Blood on the Water Read Online Free Page B

his voice rasping. “Whatever they find now you’ll see for yourself. No doubtyou’ll speak to my men who interviewed people on the shore … and the survivors.”
    “I will. Thank you. You should go home and get some food, and some sleep,” Lydiate said unhappily. His embarrassment was clearly acute and he did not seem able to add anything more.
    Monk nodded and walked on up the incline and into the street. He barely saw the buildings around him or the people. His misery settled into a hard, white-hot rage inside him. This was his river, his responsibility. The people who had been killed had been in his charge. And now there was nothing he could do to keep his promise to find the truth, and exact whatever kind of justice there was to exact.

CHAPTER
 
2
    H ESTER HEARD THE EXPLOSION from their home in Paradise Place, which was about a quarter of a mile from the riverbank on the south side, opposite the Wapping Police Station. Like everyone else along the small street, she went outside immediately and stared across the rooftops of Greenwich and the darkening expanse of the river toward the Pool of London. The flames were brilliant orange, illuminating everything around them for a few terrible seconds, and then they were gone. All along the street there was only silence.
    The woman next door stood paralyzed, a dish towel in her hands, her face contorted with horror. Farther down, where the street turned into Union Road, there were a couple of men, also motionless, shoulder to shoulder, staring toward the river. Then a youth came running up the cobbles shouting something.
    Hester realized that Scuff was beside her and she had not even heardhis feet on the stones. He was sixteen now, taller than she was, unrecognizable as the urchin she and Monk had befriended when he was, by his own estimation, roughly eleven. Then he had been narrow-shouldered, undersized, and frighteningly streetwise. Children did not survive in the London Docks alone if they were not. It was debatable whether they had adopted him, or he had adopted them. It was not discussed, but tacitly accepted, that his home with them had become permanent.
    He touched her hand. “What ’appened?” he said huskily.
    She did not hesitate to put her arm around him. “I don’t know. A very big explosion and fire, and then it went out completely.”
    “Ship,” he answered. “Must ’ave gone down like a stone. Monk won’t … be …” His voice choked off with fear.
    “No, of course he won’t,” Hester said firmly. “But he’ll be going to it. I expect we won’t see him again until tomorrow.”
    “Are you sure?”
    “No, not absolutely.” She had never lied to him. He was too much of a realist to have believed her if she had tried. Perhaps if she had known him since he was a baby there would have been a time when she would have offered only comfort, and let reality come later. But he had been a survivor when they met. His trust in them had grown slowly, and they must honor that trust with honesty, no matter how crushing the truth might be for him.
    “I’ll go …” he started.
    “No you won’t,” she replied. “You’ll stay here. I’ll go down to the wharf and ask. I have the right to know, and, believe me, I won’t take any soothing answers. I’ll come back and tell you. Promise me you’ll stay here?” She turned to face him. “I mean it, Scuff. I need to be able to trust you. And if it’s bad, I’ll need you to help me.”
    His eyes widened and he caught his breath, understanding filling his eyes. “Yes …” he nodded. “I’ll stay ’ere, I promise. But … yer’ll come back, won’t yer?”
    “Of course I will, as soon as I know anything. I promise that.”
    He sighed. “All right, then.”

    S HE RETURNED A LITTLE before midnight.
    Scuff was asleep in front of the remnants of the fire, but he woke as soon as she came into the room, fear stark in his face.
    “He’s all right,” she said immediately. “It was a