Beck looked paler.

"I can't explain it," he confessed. "It's complete nonsense."

Jeavis grunted. "I don't think so, sir. I don't think so at all. But we'll leave that for now." He looked at Beck sharply. "Just don't take it into your head to go for a trip back to France, or wherever it is you come from. Or I'll have to come after you!"

"I have no desire whatever to go to France, Inspector," Beck said dryly. "I shall be here, I assure you. Now if there is nothing further, I must return to my patients." And without waiting to see if Jeavis agreed, he walked past the two policemen and out of the room.

"Suspicious," Jeavis said darkly. "Marie my words, Evan, that's our man."

"Maybe." Evan did not agree, not because he knew anything, or suspected anyone else, but out of contrariness. "And maybe not."

Callandra became increasingly aware of Jeavis's presence in the hospital, and then, with a sick fear, of his suspicion of Kristian Beck. She did not believe for an instant that he was guilty, but she had seen enough miscarriage of justice to know that innocence was not always sufficient to save one even from the gallows, let alone from the damage of suspicion, the ruin to reputation, the fear and the loss of friends and fortune.

As she walked down the wide corridor of the hospital she felt a peculiar breathlessness and something not unlike a dizziness as she turned the corner, and almost bumped into Berenice Ross Gilbert.

"Oh! Good afternoon," she said with a gasp, regaining her balance somewhat ungracefully.

"Good afternoon, Callandra," Berenice said with her elegant eyebrows raised. "You look a trifle flustered, my dear. Is there something wrong?"

"Of course something is wrong," Callandra replied testily. "Nurse Barrymore has been murdered. Isn't that as wrong as anything can be?"

"It is fearful, naturally," Berenice answered, adjusting the drape of her fichu. "But to judge from your expression, I thought there must be something new. I'm relieved there is not." She was dressed in a rich shade of brown with gold lace. "The whole place is at sixes and sevens. Mrs. Flaherty cannot get sense out of any of the nurses. Stupid women seem to think there is a lunatic about and they are all in danger." Her rather long-nosed face with its ironic amusement was full of contempt as she stared at Callandra. "Which is ridiculous. It's obviously a personal crime- some rejected lover, as like as not."

"Rejected suitor, perhaps," Callandra corrected. "Not lover. Prudence was not of that nature."

"Oh really, my dear." Berenice laughed outright, her face full of scornful amusement. "She may have been gauche, but of course she was of that nature. Do you suppose she spent all that time out in the Crimea with all those soldiers out of a religious vocation to help the sick?"

"No. I think she went out of a sense of frustration at home," Callandra snapped back. "Adventure to travel and see other places and people, do something useful, and above all to learn about medicine, which had been her passion since she was a girl."

Berenice tossed her head in laughter, a rich gurgling sound. "You are naive, my dear! But by all means think what you will." She moved a little closer to Callandra, as if to impart a confidence, and Callandra caught a breath of rich musky perfume. "Have you seen that fearful little policeman? What an oily creature, like a beetle. Have you noticed he has hardly any eyebrows, and those black eyes like stones." She shuddered. "I swear they look just like the prune stones I used to count to know my future. You know, tinker, tailor, and so on. I am quite sure he thinks Dr. Beck did it."

Callandra tried to speak and had to swallow an obstruction in her throat.

"Dr. Beck?" She should not have been surprised. It was only her fear spoken aloud. "Why? Why on earth should Dr. Beck have-have-killed her?"

Berenice shrugged. "Who knows? Perhaps he pursued her and she rejected him, and he was furious and lost his temper and strangled her?"

"Pursued her?" Callandra stared, turmoil in her mind and a hot, sick feeling of horror rippling through her body.

"For Heaven's sake, Callandra, stop repeating everything I say as if you were half-witted!" Berenice said tartly. "Why not? He is a man in the prime of life, and married to a woman who at best is quite indifferent to him, and at worst, if I were unkind, refuses to fulfill her conjugal duties…"

Callandra cringed inside. It was inexpressibly offensive to hear Berenice speaking in such terms of Kristian and his most personal life. It hurt more than she could have foreseen.

Berenice continued, apparently with total unawareness of the horror she was causing.

"And Prudence Barrymore was quite a handsome woman, in her own fashion, one has to grant that. Not really a demure face, or traditionally pretty, but I imagine some men may have found it interesting, and poor Dr. Beck may have been in a desperate state. Working side by side can prove peculiarly powerful." She shrugged her elegant shoulders. "Still, it is hardly anything we can affect, and I have too much to do to spend more time on it. I have to find the chaplain, then I.am invited to take tea with Lady Washbourne. Do you know her?"

"No," Callandra replied abruptly. "But I know someone probably more interesting, whom I must see. Good day to you." And with that she walked off smartly before Berenice could be the one to depart first.

She had had Monk in mind when she spoke, but actually the next person she saw was Kristian Beck himself. He came out of one of the wards into the corridor just as she was passing. He looked preoccupied and anxious, but he smiled when he recognized her and the candor of it sent a warmth through her, which only sharpened her fear. She was forced to admit she cared for him more profoundly than anyone else she could recall. She had loved her husband, but it was a friendship, a companionship of long familiarity and a number of shared ideals over the years, not the sharp, strange vulnerability she felt over Kristian Beck, and not the swift elation and the painful excitement, the inner sweetness, in spite of the pain.

He was smiling and she had no idea what he had said. She blushed at her stupidity.

"I beg your pardon?" she stammered.

He was surprised. "I said 'Good morning,' " he repeated. "Are you well?" He looked at her more closely. "Has that wretched policeman been bothering you?"

"No." She smiled in sudden relief. It was ridiculous. She could have dealt with Jeavis without a hesitation in her stride. Good heavens, she was a match for Monk, let alone one of Runcorn's junior minions appointed in his stead. "No," she said again. "Not at all. But I am concerned about his efficiency. I fear he may not be as capable of the skill as this unhappy case requires."

Kristian gave a twisted smile. "He is certainly diligent enough. He has already questioned me three times, and to judge from his expression, believed nothing I said." He gave a sad little laugh. "I think he suspects me."

She caught the edge of fear in his voice, and pretended she had not, then changed her mind and met his eyes. She longed to be able to touch him, but she did not know how much he felt, or knew. And this was hardly the time.

"He will be eager to prove himself by solving the case as quickly and satisfactorily as possible," she said with an effort at composure. "And he has a superior with social ambitions and a keen sense of what is politically judicious." She saw his face tighten as he appreciated exactly what she meant, and the consequent danger to himself as a foreigner and a man with no social connections in England. "But I have a friend, a private inquiry agent," she went on hastily, aching to reassure him. "I have engaged him to look into the case. He is quite brilliant. He will find the truth."