This was the interview Monk was dreading the most, perhaps because Lucius had been his original client, and so far he had brought him only tragedy, one appalling disaster after another. And now it could appear as if he suspected Lucius of murder as well, or suspected Miriam, which Lucius might feel to be even worse. And yet, what alternative was there? The murderer was someone in the house—and not a servant. Not that he had seriously considered the servants.
When Lucius came he was haggard. His eyes were sunken with shock, staring fixedly from red-rimmed lids, and his dark complexion was bleached of all its natural warmth. He sat down as if he feared his legs might not support him. He did not speak, but waited for Monk, not regarding Robb except for a moment.
Monk had never flinched from duty, no matter how unpleasant. He tended, rather, to attack it more urgently, as if anger at it could overcome whatever pain there might be.
"Can you tell us what happened this evening from the time you sat down to dinner, and anything before that if it was remarkable in any way," he began.
"No." Lucius’s voice was a little higher than usual, as if his throat was so tight he could barely force the words through it. "It was the most ordinary dinner imaginable. We talked of trivia, entirely impersonal. It was mostly about Egypt." A ghost of dreadful humor crossed his face. "My father was describing Karnak and the great hall there, how massive it is, beyond our imagining. We speculated a while on what happened to a whole lost civilization capable of creating such beauty and power. Then he spoke of the Valley of the Kings. He described it for us. The depth of the ravines and how insignificant one feels standing on their floor staring up at a tiny slice of sky so vivid blue it seems to burn the eyes. He said it was a place to force one to think of God and eternity, whether one were disposed to or not. All those ancient pharaohs lying there in their huge sarcophagi with their treasures of the world around them—waiting out the millennia for some awakening to heaven, or hell. He knew a little of their beliefs. It was a strange, mystical conversation. My mother had been there to visit him before I was born. She was so lonely in England without him." His voice was so choked with tears he was obliged to stop.
Robb waited a few moments before he spoke. "And there were no disagreements?" he asked at length.
Lucius swallowed. "No, none. What is there to disagree about?"
"And Mrs. Gardiner was not at the table?"
Lucius’s face tightened. "No. She was not well. She is terribly distressed about Mrs. Anderson, who was in every way a mother to her for most of her life. How could she not be? I wish there were something we could do to help. Of course, we will find the best lawyer to represent her, but it looks terribly as if she is guilty. I would do anything to protect Miriam from it, but what is there?" He looked back at Monk as if he still hoped Monk might think of something.
"You have already done all you can," Monk agreed, "unless Mrs. Anderson herself can say something in mitigation, and so far she has refused to say anything at all. But tonight we have another issue to deal with, and that will not involve her." He saw Lucius wince. "Please continue. You were all together until your mother retired quite early?"
Lucius braced himself. "Yes. No one wanted to move; there was no point in separating," he said wearily. "We talked a little of politics, I can’t remember what. Something to do with Germany. No one was particularly interested. It was just something to say. I went for a walk in the garden. It was peaceful, and I preferred to be alone. I ... was thinking;’ He did not need to explain what troubled him.
"Did you see anyone as you came in or went upstairs?" Monk asked him.
"Only the servants ... and Miriam. I went to her room, but she would not do more than bid me good-night. I didn’t see anyone else."
"Did your man assist you to undress, or lay your clothes out for the next day?"
"No. I sent him to bed. I didn’t need him, and I preferred to be alone."
"I see. Did you hear anything after that? Any sound, movement, a cry, footsteps?"
"No. At least not that I recall."
Monk thanked him. Lucius seemed about to ask something further, then changed his mind and rose stiffly to his feet.
When he had gone, Robb turned to Monk. They had learned nothing more. No one was implicated nor excluded from suspicion. Robb ran his hand through his hair, his fingers closing so he pulled at it. "One of them killed her! It couldn’t have been an accident, and not possibly a suicide!"
"We had better see Miriam Gardiner," Monk said grimly.
Robb shot him a look of helplessness and frustration, then rose and went to the door to send the maid for Miriam.
She looked a shadow of the woman she had been, even when Monk had found her frightened and hiding. Her body was skeletal, as if she had barely eaten since then. Her dress hung on her shoulders so the bones showed through the thin clothes, and her bosom was scarcely rounded. Her skin had no color at all, and her beautiful hair had been dressed with little attention. She looked as if she was a stranger to any kind of rest of mind or body.
She moved jerkily, and refused to be seated when Robb asked her. Her hands were clenched and shaking. She seemed not to blink but to stare fixedly, as though her attention was only partly here.
Robb looked at Monk desperately, then, as Monk said nothing, he began to question her.
She replied in a voice that was unnaturally calm that she knew nothing at all. She had taken dinner in her room and had not left it except to go to the bathroom. She had seen no one other than the servant who had ministered to her personal needs. She had no idea what had happened. She had never quarreled with Mrs. Stourbridge ... or with anyone else. She refused to say anything further.
And no matter how either Robb or Monk pressed her, she did not yield a word. She walked away stiffly, swaying a little, as if she might lose her balance.
"Did she do it?" Robb asked as soon as the door was closed.
"I have no idea," Monk confessed. He hated the thought, but she appeared to be in a state of suppressed hysteria, almost as if she moved in a trance, a world of her own connected only here and there with reality. He judged that if there was one more pressure, however slight, she would lose control completely.
Was that what had happened? Had she, for some reason or other, gone to see Mrs. Stourbridge in her bedroom, and something, however innocently or well meant, had precipitated an emotional descent into insanity? Had Verona Stourbridge made some remark about Cleo Anderson, suggesting Miriam leave the past and its griefs behind, and Miriam had reacted by releasing all the terror and violence inside her in one fearful blow?
But where had the croquet mallet come from? One did not keep such things in a bedroom. Whoever had killed Verona Stourbridge had brought it, and it could only be as a weapon.
The murder was premeditated. He said as much aloud.
"I know," Robb admitted. "I know. But she still seems the most likely one. We’ll have to go farther back than I thought. I’ll start again with the servants. It’s here, whatever it is, the reason, the jealousy or the fear, or the rage. It’s in this house. It has to be."
They worked all night, asking, probing, going back over detail after detail. They were so tired the whole house seemed to be a maze going around and around itself, like a symbol of the confusion within. Monk’s throat was dry, and he felt as if there were sand in his eyes. The cook brought them a tray of tea at three o’clock in the morning, and another at a quarter to five, this time with roast beef sandwiches.
They again questioned Mrs. Stourbridge’s maid. The woman looked exhausted and terrified, but she spoke quite coherently.
"I don’t know nothing to her discredit, not really," she said when Robb asked her about Miriam. "She’s always bin very civil, far as I know."