A Dangerous Mourning: A William Monk Novel
Anne Perry
Language: English
Pages: 368
ISBN: 0345513940
Format: PDF / Kindle (mobi) / ePub
No breath of scandal has ever touched the aristocratic Moidore family–until Sir Basil’s beautiful widowed daughter is stabbed to death in her own bed, a shocking, incomprehensible tragedy.
Inspector William Monk is ordered to investigate in a manner that will give the least possible pain to the influential family. But Monk, brilliant and ambitious, is handicapped by lingering traces of amnesia and by the craven ineptitude of his supervisor, who would like nothing better than to see Monk fail. With the help of nurse Hester Latterly, a progressive young woman who served with Florence Nightingale in the Crimea, Monk gropes warily through the silence and shadows that obscure the case, knowing that with each step he comes closer to the appalling truth.
had been some struggle, however brief, then break the creeper outside the window and take a few ornaments and jewels. Then it would seem murder, appalling, grieving, but not shameful. There would be acute sympathy, no ostracism, no blame. It could happen to anyone. “Then I seemed about to ruin it all by proving that no one had broken into the house, so a murderer must be found among the residents.” “So that is the crime—not the stabbing of Octavia, but the slow, judicial murder of Percival. How
picked up her coat again and allowed him to help her into it, and took her leave. She entered the Queen Anne Street house discreetly and avoided all but the most essential conversation, going upstairs to check that Septimus was still recovering well. He was pleased to see her and greeted her with interest. She found it hard not to tell him anything of her discoveries or conclusions, and she made excuses to escape and go to Beatrice as soon as she could without hurting his feelings. After she
Monk is a policeman, and the visitor is his boss who doesn’t like him and is only too ready to catch him in a mistake. When Monk is well enough to leave the hospital, he is assigned a rotten case and has to discover who committed an appalling crime, while at the same time trying to discover who are his own friends and enemies. It’s a hell of a thing to find out the two at once. The more Monk pursues both threads, the more he experiences flashes of memory and feels he’s finding out not only about
before Rathbone could reply he bowed fractionally to Hester, turned on his heel, and strode off down the darkening street. “A man somewhat lacking in charm,” Rathbone said sourly. “But I suppose his calling requires little enough. May I take you somewhere in my carriage, Miss Latterly?” “I think charm is a very dubious quality,” she said with deliberation. “The Grey case is surely the finest example of excessive charm we are likely ever to see!” “I can well believe that you do not rate it
Monk said dryly. Evan pushed the window all the way up and looked outside. “There’s creeper of some sort here, sir; and it’s broken in several places where it looks as if someone put his weight on it, some pieces crushed and leaves gone.” He leaned out a little farther. “And there’s a good ledge goes along as far as the drainpipe down. An agile man could climb it without too much difficulty.” Monk went over and stood beside him. “Wonder why not the next room?” he said aloud. “That’s closer to