William Monk 02 - A Dangerous Mourning

only way her inner feelings showed was a curious stillness, as if something inside her dared not move.
    “What I am endeavoring to say, Mr. Monk, much as it pains me, and all my family, is that Octavia from time to time would encourage from the footman an admiration that was personal, and of a more familiar nature than it should have been.”
    “Which footman, ma’am?” He would not put Percival’s name in her mouth.
    A flash of irritation tweaked her mouth. “Percival of course. Do not affect to be a fool with me, Mr. Monk. Does Harold look like a man to have airs above his station? Besides which, you have been in this house quite long enough to have observed that Harold is taken with the parlormaid and not likely to see anyone else in that light—for all the good it will do him.” She jerked her shoulders sharply, as if to shrug off the distasteful idea. “Still, she is very likely not the charming creature he imagines, and he may well be better served by dreams than he would be by the disillusion of reality.” For the first time she looked away from him. “I daresay she is very bland and tedious once you are tired of looking at her pretty face.”
    Had Araminta been a plain woman Monk might have suspected her of envy, but since she was in her own way quite remarkably fine it could not be so.
    “Impossible dreams always end in awakening,” he agreed. “But he may grow out of his obsession before he meets with any reality. Let us hope so.”
    “It is hardly important,” she said, swinging back to face him and recall him to the subject that mattered. “I have come to inform you of my sister’s relationship with Percival, not Harold’s moonings after the parlormaid. Since it seems inescapable that someone in this house murdered Octavia, it is relevant that you should know she was overfamiliar with the footman.”
    “Very relevant,” he agreed quietly. “Why did you not mention it before, Mrs. Kellard?”
    “Because I hoped it would not be necessary, of course,”she replied immediately. “It is hardly a pleasant thing to have to admit—least of all to the police.”
    Whether that was because of the implication for crime, or the indignity of discussing it with someone of the social standing of the police, she did not say, but Monk thought from the lopsided suggestion of a sneer on her mouth that it was the latter.
    “Thank you for mentioning it now.” He ironed out the anger from his expression as well as he could, and was rewarded, and insulted, that she seemed to notice nothing at all. “I shall investigate the possibility,” he concluded.
    “Naturally.” Her fine golden eyebrows rose. “I did not put myself to the discomfort of telling you for you merely to acknowledge it and do nothing.”
    He bit back any further comment and contented himself with opening the door for her and bidding her good-day.
    He had no alternative but to face Percival, because he had already drawn from everyone else the fragments of knowledge, speculation and judgment of character on the subject. Nothing added now would be proof of anything, only the words of fear, opportunism or malice. And undoubtedly Percival was disliked by some of his fellow servants, for greater or lesser reason. He was arrogant and abrasive and he had played with at least one woman’s affections, which produced volatile and unreliable testimony, at best.
    When Percival appeared this time his attitude was different; the all-permeating fear was there, but far less powerfully. There was a return of the old confidence in the tilt of his head and the brash directness of his stare. Monk knew immediately there would be no point in even hoping to panic him into confession of anything.
    “Sir?” Percival waited expectantly, bristlingly aware of tricks and verbal traps.
    “Perhaps discretion kept you from saying so before.” Monk did not bother to prevaricate. “But Mrs. Haslett was one of the ladies who had more than an employer’s regard for you, was she not?” He smiled with bared teeth. “You need not permit modesty to direct your answer. It has come to me from another source.”
    Percival’s mouth relaxed in something of a smirk, but he did not forget himself.
    “Yes sir. Mrs. Haslett was … very appreciative.”
    Monk was suddenly infuriated by the man’s complacence, his insufferable conceit. He thought of Octavia lying dead with the blood dark down her robe. She had seemed so vulnerable, so helpless to protect