The Shifting Tide - Anne Perry [9]
His fingers found the soft, broken skull under the hair. It had been an extremely hard blow. Something heavy and wide had been used, and by a person either of a good height or else standing slightly above. He looked at the attendant. “You cleaned him up, washed away the blood?”
“A bit,” the attendant answered from the doorway. “There wasn’t much. Just made ’im presentable, like.” There was nothing in his face to indicate whether he knew if the man was a victim of murder or accident. There were probably many of the latter on ships, and especially on the docks, where heavy loads were moved and sometimes came loose.
“Not much blood?” Monk questioned.
“He had a woollen hat on,” Louvain explained again. “I’m afraid it must have been lost when we were carrying him here. I can describe it for you, if you think it matters.”
“There was no blood on deck,” Monk pointed out. “And very little where he was found. It might have been helpful, but it’s probably not important. I’ve seen all I need to.” He thanked Mrs. Hodge again, then went out ahead of Louvain, back to the outside room. “I want the attendant’s testimony in writing, and yours.”
A brief smile flickered across Louvain’s face, some oblique, inner humor he would not share. “I’ve not forgotten. You’ll get your pieces of paper. Dawson!” he called to the attendant. “Mr. Monk would like our testaments of Hodge’s death on paper to help him in his work. Would you be good enough, please?”
Dawson looked slightly taken aback, but he produced paper, pen, and ink. He and Louvain both wrote their statements, signed, witnessed by each other, and Monk put them in his pocket.
“Did you learn anything?” Louvain asked when they were on the pavement. The rain had now eased off and the wind slackened, allowing the mist to drift up off the water, wreathing the lamps and obscuring the roofs of some of the buildings nearby.
Someone was lying. That was what Monk had learned. Hodge had not been struck on deck and then carried below by a single thief. There was no blood on deck, no trail across the boards. Either Hodge had not died there, or there were more than two thieves, one from the boat and two on deck, or at least one of the crew had been involved. He decided not to say that much to Louvain.
“Possibilities,” he answered. “I’ll start again in the morning.”
“Report to me in three days, regardless of what you have,” Louvain reminded him. “Before, if you have the ivory, of course. I’ll pay you five pounds extra for every day short of ten that you recover it.”
“Good,” Monk said levelly, but he felt the money slip out of his grasp as he walked forward in the darkness and wondered how far he would have to go to find an omnibus back towards his home. He should not spend money on hansoms anymore.
It was nearly seven o’clock by the time he alighted from the final leg of his journey, with the two pounds that Louvain had given him still unbroken. He was in Tottenham Court Road with only a hundred yards or so to walk. The mist had settled, obscuring the distances. There were the smells of soot from the chimneys and of the horse manure which had not yet been cleared, but he knew the way almost to the step. It would be warm once he was inside.
There would be food prepared if Hester was in. He tried not to hope too fiercely that she was. Her work at the clinic was of intense importance to her. Before they had met seven years ago, she had nursed in the Crimea with Florence Nightingale. On her return to England she had worked occasionally in hospitals, but her independence on the battlefield had made her intolerant of being reduced to cleaning, stoking fires, and rolling bandages. Her temper had cost her more than one position.
As a private nurse caring for individual cases, Hester had been far more successful. More recently she had turned her attention to helping prostitutes who were injured and homeless in the course of their trade. Hester had first set up the clinic almost in the shadow of the Coldbath Prison—then, in a stroke of brilliant opportunism, moved it to a large house