Runcorn would naturally begin with the assumption that Elissa had taken her maid, and he would go to Haverstock Hill to find her. And of course there was no lady’s maid there. A man who had sold all his furniture except the sort of thing a bailiff would leave could not afford such a thing. The scrubwoman who had answered the door the first time was probably the only servant they had, and she might come only two or three times a week.
Would Elissa have taken someone from her father’s house? Or a woman friend? Or might she actually have gone alone?
But the question beating in his mind was how to keep Runcorn from finding out about her gambling, or at least the ruinous extent of it. Perhaps he was only delaying the inevitable, but asking Allardyce himself about Elissa’s companion would be as logical as beginning at Elissa’s home. He quickened his pace. He must find Runcorn and suggest that to him, persuade him to agree.
He glanced both ways at the crossroads, then sprinted across between a dray and a vegetable cart. He reached the police station at twenty minutes past eight and went straight up to Runcorn’s office.
Runcorn looked up, his face carefully devoid of expression. He was waiting for Monk to make the first move.
“Good morning.” Monk hid his smile and looked back straight into Runcorn’s bland eyes. “I thought you’d probably be going to Allardyce again to see who the woman was who went with Mrs. Beck. I’d like to come with you.” He thought of adding a request, but that would be rather too polite for Runcorn to believe of him. He would suspect sarcasm.
Runcorn’s shoulders relaxed a little. “Yes, if you want,” he said casually. There was only the slightest flicker to betray that he had not thought of it. “In fact, it would be a good idea,” he added, standing up. “I suppose Mrs. Beck would take someone, wouldn’t she? Wouldn’t be proper alone with an artist in his studio, especially not when there’s living quarters there as well. Who’d it be, a maid?”
“Or a friend,” Monk replied. “Which could be anyone. Easier to start by asking Allardyce himself.”
Runcorn frowned, taking his coat and hat from the stand near the door. “I suppose the fog’s still like pea soup, and it’ll be just as fast to walk.” It was not really a question because he did not wait for an answer.
Monk followed him down the stairs and fell into step beside him in the street. Actually, the weather was improving all the time and he could now see almost thirty yards in any direction. All the same, they decided to walk rather than try to flag down a hansom from the steady stream of traffic.
“How many sittings do you have to have for a portrait, anyhow?” Runcorn asked after several minutes.
“I don’t know,” Monk admitted. “Maybe it depends on the style and the artist. Perhaps the model sits in for you some of the time?”
“They didn’t look much alike.” Runcorn darted a sideways look at Monk. “Still, I suppose for a dress or something it wouldn’t matter.” He frowned. “What did she do the rest of the time? I mean, every day. A doctor’s wife . . . not quite a lady, but certainly gentry . . . at least.” He had exposed an ignorance without intending to. Puzzlement was written plainly in his face. “There isn’t anything she would actually have to do, is there?”
“I doubt it,” Monk lied. Surely without any resident servants she would have to do most of the housework, cooking and laundry herself. Or perhaps with so little of the house occupied, there was far less to attend to. Only sufficient food for Kristian when he was home, and herself if she was not out with friends or at the gambling tables. Maybe Kristian had his shirts laundered at the hospital.
“Then what?” Runcorn asked. They crossed the Gray’s Inn Road and walked north. “I was ill once with bronchitis. Took me ages to get back to regular duty. Enjoyed the rest for the first two or three days. Thought I’d get a lot out of a fortnight. Nearly drove me mad! Never been so bored in my life. Came back before the doctor said I should because I couldn’t stand it.”
Monk could picture it in his mind. Runcorn relaxing with a good book was almost a contradiction in ideas. Again he suppressed a smile with difficulty.
Runcorn saw it and glared at him.
“Sympathy!” Monk said quickly. “Broke my ribs, remember?”
Runcorn grunted, and they went on in silence as far as Acton Street and turned the corner. “Wouldn’t like to be a lady,” he said thoughtfully. “Imagine I’d rather have work to do . . . unless, of course, I didn’t know any different.” He was still frowning, trying to imagine a world so terrifyingly empty, when they reached the top of the stairs and knocked on Allardyce’s studio door.
It was several moments before it was opened by Allardyce himself, looking angry and half asleep. “What in hell’s name do you want at this hour?” he demanded. “It’s barely daylight! Haven’t you got a home?”
“It’s nearly nine o’clock, sir,” Runcorn answered flatly, his face set in disapproval and studiously avoiding looking at Allardyce’s hastily pulled on trousers and his nightshirt tails hanging over them. His feet were bare, and he moved from one to the other on the chilly step.
“I suppose policemen have to be up at this ungodly hour,” Allardyce said irritably. “What do you want now? You’d better come in, because I’m not standing out here any longer.” And he turned and went back inside, leaving the door open for them.
Runcorn followed him in, and Monk came a step behind. The studio was otherwise unoccupied, but there were canvases stacked against the walls. Half a dozen were in one stage or another of development—four portraits, one street scene, an interior with two girls sitting on a sofa reading. The one painting on the easel was of a man of middle age and a great look of self-satisfaction. Presumably it was a commission.
Allardyce muttered something under his breath and disappeared through the farther door.
Runcorn wrinkled his nose very slightly. He said nothing, but his face was eloquent of his disgust.
Monk walked over to a sheaf of drawings in a folder and opened them up. The first was brilliant. The artist had used only a charcoal pencil, but with an extraordinary economy of stroke he had caught the suppressed energy in face and body as three women leaned over a table. The dice were so insignificant it took a moment before Monk even saw them. All the passion was in the faces, the eyes, the open mouths, the jagged force that held them transfixed. Gamblers.
He turned it over quickly and looked at the next. Gamblers again, but this time with the vacant stare of the loser. It was powerful, desolate. A home or a fortune lost on the turn of a piece of colored cardboard, but all despair
