Anne Perry - A Sunless Sea

The sergeant winced. “Are you tellin’ me as you didn’t know?” Clearly that was incredible to him.

“No, I didn’t,” Monk answered. “I’m inquiring into the murder of a woman whose body was found on Limehouse Pier, five days ago. It was likely that Dr. Lambourn knew her. I was hoping he might be able to tell us something more about her.”

The sergeant looked startled. “That poor soul what was cut up by some bleedin’ butcher? Beggin’ your pardon, sir, but you got that wrong. Dr. Lambourn was a quiet, very respectable gentleman. Wouldn’t ’urt anyone. An’ ’e wouldn’t know any woman in that way o’ business.”

Monk wished to point out that many people appeared different in public from the way they might be in private, in the darkness of a backstreet far from where they lived. However, he could see in the man’s face that he was not open to any such suggestion about Lambourn.

“What kind of a doctor was he?” he asked instead. “I mean, what sort of patients did he treat?”

“ ’E din’t treat patients,” the sergeant replied. “ ’E studied, learned things about sickness an’ medicines an’ such.”

“Do you know what kind of illnesses?” Monk persisted. It might not matter at all, but so far Dr. Lambourn was the only person who seemed to have known Zenia Gadney as more than just a casual neighbor. So he would take any details he could get.

“No,” the sergeant replied. “But he asked a lot of questions about medicines, especially opium and laudanum, and stuff like that. Why? What’s that got to do with this poor creature you got in Limehouse?”

“I really don’t know, except that she took opium sometimes, for headaches and things.”

“So does ’alf England,” the sergeant said derisively. “ ’Eadaches, stomachaches, can’t sleep, baby’s crying, cutting its teeth, old folks got rheumatics …”

“Yes, I suppose so,” Monk conceded. “What was Dr. Lambourn studying that he asked about opium and the medicines containing it? What sort of questions did he ask, do you know?”

“No, I don’t. He was always a very quiet gentleman, with a good word for everyone. Not meaning any disrespect, Mr. Monk, but you must ’ave been misinformed some’ow. Dr. Lambourn was as decent a man as you’ll find anywhere.”

Until he had further information on the subject, he would gain nothing by arguing. He thanked the sergeant and walked outside into the street. Lambourn may well have paid Zenia Gadney sufficient money to live on, but he could tell them nothing now, and he could not possibly be responsible for her death, since he himself had apparently died two months earlier. Still, Monk would like to know more about him, even if only for the light it would throw on Zenia Gadney’s life.

“Sir!” the sergeant said abruptly from the doorway.

Monk turned back. “Yes?”

“Don’t go botherin’ Mrs. Lambourn, sir. It was all ’ard enough at the time. Leave the poor lady alone.”

So there was a Mrs. Lambourn. Monk wanted to ask more about her, but something in the sergeant’s expression troubled Monk, an anger that seemed out of place.

“What did Dr. Lambourn die of?” he asked instead.

The sergeant looked down at his hands. “ ’E took ’is own life, sir. Cut ’is wrists. Leave ’er alone … sir.” It was a warning, as much as he dared make it.

Monk had no choice but to go and speak to Joel Lambourn’s widow. If she knew nothing about her husband’s relationship with Zenia Gadney, this would be a very hard time to learn about it. If she did know, perhaps that was part of the reason he had taken his life. Monk did not want to hurt the poor woman any further, but Zenia Gadney also deserved some justice. It was urgent that Monk catch the butcher who had killed her and see him hanged; the newspapers were spreading the panic with their wild articles. There were rumours of half-men, half-beast creatures prowling the dockside area. Monk had even seen some irresponsible fool suggesting that a monster had arisen from the river, come in on the tide from some deepwater lair.

Half an hour later he was at the Lambourns’ front door in Lower Park Street, a few hundred yards from Greenwich Park, with its trees and walks, and of course the Royal Observatory, from which the world’s time was taken. The street was an area of quiet, solid houses for people who lived hardworking and private lives. He hated doing this, but he knew there was no choice so he did not hesitate.

The door was opened by a parlor maid dressed in a plain, stiff blouse and skirt and a crisp white apron. She looked at him inquiringly. “Yes, sir?”

He introduced himself and asked if he might speak to Mrs. Lambourn. He apologized for intruding on her privacy, and quickly mentioned that it was a matter of importance, or he would not have come.

He was shown to a pale green morning room overlooking the street. The curtains were half drawn, leaving the chairs in shadow and one warm patch of sunlight on the patterned carpet. There was no fire lit, but it was likely that Mrs. Lambourn was not receiving many visitors at the moment.

Monk thanked the maid. When she had gone and the door was closed, he looked around the room. The walls were lined with bookcases, all of them full. He walked over to read the titles. They covered all sorts of subjects, not merely medical texts and histories, but general British history, Chinese history (which he had not expected to see), and some very recent texts on the modern history of the United States of America.

On the opposite wall he found philosophies, the complete works of Shakespeare, Milton’s Paradise Lost , and Gibbon’s The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire . There were even a number of novels.

He was still looking at them when Dinah Lambourn came in. The slight sound of her closing the door startled him and he turned to face her.

“I’m sorry,” he apologized. “You have a most interesting selection of books!”

“My husband’s,” she said quietly.

Under normal circumstances she would have been a striking woman. She was tall, and had high cheekbones and a strong face, which now looked vulnerable, almost bruised with grief. She wore black unrelieved by any jewelry at all. Her rich, dark brown hair was the only color about her, apart from the dark blue hue of her eyes.

Her sadness was so palpable Monk felt a stab of guilt again for having come to her with such a wretched question to ask. What sort of a man had Joel Lambourn been that he could have left a woman like this and gone all the way across the river and west to the Limehouse area to find a drab woman like Zenia Gadney? Was he weak, and Dinah overpowered his dull personality? Did he fail to answer her needs, emotionally or physically, and he wanted some plain, ordinary woman who asked nothing of him? Or perhaps who dared not criticize?

Or did he have a darker side that he had not wanted Dinah to know of?

She was waiting for Monk to explain himself. How could he tell why he had come and cause her the least pain possible? And yet he must learn the truth.

“Did you know a woman named Zenia Gadney, who lived in Copenhagen Place, in Limehouse?” he asked quietly.

She blinked, as if the question puzzled her. She stood still for several moments, as though searching her memory. “No, the name is not familiar,” she said at last. “But you said ’did I know.’ Has something happened to her?”

“I’m afraid it has. This is unpleasant, Mrs. Lambourn. Perhaps you would prefer to sit down.” He said it in a tone that made it more a request than merely a suggestion.

She complied, slowly, her face going even paler, her eyes fixed on his. “How does that concern me?” Her voice trembled.