Cain His Brother

chapter 5
In Bloomsbury where they set off the next morning, it was a still, cold morning, but as they went east, and drew nearer to the river, they came into fog. It grew thick in the throat and sour with the smell of smoke from house and factory chimneys. Eventually, short of the Isle of Dogs they could go at no greater pace than a careful walk. The hansom stopped in Three Colt Street. Monk paid the cabby and held out his hand to help Drusilla down. As she had promised, she was dressed in her maid's clothes: a darkcolored skirt and pale undistinguished blouse under a jacket top and a cloak which could have been either brown or gray. In the thin half-light of the fog it was impossible to tell. She had put a shawl over her bright hair and even one or two smuts and smears on her cheeks, but nothing could mask her natural beauty, or the white evenness of her teeth when she smiled.

The cab moved off into the gloom, and with a little shiver she linked her arm in his and they began the long task. At first she stood well back as Monk spoke to peddlers, a running patterer and a rag-and-bone man, and learned nothing of use. He was not surprised that she found them alien and frightening. Their accents must have been hard for her to follow, and their faces, matted under the grime, were haunted by a permanent wariness, a mixture of anger and fear.

Within a hundred yards a troop of children now joined them, thin-faced, wide-eyed, several of them barefoot, even in the bitter cold of the wet cobbles. They were inquisitive, and eager for any odd halfpenny or farthing that might be given. Dirty little hands plucked at Monk's sleeves and at Drusilla's skirts, which were less than half the size of her usual crinoline.

Gradually they moved eastward. In Rope-Makers' Field Monk tried several shopkeepers. Drusilla even plucked up courage to make several suggestions herself. But still they met with nothing useful. There were references to Caleb Stone, few of them flattering, many of them spoken with overt fear.

Emmett Street was the same. The fog from the river was even denser here, hanging in thick curtains, blocking out the light. There was no color to drain from the drab streets with their high, narrow walls, sooty and damp- stained, the chimneys dribbling out thin wreaths of smoke. Middens ran out into the gutters and the smell was choking. The fog deadened sound; even other footsteps on the wet stones were hardly audible. Now and then the wail of a foghorn came from the river a street away.

Several times Drusilla looked at Monk, question and horror in her eyes.

"Do you want to go back?" he asked, knowing the pity and the dismay she must feel, a woman who had never seen or imagined such things before. It said much for her courage that she had come this far.

"We haven't learned anything yet," she said doggedly, gritting her teeth.

"Thank you, but I can continue."

He smiled at her with a warmth he had no need to affect. He held her arm a little closer as they went on past the West India Docks towards the Isle of Dogs.

On West Ferry Road Monk stopped a woman with a large bosom and short, very bowed legs. She was carrying a bundle of rags and was about to go through a doorway which emitted a smell of burned fat and blocked drains.

"Hey!" Monk called out.

The woman stopped and turned, too tired for curiosity. "Yeah?"

"I'm looking for someone," Monk began, as he had so many times before.

"It's worth something to me to find him."

"Oh yeah?" There was a slight flicker across the impassivity of the woman's face. "'Oo yer lookin' fer, then?"

Drusilla passed her Enid's drawing of Angus. She peered at it in the gray light. Then her face tightened and she thrust the drawing back at Monk, anger harsh in her voice.

"If yer wants Caleb Stone, yer'll find 'im wivaht my 'elp! Stuff yer money.

In't no use ter mie in me grave!"

"It isn't Caleb Stone," Monk said quickly.

"Yeah 'tis!" The woman thrust the picture back at him. "Wotcha take me fer?

I know Caleb Stone Wen I sees 'imp›, "It isn't Caleb," Drusilla said urgently, stepping forward for the first time. "He is related to him, that's why there is such a resemblance. But look more closely." She took the picture back from Monk and passed it to the woman. "Look at his face again. Look at his expression. Does he appear the sort of man Caleb Stone is?"

The woman screwed up her face in concentration. "Looks like Caleb Stone ter me. All got up like a toff, but got them same eyes, an' nose."

"But he isn't the same," Drusilla insisted. "This is his brother." "Garn!

'E in't got no bruvver."

"Yes, he has."

"Well..." the woman said dubiously. "Mebbe 'e do look a bit different, abaht the marf, partic'lar. But I in't seen 'im!"

"He'd be well-dressed and well-spoken," Drusilla added.

"I tol'jer, I in't seen 'im, an' wot's more, I don' wanter!" She shoved the picture back.

But before Drusilla could take it the door swung open and a lean man with a swarthy, unshaven face poked his head out.

"In't yer ever goin' ter stop yer yappin', yer fat cow? W'ere's me dinner?

I don' work me guts aht ter come 'ome an' listen ter yer yap, yap, yap in the street wi' some tart! Get in 'ere!"

"Shut yer face an' come an' look at this pikcher, will yer?" the woman yelled back, no particular venom in her voice at being thus spoken to.

"Still worf money ter yer?" she asked Monk.

"Yes," Monk agreed.

The man came out reluctantly, his face creased with suspicion. He glared at Drusilla, looked at Monk narrowly, then finally at the picture.

"Yeah," he said finally. "I seen 'im. So wot's it ter yer? 'Ad a pint down the Artichoke, then went dahn towards the river. W'y?"

"It wasn't Caleb Stone you saw?" Monk said doubtfully.

"No, it wasn't Caleb Stone I saw." The man mimicked his voice viciously.

"I know the difference 'atween Caleb Stone an' some geezer wi' fancy manners an' dressed like a toff."

"When was this?" Monk asked.

"'Ow do I know?" the man said irritably. "Las' week, or week afore." Monk put both hands harder into his pockets.

" 'Course yer knows, yer stupid sod!" the woman said sharply. "Fink, an' it will come back ter yer. Wot day was it? Was it afore or arter Aunt give yer them socks?"

"It were the same day," he said sullenly. "Or the day afore." He belched.

"It were the day afore, which makes it two weeks ago, 'zac'ly! An' all I kin tell yer." He turned to go back inside.

The woman shot out her hand, and Monk gave her a shilling. That was the day Angus Stonefield had disappeared. It was worth a shilling.

"Thank you," he said graciously. She grasped the money, hid it in her voluminous skirts, and followed her husband inside, slamming the door.

Monk turned to Drusilla. There was a look of triumph in her face, her eyes were bright, her skin glowing. Delighted as he was with having traced Angus to the Isle of Dogs on the day of his disappearance, even to a specific tavern, his foremost emotion was pleasure in her company, a lift of ex- citement as he looked at her and he thought how lovely she was.

"Shall we adjourn to the Artichoke and take some luncheon?" he said with a wide smile. "I think we deserve it."

"Indeed we do," she agreed heartily, taking his arm. "The very best they have to offer."

They ate at the Artichoke and Monk attempted to question the landlord, a burly man with a red face and a magnificent nose, squashed sideways from some ancient injury. But he was busy and highly disinclined to answer any questions that were not to do with the bill of fare. Monk learned nothing, except that it would be an excellent place in which two men might meet unnoticed.

Afterwards they tried a few more shops and passersby; there were few idlers in the thick fog and darkening afternoon. By three o'clock Monk offered to take her home. It was bitterly cold with a rawness that chilled to the bone, and she must be weary.

"Thank you, but you don't need to come with me," she said with a smile. "I know you want to go on until darkness."

"Of course I shall take you," he persisted. "You should not be alone anywhere near here!"

"Nonsense!" she said briskly. "We are equals in this. Courtesy I accept, but I refuse to be treated as an incompetent. Call me a hansom, and I shall be home within the hour. If you make me feel a burden to you, you will rob me of all the pleasure I feel now." She smiled at him dazzlingly, laughter in her voice. "And the very considerable feeling of accomplishment. Please, William?" She had not used his name before. He found it peculiarly pleasing to hear it on her lips.

And the argument was telling. He conceded, and took her to the nearest main thoroughfare, where he stopped a hansom and helped her in, paid the driver, and watched it retreat into the looming fog. It was quickly swallowed, even its lights engulfed within minutes. Then he turned back and spent one more hour asking, probing, seeking. But he learned nothing more, only fear and rumor of Caleb Stone, all of it ugly. He seemed an elusive man, appearing and disappearing at will, always angry, always on the edge of violence.

Everything that he knew convinced him the more that Angus Stonefield was indeed dead and that Caleb had murdered him when the hatred and jealousy of years had finally exploded.

But how to prove it to a jury? How to create more than a moral certainty, a crushing sense of injustice, of wrong done, and all answer for it defied?

There was no corpse. Maybe there never would be. Everything he knew of Caleb depicted him as a man of cruelty and absolute selfishness, but also of considerable cunning, with many friends along the waterfront who would hide him-who did, whenever he was threatened.

But surely Monk had the intelligence and the imagination to outwit him? He was walking slowly, almost feeling his way as the fog turned to darkness.

He could barely hear the muffled footsteps of others returning home in the late afternoon. Carriage lamps hung like moons suspended in the shrouds of mist. The sound of horses' hooves had no sharpness on the freezing cobbles.

There was so much of himself he did not know, but at least since the accident he had never been permanently defeated in a case that really mattered-a few thefts, never a murder. Before the accident he knew only from what he had read of his own case notes in the police files.

But every case he read showed a man of relentless tenacity, broad imagination and a passion for truth. There had been other adversaries as harsh and violent as Caleb Stone, and none of them had beaten him. He had walked a mile and a half along the West India Dock Road before he finally found a hansom and directed it to take him home to Fitzroy Street. He was expecting Genevieve Stonefield. He had promised her some report of his progress, and he must be there when she arrived. He settled back in the seat and closed his eyes for the long, slow journey. It would be well over an hour at this time of night, and in this weather, even as far as Bloomsbury.

By the time he had changed his clothes and had a hot cup of tea, and Genevieve had arrived, he was set in his determination not only to find the truth but to prove it.

"Come in, Mrs. Stonefield." He closed the door behind her and helped her with her wet cloak and bonnet. She looked extremely tired. There were fine lines in her face which had not been there a few days earlier.

"Thank you," she accepted, sitting down reluctantly, perched on the edge of the chair as if to relax would somehow leave her vulnerable.

"How is Lady Ravensbrook?" he asked.

"Ill," she answered, her eyes dark with distress. "Very ill. We do not know if she will live. Miss Latterly is doing everything for her that can be done, but it may not be enough. Mr. Monk, have you learned anything about my husband? My situation is growing desperate."

"I am very sorry about Lady Ravensbrook," Monk said quietly, and he meant it. He had liked her in the brief moment they had met. Her face had had courage and intelligence. It hurt to think of her dying so pointlessly. He looked at Genevieve. How much more must she feel a helpless sense of loss.

She was sitting rigidly on the edge of her chair, face earnest, waiting for him to answer her questions.

"I am afraid it begins to look increasingly as if you are right," he said gravely. "I wish I could hold out a more helpful answer, but I have traced him into Limehouse on the day of his disappearance, and there seems no reason to doubt he went to see Caleb, as he had so often before."

She bit her lip and her hands tightened in her lap, but she did not interrupt him.

"I am still looking, but I have not yet found anyone who has seen him since then," he went on.

"But Mr. Monk, what I need is proof!" She took a deep breath. "I know in my heart what has happened. I have known since he did not return home at the time he said he would. I have feared it for long enough, but I could not dissuade him. But the authorities will not accept that!" Her voice was rising in desperation as she could not make him understand. "Without proof I am simply an abandoned woman, and God knows, London is full of them." She shook her head as if in despair. "I cannot make any decisions. I cannot dispose of property, because as long as he is legally supposed to be alive, it is his, not mine or my children's. We cannot even appoint a new person to manage the business. And willing as Mr. Arbuthnot is, he has neither the confidence nor the experience to do it adequately himself. Mr. Monk, I must have proof!"

He stared at her earnest, anguished face and saw the fear in it. That was all he could see, it was so sharp and urgent. Did it mask grief she could not bear to allow herself, least of all now when there was so much to be done, and she was not alone where she could weep in private? Or was something less attractive behind it-a driving concern for money, property, a very thriving business which would be hers alone as a widow?

Perhaps if Monk were doing his duty to Angus as well as to her, he would look a little closer at Genevieve as well. It was an ugly thought, and he would far rather it had not entered his head, but now that it was there he could not ignore it.

"Previously you spoke of selling the business while it is still profitable and of excellent reputation," he pointed out. It was irrelevant-she could do neither-but he was interested in her change of mind.

"Have you a manager in mind?"

"I don't know!" She leaned forward and her full skirts touched and spilled over the fender. She seemed not to notice. "Perhaps it would be better than selling. Then all our present employees could remain. There is that to consider." She was ardent to convince him. "And it would be a continued source of security for us... something for my sons to inherit. That is better than a sum of money which can disappear alarmingly quickly. A piece of misguided advice, a young man willful, unwilling to be counseled by those who are older and he considers staid and unimaginative. I have heard of it happening."

He bent over and moved her skirt, in case a coal should fall or spark and set it alight.

She barely noticed.

"Aren't you looking rather far ahead?" he said a little coolly.

"I have to, Mr. Monk. There is no one to take care of me but myself. I have five children. They must be provided for."

"There is Lord Ravensbrook," he reminded her. "He has both means and influence, and seems more than willing to be of every assistance. I think your anxiety is greater than it need be, Mrs. Stonefield." He hated it, but his suspicions were wakened. Perhaps the relationship between herself and her husband was not as ideal as she had said. Possibly it was she whose affections had wandered elsewhere, not he? She was an extremely attractive woman. There was in her an element of passion and daring far deeper than mere physical charm. He found himself drawn to her, watching her with fascination, even while his mind was weighing and judging facts.

"And I have already tried to explain, Mr. Monk, that I do not wish to forfeit my freedom and become dependent upon the goodwill of Lord Ravensbrook," she went on, her voice thick with emotion she could not hide. "I won't have that, Mr. Monk, as long as I have any way at all of preventing it. I am growing more afraid day by day, but I am not yet beyond my wits' end. And whether you believe it or not, I am doing what my husband would have wished. I knew him well, for all that you may think perhaps I did not."

"I don't doubt you did, Mrs. Stonefield." It was quite out of character for him to lie. He barely knew why he did it, except some need to comfort her.

He could hardly touch her and he had no instinct to. It did not come to him naturally to express himself by touch. Whether it ever had, he could not know.

"Yes you do," she said with a pinched smile, a bitter humor of knowledge.

"You have explored every other possibility than the one that Caleb killed him, because you think it more likely." She leaned back in her chair again, and finally became aware of her skirt near the fender and almost automatically tweaked it away. "And I suppose I cannot blame you. Every day I daresay some man deserts his wife and children, either for money or another woman. But I knew Angus. He was a man to whom dishonor was not only abhorrent, it was frightening. He avoided it as another might have the touch of leprosy or the plague." Her voice at last lost its steadiness and cracked with the effort of control. "He was a truly good man, Mr. Monk, a man who knew evil for the ugliness and the ruin it is. It had no disguise of charm for him."

His intelligence told him it was a bereaved woman speaking with the hindsight of love, and his instinct told him it was the truth. This is how he had always looked in her eyes, and although she admired it wholeheartedly, it also exasperated or oppressed her at times.

"Now so many days have passed," she said very quietly, "I fear it may be beyond anyone's ability to prove what has happened to him."

He felt guilty, which was unreasonable. Even if he had followed Angus on the very day he disappeared, he might still not have been able to prove murder against Caleb. There were enough ways of disposing of a body in Limehouse. The river was deep there, with its ebb tide to carry flotsam out and its cargo boats coming and going. At the moment there were also the common graves for the victims of typhoid, to name only a few. He put half a dozen more coals on the fire.

"You do not always need a body to presume death," he said carefully, watching her face. "Although it may be a good deal harder to prove murder- and Caleb's guilt."

"I don't care about Caleb's guilt." Her eyes did not deviate from his face.

"God will take care of him."

"But not of you?" he asked. "I would have thought you a great deal more deserving... and more urgent."

"I cannot wait for charity, Mr. Monk," she answered with some asperity.

He smiled. "I apologize. Of course not. But I should like to deal with Caleb before waiting for God. I am doing all I can, and I am much closer than I was last time we spoke. I have found a witness who saw Angus in Limehouse, on the day of his disappearance, in a tavern where he might easily have met Caleb. I'll find others. It takes time, but people will talk. It is just a matter of finding the right ones and persuading them to speak. I'll get Caleb himself, in the end."

"Will you..." She was on the edge of hope, but not allowing herself to grasp it. "I really don't care if you cannot prove it was Caleb." The shadow of a smile touched her mouth. "I don't even know what Angus would want. Isn't that absurd? For all that they were so utterly different, and Caleb hated him, he still loved Caleb. It seemed as if he would not forget the child he had been and the good times they had spent together before they quarreled. It hurt him every time he went to Limehouse after Caleb, yet he would not give up."

She looked away. "Sometimes it would be weeks, especially after a particularly wretched visit, but then he would relent and go back again. On those times he'd be gone even longer, as if it were necessary to make up the difference. I suppose childhood bonds are very deep."

"Did he tell you much of his visits to Caleb?" Monk asked. "Did he give you any indication of where they met, or where they might have been? If you can think of any description at all, it might help."

"No," she said with a slight frown, as though it puzzled her on recollection. "He never spoke of it at all. I think perhaps it was his silence which made me wonder if it was as much guilt as love which took him."

"Guilt?"

There was a gentle pride in her face when she replied, a very slight, unconscious lift of her chin. "Angus had made a success of everything, his profession, his family and his place in society. Caleb had nothing. He was feared and hated where Angus was loved and respected. He lived from hand to mouth, never knowing where the next meal would come from. He had no home, no family, nothing in his whole life of which to be proud."

It was a grim picture. Suddenly, with a jolt as if he had opened a door into a different, icy world, Monk perceived the loneliness of Caleb Stone, the failure that ate at his soul every time he saw his brother, the happy, smooth, successful mirror image of what he might have been. And Angus's pity and his guilt would only make it worse.

And yet for Angus too, perhaps the memory of love and trust, the times when all things were equal for them and the divisions and griefs of the future still unknown, held a kind of sweetness that bound them together.

Why should it boil over into violence now? What had happened to change it?

He looked at Genevieve. The strain was clearly marked in her face now.

There were tiny lines in the skin around her mouth and eyes, visible even in the gaslight. Angus had been gone fifteen days. She was also using at least half her time nursing Enid Ravensbrook. No wonder she was tired and riven with fear.

"Have you someone in mind you can appoint to manage the business in Mr.

Stonefield's absence?" he asked. It was hardly relevant to him, and yet he found himself waiting for the answer, willing that she had not. It seemed so coldly practical for a woman not yet surely a widow.

"I thought Mr. Niven," she answered frankly. "In spite of the error of judgment which brought him to his present state, he is of absolute honesty, and of unusual skill and knowledge in the business. I think he would not be so rash or so lenient in another's cause. Mr. Arbuthnot has always thought well of him, and might not be averse to continuing with us if it was in Mr.

Niven's service. Mr. Niven is also very agreeable, and I should not mind thinking of him in Angus's place, since there needs must be someone. He has no family of his own, and would not be seeking to put me, or my sons, from their place."

It should have made no difference whatever, and yet he found himself chilled by the readiness of her reply.

"I had not realized you knew him personally," he said.

"Of course. He and Angus had a most cordial relationship. He has dined with us on many occasions. He is one of the few people we entertain in our home." The shadow crossed her features again. "But naturally I cannot approach him yet. It would be quite improper until I have some proof of Angus's fate that will satisfy the law." She sat very straight and sighed, as if controlling herself with an effort.

He wondered exactly what emotion it was that lay so powerfully just beneath the surface of her composure. There was a strength in her at odds with her gentle, very womanly appearance, the aura of obedient wife and devoted mother, some depth to her far out of the ordinary. It troubled him, because he had liked what he had first believed of her; even her quiet strength was appealing. He did not want to think of it as ruthlessness.

"I will do all I can, Mrs. Stonefield," he promised, his tone of voice unwittingly putting some distance between them. "As you suggest, I shall concentrate my efforts upon satisfying the authorities that your husband is dead, and leave the manner of his death for others to worry about. In the meantime, since it may not be an easy task, or a quick one, I advise you to consider Lord Ravensbrook's offer of a home for yourself and your family, even if it is upon temporary terms."

She sensed his thoughts and stood up gracefully, gathering her cape around her with a quick movement, but her face registered distaste and a hardening stubbornness of resistance.

"It will be a last resort, Mr. Monk, and I am not yet come to that pass.

I think I shall call upon Mr. Niven, and test his feelings in the matter, before I return to Lady Ravensbrook. Good day to you."

The next few hours passed with agonizing slowness for Hester. She sat by Enid's bedside watching her haggard face, which was white, sweat-soaked, with two blotches of hectic color on the cheekbones. Her hair was tangled, her body tensed, turning and shivering with pain, too sore to touch. Hester could do little but keep patting her softly with cool cloths, but still her fever rose. She was delirious, seldom wholly aware of where she was.

Genevieve returned some time in the evening and looked in for a few moments. She was not due to take her turn until morning, when Hester would go to the dressing room for a few hours' sleep.

They exchanged glances. Genevieve was flushed. Hester presumed it to be from the chill outside, until she spoke.

"I have just been to see Mr. Monk. I am afraid he does not understand my urgency to know of Angus's fate." She stopped just inside the door, her voice low in case she should disturb Enid. "Sometimes I think the suspense is more than I can bear. Then I went to call upon Mr. Niven... Titus Niven... he used to prosper in the same business as my husband, until very lately. He was also a friend."

Even though she had spoken so softly, Enid started and tried to sit up.

Quickly Hester eased her down again, smoothing her hair off her brow and speaking softly to her, although she was uncertain if Enid heard her or not.

Genevieve looked at Hester, her face tight with fear. The question was so plain it needed no speech. She was afraid the crisis was coming, and Enid might not survive the night.

Hester had no answer. Anything she could say would be only a guess, and a hope.

Genevieve let out her breath slowly. The ghost of a smile returned to her face, but it was only a reaching across pain in a moment's closeness; there was no happiness in it. Whatever comfort or ray of light Titus Niven had been able to give, it was gone again. Even the gentleness with which she had spoken his name seemed forgotten.

"There is no point in your remaining," Hester told her honestly. "It might be tonight, it might not be until tomorrow. There's nothing you can do, except be ready to take over in the morning." She tried to smile, and failed.

"I will," Genevieve promised, touching her lightly on the shoulder. Then she turned and went out of the door, closing it behind her with barely a click.

The early evening was dark, rain battering against the windows behind the thick drawn curtains. The clock on the mantel was the only other sound except for the soft hissing of the gas, and every now and again a moan or whimper from Enid.

A little after half past seven, Lord Ravensbrook knocked on the door and immediately came in. He looked worn and there was a flicker of fear in the back of his eyes, thinly masked by pride.

"How is she?" he asked. Perhaps it was a pointless question, but he knew of nothing else to say, and it was expected. He needed to say something.

"I think the crisis may be tonight," she answered. She saw his face pinch, almost as if she had struck him. She regretted for a moment that she had been so forthright. Maybe it was brutal. But what if Enid died tonight, and she had not told him? There was nothing he could do for her, but afterwards his grief would be allied with guilt. She would have treated him as if he were a child, not able to stand the truth, not worthy to be told it. The healing would be harder, and perhaps never completed.

"I see." He stood still in the middle of the room, with its shadows and florals, its femininity, isolated by his inability to speak, the social conventions that bound them to their separate roles. He was a peer of the realm, a man expected to have courage both physical and moral, absolute mastery of his emotions. She was a woman, the weaker vessel, expected to weep, to lean on others, and above all she was an employee. The fact that he did not actually pay her was irrelevant. He was as incapable of crossing the chasm between them as she. Very possibly it had not even occurred to him. He simply stood still and suffered.

When he turned slowly, his eyes were very dark and there was almost an opaque look in them, as if he could not focus his gaze. He took a deep breath.

"You mean would I like to be here at the end? Yes... yes, of course I would. You must send for me." He stopped, uncertain whether to offer to remain now. He looked across the bed. It had been changed only two hours ago, but it was badly rumpled now, in spite of Hester's frequent straightening of it. He drew in his breath sharply. "Does... does she know I am here?"

"I don't know," Hester said honestly. "Even if she doesn't seem to, she may. Please don't think it is futile. She might be much comforted." His hands were clenched by his sides. "Should I remain?" He did not move towards the bed, but looked at Hester.

"It is not necessary," she said with instant certainty. "Better to rest, then you will have the strength when it is needed." He breathed out slowly. "You will call me?"

"Yes, as soon as there is any change, I promise you." She inclined her head towards the bell rope near the bed. "As long as there is someone awake to answer, they will come to you within moments."

"Thank you. I'm most obliged, Miss... Latterly." He went to the door and turned again. "You... you do a very fine work." And before she had time to respond, he was gone.

Some twenty minutes later Enid began to be more troubled. She tossed and turned in the bed, crying out in pain.

Hester touched her brow. It was burning hot, even hotter than before. Her eyes were open, although she did not seem to be aware of the room but stared beyond Hester, as if there were someone behind her.

"Gerald?" she said huskily, "... not here." She gasped and was silent for a moment. "My dear, you really must not come-Papa will..." She gave a little gasp and then tried to smile. "You know Mama favors Alexander."

Hester wrung out the cloth in cool water again and laid it across Enid's brow, then moved the sheet and put it gently on her throat and chest. She had tried to get her to drink, and failed. She must at least do all she could to reduce her temperature. She seemed now completely delirious. "All right," Enid said suddenly. "Don't tell Papa... he is such a..." She tossed and pulled away, then suddenly seemed overtaken by sadness. "Poor George. But I simply couldn't! Such a bore. Don't understand that, do you?"

She was quiet for several minutes, then tried to sit up, peering at Hester.

"Milo? Don't be so angry with him. He didn't mean-"

"Hush." Hester put her arms around Enid. "He's not angry, I promise you.

Lie down again. Rest."

But Enid's body was rigid and she was breathing heavily, gasping with distress.

"Milo! My dear, I'm so sorry! I know it hurt you... but you really shouldn't..."

"He isn't," Hester repeated. "He isn't upset. He only wants you to rest and get better." She held Enid closer. Her body was burning, shivering, her clothes sodden with perspiration. Through the thin cotton she felt light, as if the flesh had already shrunken and her bones were brittle. Only days ago she had been a strong woman.

"So angry!" Enid cried, her voice now harsh with distress. "Why? Why, Milo?"

Hester held her gently. "He's not angry, my dear. He really isn't. If he was, it was a long time ago. It's all over now. Lie still and rest." For several minutes there was peace. Enid seemed to be easy.

Hester had seen many people in delirium, and she knew that past and present became muddled in the mind. Sometimes people seemed to retreat as far as childhood. The delusions of fever were terrifying: huge faces ballooned, then retreated: features were distorted, became hideous and threatening, full of deformities.

She ached to be able to help, to relieve any of the anguish, even to avert the crises, but there was nothing she knew to do. There was no medicine, no treatment. All anyone could do was wait and hope.

The gas hissed gently in the single light that was still burning. The clock ticked on the mantel. The fire was so low in the grate the coals were hot and red, but there was no flame whickering, no sound of collapsing embers.

Enid stirred again.

"Milo?" she whispered.

"Shall I send for him?" Hester asked. "He's only a few rooms away. He'll come."

"I know it troubles you, my dear," Enid went on as if she had not heard Hester's question. "But you really must let it go. It was only a letter. He shouldn't have written..." There was worry in her voice, and something that could even have been pity. "I shouldn't have laughed..." She trailed off and her words were lost in a mumble, and then suddenly she gave a giggle of pure delight before she fell silent.

Hester wrung out the cloth again. It was time she pulled the bell and had it changed to new water, clean and cool. But to reach it she would have to let go of Enid.

Very gently she tried to ease herself out, but Enid suddenly clung to her, her hand weak but desperate.

"Milo! Don't go! Of course it hurts. It was shameful of him. I understand, my dear... but..." Again her words became jumbled and made no more sense. Her mind began to wander. She seemed to be a young woman again, men- tioning dancing, parties. Sometimes her words were indistinguishable, but occasionally one or two would come through clearly, a man's name, a word of endearment, a chiding or a farewell. It seemed that either in imagination or reality, Enid had had many admirers, and from the intimacy of her voice and the snatched references here and there, some had loved her very much.

Milo's name was spoken once with a cry of frustration, almost despair, and then again later two or three times in a row, as if she were fascinated by it, and it was both tenderness and exasperation to her.

Towards midnight she became quieter, and Hester feared she was slipping away. She was very weak, and the fever seemed, if anything, worse. She left her for a moment to pull the bell rope. Dingle came almost immediately, still fully dressed, her face pale with distress, eyes wide. Hester asked her to fetch Lord Ravensbrook and take away the water and bring fresh, clean towels.

"Is it..." Dingle started, then changed her mind. "Is it time to change the bed linen, do you think, before his lordship comes?"

"No, thank you," Hester declined. "I'll not disturb her." "I'll help you, miss."

"It won't make any difference now."

"Is it... the end?" Dingle forced the words between stiff lips. She looked very close to weeping. Hester wondered how long she had been with Enid... possibly all her adult life, maybe thirty years or more. If she were fortunate, Lord Ravensbrook would have allowed Enid to make provisions for her, or he would do so himself. Otherwise she would be without a position-although from her white face and brimming eyes, that was far from her thoughts now.

"I think it is the crisis," Hester answered. "But she is a strong woman, and she has courage. It may not be the end."

"'Course she has," Dingle said with intensity. "Never know'd anybody like her for spirit. But typhoid's a terrible illness. It's took so many." On the bed Enid gave a little moan, then lay perfectly still.

Dingle gasped.

"It's all right," Hester said quickly, seeing the faint rise and fall of Enid's breast. "But you had better fetch his lordship without delay. Then don't forget the water-and cool, not hot. Just take the chill off it, that's all."

Dingle hesitated. "I know you done all the nursing, but I'll lay her out, if you please."

"Of course," Hester agreed. "If it's necessary. But the battle isn't lost yet. Now please send for the water. It may make a difference."

Dingle whirled around and almost ran to the door. Perhaps she had thought it simply cosmetic. Now her feet flew along the passage and she returned in less than five minutes with a great ewer full of water barely off the chill, and a clean towel over her arm.

"Thank you." Hester took the ewer with the briefest smile and immediately dipped the towel. Then she laid it, still wet, across Enid's brow and her throat, then sponged her hands and lower arms.

"Help me hold her up a little," she asked. "And I'll place it on the back of her neck for a moment or two."

Dingle obliged instantly.

"Lord Ravensbrook is taking a long time," Hester murmured, laying Enid back again. "Was he very deeply asleep?"

"Oh!" Dingle stared at her, aghast. "I forgot 'im! Oh dear-I'd better go and fetch him now!" She did not ask Hester to keep silent about the omission, but her eyes made the plea for her.

"The water was more important," Hester said by way of agreement.

"I'll get 'im now." Dingle was already on her way to the door. "An' I'd better tell Miss Genevieve..."

Milo Ravensbrook came in within moments. He had dressed, but little more.

His hair was uncombed and lay in thick, untidy curls most women would have envied with a passion. His eyes were hollow and his cheeks pinched and dark with stubble. He looked angry, frightened and extraordinarily vulnerable.

He ignored Hester and went up to the bed and stood staring at his wife.

The clock on the mantelshelf gave a faint chime of quarter past midnight.

"It's cold in here," he said without turning, accusation flaring in his voice. "You've let it get cold. Stoke the fire."

She did not bother to argue. It probably did not matter now, and he was not in a mood to listen. Obediently she went to the coal bucket, picked up the tongs and placed two pieces on the hot embers. They were slow to ignite.

"Use the bellows," he commanded.

She had seen grief take people in many different ways. Sometimes it was dread of the loneliness which would follow, the long days and years of no one with whom to share their inner thoughts, the feelings which could not be explained, the belief that no one else would love them as that person had, and accept and understand their faults as well as their virtues. For some it was guilt that somehow or other they had not said or done all that they might, and now it was already too late. The minutes were slipping by, and still they could think of nothing adequate to say to make up for all the mistakes and missed opportunities. "Thank you" or "I love you" was too hard to say, and too simple.

And for many it was the fear of death itself, the absolute knowledge that one day they must face it too, and in spite of even profound religious faith, they did not really know what lay beyond. An hour a week of formal ritual was no comfort to the mind or the soul when faced with reality.

Faith must be part of the daily web of life, a trust tested in a myriad of smaller things, before it can be a bridge over the chasm of such a passage from the known to the unknown. If Milo Ravensbrook was afraid for himself, she did not blame him.

"You can speak to her," she said to him from the end of the bed to where he stood beside it, still looking down at Enid without touching her. "Even if she does not respond, she may hear you."

He raised his head, his expression impatient, almost accusatory.

"It may comfort her," she added.

Suddenly the anger drained out of him. He looked at Hester steadily, not so much at her face as at her gray dress and white apron, which were not Dingle's clothes but her own again. She realized how used he must be to women in such attire. She probably did not appear very different from the nursery maid or the nanny who would have brought him up, told him stories, given him his food and sat with him at mealtimes and made sure he ate what was put before him, disciplined him, nursed him when he was sick, accompanied him when he went out for walks in the park or for rides in the carriage. There was a lifetime's association with the gray, starched dress, and a score of others like it.

He turned away again and obeyed her, sitting on the bed, his back to her.

"Enid," he said a little awkwardly. "Enid?"

For several minutes there was no response. He shifted and seemed about to move away again, when she muttered something.

He leaned forward. "Enid!"

"Milo?" Her voice was barely audible, a whisper with a dry wheeze in the middle. "Don't be so angry... you frighten me!"

"I'm not angry, my dear," he said gently. "You are dreaming! I'm not angry in the slightest."

"He didn't mean to..." She sighed and was silent for several minutes.

Ravensbrook turned to look at Hester, his eyes demanding an answer. Hester moved to the other side of the bed. Enid was very white, her skin stretched over her cheekbones, her eyes far back in her head as if the sockets were too large for them. But she was still breathing, barely visibly, perhaps too lightly for Ravensbrook to be certain.

"It hasn't comforted her at all!" He choked on the words. "It's made it worse! She thinks I'm angry!" It was a charge, a blame against Hester for her misjudgment.

"And you have assured her you are not. Surely that must be of comfort,"

Hester replied.

He looked away impatiently, temper darkening his face.

"Angus," Enid said suddenly. "You must forgive him, Milo, however hard it is. He tried, I swear he tried!"

"I know he tried!" Ravensbrook said quickly, turning towards her, his own fear of the disease temporarily forgotten. "It is all past, I promise you."

Enid let out her breath in a long sigh and the faintest shadow of a smile touched her lips and then faded away.

"Enid!" he cried out, taking her hand roughly.

Hester picked up the damp cloth again and wiped Enid's brow, then her cheeks, then her lips and throat.

"That's bloody useless, woman!" Ravensbrook said loudly, lurching backwards and standing up. "Don't go through your damned rituals in front of me.

Can't you at least have the decency to wait until I am out of the room. She was my wife, for God's sake!"

Hester held her hand on Enid's throat, high, under the chin, and pressed hard. She felt the skin cooler, the pulse weak but steady.

"She's asleep," she said with certainty.

"I don't want your bloody euphemisms!" His voice was cracking, but close to a shout, and filled with helpless rage. "I won't be treated like a child by some damn servant, and in my own house!"

"She is asleep!" Hester repeated firmly. "The fever has broken. When she wakens she will begin to get better. It may take some time. She has been very ill, but with care she will make a full recovery. That is if you don't distress her now and break her rest with your temper!"

"What?" he said, still angry, confused.

"Do you wish me to repeat it?" she asked.

"No! No." He stood perfectly still just inside the door. "Are you sure? Do you know what you are talking about?"

"Yes. I have seen a great deal of typhoid fever before."

"In the East End?" he said derisively. "They're dying like flies!" "In the Crimea," she corrected him. "And hundreds of the men died there too, but not all."

"Oh." His face ironed out. "Yes. I forgot about the Crimea."

"You wouldn't had you been there!" she snapped.

He made no remark, nor did he thank her, but went out, closing the door behind him.

She rang the bell, to tell Dingle that Enid was past the crisis and have her take away the bowl of used water. She also asked for a cup of tea.

Until that moment she had not realized how devastatingly tired she was.

Dingle brought her tea, hot buttered toast, a fresh stone hot water bottle and a blanket warmed next to the kitchen fire.

"But you will stay with her, won't you?" she asked urgently. "Just in case?"

"Yes I will," Hester promised.

For the first time since Hester had arrived, Dingle's face relaxed into a smile.

"Thank you, miss. God bless you."

Monk was now certain in his own mind that there was no other course but to find Caleb Stone. None of his doubts about Genevieve warranted any delay or gave rise to anything more than a suspicion at the back of his mind, an awareness, haunting and painful, of other possibilities. But whatever they might be, they still led back to Caleb. There would be both time and need to apportion guilt once Angus's fate was known, or so deeply implicated that the authorities were obliged to investigate it. He dressed in old clothes which he must have purchased some time ago for such a task. His own wardrobe was immaculate. He had the tailor's bills from past years as testament to that, and to his vanity. The quality and cut of it, the perfectly fitting shoulders, the smooth, flat lapels made him wince at the expense, at the same time as giving him an acute satisfaction. The feel of the cloth pleased him every time he dressed, as did his elegant reflection in the glass.

However, today he was bound for Limehouse, and possibly the Isle of Dogs, in search of Caleb Stone, and he did not wish to be obvious as a stranger.

As such he would be both disliked and despised, and most certainly lied to.

Therefore he put on a torn striped shirt without a collar, then baggy, ill-fitting brownish-black trousers, and grimaced at the figure he cut.

Then a stained waistcoat (largely for warmth) and an outer jacket of brown wool with several moth holes in it. He crowned it with a tall hat, and- refusing to look at himself again-he set out into the light drizzle of early morning.

He took a cab as far as the end of Commercial Road East in the heart of Limehouse, then continued on foot. He already knew it was going to be difficult to find Caleb. He had tried tentatively before. No one was eager to talk about him.

He turned his coat collar up and walked across Britannia Bridge over the dark water of Limehouse Cut, past the town hall and onto the West India Dock Road, then turned sharp right down Three Colt Street towards the river and Gun Lane. He had several places in mind to pursue the serious quest for Caleb. From what he had already learned of him, his life was a precarious balance on the edge of survival. He had been involved in various acts of violence and duplicity. He had a razor-edge temper and was spoken of in anxious and whispered tones. But so far, Monk had not been able to learn exactly how he made his money, nor where he lived, except most approximately that it was east, downriver from the West India Dock. He began with the pawnbroker in Gun Lane. He had been there before. He could not remember anything about either the man himself or the small room no doubt crowded with domestic objects of every kind, grim reminders of the degree of poverty in the area. But the man's expression of alarm when he stood over the counter and the light from the oil lamps caught his face, was proof that some time in the past they had met before, and Monk had had the best of it.

Of course, he no longer had the power of the police to use, and Wiggins, the proprietor, was a hard man. He could not have plied his trade for long if he were taken advantage of often.

"Yes?" he said guardedly as Monk came in emptyhanded. Then he recognized him. "I dunno nuffink ter tell yer," he said defensively. "I in't got nuffin 'ot, an' I don' do no bis'ness wi' thieves." He set his fat jaw hard. It was a lie, and they both knew it. Proving it was the issue. Monk had already decided his course.

"I don't believe you, but then on the other hand, I don't care either."

"Yeah? Since. when?" Wiggins's face registered profound disbelief. "Since you're more use to me in business than in gaol," Monk replied. "Oh, yeah?"

He leaned over the counter in the space between two stone jars on one side and a pile of pans and kettles on the other. "Gore inter a bit o' tradin' on the side, 'ave yer?" It was meant as an insult, then as Monk failed to be angry, his expression suddenly changed to one of amazement. "Gorn a bit bent, 'ave we? Well I never. 'Oo'd a' thought. Mr. Monk, an' all, reduced ter a bit on the side. 'Urts does it, not gettin' a reg'lar wage fer 'ounding folks? 'Ungry, are we, an' cold now an' agin? Must say as yer don' look the dandy as yer used ter. Right come down in the world, we 'ave." His smile grew with each new thought. "If yer wanter 'ock some o' that fancy rig o' yours, I daresay as I could see me way ter a fair price. Sell 'em up west, I could, for a nice penny. O' course, that's if yer don' wanna be seen doin' it yerself, like? Catches yet pride, do it?"

Monk made a powerful effort to control his temper. He considered returning at a later date in the very best clothes he had, and giving Wiggins a gold sovereign just to make the point.

"I'm a bad enemy w-hen I'm hard-pressed," he replied between his teeth.

"And I'm hard-pressed now."

"You was always a bad enemy," Wiggins said sourly. "An' a bad friend too, for all I know. D'jer wanna 'ock summink or not?"

"I want to do a little business," Monk said carefully. "Not with you, with Caleb Stone."

Wiggins's face tightened.

"I've got a job for him," Monk lied. "One I'll pay him for, and from what I hear, he could use the money. I need to know where to find him, and you seem a good place to start."

"I dunno were ter find 'im, nor I wouldn't tell you if I did." Wiggins's eyes were cold and hard. They did not flinch a fraction as they met Monk's.

The door opened and an undersized woman came in, a thin shawl held around her hunched shoulders, a pair of boots in her hand. She peered at Monk anxiously to determine whether to wait for him to finish his affairs or not.

"Wotcher want, Maisie?" Wiggins asked, cutting across Monk. "Them your Billy's boots agin? I'll give yer sixpence. If'n I gives yer more, yer'll not raise enough ter get 'em back."

"'E'll get paid Friday," she said tentatively, as if she were saying it more in hope than belief. "'E's got a bit o' work. But I gotter feed the kids. Gimme a shilling, Mr. Wiggins. I'll get it back to yet."

"They in't worth a shillin'," Wiggins said immediately. "Got 'oles in 'em.

I know them boots like the back o' me 'and. Sevenpence. That's the lot!

Take it or leave it."

"What work does Billy do?" Monk asked suddenly.

Wiggins drew in his breath to interrupt, but the woman was too quick.

"'E'll do anyfink, mister. Yer got summink as yer wants done, my Billy'll do it for yer." Her thin face was full of hope.

"I want to find Caleb Stone," Monk replied. "I just want to know where he lives, that's all. I'll speak to him myself. His brother has died, and I want to inform him officially. They were close, even though his brother lived up in the West End."

"I kin tell yer were Selina lives," she said after taking a deep breath.

"She's 'is woman, like."

Monk fished in his pocket and brought out a shilling. "That's for you now, and there's another when you take me to her doorstep. Keep the boots." She grasped the shilling in a thin, dirty hand, shot Wiggins a look halfway between triumph and the knowledge that she would certainly need him again, then led the way out of the door with Monk close behind her. Wiggins swore and spat into a brass cuspidor on the floor.

Monk was led through lined and grimy streets down to the river and eastward, as he had expected, towards the Isle of Dogs. A raw wind blew up from the water, carrying the smell of salt, stale fish, the overspill of sewage and the cold dampness of the outgoing tide sweeping down from the Pool of London towards the estuary and the sea. Across the gray water endless strings of barges made their heavy way downstream, laden with merchandise for half the earth. Ships passed them outward bound, down towards the docks of Greenwich and beyond.

A brewers' dray kept pace with them along the road, its wheels rumbling over the uneven cobbles. A rag-and-bone man called out dolefully, as if expecting an answer. Two women on the corner launched into a fierce quarrel and a cat scuttered across an alleyway with a rat in its mouth.

They were going down Bridge Street, with Limehouse Reach on one side and the West India Docks on the other. Tall masts broke the skyline, barely moving against the clouds. Chimneys belched thin streams of smoke up into the air. Maisie kept walking on past Cuba Street, then at Manilla Street she stopped.

"Fird 'ouse along ere," she said huskily. "Dahn ve steps. On'y one door.

Vat's 'er. Selina, 'er name is." She held out her hand tentatively, not sure if she would get the second shilling or not.

"What does she look like?" He wanted to see if her description tallied with Mr. Arbuthnot's. If it did he would trust her, for a shilling.

"A tart," she said quickly, then bit her lip. "Quite 'andsome, really, in a flashy sort o' way. Thin, I suppose, sharp nose, but good eyes, real good eyes." She looked at Monk to see if that was sufficient, and saw that it was not. "Sort o' brownish 'air, good an' thick. Always kind o' sure of 'erself, least w'en I sees 'er. Walks cocky, wi' a swing to 'er 'ips. Like I says, a tart." She sniffed. "But she's got guts, I'll give 'er that. Never 'eard 'er moan, not like some. Put a good face on it, no matter wot. An' she can't 'ave an easy time, wi' Caleb Stone bein' like 'e is."

"Thank you." Monk gave her the shilling. "Have you seen Caleb Stone?"

"Me? I don't go looking fer folks like that. I got enough o' me own troubles. I reckon as mebbe I seen 'im once. Though I'll deny it if yer asks in front o' anyone."

"I never saw you before," Monk said easily. "And if I were to see you again, I don't suppose I should know you. What's your name?"

She smiled conspiratorially, showing chipped teeth.

"In't got no name."

"That's what I thought. Third house along?"

"Yeah."

He turned and walked down the narrow footpath, barely wide enough to keep his feet out of the gutter, and at the third house went down the steps to the door which led off the small, rubbish-filled areaway. He knocked sharply, and had just raised his hand to repeat it when a window covered with sacking opened above him and an old woman stuck her head out. "She in't there! Come back later ifn' yer want 'er."

Monk leaned back to look up. "How much later?"

"I dunno. Middle o' the day, mebbe." She ducked back in again without closing the window, and Monk stepped away only just in time to avoid being drenched by a pail of bedroom slops.

He waited in the street about twenty yards along, half sheltered by an overhanging wall, but from where he could still see the steps down to Selina's rooms. He grew steadily colder, and towards noon it began to rain.

Many people passed him, perhaps taking him for a beggar or simply someone with nowhere else to be, one of the thousands who lived on scraps and slept in doorways. The workhouse provided food of a sort, a shelter, but little heat, and the rigid rules were almost as harsh as those in prison. There were some who thought it an even worse place.

No one regarded him with more than a passing observation, not even curiosity, and he avoided the challenge of meeting their eyes. Paupers, such as he was pretending to be, cast their glances down, wary, ashamed and frightened of everything.

Shortly after noon he saw a woman approaching from West Ferry Road, where Bridge Street swept around the curve of the river which formed the Isle of Dogs. She was of average height, but she strode with her head high and a kind of swing in her step. Even across the street he could see that her face was highly individual. Her cheekbones were high, giving her eyes a slanted look, her nose well formed, if a little sharp, and her mouth generous. He had no doubt that this was Selina. Her face had the courage and the originality to hold the attention of men like Caleb Stone, who might be violent and degraded now, but who had been born to better things.

He moved from his position, his legs aching, joints locked from having maintained his stillness for so long. He almost stumbled off the curb; his feet were so cold he had lost sensation in them. He made his way across the street, stepping in the filth and regaining his balance by flailing his arms. Furious with himself, he caught up with her just as she started down the steps.

She swung around when he was a yard away from her, a knife in her hand.

"You watch yerself, mister!" she warned. "Try anyfink, an' I'll cut yer gizzard out, I warn yer!"

Monk stood his ground, though she had taken him by surprise. If he backed away she would tell him nothing.

"I don't pay for women," he said with a tight smile. "And I've never had to take one who wasn't willing. I want to talk to you."

"Oh yeah'?" Disbelief was plain in her face, and yet she was looking at him squarely. There was no broken spirit behind her dark eyes, and her fear was only physical.

"I've come from your sister-in-law."

"Well, that's a new one." She arched her fine brows with amusement. "I in't got no sister-in-law, so that's a lie. Best try again."

"I was being polite," he said between his teeth. "The benefit of the doubt.

She is certainly married to Angus. I thought it possible you might be married to Caleb."

Her body tightened. Her slim hands on the broken railing were grasping it till the knuckles were white. But her face barely changed.

"Did yer. So wot if I are? 'Oo are yet?"

"I told you, I represent Angus's wife."

"No yer don't." She looked him up and down with immeasurable scorn. "She wouldn't give yer 'ouse room! She'd call the rozzers if summink like you even spoke to 'er, less'n it were to ask her for an 'alfpenny's charity."

Monk enunciated very carefully in his best diction.

"And if I were to come here in my usual clothes, I would be as obvious its you would be dressed like that at a presentation to the Queen. Young ladies wear white for such occasions," he added.

"An' o' course yer invited ter such frogs, so you'd know!" she said sarcastically, but her eyes were searching his face, and the disbelief was waning.

He put out a strong, clean hand, slim-fingered, immaculate-nailed, and grasped the railing near hers, but did not touch her.

She looked at his hand a moment, then back at his face.

"Wotcher want?" she said slowly.

"Do you want to discuss it on the step? You've got nosy neighbors-upstairs, if nowhere else."

"Fanny Bragg? Jealous of cow. Yeah, she'd love the chance ter throw a bucket o' slops over me. Come on inside." And she took out a key and inserted it in the door, turned it and led him in.

The room was dark, being lit by only one window, and that below street level, but it was larger than he would have guessed from outside, and surprisingly clean. The black potbellied stove gave out a considerable warmth, and there was a rug of knotted rags on the floor. There were three chairs of various colors and in different states of repair, but all of them comfortable enough, and the large bed in the shadows at the farther end was made up and covered with a ragged quilt.

He closed the door behind him and looked at her with a new regard. Whatever else she was, she had done her best to make a home of this.

"Well?" she demanded. "So yer come from Angus's wife. Wot abaht it? Why?

Wot does she want wi' me?" Her lips tightened into an unreadable grimace.

Her voice altered tone. "Or is it Caleb yer wants?" There was a world of emotion behind the simple pronunciation of his name. She was afraid of it, and yet her tongue lingered over it as if it were precious and she wanted an excuse to say it again.

"Yes, Caleb too," he agreed. She would not have believed him had he denied it.

"Why?" She did not move. "She never bothered wi' me afore. Why now? Angus comes 'ere now an' agin, but she never come."

"But Angus does?" he said gently.

She stared at him. There was fear in the back of her eyes, but also defiance. She would not betray Caleb, whether from love of him, self-interest because in some way he provided for her, or because she knew the violence in him and what he might do to her if she let him down. Monk had no way of knowing. And he would like to have known. In spite of the contempt with which he had begun, he found himself regarding her as more than just a means to find Caleb, or a woman who had attached herself to a bestial man simply to survive.

He had assumed she was not going to answer when finally she spoke.

"'E in't got no love for Angus," she said carefully. "'E don' understand 'im."

There was something in her inflexion, the lack of anger in it, which made him think that she did not include herself in the feeling, but it was too subtle to press, and far too delicate.

"Does he ever go uptown to see him?" he said instead.

"Caleb?" Her eyes widened. "No, not 'im. Caleb never goes uptown. Least, never that I knows. Look, mister, Caleb don't live 'ere. 'E just comes 'ere w'en 'e feels like it. I in't 'is keeper."

"But you are his woman...

"

Suddenly there was a softness in her face. The harsh lines of anger and defense melted, taking years away from her, leaving her, for an instant in the uncertain light, the twenty-five-year-old woman she should have been, would have been in Genevieve's place, or Drusilla's.

"Yeah," she agreed, lifting her chin a fraction.

"So when he asks you, you go uptown to see Angus." He made it a conclusion, not a question.

Again she was guarded. "Yeah. 'E told me ter go if he's short on the rent.

But I in't never bin ter 'is 'ouse. Wouldn't know were to look fer it."

"But you know his place of business."

"Yeah. So?"

"You went on the eighteenth of January, in the morning."

She hesitated only fractionally. Her eyes never left his, and she knew he must have spoken to Arbuthnot.

"So wot if I did? 'E in't complainin'."

"Caleb asked you?"

"Like I told yer, I goes up if the rent's up an' Caleb or I in't got it."

"So you go and ask Angus for it and he pays? Why, when Caleb despises him so much?"

Her jaw tightened again. "Caleb don' tell me. In't my business. Jus' waned ter see 'is bruvver. They's twins, yer know. That in't like ordinary bruvvers. 'Is wife won't never stop that, not if she tries till 'er dyin' day. Caleb in't got no love for Angus, like Angus 'as for Caleb. Come if Caleb snaps 'is fingers, 'e does."

She said it with a kind of pride, and something towards Angus which could almost have been pity, were her loyalties not so plainly defined.

"And Angus came this time?"

"Yeah. Why? I tol' yer, she won't stop 'im!"

"Did you see him that day?"

"Yeah!þþ "I don't mean in the office, I mean here in the Isle of Dogs."

"Not 'ere. I saw 'im in Lime'ouse, but 'e were comin' this way. I s'pose 'e went over the West India Docks t'wards Blackwall an' the river again."

She bent and put a piece of rotten wood into the stove and closed the door with a clatter.

"But you saw him?" he persisted.

"I jus' said I saw 'im. Don't yer 'ear good?"

"Did you see him with Caleb?"

She tipped some water out of a pail into a kettle and set it on the stove to boil.

"I tol' jer, I saw 'im goin' inter the Docks t'wards Blackwall, an' that's were Caleb said 'e were goin' ter be. In't that enough for yer?"

"Is that where Caleb said to meet him?" he asked. "What instructions did you give Angus? Or did they always meet in the same place?"

"Down by the Cattle Wharf at Cold'arbour, often as not," she replied.

"Any'ow, that's wot 'e said that time, why?' She looked back at him. "'Oo cares? 'E in't there now! Why yer askin' me all these things? Ask 'im! 'E knows were 'e went!"

"Maybe he is still there," Monk said, raising his eyebrows.

She drew breath to mock him, then saw the seriousness beneath his tone, and suddenly doubt entered her.

"Wot jer mean? Yer talkin' daft!" She put her hands on her hips. "Look, wot jer come 'ere fer anyway? Wot jer want? If yer want Caleb, the more fool you! Go look fer 'im! If Angus sent yer, then tell me wot fer, an' I'll tell Caleb. 'E'll come if 'e wants ter, and not if 'e don't."

There was no point in trying to trick her.

"No one has seen Angus since you did." He looked her straight in the eyes-large, dark eyes with long lashes. "He never returned home."

" 'E never went..." Her face paled under its dirt and paint. "Wotcher sayin'? 'E never ran orff! 'E's got everyfink 'ere. 'As 'e done summink? Is 'e on the run from the rozzers, then?" A flicker of both amusement and pity touched her mouth.

"I think it very unlikely," he replied with an answering gleam of black laughter. Although even as he did so, he realized it was not a total impossibility, though it had never occurred to him before. "Far more probable that he is dead."

"Dead!" Her face blanched. "Why would 'e be dead?"

"Ask Caleb!"

"Caleb?" Her eyes widened and she gulped hard. "That's wot yer 'ere fer!"

Her voice rose shrilly. "You fink as Caleb murdered 'im! 'E never! Why?

Why'd 'e kill 'im arter all these years? It don't make no sense." But her mouth was dry and there was terror in her eyes. She stared at him, searching for some argument to convince him, but even as she did so, the hope faded and disappeared. She knew from his face that he had seen the knowledge in her. Caleb could very easily have killed his brother, and they both knew itshe from knowing Caleb, he from her eyes.

The kettle started to jiggle from the heat of the stove.

"Yer'll never get 'im!" she said desperately, fear and protection equal in her now. "Yer'll never take Caleb Stone."

"Perhaps not. I'm more interested in proving Angus is dead."

"Why?" she demanded. "That won't prove it were Caleb, an' it sure as 'ellfire won't catch 'im... or 'ang 'im." Her face was stricken and her voice had a thickness of emotion in it.

"So his wife can be treated like a widow," he replied. "And his children be fed."

She let out her breath. "Well in't nuffin' I can do, even if I were minded to." She was struggling to convince him, and herself. She put too much certainty into it, torn by loyalties.

"You already have," he replied. "I knew Angus was last seen here, going towards Blackwall Reach. No one ever saw him after that."

"I'll deny it!"

"Of course you will. Caleb's your man. Even if he weren't, you wouldn't dare say it if he didn't want you to."

"I 'int afraid o' Caleb," she said defiantly. "'E wouldn't 'urt me. He did not bother to argue. It was another thing they both knew was a lie.

"Thank you," he said quietly. "Good-bye... for the moment."

She did not answer. On the stove the kettle started to steam.

Monk left Manilla Street and went east through the West India Docks, the way Angus Stonefield must have gone, and spent all afternoon combing the docks and slums along the Isle of Dogs and the Blackwall Reach. Caleb Stone was known well enough, but no one was willing to say where he was. Most of them would not even commit themselves to when they had last seen him. A knife grinder admitted to having spoken with him two days before, a chandler to having sold him rope a week ago, the keeper of the Folly House Tavern to seeing him regularly, but none of them knew where he was to be found at any specific time, and all spoke his name carefully, not necessarily with fear, but not lightly. Monk had no doubt whose side they would be on if there were ever a necessity to choose. He left Blackwall at dusk, and was pleased to get back to Fitzroy Street to wash and change into his more customary attire. He would go to Ravensbrook House to report to Genevieve. After all, he had something to say this time.

Then he had a dinner engagement with Drusilla Wyndham. The very thought of it made him smile. It was like a sweet smell after the dirt and stench of the Isle of Dogs, like laughter and bright colors after the gray misery.

He wore his very best jacket, perhaps partly because of the memory of Selina and her opinion of him, but mostly it was the mood he felt every time he thought of Drusilla. He could see her face in his mind's eye: the wide hazel eyes, the delicate brows, the soft mass of honey-shaded hair, the way her cheeks dimpled when she smiled. She had grace and charm, assurance, wit. She took nothing too seriously. She was a joy to the eye and to the ear, to the mind and the emotions. She seemed to have the perfect judgment of exactly what to say, and even when to remain silent.

He looked at himself in the glass, adjusting his cravat to perfection.

Then, taking his overcoat and his hat, he went out of the door and walked smartly to find a hansom, humming a little tune to himself.

Of course Hester was likely to be at Ravensbrook House, but that was something he could not avoid. He would almost certainly not run into her.

She would be in the sickroom, where he would not be permitted, even had he wished to go, which he certainly did not.

He tipped his hat to a woman he passed in the arc of the street lamp. The knowledge that he would not see Hester was an instant relief. He was in no mood to have his pres ent happiness spoiled by her criticism, her constant re minder of the pain and injustices of life. She was so one-sided about everything. She had no sense of proportion.

It was a fault possessed by many women. They took every thing both literally and personally. Those like Drusilla, who could see the realities and yet had the courage to laugh and carry herself with consummate grace, were rare indeed. He was extraordinarily fortunate that she was so obviously enjoying his company every bit as much as he did hers.

Unconsciously he increased his pace, striding out over the wet pavement.

He was quite aware that women found him attractive. He did not have to work at it; there was an element in his nature which drew their fascination.

Perhaps it was a sense of danger, of emotions suppressed beneath the surface. It was of no importance. He simply realized it was there, and from time to time had taken some slight advantage of it. To use it fully would be stupid. The last thing he wanted was some woman pursuing him, thinking of romance, even marriage.

He could marry no one. He had no idea what lay in his past beyond the last couple of years, and perhaps even more frightening than that, what lay in his character. He had very nearly killed one man in a blinding rage. That he knew beyond question. Memories of those awful moments were still there, buried in his mind, sometimes troubling his dreams.

The fact that the man was one of the worst blackguards he had ever known was immaterial. It was not the evil in the man he feared. He was dead now, killed by another hand. It was the darkness within himself.

But Drusilla knew nothing of that, which was part of her allure.

Hester did, of course. But then he did not want the thought of Hester in his mind, especially tonight, or of the typhoid fever, its anguish or its bitter realities. He would tell Genevieve Stonefleld he had made a considerable stride forward today, then he would leave and spend a bright, witty and elegant evening with Drusilla.

He stepped off the curb and hailed a hansom cab, his voice bright with anticipation.