AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Yes, but it is not of the slightest importance,” she replied airily, then dropped her lashes quite deliberately, laughing at both herself and him.
“Then would it be acceptable for me to invite you to accompany me for a cup of coffee or hot chocolate?” he said impulsively. “It is damnably cold out here, and there is a most respectable coffeehouse about a hundred yards along the street. And we might sit near the window, so as to be well observed.” Her gaiety and charm were so infectious they reached out to him like the aroma of food to a hungry man. He was ineffably weary of the smell and sound of distress, of knowing everything he pursued would end in someone’s misery. Whatever he found out about Angus Stonefield, it was going to be wretched for Genevieve and her children. There was no happy ending.
And the last thing he wanted to think of was Hester, laboring in the makeshift fever hospital, trying to relieve some tiny measure of the sea of agony around her. They would not alter the dirt or the despair of people. If typhoid did not kill them, poverty, hunger or some other disease would. Even turning it over in his mind made him angry and vulnerable. He did not even like Hester. She was certainly little enough pleasure to be with. Every encounter ended in a quarrel. Except, of course, the last one in Edinburgh. But that was only brought about by impending disaster. It held no truth in it.
“Should I not be taking you out of your way, Mr. Monk?” Drusilla said cheerfully.
“Yes,” he agreed. “And I should be delighted to be out of it. It is a most unhappy and unrewarding way at the moment.”
“Then let us go out of it.” She swung around, her huge, smartly checked crinoline skirts brushing the steps.
He offered his arm, and she took it.
They walked together along the footpath in the brisk wind, he on the outside, sheltering her from the splashes of the passing carriages. He walked slowly, to keep pace with her easily.
“I wish I could remember where I have seen that man,” she said with a little shake of her head. “Do you know him well, Mr. Monk?”
Several answers flashed through his mind that would impress her, cut before her the figure he would wish. But lies would catch up with him, and he wanted to know her for more than a few hours. Anything but the truth would jeopardize the future.
“Not at all,” he replied. “His wife asked me to help her. I used to be with the police.”
“You left?” she asked with extraordinary interest. “Why was that? What do you do now?”
A hansom bowled past them, the draught of its passage sending his coattails flying and making her bend her head and turn a little aside.
“A disagreement of principle,” he said briefly.
She looked at him with fascination, her face reflecting amusement and disbelief.
“Please don’t tantalize me so. Over what?” she begged.
“Prosecuting an innocent man,” he answered.
“Well, I never,” she said quietly, her face reflecting a dozen different and conflicting emotions. “That concerned you! And did your resignation save him?”
“No.”
She walked in silence for about twenty yards. She seemed to be thinking deeply. Then suddenly she turned to face him, and her eyes were bright, her expression relaxed.
“And what is it you do now, Mr. Monk? You didn’t tell me. You help ladies in distress because their husbands are missing?” She had a most attractive and individual voice.
“Among other things.” He stopped and indicated the coffeehouse, stepping ahead and opening the door for her. Inside was warm and noisy, and smelled of the delicious aroma of coffee beans grinding, the sweetness of chocolate, and the close, clinging odor of damp coats, wool and fur and wet leather boots.
They were shown straightaway to a table. He asked her what she wished, and on her reply ordered them both hot coffee. When it came the conversation was resumed, although in truth she was such a pleasure to look at he would not have minded silence. He was also aware of the slight hush around them, and the admiring glances of many of the other guests. If Drusilla noticed, she was so accustomed to it, it had no effect upon her.
“It must be a most interesting occupation you have,” she said, sipping at her coffee. “I suppose you meet all sorts of people? Of course you do. It is a foolish question.” She sipped again. “I don’t suppose you even remember them all when a case is over. It must be like a magic lantern slide of life, all passions and mysteries. And then it is solved, and you leave it and begin the next.”
“I am not sure that I would have phrased it like that,” he replied, smiling at her over the rim of his own cup.
“Of course you would. It is fascinating, and so unlike my life, where I know the same tedious people year after year. Now please tell me more of this man who is missing. What manner of person is he?”
Quite unwillingly he told her all he knew that was not in confidence, and watched with pleasure both her intelligence and the smooth, unharassed expression of her face, as if her mind were engaged but she was not going to permit another woman’s tragedy to spoil the pleasure or ease of their encounter.
“It seems to me,” she said thoughtfully, drinking the last of her coffee, “that the first thing you need to determine is whether he has a secret habit of some sort, be it another woman or some vice or other; or if he did as his wife feared, and went to visit his brother in the East End, and met with violence.”
“Quite,” he agreed. “That is why I am pursuing all I can in an effort to trace him during the last two or three weeks before his disappearance.”
“Hence the Geographical Society.” She nodded. “Where else might you try? Perhaps I may be of some assistance?” She bit her lip. “This is, if I am not being too presumptuous?” She looked at him candidly with her wide, hazel eyes, but there was amusement and confidence in them. He knew that if he had refused her she would not have been hurt or offended, simply philosophical, and turned her attention to something else.
