A Breach of Promise (16 page)

“What will happen to him if you lose?” Henry asked after another few moments of thoughtful silence by the fire.

“Financial penalty and social ruin,” Rathbone answered.
“And considering his profession, probably professional catastrophe as well.”

“Does he realize that?” Henry frowned.

“I’ve told him.”

“Then you must find out the truth, Oliver.” Henry leaned forward, his face very grave, worry creasing his brow. “What you have told me so far does not make any sense. No man would throw away a brilliant career, about which he obviously cares passionately, for such a reason.”

“I know,” Oliver agreed. He sat a little lower in his chair. It was soft and extremely comfortable. The whole room had a familiar feeling that was far more than mere warmth; it was a deep sense of safety, of belonging, of values which did not change. “I’ll ask Monk. Tomorrow.”

Monk was startled to see Rathbone on his step at half past eight the following morning. He opened the door dressed in shirtsleeves, his dark hair smoothed back off his brow and still damp. He surveyed Rathbone’s immaculate striped trousers and plain coat, his high hat and furled umbrella.

“I can’t guess,” he said with a shrug. “I cannot think of anything whatever which would bring you, dressed like that, to my door at this hour on a Saturday morning.”

“I don’t expect you to guess,” Rathbone replied waspishly. “If you allow me in, I shall tell you.”

Monk smiled. He had a high-cheekboned face with steady gray eyes, a broad-bridged aquiline nose and a wide, thin mouth. It was the countenance of a man who was clever, as ruthless with himself as with others, possessed of courage and humor, who hid his weaknesses behind a mask of wit—and sometimes of affected coldness.

Rathbone knew all this, and part of him admired Monk, part of him even liked him. He trusted him unquestioningly.

Monk stood back and invited him in. The room where he received his prospective clients was already warm with the fire bright in the hearth, the curtains drawn wide and a clock ticking agreeably on the mantel. That was new since the last
time Rathbone had been there. He wondered if it had been Hester’s idea, then dismissed the thought forcibly. The rest of the room was filled with her suggestions. Why not this, and what did it matter if it were?

Monk waved to him to sit down. “Is this professional?” he asked, standing by the fire and looking down at Rathbone.

Rathbone leaned back and crossed his legs, to show how at ease he was.

“Of course it is. I don’t make social calls at this hour.”

“You must have an appalling case.” Monk was still amused, but now he was also interested.

Rathbone wanted to make sure Monk understood it was professional, and not that he wanted to find Hester for personal motives. For him to believe that would be intolerable. In his own way he would never allow Rathbone to forget it.

“I have,” he said candidly. “I am out of my depth, because of the nature of it, and I know I am being lied to. I need a sound judgment on it, one from a very different point of view.” He saw Monk’s interest increase.

“If I can be of help,” Monk offered. “What is the case? Tell me about it. What is your client accused of? Murder?”

“Breach of promise.”

“What?” Monk could hardly believe it. “Breach of promise? To marry?” He laughed in spite of himself. “And you don’t understand it?” It was not quite contempt in his voice, but almost.

“That’s right,” Rathbone agreed. He was a past master at keeping his temper. Better men, more skilled at these tactics than Monk, had tried to provoke him and failed. “My client stands to forfeit not only money but his professional reputation if he loses. And he has a brilliant career. Some might even say he has genius.”

The humor vanished from Monk’s face. He stared at Rathbone with gravity, and the curiosity returned.

“So why did he court someone and then break the engagement?” he asked. “What did he discover about her?”

“He says there was nothing,” Rathbone replied. Now that it
had come to it, he might as well hear Monk’s opinion as well. Whatever his emotions towards Monk, and they were wildly varied, he respected Monk’s intelligence and his judgment. They had fought too many issues side by side, embraced too many causes together passionately, at any cost, not to know each other in a way few people are privileged to share.

“Then either he is lying,” Monk responded, watching Rathbone closely, “or there is something about himself he is not telling you.”

“Precisely,” Rathbone agreed. “But I have no idea which it is or what the something may be.”

“Are you employing me to find out … against your own client?” Monk asked. “He’ll hardly pay you for that! Or thank you, either.”

“No, I’m not,” Rathbone said sharply. “I would like a woman’s judgment on the situation. Callandra is in Scotland. I want to ask Hester.” He searched Monk’s face and saw his eyes widen very slightly but no more. Whatever Monk thought, he kept it concealed. “I don’t know her present case. I thought you might.”

“No, I don’t,” Monk answered without a flicker. “But I know how to find out. If you wish I shall do so.” He glanced at the clock. “I assume it is urgent?”

“Are you expecting someone?” Rathbone misunderstood deliberately.

Monk shrugged very slightly and stepped forward from the mantel. The half smile touched his lips again. “Not for breakfast,” he answered, crossing the room. He managed to move with the grace of suppressed energy. Always, even when weary or seeming beaten, he gave the air of one who might be dangerous to antagonize. Rathbone had never tested his physical strength, but he knew that not even the despair or the defeats of the past, the close and terrible personal danger which had plumbed the bottom of his emotional power, had broken him. The last dreadful moments of the affair in Mecklenburg Square must have come close. Hester had seen the worst extreme, but she had not betrayed it, and he knew she never would—just as
she would never have told Monk anything about the moments between herself and Rathbone.

“I suppose you have eaten?” Monk asked with assumption of the answer in his voice. “I haven’t. If you want to join me for at least a cup of tea, you’re welcome. Tell me a little bit more about this life-and-death case of yours … for breach of promise, hurt feelings and questioned reputation. Business must be hard for you to be reduced to this!”

It was nearly noon before Monk arrived at Rathbone’s rooms and simply handed him a slip of paper on which was written an address and the name “Gabriel Sheldon.” He passed it to Rathbone with a slight smile.

Rathbone glanced at it. “Thank you,” he said simply. He did not know what else to add. It was a strangely artificial situation. They knew each other in some ways so well. Rathbone knew far more of Monk than anyone else except Hester—and possibly Callandra Daviot and John Evan, the sergeant who had worked with Monk before Monk left the police force following a violent quarrel with his superior. But Evan had seen him only intermittently since then; Rathbone had worked with him every few months. They had stood together in victory and despair, in mental and physical exhaustion, in the elation of triumph and the strange, acute pain of pity. Even if they had never voiced it, they each understood what the other felt.

Rathbone knew that Monk had lost his past, everything, until four years ago. He had discovered himself as a man in his forties, not a man he always liked, sometimes a man he despised, even feared. Rathbone had watched Monk struggle to regain his memory, and had seen the courage it required of Monk to look at what he had been: the occasional cruelty, the hasty judgments, made too often in ignorance and from fear. Monk had hesitated at times, flinching from what he would find, but in the end he had never refused to look.

Rathbone admired him for it. Indeed, he would have protected him and defended him were it possible. A part of him
liked Monk quite naturally, despite their widely differing backgrounds. Rathbone was born to comfort and had received an excellent education with all the grace and social status which such an eduction afforded. Monk was the son of a fisherman from the far northeast, on the Scottish borders. His education had been struggled for, given as charity by the local vicar, who appreciated a boy of intellectual promise and driving will, and was prepared to tutor him for nothing. He had come south to London to make his fortune, assisted quickly by a man of wealth who had trained him in merchant banking until his own unjust prosecution and ruin.

Then, burning with indignation, Monk had joined the police, driven by anger and filled with passion to right the intolerable wrongs he saw.

That was so unlike Rathbone, who had studied law at Cambridge and risen easily from one position to another assisted by a mixture of patronage and his own brilliance.

Only his sense of purpose was similar, his ambition to achieve the highest, and perhaps his love of the beautiful things of life, of elegance and good taste. In Rathbone it was natural to dress perfectly. He looked and sounded the gentleman he was. It took no effort whatever.

For Monk it was an extravagance which had to be paid for by going without other things, but he never hesitated. Rathbone could not accuse him of vanity, but someone else might have, possibly even Hester herself, certainly Callandra Daviot. Rathbone had never known a woman who gave less considered thought to her appearance. But for all Monk’s natural elegance and carefully attentive grooming, he would never have the assurance Rathbone did, because it came with breeding and could not be acquired.

“Thank you,” he repeated. “I’m obliged. If you will excuse me, I will go and see her immediately. I have no time to lose.”

Monk nodded, a very slight smile on his lips. “But everything else,” he said dryly. “Let me know if I can help with your case, but it sounds hopeless to me. What is she like, this jilted lady?”

“Young, pretty, even-tempered, sufficiently intelligent to be interesting and not enough to be daunting, and an heiress,” Rathbone replied, putting on his coat and opening the door for Monk, satisfied at the surprise in Monk’s face. “She also has a spotless reputation,” he added. “And she does not drink nor is she extravagant, sharp-tongued nor given to gossip. Have you a hansom waiting, or would you care to share one?”

“I have one waiting,” Monk replied. “I assume you would like to share it with me?”

“I would,” Rathbone agreed, and strode out briskly.

The door of the Sheldon house was opened by a very young footman and Rathbone gave his name but did not offer him a card. He did not wish to make it appear a professional call.

“I am a friend of Miss Latterly, who I believe is staying here temporarily,” he said. “I realize it is probably not a convenient time to call, but the matter is of some urgency, and I am prepared to wait, should that be necessary. Would you tell her this and ask Mr. Sheldon if it is permissible for one to interrupt Miss Latterly?” Then he offered the card.

The footman took it, glanced at its expensive lettering and noted the title.

“Yes, Sir Oliver, I’ll take it straightaway. Would you care to wait in the library, sir?”

“Thank you, that would be excellent,” Rathbone accepted, and followed the man across a modest hallway to a most agreeable room lined on two sides with books and overlooking a small, rather exuberant garden, now full of lots of narcissi and early leaves of lupines. The stone wall he could see was festooned with the bare branches of honeysuckle and climbing roses, all greatly in need of pruning.

The fire was not lit and the air was chilly. The house had the small signs of a family home acknowledging certain financial restrictions—not stringent, but there in the background. Resources were not unlimited. There was also a certain recent inattention to detail, as if the mind of the mistress had been
upon other things. He was forcibly reminded of Hester’s occupation, and with it came an unwelcome understanding of how important it was to her. He had never before known a woman who had any profound interest outside the home and family. He admired it—wholeheartedly and with an instinctive emotion he could not deny. It brought them closer together. It made her in many ways more like a man, less alien, less mysterious. It meant she could understand his devotion to his work, his dedication of time and energy to it. She would know why at times he had to cancel social engagements, why he would stay up all night pursuing a thought, a solution, why every other normal routine of life had to be bent, or even broken, when a case was urgent. It made her so much easier to talk to. She grasped logic almost without seeming effort.

It also made her quite unlike the women whose lives were familiar to him, his own female relatives, the women he had courted in the past, or been drawn to, the wives of his friends and acquaintances. It made her somehow in another way unknown, even unknowable. It was not entirely a comfortable emotion.

The door opened and a large, ebullient man came in. He was dressed in a Norfolk tweed jacket of an indeterminate brown, and brownish gray trousers. His stance, his expression, everything about him was full of energy.

“Athol Sheldon!” he announced, holding out his hand. “I understand you’ve come to see Miss Latterly? Excellent woman. Sure she’ll care extremely well for my brother. Hideous experience, losing an arm. Don’t really know what to say to help.” For a moment he looked confused. Then by force of will and belief he assumed an air of confidence again. “Best a day at a time, what? Courage! Don’t meet tomorrow’s problems before they’re here. Too easy to get morbid. Good thing to have a nurse, I think. Family’s too close, at times.” He stood in the middle of the room, seeming to fill it with his presence. “Do you know Miss Latterly well?”

“Yes,” Rathbone said without hesitation. “We have been friends for some years.” Actually it was not as long as it
seemed, if one counted the actual span of time rather than the hectic events which had crowded it. There were many other people he had known far longer but with whom he had shared little of depth or meaning. Time was a peculiarly elastic measurement. It was an empty space, given meaning only by what it contained, and afterwards distorted in memory.