After luncheon he was reduced to the last places to seek: the pockets of his other clothes, jackets hanging in the cupboard. In the best of them, a well-cut, rather formal coat, he found a piece of paper, and on unfolding it carefully, saw that it was a printed sheet for a service of Evensong at a church he did not know.
Perhaps it was close by. He felt a quickening of hope. Maybe he was a member of the congregation. The minister would know him. He might have friends there, a belief, even an office or a calling of some sort. He folded up the paper again carefully and put it in the desk, then went into the bedroom to wash and shave again, and change into his best clothes, and the coat from which the sheet had come. By five o'clock he was ready, and he went downstairs to ask Mrs. Worley where St. Marylebone Church might be.
His disappointment was shattering when she showed complete ignorance, Temper boiled inside him at the frustration. She must know. But her placid, blunt face was expressionless.
He was about to argue, to shout at her that she must know, when he realized how foolish it would be. He would only anger her, drive from himself a friend he sorely needed.
She was staring at him, her face puckered.
"My, you are in a state. Let me ask Mr. Worley for yer; he's a rare fine understanding o' the city. O' course I expect it's on the Marylebone Road, but ezac'ly where I'm sure I wouldn't know. It's a long street, that is."
"Thank you," he said carefully, feeling foolish. "It's rather important."
"Going to a wedding, are yer?" She looked at his carefully brushed dark coat. "What you want is a good cabby, what knows 'is way, and'll get you there nice and prompt, like."
It was an obvious answer, and he wondered why he had not thought of it himself. He thanked her, and when Mr. Worley had been asked, and given his opinion that it might be opposite York Gate, he went out to look for a cab.
Evensong had already begun when he hurried up the steps and into the vestry. He could hear the voices lifted rather thinly in the first hymn. It sounded dutiful rather than joyous. Was he a religious man; or, it would be truer to ask, had he been? He felt no sense of comfort or reverence now, except for the simple beauty of the stonework.
He went in as quickly as he could, walking almost on the sides of his polished boots to make no noise. One or two heads turned, sharp with criticism. He ignored them and slid into a back pew, fumbling for a hymnbook.
Nothing sounded familiar; he followed the hymn because the tune was trite, full of musical cliches. He knelt when everyone else knelt, and rose as they rose. He missed the responses.
When the minister stepped into the pulpit to speak, Monk stared at him, searching his face for some nicker of memory. Could he go to this man and confide in him the truth, ask him to tell him everything he knew? The voice droned on in one platitude after another; his intention was benign, but so tied in words as to be almost incomprehensible. Monk sank deeper and deeper into a feeling of helplessness. The man did not seem able to remember his own train of thought from one sentence to the next, let alone the nature and passions of his flock.
When the last amen had been sung, Monk watched the people file out, hoping someone would touch his memory, or better still, actually speak to him.
He was about to give up even that when he saw a young woman in black, slender and of medium height, dark hair drawn softly back from a face almost luminous, dark eyes and fragile skin, mouth too generous and too big for it. It was not a weak face, and yet it was one that could have moved easily to laughter, or tragedy. There was a grace in the way she walked that compelled him to watch her.
As she drew level she became aware of him and turned. Her eyes widened and she hesitated. She drew in her breath as if to speak.
He waited, hope surging up inside him, and a ridiculous excitement, as if some exquisite realization were about to come.
Then the moment vanished; she seemed to regain a mastery of herself, her chin lifted a little, and she picked up her skirt unnecessarily and continued on her way.
He went after her, but she was lost in a group of people, two of whom, also dressed in black, were obviously accompanying her. One was a tall, fair man in his mid-thirties with smooth hair and a long-nosed, serious face; the other was a woman of unusual uprightness of carriage and features of remarkable character. The three of them walked towards the street and waiting vehicles and none of them turned their heads again.
Monk rode home in a rage of confusion, fear, and wild, disturbing hope.
4
But when Monk arrived on Monday morning, breathless and a little late, he was unable to begin investigation on Yeats and his visitor. Runcorn was in his room, pacing the floor and waving a piece of blue notepaper in his hand. He stopped and spun around the moment he heard Monk's feet.
"Ah!" He brandished the paper with a look of bright, shimmering anger, his left eye narrowed almost shut.
The good-moming greeting died on Monk's tongue.
"Letter from upstairs." Runcorn held up the blue paper. "The powers that be are after us again. The Dowager Lady Shelburne has written to Sir Willoughby Gentry, and confided to the said member of Parliament"-he gave every vowel its full value in his volume of scorn for that body-"that she is not happy with the utter lack of success the Metropolitan Police Force is having in apprehending the vile maniac who so foully murdered her son in his own house. No excuses are acceptable for our dilatory and lackadaisical attitude, our total lack of culprits to hand." His face purpled in his offense at the injustice of it, but there was no misery in him, only a feeding rage. "What the hell are you doing, Monk? You're supposed to be such a damn good detective, you've got your eyes on a superintendency-the commissionership, for all I know! So what do we tell this-this ladyship?"
Monk took a deep breath. He was more stunned by Runcorn's reference to himself, to his ambition, than anything in the letter. Was he an overweeningly ambitious man? There was no time for self-defense now; Runcorn was standing in front of him commanding an answer.
"Lamb's done all the groundwork, sir." He gave Lamb the praise that was due him. "He's investigated all he could, questioned all the other residents, street peddlers, locals, anyone who might have seen or known anything." He could see from Runcorn's face that he was achieving nothing, but he persisted. "Unfortunately it was a particularly foul night and everyone was in a hurry, heads down and collars up against the rain. Because it was so wet no one hung around, and with the overcast it was dark earlier than usual."
Runcorn was fidgeting with impatience.
"Lamb spent a lot of time checking out the villains we know," Monk continued. "He's written up in his report that he's spoken to every snout and informer in the area. Not a peep. No one knows anything; or if they do, they're not saying. Lamb was of the opinion they were telling the truth. I don't know what else he could have done." His experience offered nothing, but neither could his intelligence suggest any omission. All his sympathy was with Lamb.
"Constable Harrison found a watch with the initials J.G. on it in a pawnbroker's-but we don't know it was Grey's.''
"No," Runcorn agreed fiercely, running his finger with distaste along the deckle edge of the notepaper. It was a luxury he could not afford. "Indeed you don't! So what are you doing, then? Take it to Shelburne Hall-get it identified."
"Harrison's on his way."
"Can't you at least find out how the bloody man got in?"
"I think so," Monk said levelly. "There was a visitor for one of the other residents, a Mr. Yeats. He came in at nine forty-five and left at roughly ten thirty. He was a biggish man, dark, well muffled. He's the only person unaccounted for; the others were women. I don't want to leap to conclusions too soon, but it looks as if he could be the murderer. Otherwise I don't know any way a stranger could have got in. Grimwade locks up at midnight, or earlier if all the residents are in, and after that even they have to ring the bell and get him up."