The Silent Cry (30 page)

"You'll not be the first in the line," Monk said drily. "But we have to find them before we can do anything about it.”

MacPherson looked at him with a bleak smile, showing his teeth. "I know you, Monk. Ye may be a hard bastard, but ye're far too fly to provoke a murder that can be traced back to ye. Ye'll no tell the likes o' me what ye find.”

Monk smiled back at him, although it was the last thing he felt like.

Every other time he spoke, MacPherson was adding new darkness to Monk's knowledge of himself. Had he really been a man who had led others to believe he could countenance a murder, any murder, so long as it could not be traced to him? Could it conceivably be true?

"I have no intention of allowing you, or Vida Hopgood, to contrive your own revenge for the attacks," he said aloud, icily. "If the law won't do it, then there are other ways. These men are not clerks or petty tradesmen with little to lose. They are men of wealth and social position. To ruin them would be far more effective. It would be slower, more painful, and it would be perfectly legal.”

MacPherson stared at him.

"Let their own punish them," Monk went on drily. "They are very good at it indeed… believe me. They have refined it to an art.”

MacPherson pulled a face. "Ye have no' changed, Monk. I should no' have underestimated ye. Ye're an evil devil. I could no' cross ye. I tried to warn Runcorn agin ye, but he was too blind to see it. I'd tell him now to watch his back for getting rid o' ye from the force, but it would no' do any good. Ye'll bide your time, and get him, one way or another.”

Monk felt cold. Hard as he was, MacPherson thought Monk harder, more ruthless. He felt Runcorn the victim. He did not have the whole story. He did not know Runcorn's social ambitions, his moral vacillation when a decision jeopardised his own career, or how he trimmed and evaded in order to please those in power… of any sort.

He did not know his small-mindedness, the poverty of his imagination, his sheer cowardice, his meanness of spirit!

But then Monk himself did not know the whole story either.

And the coldest thought of all, which penetrated even into his bones was Monk responsible for what Runcorn had become? Was it something he had done in the past which had warped Runcorn's soul and made him what he was now?

He did not want to know, but perhaps he had to. Imagination would torment him until he did. For now, perhaps it would be useful to allow MacPherson to retain his image of Monk as ruthless, never forgetting a grudge.

"Who do I go to?" he said aloud. "Who knows what's going on in St.

Giles?”

MacPherson thought for a moment or two.

"Willie Snaith, for one," he said finally. "And old Bertha for another. But they'll no' speak to ye, unless someone takes ye and vouches for ye.”

"So I assumed," Monk replied. "Come with me.”

"Me?" MacPherson looked indignant. "Walk out on my business? And who's to care for this place if I go attendin' to your affairs for ye?”

Monk took one of Vida's guineas out of his pocket and put it on the table.

MacPherson grunted. "Ye are desperate," he said drily. "Why? What's it to you if a few miserable women are raped or beaten? Don't tell me any of them mean something to you!" He watched Monk's face closely. "There must be more. These bastards cross you somehow? Is that it? Or is it still to do with Runcorn and the po-liss? Trying to show them up, are ye?”

"I've already told you," Monk said waspishly. "It's not a police case.”

"Ye're right," MacPherson conceded. "It couldn't be. Not one for putting himself out on a limb, Runcorn. Always safe, always careful.

Not like you!" He laughed abruptly, then rose to his feet. "All right, then. Come on, and I'll take you to see Willie.”

Monk followed immediately.

Outside, dressed again in heavy overcoats, MacPherson led the way deeper into St. Giles, and the old area that had earlier in the century been known as the "Holy Land'. He did not go by streets and alleys as Evan had done, but through passages sometimes no more than a yard wide. The darkness was sometimes impenetrable. It was wet underfoot. There was a constant sound of dripping water from eaves and gutterings, the rattle and scratch of rodent feet, the creak of rotting timbers. Several times MacPherson stopped and Monk, who could not see him, continued moving and bumped into him.

Eventually they emerged into a yard with a single yellow gas lamp and the light seemed brilliant by comparison. The outlines of timber frames stood sharp and black, brick and plaster work reflecting the glow. The wet cobbles shone.

MacPherson glanced behind him once to make sure Monk was still there, then went across and down a flight of stone steps into a cellar where one tallow candle smoked on a holder made of half an old bottle, but it showed the entrance to a tunnel and MacPherson went in without hesitation.

Monk followed. He had a sharp memory of stomach-knotting, skin-prickling danger, of sudden pain and then oblivion. He knew what it was. It came from the past he dreaded, when he and Runcorn had followed wanted men into areas just like this. Then there had been comradeship between them. There had never been the slightest resentment on his part, he knew that clearly. And he had gone in head first without a second's doubt that Runcorn would be there to guard his back. It had been the kind of trust that was built on experience, time and time again of never being found wanting.

Now he was following Jamie MacPherson. He could not see him, but he could re-create in his mind exactly his broad shoulders and slight swagger as he walked, a little roll, as if in his youth he had been at sea. He had a pugilist's agility and his fists were always ready. He looked in his middle-fifties, his reddish-fair hair receding.

How long ago had it been that he and Runcorn had worked together here?

Twenty years? That would make Monk in his twenties then, young and keen, perhaps too angry still from the injustice to the man who had been his friend and mentor, too ambitious to gain the power for himself which would allow him to right the wrongs.

Hester would have told him he was arrogant, claiming for himself a position in judgement to which he had no right, and no qualification.

He would never admit it to her, but he winced now for the truth of it.

MacPherson's voice came out of the darkness ahead of him, warning him of the step, and an instant later he nearly fell over it. They were climbing again, and emerged into another cellar, this time with a lighted door at the far side which led into a room, and another.

MacPherson banged sharply, once, then four times, and it was opened by a man whose hair stood up in spikes on his head. His face was full of humour and the hand he held up was missing the third finger.

"Well, bless me, if it in't Monk agin," he said cheerfully. "Thought yer was dead. Wot yer doin' 'ere, then?”

"Looking into the rapes over in Seven Dials," MacPherson replied for him before Monk could speak.

Willie Snaith's hazel eyes opened wide, still looking at MacPherson.

"Yer never tellin' me the rozzers give a toss about that? I don' believe ya. Ya gorn sorft in the 'ead, Mac? Ya forgot 'oo this is, 'ave ya?”

"He's no' with the po-liss any more," MacPherson explained, coming further into the room and closing the door to the cellar behind them.

"Runcorn got his revenge, it seems, and had him drummed out. He's on his own. And I'd like to know for myself who's been doing this, because it's no' one of us who live here, it's some fancy fellar from up west way, so it is.”

"Well, if that don't beat the devil! "E wot lives longest sees most, as they say. So Monk's workin' fer us, in a fashion! That I'd live ter see the day!" He gave a rich chortle of delight. "So wot you want from me, then? I dunno 'oo dun it, or I'd a' fixe dim me self "I want to know if there were any beatings or rapes of factory women in the last three weeks," Monk replied immediately. "Or in the two weeks before that either.”

"No…" Snaith said slowly. "Not as I 'card. "Ow does that 'elp yer?”

"It doesn't," Monk answered him. "It was not what I was hoping you would say." Then he realised that was not true. It would have indicated a solution, but not the one he wanted. He did not care about Rhys Duff himself, but he knew how it would hurt Hester. That should not matter. The truth was what counted. If Rhys Duff was guilty then he was one of the most callous and brutal men Monk had ever known of.

He was twisted to a depravity from which it would be unimaginable to redeem him. And more immediate than that, although he might recover, in time, there were his companions.

He was not guilty alone. Whoever had been with him was still at large, presumably still bent on violence and cruelty. Even if the attack on Rhys had temporarily frightened them, it would not last. Such ingrained sadism did not vanish from the nature in one act, however harsh. The need to hurt would rise again, and be satisfied again.

Snaith was regarding him with growing interest.

"Yer've changed," he observed, nodding his head. "Dunno as I like it.

Mebbe I do. Edges 'a gorn. Yer in't so 'ungry no more. Bloody nuisance, yer was. More'n Runcorn, poor sod. Never 'ad yer nose fera lie, 'e din't. E'd believe yer well you'd smell the truth. Looks like yer lorst that, though, eh?”

"Difficult truths take longer," Monk said tensely. "And we all change.

You shouldn't discount Runcorn. He's persistent too, just weighs his priorities, that's all.”

Snaith grinned. "Eye ter the main chance, that one, I know that, whereas you… yer like a dog wi' a bone. Never let go. Cut orff yer 'ead, an' yer teeth'd still be fast shut! Bleedin' bastard, yare!

Still, nobody crossed yer twice, not even yer own.”

"You said that before!" Monk snapped, stung by his helplessness. "Did I do anything to Runcorn he didn't have coming?" He framed the question aggressively, as if he knew the answer, but his stomach knotted as he looked at Snaith's face in the gaslight and waited for the answer. It seemed an age in coming. He could feel the seconds slip by and hear his own heart beating.

MacPherson cleared his throat.

Snaith stared back, his round, hazel eyes shadowed, his face a trifle puckered. Monk knew before he spoke that his reply was the one he feared.

"Yeah, I reckon so. Enemy in front of yer's one thing, be' and yer's another. I don' know wot yer dun ter 'im, but it fair broke 'im, an' 'e weren't spec ting it from yer. Learned me sum mink abaht yer. Never took yer light arter that. Yer an 'and bastard, an' that's the truth." He took a breath. "But if yer want the swine wot done them women in Seven Dials, I'll 'elp yer ter that. I in't fussy 'oo I use. Go an' ask Wee Minnie. OF Bertha dunno nuthink. Find Wee Minnie, an' teller I sent yer.”

"She won't believe me," Monk said reasonably.

"Yeah, she will, 'cos less'n I tell yer w'er ter finder yer'll be wand' ring around the rookeries for the rest oyer life!”

"That's the truth, so it is," MacPherson agreed.

"So tell me," Monk accepted.

Snaith shook his head. "In't yer never scared, Monk? In't it never entered yer 'ead as we'd cut yer throat an' drop yer in the midden, jus' for ol' time's sake?”

Monk grinned back. "Several times, and if you do there is nothing I can do now to stop you. I'm too far into St. Giles to yell for help, even supposing anyone would come. But you're a businessman, at least MacPherson is. You want what I want. You'll wait until I've got it before you do anything to me.”

"There are times when I could almost like yer," Snaith said, surprised at himself. "One thing I'll say for yer, yer in't never an 'ypocrite.

Got that much on Runcorn, poor sod.”

"Thank you," Monk said sarcastically. "Wee Minnie?”

It was a tortuous hour, and Monk got lost three times before he finally slipped through an alley gateway, across a brick yard and up the back steps into a series of rooms which finally ended in the airlessly hot parlour where Wee Minnie sat on a pile of cushions, her wrinkled face in a toothless smile, her gnarled hands clicking knitting needles of bone as she worked without looking at it on what appeared to be a sock.

"So yer got 'ere," she observed with a dry chuckle. "Thought as yer'd got lorst. Yer wanter know about rape, do yer?”

He should have known word would reach here before he did.

"Yes.”

"There was two. Bad, they was, so bad no one never said nothing.”

"I don't understand. It was bad, surely that was all the more reason to do something, warn people, stay together… anything…”

She shook her head, her fingers never losing their rhythm.

"Yer gets beat, yer tell people. It in't personal. Yer gets raped bad, it's different.”

"How do you know?”

"I know everything." There was satisfaction in her voice. Then suddenly it hardened and her eyes became cruel. "Yer get them bastards! Give 'em ter us an' we'll draw an' quarter 'em, like they did in the old days. Me gran'fer told me abaht it. Yer string 'em up, or by 'ell's door, we will!”

"Can I speak to the women who were raped?”

"Can yer wot?" she said incredulously.

"Can I speak to the women?" he repeated.

She swore under her breath.

"I need to ask them about the men. I have to be sure it was the same ones. They might remember something, a face, a voice, even a name, the feel of fabric, anything.”

"It were the same men," she said with absolute certainty. "Three of 'em. One tall, one 'eavier, an' one on the skinny side.”

He tried to keep the sense of victory out of his voice. "What age were they?”

"Age? I dunno. Don't yer know?”

"I believe so. When were these attacks?”

"Wot?”

"Before or after the murder in Water Lane?”

She looked at him with her head a trifle to one side, like a withered old sparrow.

"Afore, o' course. In't bin nuffink since. Wouldn't, would there now?”

"No, I think not.”

"That were 'im, then, wot got killed?" she said with satisfaction.

"One of them." He did not bother to correct her error. "I want the other two.”

She grinned toothlessly. "You an' a few others.”