William Monk 08 - The Silent Cry

thirty-four, if my memory serves, but I’ll look in my books. Yes, of course I will.”
    Evan did not go straight to Ebury Street. First he returned to St. Thomas’s. There was a sense in which it would be kinder to the family if he could tell them at least that Rhys Duff was still alive, perhaps conscious. And if the young man could speak, maybe he could tell them what had happened, and Evan would have to ask fewer questions.
    And there was part of him which was simply not ready yet to go and tell some woman that her husband was dead and her son might or might not survive, and no one knew yet in what degree of injury, pain or disability.
    He found Riley straightaway, looking as if he had been there all night. Certainly he seemed to be wearing the same clothes with precisely the same wrinkles and bloodstains on them.
    “He’s still alive,” he said as soon as he saw Evan and before Evan could ask. “He stirred a bit about an hour ago. Let’s go and see if he’s come around.” And he set off with a long-legged stride as if he too were eager to know.
    The ward was busy. Two young doctors were changing bandages and examining wounds. A nurse who looked no morethan fifteen or sixteen was carrying buckets of slops, her shoulders bent as she strove to keep the buckets off the floor. An elderly woman struggled with a bucket of coals and Evan offered to take them from her, but she refused, looking nervously at Riley. Another nurse gathered up soiled laundry and brushed past them with her face averted. Riley seemed hardly to notice; his attention was solely upon the patients.
    Evan followed him to the end of the ward, where he saw with a rush of relief, overtaken instantly by anxiety, that Rhys Duff lay motionless on his back, but his eyes were open—large, dark eyes which stared up at the ceiling and seemed to see only horror.
    Riley stopped by the bed and looked at his patient with some concern.
    “Good morning, Mr. Duff,” he said gently. “You are in St. Thomas’s Hospital. My name is Riley. How are you feeling?”
    Rhys Duff rolled his head very slightly until his eyes were focusing on Riley.
    “How are you feeling, Mr. Duff?” Riley repeated.
    Rhys opened his mouth, his lips moved, but there was no sound whatever.
    “Does your throat hurt?” Riley asked with a frown. It was obviously not something he had expected.
    Rhys stared at him.
    “Does your throat hurt?” Riley asked again. “Nod if it does.”
    Very slowly Rhys shook his head. He looked faintly surprised.
    Riley put his hand on Rhys’s slender wrist above the bandaging of his broken hand. The other, similarly splinted and bound, lay on the cover.
    “Can you speak, Mr. Duff?” Riley asked very softly.
    Rhys opened his mouth again, and again no sound came.
    Riley waited.
    Rhys’s eyes were filled with terrible memory; fear and pain held him transfixed. Momentarily his head moved from side to side in denial. He could not speak.
    Riley turned to Evan. “I’m sorry, you’ll get nothing fromhim yet. He may be well enough to answer yes and no tomorrow, but he may not. At the moment he’s too shocked for you to bother him at all. For certain, he can’t talk to you or describe anyone. And it will be weeks before he can hold a pen—if his hands mend well enough ever.”
    Evan hesitated. He needed desperately to know what had happened, but he was torn with pity for this unbearably injured boy. He wished he had his father’s faith to help him understand how such things could happen. Why was there not some justice to prevent it? He did not have a blind belief to soothe either his anger or his pity.
    Nor did he have Hester’s capacity to provide the practical help which would have eased the aching helplessness inside him.
    Perhaps the nearest he could strive for was Monk’s dedication to pursuing truth.
    “Do you know who did this to you, Mr. Duff?” he asked, speaking over Riley.
    Rhys shut his eyes and again shook his head. If he had any memory, he was choosing to close it out as too monstrous to bear.
    “I think you should leave now, Sergeant,” Riley said with an edge to his voice. “He can’t tell you anything.”
    Evan acknowledged the truth of it, and with one last look at the ashen face of the young man lying in the bed, he turned and went about the only duty he dreaded more.
    Ebury Street was quiet and elegant in the cold morning air. There was a slick of ice on the pavements and housemaids were indisposed to linger in gossip.