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“I think they made a mess of the case,” Monk went on. “I’ve been up and down the docks in the last week. Spoken to a few people, listened to a lot. We all have. We know the Metropolitan Police didn’t do it as we would have done. They took people’s word we’d have known better than to trust. I think they’ve got cold feet now that they might have the wrong man—or at best that they haven’t proved it’s the right one. Once he’s hanged, they can’t go back on it.”
One of the men vented his opinion in unrepeatable language. Several others growled agreement.
Hooper straightened up and watched, his eyes moving from them to Monk, and back again.
“If anybody’s going to put it right, it’s us,” Monk went on recklessly. “But carefully. It may take a long time, because we’ve no authority. A court’s found Beshara guilty, and it could be right. If we find real proof of that, the kind that we know is right, then we’ll make it public, and see what happens.”
He looked around them slowly, catching each man’s eyes. “But one stupid mistake, one word out of turn, and we’ll be finished; our whole case will be shot full of holes like a sinking ship. Got that? If we don’t want to wind up on the bottom in the Thames mud, like the Princess Mary, then we’ve got to be careful, clever, and lucky.”
He gave a bitter smile. “My wife’s a nurse; she was with Miss Nightingale in the Crimea. She says Beshara will die of his illness, and it’ll be slower and crueler than a rope and a quick drop. Now let’s turn our attention to the missing brandy from Mills & Sons.”
Hooper stood up. One by one the other men picked up what they had been doing and resumed work.
Monk waited a moment. His hand was still clenched, and he knew he was not yet ready to hold a pen and write anything legible. He had put his career on the line, his credibility as a leader of men, and all that it meant to him. More than he wanted it to, more than in the past when he had been a loner, not caring what anyone else thought or believed. He had not respected his seniors, nor really cared whether his juniors respected him. In fact they had feared him, and—before the accident that had erased his memory—that had been sufficient.
How much he had changed! It was not sufficient now, not to him, and not to the man he wanted to be.
THE FOLLOWING MORNING WAS Saturday and Monk was free to take a whole weekend off. It was a mixed blessing. At any other time he would have been totally happy, looking forward to a day with Hester and Scuff. However, the morning papers were full of the reprieve for Beshara, and wild speculation as to the reason for it. Various political motives were mentioned and also a few far uglier financial ones. The words “bribery” and “corruption” were used.
Monk saw Scuff staring at it and knew Scuff now could read the article without difficulty.
“Why’d they change their minds?” Scuff asked, looking across the breakfast table at Monk. The question was simple and he wanted a simple answer. “He blew up the boat, didn’t
he?” His eyes lowered again to look at the portrait of the girl in white that had been printed. She had been the daughter of an important man, one with enough wealth and influence to have had her photographed. It was a real person who stared back at him from the page, not an artist’s impression. She was individual, with a life and a name, a mole high on her left cheek, and a shy, slightly crooked smile, as if she understood a joke and would have shared it with you.
This moment it was Scuff whom Monk had to answer to. There was no question in his mind that he must not lie, but how much truth should he tell him? How much was helpful, how much a burden it was unfair to place on him?
If he looked at Hester, he would seem to be asking her to lead. That was not what he wanted to do.
“They’re saying that it is because he’s ill,” he replied, judging his words carefully, even though his voice was rough-edged with emotion, and Scuff would hear that, too. “We don’t execute people when they’re ill.”
Scuff blinked. “Why not? If they’re going to be dead anyway, what difference does it make?”
“I don’t know,” Monk admitted. “I don’t think that’s the real reason, anyway. Apparently his family is important in Egypt, near where they’re making the canal.”
“Why does that make it all right?” Scuff asked.
“It doesn’t,” Monk said. “It makes it expedient.” He looked at Scuff’s confusion. “It is the convenient thing for them to do for their own purposes,” he explained.
Scuff’s contempt was plain in his expression.
Instantly Monk regretted his choice of words. If he showed no respect at all for the men who governed the country, how could he expect Scuff to respect authority either? He had made a mistake.
“I’m sorry,” he said grimly. “I’m so upset about all the dead people it makes me angry. I think they should have done better with Beshara’s trial, but I don’t know why they decided to let him live. Maybe they know something about it that we don’t.”
Scuff bit his lip. “Like what? Didn’t he do it, then?”
Monk hesitated. “I wasn’t on the case. I really don’t know. It is possible he didn’t …”
Hester spoke for the first time. She looked far calmer than Monk felt.
“If you think about it,” she said quietly, “it doesn’t seem likely he did it all by himself. In fact, I don’t think it’s even possible. But he refused to mention anybody else. If they hang him, he’ll never tell them who else was with him.”
“I see!” Scuff said quickly. “An’ if he’s alone an’ sick, they could get him to tell them.”
Hester looked uncertain.
Monk bit back the ghost of a smile.
