Wiliam Monk 01 - The Face of a Stranger

very still. Her eyes were so dark he could see nothing in mem, but there did not seem to be the hate he feared. For a wild moment he felt that if only he could have talked to her alone he could have explained, made her understand the necessity for all this, the compulsion.
    "My friends will swear I was there all evening." Charles's words cut across them. "I'll give you their names. This is ridiculous; I liked Joscelin, and our misfortunes were as much his. There was no reason whatever to wish him harm, and you will find none!"
    "If I could have their names, Mr. Latterly?"
    Charles's head came up sharply.
    "You're not going to go 'round asking them to account for me at the time of a murder, for God's sake! I'll only give you their names—"
    "I shall be discreet, sir."
    Charles snorted with derision at the idea of so delicate a virtue as discretion in a policeman.
    Monk looked at him patiently.
    "It will be easier if you give me their names, sir, than if I have to discover them for myself.''
    "Damn you!" Charles's face was suffused with blood.
    "Their names, please sir?"
    Charles strode over to one of the small tables and took out a sheet of paper and a pencil. He wrote for several moments before folding it and handing it to Monk.
    Monk took it without looking and put it in his pocket.
    "Thank you, sir."
    "Is that all?"
    "No, I'm afraid I would still like to ask you anything further you might know about Major Grey's other friends, • anyone with whom he stayed, and could have known well
    enough to be aware, even accidentally, of some secret damaging to them."
    "Such as what, for God's sake?" Charles looked at him with extreme distaste.
    Monk did not wish to be drawn into speaking of the sort of things his imagination feared, especially in Imogen's hearing. In spite of the irrevocable position he was now in, every vestige of good opinion she might keep of him mattered, like fragments of a broken treasure.
    “I don't know, sir; and without strong evidence it would be unseemly to suggest anything."
    "Unseemly," Charles said sarcastically, his voice grating with the intensity of his emotion. "You mean that matters to you? I'm surprised you know what the word means."
    Imogen turned away in embarrassment, and Hester's face froze. She opened her mouth as if to speak, then realized she would be wiser to keep silent.
    Charles colored faintly in the silence that followed, but he was incapable of apology.
    "He spoke of some people named Dawlish," he said irritably. "And I believe he stayed with Gerry Fortescue once or twice."
    Monk took down such details as they could remember of the Dawlishes, the Fortescues and others, but it sounded useless, and he was aware of Charles's heavy disbelief, as if he were humoring an uncaged animal it might be dangerous to annoy. He stayed only to justify himself, because he had said to them that it was his reason for having come.
    When he left he imagined he could hear the sigh of relief behind him, and his mind conjured up their quick looks at each other, then the understanding in their eyes, needing no words, that an intruder had gone at last, an extreme unpleasantness was over. All the way along the street his thoughts were in the bright room behind him -and on Imogen. He considered what she was doing, what she thought of him, if she saw him as a man at all, or only the inhabiter of an office that had become suddenly more than usually offensive to her.
    And yet she had looked so directly at him. That seemed a timeless moment, recurring again and again—or was it simply that he dwelt in it? What had she asked of him originally? What had they said to one another?
    What a powerful and ridiculous thing the imagination was—had he not known it so foolish, he could have believed there must have been deep memories between them.
    * * * * *
    When Monk had gone, Hester, Imogen and Charles were left standing in the withdrawing room, the sun streaming in from the French windows into the small garden, bright through the leaves in the silence.
    Charles drew in his breath as if to speak, looked first at his wife, then at Hester, and let out a sigh. He said nothing. His face was tight and unhappy as he walked to the door, excused himself perfunctorily, and went out.
    A torrent of thoughts crowded Hester's mind. She disliked Monk, and he angered her, yet the longer she watched him the less did she think he was as incompetent as he had first seemed. His questions were erratic, and he appeared to be no