which way the surface lay.
He reached out for Trace, then drew back his hand, now numb with cold. This was no time to be foolish.
A hand came after him. Then he felt the rest of the body, a shoulder, perhaps a head. It bumped into his helmet and something covered the glass in front of his eyes.
Hair! Loose human hair in the water! Trace was drowning!
Monk reached up and clasped the arm, trying to pull desperately on the rope at the same time. He must get help! What had happened?
There was no resistance on the arm, no weight! God Almighty! It was loose … just an arm, bloated and almost naked! He could dimly make out where his fingers had sunk into the flesh, like squeezing soft fat.
He felt himself gag, and only just controlled himself from retching. The rest of the body was there, almost whole, huge, disintegrating at the touch.
He saw Trace’s light in the gloom, waving around. Another body floated across his vision and disappeared.
It made no sense. Who were they? Why were they dead? He forced himself to govern his revulsion and move slowly after one of them. Deliberately he felt around until he found the head. He shone his light on it, close up, trying not to look at the unrecognizable features. The bullet hole was still there, not easy to see in the white, half- eaten flesh of the forehead, but plain enough in the splintered skull.
It seemed to take endless time swishing around almost helplessly in the current inside the cramped cabin, bumping into each other, into the trapped and hideous corpses, before they ascertained beyond doubt that there were three men, all of whom had been shot dead.
Trace came right up to him, holding Monk by one arm and touching his helmet to Monk’s. When he spoke, incredibly, Monk could hear him almost as normal.
“Shearer!” Trace said distinctly, waving his other arm, with the lantern, in the direction of one of the corpses.
Shearer. Of course! This abomination was why no one had seen Walter Shearer since the night of Alberton’s death. He had been loyal to Alberton after all. He had followed the barge down here, and been shot with these other two. Were they the ones who had actually committed the murders? Why? On whose orders?
He made a sign of acknowledgment, then turned and blundered out of the fearful cabin and stopped abruptly as his air hose tightened and almost broke. Terror stifled his breath. He was covered in cold sweat. Trace! Of course! He would die down here in this filthy water, alone with his murderer. He would never see light again, breathe air, hold Hester in his arms or look at her eyes.
When Monk left home that afternoon, Hester had tried, at first, to busy herself with domestic tasks. Mrs. Patrick arrived at exactly two o’clock, the agreed time. She was a small, thin woman with crisp white hair full of natural curl, and very blue eyes. Hester judged her to be about fifty years old. She had a strong face, albeit a little gaunt, and a brisk manner. She spoke with a slight Scottish burr. Hester could not place it, but she knew it was not Edinburgh. She had too many memories of that city to mistake its tones.
Mrs. Patrick, neat in a white, starched apron, began to clear up the kitchen and consider what other tasks needed doing: clean and black the small stove, put on the laundry, scrub the kitchen floor, clean out the larder and make a note of what needed restocking, take out the rugs, sweep the floors, beat the rugs and return them, hang the laundry out, and do the ironing from the previous day. And of course prepare the dinner.
“What time will Mr. Monk be home?” she enquired while Hester was sitting in the office out of the way, stitching on a shirt button.
“I don’t know,” Hester replied honestly. “He’s gone diving.”
Mrs. Patrick’s eyebrows shot up. “I beg your pardon?”
“He’s gone diving,” Hester explained. “In the river. I’m not sure what he expects to find.”
“Water and mud,” Mrs. Patrick said tartly. “For heaven’s sake, why would he be doing such a thing?” She looked at Hester narrowly, as if she suspected she had been lied to regarding the nature of Monk’s employment.
Hester was very keen to keep Mrs. Patrick’s services. Life had been altogether much easier since her advent. “He is still trying to find out who killed Mr. Alberton in the Tooley Street murder,” she said tentatively.
Mrs. Patrick’s eyebrows were still raised and a trifle crooked, her mouth twisted into profound skepticism.
“There are other guns,” Hester went on, not sure if she was making matters better or worse. “Something went down the river on the barge from Hayes Dock. It might have been to pay the blackmailers.”
Mrs. Patrick had not intended to admit that she had been following the case. She disapproved of reading about such things, but the words were out of her mouth before she realized their implication. “That was why they asked for Mr. Monk in the first place, wasn’t it?”
“Yes, it was,” Hester admitted.
“If you ask me, they don’t exist.” Mrs. Patrick smoothed her apron over her narrow hips. “I reckon as Mr. Alberton did that himself … probably sold the guns to the pirates anyway!”
“That wouldn’t make any sense,” Hester argued. “If there were no blackmailer then he could sell them anywhere he wanted.”
“Highest bidder,” Mrs. Patrick said darkly. “Money, mark my words, that’s what’ll be at the bottom of it … the love of money is at the root of all evil.” And with that she turned and went back to the kitchen and her duties.
Hester sat for another fifteen minutes turning it over in her mind, then she went through to the kitchen herself and informed Mrs. Patrick that she was going out and had very little idea when she would be back.
“You’re not going along the river?” Mrs. Patrick asked in some alarm.
“No, I’m not,” Hester assured her. “I’m going to consider the question of blackmail again, more carefully.”
Mrs. Patrick grunted and returned her attention to the sink, but her square, stiff shoulders were eloquent of her mixed satisfaction and disapproval. She was obviously not at all certain that the position she had accepted was a wise one, but it was undoubtedly interesting, and she would not leave just yet, unless it seriously threatened either her personal safety or her reputation.
Hester went again to see Robert Casbolt. She hoped to find him at home. If not she would have to seek an appointment with him in his offices, or wait there for him to return from whatever business had taken him away.
Fortunately he was at home, apparently reading. An ancient manservant informed her Mr. Casbolt would be happy to see her, and led her, not into the golden room in which they had talked before, but to an upstairs room which was, if anything, even more beautiful. French doors opened onto a balcony which overlooked the garden, at the moment full of flowers and quiet in the sun. The room was done entirely in soft earth colors and creams, extraordinarily restful, and Hester felt immediately comfortable in it.
Casbolt welcomed her, inviting her to be seated in one of the chairs facing the garden, a little to the left of a magnificent Italian bronze lion.
“It’s beautiful!” she said, moved by something more than mere admiration. There was a tenderness in the room, as if it were a place apart from ordinary life.
He was pleased. “You like it?”
“More than that,” she said honestly. “It’s … unique.”
“Yes, it is,” he agreed simply. “I spend time here alone. When I am out it is locked. I am glad you see its quality.”
Hester hoped even more profoundly that it was not as Mrs. Patrick suggested, but she must face the truth. If Alberton had intended to deal with the pirates in any manner at all, or had given them to believe he would, then perhaps his death had nothing to do with the American civil war but was a matter of money, or perhaps after all those years, an old vengeance for Judith’s brother’s death. Since Casbolt was her cousin, and obviously cared for her deeply, perhaps he even knew that, or had guessed it since. If it were either of these two answers, she longed for it to be the latter. A vengeance would be understandable. Any man might well have hungered to exact some kind of justice in the circumstances, and reached where the law could not.
“What can I do for you, Mrs. Monk?” Casbolt asked graciously. “I feel we owe you so much, believe me, you would have only to name your favor.”
“We still do not know who was responsible for the crimes.” She chose evasive words and she spoke softly.
