William Monk 13 - Death of a Stranger

of anger in the air, the harsh Liverpool voices with their unique rhythm and accent, the innate humor turned vicious against what they saw as betrayal.
    All the time he felt the frustration again, the striving to do something he was prevented from at every turn. Hope seeped away like water poured into dry sand.
    There was a picture of the prosecutor, a large man with a bland, placid face belying his appetite for success. He had educated himself out of his local dialect, but the nasal sounds of it were still there when he was excited, scenting the kill. Now and then he forgot and used a piece of idiom, and the crowd loved him for it. Monk had not realized then how much he was playing to the gallery, but now, with hindsight and memories of the scores of other trials he had attended, he could see that the prosecutor had been like a bad actor.
    Did it all rest on the skill of lawyers? What if Dundas had had someone like Oliver Rathbone? Would it have made any real difference, in the end?
    He read on through the account of witnesses: first of all other bankers, disclaiming all knowledge of improper dealings, busy washing their hands of it, talking loudly of their innocence. He could remember their well-cut jackets and tight-collared shirts, faces scrubbed and pink, voices correct. They had looked frightened, as if guilt were contagious. Monk could feel his own anger clenching inside him, still urgent and real, not something finished sixteen years ago.
    Next had come the investors who had lost money, or at least were beginning to realize they were not going to profit as they had expected. They had swung from professed ignorance to open anger when they saw that their financial competence was undermined. They had been foremost in damning Dundas with their sly, pejorative words, their judgment of his character, wise after the event. Monk could remember his fury as he had been forced to listen to them, helpless to argue, to defend, to speak of their own greed or repeat the eagerness with which they had been persuaded from one route to another, one purchase more or less, any cheaper way.
    He had wanted to testify. He could feel his anger as if it had been yesterday, and all the pressure he had put to bear on the defense lawyer to let him speak. And every time it had been refused.
    “Prejudice the jury,” he had been told. “Pillar of the community; can’t attack Baltimore or you’ll only make it worse. His family has money in every big undertaking in Lancashire. Make an enemy of him and you’ll turn half the county against you.” And so it had gone on, until his own evidence had been so anodyne as to be virtually useless. He entered the ring like a boxer with one arm behind him, bruised by blows he could not return.
    The landowner had surprised him. He had expected outrage and self-interest from him, and instead he had heard bewilderment, careful recounting of haggling and sales, attempts at diversion so as to keep one estate or another whole. But there was no spite, no desperation to preserve a reputation.
    Large sums of money had changed hands, but in spite of all the prosecutor’s attempts to make them seem dishonest or exorbitant, by and large they were exactly what everyone expected.
    However, when all the amounts were entered into evidence, Monk heard the death knell of the defense in those meticulous records. He knew now as if it were all clear in his fragmented mind just what the final verdict would be, not because it was true but because there were too many of the negotiations conducted by Dundas, agreements with his signature on them, money in his accounts. He could deny, but he could not disprove. He had acted for others. That was his business.
    But there were no other names written. He had trusted. They claimed they had trusted also. Who had betrayed whom?
    Of course Monk knew the verdict—guilty.
    But he had to know more of the detail, exactly how the fraud had been managed so that it had remained hidden until the last moment. How had Dundas expected to get away with it?
    There was a sketch of Nolan Baltimore giving evidence. Monk stared at the few lines with fascination. It was an ugly face, but there was immense vitality in it, a power in the heavy bones and appetite in the curve of the mouth. It was intelligent, but portraying no sensitivity and little subtlety or humor. Monk was repulsed, yet it was only a sketch, one man’s view. He could not recall ever having seen the man alive. He was simply the