Part 8 (1/2)

They were pa.s.sed by a nurserymaid wheeling a perambulator-a brand-new invention which was much better than the old pulling carts, and which was causing something of a stir- and accompanied by a small, self-conscious boy with a hoop.

”She never even considered remarrying,” Romola went on without being asked, and having regarded the perambulator with due interest. ”Of course it was only a little over two years, but Sir Basil did approach the subject. She was a young woman, and still without children. It would not be unseemly.”

Monk remembered the dead face he had seen that first morning. Even through the stiffness and the pallor he had imagined something of what she must have been like: the emotions, the hungers and the dreams. It was a face of pa.s.sion and will.

”She was very comely?” He made it a question, although there was no doubt in his mind.

Romola hesitated, but there was no meanness in it, only a genuine doubt.

”She was handsome,” she said slowly. ”But her chief quality was her vividness, and her complete individuality. After Harry died she became very moody and suffered”-she avoided his eyes-”suffered a lot of poor health. When she was well she was quite delightful, everyone found her so. But when she was ...” Again she stopped momentarily and searched for the word. ”When she was poorly she spoke little-and made no effort to charm.”

Monk had a brief vision of what it must be like to be a woman on her own, obliged to work at pleasing people because your acceptance, perhaps even your financial survival, depended upon it. There must be hundreds-thousands-of petty accommodations, suppressions of your own beliefs and opinions because they would not be what someone else wished to hear. What a constant humiliation, like a burning blister on the heel which hurt with every step.

And on the other hand, what a desperate loneliness for a man if he ever realized he was always being told not what she really thought or felt but what she believed he wanted to hear. Would he then ever trust anything as real, or of value?

”Mr. Monk.”

She was speaking, and his concentration had left her totally.

”Yes ma'am-I apologize-”

”You asked me about Octavia. I was endeavoring to tell you.” She was irritated that he was so inattentive. ”She was most appealing, at her best, and many men had called upon her, but she gave none of them the slightest encouragement. Whoever it was who killed her, I do not think you will find the slightest clue to their ident.i.ty along that line of inquiry.”

”No, I imagine you are right. And Mr. Haslett died in the Crimea?”

”Captain Haslett. Yes.” She hesitated, looking away from him again. ”Mr. Monk.”

”Yes ma'am?”

”It occurs to me that some people-some men-have strange ideas about women who are widowed-” She was obviously most uncomfortable about what it was she was attempting to say.

”Indeed,” he said encouragingly.

The wind caught at her bonnet, pulling it a little sideways, but she disregarded it. He wondered if she was trying to find a way to say what Sir Basil had prompted, and if the words would be his or her own.

Two little girls in frilled dresses pa.s.sed by with their governess, walking very stiffly, eyes ahead as if unaware of the soldier coming the other way.

”It is not impossible that one of the servants, one of the men, entertained such-such ludicrous ideas-and became overfamiliar.”

They had almost stopped. Romola poked at the ground with the ferrule of her umbrella.

”If-if that happened, and she rebuffed him soundly- possibly he became angry-incensed-I mean...” She tailed off miserably, still avoiding looking at him.

”In the middle of the night?” he said dubiously. ”He was certainly extremely bold to go to her bedroom and try such a thing.”

The color burned up her cheeks.

”Someone did,” she pointed out with a catch in her voice, still staring at the ground. ”I know it seems preposterous. Were she not dead, I should laugh at it myself.”

”You are right,'' he said reluctantly. ”Or it may be that she discovered some secret that could have ruined a servant had she told it, and they killed her to prevent that.”

She looked up at him, her eyes wide. ”Oh-yes, I suppose that sounds . . . possible. What kind of a secret? You mean dishonesty-immorality? But how would Tavie have learned of it?”

”I don't know. Have you no idea where she went that afternoon? '' He began to walk again, and she accompanied him.

”No, none at all. She barely spoke to us that evening, except a silly argument over dinner, but nothing new was said.”

”What was the argument about?”

”Nothing in particular-just frayed tempers.” She looked straight ahead of her. ”It was certainly nothing about where she went that afternoon, and nothing about any secret.”

”Thank you, Mrs. Moidore. You have been very courteous.” He stopped and she stopped also, relaxing a little as she sensed he was leaving.

”I wish I could help, Mr. Monk,” she said with her face suddenly pinched and sad. For a moment grief overtook anxiety for herself and fear for the future. ”If I recall anything-”

”Tell me-or Mr. Evan. Good day, ma'am.”

”Good day.” And she turned and walked away, but when she had gone ten or fifteen yards she looked back again, not to say anything, simply to watch him leave the path and go back towards Piccadilly.

Monk knew that Cyprian Moidore was at his club, but he did not wish to ask for entry and interview him there because he felt it highly likely that he would be refused, and the humiliation would burn. Instead he waited outside on the pavement, kicking his heels, turning over in his mind what he would ask Cyprian when he finally came out.

Monk had been waiting about a quarter of an hour when two men pa.s.sed him walking up towards Half Moon Street. There was something in the gait of one of them that struck a sharp chord in his memory, so vivid that he started forward to accost him. He had actually gone half a dozen steps before he realized that he had no idea who the man was, simply that for a moment he had seemed intimately familiar, and that there was both hope and sadness in him in that instant-and a terrible foreboding of pain to come.

He stood for another thirty minutes in the wind and fitful sun trying to bring back the face that had flashed on his recollection so briefly: a handsome, aristocratic fece of a man at least sixty. And he knew the voice was light, very civilized, even a little affected-and knew it had been a major force in his life and the realization of ambition. He had copied him, his dress, his manner, even his inflection, in trying to lose his own unsophisticated Northumberland accent.

But all he recaptured were fragments, gone as soon as they were there, a feeling of success which was empty of flavor, a recurring pain as of some loss and some responsibility unfulfilled.

He was still standing undecided when Cyprian Moidore came down the steps of his club and along the street, only noticing Monk when he all but b.u.mped into him.

”Oh-Monk.” He stopped short. ”Are you looking for me?”

Monk recalled himself to the present with a jolt.

”Yes-if you please, sir.”

Cyprian looked anxious. ”Have you-have you learned something?”

”No sir, I merely wanted to ask you more about your fern-fly.”

”Oh.” Cyprian started to walk again and Monk fell in beside him, back towards the park. Cyprian was dressed extremely fas.h.i.+onably, his concession to mourning in his dark coat over the jacket above the modern short waistcoat with its shawl collar, and his top hat was tall and straight sided. ”Couldn't it have waited until I got home?” he asked with a frown.

”I just spoke to Mrs. Moidore, sir; in Green Park.”

Cyprian seemed surprised, even a trifle discomfited. ”I doubt she can tell you much. What exactly is it you wish to ask?”

Monk was obliged to walk smartly to keep up with him. ”How long has your aunt, Mrs. Sandeman, lived in your father's house, sir?”

Cyprian winced very slightly, only a shadow across his face.