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“That’s still a long way from killing the best part of two hundred people,” Monk pointed out.
Runcorn sighed and ate another piece of cake. “I know,” he said with his mouth full. “But that isn’t going to change people’s reaction when the news breaks tomorrow that he won’t be hanged. I just want you to be prepared for that.”
Monk’s own feelings were momentarily lost in pity for Runcorn himself. Monk understood the man’s confusion and sense of futility; even though Monk had been taken off the case almost as soon as he began, he felt the same emotions.
Had they all allowed intense, almost unbearable shock and emotion to blind their vision? After all, Beshara had never admitted his guilt.
But then, why would he? Most guilty criminals never did.
“Did you ever really learn why he blew up the ship?” Monk asked abruptly.
“No,” Runcorn replied. “The belief is that it was just anger because foreigners were making all the money out of chopping up Egyptian land and digging a canal.”
“Did you think so?”
“Actually I assumed he was paid by someone,” Runcorn confessed. “It fits the past patterns we could find; he has done questionable things for money several times. And he had no incentive to say who paid him. I supposed that was for his family’s sake, not his own. Maybe they were even hostages to someone …” He let the idea hang in the air, an ugly, complicated thought, which changed the balance of everything. “He’s sick anyway,” he added.
M
onk nodded.
The memory he had half glimpsed was still gnawing at the back of his mind, just beyond his reach.
“YES,” HESTER ANSWERED MONK’S question when she and Monk were alone in the sitting room an hour later, after Runcorn had gone and Scuff was in bed. “It’s a nasty disease, and there isn’t a lot we can do to help people. Just—care …” She stopped, aware of what she was saying, and where Beshara would be, growing more and more ill, and eventually dying. She lifted her chin a little. “Perhaps it would show more mercy if they did hang him,” she conceded, her face pale. “But I know that isn’t the way they do it. I am sorry for him, but I feel more pity is for the families who lost the people they loved in the river that night. I can only imagine how I would feel if you were dead.” She stared at him defensively, daring him to argue with her.
“I’m alive and well,” he answered gently. Then he looked at her more closely, seeing the stiffness in her shoulders, the way she carried her head. “I wasn’t in any danger,” he added.
“I know! I …” She stopped, her voice choked in gathering tears. “Oh damn!” she swore, completely uncharacteristically.
He put his arms around her and held her tightly. He knew acutely the tide of fear and gratitude that had overwhelmed her. Life was so precious, loss so rending, that there were moments when the passion of it slipped beyond control. He wanted to find something to say, but what he felt was too enormous for words at all. In the end all he said was, “I love you,” and then felt her arms tighten around him in answer.
THE NEXT MORNING MONK was returning from an early check on a missing cargo of hides. Since it was now midsummer, it had long been daylight. He walked down from the Licensed Victuallers’ Dock to the Dog and Duck Stairs, keeping his eye out for a ferry to take him back upriver, and to the north bank again. He reached the top of the steps with still nothing in sight.
He had been there only a couple of minutes when he saw Hooper coming along from the other direction.
“Morning, sir,” Hooper said cheerfully.
“Morning,” Monk replied. “Going over the river?”
“Yes, sir.” Hooper shaded his eyes and scanned the water for sign of a ferry. Then, seeing one, he raised his arm. “What do you make of the news, sir?” he asked.
Monk had no doubt that he was referring to Beshara’s stay of execution.
“Surprised,” he answered. “I thought they would have kept quiet about the illness and just got on with it.”
Hooper’s face was grim. “It’s not over yet, sir. They should’ve left it with us. Got ’emselves in a right mess now.”
Monk looked at him, studying his face in the bright morning light. He saw resigned anger in it. Hooper was a man he had learned to respect since he had joined the River Police.
“An inevitable mess?” he asked. “Or would we have done better?”
Hooper smiled—a surprisingly gentle expression. “Maybe not, but our mistakes would ’ave been different. We know the water, and the watermen. We’d ’ave known who’d be out in the river, an’ who wouldn’t, who’s scared of wot, and who owes.”
“Do you think they’re wrong?” Monk asked.
“They went about it wrong,” Hooper replied. “They asked the questions as would get them the answers they wanted. Not lies so much as truths shaved to fit. We’d ’ave known that.”
“Is that all that is bothering you?” Monk asked.
