Blind Justice

CHAPTER 11

“Where are you going to begin?” Hester asked Monk over the breakfast table. It was so early in the morning that Scuff was still upstairs getting ready to go to school.

Monk had no need to ask her what she was referring to. The only subject on both their minds was Oliver Rathbone. Monk had lain awake a good deal of the night wondering that same thing himself. He had listened to her even breathing in the dark, not certain if it were actually so even as to indicate that she was deliberately pretending to be asleep; but he had not asked, even in a whisper, because he had no comfort or assurance to offer.

Now she was ignoring her toast and watching him, waiting for his reply, her eyes shadowed and her face tense. He wished he had something positive to say.

“The best thing would be if I could find something to prove that Taft’s death had nothing to do with Oliver,” he replied.

She bit her lip and pulled her mouth tight. “He still gave Warne the picture. Isn’t that what they’re going to charge him with?”

“Yes,” he agreed. “But he could argue that he only realized it was Drew in the photograph when the case was about to close. But yes, of course he should have stepped down.”

“William, he hated what Drew and Taft were doing to those people,” she said grimly. “It revolted him as much as it did us. He did it to ruin Drew’s testimony because he didn’t want those slimy men to get away with it. People are going to know that. But he should have introduced the evidence some other way, so it wasn’t sprung on Gavinton.”

“That is true, and that is what the prosecution will say,” he conceded. “But if Gavinton had had time to prepare a defense, he might have had the picture disallowed, and then its value would have been nothing. As it was, no one else saw it, but they all saw the look of revulsion on Gavinton’s face, and they knew damned well that Drew knew what it was.”

“But Rathbone was still wrong,” Hester concluded.

“Yes.” Monk was not yet satisfied. “But if Taft took his own life because he was guilty, it’s a hell of a lot more than just suicide. If he’d killed only himself Oliver might be seen as to blame. There’s no way anyone could foresee he’d kill his wife and daughters as well. That puts him right outside anybody’s understanding, or sympathy.”

“So how are you going to find out why he killed them too?”

“Learn everything I can,” he replied. “And I’d still like to know what happened to the money. Everyone’s forgotten that, in this mess.”

Hester reached for the marmalade, then realized she had already put some on the side of her plate. “They spent it,” she replied. “That’s obvious.”

“Is it?”

She pulled a little face, just a twitch of her lips. “William, have you any idea what Mrs. Taft’s gowns cost? Or those of her daughters?”

“No.” He was puzzled. “I know what yours cost, and it doesn’t amount to the sort of money that’s missing from the congregation’s donations to charity.”

She sighed. “I suppose, in a backhanded sort of way, I should be pleased that you didn’t notice how beautifully they fitted, or how very up to date they were.”

“But that sort of price?” he said with disbelief.

“A good portion of it. Calfskin boots-kid gloves-silk fichus and guipure lace.”

“So Mrs. Taft knew about the money too,” he deduced.

“Maybe. But not if she simply took delivery of the clothes and never saw the bills. I dare say she never had to manage the household accounts herself and wouldn’t have had the faintest idea.”

“Could she be so-” He stopped as Scuff came into the kitchen, looking at him, then at Hester. He was scrubbed pink, his skin still damp, his shirt collar crisp and blemishless. He drew in breath to say something, then changed his mind. He looked anxious.

Hester never failed to see an expression, and seldom misread it. “What’s wrong?” she asked him.

Scuff cut himself two slices of bread and took the piece of bacon she had left for him on the griddle. He made himself a sandwich and came to sit at the table before answering. He drew in a deep breath, putting off the moment of biting into the fresh bread and the crisp, savory bacon.

“How are we going to help Mr. Rathbone … I mean, Sir Oliver?” he asked. “I could do something …” He glanced down at his plate then up again quickly.

Hester nearly answered, then left it for Monk.

“We were just talking about it,” Monk answered. “I’m going to see if I can find out exactly why Taft killed himself, and why on earth he killed his family. I think there’s something important to that that we don’t know.”

“ ’E was a thief an’ ’e couldn’t take it that everybody would know.” Scuff said what to him was obvious. “Some people are like that. Truth don’t matter; it’s what people think that they care about.”

“The photograph was of Drew, not Taft,” Monk pointed out.

Scuff shrugged and bit into the sandwich. He could no longer resist it. “Maybe there was one of him too,” he said with his mouth full.

Hester started to correct him but changed her mind.

Scuff saw it and gulped down the mouthful, then looked at Monk.

“We are pretty certain there wasn’t. Though we can’t know for sure. It isn’t among the ones Sir Oliver had, anyway.”

Hester poured tea for Scuff and passed him the mug, but he did not touch it; instead he kept staring at Monk. “Oh. Well, what can I do?” he asked again.

Monk saw the eagerness in his face. Scuff needed to help, for Rathbone’s sake, but even more he needed to be part of what they were doing. To shut him out would brand him in his own mind as excluded, and of no use. Perhaps to someone who had always belonged that would be ridiculous, but Monk understood exclusion. His own slow recovery of bits and pieces of his life from before his amnesia had shown him that he had once been a man who did not have a family or a place in other people’s emotions. He had been respected, feared, and disliked. The loneliness he remembered from that life, the absence of warmth that comes from being liked for yourself, not for your achievements, had never totally left him. He could so easily recognize the echo of it in Scuff.

He must find something for Scuff to do, something that mattered.

“You ought to be at school,” he said slowly, to give himself time to think.

Scuff’s face fell. He struggled to hide his hurt and failed.

On the other side of the table Hester stiffened.

“But this is too urgent,” Monk went on, scrambling for an idea. “First I’m going to see Warne, the lawyer Sir Oliver gave the photograph to. Hester says that Mrs. Taft probably spent a lot of the missing money on clothes for herself and her daughters. I think that’s true, but I need to know for certain. The money doesn’t seem to have gone to the charities they named. In fact, we can’t find anyone at even the main charity who admits to getting more than a few pounds from them.” He kept his expression one of concentration, without the shadow of a smile. “Hester, can you see what is known of the Brothers of the Poor? But be careful. On the slight chance they took the money and put it to their own purpose, they won’t welcome inquiries.” He turned a little. “Scuff, Taft’s daughters were a little older than you are. See if you can learn anything about them, or the family. But you also must be very careful! We can’t afford to warn anyone off. Taft is dead, but Drew is very much alive, and he may be dangerous and have some dangerous friends.”

Scuff’s eyes were bright, his face flushed with excitement. “Yeah,” he said with elaborate casualness. “ ’Course I can.”

Warne had no hesitation in seeing Monk; in fact he seemed relieved that he had the opportunity. His office looked chaotic, piles of books and papers on every surface, even one of the chairs. Clearly he had been researching something with a degree of desperation. Monk wondered if Warne, privately, was just as worried as he, Hester, and Rathbone were.

He forced his mind to focus; these piles of law books and references might be related to a completely different case. The law did not stop because Rathbone was in trouble. Hundreds of people were, all over England.

“Sit down, Mr. Monk,” Warne said quickly, picking up a pile of papers to make the best chair available. “I am rather taking it for granted that you are here regarding the Taft case.”

“Thank you.” Monk sat down as Warne took his own seat on the other side of the desk, which was also piled with papers. “Yes. I need to find as much information as I can. There seem to be one or two things that don’t entirely make sense.”

Warne bit his lip. “I wish it didn’t make sense to me. Of course the police have already spoken to me. I couldn’t lie to them. They know perfectly well I didn’t find the photograph myself, nor could I say it had been sent to me anonymously. If it had, I doubt I would have used it.” He sighed. “Added to which, Sir Oliver didn’t lie.”

“Who reported the issue to the Lord Chancellor?” Monk asked bluntly.

Warne was pale and clearly unhappy. “I don’t know. I’ve wondered that myself. Not that it makes a great deal of difference. Even if we could prove that it was done entirely maliciously, it wouldn’t alter the facts. It might make whoever did it look pretty grubby, and spiteful, but it wouldn’t help Rathbone.”

Monk acknowledged that. He wanted to know out of anger rather than for any practical purpose. However, one never knew what information might turn out to be of value. He smiled bleakly. “I understand that, but I’m desperate. I’ll try any avenue.”

“Rathbone has been one of the best lawyers in the country,” Warne said ruefully. “Kind of the standard we all measure ourselves against. But some people don’t take it well when they’re beaten, especially if they thought they were definitely going to win. Punctured arrogance hurts pretty badly.” He shook his head. “Honestly, it would be hard to find out, and almost certainly a waste of time.”

“I don’t have time to waste, that’s true,” Monk admitted. “I need to know the full extent of your case against Taft. I could read through all the court transcripts and try to assess it myself, but it would more efficient if you told me. I’m not asking for confidential information, it’s just that I would prefer to have your opinion, the outline of the case.”

“Of course …” Warne hesitated.

“What is it? Am I asking you to betray anyone else’s interest?” Monk asked him. “Or your own?”

“No,” Warne’s response was instant. “I’d … I’d like to help, as I was the one who used the photograph. Rathbone gave it to me openly and honestly. He left it up to me what I did with it. And yet they are not doing anything more to me than giving me a fairly sharp slap on the wrist for not having shown Gavinton the photograph immediately.”

“Don’t you have to use it, once you’ve seen it?” Monk asked.

“No, not legally. Morally I believe I did. But morally I’m not impartial,” Warne explained. “And really, I’m not even legally impartial, nor am I meant to be. Rathbone is. He should have recused himself, not kept on with the case, even though I’m pretty sure charges wouldn’t have been brought again. Taft was nine-tenths of the way to being acquitted. Personally I think he was one of the most despicable criminals I’ve ever prosecuted.”

There was anger and hurt in Warne’s face that made Monk think of him in a new light. Perhaps in his own way he was as much a crusader as Rathbone had been. He was now seeing the downfall of a man he had spent years trying to emulate. Perhaps he also had known people like the victims of Taft: simple, ordinary people who went to church every Sunday and gave what they could to the charities that helped others, people whose faith was central to their lives. It was trust in those who led them that made the losses and injustices of life bearable.

“It was a just case,” Monk agreed. “Was it a good one legally?”

Warne sighed. “I thought it was, to begin with. I had no doubt that for all his smoothness, Taft was guilty. But as it went on, and Robertson Drew made my witnesses look pathetic and then ridiculous, I felt it slip out of my grasp. I think without the photograph Taft would have been acquitted. Somehow I didn’t even consider not using it. The only question in my mind was how to get it in without putting Rathbone in a place where he had to grant a mistrial. I couldn’t risk that; they might not have brought the case again. It wasn’t as if anyone had died, at that time.”

“But now they have,” Monk pointed out. “That makes it different, in the public perception, if not in law.”

Warne gritted his teeth. “The jury is drawn from the public,” he pointed out. “And that will play into the hands of whoever tries the case against Rathbone. There isn’t going to be much mercy for him among their lordships on the bench. He’s brought them into public disrepute. They’ll all be watched a good deal closer from now on.” He gave his head a little shake, a sharp jerky movement. “What can I do to help?”

Monk was surprised at Warne’s eagerness. He was beginning to realize how deeply Warne felt, not only because of his past admiration for Rathbone. Warne’s feelings were also fueled by his contempt for Taft and perhaps a certain conviction that emotion, as much as legal knowledge, was an integral part of prosecution.

“Tell me as much as you can about the evidence,” Monk replied. “Including your opinions of the people.”

“With pleasure,” Warne replied. “Please heaven you can see something in it that will provide a way out. With all the people Rathbone has convicted in his career, I’d be surprised if he lasted more than a few months in prison.”

Monk caught his breath. For a moment he was not certain what Warne meant, then he saw the fear in his eyes, and he understood. It was his own worst dread put into words. He did not reply, simply took out his notebook ready to write down anything he might forget. He knew the violence in prison, the accidents, the deaths that no one saw happen. There was never proof, only tragedy.

Scuff also knew violence, and how suddenly and easily it could occur. He knew what could happen to Oliver Rathbone, and he had no belief at all that he could be protected if he went to prison. He knew, too, that if they were to help him, they needed to be very careful.

Nevertheless he left Paradise Place with a spring in his step. He did not have to go to school. Not that he didn’t like it. It could even be interesting, but it was a bit cramping at times. Do as everybody else does, listen, and remember. We’ll question you on it later. You can’t just answer. You’ll have to write it down, and spell properly. There is only one right way.

Now he was going to do what really mattered: help Monk and Hester-and Sir Oliver, of course. There might be only one right way for that too. He must not make even the smallest mistake. It was not as if he were the only one who would pay.

He had already thought to leave his good jacket at home. His boots were better than many people’s, but he could scuff them a bit, get them dusty, and no one would notice. He needed to step back into the person he had been two years ago, cunning, hungry, willing to do most things for a cup of tea and a bun.

Monk had asked him to find out about the Taft family, specifically the wife and daughters. That was what he was going to do. He thought about it hard as he took a ferry across the river and sat in the stern, like a grown-up, and watched the sun bright on the water. As usual, the breeze was a bit chilly. He had known the river smell all his life, and he was used to cold.

How was he going to find out about the Tafts? Obviously he’d ask someone who knew things about them, things the family didn’t realize they’d given away. Who would know such things?

He thought about that for quite a long time, even after getting to the other side, paying the ferryman, and walking all the way to the main road and the omnibus stop. The street was busy. There were peddlers, men loading brewers’ drays, costermongers, shoppers at the vegetable carts, butchers’ boys, newspaper sellers. That was the answer: the invisible people saw things because no one noticed them. Delivery boys, scullery maids, postmen, street sweepers, lamplighters, the people you saw every day and didn’t remember. You realized they mattered only when they weren’t there and you went without something you were used to having.

The omnibus drew up and stopped. Scuff jumped on eagerly. He knew exactly where he was going, and what for. He knew how to be charming, how to ask questions without seeming to and make people think he liked them and wanted to hear what they had to say. He had watched both Hester and Monk do it often. And girls always liked to talk about other girls, and clothes, and romance. He might not find out much about Mrs. Taft, but he would hear all sorts of things about her daughters. He was going to detect. He would learn something valuable first, and then he would tell Monk and Hester how he had done it. He would help them save Sir Oliver.

From time to time Monk had done certain favors for men from police forces other than those under his own jurisdiction. Perhaps in the distant past, before his accident and resulting amnesia, that might not have been true. Evidence he found suggested he had been grudging to share back then if he could avoid it. Now he thought such an attitude not only mean-spirited but also tactically shortsighted. He saw the wisdom in not only doing favors now and then, but also in being seen to return a favor done for him.

He was grateful to be owed a few that he could now collect. He chose them very carefully. Inspector Courtland was a lean, middle-aged man who had worked his way up the ranks to a position of some power, but he never forgot the great, decent family that had nurtured him. Monk knew that his mother was a churchgoing woman who had raised five children after her husband was killed in an industrial accident. Courtland spoke of her in such a way that Monk had envied him a family childhood, which, if he had had such a thing himself, he could remember nothing of now.

He did not insult Courtland by pretending he was doing anything other than collecting a favor. He would not have appreciated such condescension himself.

“Not my case personally,” Courtland explained as they shared a couple of pints of ale and remarkably good pork pies in a public house half a mile from Courtland’s police station. “But of course I know about it. What do you need?”

Monk smiled and took another bite of his pork pie. “They do a very good baked apple here.”

Courtland nodded. “Good. It’ll take that long for me to tell you all I can about Mr. Taft and his unfortunate ending. Mind, you didn’t hear it from me.”

“Of course not,” Monk agreed. “I observed it all myself, or deduced it. I don’t know that it’s going to be any damned use anyway. But there’s something in all this that we don’t understand.”

“Something?” Courtland raised his eyebrows. “There’s everything. Starting with, where is the money? Going on to, where did Rathbone get the picture of Drew? Why did Taft kill himself because Drew was a child abuser and pornographer? And why the devil did he kill his wife and daughters? But the facts say that that is what happened.” He took another mouthful of his pie. “And you know as well as I do that if we can prove a thing happened we don’t have to find a sane reason for it-or any reason at all.”

“Just tell me as much as you know of what are absolute facts,” Monk asked. “The sort of thing the best defense in the world couldn’t shake.”

Courtland stopped halfway through his pie and took another long draft of his ale. He put his tankard down again and met Monk’s eyes.

“Taft and his wife came home from court after the revelation about Drew and the photograph,” he began. “They got there a little after five o’clock. Both daughters were at home, but there were no servants in the house.”

“At five in the afternoon? Why not?” Monk asked, his mouth full.

“Apparently they all gave notice when the scandal broke and Taft was accused of misappropriating the charity money. Mrs. Taft is probably the only one who could confirm that, though, and she’s not here to say different, poor woman,” Courtland explained.

“But he hadn’t been found guilty yet,” Monk said with some surprise. “Looks as if they didn’t expect him to be acquitted. Why was that? Did they know something more than the prosecution did?”

“A good question,” Courtland answered. “But I doubt we’ll get a straight answer from them. If they left because they thought he was guilty, they’ll want to stay far away from the whole thing.”

Monk thought for a moment, drinking more of his ale, and Courtland waited.

Someone slapped the plump barmaid lightly on the behind, and there was a burst of laughter from the next table. She flounced off, giggling.

“Did they go before the trial began, or afterward?” Monk asked. “Because, according to the prosecution, they thought they had a good case against Taft, until Drew started to give evidence. Then he pretty well destroyed it.”

“You’re giving the servants credit for more foresight than I think they warrant,” Courtland told him grimly. “Looks more like they went as soon as they got a decent offer anywhere else. The feeling was much divided in the community. Still is. Servants don’t like uncertainty. Can’t blame them. If you’ve been in a home where there’s a scandal it can be hard to find another place.”

“Yes, I suppose so,” Monk agreed. “So the daughters were home, and Mr. and Mrs. Taft got back at about five o’clock. What then?”

Courtland shook his head. “Their lawyer, Gavinton, called by. He’s not sure as to the exact time, but he thinks about half past eight. He said Taft was very upset, but he didn’t think he was in the least suicidal.”

Monk smiled bleakly. “Well, he would say that. He’s hardly likely to admit he found the man looking as if he’d kill his family and then himself. He’d have a lot of explaining to do if he walked out and left them after that.”

“True,” Courtland conceded. “All the same, it’s easy enough to believe that as far as Gavinton was concerned, Taft was distressed at the prospect of conviction, as any other man would’ve been, and upset to find that the man he had trusted so completely was a child abuser and pornographer. But that isn’t the type of distress that drives you to kill your family and then yourself. You really can’t blame Gavinton for not noticing that anything seemed out of the ordinary, given what the circumstances were.”

“Does he blame himself?” Monk asked curiously.

“Actually, yes, he does. He says he ought to have seen it, but he didn’t.”

“What about Drew? Did he call?”

“No. Not while Gavinton was there, anyway, and there is nothing to suggest that he came later on. But even if he had, Taft didn’t die until a few minutes after five in the morning, by which time Drew was miles away and can prove it. So can Gavinton. Not that anyone suspects him.”

“Five in the morning?” Monk was mildly surprised. “That’s late to commit suicide. Just about daylight again.” Had Taft sat up all night, trying to think of a way out? Or trying to find the courage to end his life?

“Yes, it is,” Courtland agreed. “Neighbors heard the shot and sent for the police. They got there from the local station well within half an hour. They found Taft shot through the roof of the mouth. Mrs. Taft had been strangled and both daughters suffocated. The gun was there, the house doors were locked. Drew was at home in his bed, as his servants will testify.” He swallowed the last of his pie. “Naturally the police searched the house, but they could find nothing to suggest anything other than the tragically obvious conclusion.”

Monk was largely ignoring his food, good as it was. He tried to picture the scene in his mind. It was all too easy. He had tasted despair himself, in the long dark hours of the night. Most people do, at one time or another. Money problems become insurmountable; news comes of a death in the family; there is incurable illness, failure, a consuming love that is not returned; or perhaps there is simply the loss of a friend who to that point had made all other grief bearable.

Some people retreat into silence, some weep, some lose their tempers and break things, very few kill themselves. That is a journey whose end is unknown, except that there is no return from it. Why had Taft, a man who professed an overpowering Christian faith, taken that road?

The obvious answer was that his faith was not real and perhaps never had been-at least not for some considerable time. But Hester had felt that his self-love was real enough; that didn’t fit the picture of suicide either.

“Do you believe the police’s conclusion?” Monk asked Courtland, looking up to meet his eyes.

“Short of finding some evidence to the contrary, I have to,” Courtland replied. “And I can’t even think of what that evidence could be.”

Monk could think of nothing either. He finished his meal in near silence, then thanked Courtland and left.

Monk spent the rest of the day examining the police evidence in detail, and it stood up to his closest scrutiny. Both Gavinton and Drew’s accounts of their whereabouts were unassailable. Gavinton had been at home with his wife and family. His wife was restless and had not slept well. She had told the police, ruefully, that the sight of her husband sleeping, blissfully unaware of her insomnia, had added to her sense of being utterly alone in the house. She had finally given in to temptation, and woken her lady’s maid to make her a cup of hot milk. The maid had confirmed this, with sufficient detail to remove doubt.

Monk had not considered Gavinton likely to be guilty of violence anyway. He decided to go to see him only because such an omission would have been incompetent.

He had found Gavinton pale-faced and looking harassed. He agreed to speak to Monk with the air of a man who felt he had little alternative. He was standing behind an unusually tidy desk, no more than one pile of papers on it.

“I’m not sure what I can tell you, Mr. Monk.” He waved his hand indicating the chair opposite. “I am as stunned as you must be by Taft’s suicide. Even more that he should take the fearful action of killing his family as well. I have no explanation to offer.”

“Was there anything he said or did that with hindsight seems relevant to you now?” Monk asked, aware that Gavinton had no obligation to answer him.

Gavinton was profoundly disconcerted. He was not used to a failure he could not deny, or about which he could shift most of the blame on to someone else. He looked down at the all-but-empty desk. “I’ve thought about that, and in spite of the fact that I defended the man, and therefore I imagined I had come to know him to a degree-I certainly knew where I thought him most vulnerable-the answer is that I cannot think of anything that makes sense of what he’s done. Believe me; I want to for my own sake.”

Monk smiled bleakly. He had no difficulty in believing that.

“You saw him that evening …” he began.

“Yes. He was upset, of course. But he hadn’t actually seen the photograph,” Gavinton said quickly.

“Did you tell him what it was?” Monk had no intention of letting him escape the issue.

“I had no choice,” Gavinton said tartly. “He had to understand why I couldn’t allow it to be seen by the jury. It was … repellent. The boy was only five or six years old … thin as a rail. If you’d seen his face-” He stopped abruptly, his voice choking off. “I think if the jury’d seen it they’d have wanted to hang Drew. I did myself.” He gave a violent shudder, something of a courtroom gesture. Even now he could not entirely stop playing for effect.

“And Taft?” Monk pursued. “Was he disillusioned to the point of despair?” Monk was trying to imagine what might have been going through Taft’s mind.

“I described it as factually as I could, without details,” Gavinton replied. “Taft was stunned, and angry, but he certainly didn’t appear insane or suicidal.”

Monk did not reply to that.

“Could there have been a photograph of him also?” he asked instead.

Gavinton looked as if he were cornered, his face tight, eyes moving from one point to another in the room. He considered for a few moments before at last replying, “I thought about that too, but it didn’t seem to be on his mind. He was disillusioned with Drew, of course, but his overriding distress seemed to spring from the realization that Drew changing his testimony would mean he himself would almost certainly be convicted. Whatever sentence Rathbone handed down, Taft’s career as a preacher was over, and that mattered to him above all else.”

“Did you see Mrs. Taft?” Monk asked.

Gavinton looked even paler. “Yes. The poor woman was distraught. I think that up until that time she had believed Taft innocent. Or if not innocent, at least she had convinced herself it was some slight error, a misjudgment, but not more than that. I imagine she wondered how on earth she would survive. His reputation would be ruined. He would be in prison, and I have no idea how she could have provided for herself. I might have wondered if she had taken her own life, but one cannot strangle oneself.”

“Many women can make their own way in life,” Monk answered, even though a degree of pity stirred within him. “Many widows do, and all women who don’t marry. They may have little to spare on luxuries, but they survive. That is the lot of most people in the world. She was still quite young, and very handsome. She could have married again.”

“It hardly matters,” Gavinton pointed out. “She is dead. Perhaps Taft thought she wouldn’t survive without him.”

“And his daughters as well?” Monk asked. “What damnable arrogance and stupidity.”

“Damnable indeed,” Gavinton said quietly. For the first time genuine humility touched him. “I’m sorry. I failed more than I could have imagined in this one.” He looked numbed by the magnitude of the disaster.

Monk was uncertain he had learned anything of value, but he thanked Gavinton for his time, rose to his feet, and left.

He also checked Drew’s whereabouts at the time of Taft’s death, not with Drew himself but with the police. According to their files Drew lived in a modest but very comfortable house two or three miles away from Taft’s home. He had two resident servants: a manservant and a woman to do the cleaning and laundry. They both lived on the premises. The door had bolts on the inside, which were not undone during the night.

Drew said he had slept uneasily; that was easy to believe. He had supposedly paced the floor of his study until close to midnight then gone to bed. Within a quarter of an hour of the shots being heard at Taft’s house, Drew had woken his manservant when he had accidentally dropped a bottle of whisky in his study and smashed it on the marble hearth.

It was convenient, but it was also unarguable. Were it Drew who was dead, Monk thought wryly, he might have more grounds for suspecting Taft of murder. Even had it been Drew who had committed suicide, it would have been easier to understand. But nothing the police had found involved Drew in Taft’s death.

There were at least fifty pictures, aside from Drew’s, in Rathbone’s possession. But did anyone else have copies of the pictures? Ballinger had run the club, but that didn’t necessarily mean he was the only one with photographs. There could be someone else involved, someone who might be protecting his own skin, or cutting himself a piece of the blackmailing profit.

But none of this speculation helped Rathbone. Rathbone needed evidence that proved to the law that he was within the bounds of his judicial behavior, and to the public that he was not responsible for the death of Taft, or his wife and daughters.

Monk had a deep, cold fear that no such thing would exist. Whatever Rathbone’s intentions, and he did not doubt them, his actions had been disastrous.

He decided he must find a way to search Taft’s house, see where he had killed himself, look at his belongings, and get inside the mind of the man who had done such a thing. And he must do it legally.

First he returned to the financial side of the crime, getting all the papers Dillon Warne could give him, but this time looking not for evidence of embezzlement but for an indication of the Taft family’s daily life: their tastes, their expenses, their pleasures.

He chose to do it at the Portpool Lane clinic with Squeaky Robinson, because Squeaky could interpret figures into evidence.

Squeaky complained all evening about the time it was taking, and how many better things he had to do, and that this was not what he was paid for. But at the same time there was a deep satisfaction in him that he still might help Rathbone and that Monk had recognized his value and had asked for his assistance. Behind the scrape of his voice there was a distinct pleasure, and he worked with both speed and skill. It was a matter of double-entry bookkeeping; there were payments to companies for shipments that had appeared to take place, but had not done so. Occasionally there were complicated calculations that took very careful repeating to see where the figures had disappeared. Monk found it difficult to follow, but when Squeaky explained it, finally he understood. A little after midnight he leaned back in his chair and looked across at Squeaky.

“I see,” he said quietly. “Thank you.”

Squeaky inclined his head in acknowledgment. “He was a bad bastard,” he said quietly. “He stole thousands, drove some of them poor souls into beggary ’cos they swallowed his lies. Still don’t know what he did with it. It’s somewhere he can reach it. I’ll bet the house on that! Just got to find it. Everything that poor devil Sawley said about him were true, an’ they made him look like an idiot. That was wrong.”

Monk looked at Squeaky’s thin face with its angular features and stringy hair. For all his oddity, his sense of the wrong in humiliating another person gave him a kind of dignity.

“You’re right,” Monk agreed. “And Robertson Drew deserved to be pilloried for it too. He lied about the money, about people, and probably about everything else. If he were to get blackmailed over his personal indulgences, I would think that a very appropriate fate.”

“What are we going to do about all this?” Squeaky said, thinking practically.

Monk noticed that Squeaky still considered himself part of the battle.

“I’m not certain,” he replied thoughtfully. “Taft is the only one charged with a crime directly, and he is dead. I imagine Drew will remain very quiet for some time and then probably disappear off to another city and start again-new name, new congregation. Anywhere as large as Manchester or Liverpool and he’d probably never be recognized.” He realized as he said it just how much that angered him.

Squeaky regarded him with quiet disgust. “An’ you’re going to let that happen?”

“First thing is to do something to vindicate Rathbone,” Monk answered him. “Once he’s in prison we’ll not get him out again.”

“He won’t bloody survive it!” Squeaky agreed, his anger hot again. “Bad bastards he’s put away, somebody’ll stick a knife in his guts in the first month … or sooner. You’d better think sharpish.” He stared at Monk as if expecting something immediate in return, a plan of battle.

Monk was stung by the unreasonableness of it, and yet also flattered, which was ridiculous. Why did he care what Squeaky Robinson, of all people, thought of him?

“I can only keep returning to one question: Why did Taft kill himself and his family?” Monk said slowly. “What purpose did it serve?”

“Personally, I’d have wanted to kill Taft. I think he got off easy,” Squeaky responded reasonably. “There’s something big as we don’t know here, if you ask me.”

Monk stood up slowly, his back stiff. “I agree. But I don’t know how on earth we’re supposed to find it.” He indicated the papers on the table between them. “All this says to me is that Taft stole a very great deal of money over a long period of time. It would be interesting to know who else got a cut, and in what proportion. But right now I’m too tired to think. I’ll start again in the morning. Thank you for your help.”

“Ain’t finished yet,” Squeaky said grimly. “There’s something more here. But I s’pose that’s enough for tonight.”

Monk did not argue. He was so tired his body ached, and he knew that if there was any better answer to Rathbone’s guilt, he had not found it.

Monk was home and in bed by three in the morning. He slept far later than he had intended to and woke with a start, the room full of sunlight. He sat up sharply, saw the clock, and scrambled out of bed.

Fifteen minutes later he was sitting at the kitchen table sipping hot tea. He was well aware that his hair was untidy and that he was less than perfectly shaved. Many urgent things gnawed at his mind. He was too late to have caught Scuff, who was presumably already off to school, for once perhaps needing no persuasion.

Hester was looking at him expectantly, waiting for him to tell her what he had learned, and he was embarrassed that it was of so little use.

“I’ve got to find the money,” he repeated. “Even Squeaky doesn’t have much of an idea where it actually is. Taft lived well, but not well enough to account for all that’s missing.” He sipped his tea, which was still too hot to drink easily. “If we don’t find it, then the court will point out that it could certainly have gone to a different charity, that it just wasn’t properly documented.”

“If Taft has it somewhere, then it must be where he could have reached it,” Hester reasoned.

“Or he gave it to Drew,” he added.

She frowned. “Would Taft really have trusted anybody else with it?”

He sat silently for a few moments. “I doubt it,” he conceded at last.

“Do you really think it’s possible, what you said-that they gave it to another charity and just didn’t record it?” she asked skeptically.

This time he did not hesitate. “No. It’s somewhere.”

“Do you think Drew at least knows where it is?” she asked.

“Yes, probably,” he agreed. “I think that when he was testifying it was as much to save himself as to save Taft.”

Hester looked at him pensively. “If I had been in Taft’s place, I think I’d have wanted to kill Drew, if I killed anyone at all!”

“Of course you would.” He bit his lip but still failed to hide a smile. “But then you are about as like Taft as I am like Cleopatra.”

She looked him up and down, smiling herself. “I don’t see it,” she said drily. “Perhaps a slightly better shave?” Then her amusement vanished. “Even if he did want to kill himself … his poor family …”

“I know that if I were in that kind of trouble I’d want you and Scuff to go and take everything you could with you,” Monk admitted. “My one comfort would be that you would survive.”

She looked at him witheringly. “And you think either of us would go? I would never leave you, unless it would be to help somehow, and Scuff wouldn’t forgive me if I did.”

“I would want you to survive,” he repeated, refusing to think of it any more vividly. “It would be about the only thing that would salvage some honor-apart from the fact that I love you.”

Her smile was so sweet, so gentle that for a moment he felt a warmth rush up inside him and tears prickled his eyes. He felt absurd, overemotional. He was afraid to speak in case his voice betrayed him.

“But then, of course, you wouldn’t have gotten yourself into the kind of mess Taft was in,” she said, as if continuing her own thought.

He knew she was speaking to fill the silence and save him from the betrayal of his vulnerability.

“There is something we don’t know, there just has to be,” she continued. She looked a touch desperate suddenly.

“It’s not your fault, you know, just because you began the investigation.” He said the first thing that sprang to his mind, or perhaps it was there already.

“Yes it is,” she responded immediately. “There wouldn’t even have been a case if I hadn’t listened to Josephine Raleigh and started to look into it. And then I asked Squeaky’s help, and it was he who found the financial evidence. Without that, they wouldn’t have brought anything to court.”

He raised his eyebrows. “So we shouldn’t try to catch criminals or prosecute them in case the trial ends badly for some of the people involved? Punishment does slop over the sides sometimes and land on the bystanders as well. Sometimes they deserve it and sometimes they don’t. Mrs. Taft certainly didn’t deserve to die, but she was quite willing to live very well indeed on the profits of Taft’s embezzlement.”

Hester stared at him, her brow furrowed in thought. “I wonder how many women bother to consider if the money they spend is honestly earned or not. I know what you do to provide for us, but then I don’t have half a dozen hungry children to clothe and feed, teach, nurse, and generally keep clean and happy. Maybe if I did, then I wouldn’t have time to wonder about much.”

“Mrs. Taft didn’t have half a dozen,” Monk pointed out. “Added to which, she knew perfectly well what Taft did for a living because he did it in front of her. And she must have seen the clothes of the congregation and been able to have a damn good guess as to their income.” He felt the anger rise inside him. “Couldn’t you place someone pretty well by their clothes, how many times a collar had been turned, socks darned, children’s clothes patched? Don’t you know the age of a dress by its cut and color?”

Her eyes flickered for an instant. “Yes,” she said gently. “But I care. Perhaps she didn’t want to.”

“Perhaps?” he said with a sharp edge of sarcasm.

She gave a slight, surprisingly elegant shrug. “It’s still not an offense worthy of death.”

“Of course it isn’t,” he agreed. “I’m sorry, that isn’t what I meant.” He reached forward and touched her hand. “The jury is going to say that this was Oliver’s fault, which may not be fair, but we have to deal with the fact. I don’t know where further to look for evidence of what really happened, or why. It doesn’t seem possible that anyone else killed him.”

“Then we need to find the reason why Taft killed himself,” she said intently. “Maybe if the trial had gone on, something more would’ve come out. What if he couldn’t face it?” Her voice dropped at the last few words, as if she were not sure if she believed it herself. “He was a very arbitrary, very domineering sort of man.”

He was startled. “Why do you think that? You said that in church he was charming, courteous …”

She rolled her eyes. “William! People are not always the same at home with their families as they are in public, especially men.” Her face softened, her eyes were suddenly very gentle. “If you could remember the past, going to church with your parents, you’d know that better.”

The hurt that might have caused was healed before it began by the look in her face. What did the past matter when the present held such sweetness?

He smiled, having no words for what he felt. “So what makes you say that of Taft, then?” he insisted.

“You asked Scuff to find out,” she replied. “I know it was mostly to give him something to do, to feel he was helping, but he discovered quite a lot about the family.”

Monk stiffened. “Who from? Was he-”

“No, he wasn’t in any danger,” she answered him with a slight smile. “Actually, he was very astute. You’d be proud of his detective work. He found the scullery maid who was dismissed, and a delivery boy who spent rather more time in the Tafts’ kitchen than he should have. Apparently Taft was something of a martinet in his own house. Everything ran to his rules: what they ate and when; family prayers for everybody, like it or not; what they were allowed to read; even what color their dresses should be.”

Monk was amazed, and a little doubtful. “And the scullery maid knew all this?”

“Her best friend was the tweeny. They shared a bedroom,” Hester explained. “And believe me, between-stairs maids are all over the house and observe a great deal.” She bit her lip and for a moment her eyes were bright with tears, pity, memory, and very painful laughter. “If you have a scandal in the house, the last thing you should do is let all your staff leave.”

He sat thinking for a moment, absorbing what she had told him. A very different, sad, and frightening picture was emerging of Mr. Taft.

“So he killed himself to save what?” he asked. “Not his family, obviously.”

“I don’t know!” She clenched her fists on the tabletop.

He hesitated a moment, but honesty compelled him to speak. “Hester, we’ve got to face it-legally, Oliver was wrong. Morally, I don’t know; he meant well, but that doesn’t make it right. He shouldn’t have kept those pictures in the first place.”

“That’s like saying you want to have an army to defend us if we’re attacked, but for heaven’s sake don’t give them guns!”

“That’s a bit extreme.”

“Is it?” she demanded. “Of course power’s dangerous. Life is dangerous. I know Oliver’s not perfect. But what is ‘perfect,’ anyway? Most of the people I know who have never made a mistake are that way because they never do anything at all. If people didn’t take risks there would be no exploration, no inventions, no great works of art. We certainly won’t defend anyone accused of anything, in case they turn out to be guilty. We wouldn’t let ourselves fall in love, in case the other person hurt us or let us down or, above all, in case we saw in him some of our own weaknesses.”

“Hester …”

“What?” She faced him, her eyes blazing and full of tears.

“You’re right,” he said gently. “Don’t ever change … please.” He stood up. “I’ve got to get to Wapping. Poor Orme has been covering for me for heaven knows how long.”