“When did you last see Shearer?” Monk asked.
The clerk thought for a few minutes. “Doesn’t deal with us a lot,” he replied. “Certainly I haven’t seen him for a couple of months or more. I expect he’s very busy, what with poor Mr. Alberton gone. Don’t know what’s going to happen to the business. Good reputation, but won’t be the same without Mr. Alberton himself. Very reliable, he was. Knew a lot about shipping, and trade too. Knew who had what, and always paid a fair price, but nobody’s fool. Can’t replace that, even though Mr. Casbolt is brilliant at the buying, so I hear. Terrible shame.”
“I can’t find anybody who has seen Shearer since Mr. Alberton’s death,” Monk told him.
The clerk looked surprised. “Well, I never. Knew he thought the world of Mr. Alberton, but didn’t think he’d go off like that. Thought he’d stay around to look after the business best he could, for the widow’s sake, poor woman. Goes to show, you never know, do you?”
“No. Who did Shearer deal with mostly, if not you?”
“Pocock and Aldridge, up on the West India Dock Road. Big place. Ask anyone.”
Monk thanked him and left. It was some distance to the West India docks, so he took the first hansom he saw and arrived twenty-five minutes later. He paid the driver and alighted, then turned towards the building, and suddenly he knew exactly what it would be like inside, as if he had visited it frequently and this were only one more routine call.
It was unnerving. He had no idea why he would have come here, or when. It was no time he could recall since the accident. He strode across the pavement, almost bumping into a thin man in gray, and without apologizing, he went up the few steps and pulled the door open.
Inside was completely strange to him, not as he had seen it in his mind’s eye at all. The proportions were more or less the same, but there was a desk where he had not seen it, the walls were the wrong color, and the floor, which had been the most individual feature, tiled in gray-and-white marble, was now wooden.
He stopped abruptly, confused.
“Mornin’, sir. Can I ’elp yer?” the man behind the desk asked.
Monk collected himself with difficulty. He found he was fumbling for words, trying to bring himself back to the present.
“Yes … I need to speak to …” The name Taunton came into his mind, but he had no idea from where.
“Yes, sir? ’Oo was it yer wanted?” the man asked helpfully.
“Do you have a Mr. Taunton here?”
“Yes, sir. Would that be the elder Mr. Taunton or the younger?”
Monk had no idea. But he must answer. He went with instinct rather than sense.
“The elder.”
“Yes, sir. What name shall I say?”
“Monk. William Monk.”
“Right, sir. If yer’d care ter wait, sir, I’ll tell ’im.”
The message came back within minutes, and Monk was directed up a stair that curved graciously onto a landing. He could not remember what the man in the hall had said, but he had no hesitation in turning left and walking to the end of the corridor. This was familiar, a little smaller than he recalled, but he even knew the feel of the handle when he touched it, recalled the catch as the door stuck before it swung wide.
The man inside the comfortable room was standing. There was surprise in his face, and unease in the angles of his body. He was a little older than Monk, perhaps fifty. His hair was receding, auburn in color, his cheeks ruddy. Monk knew that Mr. Taunton the younger was his half brother, not his son, a taller, darker man with a sallow complexion.
“Well, well,” Taunton said nervously. “After all these years! What brings you here, Monk? Thought I’d seen the last of you.” He looked puzzled, as if Monk’s appearance confused him. He could not help staring, first at Monk’s face, then at his clothes, even his boots.
Monk realized that Taunton was older than he had expected. He could not recall him with a full head of hair, but the gray in it was new, the lines in his face, a certain coarsening of features. He had no idea how long it had been since they had last met, or what the circumstances were. Was it to do with police work, or even before that? That would make it twenty years or more, well into the past that Monk had lost completely, not even patched together from fragments learned here and there, people he had come across in investigations since the accident.
He could not afford to trust that Taunton was a friend; he could not assume that of anyone. The little he knew of his life showed he had earned more fear than love. There might be all manner of old debts left unpaid, his and others’. This was a time when he wished fiercely that he knew himself better, knew who were his enemies, and why, knew their weaknesses. He was without armor, without weapons.
He searched Taunton’s face, and saw no warmth in it. The expression was guarded, careful, but already there was a beginning of pleasure, as if he had seen a vulnerability in Monk, and it pleased him.
Monk racked his mind for something to say that would not betray his ignorance.
“The place has changed.” He played for time, hoping Taunton would let slip some information, so at least he would know how long ago they had last met, perhaps even the mood, whether their enmity was open or concealed. Because with every passing second he was more and more certain that it was enmity.
“Twenty-one years, I make it,” Taunton said with a faint curl of his lip. “We’re doing well. Did you think we couldn’t have the odd renovation here and there?”
Monk looked around the office. It was well appointed, but not luxurious. He allowed his observation of it to reflect in his expression—unimpressed.
The color deepened in Taunton’s cheeks.
“You’ve changed too,” he said with a faint sneer. “No more fancy shirts and boots. Thought you’d have had everything made ’specially for you by now. Fall on hard times, did you?” There was a keen undertone of pleasure in his voice, almost relish. “Dundas take you down with him, did he?”
Dundas. With blinding clarity Monk saw the gentle face, the intelligent, clear blue eyes with laughter deep in the lines around them. Then as quickly it was overtaken by grief and a raging helplessness. He knew Dundas was dead. He had been fifty, perhaps fifty-five. Monk himself had been in his twenties, aspiring to be a merchant banker. Arrol Dundas was his mentor, ruined in some financial crash, blamed for it, wrongly. He had died in prison.
Monk wanted to smash the sneering face in front of him. He felt the rage burn up inside him, knotting his body, making it difficult even to swallow, his throat was so tight. He must control it, hide it from Taunton. Hide everything until he knew enough to act and foresee the results.
How much did Taunton know of Monk since then? Did he know he had joined the police? Monk could not be sure. His reputation had spread widely. He had been one of the best and most ruthless detectives they had had, but he might never have had occasion to work here in the West India docks.
“A little change of direction,” he answered the question obliquely. “I had certain debts to collect.” He allowed himself a smile, wolfish, as he intended it to be.
Taunton swallowed. His eyes flicked up and down Monk’s very ordinary clothes, the ones he had chosen in order to be inconspicuous on the river and in the docks.
“Doesn’t look like they amounted to much,” he observed.
“I haven’t collected them all yet,” Monk answered, the words out before he gave them thought.
Taunton was rigid, his hands moving restlessly by his sides, his eyes never leaving Monk’s face.
“I don’t owe you anything, Monk! And after twenty-one years, I don’t know who does.” He let out a little snort. “We always did very well by you. Everybody made their profit. No one got caught, far as I know.”
Caught! The word struck Monk like a physical blow. Caught by whom? Over what? He did not dare ask. What had Dundas been accused of in the end, what was it that had ruined him? Monk could remember only the fury he had felt, and the absolute conviction that Dundas was innocent, blamed wrongly, and he, Monk, should have known some way to prove it.