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Why not the professional prostitutes? Because they had men who looked after them. They were merchandise, too valuable to risk. If anyone was going to beat them, disfigure them, reduce their value, it would be the pimps, the “owners,” and it would be for a specific reason, probably punishment for thieving, for individual enterprise instead of returning their takings to their masters.
Monk had already ruled out a rival trying to take over a territory. These women did not share their takings with anyone. They certainly did not threaten any regular prostitute’s living. Anyway, a pimp would beat, but he would not rape. This had none of the marks of an underworld crime. There was no profit in it. People who lived on the edge of survival did not waste energy and resources on pointless violence time after time.
He turned a corner and the wind was bitter and stung his skin, making his eyes water. He wanted to go home, weigh what he had heard and plan a strategy. But these crimes had happened at night. Night was the time when he should look for other witnesses, cabdrivers who had picked up fares and taken them from the edge of Seven Dials back westwards. It was less than honest to go to his own warm rooms, to hot food and a clean bed, and tell himself he was trying to find the man who had done these senseless and bestial things.
He stopped off at a public house and had a hot pie and a glass of stout and felt at least fortified, if not comforted. He thought of scraping a conversation with some of the other patrons, or with the landlord, and decided against it. He did not yet want to be known as an agent of enquiry. Word would spread rapidly enough. Let Vida do the more obvious asking. She belonged there and would be respected, probably even told the truth.
He worked until long after midnight, trudging the streets on the edges of Seven Dials, generally to the west and north, towards Oxford Street and Regent Street, speaking to cabby after cabby, always asking the same questions. The very last began as they all had.
“Where to, guv?”
“Home … Fitzroy Street,” Monk replied, still standing on the pavement.
“Right.”
“Often work this patch?”
“Yeah, why?”
“Sorry to take you so far out of your way.” He put his foot on the step, taking his time.
The cabby gave a sharp laugh. “That’s wot I’m ’ere fer. Jus’ ’round the corner in’t no good ter me.”
“Take a few trips north and west, do you?”
“Some. Are yer gettin’ in or not?”
“Yes,” Monk answered without doing so. “Do you remember taking a couple of gentlemen from this area, probably about this time of night or later, who were a bit roughed up, maybe wet, maybe scratched or bruised, back up west?”
“Why? Wot’s it to yer if I did? I take lots o’ gents ter lots o’ places. ’Ere, ’oo are yer, an’ w’y d’yer wanna know fer?”
“Some of the local women around here have been beaten, pretty badly,” Monk replied. “And I think it was by men from somewhere else, probably west, well-dressed men who came down here for a little sport and took it too far. I’d like to find them.”
“Would yer!” The cabby was hesitating, weighing the advantages and disadvantages of cooperation. “W’y? Them women belong to yer, do they?”
“I’m bein’ paid for it,” Monk said honestly. “It’s worth it to someone to have it stopped.”
“ ’Oo? Some pimp? Look, I in’t standin’ ’ere all night answering damn silly questions for yer, less you pays, right?”
Monk fished in his pocket and brought out half a crown. He held it where the cabby could see it, but did not yet offer it.
“For Vida Hopgood, whose husband owns the shop where they work. She doesn’t approve of rape. I take it you don’t care?”
The cabby swore, his voice angry. “ ’Oo the ’ell are you ter tell me I don’ care, yer bleedin’ toff from up west yerself? Them bastards come down ’ere an’ took a woman, an’ used ’er like dirt, then go ridin’ back ’ome like they’d bin on a day’s outin’ in the city!” He spat with terse contempt.
Monk handed him the half crown and he bit it automatically.
“So where did you pick them up, and where did you take them?” Monk asked.
“Pick ’em up Brick Lane,” the cabby replied. “An’ took ’em up ter Portman Square. ’Nother time took ’em ter Eaton Square. Don’t mean ter say that’s where they lives. You in’t got a cat in ?
?ell’s chance o’ finding ’em. And wot if yer do? ’Oo d’yer think’s gonna believe some poor bitch from Seven Dials agin’ a toff from up west? They’ll say she’s sellin’ ’erself, so wot’s wrong if ’e’s a bit rough? ’E’s bought and paid for it, in’t ’e? They don’t give decent women much of a chance wot’s bin raped. Wot chance ’as an ’ore got?”
“Not much,” Monk said miserably. “But there are other ways, if the law will do nothing.”
“Yeah?” The cabby’s voice lifted in a moment’s hope. “Like wot? Top the bastard yerself? Yer’d only get strung up for it, in the end. Rozzers’ll never let murder of a gent go. They won’t upset theirselves too much over it if some ’ore from down ’ere gets bashed over the ’ead an’ dies of it. ’Appens all the time. But let some gent get a shiv in ’is gut an’ all ’ell’ll get loose. There’ll be rozzers up an’ dahn every street. I tell yer, it in’t worth it. We’ll all pay, mark my words.”
“I was thinking of something a little subtler,” Monk replied with a tight, wolfish smile.
