read and write as they believed. As you know, we failed.”
Runcorn cleared his throat. The politics of foreigners were not his concern. His business was crime there in London, and he wanted to remain on ground he understood. “So you came home . . . at least you came here, and Mrs. Beck . . . Mrs. . . . what did you say?”
“Frau von Leibnitz, but she was my wife by then,” Kristian replied.
“Yes . . . yes, of course. You came to London?” Runcorn said hastily.
“In 1849, yes.” A shadow passed over Kristian’s face.
“And practiced medicine here?”
“Yes.”
“And Mrs. Beck, what did she do? Did she make friends here again?” Runcorn asked, although Monk knew from the tone of his voice that he had no purpose in mind, he was foundering. What he wanted to know was were they happy, had Elissa taken lovers, but he did not know how to say it so the answer was of value.
“Yes, of course,” Kristian answered. “She was always interested in the arts, music and painting.”
“Was she interested in your work?” Monk interrupted.
Kristian was startled. “Medicine? No . . . no she wasn’t. It . . .” He changed his mind and remained silent.
“When did she first meet Allardyce?” Runcorn went on.
“I don’t know. About four or five months ago, I think.”
“She didn’t say?”
“Not that I remember.”
Runcorn questioned him for several more minutes but knew he was achieving nothing. When there was a sharp knock on the door and a medical student asked if Kristian was ready to see patients again, both Monk and Runcorn were happy to leave.
“Was Maude Oldenby the only patient you visited?” Runcorn asked as Kristian stood at the door.
The ghost of a smile touched Kristian’s lips. “No. I also saw Mrs. Mary Ann Jackson, of 21 Argyle Street.” He went out and closed the door quietly. They heard his footsteps down the corridor.
Neither of them remarked that Argyle Street was rather a long way from Haverstock Hill, but only a few hundred yards from Acton Street.
“He’s lying,” Runcorn said when they were outside on the pavement again.
“What about?” Monk said curiously.
“I don’t know,” Runcorn said, beginning to walk rapidly and avoiding Monk’s gaze. “But he is. Don’t you know what your wife is doing and who her friends are?”
“Yes . . . but . . .”
“But what? But nothing. He knows. He’s lying. Let’s take the omnibus back.”
They did, and Monk was glad of it; it made conversation impossible, and he was able to concentrate on his own thoughts. He would have defended Kristian to Runcorn, out of loyalty to Callandra, but he also was convinced that Kristian was lying. Without saying as much, he had affected to know almost nothing of Elissa’s daily life. Certainly he was dedicated to medicine, but he was also a warm and emotional man. He was deeply moved by his wife’s death, and when he had spoken of their days in Vienna the passion of it was still there in him, taking him back to it whether he wished or not.
What had happened since then? It was thirteen years. How much did people change in that time? What did they learn of each other that became unbearable? Infatuation died, but did love? What was the difference? Did one learn that too late? Was it Elissa that Kristian still so obviously cared for, or the memory of the time when they had fought for liberty and high idealism on the barricades of Vienna?
Did Callandra know anything of this? Had she ever even met Elissa? Or, like Monk, had she imagined some tedious woman with whom Kristian was imprisoned in an honorable but intolerably lonely marriage of convenience? He had a cold, gripping fear that it was the latter.
What if she had then discovered this woman Argo Allardyce had seen, the woman whose beauty haunted him and stared out of the canvas to capture the imagination of the onlooker?
What did one love in a woman? Love was surely for honor and gentleness, courage, laughter and wisdom, and a hundred thoughts shared. But infatuation was for what the heart thought it saw, for what the vision believed. A woman with a face like Elissa Beck’s could have provoked anything!
Hester went to the hospital early, in part to see how Mary Ellsworth was progressing. She found her weak and a little nauseous, but with no fever, and no swelling or suppuration around the wound. However, even if the operation were entirely successful, she knew even better than Kristian did that that was only the beginning of healing. Mary’s real illness lay in her mind, the fears and anxieties, the introspection and the numbing boredom that crippled her days.
Hester spoke with her for a little while, trying to encourage her, then went to find Callandra. She looked in the patients’ waiting rooms and was told by a young nurse that she had seen Callandra in the front hall, but when Hester got there she met only Fermin Thorpe, looking angry and important. He seemed about to speak to Hester, then with a curt gesture of irritation he turned on his heel and went the other way. Callandra came from one of the wards, her hair flying up in a gray-brown streamer, the main coil of it askew.
“That man is an interfering nincompoop!” she said furiously, her face flushed, her eyes bright. “He wants to reduce the allowance of porter every day for nurses. I don’t approve of drunkenness any more than he does, but he’d get far better work out of them if he increased their food ration! It’s drink on an empty stomach that does it.” She blinked. “Talking about stomachs, how is Mary Ellsworth?”
Hester smiled a little bleakly. “Miserable, but there’s no infection in the wound.”
