The thought of Runcorn brought him up sharply. Runcorn had been his superior, but never felt it. He was always aware of Monk treading on his heels, Monk being better dressed, quick witted, sharper tongued, Monk always waiting to catch him out!
Was that memory speaking to him, or only what he had deduced from Runcorn's attitude after the accident?
This was Runcorn's area. When he had the evidence it would be Runcorn he would have to take it to.
"Yes… he said aloud. "It might be hard to find where they come from… but easier to find where they went. They'd be dirty, after rolling on the cobbles with the women, fighting. One or two of them might have been marked. Those women fought… enough at least to scratch or bite." His mind was picturing shadowy figures only, but some things he knew. "They'd be elated, touched with both victory and fear. They'd done a monstrous thing. Some echo of that would be there in their manner. Some cabby, somewhere, will have noticed. He would know where he took them, because it would be out of the area.”
"Said you was a clever sod," she let out her breath in a sigh of relief. "Nah there's one more fer yer ter see. Dot Mac Rae She's married legal, but 'er us band useless. Consumptive, poor devil. Can't do nothin'. Coughin' 'is lungs up. She gotta work, an' shirt stitchin' don't do it.”
Monk did not argue, nor did he need it explaining to him. Somewhere in his memory was burned such knowledge. He walked beside her in the thickening snow. Other people were hurrying by, heads down, occasionally calling out a greeting or even a joke. Two men staggered out of a public house, supporting each other as far as the gutter, then collapsed, cursing, but without anger. A beggar wrapped his coat tighter around himself and settled down in a doorway. Within moments another joined him. Together they would be warmer than separately.
Dot Mac Rae told them essentially what they had already heard. She was older than the others, maybe forty, but still handsome. Her face had character and there was courage in her eyes. There was also a helpless anger. She was trapped and she knew it. She did not expect either help or pity. She told Monk quite simply what had happened some two and a half weeks ago when she had been attacked by two men approaching her from opposite sides of a courtyard. Yes, she had been quite certain it had been only two men. One of them had held her down while the other had raped her, then when she had fought back, they had both beaten and kicked her, leaving her almost senseless on the ground.
She had been found and helped home by Percy, a beggar who frequently slept in a doorway in the area. He had seen there was something badly wrong, and done all he could to assist her. He had wanted to report it to someone, but who was there? Who cared about a woman who sold her body being beaten a little, or taken by force?
Vida did not comment, but again her feeling was evident in her face.
Monk asked questions about time and place, anything Dot could remember which would differentiate these men from any others.
She had not seen them clearly, they had been no more than shapes, weight, pain in the darkness. She had been aware of an overwhelming sense of rage in them, and then afterwards excitement, even elation.
Monk walked away through the snow so blind with anger he was almost oblivious of being cold. He had left Vida Hopgood at the corner of her street, and then turned to leave Seven Dials and head back towards the open thoroughfares, the lights and the traffic of the main areas of the city. Later he would find a hansom and ride the rest of the way to his rooms in Grafton Street. Now he needed to think, and to feel the quick exercise of muscles, pour his energy into movement, and smart under the sting of ice on his face.
This helpless rage at injustice was familiar. It was an old pain, dating far back before the accident, into the times he only caught glimpses of when some emotion, or some half-caught sight or smell, carried him back. He knew the real source of it. The man who had been his guide and mentor when he had newly come south from Northumberland, bound to make his fortune in London, the man who had taken him in, taught him so much not only about merchant banking and the uses of money, but about cultured life, about society and how to be a gentleman, he had been ruined by injustice. Monk had done everything he could to help him, and it had not been enough. He had suffered that same feeling of frustration then, of pacing the streets racking his brain for ideas, of believing the answer was beyond his reach, but only just.
He had learned a lot since then. His character had become harder, his mind faster, more agile, more patient to wait his chance, less tolerant of stupidity, less afraid of either success or failure.
The snow was settling on his collar and seeping down his neck. He was shuddering with cold. Other people were dim forms in the gloom. In the streets the gutters were running over. He could smell the stench of middens and sour drains.
There was a pattern in these rapes. The violence was the same… and always unnecessary. They were not seeking unwilling women.
God help them, they were only too willing. These were not professional prostitutes. They were desperate women who worked honestly when they could, and went to do the streets only when hunger drove them.
Why not the professional prostitutes? Because they had men who looked after them. They were merchandise, too valuable to risk. If anyone was going to beat them, disfigure them, reduce their value, it would be the pimps, the 'owners', and it would be for a specific reason, probably punishment for thieving, for individual enterprise instead of returning their takings to their masters.
He had already ruled out a rival trying to take over a territory. These women did not share their takings with anyone. They certainly did not threaten any regular prostitute's living. Anyway, a pimp would beat, but he would not rape. This had none of the marks of an underworld crime. There was no profit in it. People who lived on the edge of survival did not waste energy and resources on pointless violence time after time.
He turned a corner and the wind was bitter and stung his skin, making his eyes water. He wanted to go home, weigh what he had heard and plan a strategy. But these crimes had happened at night. Night was the time when he should look for other witnesses, cab drivers who had picked up fares and taken them from the edge of Seven Dials back westwards. It was less than honest to go to his own warm rooms, hot food and clean bed, and tell himself he was trying to find the man who had done these senseless and bestial things.
He stopped off at a public house and had a hot pie and a glass of stout and felt at least fortified, if not comforted. He thought of scraping a conversation with some of the other patrons, or with the landlord, and decided against it. He did not yet want to be known as an agent of enquiry. Word would spread rapidly enough. Let Vida do the more obvious asking. She belonged here and would be respected, probably even told the truth.
He worked until long after midnight, trudging the streets on the edges of Seven Dials, generally to the west and north, towards Oxford Street and Regent Street, speaking to cabby after cabby, always asking the same questions. The very last was typical of them all.
"Where to, guy?”
"Home… Fitzroy Street," Monk replied, still standing on the pavement.
"Right.”
"Often work this patch?”
"Yeah, why?”
"Sorry to take you so far out of your way." He put his foot on the step, taking his time.
The cabby gave a sharp laugh. "That's wot I'm 'ere fer. Jus' round the corner in't no good terme.”
"Take a few trips north and west, do you?”
"Some. Are yer getting' in or not?”
"Yes," Monk answered, without doing so. "Do you remember taking a couple of gentlemen from this area, probably about this time of night, or later, who were a bit roughed up, maybe wet, maybe scratched or bruised, back up west?”