The William Monk Mysteries_ The First Three Novels - Anne Perry [99]
The description both Yeats and Grimwade had given of the only visitor unaccounted for did not fit Lovel Grey, but it was so indistinct that it hardly mattered. If Rosamond Grey’s child was Joscelin’s, and not Lovel’s, that could be reason enough for murder; especially if Joscelin himself knew it and perhaps had not been averse to keeping Lovel reminded. It would not be the first time a cruel tongue, the mockery at pain or impotence had ended in an uncontrolled rage.
Evan broke into his thoughts, almost as if he had read them.
“Do you suppose Shelburne killed Joscelin himself?” He was frowning, his face anxious, his wide eyes clouded. He had no need to fear for his own career—the establishment, even the Shelburnes, would not blame him for a scandal. Was he afraid for Monk? It was a warm thought.
Monk looked up at him.
“Perhaps not. But if he paid someone else, they would have been cleaner and more efficient about it, and less violent. Professionals don’t beat a man to death; they usually either stab him or garrote him, and not in his own house.”
Evan’s delicate mouth turned down at the corners. “You mean an attack in the street, follow him to a quiet spot—and all over in a moment?”
“Probably; and leave the body in an alley where it won’t be found too soon, preferably out of his own area. That way there would be less to connect them with the victim, and less of a risk of their being recognized.”
“Perhaps he was in a hurry?” Evan suggested. “Couldn’t wait for the right time and place?” He leaned back a little in his chair and tilted the legs.
“What hurry?” Monk shrugged. “No hurry if it was Shelburne, not if it were over Rosamond anyway. Couldn’t matter a few days, or even a few weeks.”
“No.” Evan looked gloomy. He allowed the front legs of the chair to settle again. “I don’t know how we begin to prove anything, or even where to look.”
“Find out where Shelburne was at the time Grey was killed,” Monk answered. “I should have done that before.”
“Oh, I asked the servants, in a roundabout way.” Evan’s face was surprised, and there was a touch of satisfaction in it he could not conceal.
“And?” Monk asked quickly. He would not spoil Evan’s pleasure.
“He was away from Shelburne; they were told he came to town for dinner. I followed it up. He was at the dinner all right, and spent the night at his club, off Tavistock Place. It would have been difficult for him to have been in Mecklenburg Square at the right time, because he might easily have been missed, but not at all impossible. If he’d gone along Compton Street, right down Hunter Street, ’round Brunswick Square and Lansdowne Place, past the Foundling Hospital, up Caroline Place—and he was there. Ten minutes at the outside, probably less. He’d have been gone at least three quarters of an hour, counting the fight with Grey—and returning. But he could have done it on foot—easily.”
Monk smiled; Evan deserved praise and he was glad to give it.
“Thank you. I ought to have done that myself. It might even have been less time, if the quarrel was an old one-say ten minutes each way, and five minutes for the fight. That’s not long for a man to be out of sight at a club.”
Evan looked down, a faint color in his face. He was smiling.
“It doesn’t get us any further,” he pointed out ruefully. “It could have been Shelburne, or it could have been anyone else. I suppose we shall have to investigate every other family he could have blackmailed? That should make us rather less popular than the ratman. Do you think it was Shelburne, sir, and we’ll just never prove it?”
Monk stood up.
“I don’t know but I’m damned if it’ll be for lack of trying.” He was thinking of Joscelin Grey in the Crimea, seeing the horror of slow death by starvation, cold and disease, the blinding incompetence of commanders sending men to be blown to bits by enemy guns, the sheer stultifying of it all; feeling fear and physical pain, exhaustion, certainly pity, shown by his brief ministrations to the dying in Scutari