AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“No one, sir. I think it was all part of Mr. Monk’s revenge for Mr. Orme’s death. A shifting of the blame, if you like.”
“Thank you. And may I offer you my sympathies for the distress all this must have caused you?” Wingfield added.
“Thank you, sir,” McNab said humbly.
Monk was furious. He could feel the rage build up inside him, but he was helpless to do anything about it. He had to sit and listen in silence.
Rathbone rose to his feet and walked elegantly to the center of the open space in front of the witness stand as if it had been an arena. Every eye in the room was on him. It was the first time he had moved forward to join battle.
There was a sigh of anticipation around the gallery.
A juror coughed.
“Mr. McNab, you told the court that you have known Mr. Monk, on and off, for about sixteen years, is that right?”
“Yes, sir, I have.” McNab was totally unperturbed. This elegant lawyer with his smooth hair and calm, slightly smiling face did not bother him in the slightest.
“So you did not know him in his Californian days, which would be more like twenty years ago?”
“That’s right,” McNab agreed.
“You have never been to California? In fact you have never been off the shores of Britain, other than for a brief trip to France?” Rathbone continued.
McNab moved position very slightly. He did not like the question. It made him look unsophisticated, a man of narrow experience.
“When you first met Mr. Monk you said it was professionally rather than socially?” Rathbone went on.
“It was.”
“Your profession, or his?”
McNab swallowed. He looked steadily at Rathbone. “His,” he said at last. Rathbone would have checked anyway. McNab had not been in the Customs or the police at the time.
Rathbone nodded. “Just so,” he agreed. “A very tragic affair, I believe…”
Wingfield half-rose, then changed his mind and subsided again. Objecting would be futile, and he knew it. Better not to try than to be seen to try, and fail.
McNab’s face tightened, but he was not going to help.
Rathbone was far too wise to deliberately lose the sympathy
of the jury. “A crime in which your younger half brother, Robert Nairn, was involved, and for which he was hanged. You asked Mr. Monk to intercede for him, to plead for mercy. Mr. Monk did not do so. That is a very brief summary, but is it correct?”
McNab’s voice was tight as he agreed it was the truth. If he was trying to conceal his emotion, he did not succeed. It was palpable in the air, like a charge of electricity. His blunt, rather lumpy face was white and his shoulders bulged with the knotting of his muscles.
“And you have resented Mr. Monk ever since for that?” Rathbone sighed. “Misguided. Mr. Monk did not sentence Robert Nairn, nor had he the power to prevent the full execution of the law. But it is understandable. Your half brother paid for his crime with his life, and you with that grief, and that stain upon the rest of your life.”
McNab’s hand tightened on the rail till his knuckles shone white.
“It would be fair to say that you did not like Mr. Monk, would it not?” Rathbone was still calm, as if they were at a dinner table and the court were fellow guests around it.
“I hate him,” McNab agreed. He must have known that denying it would be hopeless. “Just like he hated Mr. Pettifer. Difference is, I didn’t kill Mr. Monk. Not that I wouldn’t be pleased if it had been the other way round, and Mr. Monk the one as drowned.”
“Thank you for your honesty, Mr. McNab,” Rathbone said politely. “It makes all this so much easier to understand. It must have been trying indeed to have a man of Mr. Monk’s skill and tenacity forever on your tail, after the gun battle and the death of Mr. Orme.”
McNab gave an exaggerated shrug. “I can live with it. He’s not as dangerous as he thinks he is.”
“But you did check to see if any of this big conspiracy theory of his was true?”
