Anne Perry - The Twisted Root

The police believed Miriam was a material witness to the crime who had not offered them the truth, even when pressed. She was a woman apparently not guilty of murder but quite plainly in a state close to hysteria, and not fit to be released except into the care of some responsible person who would look after her and also be certain that she was present to appear in court on the witness stand as the law demanded. Lucius and his father were the obvious and willing candidates.

It was passionately against her will. She stood white-faced in the police station, turning from Robb to Monk.

"Please, Mr. Monk, I will give any undertaking you like, pledge anything at all, but do not oblige me to go back to Cleveland Square! I will gladly work in the hospital day and night, if you will allow me to live there."

The police station superintendent looked at her gravely, then at Robb.

"I think…" Robb began.

But the superintendent did not wish to hear his opinion. "You are obviously distressed," he said to Miriam, speaking slowly and very clearly. "Mr. Stourbridge is to be your husband. He is the best one to see that you are given the appropriate care and to offer you comfort for the grief you naturally feel upon the arrest of a woman who showed you kindness in the past. You have suffered a great shock. You must rest quietly and restore your strength."

Miriam swung around to gaze at Monk. Her eyes were wild, as if she longed to say something to him but the presence of others prevented her.

He could think of no excuse to speak to her alone. Major Stourbridge and Lucius were just beyond the door waiting to take her back to Cleveland Square. There was a constable on one side of her and the desk sergeant on the other. Their intention was to support her in case she felt faint, but in effect they closed her in as if she were under restraint.

There was nothing he could do. Helplessly, he watched her escorted from the room. The door opened and Lucius Stourbridge stepped forward, his face filled with tenderness and joy. Behind him Harry Stourbridge smiled as if the end of a long nightmare was in sight.

Miriam tripped, staggered forward and had to be all but carried by the constable and the sergeant. She flinched as Lucius touched her.

Hester was home before Monk, and was looking forward to his coming, but when he came in through the door and she saw his face, she knew instantly that something was very seriously wrong. He looked exhausted. His skin was pale and his dark hair limp and stuck to his brow in the heat.

Alarm welled up inside her. "What is it?" she demanded urgently.

He stood in the middle of the floor. He lifted his hand and touched her cheek very lightly. "I know what it is you couldn’t tell me … and why. I’m sorry I had to pursue it."

She swallowed. "It?"

"The stolen medicines," he answered. "Who took them and why, and where did they go? It’s a far more obvious cause for blackmail."

She tried not to understand, pushing the realization away from her. "The medicines couldn’t have anything to do with Miriam Gardiner."

"Not directly, but one leads to the other." His eyes did not waver, and she knew that he was quite certain of what he said.

"What? What connection?" she asked. "What’s happened?" There was no purpose in suggesting he sit down or rest in any fashion until he had told her, and neither of them pretended.

"Cleo Anderson stole the medicines to treat the old and the sick," he answered her softly. "Somehow Treadwell knew of it, and he was blackmailing her. Perhaps he followed Miriam. Maybe she unintentionally let something slip, and he pieced together the rest."

"Cleo’s involved? Do you know that?" She was confused, her mind whirling. "If Treadwell was blackmailing Cleo Anderson, then why would Miriam kill him? To protect her? It doesn’t explain why she left Cleveland Square. What about Lucius Stourbridge? Why didn’t she go back to him and explain? Something …" She trailed off. None of it really made sense.

"Miriam didn’t kill Treadwell," he told her. "The police let her go. She was defending Cleo because of old loyalties, and probably because she believed in her cause as well."

"That isn’t enough," she protested. "Why did she leave Cleveland Square in the middle of the party? Why wouldn’t she allow Lucius to know where she was?"

"I don’t know," he admitted. "She was released into his care, and she looked as if she were going to an execution. She begged not to be, but they wouldn’t listen to her." A frown creased his face and there was pain etched more deeply than the weariness. "For a moment I thought she was going to ask me to help her, but then she changed her mind. They all but carried her out."

She heard the edge of pity in his voice. She felt it herself, and she was angered that the police authorities should consider that Miriam needed to be released into anybody’s care. She should have been permitted the dignity of going wherever she wished, and with whomever. She was no longer charged with anything.

But far more immediate, and closer to her own emotions, was her concern for Cleo Anderson.

"What are we to do to help her?" She took for granted that he would.

Monk was still standing in the middle of the room, hot, tired, dusty and with aching feet. Remarkably, he kept his temper.

"Nothing. It is a private matter between them now."

"I mean Cleo!" she said. "Miriam has other people to care for her. Anyway, she is not accused of a crime."

"Yes, she is: complicity in concealing Treadwell’s murder. Even though she says she did not know he was dead. She is almost certainly a witness to the attack. The police want her to testify."

She waved her hand impatiently. She did not know Miriam Gardiner, but she did know Cleo and what she had done for old John Robb and others like him.

"So she’ll have to testify. It won’t be pleasant, but she’ll survive it. If she’s worth anything at all, her first concern will be for Cleo, and ours must be, too. What can we do? Where should we begin?"

His face tightened. "There’s nothing we can do," he replied briefly, moving away from her and sitting down in one of the chairs. The way his body sank, the sudden release at the last moment, betrayed his utter weariness. "I found Miriam Gardiner, and she is returned to her fiance. I wish it were not Cleo Anderson who is guilty, but it is. The best I could do was stop short of finding any proof of it, but Robb will. He’s a good policeman. And his father’s involved." He was angry with himself for his emotions, and it showed in his face and the sharp edge to his voice.

She stood in the center of the floor, cool and fresh in a printed cotton dress with wide skirts and a small, white collar. It was pretty, and it all seemed terribly irrelevant. It was almost a sin to be comfortable and so happy when Cleo Anderson was in prison and facing … the long drop into darkness at the end of a rope.

"There must be something…." She knew she should not argue with him, especially now, when he was exhausted and probably very nearly as distressed about this as she was. But her self-control did not extend to sitting patiently and waiting until a better time. "I don’t know what… but if we look … Maybe he threatened her. Perhaps there was some degree of self-defense." She cast about wildly for a better thought. "Maybe he tried to coerce her into committing some sort of crime. That could be justified…."

"So she committed murder instead?" he said sarcastically.

She blushed hotly. She wanted to swear at him, use some of the language she had heard in the barracks in Sebastopol, but it would be profoundly unladylike. She would despise herself afterwards, and more important, he would never look at her in the same way again. He would hear her words in his ears every time he looked at her face. Even in moments of tenderness, when she most fiercely desired his respect, the ugliness would intrude.