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You shouldn't discount Runcorn. He's persistent too, just weighs his priorities, that's all.”
Snaith gri
Still, nobody crossed yer twice, not even yer own.”
"You said that before!" Monk snapped, stung by his helplessness. "Did I do anything to Runcorn he didn't have coming?" He framed the question aggressively, as if he knew the answer, but his stomach knotted as he looked at Snaith's face in the gaslight and waited for the answer. It seemed an age in coming. He could feel the seconds slip by and hear his own heart beating.
MacPherson cleared his throat.
Snaith stared back, his round, hazel eyes shadowed, his face a trifle puckered. Monk knew before he spoke that his reply was the one he feared.
"Yeah, I reckon so. Enemy in front of yer's one thing, be' and yer's another. I don' know wot yer dun ter 'im, but it fair broke 'im, an' 'e weren't spec ting it from yer. Learned me sum mink abaht yer. Never took yer light arter that. Yer an 'and bastard, an' that's the truth." He took a breath. "But if yer want the swine wot done them women in Seven Dials, I'll 'elp yer ter that. I in't fussy 'oo I use. Go an' ask Wee Mi
"She won't believe me," Monk said reasonably.
"Yeah, she will, 'cos less'n I tell yer w'er ter finder yer'll be wand' ring around the rookeries for the rest oyer life!”
"That's the truth, so it is," MacPherson agreed.
"So tell me," Monk accepted.
Snaith shook his head. "In't yer never scared, Monk? In't it never entered yer 'ead as we'd cut yer throat an' drop yer in the midden, jus' for ol' time's sake?”
Monk gri
"There are times when I could almost like yer," Snaith said, surprised at himself. "One thing I'll say for yer, yer in't never an 'ypocrite.
Got that much on Runcorn, poor sod.”
"Thank you," Monk said sarcastically. "Wee Mi
It was a tortuous hour, and Monk got lost three times before he finally slipped through an alley gateway, across a brick yard and up the back steps into a series of rooms which finally ended in the airlessly hot parlour where Wee Mi
"So yer got 'ere," she observed with a dry chuckle. "Thought as yer'd got lorst. Yer wanter know about rape, do yer?”
He should have known word would reach here before he did.
"Yes.”
"There was two. Bad, they was, so bad no one never said nothing.”
"I don't understand. It was bad, surely that was all the more reason to do something, warn people, stay together… anything…”
She shook her head, her fingers never losing their rhythm.
"Yer gets beat, yer tell people. It in't personal. Yer gets raped bad, it's different.”
"How do you know?”
"I know everything." There was satisfaction in her voice. Then suddenly it hardened and her eyes became cruel. "Yer get them bastards! Give 'em ter us an' we'll draw an' quarter 'em, like they did in the old days. Me gran'fer told me abaht it. Yer string 'em up, or by 'ell's door, we will!”
"Can I speak to the women who were raped?”
"Can yer wot?" she said incredulously.
"Can I speak to the women?" he repeated.
She swore under her breath.
"I need to ask them about the men. I have to be sure it was the same ones. They might remember something, a face, a voice, even a name, the feel of fabric, anything.”
"It were the same men," she said with absolute certainty. "Three of 'em. One tall, one 'eavier, an' one on the ski
He tried to keep the sense of victory out of his voice. "What age were they?”
"Age? I du
"I believe so. When were these attacks?”
"Wot?”
"Before or after the murder in Water Lane?”
She looked at him with her head a trifle to one side, like a withered old sparrow.
"Afore, o' course. In't bin nuffink since. Wouldn't, would there now?”
"No, I think not.”
"That were 'im, then, wot got killed?" she said with satisfaction.
"One of them." He did not bother to correct her error. "I want the other two.”
She gri
"Where did they happen, exactly? I need to know. I need to speak to people who might have seen them coming or going, people in the street, traders, beggars, especially cabbies who might have brought them or taken them away afterwards.”
"Wot fer?" She was genuinely puzzled, it was plain in her face. "Yer know 'oo it were, don't yer?”
"I think so, but I need to prove it…”
"Wot fer?" she said again. "If yer think as the law'll take any notice, yer daft! An' yer in't daft, not yer worst enemy'd say that oyer Other things mebbe.”
"Do you want them caught?" he asked. "You imagine after what happened to one of them, they'll come back to St. Giles, for you to knife them and dump them on some midden? It'll be Limehouse, or the Devil's Acre, or Bluegate Fields next time. If we want justice, it will have to be in their territory, and that means with better weapons than yours. It means evidence, proof, not for the law, which as you say, doesn't care, but for society, which does.”
"Abaht prostitutes getting' raped or beat?" she said, her voice cracking high with disbelief. "Yer've lorst your wits, Monk! It's finally got toyer!”
"Society ladies know their men use prostitutes, Mi
"Yer get 'em, Monk," she said slowly, and for the first time her fingers stopped moving on the needles. "Ye're a clever sod, you are.
Yer get 'em for us. We'll not ferget yer.”
"Where did they happen, the two in St. Giles?”
"Fisher's Walk, the first one, an' Ellicitt's Yard the second.”
"Time?”
"Jus' arter midnight, both times.”
"Dates?”
"Three nights afore the murder in Water Lane, night afore Christmas Eve.”
"Thank you, Mi
"Yeah, I'm sure.”
The following day he went to Evan and aft era little persuasion obtained from him copies of the pictures of Rhys Duff and his father.
He looked at the faces with curiosity. It was the first time he had seen them, and they were neither as he had pictured them. Leighton Duff had powerful features, a strong, broad nose, clear eyes that were blue or grey from the light in them, and the appearance of keen intelligence. Rhys was utterly different, and it was his face which troubled him. It was the face of a dreamer. He should have been a poet or an explorer of ideas. His eyes were dark under winged brows, his nose good, if a trifle long, his mouth sensitive, even vulnerable.