The Shifting Tide by Anne Perry Read Free Book Online

social events, no matter what it cost her temper or her indignation. Squeaky was still grumbling about the responsibility of balancing the books, but if there was a man in London who could do it, it was he.
     
    Hester was pleased to arrive home, even though she was aware that Monk would probably not be there. At least he had a case to work on, rather than looking for business, hoping and failing. Although as she cleared out the grate to light a low fire, being careful from habit to use no more coal than necessary, in spite of their suddenly improved circumstances, she could not keep her thoughts from turning to the problems he would face in an area so unfamiliar to him.
    She lit the fire and watched the slow flame seeking the wood sticks, then the smaller pieces of coal. But after a brief blaze, the fire was not catching. The flame had sunk to a smolder. She bent down on her hands and knees and knelt forward to blow gently at the small part that was still alive. She knew the trick of placing an open newspaper over the whole front of the fireplace, to make the chimney draw, but she had no newspaper. It was an extra expense unnecessary at the moment. Anyway, she was too busy to take much interest in the world and its troubles. There was no time to read such things.
    The flames licked up again.
    This was the season of year when stew was a very welcome meal, and if the big pan was left on the back of the stove, she could add vegetables to it every day, and it kept perfectly. It also meant that whatever time Monk came home, a meal was hot and waiting. This time she felt free to add a nice amount of fresh meat, and when she heard his key in the lock shortly after seven, the meal was cooked.
    “Well?” she asked when they were seated at the table and the bowls were steaming in front of them.
    He thought before he replied, watching her reaction. “I’ve never been so cold in my life!” he answered, then smiled widely. “At least not that I can remember . . .” Since recovering so much of his past in the recent railway case, the fact of his amnesia no longer haunted him as it had from the time of the coach crash which had caused it, a month or two before they had first met—now nearly seven years ago. It was as if the ghosts were laid, the worst known and faced, and they had been not giants but ordinary weaknesses after all, frailties that could be understood, pitied, and healed. The horror had shrunk to human proportions, into tragedy rather than wickedness. Now he could joke about it.
    She smiled back. A long-borne weight was gone. “Is the river very different from the streets?” she asked.
    “It feels different,” he replied, taking another mouthful and savoring the richness of it compared with their recent frugality. “Everything’s governed by the tides; all of life seems to revolve around them. Ships go upstream and downstream with the ebb and flow. Get caught at low water and you run aground, but try to pass under the bridges at high water and you break your masts. The rivermen know it to the foot.” He thought for a moment. “But the water has a beauty the streets don’t. There’s a feeling of width. The light and shadow are always changing.”
    She looked at his face and saw the awe of it in him. There was something in the elements of the river which had captured him already. Again the fear touched her that he was out of his depth. Might he be too occupied in seeing what was physical to be aware of the differences in the minds of thieves and receivers, the subtleties of deceit and violence whose warnings he might not recognize because he was unfamiliar?
    “You aren’t listening,” he accused her.
    “I’m trying to picture it,” she said quickly, meeting his eyes again. “It doesn’t sound like the city at all. Where do you start to look for the ivory? Can you trace where people have passed when there are no tracks, no footprints?” Then she wished she had not asked, because how could he know? It