why all the boys loved her.

There was so much kindness in that one smile that she seemed to project light. To have even a fraction of her full passion bestowed on him gave Unt hope.

11. The Charge

“Time,” said the beadle, rousing Unt from his reverie. He looked at the old man, blinking.

“Time for your trial, young ‘un,” Tulk repeated. “Time for the big event.”

Unt was already dressed. Crystal had been over with a change of clothes and his appearance was as ready as it was going to be. He’d sent her away after she’d made the delivery.

He’d told her to go and get a seat for the trial. Her support would be more use there than it was here and he didn’t want her getting shut out by the crowds or relegated to the back benches. He would need her where he could see her.

Unt stood up as Tulk opened the cell and let himself be led to the cabin door. As the beadle swung the door open, Unt was prepared to be blinded by the sun but the day was overcast. It was the kind of sky that didn’t want to shine but couldn’t be bothered to do anything else, so it just sat there, grey.

The people gathered outside matched the weather’s mood. He’d thought there’d either be a baying crowd or else no-one at all but instead, there were maybe three-score people. It was more than a group but less than a mob and their attitude was more curious than hostile. They looked on Unt with the macabre interest of people viewing a corpse.

They pressed in for a closer look but Tulk pushed through them with the easy authority of experience. One skinny youth, a few years older than Unt, pushed through from the back. “Cheat!” he yelled.

“Becker, is that you caterwauling?” asked Tulk without looking. “You should be more careful banding that word around with your curious luck at the tables.”

That silenced the boy and the crowd as well. As Tulk walked Unt up the street, the rest fell in behind or walked alongside them. The farther they walked, the more the crowd grew but an eerie silence stayed over them.

If Unt’s journey to confinement had seemed long, the journey to his judgement was even longer. Yesterday, he’d dreaded seeing people he knew but now, anonymity was out of the question. Everywhere he looked among the crowd, he saw the familiar flicker of people he knew. Not one of them could meet his eyes and neither could he meet theirs, so he walked on with his eyes to the floor.

When they reached Fortune Square, a second crowd was already gathered. This was larger than the one that moved along with Unt and as the two merged into one, the assembly reached a critical mass that energised them.

“Move aside!” bawled Tulk. “If the main event’s stuck out here, who do you think is gonna be standing trial inside?”

He had to back up his voice with the use of elbows but he ploughed them through the Square without any difficulty. Unt had little time to dwell on his return to Fate Hall: his place of work, the site of his former triumph, arrest and now, place of judgement. Tulk had him through the entrance corridor before he knew it.

Inside, the press of people was denser. Old Tulk had to work harder but he barged his way through in the same old manner. The squash of people was so dense that it didn’t seem possible they had somewhere to move to. For his own sake, he had enough difficulty breathing, never mind moving. It was an actual relief when they broke through into the depopulated space where he was to be tried.

Tulk squeezed his shoulder. “It’s time I’ll be leaving you, son,” he said. “I never make it my business to get to know the ins and outs of cases but as far as I’m concerned, you’ve been a good lad and you’re all right in my book. Good luck, Unt.”

With that, he slipped away as easily as he’d got them through the eager throng. Except for some guards, Unt was left alone, isolated in a square defined by invisible walls. It seemed absurd that on the other side of this emptiness was a furious crush of people and all of them focused on him.

In the lower galleries, the congestion wasn’t so bad, as though a sense of the unseen boundary was holding people back. Up above, the balconies were fit to burst. The people up there looked so tightly packed that at any point, the pressure could squeeze people up and over to spatter down below.

In the higher and lower arenas, Unt searched for Crystal, Bulton, Bull’s parents or any other familiar face. All he made out were strangers. It seemed madness that so many people he didn’t know were willing to suffer this to see his trial.

He decided to assume that Crystal was there, somewhere. She might not have got to the front but it had been difficult enough for him to get in.

Unt noticed a few differences from the Hall’s normal look. A podium had been erected between the judges’ bench and his own. He guessed that was the witness stand. The other change was a black velvet curtain that hung behind the judges’ seat. A board stood behind it but the contents were concealed.

From the corner of his eye, he detected a commotion on the edge of his bubble. When he looked, he saw Ostin bustling through. The Defender was using his experience to slip through the throng. He seemed to ride under the crowd, letting himself be buffeted around so long as he kept on course. His satchel was clung to his chest like a precious relic.

On seeing Unt looking, he sat down on a distant pew, reconsidered after a moment and came and sat at Unt’s bench.

“Thinking of abandoning me?” Unt half-joked.

“No, no, no,” Ostin shook his head. “I’ve just got some, er, I was just going over a final bit of prep.”

“And you need a lot of space to do that?”

“No, just to concentrate,” said Ostin. He pulled a sheaf of papers from his satchel and began casting dice. He scribbled the scores in the margins in a minute and illegible hand. Unt wondered why he was showing such energy now when he hadn’t before and what it was he could possibly be deciding. He suspected the Defender was just making to look busy so he wouldn’t have to deal with his client.

Time dragged, waiting for the judges to appear. The allotted time came and went and the only thing that changed was that Unt’s area of isolation had shrunk.  The curiosity and the pressure of human bodies had slowly overcome any sense of decorum. By the time the door to the Council chambers opened, only the benches around Unt and the floor directly before him were free from interlopers.

At last, the five Councillors appeared. Unt mentally ticked them off as they appeared: Erk, Taylor, Pello and Hodd, and finally, the dread form of Lasper. The first four moved to their positions quickly, as though embarrassed by the situation but Lasper milked his position at the tail for everything it was worth. The smile of triumph was written everywhere on his body but his face. All the while, he kept his eyes on Unt.

Erk bore the black sash of the Chairman and it was he who rose to address the court. “Partners in Fate,” he said, “We are gathered here to pass judgement on Mr Unt of the Order of Councillors, resident of West Ridge.

“Mr Unt is charged with causing the obstruction of official rolls of determination, namely the Fall of this year. It is alleged that he knowingly falsified records and encouraged others to do so, thereby affecting the professional and marital allocations of himself and others.

“Specifically, the charges relate to an incident on the sixteenth of the fourth in which two female minors were rescued from drowning. Statements given at the time credited another party with their rescue whereas it is alleged that the rescues were performed by Mr Unt. Credit given for this rescue affected the Talent Modifiers of the people involved and therefore the results of their Fall.

“It is estimated that, if true, the miscalculated Talent Modifiers affected the professional draw by a factor of thirty-seven percent and the marital draw by a factor of eighty-two percent.

“This incident was witnessed by the two accident victims, the person currently accredited with the rescue and Mr Unt.

“Mr Unt is today represented by Defender Ostin. Mr Ostin will be presently invited to enter a plea, after which witnesses will be summoned.”

Erk then went over the same procedures that Ostin had explained the night before. When he was done, he looked at Ostin with a small, stiff nod and said, “Mr Ostin, please deliver your client’s plea.”

Ostin rose. “Innocent of Intent,” he said quickly and planted himself back down. There was a loud murmur from the crowd. Unt wondered if there was any plea that wouldn’t have got the same response.

“So noted,” said Erk without emotion and wrote the plea on a leather-bound ledger before him.

“Let us proceed to the first witness,” he said when he was done. “The court calls to the stand Acolyte Pollock of the Order of Councillors.” He nodded to an orderly who disappeared through one door and reappeared with Pollock in tow.

Pollock went briskly to the witness stand. He was offered a seat but shook his head in refusal. He stood up to the railings that surrounded the stand but didn’t rest so much as a hand to support himself.

“Mr Pollock,” Erk began, “How many years have you been in the Order of Councillors?”

“Thirty-five years,” Pollock pronounced it like a sentence but with pride, “Eighteen of those as Acolyte.”

“You preclude my next question, “Erk smiled in his mild way. “I’ll skip to another for which I know the answer but I’ll state for the benefit of the court: you are my own apprentice, are you not?”

“I certainly am, sir.”

“For eighteen years?”

“For eighteen years.”

“You are, therefore, after myself, the most senior person responsible for overseeing public order?”

“Yes, sir.”

“And it was in this capacity that yesterday morning, you were handed a letter?”

“Yes.”

“And this letter made the allegations against Mr Unt. Thank you, Mr Pollock. In a moment, I will ask you to read from that letter but I have a couple of questions first.”

“Of course, sir.”

“Very well. How was the letter delivered?”

“By hand, sir.”

“And who was the person who gave you the letter?”

“I can’t say, sir.”

“Why not?”

“A condition of anonymity was agreed before the letter was handed over.”

“This agreement was a decision you made yourself?”

Pollock looked offended at any implication he’d exceeded his authority. “No sir, it was a decision made by a dice roll which adhered to the guidance in section eight, table three-point-two of the Council Order Handbook.”

“And you were right to do so,” Erk diffused his underling’s hostility with a bland, patient smile. “Can you at least give us a physical description of this person?”

“No, sir. This was part of the anonymity agreement. The information contained within the letter could only have been known by a handful of individuals. Any physical description would signal the bearer as much as by name.”

“All right, Mr Pollock, I think now would be a good time for you to read out the letter.”

Pollock seemed happy at this important duty. He reached inside his robe and pulled out a crisply-rolled letter. It was bound with a blue ribbon in a neat little cylinder. There were crease-marks where it had been folded by the original bearer and it was obvious that Pollock had shown it more love and care. He looked to Erk for permission to start and receiving a slight nod, he began to read.

“Dear sirs, it is my sad duty to tell you of illegal activity made by Unt, a resident of West Ridge. This activity involves several others, including myself, who were persuaded by Unt to falsify witness statements we made during our Work Experience.

“On the occasion I’m writing about, our group was working alone. The people in the group were Unt, Bulton, Mélie and Olissa. Mélie and Olissa fell in the river and Unt rescued them. Bulton helped pull them out of the water.

“After the girls had recovered, we knew we had to go and report the accident and get treatment but Unt stopped us. He said he didn’t want anyone to know that he’d made the rescue and asked us to say Bulton did it.

“He said he didn’t want credit but when the Fall came, that credit would help Bulton get the job he wanted. He told the girls if they were thankful that they’d do this for him.

“It didn’t seem to hurt anyone and it seemed fair to do what the rescuer wanted so we all agreed. When we gave our reports, we said Bulton did it.

“For weeks afterwards, I felt guilty about lying, even though it seemed nobody would get hurt. It felt wrong against who we are and the values of the town but I didn’t think I could say anything.

“After the Fall, I saw what even a well-meant lie could do. People I knew who’d wanted certain jobs couldn’t get them because of where Unt and Bulton ended up. Then the people who wanted
their
jobs couldn’t get them because they were also taken. I saw a lot of people made upset.

“Then, when the marriages were drawn, the same thing happened. Because of the jobs they’d ended up with, people were put into marriages they didn’t want. Even more people were upset.

“I now see the harm my actions have done and I am truly very sorry. Although we didn’t mean it, we’ve brought great hurt to our friends and the people around them.

“It has taken me many weeks to get up the courage to make this confession. I don’t want to bring harm to Unt - he didn’t know the wrong he was doing - but I know we are guilty and this is the only way to repair the damage we did. Once again, I’m truly sorry.”