“Thank you.” Monk gave her the shilling. “Have you seen Caleb Stone?”
“Me? I don’t go looking fer folks like that. I got enough o’ me own troubles. I reckon as mebbe I seen ’im once. Though I’ll deny it if yer asks in front o’ anyone.”
“I never saw you before,” Monk said easily. “And if I were to see you again, I don’t suppose I should know you. What’s your name?”
She smiled conspiratorially, showing chipped teeth.
“In’t got no name.”
“That’s what I thought. Third house along?”
“Yeah.”
He turned and walked down the narrow footpath, barely wide enough to keep his feet out of the gutter, and at the third house went down the steps to the door which led off the small, rubbish-filled areaway. He knocked sharply, and had just raised his hand to repeat it when a window covered with sacking opened above him and an old woman stuck her head out.
“She in’t there! Come back later ifn’ yer want ’er.”
Monk leaned back to look up. “How much later?”
“I dunno. Middle o’ the day, mebbe.” She ducked back in again without closing the window, and Monk stepped away only just in time to avoid being drenched by a pail of bedroom slops.
He waited in the street about twenty yards along, half sheltered by an overhanging wall, but from where he could still see the steps down to Selina’s rooms. He grew steadily colder, and towards noon it began to rain. Many people passed him, perhaps taking him for a beggar or simply someone with nowhere else to be, one of the thousands who lived on scraps and slept in doorways. The workhouse provided food of a sort, a shelter, but little heat, and the rigid rules were almost as harsh as those in prison. There were some who thought it an even worse place.
No one regarded him with more than a passing observation, not even curiosity, and he avoided the challenge of meeting their eyes. Paupers, such as he was pretending to be, cast their glances down, wary, ashamed and frightened of everything.
Shortly after noon he saw a woman approaching from West Ferry Road, where Bridge Street swept around the curve of the river which formed the Isle of Dogs. She was of average height, but she strode with her head high and a kind of swing in her step. Even across the street he could see that her face was highly individual. Her cheekbones were high, giving her eyes a slanted look, her nose well formed, if a little sharp, and her mouth generous. He had no doubt that this was Selina. Her face had the courage and the originality to hold the attention of men like Caleb Stone, who might be violent and degraded now, but who had been born to better things.
He moved from his position, his legs aching, joints locked from having maintained his stillness for so long. He almost stumbled off the curb; his feet were so cold he had lost sensation in them. He made his way across the street, stepping in the filth and regaining his balance by flailing his arms. Furious with himself, he caught up with her just as she started down the steps.
She swung around when he was a yard away from her, a knife in her hand.
“You watch yerself, mister!” she warned. “Try anyfink, an’ I’ll cut yer gizzard out, I warn yer!”
Monk stood his ground, though she had taken him by surprise. If he backed away she would tell him nothing.
“I don’t pay for women,” he said with a tight smile. “And I’ve never had to take one who wasn’t willing. I want to talk to you.”
“Oh yeah?” Disbelief was plain in her face, and yet she was looking at him squarely. There was no broken spirit behind her dark eyes, and her fear was only physical.
“I’ve come from your sister-in-law.”
“Well, that’s a new one.” She arched her fine brows with amusement. “I in’t got no sister-in-law, so that’s a lie. Best try again.”
“I was being polite,” he said between his teeth. “The benefit of the doubt. She is certainly married to Angus. I thought it possible you might be married to Caleb.”
Her body tightened. Her slim hands on the broken railing were grasping it till the knuckles were white. But her face barely changed.
“Did yer. So wot if I are? ’Oo are yer?”
“I told you, I represent Angus’s wife.”
“No yer don’t.” She looked him up and down with immeasurable scorn. “She wouldn’t give yer ’ouse room! She’d call the rozzers if summink like you even spoke to ’er, less’n it were to ask her for an ’alfpenny’s charity.”
Monk enunciated very carefully in his best diction.
“And if I were to come here in my usual clothes, I would be as obvious as you would be dressed like that at a presentation to the Queen. Young ladies wear white for such occasions,” he added.
“An’ o’ course yer invited ter such fings, so you’d know!” she said sarcastically, but her eyes were searching his face, and the disbelief was waning.