Anne Perry - Defend and Betray

“Thank you, Dr. Hargrave.” Monk rose to his feet. “You have been very patient.”

“Not at all.” Hargrave stood up and moved towards the door. “I'm only sorry I could be of no assistance. What will you do now?”

“Retrace my steps,” Monk said wearily. “Go back over police records of the investigation, recheck the evidence, times, places, answers to questions.”

“I am afraid you are in for a disappointing time,” Hargrave said ruefully. “I have very little idea why she should suddenly leave all sanity and self-interest, but I fear you will find in the end that Alexandra Carlyon killed her husband.”

“Possibly,” Monk conceded, opening the door. “But I have not given up yet!”

Monk had not so far been to the police about the case, and he would not go to Runcorn. The relationship between them had always been difficult, strained by Monk's ambition forever treading on Runcorn's heels, hungry for his rank, and making no secret that he believed he could do the job better. And Runcorn, afraid in his heart that that was true, had feared him, and out of fear had come resentment, bitterness, and then hatred.

Finally Monk had resigned in rage, refusing to obey an order he considered profoundly incompetent and morally mistaken. Runcom had been delighted, free at last of his most dangerous subordinate. The fact that Monk had proved to be correct, as had happened so often before, had robbed him of victory, but not of the exquisite release from Monk's footsteps at his back and his shadow forever darkening his prospects.

John Evan was a totally different matter. He had not known Monk before the accident and had been assigned to work as his sergeant on his return from convalescence, when he began the Grey case. He had found a man discovering himself through evidence, the views and emotions of others, records of past cases, and not at all certain that he liked what he saw. Evan had learned Monk's vulnerability, and eventually guessed how little he knew of himself, and that he fought to keep his job because to lose it would be to lose not just his means of livelihood but the only certainty he possessed. Even at the very worst times, when Monk had doubted himself, not merely his competence but even his honor and his morality, Evan had never once betrayed him, to Runcorn or to anyone else. Evan and Hester Latterly had saved him when he himself had given it up as impossible.

John Evan was an unusual policeman, the son of a country parson, not quite a gentleman but certainly not a laborer or an artisan. Consequently Evan had an ease of manner that Monk admired and that irritated Runcorn, since both of them in their very different ways had aspirations to social advancement.

Monk did not wish to return to the police station to see Evan. It held too many memories of his own prowess and authority, and his final leaving, when juniors of all sorts had gathered, spellbound and awestruck, ears to the keyhole, to hear that last blazing quarrel, and then had scattered like rabbits when Monk threw open the door and strode out, leaving Runcorn scarlet-faced but victorious.

Instead he chose to seek him in the public house where Evan most frequently took his luncheon, if time and opportunity afforded. It was a small place, crowded with the good-natured chatter of street sellers, newsmen, petty clerks and the entrepreneurs on the edge of the underworld. The smells of ale and cider, sawdust, hot food and jostling bodies were pervasive and not unpleasant. Monk took a position where he could see the door, and nursed a pint of cider until Evan came in. Then he forced his way to the counter and pushed till he was beside him.

Evan swung around with surprise, and pleasure lit his face immediately. He was a lean young man with a long, aquiline nose, hazel eyes and an expression of gentle, lugubrious humor. Now he was quite openly delighted.

“Mr. Monk!” He had never lost the sense that Monk was his superior and must be treated with a certain dignity.”How are you? Are you looking forme?” There was a definite note of hope in his voice.

“I am,” Monk confessed, more pleased at Evan's eagerness than he would willingly have expected, or conceded.

Evan ordered a pint of cider and a thick mutton-and-pickle sandwich, made with two crusty slices, and another pint for Monk, then made his way over to a corner where they could be relatively private.

“Yes?” he said as soon as they were seated. “Have you a case?”

Monk half hid his smile. “I'm not sure. But you have.”

Evan's eyebrows shot up. “I have?”

“General Carlyon.”

Evan's disappointment was apparent. “Oh-not much of a case there, I'm afraid. Poor woman did it. Jealousy is a cruel thing. Ruined a good many lives.” His face puckered. “But how are you involved in it? “ He took a large bite from his sandwich.

“Rathbone is defending her,” Monk answered.”He hired me to try and find out if there are any mitigating circumstances-and even if it is possible that it was not she who killed him but someone else.”

“She confessed,” Evan said, holding his sandwich in both hands to keep the pickle from sliding out.

“Could be to protect the daughter,” Monk suggested. “Wouldn't be the first time a person confessed in order to take the blame for someone they loved very deeply.”

“No.” Evan spoke with his mouth full, but even so his doubt was obyious. He swallowed and took a sip of his cider, his eyes still on Monk. “But it doesn't look like it in this case. We found no one who saw the daughter come downstairs.”

“But could she have?”

“Can't prove that she didn't-just no cause to think she did. Anyway, why should she kill her father? It couldn't possibly gain her anything, as far as she was concerned; the harm was already done. She is married and had a child-she couldn't go back to being a nun now. If she'd killed him, then…”

“She'd have very little chance indeed of becoming a nun,” Monk said dryly. “Not at all a good start to a life of holy contemplation.”

“It was your idea, not mine.” Evan defended himself, but mere was an answering flick of humor in his eyes. “And as for anyone else-who? I can't see Mrs. Carlyon confessing to save Louisa Furnival from the gallows, can you?”

“Not intentionally, no, only unintentionally, if she thought it was Sabella.” Monk took a long pull from his cider.

Evan frowned. “We thought it was Sabella to begin with,” he conceded. “Mrs. Carlyon only confessed when it must have seemed to her we were going to arrest Sabella.”

“Or Maxim Furnival,” Monk went on. “Perhaps he was jealous. It looks as if he had more cause. It was Louisa who was doing the flirting, setting the pace. General Carlyon was merely responding.”

Evan continued with his sandwich, and spoke with his mouth full again. “Mrs. Furnival is the sort of woman who always flirts. It's her manner with most men. She even flirted with me, in a sort of way.” He blushed very slightly, not at the memory- he was a most personable young man, and he had been flirted with before-but at reciting it to Monk. It sounded so unbecomingly immodest. “This can't have been the first time she made a public spectacle of exercising her powers. Why, if he put up with it all these years-the son is thirteen so they have been married fourteen years at least, and actually I gather quite a lot longer-why would Maxim Furnival suddenly lose his head so completely as to murder the general? From what I gather of him, General Carlyon was hardly a romantic threat to him. He was a highly respectable, rather pompous soldier well past his prime, stiff, not much sense of humor and not especially handsome. He had money, but so has Furnival.”

Monk said nothing, and began to wish he had ordered a sandwich as well.