put his mind or his imagination to anything else.
'She has missed you,' the elder Stourbridge prompted. 'She will be pleased to hear that Mr. Monk is willing to assist us.'
'Yes... yes, of course,' Lucius agreed, glancing at Monk with the shadow of a smile, then going out and closing the door.
Harry Stourbridge turned to Monk, the sunlight bright on his face, catching the fine lines and showing more nakedly the tiredness around his eyes.
'Ask what you wish, Mr. Monk. I will do anything I can to find Miriam, and if she is in any kind of difficulty, to offer her all the help I can. As you can see, my son cares for her profoundly. I can imagine no one else who will make him as happy.'
Monk found it impossible to doubt Major Stourbridge’s sincerity, which placed upon him an even greater emotional burden. Why had Miriam Gardiner fled their house, their family, without a word of explanation? Had it been one sudden event or an accumulation of small things amounting to a whole too great for her? What could it be that she could not even offer these people who loved her some form of explanation?
And where was Treadwell the coachman?
Stourbridge was staring at Monk, waiting for him to begin.
But Monk was uncertain where to start. Harry Stourbridge was not what he had imagined, and he found himself unexpectedly sensitive to his feelings.
'What do you know of Mrs. Gardiner?' he asked, more brusquely than he had intended. Pity was of no use to Lucius or his father. He was here to address their problem, not wallow in emotions.
'You mean her family?' Stourbridge understood straightaway what Monk was thinking. 'She never spoke of them. I imagine they were fairly ordinary. I believe they died when she was quite young. It was obviously a matter of sadness to her, and none of us pursued the subject.'
'Someone will have cared for her while she was growing up,' Monk pressed. He had no idea if it was a relevant point, but there were so few obvious avenues to follow.
'Of course,' Stourbridge agreed, sitting down at last. 'She was taken in by a Mrs. Anderson, who treated her with the greatest kindness. Indeed, she still visits her quite frequently. It was from Mrs. Anderson’s home that she met Mr. Gardiner, when she was about seventeen, and married him two years later. He was considerably older than she.' He crossed his legs, watching Monk anxiously. 'I made enquiries myself, naturally. Lucius is my only son, and his happiness is of the greatest importance to me. But nothing I learned explains what has happened. Walter Gardiner was a quiet, modest man who married relatively late. He was nearly forty. But his reputation was excellent. He was rather shy, a trifle awkward in the company of women, and he worked extremely hard at his business—which, incidentally, was the selling of books. He made a modest success of it and left Miriam well provided for. By all accounts she was very happy with him. No one had an ill word to say for either of them.'
'Did they have children?' Monk asked.
A shadow crossed Stourbridge’s eyes. 'No. Unfortunately not. That is a blessing that does not come to every marriage.' He drew in his breath and let it out silently. 'My wife and I have only the one child.' There was a sharp memory of pain in his face, and Monk was very aware of it. It was a subject he himself had considered little. He had no title or estates to leave, and he had no memory of ever considering marriage, far less a family. He felt in no way incomplete without such a thing. But, then, Hester was not an ordinary woman. He had married her with no thought of the comfort of domestic life. She was not the one he would have chosen if he had. The thought made him smile unconsciously. One could not tell what the future might bring. He had already surprised himself by changing as radically as he had. Perhaps in a few years he would think of children. Now he was honest enough to know that he would resent such other demands on Hester’s time and emotion as a child would have to be.
Stourbridge was waiting for his attention.
'She is somewhat older than your son,' Monk put in as tactfully as he could. 'Exactly how much older is she?'
A flash of amusement crossed Stourbridge’s face.
'Nine years,' he replied. 'If you are going to ask if she could give him an heir, the answer is that I do not know. Of course, we would like it if Lucius were to have a son, but it is not our main concern. There is no guarantee of such a thing, Mr. Monk, whomever one marries, and Miriam was never made to believe it was a condition of the marriage.'
Monk did not argue, but he would judge for himself whether Mrs. Stourbridge shared her husband’s feelings. So far his questions had elicited nothing in which he could see any reason for Miriam Gardiner to have left. He wished he had a clearer picture of her in his mind. Seen through the eyes of Lucius and Harry Stourbridge, she was the model of the ideal woman. Their image gave her no flesh and blood, and certainly no passions. Had they seen anything of the real woman beneath the surface they so much admired? Was it any use asking Harry Stourbridge anything further, except bare facts?
'Was this her first visit to this house?' Monk said suddenly.
Stourbridge looked slightly surprised.
'No, not at all. She had been here half a dozen times. If you are thinking we did not make her welcome, or that she felt overwhelmed or less than comfortable with the idea of living among us, you are mistaken, Mr. Monk.'
'Would she have lived here, in this house?' Monk asked, envisioning a score of reasons why she might have found the prospect unendurable. Having been mistress of her own home, no matter how ordinary compared with this house, so close to Kensington Gardens, she might find the sheer loss of privacy insupportable. Hester would have! He could not imagine her spending the best part of her life under someone else’s roof. When she had nursed privately, as she had since returning from the Crimea, she had always known that any position was temporary and that, whatever its difficulties, it would reach an end. And she’d had a measure of privacy, and of autonomy, in that the care of the patient was in her charge.
A whole new concept of imprisonment opened up to him.
Harry Stourbridge was smiling.
'No, Mr. Monk. I have properties in Yorkshire, and Lucius is very fond of life in the north. Miriam had visited there some months ago—I confess, when the weather was a good deal less clement—but she was charmed by the
