Wiliam Monk 01 - The Face of a Stranger Read Online Free PDF Page B

clothes was a natural grace rather than effeminacy. His face was sensitive, all eyes and nose, and his hair waved back from his brow thick and honey brown. Above all he appeared intelligent, which was both necessary to Monk and frightening. He was not yet ready for a companion of such quick sight, or subtlety of perception.
    But he had no choice in the matter. Runcorn introduced Evan, banged a pile of papers on the wide, scratched
    wooden table in Monk's office, a good-sized room crammed with filing drawers and bookcases and with one sash window overlooking an alley. The carpet was a domestic castoff, but better than the bare wood, and there were two leather-seated chairs. Runcorn went out, leaving them alone.
    Evan hesitated for a moment, apparently not wishing to usurp authority, then as Monk did not move, he put out a long finger and touched the top of the pile of papers.
    "Those are all the statements from the witnesses, sir. Not very helpful, I'm afraid."
    Monk said the first thing that came to him.
    "Were you with Mr. Lamb when they were taken?"
    "Yes sir, all except the street sweeper; Mr. Lamb saw him while I went after the cabby."
    "Cabby?" For a moment Monk had a wild hope that the assailant had been seen, was known, that it was merely his whereabouts that were needed. Then the thought died immediately. It would hardly have taken them six weeks if it were so simple. And more than that, there had been in Runcorn's face a challenge, even a kind of perverse satisfaction.
    "The cabby that brought Major Grey home, sir," Evan said, demolishing the hope apologetically.
    "Oh." Monk was about to ask him if there was anything useful in the man's statement, then realized how inefficient he would appear. He had all the papers in front of him. He picked up the first, and Evan waited silently by the window while he read.
    It was in neat, very legible writing, and headed at the top was the statement of Mary Ann Brown, seller of ribbons and laces in the street. Monk imagined the grammar to have been altered somewhat from the original, and a few aspirates put in, but the flavor was clear enough.
    "I was standing in my usual place in Doughty Street near Mecklenburg Square, like as I always do, on the corner, knowing as how there is ladies living in many of them
    buildings, especially ladies as has their own maids what does sewing for them, and the like."
    Question from Mr. Lamb: "So you were there at six o'clock in the evening?"
    "I suppose I must have been, though I carsen't tell the time, and I don't have no watch. But I see'd the gentleman arrive what was killed. Something terrible, that is, when even the gentry's not safe."
    "You saw Major Grey arrive?"
    "Yes sir. What a gentleman he looked, all happy and jaunty, like."
    "Was he alone?"
    "Yes sir, he was."
    "Did he go straight in? After paying the cabby, of course."
    "Yes sir, he did."
    "What time did you leave Mecklenburg Square?"
    "Don't rightly know, not for sure. But I heard the church clock at St. Mark's strike the quarter just afore I got there."
    "Home?"
    "Yes sir."
    "And how far is your home from Mecklenburg Square?"
    "About a mile, I reckon."
    "Where do you live?"
    "Off the Pentonville Road, sir."
    "Half an hour's walk?"
    "Bless you, no sir, more like quarter. A sight too wet to be hanging around, it was. Besides, girls as hang around that time of an evening gets themselves misunderstood, or worse."
    "Quite. So you left Mecklenburg Square about seven o'clock."
    "Reckon so."
    "Did you see anyone else go into Number Six, after Mr. Grey?"
    "Yes sir, one other gentleman in a black coat with a big fur collar."
    There was a note in brackets after the last statement to say it had been established that this person was a resident of the apartments, and no suspicion attached to him.
    The name of Mary Ann Brown was written in the same hand at the bottom, and a rough cross placed beside it.
    Monk put it down. It was a statement of only negative value; it made it highly unlikely that