The Silent Cry (19 page)

Little wonder Rhys had nightmares, and could not speak! It would be a memory no man could live with.

He looked at the young Duke Kynaston's rather supercilious face, with the consciousness of youth, strength, and money so plain in it. But there were no bruises, even healed ones fading, no cuts or scratches except one faint scar on his cheek. It would have been no more than a nick of the razor such as any young man might make.

"So what is it you imagine we can tell you?" Duke said a little impatiently.

"St. Giles is a large area…" Evan began.

"Not very," Duke contradicted. "Square mile or so.”

"So you know it?" Evan said with a smile.

Duke flushed. "I know of it, Mr. Evan. That is not the same thing.”

But his annoyance betrayed that he perceived it was.

"Then you will know that it is densely populated," Evan continued, 'with people who are most unlikely to offer us any assistance. There is a great deal of poverty there, and crime. It is not a natural place for gentlemen to go. It is crowded, dirty and dangerous.”

"So I have heard.”

"You have never been there?”

"Never. As you said, it is not a place any gentleman would wish to be." Duke smiled more widely. "If I were to go searching cheap entertainment, I would choose the Haymarket. I had imagined Rhys would do the same, but possibly I was wrong.”

"He has never been to the Haymarket with you?" Evan asked mildly.

For the first time Duke hesitated.

"I hardly think my pleasures are any of your concern, Mr. Evan. But no, I have not been with Rhys to the Haymarket, or anywhere else, for at least a year. I have no idea what he was doing in St. Giles." He stared back at Evan with steady, defiant eyes.

Evan would like to have disbelieved him, but he thought it was literally true, even if there were an implicit lie embedded in it somewhere. It was pointless to press him on the subject. He was obviously not willing to offer anything and Evan had no weapon with which to draw him against his will. His only tactic was to bide his time, and look as if he were content with it.

"Unfortunate," Evan said blandly. "It would have made our task shorter. But no doubt we shall find those who do. It will take more work, more disruption to others, and I dare say more investigation of private lives, but there is no help for it.”

Duke looked at him narrowly. Evan was not sure if he imagined it, but there seemed a flicker of unease.

"If you want to wait in the morning room, there may be a newspaper there, or something," Duke said abruptly. "It's that way." He indicated the door to his left, Evan's right. "I expect when Papa comes home he'll see you. Not that I imagine he can tell you anything either, but he did teach Rhys at school.”

"Do you imagine Rhys might have confided in him?”

Duke gave him a look of such incredible contempt no answer was necessary.

Evan accepted the invitation and went to the cold and very uncomfortable morning room. The fire had long since gone out and he was too chilly to sit. He walked back and forth, half looking at the books on the shelf, noticing a number of classical titles, Tacitus, Sallust, Juvenal, Caesar, Cicero and Pliny in the original Latin, translations of Terence and Plautus, the poems of Catullus, and on the shelf above, the travels of Herodotus, and Thucydides' history of the Peloponnesian War. They were hardly the reading a waiting guest would choose. He wondered what manner of person usually sat here.

What he really wanted was to ask Kynaston about Sylvestra Duff. He wanted to know if she had a lover, if she was the sort of woman to seize her own desires even at the expense of someone else's life. Had she the strength of will, the courage, the blind, passionate selfishness? But how did you say that to anyone? How did you elicit it from them without their wish?

Not by pacing the floor alone in a cold room, thinking about it. He wished he had Monk's skill. He might have known.

He went to the fireplace and pulled the bell rope. When the maid answered he asked if he could see Mrs. Kynaston. The maid promised to enquire.

He had no picture in his mind, but still Fidelis Kynaston surprised him. He would have said at a glance that she was plain. She was certainly over forty, nearer to forty-five, and yet he found himself drawn to her immediately. There was a composure in her, an inner certainty which was integrity.

"Good evening, Mr. Evan." She came in and closed the door. She had fair hair which was fading a little at the temples, and she wore a dark grey dress of simple cut, without ornament except for a very beautiful cameo brooch, heightened by its solitary presence. The physical resemblance to her son was plain, and yet her personality was so utterly different she seemed nothing like him at all. There was no antagonism in her eyes, no contempt, only amusement and patience.

"Good evening, Mrs. Kynaston," he said quickly. "I am sorry to disturb you, but I need your help, if you are able to give it, in endeavouring to learn what happened to Rhys Duff and his father. I cannot question him. As you may know, he cannot speak, and is too ill to be distressed by having the subject even mentioned to him. I dislike raising it with Mrs. Duff more than I am obliged to, and I think she is too deeply shocked at present to recall a great deal.”

"I am not sure what I know, Mr. Evan," she answered with a frown. "The imagination answers why Rhys may have gone to such an area. Young men do. They frequently have more curiosity and appetite than either sense or good taste.”

He was surprised at her candour, and it must have shown in his expression.

She smiled, a lop-sided gesture because of the extra ordinariness of her face.

"I have sons, and I had brothers, Mr. Evan. Also my husband is the principal of a school for boys. I should indeed have my eyes closed were I to be unaware of such things.”

"Did you not find it difficult to believe that Rhys would go there?”

"No. He was an average young man, with all the usual desires to flout convention as he thought his parents considered it, and yet to do exactly what all young men have always done.”

"His father before him?" he asked.

Her eyebrows rose. "Probably. If you are asking me if I know, then the answer is that I do not. There are many things a wise woman chooses not to know, unless the knowledge is forced upon her, and most men do not force it.”

He hesitated. Was she referring to the use of prostitutes, or something else as well? There was a shadow in her eyes, a darkness in her voice. She had looked at the world clearly and seen much unpleasantness. He was quite sure she had known pain, and accepted it as inevitable, her own no less than that of others. Could it be to do with her son Duke? Might he have a great deal to do with the younger, more impressionable Rhys's behaviour? He was the kind of youth others wanted to impress, and to emulate.

"But nevertheless, you guess?" he said quietly.

"That is not the same, Mr. Evan. What you only guess you can always deny to yourself. The element of uncertainty is enough. But before you ask; no, I do not know what happened to Rhys, or to his father. I can only assume Rhys fell in with bad company, and poor Leighton was so concerned for him that in this instance he followed him, perhaps in an attempt to persuade Rhys to leave, and in the ensuing fight Leighton was killed and Rhys injured. It is tragic. With a little more consideration, less pride and stubbornness, it need not have happened.”

"Is this guess based on your knowledge of the character of Mr. Duff?”

She was still standing, perhaps also too cold to sit.

"Yes.”

"You knew him quite well?”

"Yes, I did. I have known Mrs. Duff for years. Mr. Duff and my husband were close friends. My husband is profoundly grieved at his death. It has made him quite unwell. He took a severe chill, and I am sure the distress has hindered his recovery.”

"I'm sorry," Evan said automatically. "Tell me something about Mr.

Duff. It may help me to learn the truth.”

She had an ability to stand in one place without looking awkward or moving her hands unnecessarily. She was a woman of peculiar grace.

"He was a very sober man, of deep intelligence," she answered thoughtfully. "He took his responsibilities to heart. He knew a large number of people depended upon his skills and his hard work." She made a small gesture of her hands. "Not merely his family, of course, but also all those whose future lay in the prosperity of his company. And you will understand, he dealt with valuable properties and large amounts of money almost daily." A flicker crossed her face, and her eyes lightened as if a new thought had occurred to her. "I think that is one of the reasons Joel, my husband, found him so easy to speak with. They both understood the burden of responsibility for others, of being trusted, without question. It is an extraordinary thing, Mr.

Evan, to have people place their confidence in you, not only in your skills but in your honour, and take it for granted that you will do for them all that they require.”

"Yes…" he said slowly, thinking that he too was on occasion treated with that kind of blind faith. It was a remarkable compliment, but it was also a burden, when one realised the possibilities of failure.

She was still lost in her thoughts. "My husband is the final judge in so many issues," she went on, not looking at Evan, but at some inner memories of her own. "The decisions upon a boy's academic education, and perhaps even more, his moral education, can affect the rest of his life. In fact I suppose when you speak of the boys who will one day lead our nation, the politicians, inventors, writers and artists of the future, then it may affect us all. No wonder these decisions have to be made with care, and with much searching of conscience, and with absolute selflessness. There can be no evasions into simplicity. The cost of error may never be recovered.”

"Did he have a sense of humour?" The words were out before Evan realised how inappropriate they were.

"I beg your pardon?”

It was too late to withdraw. "Did Mr. Duff have a sense of humour?”

He felt the blush creep up his face.

"No…" She stared back at him in what seemed like a moment's complete understanding, too fragile for words. Then it was gone. "Not that I saw. But he loved music. He played the pianoforte very well, you know? He liked good music, especially Beethoven and occasionally Bach.”

Evan was forming no picture of him, certainly nothing to explain what he was doing in St. Giles, except following a wayward and disappointing son whose taste in pleasures he did not understand, and perhaps whose appetites frightened him, knowing the danger to which they could lead disease being not the least of them. He would not ask this woman the questions whose answers he needed, but he would ask Joel Kynaston: he must.

It was another half-hour of largely meaningless but pleasant conversation before the butler came back to say that Mr. Kynaston had returned and would see Evan in his study. Evan thanked Fidelis and followed where he was directed.

The study was obviously a room for use. The fire blazed in a large hearth, glinting on wrought brass shovel and tongs and gleaming on the fender. Evan was shivering with cold, and the warmth enveloped him like a welcome blanket. The walls were decorated with glass-fronted bookcases, and pictures of country domestic scenes. The oak desk was massive and there were three piles of books and papers on it.

Joel Kynaston sat behind it, looking at Evan curiously. It was impossible to tell his height, but he gave the impression of being slight. His face was keen, nose a trifle pinched, mouth highly individual. It was not a countenance one would forget, nor easily overlook. His intelligence was inescapable, as was his consciousness of authority.

"Come in, Mr. Evan," he said with a slight nod. He did not rise, immediately establishing their relative status. "How may I be of service to you? If I had known anything about poor Leighton Duffs death I should already have told you, naturally. Although I have been ill with a fever, and spent the last few days in my bed. However, today I am better, and I cannot lie at home any longer.”

"I'm sorry for your illness, sir," Evan responded.

"Thank you." Kynaston waved to the chair opposite. "Do sit down. Now tell me what you think I can do to be of assistance.”

Evan accepted, finding it less comfortable than it looked, although he would have sat on boards to achieve the warmth. He was obliged to sit upright rather than relax.

"I believe you have known Rhys Duff since he was a boy, sir," he began, making a statement rather than a question.

Kynaston frowned very slightly, drawing his brows together. "Yes?”

"Does it surprise you that he should be in an area like St. Giles?”

Kynaston drew in a deep breath and let it out slowly. "No. I regret to say that it does not. He was always wayward, and lately his choice of company caused his father some concern.”

"Why? I mean for what specific reason?”

Kynaston stared at him. Several reactions flickered across his face.

He had highly expressive features. They showed amazement, disdain, sadness, and something else not so easily read, a darker thing, a sense of tragedy, or perhaps evil.

"What exactly do you mean, Mr. Evan?”

"Was it the immorality of it?" Evan expanded. "The fear of disease, of scandal or disgrace, of losing the favour of some respectable young lady, or the knowledge that it might lead him to physical danger, or greater depravity?”

Kynaston hesitated so long Evan thought he was not going to answer.

When finally he did speak, his voice was low, very careful, very precise, and he held his strong, bony hands in front of him, clutched tightly together.

"I should imagine all of those things, Mr. Evan. A man is uniquely responsible for the character of his son. There cannot be many experiences in human existence more harrowing than witnessing your own child, the bearer of your name and your heritage, your immortality, treading a downward path into weakness, corruption of the mind, and of the body." He looked at Evan's surprise. His eyebrows rose. "Not that I am suggesting Rhys was depraved. There was a predisposition to weakness in him which required greater discipline than perhaps he received. That is all. It is common among the young, especially an only boy in a family. Leighton Duff was concerned. Tragically, it now appears that he had grave cause.”