The Silent Cry (21 page)

"I saw 'im under the lights," the patterer responded. "Faces is me business, least it's part of it. I 'member 'is eyes partic'lar. Not like most folks. Big, black almost. "E looked lorst.”

"Lost?”

"Yeah, like 'e weren't sure wot 'e wanted nor which way ter go. Kind o' miserable.”

"That can't be unusual around here." "E don' belong around 'ere. I knows most 'oo belongs 'ere. Don' I, Mr. Shotts?”

Shotts looked startled. "Yeah… yeah, I s'pose you would.”

"But you go Seven Dials way as well." Evan remembered what Shotts had said about the patterer telling him of Monk's case. "Have you seen him there too?" It was a remote chance, but one he should not overlook.

"Me?" the patterer looked surprised, his blue eyes staring at Evan. "I don' go ter Seven Dials. This is me patch.”

"But you know what happens there?" He should not give up too easily, and there was an uncertainty at the back of his mind.

"Sorry, guy, no idea. Yer'd 'ave terask some o' them wot works there.

Try Jimmy Morrison. "E knows Seven Dials.”

"You don't know about violence in Seven Dials, towards women?”

The patterer gave a sharp, derisive laugh. "Wot, yer mean diff rent from always?”

"Yes!”

"Dunno. Wot is it?”

"Rape and beatings of factory women.”

The patterer's face wrinkled in disgust. Evan could not believe he had already known. Why had Shotts lied? It was a small thing, very small, but what was the point of it? It was out of the character he knew of the man, and disturbing.

"You told me he knew," he said as soon as they were a dozen yards away.

Shotts did not look at him. "Must 'a bin someone else," he replied dismissively.

"Don't you write down who tells you what?" Evan pressed. "It makes a lot of difference. Did you ever speak to him before on this case?”

Shotts turned into the wind and his answer was half lost.

"Course I did. Said so, didn't I?”

Evan let the matter rest, but he knew he had been lied to, and it troubled him. His instinct was to like Shotts, and to respect his abilities. There was something he did not know. The question was, was it something important?

He saw Monk that evening. Monk had left a note for him at the police station, and he was happy to spend an hour or two over a good meal in a public house, and indulge in a little conversation.

Monk was in a dour mood. His case was going badly, but he had considerable sympathy for Evan.

"You think it could be the widow?" he asked, his eyes level and curious. The slight smile on his lips expressed his understanding of Evan's reluctance to accept such a thing. He knew Evan too well, and his affection for him did not prevent his amusement and slight derision at his optimism in human nature.

"I think it was probably just what it looked like," Evan replied gloomily. "Rhys was a young man who had been indulged by his mother, and whose father had great expectations of him which he possibly could not live up to, and did not want to. He indulged a selfish and possibly cruel streak in his character. His father went after him to try to stop him, perhaps to warn of the dangers, and somehow they became involved in a fight with others. The father died. The son was severely injured physically, and so horrified by what he saw that now he cannot even speak.”

Monk cut into the thick, light suet crust of his steak and kidney pudding.

"The question is," he said with his mouth full, 'were they both attacked by the denizens of St. Giles, or did Rhys kill his own father in a quarrel?”

"Or did Sylvestra Duff have a lover, and did he either do it himself, or have someone else do it?" Evan asked.

"Who is he? Samson?" Monk raised his eyebrows.

"What?”

"He took on two men at once, killed one and left the other senseless, and walked away from the scene himself," Monk pointed out.

"Then there was more than one," Evan argued. "He hired somebody, two people, and it was coincidence Rhys was there. He was following Leighton Duff, and happened to come on him when he had found Rhys.”

"Or else Rhys was in it with his mother," Monk swallowed and took a mouthful of his stout. "Have you any way of looking into that?" He ignored Evan's expression of distaste.

"Hester's there. She's nursing Rhys," Evan replied. He saw the emotion cross Monk's face, the momentary flicker, the light and then the shadow. He knew something of what Monk felt for her, even though he did not understand the reasons for its complexity. He had seen the trust between them. Hester had fought for Monk when no one else would.

She had also quarrelled when, at least to Evan, it made no sense at all. But he knew the dark areas of Monk's heart prevented him from committing himself as Evan would have. Half-memories and fears of what he did not know made it impossible for him. What he did not know was whether it was fear for Hesterand the hurt he might cause her in that part of himself which lay secret, or simply fear for himself and his own vulnerability if he allowed her to know him so well, to become even more important to him, and to understand it himself.

Nothing in Monk's behaviour let him know. He thought perhaps Hester did not know either.

Monk was halfway through his meal.

"She won't tell you," he said, looking at his plate.

"I know that," Evan replied. "I'm not placing her in the position of asking.”

Monk looked up at him quickly, then down again.

"Made any advance in your case?" Evan asked.

Monk's expression darkened, the skin on his face tight with the anger inside him.

"Two or three men came into Seven Dials quite regularly, usually a Tuesday or Thursday, about ten in the evening up until two or three in the morning. As far as I can tell they were not drunk, nor did they go into any public houses or brothels. No one seems to have seen their faces clearly. One was of above average height, the other two ordinary, one a little heavier than the other. I've found cabbies who have taken them back to Portman Square, Eaton Square…”

"They're miles apart!" Evan exclaimed. "Well, a good distance.”

"I know," Monk snapped. "They've also been taken to Cardigan Place, Belgrave Square and Wimpole Street. I am perfectly aware that they may live in three different areas, or more likely very simply have changed cabs. I don't need you to tell me the obvious. What I need is for the police to care that over a dozen women have been beaten, some of them badly injured and could have been dead, for all these animals cared!

What I need is a little sense of outrage for the poor as well as the inhabitants of Ebury Street: a little blind justice, instead of justice that looks so damned carefully at the size and shape of your pockets, and the cut of your coat before it decides whether to bother with you or not!”

"That's unfair," Evan replied, staring back at him with equal anger.

"We have only so much time, so many men, which you know as well as I do. And even if we find them, what good would it do? Who's going to prosecute them? It will never get to court, and you know that too!" He leaned forward, elbows on the table. "What are you hoping for, Monk? Private vengeance? You'd better be dammed sure you are right!”

"I shall be!" Monk said between his teeth. "I shall have the proof before I act.”

"And then what murder?" Evan demanded. "You have no right to take the law into your own hands, or to put it in the hands of men you know will take it for themselves. The law belongs to all of us, or we are none of us safe!”

"Safe!" Monk exploded. "Tell that to the women in Seven Dials! You're talking about theory… I'm dealing with fact!”

Evan stood his ground. "If you find these men and tell whoever has hired you, and they commit murder, that will be fact enough.”

"So what is your alternative?" Monk said.

"I haven't one," Evan admitted. "I don't know.”

As he had told Evan, Monk was having peripheral success in finding the men responsible for the rapes and violence in Seven Dials. He was still not sure if there were generally three, or only two. No cabby could reliably describe three men at any one time. Everything that was said was imprecise, vague, little more than an impression: hunched figures in the fog and cold of the winter night, voices in the darkness, orders given for a destination, shadows moving in and out, a sudden shift in weight in the cab. One driver was almost certain that a third person had got out at an intersection where he had been obliged to stop because of the traffic.

Another had said one of his fares had been limping badly. One had been wet as though rolling in a gutter or fallen in a water butt. One, caught briefly in the coach light had had a bloody face.

There was nothing to prove any of them were the men Monk was looking for.

On Sunday, when he knew he would find her at home, he told Vida Hopgood as much. Seated in her red parlour before a very healthy fire, and sipping dark brown tea with so strong a flavour, he was glad of a sticky sweet bun to moderate it a little.

"Yer sayin' yer beat?" she asked contemptuously, but he heard the note of disappointment in her and saw the shadow cross her eyes. She was angry, but her shoulders sagged beneath the burden of hope lost.

"No, I'm not!" he responded sharply. "I'm telling you what I know so far. I promised I'd do that, if you remember?”

"Yeah…" she agreed grudgingly, but she was sitting up a little straighter. She looked at him with narrowed eyes. "Yer do believe they was raped, don't yer?”

"Yes, I do," he said without doubt. "Not necessarily all by the same men, but at least eight of them probably were, and three of them I think may be provable.”

"Mebbe?" she said guardedly. "Wot use's "mebbe"? Wot about the others? "Oo done them, then?”

"I don't know, and it doesn't matter. If we prove two or three, that will be enough, won't it?”

"Yeah! Yeah, it'll do fine." She stared at him, defying him to ask her what she planned to do about it.

He had not intended to ask. He was angry enough not to care.

"I'd like to speak to more women." He took another sip of the bitter tea. The flavour was appalling, but it did have an invigorating effect.

"Wot fer?" She was suspicious.

"There are gaps in times, weeks when I know of no one attacked. Is that true?”

She thought for several minutes before she answered.

"Well?”

"No, it in't. Yer could try Bella Green. Din't wanna bringer inter it, but if I 'ave ter, then I will.”

"Why not?”

"Geez! Why the 'ell der yer care? Because 'er man's an ol' sol'jer an' it'll cut 'im up sum mink terrible ter know as she bin beat, an' 'e couldn't 'elp 'er, let alone that she goes aht ter earn wot 'e can't, that way. Poor sod lorst 'is leg at the Battle o' the Alma. In't good fer much now. "Urt bad, 'e were. Never bin the same since 'e come back.”

He did not let his emotion show.

"Any others?”

She offered him more tea, and he declined.

"Any others?" he repeated.

"Yer could try Maggie Arkwright. Yer prob'ly won't believe a word wot she says, but that don' mean it in't true… sometimes, anyway.”

"Why would she lie to me about that?”

"Cos 'er geezer's a thief, professional like, an' she'll never tell a rozzer the truth, on principle." She looked at him with wry humour.

"An' if yer thinks as yer can kid 'er yer in't, yer dafter 'n I took yer fer.”

"Take me to them.”

"I in't got time nor money ter waste. Yer doin' anythin' 'cept keepin' bread in yer belly, an' yer pride?" Her voice rose. "Yer any damn use at all? Or yer gonna tell me in a monfs time that yer dunno 'oo done it, any more'n yer do now, eh?”

"I'm going to find who did it," he said without even a shadow of humour or agreeability. "If you won't pay, then I'll do it myself. The information will be mine." He looked at her with cold charity, so she could not possibly mistake him.

"Or'ight," she said at length, her voice very low, very quiet. "I'll take yer ter Bella, anter Maggie. Get up then. Don' sit all day usin' up me fire!”

He did not bother to reply, but rose and followed her out, putting his coat back on as they went through the door into the street where it was nearly dark and the fog was thicker. It caught in his throat, damp, cold and sour with the taste of soot and old smoke.

They walked in silence, their footsteps without echo, sound swallowed instantly. It was a little after five o'clock. There were many other people on the streets, some idling in doorways, having lost heart in begging, or seeing no prospects. Others still waited hopefully, peddling matches, bootlaces and similar odds and ends. Some went briskly about business, legal or illegal. Pickpockets and cut purses loitered in the shadows, and disappeared again, soft-footed. Monk knew better than to carry anything of value.

As he followed Vida Hopgood along the narrow alleys, staying close to the walls, memory hovered at the edge of his mind, fleeting impressions of having been somewhere worse than this, of urgent danger and violence. He passed a window, half filled with straw and paper, ridiculous as a barrier against the cold. He turned as if thinking he knew what he would see, but it was only a blur of yellow faces in the candlelight, a bearded man, a fat woman, and others equally meaningless to him.

Who had he expected? His only feeling was of danger, and that he must hurry. Others were depending upon him. He thought of narrow passages, crawling on hands and knees through tunnels, and the knowledge all the time that he could fall head first into the abyss of the sewers below and drown. It was a favourite trick of the thieves and forgers who hid in the great festering tenements of the "Holy Land', seven or eight acres between St. Giles and St. George's. They would lead a pursuer along a deliberate track, through alleys and up and down stairs. There were trap doors to cellars leading one to another for hundreds of yards. A man might emerge half a mile away, or he might wait and stick a knife into his pursuer's throat, or open up a trap to a cesspool. The police went there only armed, and in numbers, and even then rarely. If a man disappeared into the rookeries he might not be seen again for a year. It hid its own, and trespassers went there at their peril.

How long ago had that been? "Stunning Joe's' public house had gone. He knew that much. He had passed the corner where it used to be. At least he thought he knew it. The "Holy Land' itself had certainly opened up. The worst of the creaking tenements were gone, collapsed and rebuilt. The criminal strongholds had crumbled, their power dissipated.

Where had the memory come from, and how far back was it? Ten years, fifteen? When he and Runcorn had both been new and inexperienced, they had fought there side by side, guarding each other's backs. It had been a comradeship. There had been trust.

When had it gone? Gradually, a dozen, a score of small issues, a parting of the paths of choice, or one sudden ugly incident?

He could not remember.

He followed Vida Hopgood across a small yard with a well in it, under an archway and then across a surprisingly busy street and into another alley. It was bone-achingly cold, the fog an icy shroud. He racked his brain, and there was nothing there at all, only the present, his anger with Runcorn now, his contempt for him, and the knowledge that Runcorn hated him, that it was deep and bitter and that it governed him. Even when it was against his own interest, his dignity and all that he wanted to be, it was so passionate in him he could not control it. It consumed his judgement. "Ere! Wot's the matter wivyer?" Vida's voice cut across his thoughts, dragging him back to Seven Dials, and the rape of the sweatshop women.

"Nothing!" he said sharply. "Is this Bella Green's?”

"Course it is! Wot the 'ell dyer think we're 'ere fer?" She banged on the rickety door and shouted Bella's name.

It was several minutes before it was answered by a girl somewhere between twelve and fifteen. Her long hair was curling and knotted, but her face was clean and she had nice teeth.

Vida asked for Bella Green.

"Me ma's busy," the girl replied. "She'll be back in a wile. You wanna wait?”

"Yeah." Vida was not going to be put off, even had Monk allowed it.

But they were not permitted in. The child had obviously been warned about strangers. She slammed the fragile door and Monk and Vida were left on the step in the cold.

"The gin mill," Vida said immediately, taking no offence. "She'll 'a gorn ter get Jimmy a bottle. Dulls the pain, poor sod.”

Monk did not bother to enquire whether the pain was physical, or the bleak despair of the mind. The difference was academic, the burden of living with it was the same.

Vida's guess was right. Inside the noise and filth of the gin shop, the sound of laughter, the shards of broken glass and the women huddled together for warmth and the comfort of living flesh rather than the cold stones, they found Bella Green. She was coming towards them cradling a bottle in her arms, holding it as if it were a child. It was a few moments' oblivion for her husband, a man she must have seen answer his country's call whole and full of courage and hope, and received back again broken in body and fast sinking in mind as he looked at the long, hopeless years ahead, and daily pain.

Beside her a woman wept and sank slowly to the floor in the maudlin self-pity of gin drunkenness.

Bella saw Vida Hopgood and her tired face showed surprise, and something that might have been embarrassment.

"Need ter see yer, Bella," Vida said, ignoring the gin as if she had not seen it. "Din' wanner. Know yer busy wi' yer own troubles, but need yer 'elp.”

"Me 'elp!" Bella could not grasp it. "Per wot?”

Vida turned and went out into the street, stepping over a woman fallen on the cobbles, insensible to the cold. Monk followed, knowing the uselessness of trying to pick anyone up. At least on the ground they could fall no further. They'd be colder, wetter, but less bruised.

They walked quickly back to the door where Monk and Vida had knocked.

Bella went straight in. It was cold and the damp had seeped through the walls. It smelled sour, but there were two rooms, which was more than some people had. The second had a small black stove in it, and it gave off a faint warmth. Sitting beside it was a man with one leg. His empty trouser hung flat over the edge of his chair, fastened up with a pin. He was clean shaven, his hair combed, but his skin was so pale it seemed grey, and there were dark shadows around his blue eyes.

Monk was reminded of Hester with a jolt so sharp it caught his breath.

How many men like this must she have known, have nursed, have seen them when they were carried in from the battlefield, still stunned with horror and disbelief, not yet understanding what had happened to them, what lay ahead, only wondering if they would survive, hanging on to life with the grim, brave desperation that had brought them so far.

She had helped them during the worst days and nights. She had dressed the appalling wounds, encouraged them, bullied them into fighting back, into hanging on when there seemed no point, no hope. As she had done to him, at the end of the Grey case. He had wanted to give up then.

Why waste energy and hope and pain on a battle you could not win? It was exhausting, futile. It had not even dignity.

But she had refused to give up on him, on the struggle. Perhaps she was used to going on, enduring, keeping up the work, the sense of purpose, the outward calm, even when it seemed utterly useless. How could exhausted men fight against absurd odds, survive the pain and the loss, support their fellows, except if the women who nursed them showed the same courage and blind pointless faith?

Or perhaps faith was never pointless. Maybe faith itself was the point? Or courage?

But he had not meant to think of Hester. He had promised himself he would not. It left an emptiness inside him, a sense of loss which pervaded everything else, spoiling his concentration, darkening his mood. He needed his energy to think of details he was storing in his mind about the violence in Seven Dials. These women had no help but that which Vida Hopgood could wring from him. They deserved his best.

He must forget the man slumped in the chair, waiting with desperation for the few hours' release the gin would give him, and concentrate on the woman. Perhaps it could even be done without him realising his wife had been raped. Monk could word it so it sounded like a simple assault. There was a great difference between what one thought one knew, privately, never acknowledging directly, and what one was forced to admit, to hear spoken, known by others where it could never after be forgotten.

"How many men where there?" he asked quietly.

She knew what he was referring to, the understanding and the fear were plain in her eyes.

"Three.”

"Are you sure?”

"Yeah. First there was two, then a third one came. I din't see where from.”

"Where was it?”

"The yard orff Foundry Lane.”

"What time?”

"About two, near as I can remember." Her voice was very low, never once did she look sideways at her husband. Perhaps she wanted to pretend he was not there, that he did not know.

"Do you remember anything about them? Height, build, clothes, smell, voices?”

She thought for several minutes before she replied. Monk began to feel a lift of hope. Perhaps that was foolish.

"One o' them smelled like sum mink odd," she said slowly. "Like gin, on'y it weren't gin. Kind o'… sharper, cleaner, like.”

"Tar? Creosote?" he guessed, as much to keep her mind on it as in hope of defining it quickly.

"Nah… cleaner 'n that. I know tar. An' I know creosote. Weren't paint nor nuffink. Anyway, 'e weren't a labourer, 'cos 'is 'ands was all smooth… smoother 'n mine!”

"A gentleman…”

"Yeah Vida gave an ugly snort expressive of her opinion.

"Anything else?" Monk pressed. "Fabric of clothes, height, build?

Hair thick or thin, whiskers?”

"No w'iskers." Bella's face was white as she recalled, her eyes dark and hollow. She was speaking in little more than a whisper. "One o' them was taller than the others. One were thin, one 'eavier. The thin one were terrible angry, like there were a rage eatin' 'im up inside. I reckon as mebbe 'e were one o' them lunatics from down Lime'ouse way, wot eats them Chinese drugs an' goes mad.”