A succession of emotions played across Arbuthnot's face-pain, resignation, pity, ending in a kind of grudging respect.

“Thank you for your candor, sir. If there is anything else I can do to be of assistance, you have but to inform me.” He rose to his feet. “Now there is a great deal I must attend to.” He gulped and coughed. “Just in case Mr.

Stonefield should return, things must be kept going . . . .”

Monk nodded and said nothing. He stood up and put on his coat. Arbuthnot showed him out through the office, now filled with clerks busy with letters, ledgers, and messages. The room was brightly lit, every lamp burning, neat heads bent over quills, ink and paper. There was no sound but the scratching of nibs and the gentle hissing of the gas. No one looked up as he passed, but he knew there would be whispers and the exchanging of glances the moment he was gone.

Monk assumed Stonefield had gone to the East End in answer to some message either directly from Caleb or at least concerning him. There was no other explanation suggested. It did cross his mind as he went down the steps into the windy street, fastening his coat again, that the woman, Selina, might have some relationship with Stonefield which had nothing to do with Caleb.

Some eminently respectable men with faultless domestic lives still had a taste for the rougher charms of street women, and kept a second estab- lishment quite separate from, and unknown to, the first. He discounted it because he did not believe Stonefield would have been rash enough to allow such a woman, if she existed, to know of his business address. It would be absurdly dangerous and completely unnecessary. Such arrangements survived only if total secrecy were observed.

He walked briskly down as far as the bridge. Perhaps it was unprofessional, but he believed Genevieve that Angus Stonefield had gone to see his brother and that this time the quarrel between them had ended in violence which had either injured Angus so seriously he had been unable to return home, or even to send a message, or else he was dead, and the best Monk could do would be to find proof of it adequate to entitle his widow to his estate.

He must begin by finding the cabby who had picked Angus up on the morning he disappeared. It would most probably be one from the nearest stables; if not, he would move outward from there.