The Dark Assassin (45 page)

There was
horror, disgust, and self-mockery in Rathbone's face. "And what is it you
imagine I can do in this . . . this pursuit of the unspeakable?"

Monk grinned
now. "Oh, you are in command," he assured him. "You will tell us
what is proof and what is not."

Rathbone gave
him a dark, twisted look and excused himself to change his clothes.

They went first
to Runcorn, as a matter of geographical simplicity. He was horrified, as they
had known he would be. Even more than that, he was angry with himself for not
having seen the difference in the two descriptions of the assassin.

"No one
did," Monk assured him honestly. "It was only when I was telling
Hester about it and repeating it myself that I realized. That one detail too
much was his only slip."

Runcorn's face was
hard and bleak. "I'll trace each step of that bastard's way," he
promised, "if I have to climb or crawl through every sewer in London and
question the bloody rats!"

At the thought,
Mark's face pulled tight, his mouth in a downward turn, but he did not argue.

Next they got
Orme out of his bed with an apology for the hour, as he could just barely have
gone to sleep after a hard day. He made no complaints, not even by change of
expression on his face. Monk hoped profoundly that it was not because he did not
dare to. Orme had earned the right to respect and consideration for his
feelings, his well-being, and the fact that he might have other cares and
occupations in life than serving the demands of the River Police in general, or
Monk in particular.

"I can't do
it without you," Monk said frankly.

"That's all
right, sir. 'Ow's the boy?" Orme replied, dashing cold water on his face
to wake himself up. They were standing in the kitchen of his small home, where
Monk had never before been. He was uncomfortably aware that not only had he
intruded, uninvited, on the one place where Orme had privacy, mastery, but also
he had brought others who were strangers in all but name.

"Recovering
well," he replied. "Can I make you a cup of tea while you
dress?"

Orme stared at him.
"I'll make it, sir. If you just like-"

"I'll do
it," Monk insisted. "I'm not asking for instructions, just
permission."

"Yes ...
sir. The tea's in the caddy up there." He pointed to an Indian-style tin
at the back of the tidy kitchen shelf. "The kettles beside the stove, and
there's milk in the pantry cupboard. Water's already pumped for the morning.
But-"

"Thank
you," Monk interrupted him again. "Just dress. There's no need to
shave. We're going down into the sewers."

Orme obeyed.
Monk moved around the small, immaculately tidy kitchen while Runcorn riddled
the last ash from the stove and piled it delicately with new coal to make it
burn up again, warm the kitchen, and boil the water in the kettle. Rathbone
merely sat and watched, as his skills would be required later.

Seven minutes
later Orme was back down, dressed for going onto the river. Then over hot,
strong tea, they discussed the exact tactics of how they would hunt down the
evidence they needed to hang Aston Sixsmith.

"What do we
need, sir?" Orme looked at Rathbone.

Rathbone had
obviously been considering it. "We have on Sixsmith's own admission that
he knew this assassin." He frowned. "I wish we could find a name for
the man! We need unarguable evidence that Sixsmith knew him, with the credible
assumption that he also knew his occupation. It seems obvious enough that
Sixsmith told Argyll of the trouble toshers and other men were causing, and
that they needed to be bought off. You might see if that's actually true. How much
trouble were the toshers? Because the money went to the assassin, and yet the
work is still apparently going on." He looked at them in turn.

"What about
the cave-in?" Runcorn asked. "Do we knew exactly what caused that,
and if it was foreseeable? Was it what James Havilland was afraid of? Has it
anything to do with Sixsmith?"

"And what
about Mary?" Monk added.

"And what
connection was there between Sixsmith and Toby Argyll?" Rathbone asked.
"In short, Alan Argyll may be technically innocent of having hired the
assassin, but is he innocent of everything? Is this one man, or a
conspiracy?"

Orme looked at
Monk. "Questions, sir. We gotta find people 'oo've seen Sixsmith an' the
man wi' the teeth, afore 'Avilland were shot, an' prove as they know each
other. We gotta find navvies an' toshers an' the like 'oo know if Sixsmith knew
about the dangers o' movin' that machine too fast an' cuttin' wi'out askin'
enough about streams an' wells an' the like."

Rathbone's eyes
widened. "Exactly," he agreed. "Very well summed up, Mr.
Orme." He gave a very slight smile. "Perhaps you don't really need my
presence?"

Monk gave him a
wry look and then smiled back. "We couldn't possibly manage without you,
Rathbone," he replied.

They spent some
further time apportioning duties and planning where and how often to meet in
order to compare notes and keep each other informed. They had an hour's sleep
sitting in the chairs in the kitchen, then another hot cup of tea and several
slices of thick toast. By half past four, they were on their way towards the
main road, where they caught a hansom and started the journey to the tunnel.

They stopped to
pick up Crow. He was a sleepy and startled recruit, but willing enough when he
heard the truth of the events. He sent a messenger to find Sutton and tell him
where they were going, and that it was extremely urgent that he join them. They
did not wait for the ratcatcher, but arranged a rendezvous.

The wind was
gusting hard and carried the smell of rain as they made their way down the
muddy slope to the bottom of the tunnel. The walls oozed water in the lantern
light, and on the bottom it was running slowly in between the broken bricks and
pebbles. The wooden planks were slimy underfoot. When Monk held his lantern up,
the beam shone on the mist of fine rain, lighting the wet walls and the planks
that held them back, but barely reaching the higher beams that forced them
apart, crisscrossing upwards to an invisible sky. The air smelled of earth,
water, and old wood.

Monk wrinkled
his nose, not knowing if he really smelled the sour odor of sewers or if it was
just conjured by memory and imagination. He had to make a greater effort than
he had expected in order to force himself to walk calmly under the brick facing
of the tunnel and the vast weight of earth on top of him. Their feet echoed on
the boards and the water sloshed around the wood and up over the soles of his
boots. It was bitterly cold.

He heard
Rathbone gasp behind him, and wondered if the darkness suffocated him as much,
if it brought out the sweat on his skin and made him strain his eyes and ears
for anything that would give him a sense of proportion, direction, any of the
things one takes for granted above-ground.

A thousand yards
on they separated, in order to cover as much ground as possible. For safety's
sake they went in pairs: Runcorn and Orme, Rathbone and Crow, with Monk to wait
at the appointed place for Sutton.

"Don't go
by yerself, sir!" Orme warned, his voice sharp with anxiety. "One
slip an' yer finished. 'It yer 'ead an' the rats'll get yer. It in't a nice way
ter go."

Monk saw
Rathbone's sensitive mouth twist in revulsion, and he smiled. "I won't,
Sergeant, I promise you."

Orme nodded and
disappeared into the darkness behind Runcorn, their lights swallowed up in moments.

Rathbone took a
deep breath and, body rigid, followed after Crow without once looking
backwards. Perhaps he was afraid that if he did he would lose his nerve to
proceed.

Sutton arrived
twenty-five minutes later, accompanied as always by the little dog. "It's
a bad business, Mr. Monk," he said grimly. "Were d' yer wanna
start?"

The decision had
already been made. "The other four are looking to find out if Sixsmith was
ever seen with the assassin, and if so, when and by whom. I want to find out
more about the dangers of cave-in that Havilland was so worried about, and how
much Sixsmith actually knew of it."

"Yer mean
could 'e ave stopped it?" Sutton asked. He frowned. "Don't make no
sense, Mr. Monk. Why couldn't 'e 'ave gone careful, if 'e'd really understood?
Cave-in don't do 'im no good."

"When I
thought Sixsmith was innocent," Monk explained, beginning to walk deeper
into the tunnel, "I assumed Argyll was giving the orders and he had little
choice. I took it for granted that whatever he feared, he would have told
Argyll, and been ignored. But maybe that's not true. Is he callous, a villain,
or just incompetent?"

"Why'd 'e
'ave 'Avilland killed?" Sutton asked curiously, following on Monk's heels.
"It 'ad ter be ter keep 'im quiet about the dangers, 'adn't it?"

"Yes. But
that doesn't mean he believed him. He might have thought Havilland was just
scare-mongering."

Sutton grunted.
"Mebbe."

The first thing
they did was to find navvies at the excavation face and question them. They
moved with speed. After the ordeal of the trial they did not expect Sixsmith
back at the site that day, but it was not impossible that he would be there. He
was a man accused wrongly, according to the law, and found innocent by his
peers. If they seemed to others to be harassing him now, their position would
be unpleasant, to say the least. He might even claim they were exceeding their
office. Monk's career could be jeopardized, and possibly Orme's and Runcorn's
as well. Rathbone's reputation would not profit from his expedition into the
sewers to pursue a man he had prosecuted and failed to convict. He would appear
to be losing with neither dignity nor honor.

The navvies told
them nothing, and after an hour or so Monk realized he was wasting his time.
Instead he took Sutton's advice and sought out a couple of toshers. They were
father and son, amazingly alike: both blunt-faced, with a cheerful and
sarcastic disposition.

"Sixsmith?"
the father said with a twist of his mouth. "Strong feller, not scared o'
nobody. Yeh, I knowed 'im. Why?"

Monk allowed
Sutton to ask the question. They had already planned what to say. " 'E
din't kill 'Avilland arter all," Sutton replied casually. " 'E really
thought as the money were ter pay off toshers wot was makin' trouble."

"An' I'm
the queen o' the fairies!" the father said witheringly.

"Yer sayin'
as yer never took no money?" Sutton asked, his voice almost
expressionless.

"Weren't
nothin' ter take!"

"Sixsmith's
a bleedin' liar!" the son added angrily. "We weren't makin' no
trouble, an' wot's more, Mr. Sutton, just 'cos yer catches rats fer the gentry,
it don't give yer no right ter say as we were. Yer know that, yer scurvy
bastard!"

"I know yer
din't used ter," Sutton agreed. " 'Ow about others? Wot about Big
Jem, or Lanky, or any o' them?"

"We in't stupid,"
the father retorted. "Gettin' meself in jail won't 'elp no one."

"Did Mr.
Sixsmith know that?" Monk asked, speaking for the first time.

"Course 'e
did!" The father looked at him, his face screwed up in disgust like a
gargoyle in the lantern light. " 'E's a fly sod, an' all."

"Not fly
enough to avoid a cave-in," Monk observed.

"Course 'e
were!" the father said intently. " 'E knew as much about streams and
wells and clay stretches as any of us. 'E just don't give a toss."

They asked other
toshers, but nothing they could elicit contradicted the belief that there was
no more trouble than usual, just the odd quarrel or fight. There had been no
deliberate sabotage, and the accidents were rather fewer than average for the
heavy and dangerous work in progress.

The thing that
struck Monk most forcibly, and which he told the others when they went up in
the middle of the day, was that in everyone's opinion Sixsmith was an extremely
clever and able man who was very well aware of all the risks and advantages of
everything he did.

"So he knew
about the streams and wells?" Rathbone said grimly. He looked strained.
His nostrils flared with the stench he had been unable to avoid. His clothes
were spattered with mud and clay, and his boots were sodden. Even the bottoms of
his trousers were wet.

"Yes,"
Monk agreed, knowing what the inevitable conclusion must be. "It seems he
did not care about the cave-in."

"Or he may
even have wanted it!" Rathbone added. "But why? What is it that we
don't know, Monk? What's missing to make sense of this?" He turned to
Runcorn and Orme.

" 'E knew
the assassin," Orme said, his face tight. " 'Aven't got a witness as
yer could bring inter court yet, but they're there. 'E knew 'is way around, did
Sixsmith."