brother, if she is driven to choose.”
“Which presumably you will do?”
“How perceptive of you!”
“Not particularly. You were rather obvious.”
Monk opened his mouth to retort.
“William!” Callandra commanded. “I will be obliged if you will take your leave. Whether you return to your room in the Grassmarket or not is up to you, but it seems more than apparent to me that you need a good night’s sleep.” She regarded Henry Rathbone with affection. “I am sure you must be ready to retire, and I am. Good night, Mr. Rathbone. You have been of great support to me in this most trying time, and my gratitude to you is immense. I hope we shall remain friends once you have returned to London.”
“I am always at your service, ma’am,” he said with a smile which warmed his whole face. “Good night. Come, Oliver. We have all but outstayed our welcome.”
“Good night, Lady Callandra,” Oliver said courteously. He turned to Hester, ignoring Monk. His face was suddenly gentle. The anger fled and a pronounced tenderness took its place. “Good night, my dear. Tonight you are free, and we shall find the solution somehow. You shall not be jeopardized again.”
“Thank you,” she said with a sudden rush of emotion making her voice hoarse. “I know how much you have done for me already, and I am profoundly grateful. Nothing I can say-”
“Don’t,” he interrupted. “Just sleep well. Tomorrow is time enough to think of the next step.”
She took a deep breath. “Good night.”
He smiled and led the way to the door. Henry Rathbone followed immediately after him, smiling at Hester, and leaving without further speech.
Monk hesitated, frowning, then seemed to think better of what he had been going to say.
“Good night, Hester, Lady Callandra.”
He was gone and the door closed before she realized it was the first time she could recall his having used her given name. It was odd to hear it on his tongue, and she was torn between relief that he had left and a desire for him to stay. That was ridiculous. She was much too tired and overwrought to make any sense even to herself.
“I think I will go to bed if you don’t mind,” she said to Callandra. “I think I am really…”
“Exhausted,” Callandra finished very gently. “Of course you are, my dear. I shall have the innkeeper send us both up hot milk and a spot of brandy. I think I need it about as much as you do. I can confess to you now, I was deathly afraid I was going to lose one of the dearest friends I have. The relief is rather more than I can comfortably cope with. I am very ready to sleep.” She held out her hand, and without an instant’s hesitation, Hester took it, and walked into her arms to cling to her as fiercely as she was able, and did not move till the innkeeper knocked on the door.
Early the following morning everyone was a trifle self-conscious over the previous night’s high emotion. No one referred to it Henry Rathbone took his leave back to London, stopping for a moment to speak with Hester and then failing to find words for what he meant. It did not matter in the slightest. She had no need of them.
Callandra also went, apparently satisfied that she could add nothing further to the situation.
Oliver Rathbone said that he was going to council with Argyll once more, and that no doubt he would see Monk and Hester again before he also returned to London. Not unnaturally he had other cases awaiting him. He said nothing to Monk about whatever he had intended to do at Ainslie Place, and took only a moment to speak, rather formally, to Hester. She thanked him yet again for his work on her behalf, and he looked embarrassed, so she pursued it no further.
By nine o’clock she and Monk were alone, everyone else having departed for the morning train south. It was a windy day but not unpleasant, and fitful shafts of sunlight gave it a brightness out of keeping with both their moods. They stood side by side on Princes Street, staring up its handsome length towards the rise of the new town, and Ainslie Place.
“I don’t know where you think you are going to stay,” Monk said with a frown. ‘The Grassmarket is most unsuitable, and you cannot afford the hotel where Callandra was.”
“What is wrong with the Grassmarket?” she demanded.
“It’s not suitable for a woman alone,” he replied irritably. ‘Tor heaven’s sake, I thought your own common sense would have told you that! The neighborhood is rough, and a great deal of it none too clean.”
She looked at him witheringly. “Worse than Newgate?” she inquired.
“Acquired a taste for it, have you?” he said, tight-lipped.
“Then leave me to attend to my own accommodation,” she said rashly. “And let us proceed to Ainslie Place.”
“What do you mean ‘us’? I’m not taking you!”
“I do not require you to. I am perfectly capable of taking myself. I believe I shall walk there. It is not an unpleasant day and I should welcome a little exercise. I have not had much of late.”
Monk shrugged and set out at a smart pace, so smart she was obliged almost to run to keep up with him. She had no breath to continue the conversation.
They arrived after ten, Hester with sore feet and feeling too heated for comfort, and by now in a very different temper. Damn Monk!
He, on the contrary, was looking rather pleased with himself.
The door of number seventeen was opened by McTeer. His dismal expression fell even farther when he saw Monk, and approached disastrous proportions when he saw Hester behind him.
“And who will ye be wanting?” he said slowly, rolling the words on his tongue as if he were making a prognostication of doom. “Have ye come for Mr. Mclvor?”
“No, of course not,” Monk said. “We have no power to come for anybody.”
McTeer snorted. “I thought maybe ye were the po-liss…”
It still jarred Monk that he was no longer a policeman and had no power whatever. His new status gave him freedom, and at the same time robbed him of half the ability to use it to its uttermost.
“Then ye’ll be wanting Mrs. Mclvor, no doubt,” McTeer finished for himself. “Mr. Alastair is no here at this time o’ day.”
“Of course not,” Monk agreed. “I should be obliged to see whoever I may.”
“Aye, aye, I daresay. Well, you’d better come in.” And reluctantly McTeer pulled the door wide enough open to allow them to pass into the hall, with its giant picture of Hamish Farraline dominating the room.
Hester stared at it with curiosity as McTeer withdrew. Monk waited impatiently.
“What are you going to say?” Hester asked him.
“I don’t know,” he replied tersely. “It can’t be prescribed and followed like a dose of medicine.”
“Medicine is not prescribed and followed regardless,” she contradicted. “You watch the progress of the patient and do whatever you think best according to his response.”
“Don’t be pedantic.”
“Well, if you don’t know now, you had better make up your mind very rapidly,” she replied. “Oonagh will be here in a moment, unless she sends a message that she will not receive you.”
He turned his back, but remained standing close to her. She was right, and it irritated him almost beyond bearing. There had been too much emotion in the last few weeks, and he was profoundly disturbed by it. He hated his feelings to be beyond his control. The anger brought back memories which frightened him, recent memories of confusion and fear. The possibility of failure was another all too recent memory he preferred not to reawaken. The emotion caused by the knowledge that she might very easily die was a profound and deeply confused turmoil he chose to ignore. If he did so for long enough, he could sink into all the other memories he had lost.
She did not interrupt his thoughts again until McTeer returned to say that they would be received in the library. He did not say by whom.
When he opened the library door and announced them, all three of the women were there: Eilish, pale as a ghost, her eyes dark with fear; Deirdra, tense and unhappy, glancing all the time at Eilish; and Oonagh, composed and grave, and somewhat apologetic. It was she who came forward to greet first Hester, then Monk. As always, she was not lost for words.
“Miss Latterly, no expression of regret can suffice for what you have endured, but please believe that we are truly sorry, and as far as we have any part in it, we apologize profoundly.”
