Acceptable Loss (19 page)

Rathbone put his elbows on the desk, and his fingertips very gently together. “You are offering me life in prison in exchange for full
admission, with details you can prove, of his visit to the boat, the nature of what went on there, and his payment of blackmail money to Parfitt? And all this is in the hope that it will somehow lead you to the man behind it?”

There was no point in arguing the shadings of meaning. “Yes.”

“I’ll ask him, but I’m not sure if I can recommend it is in his interest. God, what a mess!”

Monk did not answer him.

M
ONK WORKED ON THE
river the rest of the day. There had been a large theft of spices from an East Indiaman in the Pool of London, and it took him until nearly midnight to trace the goods and arrest at least half the men involved in the crime. By quarter to one, a new moon in a mackerel sky made the river ghostly. Ships were riding at anchor, sails furled, like a gently stirring lace fretwork against the light, beautiful and totally without color. There was only a faint murmur of water and the sharp smell of salt in the air.

Monk stepped off the ferry at Princes Stairs and walked slowly up the hill to home.

Hester had left the light on in the parlor, but it was only when he stepped in to turn the gas off that he saw she was curled up in the large armchair, sound asleep.

His first thought was clear. She’d been waiting for him, or she would have been in bed. Was Scuff ill? No, of course not. If he were, she would have been with him. He remembered how many nights she had spent in the chair beside Scuff’s bed when he had been injured hunting the assassin in the sewers.

He bent down and spoke her name softly, not to startle her.

“Hester.”

She opened her eyes and sat up, smiling, pushing her hair back off her face where it had fallen out of its pins. “He didn’t do it,” she said with intense pleasure.

Monk was confused and too tired to think. “Who didn’t?”

“Rupert Cardew.” She stood up, so close to him that he could feel the warmth of her and smell her skin and her hair, clean cotton and,
very faintly, soap. “I’m sorry,” she went on. “I know that leaves the case open and you have to go back and start again. But I’m just so glad it wasn’t Rupert.”

“He told you that?” he asked. “I’m surprised they let you in to see him. Did his father take you?”

A look of disgust flickered across her face. “William, for heaven’s sake! I’m not a complete simpleton. No, I haven’t been to see him, nor would I expect him to say anything different.” She smoothed her skirts without much effect; they were creased beyond any help but a flat iron. “With help from Crow, I found a prostitute Rupert visited earlier that day, and she admits that she stole his cravat and gave it to someone else, but she’s terrified to say who. But if Rupert didn’t have it, then he couldn’t have used it to strangle Mickey Parfitt, and that’s the only real evidence against him. All the rest just bears that up. He never denied having been on the boat, or having been blackmailed for it. But so have many other people.”

She had just broken his case against Cardew. He should have been disconcerted, even angry, but instead he felt an absurd sense of relief.

She saw it in his eyes and put her arms around his neck, pulling his head down gently and kissing him.

M
ONK WOKE LATE, AND
Hester was already up. It was a moment or two before he remembered what Hester had told him about the cravat. When it came back, he leaped out of bed, washed, shaved, and dressed as fast as he could. He had a new idea forming in his mind, and he had to draw the pieces of it together, prove them one by one.

He ate the most perfunctory breakfast, and left the house with only a brief word to Scuff and a quick moment of meeting Hester’s eyes, touching her cheek, and then going out of the door.

As he crossed the river again, in the rhythmic movement of the ferry, his mind was absorbed in what this new revelation meant. He had no doubt of what Hester had said, but later he would go and see this young woman and make certain that she had not been influenced to swear she’d taken the cravat. Her testimony might have to stand
up in court. Was it conceivable that Lord Cardew had hired someone to find her and had possibly even paid her to come up with such a lie? He did not believe it, but it was necessary that he be thorough. If they ever found anyone else to accuse, that person would no doubt hire a barrister to defend him who was something like as clever as Oliver Rathbone. The question would be asked.

But Monk would put it off until he had explored other possibilities. Orme had gone over Parfitt’s financial records, such as they were, and had found nothing to suggest that Parfitt had withheld any of the proceeds from the man who had given him the boat. If he had, then it was well hidden, and certainly not spent on his own pleasure. He lived no more comfortably than could be accounted for by the obvious takings of the boat’s trade, without the blackmail. Whoever was behind it had had no apparent motive to get rid of Parfitt. He would only have to be replaced with someone just like him.

Did he already have someone in mind? A friend, a relative, a creditor to whom he owed some favor?

That was the man Monk wanted to catch so intensely that he could taste it like a bitter flavor in his mouth. Was it Ballinger? Or was it even possible that Ballinger was another victim, like Sullivan had been, except turned to recruit more victims, perhaps as the price of his own survival? A dangerous tactic. Ballinger was not a man whose flaws one could manipulate.

Before anything else, Monk needed to know as much as possible of the facts. Where had Ballinger been on the night of Parfitt’s death?

Hester had told him of the ferryman rowing a man resembling Ballinger across the river and then later bringing him back. It would not be difficult to ascertain if it had been Ballinger. If he had been visiting a friend, he would have no occasion to deny it.

“C
ERTAINLY,”
B
ALLINGER SAID WITH
a smile when Monk visited him in his offices in the city. “Bertie Harkness.” He sat at ease behind a large desk. The room was unostentatiously comfortable. Bookcases lined two walls, filled in a disorderly manner with dark leather-bound volumes, clearly there for use, not ornament. There
were old hunting prints on the walls, personal mementoes on sills, a portrait of his wife in a silver frame, a bronze bust of Julius Caesar, a pair of pearl-handled opera glasses.

“Known each other for years,” Ballinger continued. “In fact, far longer than I care to remember. I drop by for a late supper and a little conversation every now and again.” He looked puzzled. “Why does this concern you, Inspector? I find it impossible to believe that you suspect Harkness of anything.” His eyebrows rose. “Or is it me you suspect?” He said it with faint amusement, but his eyes were unnervingly direct.

Monk made himself look surprised. “Of what? You might have some sympathy with whoever killed Mickey Parfitt. Many people might have, myself included. But I don’t think you would lie to protect him.” He gave a slight shrug. “Unless he were a member of your own family, for example. But I have no reason whatever to suspect that.”

Ballinger still appeared puzzled. Monk looked at his hands on the leather inlaid surface of the desk. They were motionless, deliberately held still.

Monk smiled. “I have an idea as to the time you crossed the river, by ferry …” He saw a very faint smile lift the corners of Ballinger’s mouth, and in that instant Monk knew that in spite of Ballinger’s affectation to the contrary, he was not surprised. “Naturally, we questioned anyone that we knew would be in the area,” Monk went on almost expressionlessly. “Such as ferrymen. It is always possible that any witness might have seen something that would later have meaning for them.”

“I did not see Rupert Cardew,” Ballinger replied, studying Monk’s face. “At least not so far as I know. I observed a few other people on the river; some of them looked to be young men, no doubt about private pleasures. I could not responsibly identify any of them. I’m sorry.”

“Even so,” Monk persisted. “If you could tell me the time, as closely as you know it, and exactly what you did see, it might help.”

Ballinger hesitated, as if still puzzled as to its importance.

“Even if it merely confirms someone else’s story,” Monk added. “Or proves it false.”

“I couldn’t identify anyone,” Ballinger said, and gave a slight gesture of helplessness. “Apart from the ferryman, of course, Stanley Willington.”

“Of course,” Monk agreed. “But if you saw one person, or two, it could help. Or if you saw no one, at a time someone claimed to be there …” He allowed it to hang in the air, self-explanatory.

“Yes … I see. Let me think.” Ballinger’s eyes never left Monk’s, as if it were a kind of duel to which neither of them would admit. “I took a hansom as far as Chiswick. I think I arrived there about nine. There were still a number of people around, although it was dark. I saw them as figures on the quayside, talking, laughing. I smelled smoke—cigars. I recall that. It is a highly recognizable aroma. And it suggests gentlemen.”

Monk nodded. It was a clever observation, and he acknowledged it.

“I waited about ten minutes for a ferry. I preferred to have Stanley. He entertains me.” The description was good, and it matched Willington’s own account, as no doubt Ballinger knew it would.

Ballinger continued. All of it was in accordance with what Monk already knew, but it served the purpose he intended. He would check on it, not only with the men on the river, all the way up to Mortlake, a distance of nearly a mile and a half, but with Bertie Harkness, whose address Ballinger also offered.

“Thank you,” Monk said when he was finished and standing by the door. “It may help us catch someone in a lie.”

“I admit, I don’t see the purpose,” Ballinger replied. “Was I misinformed that you have evidence sufficient to bring Rupert Cardew to trial?”

Monk smiled, perhaps a little wolfishly, memory harsh in his mind. “He is defended by Oliver Rathbone,” he replied, “so I need every scrap of evidence I can find. There must be no surprises, no loopholes. I’m sure you understand.”

Ballinger inhaled deeply, then let out a sigh, and smiled back. “Of course,” he agreed, not bothering to conceal the pleasure in his eyes.

———

M
ONK SPENT ANOTHER COMPLETE
day checking on all the accounts he had from ’Orrie Jones, Crumble, Tosh, and various other people on the river who had serviced the boat, before he finally called on Bertram Harkness.

Harkness was a portly man in his early sixties, roughly Ballinger’s own age. He had a military bearing, although he professed no retired rank and made no mention of service. His hair was short and graying, as was his bristling mustache.

He received Monk in the study of his house, a room lined with books, drawings, and a curious mixture of exotic seashells and miniature bronzes of guns, mostly Napoleonic cannons.

“I don’t know what you think I can tell you,” he said rather abruptly. “I was reasonably near the river that night, but I saw nothing and heard nothing. I had a late supper with Arthur Ballinger, whom I have known for years. Since our school days, actually. He often drops by. Been a bit out of it since my injury. Took a bad fall from my horse.” He tapped his right thigh. “Good of Ballinger. Keeps me up with the news I can’t get from the papers, you know?”

“I see. Yes, it must be pleasant to hear a little deeper insight than is printed for the general public,” Monk agreed.

“Damned right. So, what on earth is it you want from me, young man? Ballinger came up by river. Pleasant way to travel on an autumn evening. But for God’s sake, if he’d seen something of this wretched murder, don’t you think he’d have told you?” There was challenge in his voice, and the slightly aggressive cock of his head.

“Yes, sir,” Monk said politely, increasingly aware that Harkness’s temper was thin. “He has already told me precisely what he saw. But it is the timing that matters, and he is not certain about it. I thought you might be able to help in that.”

Harkness appeared mollified. “Ah! Bad business. Sorry for Cardew, poor devil. Lost his eldest son, and spoiled the younger. Happens. Easy mistake. Now he’s going to pay for it up to the hilt. Both sons gone. Family name ruined. Damned grief, children. I’d have the bastard horse-whipped, if they weren’t going to hang him anyway.”

“The time, Mr. Harkness,” Monk reminded him. “It would help a
great deal if you could tell me enough for me to know precisely when Mr. Ballinger was on the river, both coming here and going home again.”

“Doesn’t the damn ferryman know?”

“No, sir.”

“Well, I didn’t look at the clock,” he said brusquely. “We sat down to supper about ten, as I recall. Talked for an hour or so afterward. Dare say he left at midnight. Whatever he says, that’ll be the truth.” Harkness regarded Monk with disfavor. “Good sportsman, Ballinger. Always admire that, you know? No, I don’t suppose you do.” He looked Monk up and down. “Don’t look like a damn policeman, I’ll give you that.”

Monk swallowed his temper with considerable difficulty. “ ‘Good sportsman’?” he inquired.

“That’s what I said. Good God, man, isn’t that simple enough for you? Damn good at the oars. And wrestling. Strong, you see?”

“Yes, sir.” Monk breathed out slowly. There it was, the sudden gift in all the other irrelevant evidence. The idea burned hot and bright in his mind. “Thank you, Mr. Harkness.”

Harkness shrugged. “I like to be fair,” he replied, standing a little straighter.

Monk forbore from making any reply to that, although one rested on his tongue. He thanked Harkness again and allowed the butler to show him out into the blustery darkness of the street, with the damp smell of the river in the air.

He took nearly half an hour to find a ferryman willing to row him back from Mortlake to Chiswick, and he timed how long it took. While he was sitting in the boat he considered what Harkness had told him, and went over in his mind all the times and details that he had been able to confirm.