mere formality but was now a very real battle in which it was even possible that Jericho Phillips's fight for his life could end in victory. People in the gallery were straining to look at him. He had assumed a sudden public stature that was both frightening and fascinating.
Monk had already been identified. Both the jury and the spectators had heard of him from earlier witnesses. Now they stared in sharp interest as the questions began.
“I did not call you earlier, Commander Monk,” Rathbone began, “because you are familiar with only part of this case, and Mr. Orme was involved from the beginning, when Mr. Durban was first called to the discovery of the boy's body.” He walked elegantly across the open space, as if he were very much at ease. Only someone who knew him as well as Monk did would see that his shoulders were stiff, and he did not carry his hands quite naturally. “However,” he continued, turning to face the witness stand, “certain facts have come to our attention that suggest unusual elements with which you could help us.” He waited, for dramatic effect, not because there was any question in his words.
Tremayne shifted in his seat as though he could not find a comfortable position.
“This case had been dropped, Mr. Monk.” Rathbone's voice was suddenly challenging. “Why did you choose to reopen it?”
Monk had expected exactly this question. “Because I came across a record of it in Mr. Durban's papers, and the fact that it was still unsolved bothered me,” he replied.
Rathbone's eyebrows rose. “Indeed? Then I assume you pursued all of Mr. Durban's other unsolved cases with equal zeal?”
“I would like to solve them all,” Monk replied. “There were not many: a few minor thefts, one to do with the smuggling of half a dozen kegs of brandy; the fencing of stolen china and ornaments; a couple of incidents of public drunkenness that ended in fights; a few broken windows. The murder of children comes before all those.” He too paused for effect, and smiled very slightly. “I'll attend to the rest, if I have time.”
Rathbone's face changed slightly, acknowledging that he had an adversary not to be trifled with. “Of course that takes priority,” he agreed, changing his angle of attack with barely a trace of awkwardness. “It seems from what we have heard that it comes before a great many things in your estimation. You appear to have read Mr. Durban's notes with great attention. Why is that?”
Monk had not foreseen the question phrased quite that way. “I have held Mr. Durban's position since shortly after his death. I thought I had a great deal to learn from his experience, and what he had written about.”
“How modest of you,” Rathbone observed. “So you admired Mr. Durban a great deal?”
There was only one possible answer. “I did.”
“Why?” Rathbone asked innocently.
Monk had opened the way to such a question; now he had to answer it. He had no time to concoct a reply that was careful or measured to safeguard the case. “Because he held command without abuse of his authority,” he said. “His men both liked and respected him. For the short time that I knew him, before he gave his life in the call of duty, I found him to have humor, kindness, and integrity.” He nearly said something about hating injustice, and stopped himself just in time.
“A fine eulogy for a man who is not here to speak for himself,” Rathbone said. “He certainly has a loyal friend in you, Mr. Monk.”
“You say that as if loyalty to a friend were an offense,” Monk retaliated, just a shade too quickly, betraying his anger.
Rathbone stopped, turned slowly towards Monk up in the witness stand, and smiled. “It is, Mr. Monk, when it places itself before loyalty to truth, and to the law. It is an understandable quality, perhaps even likable-except of course, to the man who is accused of a hideous crime so that one friend may pay a debt to another.”
There was a rustle of sharpened interest around the room. One or two of the jurors looked anxious. Lord Justice Sullivan's face was carefully expressionless.
Tremayne rose to his feet, but with anger rather than confidence.
“Profound as Sir Oliver's philosophy may be, my lord, it does not appear to contain a question.”
“You are quite correct,” Sullivan agreed, but with reluctance. “Such observations more properly belong in your club, Sir Oliver. You called Mr. Monk to the stand; therefore, I assume you have something to ask him. Please proceed with it.”
“My lord,” Rathbone said, masking only the slightest irritation. He looked back up at Monk. “What was your own occupation when you first met Mr. Durban?”
“I was a private agent of inquiry,” Monk answered. He could guess where Rathbone was leading, but he could not avoid going with him.
“Did that fit you for taking over Mr. Durban's position as Commander of the River Police at Wapping?”
“I don't think so. But I had been in the Metropolitan Police before that.” Surely Rathbone was not going to bring up his loss of memory? He was seized with a sudden cold uncertainty that he might.
But that was not where Rathbone struck.
“Why did you leave the Metropolitan Police?” he asked.
Sullivan was impassive, but as if he were containing his emotion with difficulty. His color was high, his fist tightly closed on the bench.
“Sir Oliver, are you questioning Mr. Monk's professional ability, his reputation, or his honesty?” he asked.
“None of those, my lord.” Irritation marked Rathbone's face now. His hands were closed tight and hard. “I believe Mr. Durban had leadership skills that Mr. Monk intensely admired, because he had failed to exhibit them himself in the past. Mr. Durban, in choosing him as his successor, gave him the opportunity to try a second time, which is a chance few men receive. Mr. Durban also expressed a confidence in him that he did not have in himself. I will show that Mr. Monk's sense of debt to Durban drove him to exceed his authority, and his usual judgment, in pursuit of Jericho Phillips, and that he did so to pay what he perceived as a debt. He also desired profoundly to earn the respect of his men by vindicating Durban 's original pursuit of the murderer.”
Tremayne shot to his feet, his face filled with consternation, forgetting even to address the judge.
“That is a very large and rather rash assumption, Sir Oliver.”
Rathbone turned to Sullivan with an air of innocence.
“My client is accused of a very terrible crime, my lord. If he is found guilty he will be hanged. No lengths within the law are too great to make certain that justice is done, and that we do not also allow our emotions, our pity or our revulsion, to dictate our thoughts and overwhelm our reason. We too wish to see someone pay, but it must be the right someone.”
“Of course it must,” Sullivan said forcefully. “Proceed, Sir Oliver, but get to the point.”
Rathbone bowed very slightly. “Thank you, my lord. Mr. Monk, did you follow Durban 's notes to retrace his original detection, or did you accept his observations and deductions as sufficient?”
“I followed them again and questioned the same people again, as far as I could,” Monk answered with a tone suggesting that the answer was obvious.
“But in each case you already knew what evidence you were looking for,” Rathbone pointed out. “For example, Mr. Durban began with an unidentified corpse and had to do whatever he could to learn who the boy was. You began knowing that Mr. Durban believed it to be Walter Figgis. You had only to prove that he was right. Those are not the same courses of action at all.”
Several jurors fidgeted unhappily. They could see the plain difference.
“Are you sure you were not merely confirming what you already wished to believe?” Rathbone hammered the point home.
“Yes, I am sure,” Monk said decisively.
Rathbone smiled, his head high, the light gleaming on his fair hair.
“How do you identify the body of a boy who has been in the water for some days, Mr. Monk?” he challenged. “Surely it is… severely changed? The flesh…” He did not continue.
The mood of the court altered. The reality of death had entered again, and the battle of words seemed faintly irrelevant.
“Of course it is changed,” Monk said softly. “What had once been a bruised, burned, and underfed boy, but very much alive, had become so much cold meat, like something the butcher discarded. But that is what we had to work with. It still mattered that we learn who he was.” He leaned forward a little over the railings of the stand. “He still had hair, and height, shape of face, possibly some clothes left, and quite a bit of skin, enough to guess his coloring,
