The Silent Cry Page 0,7

to one side to allow a nurse to pass with a bundle of laundry.

"Well, the boy's still alive, and if he survives tonight, he might recover," Riley answered. "Too soon to say. But to take on both of them, and do that much damage, I'd say two assailants who were both big and well used to violence, or possibly even three. Or else again, two complete lunatics."

"Could they have fought each other?"

Riley looked surprised. "And left themselves damn near dead on the pavement? Not very likely."

"But possible?" Evan insisted.

Riley shook his head. "Don't think you'll find the answer is that easy, Sergeant. The younger man is taller. The older one was a bit plump, he was well muscled, quite powerful. He'd have taken a lot of beating, considering he was fighting for his life. And there was no weapon to give the advantage."

"Can you tell if the wounds were made attacking or defending?"

"Mostly defending, as well as I can judge, but it's only a deduction made from their position, on forearms, as if he were putting up his arms to protect his head. He may have begun by attacking. He certainly landed a few blows, judging from his knuckles. Someone else is going to be badly marked, whether it is anywhere that shows or not."

"There was blood on the outside of his clothes," Evan told him.

"Someone else's blood." He watched Riley's face closely.

Riley shrugged. "Could be the younger man's, could be someone else's.

I've no way of knowing."

"What condition is he in now, the younger man? What are his injuries?"

Riley was distressed, he looked overwhelmed by his knowledge as if it were something he would have gladly put down.

"Very bad," he said almost under his breath. "He's still senseless, but definitely alive. If he pulls through tonight he'll need a lot of careful nursing, many weeks, maybe months. He's badly injured internally, but it's hard to tell exactly what. Can't see inside a body without cutting it open. As much as I can feel, the major organs are terribly bruised, but not ruptured. If they were, he'd be dead by now. Luckier than the other man where the blows landed. Both his hands are badly broken, but that hardly matters, compared."

"Nothing in his clothes to say who he is, I suppose?" Evan asked without any real hope.

"Yes," Riley said quickly, his eyes wide. "Apparently he had a receipt for socks with the name "R. Duff" on it. Must be his. Can't think why you'd carry a receipt for another man's socks! And he has the same tailor as the dead man. There's a very slight physical resemblance about the shape of head, way the hair grows, and particularly the ears.

Do you notice a man's ears, Sergeant Evan? Some people don't. You'd be surprised how many. Ears are very distinctive. I think you might find our two men are related."

"Duff?" Evan could hardly believe his good fortune. "R. Duff?"

"That's right. No idea what the "R" stands for, but maybe he'll be able to tell us himself tomorrow. Anyway, you can try the tailor in the morning. A man often knows his own handiwork."

"Yes yes. I'll take a piece of it to show him. Can I see the boy's clothes?"

"They're by his bed, over in the next ward. I'll take you." He turned and led the way along the wide, bare corridor, and into a ward lined with beds, grey blanketed, each showing the outline of a figure lying or propped up. At the farther end a pot-bellied stove gave off quite a good heat, and even as they walked up, a nurse staggered past them with a bucketful of fresh coals to keep it stoked.

Evan was reminded sharply of Hester Latterly, the young woman he had met so soon after his first encounter with Monk. She had gone out to the Crimea and nursed with Florence Nightingale. He could not even imagine the courage it must have taken to do that, to face that raging disease, the carnage of the battlefield, the constant pain and death, and to find within oneself the resources to keep on fighting to overcome, to offer help and to give some kind of comfort to those you were powerless even to ease, let alone to save.

No wonder such an anger still burned inside her at what she perceived to be incompetence in medical administration! How she and Monk had quarrelled! He smiled even as he thought of it. Monk loathed her sharp tongue at the same time