The Dark Assassin (13 page)

"Rose!"
Applegate expostulated.

"You are
not shocked, are you?" Rose asked Hester with a flicker of anxiety.

Hester wanted to
laugh, but it might hurt their feelings, as if she did not take death
seriously. She did, infinitely seriously. But she knew that in the drowning,
suffocating horror of war or epidemic disease, laughter, however black, was
sometimes the only bulwark against defeat-or madness. But one could not say so
in a London withdrawing room, or morning room, or any part of the house at all.

"No,
no," she assured Rose. "In fact, I would like to remember it to say
again. There will be countless times when it will be appropriate. Would you
like attribution, or prefer I forget who said it first?"

Rose blinked,
but it was with pleasure as well as self-consciousness. "I think it might
be better for my husbands position if you forgot," she replied
reluctantly. "The House of Commons is extremely robust in its opinions,
but then there are no ladies speaking, and that makes all the difference."
Her mouth pulled in an expression of wry distaste.

Hester
understood. She had been freer to say what she thought on the fringes of the
battlefield, and had found the return to England painfully restrictive. She
went back again to the subject of Mary Havilland. "Did you know her
family?" she asked.

Rose shrugged.
"Slightly. I liked Mary very much, and it was difficult to do that and be
more than civil to the rest of them."

"They were
at odds?"

"Oh, yes.
You see, Jenny-that is her elder sister, Jenny Argyll-is completely devoted to
her husband and children, as she has to be." An expression of both
irritation and surrender crossed her face.

"Has to
be?" Hester asked quickly.

"I have no
children to depend upon me, and a husband whom I would trust to the ends of the
earth. But few women are as fortunate as I am, and Jenny Argyll is certainly
not among them." Rose shrugged again. "I believe Alan Argyll is
reasonable enough, but if he has faults, Jenny may naturally prefer not to be
more aware of them than she is obliged to be. She will not appreciate her
sister finding them for her, since she cannot afford to address them! When you
are helpless, ignorance is a great comfort."

"And Mary .
. . did that?" Hester asked. "Either his faults were very grave
indeed, or she was very insensitive." A darker picture was forming at the
back of her mind.

"I don't
know," Rose admitted. "Of course, when we love someone, we don't
always exercise the best sense when warning them of what we perceive to be a
danger. I do know that Mary broke off her own betrothal to Toby Argyll, Alan's
younger brother. She was candid about it to me."

"Candid?"
Hester pressed, uncertain what Rose meant. "You mean she told you why she
broke it off? Was it something she learned of him?" She would rather not
have known, but it could not be avoided now. "Was that what..."

"Oh,
no!" Rose said quickly. "You mean did she learn that Toby had some
part in her father's death? And she couldn't bear it? Is that what you are
thinking?"

"Yes,"
Hester admitted. "It might be enough to break one's spirit, even that of
someone very strong."

"Not
Mary." Rose had no doubt in her voice at all. She was sitting upright in
the chair now, back straight. "She wasn't in love with Toby, not really in
love, where her world would be plunged into darkness without him! She liked him
well enough. She thought his was probably the best offer she would get. After
all, how many of us really fall headlong in love with someone we can
marry?" She smiled as she said it, her hands relaxed in her lap, and
Hester knew that she was not including herself when she spoke. "Most women
make an acceptable bargain," Rose continued. "And Mary was realistic
enough to do that. But believe me, breaking it off did not cast her into
despair." She lowered her voice confidentially. "In fact, I think
that part of it was no small relief to her. She could refuse him with an easy
conscience. No one would expect her to marry so soon after her father's death,
poor soul."

"My dear,
you should not repeat that," Applegate warned.

"I
shan't," she promised. Apparently she felt that telling Hester was a
matter of honor, a debt to Mary she had no intention of neglecting. "She
did not take her own life, Mrs. Monk. Nor did she believe that her father had
done so; for him, it would have been not only a sin against the Church, but far
worse than that-a sin against himself. And if it was true for him, then it must
be true for her. I don't know what happened, but I will do anything and
everything I can to help you find out. Any information I can find, any door I
can open, you have but to tell me. Perhaps we can still effect the reform she
was working on, and save the lives of at least some of the men who would be
killed if there were further accidents in the construction."

"Thank
you," Hester said warmly. "I will call on you the moment I have a
clearer idea of what to do." She turned to Applegate. "What
information was Mary Havilland going to bring you? What do you need to know
before you can act?"

"Proof that
the safety rules are not being kept," he replied. "And I am afraid
that proof will be very hard to find. Engineers will say that they have
surveyed the ground and the old rivers and streams as well as is possible. Men
who work with the machines are accustomed to danger and know that a degree of
it is part of life. Just as men who go to sea or down into the mines live with
danger and loss, without complaining, so do navvies. They would consider it
cowardly to refuse or to show self-pity, and would despise any man who did.
More than that, they know they would lose their jobs, because for every man who
says he will not, there are a dozen others to take his place."

"And lose
arms or legs, or be crushed to death?" Rose demanded. "Surely
..." She stopped, looking to Hester for support.

Hester remained
silent. What Applegate said was true. There were tens of thousands like the
Collards: proud, angry, stubborn, desperate.

She stood up.
"Thank you, Mr. Applegate. I will do all I can to find the proof Mary
Havilland was looking for. As soon as I have something I shall return."

"Or if we
can help," Rose added. "Thank you for coming, Mrs. Monk."

"No!"
Monk said firmly when she told him that evening. "I'll pursue it until I
find what happened to both Mary Havilland and her father."

"There's
going to be a disaster if nothing is done, William," she argued urgently.
"Do you expect me to sit by and let that happen?" She made no
reference to giving up Portpool Lane, but it hung unsaid between them.

They were
standing in the kitchen, the dishes cleared away and the kettle pouring steam
into the air as Hester prepared to make the tea.

"Hester,
Mary Havilland may have been murdered to prevent her doing precisely
that!" Monk said angrily. "For the love of heaven, isn't that what
you've just been telling me?"

"Of course
I can see it!" she retorted as she yanked the kettle off the hob.
"Are you going to stop your investigation?"

"Am I... ?
No, of course not! What's that got to do with it?"

"It has
everything to do with it!" she answered, raising her voice to match his.
"You can risk your life every day, but if I want to do something I believe
in, suddenly I'm not allowed to?"

"That is
completely different. You are a woman. I know how to protect myself," he
said, as if it were a fact beyond dispute. "You don't."

She drew in a
deep breath. "You pompous-" she began, then stopped, afraid she would
say too much and let all her frustration and loss pour through. She would never
be able to retract it because he would know it was true. She forced herself to
smile at him instead. "Thank you for being afraid for me. It's really very
kind of you, but quite unnecessary. I shall be discreet."

For a moment she
thought he was going to lose his temper entirely. Instead he started to laugh,
and then laughed harder and harder until he was gasping for breath.

"It is not
all that funny!" she said waspishly.

"Yes, it
is," he replied, wiping his eyes with the back of his hand. "You've
never been discreet a day in your life." He took her by the shoulders,
quite gently but with thorough strength that she could not escape. "And
you are not going to pursue Mary Havilland's path finding proof that any of the
construction machines are being used dangerously!"

She said
nothing, but when she turned her attention back to the tea she realized that
the kettle was almost empty; it had boiled nearly dry. She would have to refill
it and begin again.

"William,"
she said gently, "I'm afraid the tea will have to wait a little. I'll
bring it through to you when it's ready, if you like." If he wanted to
think that was any kind of admission of defeat or of obedience, this was not
the time to point out to him that it was nothing of the sort.

"Thank you.
That is a good idea." He turned and went back into the sitting room.

"Really!"
she said under her breath, but glad it was over for the moment, and she could
be alone to gain control of her feelings again.

FOUR

Monk was in the
stern of the ferry next morning as it made its way across the choppy waters.
Waves were slapping the sides of the small boat, and the damp, raw wind stung
the skin, freezing the cheeks and arms. The boatman needed not only his
strength but his skill to keep from "catching crabs" with the oar
blades and drenching them both.

At least the
wind had driven the fog away and the long strings of barges were going
downriver on the tide, carrying goods from the Pool of London to everyplace on
earth.

He had spoken to
Hester last night as if he was afraid for her safety, and indeed that was his
concern. He did not want to prevent her from doing what she believed was right,
but when she became involved in a cause she lost all sense of proportion. More
than once it had endangered her.

He looked at the
choppy water, dark, turgid, and filthy. Perhaps if he could remember all his
youth, his other experiences of women, of love, he would be more realistic. But
he remembered nothing, and he wanted Hester as she was: naive, rash, stubborn,
vulnerable, passionate, opinionated, loyal, sometimes foolish, always
honest-too honest-never mean of spirit, and never, ever a coward. But he wanted
her alive, and if she did not have the sense to protect herself, then he must
do it for her.

He would find
out what happened to Mary Havilland, and to her father, because Hester would
despise him if he did not.

How had she felt
seven years ago over her own father's suicide? He had only just met her then,
and they had scraped each other raw to begin with. She had found him cold and
arrogant. Perhaps he had been, but he had also been bewildered by the unknown
world around him because of his memory loss, increasingly aware he was
disliked. It was Hester's strength and courage that had constantly buoyed him.

Had she felt
guilty that she was not in England and at home when her parents both so
desperately needed her? Was that at least in part why she was determined now to
fight for Mary Havilland and, through her, for her father?

He had not even
thought of that before.

They were at the
Wapping shore. He paid the ferryman, climbed the steps up into the harsher
wind, and strode over to the door. It was warm inside, but it took several
minutes before the heat thawed his numb flesh. It made his hands tingle as the
blood circulated again, and he was aware of the men putting on heavy overcoats
and then caps as they went out to begin the next patrol.

He spoke to them
briefly, listening to the report of the night's events: a couple of robberies
and several fights, one ending in a knifing. The victim had died, but they had
the man who had done it, and apparently it was the culmination of a long feud.

"Anyone
else involved?" he asked.

Clacton gave him
a sideways look eloquent of contempt, and Monk realized his mistake. He was
treating Clacton as an equal, as he would Orme. Clacton was spoiling for a
fight, inching around and around to find a weakness to jab. Monk held his
temper with an effort. A man who loses his temper at a subordinate's rudeness
isn't fit to command. No one must manipulate him. Nor must he be seen to need
Orme's help. He was alone. Orme wanted him to succeed. Clacton wanted him to
fail. For none of them would he ever take Durban's place. He did not mind that.
He must make his own place, and none of them could admire Durban more than he
did, for it was Monk who understood what he had done better than they, and who
carried a far greater burden of guilt for it.

He would not
correct himself and rephrase the question. He must retrieve the station another
way. He turned to Butterworth. "Mr. Clacton seems unwilling to reveal
their names. Friends of his, perhaps. Or informants. Perhaps you can be more
enlightening?"

Clacton moved
his mouth to protest, then looked at Monk's face and decided better of it.