William Monk 17 - Acceptable Loss

else?”
    “It’s narrer in the middle an’ wide at both ends,” she said. “One end bigger than the other … longer, like.”
    “Was it plain or patterned?”
    “Patterned. Yer know that, fer Gawd’s sake! It ’ad little yeller animals on it, three at a time. Cats, or summink.”
    “How?”
    “One on top o’ the other. Three of ’em.”
    “Thank you, Hattie. I believe you. Now go and pack some clothes into a bag, get dressed, and I will take you to a safe place.”
    She remained sitting down. “Where?”
    “In the city, Portpool Lane. You will be safe there. You will be fed and have your own room. You’ll work for it, at whatever Mrs. Monk tells you to do.” He saw the look on her face. “It used to be a brothel,” he said with a broad smile. “It’s a clinic for sick women, and injured ones.”
    She swore at him, colorfully and with profound feeling, but she did as he told her.
    They took a hansom from the Chiswick mall all the way into the city. It was a long and expensive ride, but Monk felt it was more than warranted by the circumstances. He did not wish her to be seen with him; in fact, he could not afford it. It would be so easy for anyone to make a few inquiries and find the clinic. Perhaps he should warn Squeaky Robinson to keep a close eye on Hattie and see that she did not show herself in the rooms where casual patients came for treatment or help, at least until the case had come to trial and she had testified. After that, her safety could be reconsidered.
    As the wheels rumbled over the streets, he engaged her in conversation, as much in order to take her mind off her present situation as in the expectation of learning anything more. Either way, he failed.
    “Yer gotta keep ’im from findin’ me,” she said, hugging her arms around her body and sitting forward on the seat. “ ’E’ll do me, ’e will.”
    “Who?” he asked.
    “Tosh, o’ course!” she answered angrily. “I in’t scared o’ Crumble. ’E couldn’t squash a fly. Feared of ’is own shadder, an’ fearder still o’ Tosh.”
    “What about ’Orrie Jones?”
    “I dunno. Sometimes I think ’e’s ’alf-witted, other times I in’t so sure. But ’e wouldn’t do nuffink ’less Tosh told ’im ter, wotever ’e thought fer ’isself.”
    “Did you ever hear the name of Jericho Phillips?”
    “No. ’Oo’s ’e?”
    “He’s dead now, but he used to run a boat like Mickey’s, but down the river.”
    “An’ now Mickey’s dead, eh?” she said thoughtfully. “Could Mr. Cardew a killed ’im?”
    “No. We know who killed Phillips. The man who did it killed himself also.”
    She gave a little grunt.
    “Why did you think it was the same person?” he asked. “Do you think Mickey and Phillips knew each other?”
    “Dunno. Mickey din’t work for ’isself. ’E come from Chiswick, same like the rest of us. ’E never ’ad money ter get a boat. Someone else staked ’im. Mebbe it were the same person.”
    “Rupert Cardew?”
    “Don’t be daft!” she retorted. “Why’d ’e have me steal ’is necktie ter make it look like ’e killed Mickey if ’e were behind it all? It’s someone wi’ twice the brains ’e ’as.”
    “More than Mickey, or Tosh?”
    “They got cunning; it in’t the same.”
    He did not argue. Deliberately he guided the conversation to other, more pleasant subjects, and finally they arrived at PortpoolLane. He took her inside, introduced her to Squeaky Robinson, and then to Claudine Burroughs, explaining the need to keep her safe.
    “She can help me,” Claudine said decisively. “I won’t let her out of my sight.”
    Monk thanked her, wondering wryly how Hattie would take to that. It might well be the best care she had ever known.
    I N THE MORNING M ONK went to see Rathbone and told him that he had now found evidence that made it extremely unlikely that Rupert Cardew was responsible for the death of Mickey Parfitt.
    Rathbone was startled. “And the cravat? Was it not his?” he asked, as if unable to believe in the release from the responsibility of an impossible task.
    “Yes, it was his,” Monk replied, sitting down in the chair opposite Rathbone’s desk without being invited. “A prostitute stole it from him that afternoon and gave it to someone she is too afraid to name. But I believe her. She can describe it far too precisely for her to have only seen it around his neck. She had seen it undone, felt it, and knew it was silk. She admitted to taking