Page 80 of The Shifting Tide (William Monk 14)

Claudine helped her roll the body and very quickly stitch the makeshift shroud around her, catching it in places so it would not fall undone if she were carried hastily, and perhaps with little skill. They did not speak, but every few moments their eyes met, and a kind of understanding made them move in unison, each reaching to help the other.

Squeaky came upstairs again. The three of them took her with stumbling steps, awkwardly, their backs aching, along the passage and to the back door, then outside into the yard. Hester raised her arm in signal to the men. In the faint light of street lamps twenty yards away they looked huge and untidy, coats flapping in the rising wind, bareheaded, hair plastered down. The rain made their skins shiny, almost masklike in the unnatural shadows. They acknowledged Hester and Claudine, but waited until they had gone back inside before they approached.

Sutton went out alone and spoke to the men.

The larger of the two nodded and beckoned his companion. Carefully they pi

cked up the corpse, and without speaking they turned and walked slowly in the rain. They stood very upright with the weight balanced between them as if they were used to such a thing.

Hester and Claudine stood side by side at the doorway, so close their bodies touched, watching as the men passed under the street lamp. For a moment the rain was lit above them in bright streams. Then it glimmered pale on their backs as they retreated into the darkness. The van at the end of the street was little more than a greater denseness in the shadows.

No one spoke. It was quite unnecessary, and there was nothing to say. In a few hours another day would begin.

TWELVE

Rathbone had been to visit Gould in prison because he had promised Monk that he would. He had expected to find a man he was morally obliged to defend, not for the man’s sake, or because he was moved by any conviction that he was innocent, but because it was a clear duty. He realized as he left that he was inclined towards accepting Gould’s story that he really had found Hodge unconscious but not apparently injured. He admitted freely that he had stolen the ivory, but his indignation at the charge of murder had a ring of honesty that Rathbone had not expected.

However, on speaking to the undertaker who had buried Hodge, there could be no doubt whatever that he had suffered an appalling blow to the head. It had crushed the back of his skull, and was presumably the cause of his death. The undertaker had done as he was asked in burying Hodge, being assured both by Louvain and by Monk that all evidence had been recorded under oath and would be passed to the appropriate authorities. The perpetrator of the crime was being sought, and when found would be brought to justice.

Rathbone returned to his office and began to consider what possible courses were open to him. He was thus occupied when Coleridge informed him that Monk was at the door. It was a little after half past eight in the morning.

“Now?” he said incredulously.

Coleridge’s face was studiously without expression. “Yes sir. I daresay he is also concerned about the case.” He had no idea what the case was, and he was apparently offended by the omission. He also desired Rathbone to realize that Monk was not the only person working long and remarkable hours.

“Yes, of course,” Rathbone acknowledged. He had no intention of telling Coleridge what the case was; he could not afford to until it was absolutely necessary. Even then, it would be only what he was going to say in court, and not include the reason for any of his extraordinary silences. But Coleridge did deserve to be treated with consideration. “He would be,” he said, referring to Monk. “It is a grave matter. Will you show him in, please.”

“Would you like a cup of tea, Sir Oliver? Mr. Monk looks unusually. .” The clerk searched for an adequate phrase. “In need of one,” he finished.

Rathbone smiled. “Yes, please. That is most thoughtful of you.”

Coleridge retreated, mollified.

Monk came in a moment later, and Rathbone saw immediately what Coleridge had meant. Monk was wearing the same clothes he had had on last time and his face looked even hollower, as though he had neither eaten nor slept well since then. He came into the office and closed the door behind him.

“Coleridge is coming back with tea in a few minutes,” Rathbone warned. “Have you found any of the crew yet? You’ll have to tell them, even if you keep them by force. You can’t put them into the clinic, can you?”

“We haven’t found them,” Monk replied, his voice low and rasping with exhaustion. “Not any of them. They could be anywhere in the country, or back at sea on other ships going God knows where.” He remained standing. Rathbone noticed that Monk’s body was rigid. His right hand flexed and unflexed and the muscles of his jaw twitched in nervous reaction. He must be in agony over Hester alone in Portpool Lane. He would have no idea whether there were more people dead, plague raging through the place with all its horror and its obscenity. Or if they were cooped up waiting, dreading every cough, every chill or flush of heat, every moment of faintness whether mere exhaustion or the beginning of the measured agony of fever, swelling, pain, and then death.

Rathbone was overcome with relief that Margaret was not in there; it welled up inside him like an almost physical escape from pain, like the fire of brandy felt in the stomach and the blood when one has been numb with cold.

He stood facing Monk, who was gray with dread of losing all that mattered most to him and gave his life purpose and joy. If Hester died, he would be alone in a way that would be a constant ache inside him, increasing every burden, dulling any possible happiness. And Rathbone was awash with relief at his own safety. It filled him with shame.

“I saw Gould,” he said aloud, trying for his own sake almost as much as Monk’s to occupy their minds with the practical. Pity would be no help. “I believed him.” He saw the slight lift of surprise in Monk’s face. “I didn’t expect to,” he said. “He’ll make a good witness, if I have to put him on the stand. The trouble is, I don’t know what the truth is, so I’m afraid of what I’ll uncover.”

Monk was pensive. “Well, so far as we know there was no one on board the ship apart from the skeleton crew and Gould, so the only defense can be that if Gould didn’t kill him, then one of the crew did, or else it was an accident.”

“If it was an accident then it can only have happened if he fell and cracked his head open, possibly breaking his neck,” Rathbone reasoned. “And if that were the case, it should have been apparent to whoever found him. Was his neck broken? You didn’t say so.”

“No it wasn’t.”

“And you said there was so little blood you thought he was actually killed somewhere else,” Rathbone went on. “You said. .”

“I know what I said!” Monk snapped. “That was before I knew about the plague.”

“Don’t say that word!” Rathbone said sharply, his voice rising. “Coleridge will be back any minute!”

Monk winced, as though he had been caused sudden pain.

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