She was well bred and had been highly respectable while her army surgeon husband was alive. Now as a fairly wealthy widow, she was becoming rather less so. Indeed some might have considered her a trifle eccentric. She had made a pact with a private agent of enquiry that she would support him financially during his lean times, as long as he shared with her his more interesting cases. That was not in any sense respectable: but it was enormously diverting, at times tragic and always absorbing. Frequently it accomplished if not happiness, at least a resolution and some kind of justice.

The hansom was moving at a brisk pace through the traffic. She shivered in the cold.

And there was the agent of enquiry himself. Charles would never have approved of William Monk. How could Society possibly accept a man without a memory? He could be anyone! He could have done anything!

The possibilities were endless, and almost all of them unpleasant. Had he been a hero, an aristocrat or a gentleman, someone would have recognised him and owned him.

Since the one thing he knew about himself for certain was that he was a policeman, that automatically placed him in a social category somewhere beneath even the most regrettable trade. And of course trade was beneath any of the professions. Younger sons of the gentry went into the army or the church or the law those who did not marry wealth and relieve themselves of the necessity of having to do anything. Elder sons, naturally, inherited land and money, and lived accordingly.

Not that Hester's friendship with Monk could easily be categorised.

Pressing through the traffic in the rain, she thought of it with a mixture of emotions, all of them disturbingly powerful. It had lurched from an initial mutual contempt, to a kind of trust which was unique in her life, and, she believed, in his also. And then as if suddenly afraid of such vulnerability, they had been quick to quarrel, to find fault and keep little rein on temper.

But in times of need, and the mutual caring for some cause, they had worked together in an understanding that ran deeper than words, or the need or time for explanations.

In one fearful hour in Edinburgh, when they had believed they faced death, it had seemed to be that kind of love which touches only a few lives, a depth of unity which is of the heart and mind and soul, and for one aching moment of the body also.

In the lurching of the cab and the hiss of wheels in the rain she could remember Edinburgh as if it had been yesterday.

But the experience had been too dangerous to the emotions, too demanding for either of them to dare again.

Or had it only been he who would not dare?

That was a question she did not want to ask herself, she had not meant to allow the thought into her mind… and there it was, hard and painful. Now she refused to express it. She did not know. She did not want to. Anyway, it was all irrelevant. There were parts of Monk she admired greatly: his courage, his strength of will, his intelligence, his loyalty to his beliefs, his passion for justice, his ability to face almost any kind of truth, no matter how dreadful, and the fact that he was never, ever a hypocrite.

She also hated the streak of cruelty she knew in him, the arrogance, the frequent insensitivity. And he was a fool where judgement of character was concerned. He could no more read a woman's wiles than a dog could read Spanish! He was consistently attracted to the very last sort of woman who could ever make him happy.

Unconsciously she was clenching her hands as she sat in the cold.

He was bewitched, taken in again and again by pretty, softly spoken, outwardly helpless women, who were shallow of nature, manipulative and essentially searching for comfortable lives far from turmoil of any kind. He would have been bored silly by any one of them within months.

But their femininity flattered him, their agreement to his wildest assertions had seemed like good nature and good sense, and their charming manners pleased his notion of feminine decorum. He fancied himself comfortable with them, whereas in truth he was only soothed, unchallenged, and in the end bored, imprisoned and contemptuous.

But still he made the same mistake! His recent visit to one of the smaller German principalities was the perfect example. He had fallen under the spell of the extremely shallow and utterly selfish Countess Evelyn von Seidlitz. She was deliciously pretty with her enormous brown eyes and dimpling laugh. She had a wicked sense of humour and knew precisely how to charm, flatter and entertain. She was lovely to look at and fun to be with. She was also cold, manipulative and greedy.

They were pressed in on all sides by hansoms, drays, carriages. Drivers were shouting. A horse squealed.

Monk had seen through the Countess eventually, of course, but it had required unarguable evidence to convince him. And then he was angry, above all, it seemed, with Hester! She did not know why. She recalled their last meeting with twinges of pain which took her unexpectedly. It had been highly acrimonious, but then so had a great many of their meetings. Normally it caused her irritation that she had not managed to think of a suitable retaliation at the right moment, or satisfaction that she had. She was frequently furious with him, and he with her. It was not unpleasant, in fact at times it was exhilarating. There was a kind of honesty in it, and it was without real hurt. She would never have struck at any part of him she felt might be genuinely vulnerable.

So why did their last encounter leave her this ache, this feeling of being bruised inside? She tried to recall exactly what he had said.

She could not now even remember what the quarrel had been about: something to do with her arbitrariness, a favourite subject with him.

He had said she was autocratic, that she judged people too harshly and only according to her own standards, which were devoid of laughter or humanity.

The hansom lurched forward again.

He said she knew how to nurse the sick and reform the dilatory, the incompetent or the feckless, but she had no idea how to live like an ordinary woman, how to laugh or cry and experience the feelings of anything but a hospital matron, endlessly picking up the disasters of other people's lives, but never having one of her own. Her ceaseless minding of other people's business, the fact that she thought she always knew better, made her a bore.

The sum of it had been that he could do very well without her, and while her qualities were admirable, and socially very necessary, they were also personally unattractive.

That was what had hurt. Criticism was fair, it was expected, and she could certainly give him back as much in quality and quantity as she received. But rejection was another thing altogether.

And it was completely unfair. For once she had done nothing to warrant it. She had remained in London nursing a young man desperately damaged by paralysis. Apart from that, she had been occupied trying to save Oliver Rathbone from himself, in that he had undertaken the defence in a scandalous slander case, and very nearly damaged his own career beyond repair. As it was, it had cost him his reputation in certain circles. Had he not been granted a knighthood shortly before the affair, he could certainly abandon all hope of one now! He had shed too ugly a light on royalty in general to find such favour any more. He was no longer considered as 'sound' as he had been all his life until then. Now he was suddenly 'questionable'.

But she found herself smiling at the thought of him. Their last meeting had been anything but acrimonious. Theirs was not really a social acquaintance, rather more a professional friendship. He had surprised her by inviting her to accompany him to dinner, and then to the theatre. She had accepted, and enjoyed it so much she recalled it now with a little shiver of pleasure.