William Monk 18 - A Sunless Sea

wicked out east, so they say.”
    Monk clenched his teeth and took a deep breath. “What was she mumbling about? Do you remember?”
    Jenkins was oblivious to his impatience.
    “Sort of,” he said thoughtfully. “Couldn’t make a lot of sense of it, but mostly about suicide an’ whores an’ things like that. But like I said, she were out of ’er ’ead. She weren’t no whore. I’d lay money on that.” He shook his head. “She was quality, even if she were ’alf daft. She went on about lyin’, an’ betrayal an’ all sorts. I dare say if she were come to ’er senses, she’d be a different person. Yer shouldn’t take ’er word for nothin’, sir. An’ I don’t reckon as she knew Mrs. Gadney anyway. Yer couldn’t think o’ two women less like each other.”
    “Did she ask for Mrs. Gadney? Ask where she lived, or if you knew her?”
    “Not as I recall. Just came in for penny twists, raved on about people killin’ theirselves, and then went out again.”
    “Thank you. You’ve been most helpful.” Monk bought a tin of treacle, in the hope that Hester might make a treacle sponge pudding for him and Scuff, and then went back out into the street again.
    He asked the same questions in the other shops along Copenhagen Place. It was the tobacconist who finally told him that a tall woman with dark hair had been in looking for Zenia Gadney; apparently when she had been in his shop, she had been more or less composed, and he had told her that Mrs. Gadney lived farther along, toward the middle of the lane.
    Monk spoke to others as well. Two more people had seen the woman, but they could add nothing further. Monk had all he needed to oblige him to go and face Dinah Lambourn.
    H E WAS LOATH TO do so, so he delayed the task and went back to the station at Wapping and checked that everything was under control there. Then he put on his coat and went out onto the dockside. The quickest way to Greenwich would be along the north bank of the river, where he was, and then a boat from Horse Ferry across to Greenwich Pier. It would take some time. Hopefully, the chill late afternoon breeze in his face and the familiar sounds of the river would help him compose in his mind what he would say.
    He stood on the dockside and looked across the busy water, which was getting a little choppy on the turning tide. The sky was darkening already, the light fading. In a little over a fortnight it would be the winter solstice, and, shortly after, Christmas. He could put it off; go home now, leave Dinah one more evening unchallenged, in her own home with her daughters. Poor girls, they had already lost so much. He wondered if they had anyone else—apart from Amity Herne. He could not imagine Amity giving them any warmth or comfort in the desperate time that might so easily be ahead.
    That was an uncharitable thought! Amity might be quite a decent woman. People sometimes stretched to meet a challenge and were braver and kinder than even they themselves thought possible.
    There was a ferry coming in toward the Wapping Steps. It would drop off its passengers, and he could take it home. He would be there in half an hour, in his own kitchen, and—far more than that—amid the emotional safety that his home offered to him. He and Hester could talk about what to get Scuff for Christmas: what he would want, and what might overwhelm or embarrass him. Monk had thought of getting him a pocket watch. Scuff had just learned to tell the time instead of guessing it. Hester wanted to get him books. Would both be too much? Would Scuff feel as if he had to get them each something?
    He walked over to the top step, ready to go down to the boat.
    Then he changed his mind and walked briskly across the dock and back toward the road. He would do it now, face it and get it over.
    It seemed too short an hour before he was sitting in the withdrawing room and Dinah, grave and tense, was upright in the chair opposite him. Her face was almost bloodless, and her hands were knotted in her lap, clutching each other uneasily, knuckles white.
    Monk began straightaway, because he knew there was no good way to ask her the questions he needed to ask anyway.
    “Mrs. Lambourn, when I was here before, you told me that you knew your husband had an affair with another woman, but that you knew nothing about her, including where she lived. Did I understand you correctly?”
    “Of course, I know now,” she replied.
    “But did you know before she was killed?” he