William Monk 13 - Death of a Stranger

news broke in the late edition that evening: MICHAEL DALGARNO ARRESTED FOR BRUTAL MURDER OF KATRINA HARCUS IN SECOND TRAGEDY FOR BALTIMORE AND SONS.
    Runcorn must think he had enough to go to trial. Please heaven he was right!
    But Runcorn was not certain. Monk knew that the moment he spoke to him the next morning, even though he denied it. They were in Runcorn’s office, papers scattered on the desk and the sunlight coming through the window making bright patterns on the rest of the floor.
    “Of course it’s enough!” Runcorn repeated. “He was pulling a land fraud against the investors in Baltimore and Sons, and Katrina Harcus knew it. She told him so, begged him to stop. He had two reasons for wanting her dead.” He held up his fingers. “To keep her quiet about the fraud, for which she may well have had proof—and he destroyed it, she as good as told you that. And because he now had a chance of marrying Livia Baltimore, who was shortly going to be a rich woman.” He looked across at Monk challengingly. “And whether he had anything to do with Nolan Baltimore’s death or not, we’ll probably never know, but it’s possible.” He drew in his breath. He held up a third finger. “Added to that, he can’t prove where he was at the time of her death. He says he was at home, but there’s no one who can swear to it.”
    “What about the cloak?” Monk asked, then instantly wished he had not. It had to remind Runcorn of the button as well, and he had not yet destroyed the jacket, or had a chance to find a replacement button, if he dared do that.
    Runcorn sighed irritably. “No trace of it,” he said. “Can’t find anyone who saw him with a cloak anything like that. He had a cape for the opera.” His tone of voice suggested what he thought of that. “But he’s still got it.”
    Monk was disappointed.
    “Nothing with the button either,” Runcorn went on. “All his coats and jackets are complete, and his manservant says there’s nothing missing.”
    “Then it all hangs on there being a fraud,” Monk pointed out. He hated having to say it, but it was the truth. “And we can’t prove that.”
    “The land!” Runcorn said truculently, his chin forward. “You said there are rabbits in it. You told me you saw them yourself. Is there some kind of a rabbit that can build tunnels through a hillside that a team of navvies couldn’t blast through with dynamite, for God’s sake?”
    “Of course there isn’t. At least I hope not,” Monk said wryly. “But even if there was a bit of sharp profit made on that, it wasn’t because Dalgarno owned the land they had to divert to.”
    “If there was no profit, why do it?” Runcorn demanded.
    Monk was patient. “I didn’t say there was no profit, only that it wasn’t because Dalgarno owned the land. He didn’t; neither did either of the Baltimores. It may have been a matter of bribery. Someone paid very nicely to have the line diverted from his land, but we haven’t any proof of it, and I don’t think Katrina did either. At least she didn’t tell me about it—” He stopped.
    “What?” Runcorn said quickly. “What is it, Monk? You’ve remembered something!”
    “I think she knew something more that she had not yet told me,” he admitted.
    “Then that was it!” Runcorn’s face was alight. “That was the proof she was going to give you, but Dalgarno killed her before she could! She wanted to try one more time to persuade him to give it up—”
    “We have no evidence of that!” Monk cut across him.
    “Look!” Runcorn clenched his fist and stopped just short of banging it on the table. “This fraud is a copy of the first one, for which Arrol Dundas was jailed sixteen years ago—yes?”
    Monk felt his body tense. “Yes,” he said very quietly.
    “Which Nolan Baltimore had to have known about, either at the time or when it all came out in court?” Runcorn pressed.
    “Yes . . .”
    “All right. Now, this Dundas wasn’t a fool. He got away with it for quite a long time—in fact, he nearly got away with it altogether. Nolan Baltimore knew all about it, presumably so did Jarvis Baltimore—and so very possibly did Michael Dalgarno. It’s all part of the company’s history, after all. Find out how Dundas got tripped up, Monk. Find the details of it, piece by piece.”
    “It was his land,” Monk said wearily. “He bought it before the railway was diverted, and then sold it to them expensively after falsifying the survey report