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Scuff took a deep breath and looked at Monk, blinking to keep back the tears. “Don’ yer wanna know, then?”
Monk felt a guilt so deep that for a moment he could not find the words to express it even to himself, far less to try to mend anything in the child staring at him, waiting.
“Yes, I do want it,” he said at last. He must not intrude on Scuff’s precious dignity, for the boy had little else. He must never allow him to know he had seen the tears. “But I don’t risk my men’s lives, even for that. That’s something you have to learn.”
“Oh.” Scuff swallowed. He thought about it for a moment or two while they both stood in the rain getting steadily wetter. “Not nob’dy’s?”
“Nobody’s at all,” Monk assured him. “Even those I don’t like much, such as Clacton, never mind those I do.”
“Oh,” Scuff said again.
“So don’t do it,” Monk added. “Or you’ll be in trouble. I’ll let you off this one time.”
Scuff grunted. “So yer wanna know w’ere ’e lives, then?”
“Yes, I do…please.”
“ ’E lives down the Blind Man’s Cuttin’, wot leads inter the old sewer an’ tunnel. There’s lots o’ folk live down there, but I can find ’im. I’ll take yer. ’E’s a bad ’un, mind. An’ ’e knows them sewers like a tosher, exspecial the old ones down near the Fleet.”
“Thank you. I think we had better take some men with us. We’ll go to the station and find them.” Monk starte
d to walk.
Scuff remained where he was.
Monk stopped and turned, waiting.
“I in’t goin’ there,” Scuff said stubbornly. “It’s all rozzers.”
“You’re with me,” Monk said quietly. “Nobody will hurt you.”
Scuff looked at him gravely, his eyes shadowed with doubt.
“Would you rather wait outside?” Monk asked. “It’s wet, and it’s cold. But it’ll be warm in there, and we’ll get a drink of hot tea. There might even be a piece of cake.”
“Cake?” Temptation ached in Scuff’s eyes.
“And hot tea, for sure.”
“An’ rozzers…”
“Yes. Do you want me to send them all out into the rain?”
Scuff smiled so widely it showed his lost teeth. “Yeah!”
“Imagine it!” Monk replied. “That’s as good as you’ll get. Come on!”
Hesitantly Scuff obeyed, walking beside Monk until they reached the steps, then hanging back. Monk held the door for him and waited while he took smaller and smaller steps, then stopped altogether just inside, staring around with enormous eyes.
Orme looked up from the table where he was writing a report. Clacton drew in his breath, caught Monk’s eye, and changed his mind.
“Mr. Scuff has information for us which may be of great value,” Monk told Orme. “He will give it to us, of course, but it would be pleasanter over a cup of tea, and cake, if there is any left.”
Orme looked at Scuff and saw a wet and shivering child. “Clacton,” he said sharply, fishing in his pocket and pulling out a few pence, “go and get us all a nice piece of cake. I’ll make the tea.”
Scuff took another step inside, then inched over towards the stove.
Two hours later Monk, Scuff, Orme, Kelly, and Jones, the men armed with pistols, descended down the open workings and along the sodden bottom between the high walls of Blind Man’s Cutting. As it closed overhead, they lit their lanterns.
