Caspar Gordonson met him there and explained who was who. The yard in front of the building was already full of people: prosecutors, witnesses, jurors, lawyers, friends and relatives, idle spectators, and probably whores and thieves looking for business. The prisoners were led across the yard and through a gate to the bail dock. It was already half full of defendants, presumably from other prisons: the Fleet Prison, the Bridewell and Ludgate Prison. From there Mack could see the imposing Sessions House. Stone steps led up to its ground floor, which was open on one side except for a row of columns. Inside was the judges’ bench on a high platform. On either side were railed-off spaces for jurors, and balconies for court officers and privileged spectators.

It reminded Mack of a theater—but he was the villain of the piece.

He watched with grim fascination as the court began its long day of trials. The first defendant was a woman accused of stealing fifteen yards of linsey-woolsey—cheap cloth made of a mixture of linen and wool—from a shop. The shopkeeper was the prosecutor, and he valued the cloth at fifteen shillings. The witness, an employee, swore that the woman picked up the bolt of cloth and went to the door then, realizing she was observed, dropped the material and ran away. The woman claimed she had only been looking at the cloth and had never intended to make off with it.

The jurors went into a huddle. They came from the social class known as “the middling sort”: they were small traders, well-to-do craftsmen and shopkeepers. They hated disorder and theft but they mistrusted the government and jealously defended liberty—their own, at least.

They found her guilty but valued the cloth at four Shillings, a lot less than it was worth. Gordonson explained that she could be hanged for stealing goods worth more than five shillings from a shop. The verdict was intended to prevent the judge from sentencing the woman to death.

She was not sentenced immediately, however: the sentences would all be read out at the end of the day.

The whole thing had taken no more than a quarter of an hour. The following cases were dealt with equally rapidly, few taking more than half an hour. Cora and Peg were tried together at about midafternoon. Mack knew that the course of the trial was preordained, but still he crossed his fingers and hoped it would go according to plan.

Jay Jamisson testified that Cora had engaged him in conversation in the street while Peg picked his pockets. He called Sidney Lennox as the witness who had seen what was happening and warned him. Neither Cora nor Peg challenged this version of events.

Their reward was the appearance of Sir George, who testified that they had been helpful in the apprehension of another criminal and asked the judge to sentence them to transportation rather than hanging.

The judge nodded sympathetically, but the sentence would not be pronounced until the end of the day.

Mack’s case was called a few minutes later.

Lizzie could think of nothing but the trial.

She had dinner at three o’clock and, as Jay was at the court all day, her mother came to dine and keep her company.

“You’re looking quite plump, my dear,” Lady Hallim said. “Have you been eating a lot?”

“On the contrary,” Lizzie said. “Sometimes food makes me feel ill. It’s all the excitement of going to Virginia, I suppose. And now this dreadful trial.”

“It’s not your concern,” Lady Hallim said briskly. “Dozens of people are hanged every year for much less dreadful crimes. He can’t be reprieved just because you knew him as a child.”

“How do you know he committed a crime at all?”

“If he did not, he will be found not guilty. I’m sure he is being treated the same as anyone foolish enough to get involved in a riot.”

“But he isn’t,” Lizzie protested. “Jay and Sir George deliberately provoked that riot so that they could arrest Mack and finish the coal heavers’ strike—Jay told me.”

“Then I’m sure they had good reason.”

Tears came to Lizzie’s eyes. “Mother, don’t you think it’s wrong?”

“I’m quite sure it’s none of my business or yours, Lizzie,” she said firmly.

Wanting to hide her distress from her mother, Lizzie ate a spoonful of dessert—apples mashed with sugar—but it made her feel sick and she put down her spoon. “Caspar Gordonson said I could save Mack’s life if I would speak for him in court.”

“Heaven forbid!” Mother was shocked. “That you should go against your own husband in a public courtroom—don’t even speak of it!”

“But it’s a man’s life! Think of his poor sister—how she will grieve when she finds out he has been hanged.”

“My dear, they are miners, they aren’t like us. Life is cheap, they don’t grieve as we do. His sister will just get drunk on gin and go back down the pit.”

“You don’t really believe that, Mother, I know.”

“Perhaps I’m exaggerating. But I’m quite sure it does no good to worry about such things.”

“I just can’t help it. He’s a brave young man who only wanted to be free, and I can’t bear the thought of him hanging from that rope.”

“You could pray for him.”

“I do,” Lizzie said. “I do.”

* * *

The prosecutor was a lawyer, Augustus Pym.

“He does a lot of work for the government,” Gordonson whispered to Mack. “They must be paying him to prosecute this case.”

So the government wanted Mack hanged. That made him feel low.

Gordonson approached the bench and addressed the judge. “My lord, as the prosecution is to be done by a professional lawyer, will you allow me to speak for Mr. McAsh?”

“Certainly not,” said the judge. “If McAsh cannot convince the jury unless he has outside help, he can’t have much of a case.”

Mack’s throat was dry and he could hear his heartbeat. He was going to have to fight for his life alone. Well, he would fight every inch of the way.

Pym began. “On the day in question a delivery of coal was being made to the yard of Mr. John Cooper, known as Black Jack, in Wapping High Street.”

Mack said: “It wasn’t day—it was night.”

The judge said: “Don’t make foolish remarks.”

“It’s not foolish,” Mack said. “Whoever heard of coal being delivered at eleven o’clock at night?”

“Be quiet. Carry on, Mr. Pym.”

“The delivery men were attacked by a group of striking coal heavers, and the Wapping magistrates were alerted.”

“Who by?” said Mack.

Pym answered: “By the landlord of the Frying Pan tavern, Mr. Harold Nipper.”

“An undertaker,” said Mack.

The judge said: “And a respectable tradesman, I believe.”

Pym went on: “Mr. Roland MacPherson, justice of the peace, arrived and declared a riot. The coal heavers refused to disperse.”

“We were attacked!” Mack said.

They ignored him. “Mr. MacPherson then summoned the troops, as was his right and duty. A detachment of the Third Foot Guards arrived under the command of Captain Jamisson. The prisoner was among those arrested. The Crown’s first witness is John Cooper.”

Black Jack testified that he went downriver to Rochester to buy coal that had been unloaded there. He had it driven to London in carts.

Mack asked: “Who did the ship belong to?”

“I don’t know—I dealt with the captain.”

“Where was the ship from?”

“Edinburgh.”

“Could it have belonged to Sir George Jamisson?”

“I don’t know.”

“Who suggested to you that you might be able to buy coal in Rochester?”

“Sidney Lennox.”

“A friend of the Jamissons’.”

“I don’t know about that.”

Pym’s next witness was Roland MacPherson, who swore that he had read the Riot Act at a quarter past eleven in the evening, and the crowd had refused to disperse.

Mack said: “You were on the scene very quickly.”

“Yes.”

“Who summoned you?”

“Harold Nipper.”

“The landlord of the Frying Pan.”