by Anne Perry
Hester would survive this. She had suffered worse in the Crimea, physical hardships of a greater order, terrible cold, probably hunger too, weeks without proper sleep—and danger as well, danger of injury or disease, or both. She had been on the battlefield within sound of the guns, within range of them, for all he knew. Of course she would survive a week or two in Newgate. It was absurd to be frightened for her. She was not an ordinary woman to faint or weep in the face of hardship. She would suffer, of course, she was as susceptible as anyone else, but she would rise above it.
His part was to go to the Farraline house and learn the truth.
But as the evening lengthened into night and those around him drifted into weary sleep, the sanguine mood left him, and all he could see as he grew colder and stiffer and more tired was the difficulty of discovering anything useful from a household in mourning, closed in on itself, where one member was guilty of murder and they had the perfect scapegoat in an outsider already accused and charged.
By morning his back ached, his leg muscles were jumping with the long lack of either comfort or exercise, and he was so cold his feet had lost all sensation. His mood and his temper were equally poor.
Edinburgh was bitterly cold, but at least it was not raining. An icy wind howled down Princes Street, but Monk had no interest in either its history or its architectural beauties, so he was perfectly happy to hail the first cab he saw and give the driver the Farralines’ address in Ainslie Place.
From the footpath the house was certainly imposing enough. If the Farralines owned it freehold and without mortgage, then they were, financially at least, in very good fortune indeed. It was also, in Monk’s opinion, in excellent taste. Indeed, the classical simplicity of the whole square appealed to him.
But that was all incidental. He turned his attention to the matter in hand. He mounted the step and pulled the doorbell.
The door opened and a man who should have been an undertaker, from his expression, regarded him without a shred of interest.
“Yes sir?”
“Good morning,” Monk said briskly. “My name is William Monk. I have come from London on a matter of importance. I should like to speak either to Mr. Farraline or to Mrs. McIvor.” He produced a card.
“Indeed, sir.” The man’s face registered no change at all. He offered a silver tray. Monk dropped the card onto it. Apparently he was not an undertaker but the butler after all. “Thank you, sir. If you’ll be good enough to wait in the hall, I’ll see if Mrs. McIvor is at home.”
It was exactly the same polite fiction as in London. Of course he would know whether his mistress was at home, it was simply a matter of whether she would receive Monk—or not.
He waited in the crepe-hung hall, shifting from foot to foot in impatience. He had already worked out what message he would send next if she should refuse. He hoped the fact that he had come from London might be sufficient, anything further was not for the servants to be informed.
He had not long to be in doubt. It was not the butler who returned, but a woman in her mid-thirties, slender and straight-backed. For an instant her bearing reminded him of Hester; she had the same pride and determination in the set of her shoulders and the carriage of her head. However, her face was quite different, and the sweep of fair, almost honey-colored hair was unlike any he had ever seen before. She was not quite beautiful; there was too much individuality in her features, a strength in the jaw and a coolness in the eyes which offended convention. This must be Oonagh McIvor.
“Mr. Monk.” It was an acknowledgment, not a question. As soon as he heard her voice with its clarity and timbre he knew she would have mastered any but the most desperate of situations. “McTeer informs me you have come from London on some business with which you wish my assistance. Did he understand you correctly?”
“Yes, Mrs. McIvor.” From Hester’s description he had no doubt it was she, and no need to ask. Nor did he have the slightest qualm in lying. “I am involved in the prosecution of Miss Latterly in the matter of your late mother’s death, and it is my assignment to ascertain the facts, such as are known or can be discovered, so that there will be no errors, oversights or unpleasant surprises when the matter comes to trial. The verdict will be final. We must make sure it is the right one.”
“Indeed?” Her fair eyebrows rose minimally. “How very thorough. I had no idea the English prosecution—I believe it is not a Procurator Fiscal such as we have—was so diligent.”
“It is an important case.” He met her look squarely and without evasion or the slight tentativeness of good manners. Instinctively he felt she would despise deference and respect strength, as long as he at no time presumed, or allowed her to sense bluster in him, and never made a threat, implicit or explicit, that he could not keep. They had met only moments before, and yet already there was an awareness of each other’s nature and a measuring of both intellect and resolve, one he thought not without interest on her part.
“I am pleased you are sensible of it.” She allowed the slightest smile to curve her lips. “Naturally the family will give you all the assistance of which we are capable. My elder brother is the Procurator Fiscal, here in Edinburgh. We are familiar with the fact that even in cases where guilt seems beyond question the prosecution can fail to obtain a conviction, if those conducting it do not take every care in the preparation of evidence. I assume you do have a letter to this effect?” The inquiry was made courteously, but brooked no evasion.
“Naturally.” He produced a very creditable forgery he had taken the care to prepare on police paper he still had. That it was from the wrong station he trusted she would not know.
“It makes my task a great deal easier that you so readily comprehend the necessity of being sure of every detail,” he said as she examined the letter. “I confess, I had not thought I should be so fortunate in finding such …” He hesitated, allowing her to think it delicacy, in truth searching for exactly the right word that would not sound like flattery. He judged her to be a woman who would feel only contempt for anything so obvious, although he doubted she would be so open as to show it, except by the chill of a glance, the sudden fading of interest from her eyes. “… a grasp of reality,” he finished.
This time her smile was broader, a definite warmth in all her face, and something like a flicker of curiosity in her eyes as she regarded him.
“I am grieved, of course, Mr. Monk, but it has not so destroyed my wits as to rob me of my understanding that the world must proceed, and its business be done according to the law, and with the proper procedure. Please tell me in what way, precisely, we may be of assistance. I imagine you will wish to question people, the upstairs servants in particular?”
“That would be necessary,” he agreed. “But servants can be very easily frightened by such a tragedy, and then their accounts sometimes vary. It would be most helpful to speak with the members of the family as well, perhaps leave the servants until later, when their first apprehension has had time to disappear. I do not wish to give the impression that I suspect them of anything.”
This time her smile was one of humor, albeit bitter.
“Don’t you, Mr. Monk? No matter how convinced you are of Miss Latterly’s guilt, surely it must have crossed your mind that my mother’s lady’s maid, at least, could conceivably have stolen the brooch?”
“Of course it has crossed my mind, Mrs. McIvor.” He smiled back, without looking away from her eyes. “All sorts of other answers are possible, with a stretch of the imagination, however unlikely. And the defense—and no doubt there will be one—since it cannot prove Miss Latterly innocent, will have to endeavor to prove someone else guilty. Or at the worst for them, prove that someone else could have been guilty, by virtue of motive, means or opportunity. It is precisely that which I have come to forestall.”
“Then we had better make plans to begin,” she said with decision. “No doubt if you have just arrived in Edinburgh, you will wish to find yourself accommodation, and possibly rest after your journ
ey, if you have been on the train all night. Then perhaps you would dine with us this evening, when you may meet the rest of my family?” It was an invitation formally given, and for a most businesslike reason, and yet there was interest in her which was of a sharper nature, however slight.
“That would be excellent, thank you, Mrs. McIvor,” he accepted. He must not become carried away with optimism; he had barely begun and had learned nothing whatever, but at least the first barrier was crossed with surprising ease. “Thank you.”
“Then we shall see you at seven,” she said with an inclination of her head. “McTeer will show you out, and if he can give you any directions which may be helpful, please feel free to ask. Good day, Mr. Monk.”
“Good day, Mrs. McIvor.”
* * *
Monk had asked McTeer to advise him about lodgings, and the butler’s grim response had stung him with its condescension. He had suggested several inns and public houses of one sort or another, all in the old part of the city. When Monk had asked if there was nothing closer to Ainslie Place, he had been informed, with raised eyebrows, that Ainslie Place was not the area where such establishments were to be found.
So at ten o’clock Monk was in a street with high tenements on either side, and known as the Grassmarket, his case in his hand, his temper still seething. He had a sharp sense of being in a foreign city. The sounds and smells were different from those in London. The air was colder and had not the grit and odor of chimneys in it, although the buildings were stained enough and the eaves dripping grimy water. The cobbles of the street were like those of London, but the narrow footpaths at the sides were barely above the level of the thoroughfare, the gutters shallow. But then the street itself was at such a pitch its surface drained down the hill anyway.
He walked slowly, staring around him, interested in spite of himself. The buildings were largely of stone, which gave them a dignity and permanence, and nearly all were four, five or six stories high, ending in a jumbled mass of steeply inclined roofs, dormers and fine crowstepped gables, like numerous flights of stairs amid the slates. On one gable he saw an iron cross, and then craning upwards to see the better, he noticed another, and another. It was certainly not a church, nor did it seem to have been a religious establishment of any sort.
Someone bumped into him sharply and he realized with a jolt that he had not stood still while gazing upwards, and was thus causing something of a hazard.
“Sorry,” he apologized peremptorily.
“Aye, well watch where ye’re goin’ an’ stop gaupin’, afore ye knock some poor soul into the gutter,” came the reply, in a voice so strongly accented it barely sounded like English, and yet so distinct was the diction it was understandable without effort. “Are ye lost?” The man hesitated, detecting a stranger and forgiving error because of it. Strangers were half-witted anyway, and one should not expect normal behavior from them. “Ye’re in Templelands, in the Grassmarket.”
“Templelands?” Monk said quickly.
“Aye. Where are you making for, do you know?” He was now disposed to be helpful, as good men are towards those they sense cannot care for themselves.
Monk was obliged to smile to himself. “I’ve been looking for lodgings.”
“Oh, aye? Well ye’ll find a good, clean room at William Forster’s, down there at number twenty, and there’s McEwan the baker’s, next door. Innkeeper and stabler, Willie is. Ye’ll see it written up on the wall. Can’t miss that, if ye’ve eyes in yer head.”
“Thank you. I’m obliged.”
“Ye’re welcome.” He made as if to move on.
“Why Templelands?” Monk asked quickly. “What temple was there here?”
The man’s face registered amusement and mild contempt. “No temple at all. The land used to belong to the Knights Templar, long ago. You know, Crusades, and the like?”
“Oh.” Monk was surprised. He had not thought of Edinburgh as being of such age, or of the Templars so far north. Dim memories of history came back to him, names like Mary Queen of Scots, and the Auld Alliance with France, and the Stuart kings, battles on the moors above Culloden, Bannockburn, massacres in the snowbound steeps of Glencoe, secret murders like the death of Duncan, or of Rizzio, or perhaps Darnley right here in Edinburgh. It was in a mist of stories and impressions he could only dimly recall, but it was part of his northern heritage, and it made these streets with their towering houses more familiar. “Thank you,” he added, but the man was already moving away, his duty discharged.
Monk crossed over the street and walked on until he saw WM. FORSTER, STABLER & INNKEEPER written right across the front of a large building, between the second and third stories, and the name of McEwan’s Bakery at one end. It was a four-story building; the first two were of cut stone blocks, and the windows were large, indicating generous rooms. Several of the high chimney pots at the spine of the roof were smoking, a hopeful sign. Since he had no horse, he did not bother going through the archway into the yard, but knocked hastily on the front door.
It was opened almost immediately by a large woman, busy drying her hands on her apron. “Aye?”
“I’m looking for lodgings,” Monk replied. “Possibly for a week or two. Have you a room?”
She glanced at him rapidly, summing him up, as was her trade.
“Aye, I have.” Evidently she approved of him. If he had more clothes in his case of the same quality as those he was wearing, they alone would pay his rent for a month or more. “Come in and I’ll show ye.” She backed away to allow him in, and he followed gratefully.
Inside was narrow and dimly lit, but it smelled clean and the air was warm and dry. Someone was singing in the bowels of the kitchen, loudly, and every so often a little sharp, but it was a cheerful sound, and he felt it welcoming. She led him up three flights of stairs, puffing and blowing noisily and stopping on each landing to regain her breath.
“There,” she said between gasps when they reached the top floor and she threw open the door to the room he was to occupy. It was clean and airy and looked out over the Grassmarket and the roofs opposite.
“Yes,” he said without hesitation. “This will do very well.”
“Ye up from England?” she asked conversationally.
She made it sound like a foreign land, but then strictly speaking it was.
“Yes.” It was an opportunity he should not waste. There was certainly no time to spare. “Yes, I’m a legal consultant.” That was something of a euphemism, but advisable, and better than suggesting he was from the police. “Preparing for a trial concerning the death of Mrs. Farraline, up at Ainslie Place.”
“She dead?” the woman said with surprise. “How’d that happen? Still, she was getting on, so little wonder. Contesting the will, are they?”
There was interest in her face, and her assumption certainly caught Monk’s attention.
“Well, it really isn’t something I should discuss, Mrs. Forster….” He took a chance, and it was not contradicted. “But I daresay you won’t need me to tell you everything anyway?”
Her smile broadened knowingly. “Money ain’t always a blessing, Mr….?”
“Monk, William Monk,” he supplied. “Lot of money, is there?”
“Well, ye’d know that, wouldn’t ye?” Her eyes were bright brown and full of amusement.
“Not yet,” he prevaricated. “But I have my guesses—naturally.”
“Bound to be.” She nodded. “All that big printing works, been there ever since the twenties, getting bigger all the time, and that fine house up the new town. Oh yes, there’s a lot of money there, Mr. Monk. Well worth fighting over, I should think. And the old lady still owned a fair piece of it, or so I heard, in spite of Colonel Farraline being dead these eight or ten years.”
Monk thought rapidly and took a gamble.
“Mrs. Farraline was murdered, you know? That is the case I am concerned with.”
Her face was aghast.
“Ye don’t say so! Murdered? Well I never! The
poor old soul. Now who in the good God’s name would have done a thing like that?”
“Well, there is suspicion it was the nurse who accompanied her on the train down to London….” He hated saying it, even in so slight a way and without naming Hester. It was almost like an admission that the idea was possible.
“Oh. What a wicked thing to do! Whatever for?”
“A brooch,” he said between his teeth. “Which she gave back, and before anyone missed it. Found it in her own baggage, by accident, or so she said.”
“Oh yes?” Mrs. Forster’s eyebrows rose with delicate skepticism. “And what would a woman like that be doing with the sort of brooch Mrs. Farraline would wear? We all know what nurses are like. Drunken, dirty and no better than they should be, most of them. What a terrible thing. The poor soul.”
Monk felt his face burning and his jaw tightened as if he would grind the words between his teeth.
“She was one of the young ladies who went out to nurse our soldiers in the Crimea—served with Miss Nightingale.” His voice was rasping and without any of the control he had sworn he would keep.
Mrs. Forster looked nonplussed. She stared at Monk, reading his face to see if he had really meant what he had said. It took her only a glance to assure herself that he did.
“Well I never,” she said again. She took a deep breath, her eyes wide and troubled. “Perhaps it was not her after all. Had ye thought o’ that?”
“Yes,” he said with a grim smile. “I had.”
She said nothing, but stared at him, waiting.
“In which case it was somebody else,” he said, completing the thought for her. “And it would be most interesting to find out who.”
“Aye, that it would,” she agreed, and shrugged her ample shoulders. “And I’ll not be envying you the task o’ that. They’re a powerful family, the Farralines. He’s the Fiscal, you know?”
“What about the others?” It was easy and natural to ask, and her opinion might yield something.