by Anne Perry
He put his hand on Trace’s arm to signal they should leave. They had seen all there was. They moved slowly away. And was it all simply greed, a matter of selling the guns twice and thus having more money? Admittedly, a vast amount more.
He lurched through the gloom, fumbling his way, awash in clouds of mud, pulled by tides as the flow increased, and they were trying to fight against it. It seemed an endless journey. His legs ached from the weight of his boots. He was imprisoned behind the glass plate, breathing pumped air. He struggled to remember what they had told him to do. Use the outlet valve. Get more buoyancy. That was better. Life and sunlight were only a few fathoms away, but like another world.
Trace was beside him, moving more rapidly, surer-footed. He was waving his light, guiding and urging Monk forward. Then suddenly Trace dropped his light. Monk saw his hands scrabble at where his throat would be beneath the helmet; his face appeared contorted behind the glass, as though he were gasping, choking for air.
Then his ropes tightened, and he was dragged backwards and up, disappearing into the murk, leaving Monk completely alone.
Where was the boat? He strained upwards, looking for its shadow through the cloud of sand that swirled around him, and did not see it.
Then at last the steps were there. He grasped them, hauling himself up, desperate to reach the top, the light, to get out of the cold, clammy, imprisoning suit. It seemed to take forever. He was leaden-weighted. There was no help from the ropes. They had stopped pulling him. He had to climb on his own. The effort was overwhelming.
At last his head broke the surface and instinctively he gasped, drawing in only more pumped air. Hands reached out to help him aboard, and as the water drained off him and the attendant removed the front glass from his helmet, he recognized Robert Casbolt. Then a shot rang out, and another, and another. The attendant crumpled forward, his chest scarlet, and slid into the water.
The other two men lay sprawled beside the pumping equipment, one partly on his back next to Trace, staring sightlessly upward, a dark hole in his head, the third doubled over the after thwart, blood on his hair. Philo Trace was slumped in the bottom of the boat, eyes closed, barely conscious, his helmet beside him.
Casbolt was holding a gun, its muzzle pointed towards Monk.
“You found something down there that showed you it was Trace,” he said with a sad little shake of his head. “But you weren’t quick enough for him. He shot you. He nearly got away with it, too. If your wife hadn’t come to me with the truth, and I raced here to try to rescue you, then he would have succeeded! Tragically, I was just too late.…” He swallowed hard. “I really am sorry. All I wanted was Judith … back again, as it used to be. And enough money to look after her. That was all I ever wanted.” He raised the gun a little higher.
A shot rang out, then another. Casbolt teetered for a moment and then overbalanced, falling into the brown, swelling tide.
Across the water another boat was coming towards them, Lanyon in the bow, a pistol in his hand. Beside him, Hester was ashen-faced, the wind whipping her hair and blowing her torn and wet skirts.
The boat reached the barge and Lanyon jumped over. A look of horror filled his eyes as he saw the bodies. It was a moment before he collected himself and came over to Monk. Trace coughed and sat up a little straighter, one of the other boat’s crew helping him.
Hester scrambled from one boat to the other and ran forward, falling on her knees beside Monk, saying his name over and over, searching his face, desperate to know he was all right. Her voice caught in her throat; her breathing was wild and jerky.
He grinned at her, and saw the tears of relief run down her cheeks. He could understand so very easily that you could love one woman so much that no one else filled your heart or mind. For a moment he could almost have been sorry for Casbolt. He had wanted Judith all his life. Love could hurt. It would ask for sacrifices greater than the imagination could foresee, and it was not always returned, or even understood. But it did not excuse what he had done. The end does not justify the means.
Lanyon unfastened Monk’s helmet and lifted it off.
Hester put her arms around Monk’s neck and buried her head on his shoulder, clinging to him with all the strength she possessed, until it hurt them both, but she could not let go.
A FUNERAL IN BLUE
by Anne Perry
Elissa Beck, the wife of Dr. Kristian Beck, a prominent London surgeon, is found strangled along with another woman in the studio of a well-known London artist. Hester Monk presses her husband, Inspector William Monk, to search for evidence that will save her former colleague from the hangman’s noose as well as solve the riddle of Elissa Beck’s secret life and murder.
Published by Ballantine Books.
Available at bookstores everywhere.
THE TWISTED ROOT
by
Anne Perry
As private investigator William Monk listens to the young Lucius Stourbridge plead for help in tracking down his runaway fiancée, he feels a sense of heavy foreboding. Miriam Gardiner disappeared suddenly from a croquet party at the luxurious Bayswater mansion of her in-laws-to-be and has not been seen since. But on Hampstead Heath, Monk finds the coach in which Miriam had fled and, nearby, the murdered body of the coachman. There is no trace of Miriam.
What strange compulsion could have driven the beautiful widow to abandon the prospect of a loving marriage and financial abundance? Monk’s attempt to answer that question proves a challenge, as Miriam Gardiner’s fateful flight ends in a packed London courtroom and a charge of murder. And in a race with the hangman, Monk and clever nurse Hester Latterly—themselves now newlyweds—desperately pursue the elusive truth … and an unknown killer whose malign brilliance they have scarcely begun to fathom.
Published by Ballantine Books.
Available at bookstores everywhere.
Immerse yourself in the mysterious world of Anne Perry’s Victorian London. Look for this thrilling William Monk novel, available in paperback!
A BREACH OF PROMISE
A William Monk Novel
by Anne Perry
Stripping away the pretty masks that conceal society’s darkest transgressions, Anne Perry unflinchingly exposes the human heart’s deepest hiding places—and creates the most mesmerizing courtroom drama of her distinguished career.
Published by Ballantine Books.
Available at bookstores everywhere.
THE SILENT CRY
by Anne Perry
The reign of Queen Victoria brought Londoners fabulous wealth; however, not all citizens of the British capital enjoyed these amenities. For deep in the filthy and dangerous slums of London one could transact secret and shameful business—even the privileged like Leighton Duff who pays for this privilege with his life.
Rhys Duff, the son of Leighton Duff, is found barely alive next to his father’s body. Inspector William Monk is called to investigate the brutal assaults of the Duffs as well as a series of rapes and beatings of local prostitutes. Could there be a connection? Monk soon uncovers shocking evidence that points to the young Rhys Duff and the possibility that he murdered his own father …
Published by Ballantine Books.
Available at bookstores everywhere.
