Cain His Brother - Anne Perry [116]
Perhaps he had been naive to have thought it might be so easy. Either the information was incorrect, an invention for the benefit of whoever she was telling, or else it was basically true, but she had changed her name, presumably to avoid the disgrace of whatever crime had brought her across Monk’s path.
He ignored a flower seller and a boy with the latest edition of the newspapers.
Perhaps the whole thing was nothing to do with his profession. Maybe he had met her purely personally. Her sense of injury might spring from some sexual betrayal he had committed.
His heart went cold at the thought. Had they been lovers and he had deserted her? Had there perhaps been a child, and he had left her, rather than take responsibility? It was not impossible. Men had done that from time immemorial. God knew, there were illegitimate children all over the country, and bungled abortions as well. He had seen them himself, even since the accident, let alone before. If that were true, she could not hate him any more profoundly than he would hate himself. He deserved the ruin she wished him.
He passed a seller of hot pies, and for a moment the savory aroma tempted him, then his stomach revolted at the thought of eating.
He had to know the truth. At any cost, whatever labor or pain, he must know.
And if he was guilty of such a thing, how could he tell Hester? She would not forgive him for that. She would not stand by with her courage and spirit, and help him fight his way back.
Neither would Callandra. Nor John Evan, for that matter.
He had to be the first to know.
But where to turn next? If Drusilla had changed her name, it could have been anything before, any of a million names.
He stepped off the curb and avoided the traffic and the horse dung.
Except almost all people wanted to keep some sense of identity, some link with the past. There was often a connection, a link of sound, of initial letter, or some other association in the mind. At times it was a family name, a mother or grandmother’s maiden name, for example.
He reached the far pavement just as a landau missed him by no more than a yard.
Perhaps the part about Buckinghamshire was true? Or about the church?
He turned on his heel, back across the road again, and strode back to the library where the directory of all clergy was lodged, and asked to see it again. This time he searched the incumbents of Buckinghamshire for any senior clergyman who had died within the last ten years.
But there were none whose names suggested any connection, however tenuous, with Drusilla Wyndham.
“Is this all?” he asked the clerk who was hovering anxiously. “Is there any way one might have been missed? Perhaps I had better look further back than ten years.”
“Of course, sir, if you think it will help,” the clerk agreed. “If you could be a little more precise as to what it is you are searching for, perhaps I could be of some assistance.” He adjusted his spectacles and sneezed. “I do beg your pardon.”
“I’m looking for a clergyman who died in Buckinghamshire, probably within the last ten years,” Monk replied, feeling foolish and desperate. “But I have been given the wrong name.”
“Then I don’t know how you can find it, sir,” the clerk said, shaking his head unhappily. “Do you know anything else about him?”
“No …”
“Do you not have even the least idea what his name is? Not even what it may have sounded like?” The man appeared to be pressing the issue simply for something to say. He looked most uncomfortable.
“It may have sounded like Wyndham,” Monk replied, also only for civility’s sake.
“Oh, dear. I am afraid I can think of nothing. Of course, there was the Reverend Buckingham, who died in Norfolk.” The clerk gave a jerky, bitter laugh, and sneezed again. “In a place called Wymondham, which of course is pronounced ‘Wyndham,’ at least locally. But that is hardly of use to you—”
He stopped, startled because Monk had risen to his