The William Monk Mysteries_ The First Three Novels - Anne Perry [487]
Monk sat down, primarily to encourage Hester to speak, but he accepted the invitation to supper.
“Excuse me.” Tiplady rose to his feet and limped to the door. “I shall see about it with Molly and Cook.”
“What is it?” Monk demanded. “What has happened?”
“Very little,” Hester said wearily. “Only what we expected. Evan recounted how Alexandra had confessed.”
“We knew that would come,” Monk pointed out, angry that she was so discouraged. He needed her to have hope, because he too was afraid. It was a ridiculous task they had set themselves, and they had no right to have given Alexandra hope. There was none, none at all of any sense.
“Of course,” she said a little sharply, betraying her own fragile emotions. “But you asked me what had happened.”
He looked at her and met her eyes. There was a moment of complete understanding, all the pity, the outrage, all the delicate shades of fear and self-doubt for their own part in it. They said nothing, because words were unnecessary, and too clumsy an instrument anyway.
“I started to look at physical possibilities,” he said after a moment or two. “I don’t think Fenton Pole can be the other abuser. There doesn’t seem to have been enough opportunity for him to be alone with either Cassian or Valentine.”
“So where are you going next?”
“The Furnivals’, I think.”
“To Louisa?” she said with a flash of bitter amusement.
“To the servants.” He understood precisely what she meant, with all its undertones. “Of course she would protect Maxim, but since it hasn’t been mentioned yet, she won’t have any idea that we are looking for abuse of children. She’ll be thinking of herself, and the old charge about the general.”
Hester said nothing.
“Then I’ll go to the Carlyons’.”
“The Carlyons’?” Now she was surprised. “You’ll not find anything there, but even if you did, what good would it do? They’ll all lie to protect him, and we know about him anyway! It’s the other person we need to find—with proof.”
“Not the colonel—Peverell Erskine.”
She was stunned, her face filled with amazement and disbelief. “Peverell! Oh no! You can’t think it was him!”
“Why not? Because we like him?” He was hurting himself as well as her and they both understood it. “Do you think it has to be someone who looks like a monster? There was no violence used, no hate or greed—just a man who has never grown up enough to find an appropriate closeness with an adult woman, a man who only feels safe with a child who won’t judge him or demand a commitment or the ability to give, who won’t see the flaws in his character or the clumsiness or inadequacy of his acts.”
“You sound as if you want me to feel sorry for him,” she said with tight, hard disgust, but he did not know whether that disgust was at him, at the abuses, or only at the situation—or even if it was so hard because underneath it was the wrench of real pity.
“I don’t care what you feel,” he lied back. “Only what you think. Just because Peverell Erskine is an agreeable man and his wife loves him doesn’t mean he can’t have weaknesses that destroy him—and others.”
“I don’t believe it of Peverell,” she said stubbornly, but she gave no reason.
“That’s just stupid,” he snapped at her, aware of the anger inside himself to which he chose to give no name. “You’re hardly much use if you are working on that level of intelligence.”
“I said I don’t believe it,” she retorted equally violently. “I didn’t say I wouldn’t investigate the possibility.”
“Oh yes?” He raised his eyebrows sarcastically. “How?”
“Through Damans, of course,” she said with stinging contempt. “She discovered something that night—something that upset her beyond bearing. Had you forgotten that? Or did you just think I had?”
Monk stared at her, and was about to make an equally acid reply when the door opened again and Major Tiplady returned, immediately