“You are quite sure of what you say?” she pressed. There was a flicker of amusement in her eyes—or was it perception?
There was nothing to do but be brazen. He made the same laughter reflect in his own face. It was not difficult.
“Yes, I am quite certain that I have no evidence that she is anything more than extravagant and unaware of the amount she needs to pay rather than can be persuaded to pay,” he answered. “And there is much evidence that she is, in all ways that matter, a thoroughly respectable woman.”
She was standing with her back to the window and the light made a halo of her hair.
“Hmm.” She sighed a little. “All in so short a time, and yet it has taken you many days to search for evidence that will convict Miss Latterly….”
He should have foreseen that, and he had not. He thought quickly.
“Miss Latterly has taken a great deal of trouble to hide any such evidence, Mrs. McIvor. Mrs. Farraline had nothing to hide. Murder hardly compares with a little extravagance in one’s dressmaker, milliner, glover, hosier, bootmaker, haberdasher, furrier, jeweler or perfumier.”
“Great heavens!” She laughed, turning to face him. “What an array of people! Yes, perhaps I begin to understand. Anyway, I am obliged to you, and also for having the courtesy to tell me so rapidly. How is your own investigation proceeding?”
“So far I can find nothing with which the defense could trap us,” he said truthfully. “I should like very much to learn where she obtained the extra digitalis, but either it was not from an apothecary locally or, if it was, they prefer to remain silent about it.”
“I suppose that would not be altogether surprising. The sale would make them, however innocently, party to the murder,” she said, watching his face. “People do not like to compromise their reputations, especially if they are in business. It would not improve his trade.”
“No.” He pursed his lips. “Although I would like to have found him. The defense will point out that she had very little
time in which she could have left the house. She was in a city she did not know—she cannot have gone far.”
Oonagh drew breath as if to say something, then let it out in a sigh.
“Have you given up, Mr. Monk?” There was only the faintest shadow of challenge in her voice, and disappointment.
He too nearly spoke before thinking. It was on the edge of his tongue to deny it fiercely, then he realized how the emotion would betray him. Carefully he masked his feelings.
“Not yet,” he said casually. “But I am close to it. I may soon have done all I can to assure the outcome.”
“I hope you will call on us again before you leave Edinburgh?” There was nothing in her face. She needed no artifice and she knew it. Such a thing would be beneath her.
“Thank you, I should like to. You have been most courteous.”
He excused himself, and in the empty hall, after she had returned to the nether part of the house, he ran lightly to the stairs and up them to search for Hector Farraline. If he waited for McTeer he would have to explain why he wished to see Hector, and would very likely be politely refused.
He knew the geography of the house from his earlier visits, when he had questioned the servants and been shown Mary’s bedroom, the boudoir and the dressing room where the cases and the medicine cabinet had been.
He found Hector’s room without difficulty and knocked on the door. It was opened almost immediately with eagerness which was explained when Hector’s face fell, and Monk realized he had been expecting someone else, probably McTeer with a little refreshment. Monk had observed that the family did not restrict Hector his liquid sustenance, or seem to make any stringent efforts to keep him sober.
“Oh, the detective, again,” Hector said disapprovingly.
“Not that ye’ve found out a damn thing all the time ye’ve been here! Some poor fool’s paying ye money for naught.”
Monk went in and closed the door behind him. In other circumstances he might have lost his temper at such language, but he was too intent upon what he might learn from Hector.
“I came looking to find evidence that the defense would put up to clear Miss Latterly,” he answered with a candid glance at the older man. He still looked ill, red-eyed and pale-faced, his movement shambling.
“Why did she kill Mary?” Hector said wretchedly, crumpling into the large leather chair near the window. He did not bother to invite Monk to sit down. The room was very masculine; there were scores of books in an oak case against one wall, too far away for Monk to read the titles. A very fine watercolor painting of a Napoleonic hussar hung above the mantelpiece, and another of a soldier of the Royal Scots Greys was on the wall opposite. A little below it was a portrait of an officer in full Highland dress. He was a young man, handsome, with fine features, thick fair hair and wide level eyes. It was several minutes before Monk recognized it as Hector himself, probably thirty years ago. What on earth had happened to the man in that time to change him from what he had been to the pathetic wreck he was now? Surely it must have been more than simply an elder brother with more character, more intelligence and more courage? Were envy and defeat such virulent diseases?
“Why would a woman like that risk everything for a few pearls?” Hector demanded, his voice suddenly sharp with irritation. “It makes no sense, man. She’ll be hanged … there’ll be no mercy for her, ye know?”
“Yes,” Monk said very quietly, his throat dry. “I do know. You said something the other day about the company books being falsified….”
“Oh, aye. So they are.” Hector said it without the slightest hesitation, and almost without expression.
“By whom?”
Hector blinked. “By whom?” he repeated, as if the question were a curious thing to ask. “I’ve no idea. Maybe Kenneth. He’s the bookkeeper—but he’d be a fool to do it. It’d be so obvious. But then he is a fool.”
“Is he?”
Hector looked at him, realizing he was asking a question, not merely responding to a casual remark.
“Not over anything specific,” he said slowly. “Just a general opinion.”
Monk was certain he was lying, and equally certain he had no intention of telling anyone precisely what Kenneth had done to earn his contempt.
“How do you know?” he asked, sitting down on the smaller, more upright chair opposite him.
“What?” Hector looked composed. “I live in the same house with him, for heaven’s sake. Have done for years. What’s the matter with you, man?”
Monk was surprised with himself that he was so little irritated.
“I realize how you know he’s a fool,” he said calmly. “I don’t know how you know the books have been meddled with.”
“Oh, I see.”
“Well, how do you know?”
Hector looked far away. “Something Mary said. Can’t remember what, exactly. Annoyed about it though. Very.”
Monk leaned forward sharply. “Did she say it was Kenneth? Think, man!”
“No she didn’t,” Hector replied, puckering his brow. “She was just annoyed.”
“But she didn’t send for the police?”
“No.” He opened his eyes wide and looked at Monk with satisfaction. “That’s why I thought it was Kenneth.” He shrugged. “But Quinlan is a clever swine. Wouldn’t put anything past him either. Upstart. All brains and ambition, greedy for power. Does everything sideways. Never knew
why Oonagh was so nice with him. I wouldn’t have let him marry Eilish. I’d have sent him on his way, for all that he was charming enough to begin with.”
“Even if she loved him?” Monk asked quietly.
Hector said nothing, for several seconds staring out of the window.
“Aye, well, maybe if I thought that …”
“Didn’t you?”
“Me?” Hector’s fair eyebrows rose, wrinkling his brow. “What do I know about it? She doesn’t tell me things like that.” A look of grief came into his face, so intense and so sudden Monk was embarrassed to have seen it. It was a rare feeling for him, and surprisingly painful. For a moment he was confused, not knowing what to say or do.
But Hector was oblivious of him. The emotion was too consuming and too immediate for him to care what others thought of him.
“But I’d be surprised if he embezzled,” he said suddenly. “He’s a fly beggar, that one, far too clever to steal.”
“What about Mr. McIvor?”
“Baird?” Hector looked up again, his expression changed to one of amusement and pity. “Maybe. Never understood that one. Deep. Mary was fond of him, for all his moods. Used to say there was more good in him than we knew. Which’d no be hard, as far as I’m concerned.”
“Has he been married to Oonagh long?”
Hector smiled and it altered his face startlingly. The years of self-abuse dropped away and Monk saw the shadow of the man in the Highland dress thirty years ago. The resemblance to the portrait of Hamish Farraline in the hall was stronger, and yet also in some ways less. The pride and the bearing were more alike, the dignity and self-assurance. But there was a humor in Hector that was absent in his older brother, and oddly, considering the man he was now, a sense of peace.
“Ye’ll be thinking they’re an odd pair,” Hector said, regarding Monk knowingly. “So they are. But I’m told Baird
was very dashing when he first came here, very romantic. All dark, brooding looks and hidden passion. Should have been a Highlander, not an Englishman. Oonagh turned down a perfectly good Scots lawyer to take Baird on. Good family, too, the lawyer, very good.”
“Mother-in-law?” Monk asked.
Hector’s face was incredulous, as if he had seen a sudden flash of light.
“Oh aye! A mother-in-law, right enough. A fair dragon of a woman. Ye know, ye’re no half as daft as I thought. That’d make sense, so it would. I can easy imagine Oonagh’d far rather stay here in this house with a man like Baird McIvor than marry an Edinburgh man with a mother of any sort, let alone one like Catherine Stewart. Then she’d no a’ bin mistress in her own house, nor kept her hand in the Farraline business as she does now.”
“Does she? I thought it was Alastair who was head of the company?”
“Aye, he is, but it’s her brains, and Quinlan’s, devil take him.”
Monk rose to his feet. He did not wish to be caught here by McTeer coming with refreshment for Hector, or Oonagh, as he crossed the hall so long after she had bidden him farewell.
“Thank you, Major Farraline. You have been most interesting. I think I shall take your advice and go and see if I can find out who has meddled with the books of Farralines. Good day to you.”
Hector lifted a hand in a half salute, and sat back on his chair again, staring miserably out of the window.
Monk already knew quite a lot about the Farraline printing company, including where to find it, and consequently as soon as he had left Ainslie Place he took a cab along Princes Street into Leith Walk, the long road that led to the Firth of Forth and the dockyards of Leith. The distance from the end of Princes Street was about two miles altogether,
and the printing house was halfway. He alighted, paid the driver, and went to look for Baird McIvor.
The building itself was large, ugly and entirely functional. It immediately adjoined other industrial buildings on either side, the largest of which was, according to the legend on the doorway, a rope manufacturer. Inside was a single, vast, open space with the newest part cleared to form a sort of entrance, from which rose a wrought-iron staircase to a landing. There were several doors in sight, presumably offices for the managers of different divisions and for whatever bookkeepers and other clerks were necessary. The rest of the interior was given over to the printing itself, being filled with presses, typesetting equipment, racks of type and inks. Bales of paper were stored in enormous piles at the far end, along with cloth for binding, thread and yet further machinery. There was no bustle, but a steady hum of industry and regulated movement.
Monk asked the clerk who approached him if he might speak with Mr. McIvor. He did not state his business, and the man must have assumed it had something to do with the company, because he did not inquire but led him up to the first fine hardwood door, knocked and opened it.
“A Mr. Monk to see you, Mr. McIvor.”
Monk thanked him and went in before Baird could have the opportunity to refuse. He barely glanced at the neat bookshelves, the bright gas lamp hissing on the wall, the odd pieces of blank paper on the desk (presumably there for McIvor to judge their comparative quality), and the piles of books sitting on the floor. His attention was on Baird and the surprise and alarm on his face.
“Monk?” He half rose from his desk. “What do you want here?”
“Just a little of your time,” Monk said without a smile. He had already concluded that he would learn nothing from Baird by simply asking him. He would have used subtlety had he the time, or the coolness of brain, but he had not. He must resort to force. “I have evidence which strongly
suggests that the company books have been tampered with and money has been taken.”
Baird blanched and anger filled his dark eyes, but before he could protest or deny, Monk went on. This time he smiled, but it was wolfish, a baring of the teeth, and offered no comfort at all.
“I understand the defense has employed a brilliant barrister.” That was hope ahead of knowledge, but if it was not true now, he would do everything within his power to see that it became true. “We don’t want them finding this and making some suggestions to the jury that it was the true motive for Mrs. Farraline’s murder, in order to cause reasonable doubt that it was in fact this nurse.”
Baird sat back in his chair and stared at him, comprehension filling his face and resentment dying away.
“No … no, of course not,” he said grudgingly, but his eyes were still wary and Monk noticed that there was a very fine bead of sweat on his brow. It sharpened his attention and he determined to pursue it to the end.
“After all,” he added, “if it were so, it might provide an excellent motive for murder. I imagine Mrs. Farraline would not have permitted such a crime to pass unpunished, even if privately rather than publicly?”
Baird hesitated, but the expression on his face was as much anger and grief as any overt fear. He was a more complex man than Monk had at first assumed—his rather contemptuous assessment of a man who would prefer Eilish to Oonagh.