Laura has been vanquished, but Willie has been seriously wounded. Kenneth and Julia have separated, as Kenneth learned Julia's guilty secret. Hallie remembers that she was once Maude Browning, and wants revenge on Barnabas. Delia is falling under the power of an ancient whip used in slave ships.
TRIAL BY JURY
Chapter 1
Willie slept peacefully, stroking a furry object under his hand. Kenneth cocked his head when he saw it. he cleared his throat and spoke.
"Mr. Collins, you must be aware that visiting hours are over."
The bat under Willie's hand dissolved and Barnabas stood in front of Kenneth.
"What were you doing, anyway?"
"I just wanted to be with him. I did not mean to hurt him nor anything."
Kenneth grumbled again, impatiently. "Just make sure I don't catch you again."
"All right" Barnabas smiled sheepishly.
But Kenneth did not return the smile. He only looked sternly at him. "You can go now, Mr. Collins."
It was not use. Kenneth had found something unpleasant about his wife that he found difficult to live with. Barnabas moved towards the door. There he stopped and turned "How are you and Julia doing?"
"I imagine that you know that we have separated. And if you want to plead with me to reconsider, you are wasting your time."
"She wants to go back with you."
"We all want things that we can't have."
"But why can't you go to her?"
"She and you got away with murder once. You should be content with having avoided prosecution. Surely that should be enough."
"I thought you'd reconsider."
"I won't. Certain things are not done. Period."
"Why should he have to go through all that again? She already came close to a nervous breakdown a couple of times. Do you want a repeat performance?"
"That's between her and her conscience."
"Damn it! How many times has she got to pay for it? Can you really throw her away like that?"
"The subject is closed, Mr. Collins."
Zeb let the papers fall to the ground. He could not have read that. It was a trick... a trick of his eyes. The words did not mean what he thought they meant...
Sheriff Brant, of all people! He touched his face, still bruised form the beating that Brant had given him.
"Zeb?" Jessica called "anything wrong?"
Zeb shook his head.
"You don't have to finish straightening up those papers today. They just stood there for so long that a couple more days won't make any difference."
Zeb shrugged and fished the papers again.
"Leave it. You'll go blind reading that thing over and over. Just leave it for tomorrow."
With an effort, Zeb put the paper away. "You are right."
"Come to bed, tiger. Or are you going to tell me that I brought this nightgown for nothing?"
"You want us to kick Derek out of your house?" Megan had to make sure that she understood Delia.
"I would do it myself, but he has ;powers. I am afraid of doing it myself. I do not know what he could do if he got mad. If I knew of a way to weaken him so that I could overpower him.
"I think that you worry needlessly. He is not violent. But if you feel more comfortable doing something like that, talk to Angelique. She'll tell you how to protect yourself."
Julia took notes as she read the papers before her. That was it. Bury herself in her work. That was what she always did when she hurt.
Face it. Her marriage was over. Kenneth would never overlook her guilty secret, or her keeping him in the dark about it.
She felt angry. With herself. With Barnabas for causing it. With Kenneth for being so stubborn and self-righteous. And more than a bit with Dave for leaving her in such a lurch.
There was a rustle of wings, and then Barnabas was in front of her.
"You come at bad time. Any moment I will start yelling that everything is your fault."
"I already know that." Barnabas smiled self-deprecatingly. I already saw Kenneth at the hospital." he told her of what had happened.
"Petting you? You mean you were his teddy bear?"
"Yes."
Julia shook her head, as if she did not believe what she heard. "You never cease to amaze me."
"I could not leave him yet. You know how close he and I are. I kept thinking of how I could have lost him and..."
"And how could you pass up the opportunity to make an ass of yourself? What did Kenneth say?"
"The same. He feels cheated. Or, as he puts it, it is a matter of principle."
"Yes, the same."
"It isn't fair." Barnabas sighed. "You know what we went through, you and I. We though that it was over. Of course, we knew we'd hit rough spots now and then. But nothing like this."
"I guess we did not truly have the right to put it behind us, after all."
":But what else have we got to do? It cost me Sarah, for starters. Then I went down on my knees and begged for your life. George could have easily shot me. Or raped me. I would not have defended myself. I saved string, even if I felt foolish for doing so. I went to Old Munsungan to show me a way out. I made it possible for Zeb to shoot me with impunity. He just pistol-whipped me. And you... you kept going from nervous breakdown to nervous breakdown. What else can we do? Is there a way we don't have to pay anymore?"
"That's the way Kenneth is." Julia sighed. "He's my self-appointed conscience."
"I think that what really hurts him is being kept in the dark as we did. He felt excluded from your life."
"Yes. If I had confessed to him, throwing myself at his mercy, weeping and everything, then maybe he'd be generous. But that's not my style at all. and he's a bit of twerp."
"More than a bit." Barnabas said bitterly, then added "I am glad that you are bearing it well."
Julia nodded. "As you said, I have paid for it, and what I still owe, I have been forgiven. And I am not the type to say that I am nothing without a man. Kenneth is angry with me, but I am angry with him, too."
"Are you angry with me?"
"Of course." Julia smiled "After all, the whole thing IS your fault. But "she sighed "I am not so angry as to forget that you helped me. So don't be in a hurry to bring back the whip."
"If you think that it will help..."
"No, it helped me once and that should be enough. But if you want, I have some paperwork to straighten up."
Barnabas looked at it and made a face. "I wish you whipped me instead."
"You don't like paperwork."
"Do you?"
"No. But it won't kill you. And then suffering is supposed to be good for the soul."
The paper still laid there. He picked it up again. He should throw it away, but he did not.
It could not be true... Not Uncle Dave. Not him... Not one of those... those perverts.
It was all the other's fault. That George Brant. He had seduced Uncle Dave. It was all Brant's fault...
He touched his aching face. George Brant had done this to him. And to Jessica too...
He ground his teeth. George Brant would pay... He would make sure of that.
Carolyn held Edmund by the hand as the lights were lit in Collinwood to welcome her back. Behind her stood Roger and Quentin.
"Home at last." she said "I didn't realize that I missed it so much."
"We all missed it." Roger said.
"But we are back." Carolyn smiled warmly, drawing Edmund close to her. "This is going to be a happy house again. For all of us."
Buffy looked at her glass, wishing she could drown herself in it. Dirk was gone, would never come back to her... She shouldn't even miss him.
She had been faithful to him and Laura, and they had thrown her away. She had betrayed Barnabas and he had taken her back with no questions asked.
But it was Dirk that kept coming back to her.
Why did she keep on attracting creeps to her, anyway? John Yeager had not been enough. She had to fall for Dirk Wilkins.
Why couldn't he attract somebody like Barnabas for a change? Why did she still miss Dirk, knowing what he was and what he had done to her?
She moved towards the bookcase, opened the secret door, less and less secret each day, and stared at Barnabas' face.
"For a while I thought of hating you." she confessed " for bringing me into this strange world. But I knew that it was not true. All you ever did was save me from Haskell. No, if I should hate someone, it should be myself."
She left the room, just in time to see Oriana getting her bags together.
"Are you leaving?" she asked with astonishment.
"Yes."
"Why? He wants you to stay with him."
"I know. That's why I am leaving, before it gets too serious with him."
"It meant nothing to you, then?" Buffy asked "this last betrayal is not what he needs."
"I did not betray him when it counted. Now... now I have to think of myself. And of him too. I never meant it to get this serious, and I'd better cut it before it gets worse."
"But why can't you get serious with him?"
"For one thing, I would not like to come second place to Willie in his affection." she stopped Buffy's protest." I don't imply anything sexual, but that fact is that when Willie was in the hospital, being operated on, I did not exist for him."
Buffy looked at her hostilely, loyalty to Barnabas swelling belatedly in her. "You just can't handle commitment, is that it?"
"I do want commitment. Not yet, but I want it. And I want to have children someday. Barnabas is sterile, hopelessly sterile. And he's not somebody that can help you raise a child, either. I want a normal relationship and that he cannot offer."
"So you leave him like this?"
"Better for him if it is a clean break."
"You don't care for him at all."
"I do. But not enough to sacrifice my future. " she shrugged. "tell him that I got a new assignment and that I could not pass it up. Tell him that he comes a poor second to my stories, if you like."
