by Anne Perry
Duke’s utter amazement was too profound to disbelieve.
“What?”
Monk repeated what he had said.
“With Leighton Duff? Have you lost your wits? I’ve been whoring in St. Giles, certainly—with Rhys, for that matter, and my brother Arthur. But Leighton Duff! That pompous, dry-as-dust old stick!” He started to laugh, and it was harsh, critical, but as far as Monk could tell, perfectly genuine.
“I take it you think it unlikely Mr. Duff would have gone to St. Giles in search of a prostitute?”
“About as likely as Her Majesty appearing on the stage of the music halls, I should think,” Duke replied bitterly. “Whatever gave you that notion? You must be very out of touch with the case. You really have not the least idea, have you?”
Monk took the picture of Leighton Duff out of his pocket.
“Is that a good likeness of him?”
Duke considered it for a moment. “Yes, it is, actually. It is extremely good. He had just that rather patronizing air of self-righteousness.”
“You did not like him,” Monk observed.
“A crashing remark of the obvious.” Duke raised his eyebrows. “Do you really make a living at this, Mr. Monk?”
“You would be surprised how people betray themselves when they imagine themselves safe, Mr. Kynaston,” Monk said with a smile. “But thank you for your concern on my behalf. It is not necessary. What I came for was to warn you, and your brother, that the people of St. Giles, and of Seven Dials as well, are aware of who committed the recent rapes in their areas, and if either of you should return there, it is very probable you will meet with most unpleasant ends. You have been there. You know or can imagine how easily that could be accomplished and your bodies never found … at least not recognizable ones.”
Duke stared at him with a mixture of shock and incomprehension, but there was marked fear in it as well.
“Why do you care if I get murdered in St. Giles?” he said truculently, then passed his tongue over dry lips.
“I don’t,” Monk replied with a smile, but even as he said it, it was not entirely true. He disliked Marmaduke Kynaston less than when he had come in, for no reason that he would have been prepared to explain. “I don’t want the people of St. Giles to be pursued by a murder enquiry.”
Duke took a deep breath. “I should have known. Are you from St. Giles?”
Monk laughed outright. It was the first time he had felt like laughing for days.
“No. I come from Northumberland.”
“I suppose I should thank you for the warning,” Duke said casually, but his eyes still held the shock, and there was a reluctant sincerity in his voice.
Monk shrugged and smiled.
He left the house even further confused.
Time was desperately short.
He took Leighton Duff’s picture to Seven Dials and showed it to cabbies; street peddlers; a running patterer; sellers of flowers, bootlaces, matches and glassware; and to a ratcatcher and several prostitutes. It was recognized by at least a dozen people, and some without any hesitation at all. Not one of them was prepared to identify Rhys.
By the second night Monk had only one more question in his mind. He returned to St. Giles to pursue the answer, and walked the alleys and courtyards, the dripping passages and up and down the rotting stairs, until dawn came gray and bleak at about seven o’clock and he was exhausted, and so cold his feet were numb and he could not control the shaking of his body. But he knew two things. Rhys Duff and his father had come to St. Giles on the night of the murder from different directions, and there was no proof they had met until the fatal encounter in Water Lane.
The other thing he learned by chance. He was talking to a woman who had been a prostitute in her youth, and had saved sufficient money to purchase a boardinghouse, but still knew a remarkable amount of gossip. He went to her partly to confirm certain dates and places, but mainly from his compulsion to probe the darkness in his own mind, the fear that gathered every time Runcorn’s face came to his thoughts, which it did so often in these dark, slippery paths. It was not Runcorn as he was now, graying at the temples, a little broader at the waist, but a younger, keener Runcorn, shoulders straight, eyes clearer and braver.
“Do you remember the raid in the brothel when the magistrate, Gutteridge, was caught with his trousers down?” He was not sure why he asked, or what he expected the answer to be, only that it lay at the back of his mind and would not leave.
She gurgled with delight. “ ’Course I do. Why?”
“Runcorn led it?”
“You know that. Can’t tell me you’ve forgot.” She looked at him narrowly, her head tilted to one side.
“Did he set it up?” he asked.
“Wot’s this, a game or summink? You set it up, an’ Runcorn took it from yer. Yer let ’im, ’cos yer know’d poor ol’ Gutt-’ridge was gonna be there. Runcorn walked right iner it, daft sod.”
“Why? It was Gutteridge’s own fault. Did he expect the police to hold off just because he was indulging himself?”
Her eyes widened. “Yeah. ’Course ’e did. Or at least warn ’im. Upset a lot o’ people, that did … important people, like. None o’ us, mind. Laughed till we creased ourselves, we did.”
“What people?” Monk paused, knowing something eluded him, something that mattered.
“ ’Ere, wot’s this abaht?” she said with a frown. “It’s all dead an’ buried nah. ’Oo cares anymore? It don’t ’ave nuffink ter do wi’ them rapes ’ere.”
“I know it doesn’t. I just want to know. Tell me,” he pressed.
“Well, there was a few gents wot felt theirselves a bit exposed, like, arter that.” She laughed hugely at her own joke. “They’d always trusted you rozzers to keep yer distance from certain ’ouses o’ pleasure.” She wiped her eyes with the back of her hand. “Arter that they din’t trust no one. Couldn’t. It kind o’ soured relations atween the rozzers and certain people o’ influence. On’y time I ever thought as I could like Mr. Runcorn. Bleedin’ pain, ’e is, most o’ the time. Worse ’n you. Yer a mean bastard, but yer was straight, and yer weren’t full o’ cant. I never knowed yer ta preach one thing an’ do another. Not like ’im.” She looked at him more closely. “Wot is it, Monk? W’y d’yer give a toss abaht a twenty-year-old raid in a bawdy ’ouse?”
“I’m not sure,” he said honestly.
“Arter yer, is ’e?” she asked with a note of something which could even have been sympathy. He was not sure whether it was for him or for Runcorn.
“After me?” he repeated. “Why?” It sounded foolish, but she knew something about it or she would not have leaped to such a conclusion. He had to know. He was too close now not to grasp it, whatever it was.
“Well, yer dropped ’im right in it, din’t yer?” she said incredulously. “Yer knew all them folk was there, an’ yer never toi’ ’im. Let ’im charge in an’ make a right fool of ’isself. Don’t suppose nuffink was said, but they don’ never fergive that kind o’ thing. Lorst ’is promotion then, an’ lorst ’is girl too, ’cos ’er father were one of ’em, weren’t ’e?” She shrugged. “I’d watch me back, if I was you, even arter all this time. ’E don’ fergive, yer know? Carries a grudge ’ard, does Runcorn.”
Monk was barely listening. He could not remember doing it, even after her retelling of it. But he could remember the feeling of victory, the deep, hot satisfaction of knowing he had beaten Runcorn. Now it was only shame. It had been a shabby trick and too deep a revenge for anything Runcorn could have done to him. Not that he knew of anything.
He thanked her quietly and walked out, leaving her puzzled, muttering to herself about how times had changed.
Why? He walked with his head down into the rain, hands deep in his pockets, ignoring the gutters and his wet feet. It was fully light now. Why had he done such a thing? Had it been as deliberate and as calculatedly cruel as everyone else thought? If it had, then no wonder Runcorn still hated him. To lose the promotion was fair enough. That was the f
ortune of war. But to lose the woman he loved must have been a bitter blow, and one Monk would not now have dealt to any man.
The trial of Rhys Duff had already begun. The information he had was highly pertinent, even if it offered little real help. He should go and tell Rathbone. Hester would be hurt. How Sylvestra Duff would take the news that her husband was also a rapist, he could not even imagine.
He crossed Regent Street, barely noticing he was out of St. Giles, and stopped to buy a hot cup of tea. Perhaps he should not tell Rathbone? It did not clear Rhys of the murder of his father, only of one rape, with which he was not charged anyway.
But it was part of the truth, and the truth mattered. They had too little of it to make sense as it was. Rathbone had paid him to learn all he could. He had promised Hester. He needed to cling to his sense of honor, the integrity, and the trust of the friends he had now. What he had been was acutely painful to contemplate. He had no memory of it, no understanding.
Did Rhys Duff understand himself?
That was irrelevant. Monk was a grown man, and whether he remembered it or not, he was responsible. He was certainly in possession of all his faculties and answerable at present. His only reason for not facing himself was fear of what he would find, and the gall to his pride of facing Runcorn and admitting his remorse.
Had he what it took—courage?
He had been cruel, arbitrary, too hasty to judge, but he had never been a liar, and he had never ever been a coward.
He finished the last of his tea, took a bun and paid for it, then, eating as he went, he started towards the police station.
He was obliged to wait until quarter past nine before Runcorn arrived. He looked warm and dry in his smart overcoat, his face pink and freshly barbered, his shoes shining.
He regarded Monk soberly, his gaze going from Monk’s dripping hair and his exhausted face, hollow eyes, down his wet coat to his sodden and filthy boots. Runcorn’s expression was smug, glowing with rich satisfaction.
“You look on hard times, Monk,” he said cheerfully. “You want to come in and warm your feet? Perhaps you’d like a cup of tea?”
“I’ve had one, thank you,” Monk said. Only a sharp reminder inside himself of his contempt for cowardice kept him there, and the thought of what Hester would think of him if he were to fail the final confrontation now. “But I’ll come in. I want to talk to you.”
“I’m busy,” Runcorn replied. “But I suppose I can spare you fifteen minutes. You look terrible!” He opened his office door and Monk followed him in. Someone had already lit the fire and the room was extremely pleasant. There was a faint smell of beeswax and lavender polish.
“Sit down,” Runcorn offered. “But take your coat off first, or you’ll mark my chair.”
“I’ve spent the night in St. Giles,” Monk said, still standing.
“You look like it,” Runcorn retorted. He wrinkled his nose. “And, frankly, you smell like it too.”
“I spoke to Bessie Mallard.”
“Who is she? And why are you telling me?” Runcorn sat down and made himself comfortable.
“She used to be a whore. Now she has a small boardinghouse. She told me about the night they raided the brothel in Cutters’ Row and caught the magistrate, Gutteridge, and he fell downstairs—” He stopped. There was a tide of dull purple spreading up Runcorn’s face. His hands on the smooth desktop were curling into fists.
Monk took a deep breath. There was no evading it.
“Why did I hate you enough to let you do that? I don’t remember.”
Runcorn stared at him, his eyes widening as he realized what Monk was saying.
“Why do you care?” His voice was high, sounded a little hurt. “You ruined me with Ellen. Wasn’t that what you wanted?”
“I don’t know. I’ve told you … I can’t remember. But it was a vicious thing to do, and I want to know why I did it.”
Runcorn blinked. He was thrown off balance. This was not the Monk he thought he knew.
Monk leaned forward over the desk, staring down at Runcorn. Behind the freshly shaved face, the mask of self-satisfaction, there was a man with a wound to his esteem which had never healed. Monk had done that … or at least part of it. He needed to know why.
“I’m sorry,” he said aloud. “I wish I had not done it. But I need to know why I did. Once we worked together, trusted each other. We went to St. Giles side by side, never doubting the other. What changed? Was it you … or me?”
Runcorn sat silent for so long Monk thought he was not going to answer. Monk could hear the clatter of heavy feet outside, and rain dripping from the eaves onto the windowsill. Outside was the distant rumble of traffic in the street and a horse whinnying.
“It was both of us,” Runcorn said at last. “It began over the coat, you could say.”
“Coat! What coat?” Monk had no idea what he was talking about.
“I got a new coat with a velvet collar. You went and got one with fur, just that bit better than mine. We were going out to the same place to dine.”
“How stupid,” Monk said immediately.
“So I got back at you,” Runcorn replied. “Something to do with a girl. I don’t even know what now. It just went from one thing to another, until it got too big to go back on.”
“That was all? Just childish jealousies?” Monk was horrified. “You lost the woman you loved—over a coat collar?”
The blood was dark in Runcorn’s face. “It was more than that,” he said defensively. “It was …” He looked up at Monk again, his eyes hot and angry, more honest than Monk had ever seen them before. For the first time he knew, there was no veil between them. “It was a hundred things—you undermining my authority with the men, laughing at me behind my back, taking credit for my ideas, my arrests …”
Monk felt the void of ignorance swallowing him. He did not know whether that was the truth, or simply the way Runcorn excused himself. He hated it with the blind, choking panic of helplessness. He did not know! He was fighting without weapons. He might have been a man like that. He did not feel it was himself, but then how much had his accident changed him? Or was it simply that he had been forced to look at himself from the outside, as a stranger might have, and seeing himself, had changed?
“Did I?” he said slowly. “Why you? Why did I do that only to you? Why no one else? What did you do to me?”
Runcorn looked miserable, puzzled, struggling with his thoughts.
Monk waited. He must not prompt. A wrong word, even one, and the truth would slip away from him.
Runcorn lifted his eyes to meet Monk’s, but he did not speak immediately.
“I suppose … I resented you,” he said at last. “You always seemed to have the right word, to guess the right answers. You always had luck on your side, and you never gave anyone else any room. You didn’t forgive mistakes.”
That was the damning indictment. He did not forgive.
“I should have,” he said gravely. “I was wrong in that. I am sorry about Ellen. I can’t take it back now, but I am sorry.”
Runcorn stared at him. “You are, aren’t you,” he said in amazement. He took a deep breath and let it out in a sigh. “You did well with the Duff case. Thank you.” It was as close as he could come to an acceptance.
It was good enough. Monk nodded. He could not allow the lie to remain. It would break the fragile bridge he had just built at such a cost.
“I haven’t finished with it yet. I’m not sure about the motive. The father was responsible for at least one of the rapes in St. Giles himself, and he was in Seven Dials regularly.”
“What?” Runcorn could scarcely believe what he seemed to have heard. “That’s impossible! It doesn’t make any sense, Monk.”
“I know. But it is true. I have a dozen witnesses. One who saw him smeared with blood the night before Christmas Eve, when there was a rape in St. Giles. And Mrs. Kynaston and Lady Sandon will swear Rhys Duff was with them at the time, miles away.”
“We’re no
t charging Rhys Duff with rape.” Runcorn frowned, now thoroughly disturbed. He was a good enough policeman to see the implications.
Monk did not argue further. It was unnecessary.
“I’m obliged,” Runcorn said, shaking his head.
Monk nodded, hesitated a moment, then excused himself and went out to go home and bathe and sleep. Then he must go and tell Rathbone.
12
The trial of Rhys Duff had commenced on the previous day. The court was filled and an hour before the trial began the ushers closed the doors. The preliminaries had already been conducted. The jury was chosen. The judge, a handsome man of military appearance and with the marks of pain in his face, called the court to order. He had come in with a pronounced limp and sat a trifle awkwardly in his high, carved chair in order to accommodate a stiff leg.
The prosecution was conducted by Ebenezer Goode, a man of curious and exuberant appearance, well known and respected by Rathbone. Goode was unhappy with proceeding against someone as obviously ill as Rhys Duff, but he abhorred not only the crime with which he was charged but the earlier ones which had provided the motive. He willingly made concession to Rhys’s medical needs by allowing him to sit in the dock, high above the body of the court and railed off, in a padded chair to offer what comfort there was for his physical pain. He also had made no demur when Rathbone had asked that Rhys not be handcuffed at any time, so he might move if he wished, or was able to, and sit in whatever position gave him the least discomfort.
Corriden Wade was in court and could be called should he be needed, and so was Hester. They were both to be allowed immediate access to the prisoner if he showed any need for their attention or assistance.
Nevertheless, as the testimony began, Rhys was alone as he faced a bitterly hostile crowd, his accusers and his judges. There was no one to speak for him except Rathbone, standing a solitary figure, black-gowned, white-wigged, a fragile barrier against a tide of hatred.
Goode called his witnesses one after the other: the women who had found the two bodies, Constable Shotts and John Evan. He took Evan carefully step by step through his investigation, not dwelling on the horror but permitting it to be passionately conveyed through Evan’s white face and broken, husky voice.