William Monk 04 - A Sudden Fearful Death

dresses expensively, but his taste is extremely mundane, and his figure and deportment are a trifle portly and lacking in grace.
Substantial
is the word I would choose.”
    “Which says more about your feeling for him than about the man himself,” Henry observed. “Is he vain?”
    “Yes. Intellectually vain. I think it very probable he did not even notice her except as an extremely efficient adjunct to his own skills. I would be very surprised if he even gave her emotions a thought. He expects admiration, and I have been led to believe he always gets it.”
    “But not guilty?” Henry wrinkled his brow. “What would he have to lose if she accused him of impropriety?”
    “Not nearly as much as she. No one of any standing would believe her. And there is no evidence whatever except her word. His reputation is immaculate.”
    “Then what disturbs you? Your client is innocent and you have at least a fighting chance of clearing him.”
    Oliver did not answer. The light was fading a little in the sky, the color deepening as the shadows spread across the grass.
    “Did you behave badly?”
    “Yes. I don’t know what else I could have done—but yes, I feel it was badly.”
    “What did you do?”
    “I tore Barrymore to shreds—her father,” Oliver answered quietly. “An honest, decent man devastated by grief for a daughter he adored, and I did everything I could to make him believe she was a daydreamer who fantasized about her abilities and then lied about them to others. I tried to show that she was not the heroine she seemed, but an unhappy woman who had failed in her dreams and created for herself an imaginary world where she was cleverer, braver, and more skilled than she was in truth.” He drew in a deep breath. “I could see in his face I even made him doubt her. God, I loathed doing that! I don’t think I have ever done anything for which I felt grubbier.”
    “Is it true?” Henry’s voice was gentle.
    “I don’t know. It could be,” Oliver said furiously. “That isn’t the point! I put dirty, irreverent fingers over the man’s dreams! I dragged out the most precious thing he had, held it up to the public, then smeared it all over with doubt andugliness. I could feel the crowd hating me—and the jury—but not as much as I loathed myself.” He laughed abruptly. “I think only Monk equaled the hold of me as I was leaving and I thought he was going to strike me. He was white with rage. Looking at his eyes, I was frightened of him.” He gave a shaky laugh as the shame of that moment on the Old Bailey steps came back to him, the frustration and the self-disgust. “I think if he could have got away with it, he might have killed me for what I did to Barrymore—and to Prudence’s memory.” He stopped, aching for some word of denial, of comfort.
    Henry looked at him with bright, sad eyes. There was love in his face, the desire to protect, but not to excuse.
    “Was it a legitimate question to raise?” he asked.
    “Yes, of course it was. She was normally a highly intelligent woman, but there was nothing whatever to make anyone, even a fool, think that Sir Herbert would leave his wife and seven children and ruin himself professionally, socially, and financially for her. It’s preposterous.”
    “And what makes you think she believed he would?”
    “The letters, damn it! And they are in her hand, there is no question about that. The sister identified them.”
    “Then perhaps you do have a tormented woman with two quite distinct sides to her nature—one rational, brave, and efficient, the other quite devoid of judgment and even of self-preservation?” Henry suggested.
    “I suppose so.”
    “Then why do you blame yourself? What is it you have done that is so wrong?”
    “Shattered dreams—robbed Barrymore of his most precious belief—and perhaps a lot of others as well, certainly Monk.”
    “Questioned it,” Henry corrected. “Not robbed them—not yet.”
    “Yes I have. I’ve made them doubt. It is tarnished. It won’t ever be the same again.”
    “What do you believe?”
    Oliver thought for a long time. The starlings were quietat last. In the gathering dusk the perfume of the honeysuckle was even stronger.
    “I believe there is something damned important that I don’t know yet,” he answered finally. “Not only don’t I know it, I don’t even know where to look.”
    “Then go with your beliefs,” Henry advised, his voice comfortable and familiar in the near darkness.