Anne Perry - Death Of A Stranger

Monk took it, rising also. It was a firm, strong grip, unaffected. Dalgarno was extremely sure of himself, but with a sharp edge of hunger, an ambition in which Monk could see himself as he had once been… in fact, not so long ago. He had left merchant banking and financial venture far behind, but as a policeman that ambition had merely been redirected. Every case was still a battle, a personal challenge.

His charges from Katrina Harcus were to save Dalgarno and to prevent any possible disaster, and to do either of them he needed to have as much knowledge as he could of Jarvis Baltimore.

“One further question, Mr. Dalgarno,” he said casually. “There are always risks of land purchase posing problems. The best deals can founder on that if a section of the proposed track runs into difficulties. Not everyone sees progress as a blessing.”

Dalgarno’s face was mute testimony of his understanding.

“Who deals with that subject in your company?” Monk enquired. “Yourself? Or Mr. Baltimore?”

Was there a slight hesitation in Dalgarno, or was it only that Monk wanted to see it there?

“We’ve all dealt with it at one time or another,” Dalgarno replied. “As you say, it is a subject which can cause a great deal of concern.”

Monk frowned. “All?”

“The late Mr. Nolan Baltimore was also concerned with land,” Dalgarno explained.

“Indeed.” Monk was about to continue when the door opened and a man he instantly assumed to be Jarvis Baltimore stood in the entrance, his face a little flushed, his expression impatient. “Michael, I…” He saw Monk and stopped abruptly. “I’m sorry. I didn’t know you had a client.” He held out his hand. “Jarvis Baltimore,” he introduced himself.

Monk took Baltimore’s hand and felt a grip a little too powerful, as of someone determined to exert his authority.

“Mr. Monk represents a client interested in a large purchase of rolling stock,” Dalgarno explained.

Baltimore fixed his expression into one of ease and interest, although his body still carried a barely suppressed tension. “I’m sure we can help you, Mr. Monk. If you give us your client’s requirements, we will quote for you on all goods.”

“And services?” Monk raised his eyebrows. “Mr. Dalgarno said you also have some skill in negotiating the purchase of land and right-of-way.”

Baltimore smiled. “Certainly. At a fee, of course!” He glanced quickly at Dalgarno, then back at Monk. “Now I’m afraid we must both leave the discussion for today. My family has very recently been bereaved, and Dalgarno is a close friend-one of us, almost. My mother and sister are expecting us both this evening…”

Monk looked to Dalgarno and saw the quick response in his face, the immediacy of his answer. Was that ambition, affection, pity? He had no way of telling.

“I’m sure you understand,” Baltimore went on.

“Of course,” Monk agreed. “Again, please accept my condolences. This was only a preliminary discussion. I will report back to my principals, and they will instruct me further. Thank you very much for your time, Mr. Baltimore, Mr. Dalgarno.”

He excused himself and took his leave, turning over impressions in his mind as he made his way home.

“What was Dalgarno like?” Hester asked him an hour later over a supper of grilled fish with mashed potato and onions. “Do you think he is involved in any kind of fraud?”

He hesitated before he replied, surprised by how decisive his answer was. She was watching him with interest, her fork poised in the air.

“I don’t know whether there is any fraud or not,” he replied steadily. “But if there is, I would find it hard to believe he was duped. He seemed knowledgeable, intelligent, and far too ambitious to leave anything to chance-or to anyone else’s judgment. I would think him the last man to trust his welfare to another.”

“Then Miss Harcus’s opinion of him is formed more by being in love than the reality?” She smiled a trifle ruefully. “We all tend to see people we care about rather more as we wish them to be. Are you going to tell her he is very well able to care for his own reputation?”

“No,” he said with his mouth full. “At least not until I know if there is any land fraud or not. I’m going to Derbyshire tomorrow to look at the survey reports, and then at the site.”

She frowned. “Why is she so convinced that there is something wrong? If it is not Dalgarno, who is it she thinks is to blame?” She put her fork down, forgetting her meal altogether. “William, is it possible that it was Nolan Baltimore, the man who was killed in Leather Lane, and his death had to do with land fraud, and not prostitution at all? I know he probably wasn’t there because of land,” she went on quickly. “I do know what Abel Smith does for a living!” Her mouth twisted in a tight little smile. “And I assume he went there for that purpose. But it would make sense, wouldn’t it, if whoever killed him followed him there and chose that place in order to disguise his real motive?”

This time she ignored the quickening of his interest.

“And left Baltimore there so anyone would assume exactly what they do,” she went on. “Except his family, of course. Did I tell you his daughter came to me in Coldbath Square to ask if I knew anything that could help clear his name?”

“What?” He jerked forward. “You didn’t tell me that!”

“Oh… well, I meant to,” she apologized. “Not that it makes any difference. I can’t, of course. Tell her anything, I mean. But the family would want to believe it was nothing to do with prostitution, wouldn’t they?”

“They wouldn’t be keen to think it was land fraud either,” he said with a smile. But the thought took fire in his mind. It fitted with what he had seen of the two younger men in Baltimore’s offices, what Katrina Harcus believed of Dalgarno, and it made more sense of Nolan Baltimore’s death than a prostitute’s or a pimp’s having killed him.

Hester was looking at him, waiting for his response.

“Yes,” he agreed, taking more fish and potato. “But I still don’t know if there is any fraud-or, if you’re right, I suppose I should say was! I must go to Derbyshire tomorrow and see the site. I need all the maps, in large detail, and I need to look at exactly what they are doing.”

She frowned. “Will you know from that? I mean, just looking at the maps and the land?”

This was the time to tell her of his jolting memory, his sense of familiarity with the whole process of surveying for railways, and the land purchase with its difficulties. He had told her long ago of the snatches he had remembered of Arrol Dundas and his helplessness to prove the truth at the time. She would understand why he was compelled now to learn the truth about Baltimore and Sons, whether Katrina Harcus needed it or not. If he explained his fears it would make it easier if he had to admit later on that he had been at least partly implicated in the fraud-and the disaster afterwards which it may have caused.

He thought of her work with the women in Coldbath Square. She would be going back there tonight. She was dressed for it already, a long night’s hard and thankless labor. He might not see her again until after he came back from Derbyshire. It should wait until another time, when he would have the opportunity to be with her, to assure her of… what? That whatever he had been in the past, he was no longer that man anymore?

“I don’t know,” he said. That was in essence true, even if not all of it. “I don’t know what better to try.”

She picked up her knife and fork and started to eat again. “If I hear anything more about Nolan Baltimore, I’ll tell you,” she promised.