Authors: Jennifer Donnelly
"He thinks you've lost your mind. Thinks you're one step away from the loony bin."
Fiona made no reply.
"Is it true? Was a bloke really murdered?"
"Yes," she whispered. "It was the man who attacked me. Another man, a man named Frankie, did it."
"Jesus Christ, that's Betts. The same sod who killed Alf. Who burned
me warehouse to the ground. And you saw it? You were there when it
hap-pened?"
"Yes."
Joe felt sick. There were men who went to pieces over witnessing
some-thing like that, never mind a pregnant woman. She should never have
seen it. She should never have been anywhere near Sid Malone and his
pack.
"Still think he's some poor stray dog, your brother?" he asked her.
"Still think all he needs is a pat on the head and a biscuit or two and
he'll come round?"
"He didn't do it."
"He may as well have! You know who Frankie Betts is, don't you? Don't
you, Fiona? No? Well then, I'll tell you. He's your brother's
right-hand man. The heir apparent. Not just a hard man, a bloody
lunatic. And you were in the same room with him! It could have been you
he killed!"
"Charlie wants to go, Joe. He wants to leave the life. Frankie Betts
said so. He told me to stop meddling. To leave Charlie alone. But if I
could just see him, just speak with him, he would leave. I know he
would."
Joe made no reply. He turned away from Fiona. His rage was so great
that he wanted to upend the bedside table, throw the water jug across
the room. It took all his self-control not to.
"Do you have any idea how angry I am?" he asked, turning back to her.
"How could you do it, Fiona? How could you put yourself and our baby in
such danger? After I told you ten times not to?"
Fiona still made no reply.
"Did you ever think, for even one bleeding second, what it would be
like for Katie to grow up without a mother? For me to become a widower?
Answer me!"
She lifted her face then and the sight of it broke his heart. It was
horribly bruised. Her lip was cut. One of her eyes had been blackened.
There were livid finger marks on her neck.
She picked up one of the newspapers on the bed. He saw that it was
the Clarion. A shrill headline quoted Freddie Lytton's latest diatribe
against Sid Malone. Staring at it, she started to speak.
"Once, when I was ten years old and Charlie nine, we were coming back
from the corner shop when we saw a group of boys--there were five of
them--tormenting a cat. They'd tied its front legs together and were
kicking it, trying to make it run, then laughing when it fell over. They
were older than us. Bigger, too. Charlie handed me the tea and sugar
we'd bought, walked up to the ringleader, and punched him in the face.
He didn't break his nose, but he bloodied it. The boy started crying.
Charlie punched a second boy in the stomach and they all ran off.
"When they'd gone, he picked up the cat. It was in a bad way. One of
its legs was broken. He took it home and made a bed for it out of rags
and an old egg basket. When our Mam saw the poor thing, she didn't have
the heart to make him put it out again. He sat up with that animal the
entire night, keeping it close to the fire, feeding it milk with a
spoon. He even made a splint for its leg. He was so kind, my brother.
Even as a little boy." She gestured at the paper. "And now this... this
is what that little boy has come to. How, Joe? How?" Her voice broke.
Joe sat down next to her. He put an arm around her. They sat that way for several minutes, then she said, "Can we go home now?"
He shook his head. "No, luv, we can't."
She looked up at him, confused.
"Not until you promise me you'll never do this again. Never."
"I can't do that. You know I can't. Please don't ask me to."
"I am asking. Choose. Right now. Me or Sid Malone."
Fiona looked at him with huge, wounded eyes. "But Joe..."
Joe's heart sank. "I guess I have me answer, don't I?" he said.
"You'd do it again, wouldn't you? You'd tear the world apart with your
two bare hands if it would bring him back. Nothing I could say would
change that. I'm only wasting my breath."
He tried not to show the grief he was feeling. He tried to summon the
courage he needed to do what he had to do. She was everything to him;
he didn't know how to even breathe without her, but he didn't know what
else to do. He didn't know how else to make her stop, and he refused to
simply stand aside and allow her to destroy herself and their family in
this mad, doomed pursuit of her brother.
"Our carriage is downstairs," he said. "I'll tell Dr. Taylor that
you're trav-eling alone and I'll have the driver wait for you. I'll make
me own way back in a cab."
"Joe, please. Don't do this."
"I'll be at the Coburg until I find something more permanent. I'll
have Trudy fetch my things from the house. I love you, Fiona, and I love
Katie. More than my own life. I hope you change your mind."
"You're leaving me? You're leaving me again?"
"First time was my fault," he said. "This time it's yours."
Fiona's face crumpled. She dissolved into tears. He nearly faltered
at the sound of her weeping, but he forced himself to stand up and
leave.
"I hope you do choose, Fee," he whispered, on his way out of the door. "And I hope to God you choose me."
"You know, I think old Florrie Nightingale was snifflng the ether
when she wrote this book," Ella said, holding up her copy of
Introductory Notes on
Lying-in Institutions. "Twenty-three hundred cubic feet for every patient? Plus a window?"
India nodded, frowning. "We're going to have to make do with less,
aren't we? A lot less. Less space, fewer windows. Less water, fewer
sinks and privies."
"The only thing we'll have more of is patients."
"But it's not a bad building, is it?"
"No, it's in rather good shape, I think. Roof seems sound. No water
dam-age. Lights work. Plumbing works. Sinks on every floor. It's bare
bones, but it has what we need."
"We'd have to put in toilets. A kitchen. Or at least a stove."
"I'm sure we could do that for under a thousand. But then how do we
pay for sheets and towels? Syringes and bedpans and scalpels and..."
India sighed. "I know. I know. We need twenty-four thousand, not twenty-four hundred."
India and Ella were standing inside an old paint factory on Gunthorpe
Street that Mrs. Moskowitz had heard was for sale. Cheap. Twelve
hun-dred pounds reduced from fifteen hundred. The owner was bankrupt and
needed to sell it quickly. She had told Ella and India to go look at
it, and they'd laughed.
"Mama, it may as well be a million pounds!" Ella had said. "We don't
have the money. We have only the twenty-four hundred our donors gave us.
It's nowhere near enough to buy the building, renovate it, and furnish
it."
"Is there so much harm in looking? God gives the nuts; He doesn't crack them," Mrs. Moskowitz had said.
And so they'd gone. The estate agent had escorted them through the
building, then told them that in his opinion they could offer a
thousand. He'd gone for a cup of tea and left them to wander the
premises.
"Only a thousand," India said now.
"A bargain," Ella said.
"You know what your mother would say."
"I do, but I think God will have to rob a bank if He wants to help us with this one."
"Hullo!" a voice shouted from the doorway. "India, Ella... are you in there?"
India turned in time to see Harriet Hatcher take a long drag on a ciga-rette, then flick the fag end into the street.
"Harriet!" she exclaimed. "What are you doing here?"
"I stopped by the caff for a visit. Wanted to see if you two had made
any progress with the clinic. Ella's mum told me where you were. Look
who I brought with me," she said, smiling impishly.
A bulky figure hurtled in through the open door. "Jones!" a familiar voice boomed. "Still dreaming those pipe dreams, are we?"
"Professor Fenwick!" India cried, delighted to see her teacher. "What
brings you here?" But Fenwick had already veered off to inspect the gas
lighting.
"Word's out about what you two are doing in the Moskowitzes'
back-yard," Harriet said. "It's all anyone talks about. At the school.
At the hospi-tals. Fenwick wanted to come and see for himself. Says he's
giving up teaching. Says he can't bear this year's graduating class."
"Dunces, every one of them!" Fenwick bellowed, striding past them
toward the staircase. "They spend more time at estate agents asking
about the prices of fancy premises on Harley Street than they do with
their case-books!" He disappeared up the steps.
"We were thinking of putting the children's ward on the first floor, Pro-fessor," India called up after him.
"No, no, no, no, no! This is an old building. Who knows how good the
water is? Put the maternity ward up here. It requires the most hot
water. Pressure's bound to be better on the first floor than the second
or third. 'Gads, Jones, you have been inside a hospital, haven't you?"
Harriet gave India a quick thumbs-up. "He's in!" she whispered, grinning.
"You'll need an administrator, you know. Someone to run the place.
Balance the books. Hire and fire," Fenwick said, walking back
downstairs. "Arthur Fenwick. How do you do?" he added, extending his
hand to Ella.
"Do you know of anyone who might be interested, Professor?"
"Don't be cheeky, Jones. When you get this place up and running, give me a call."
"If, Professor, if," India sighed. She explained what had happened to her cousin and the clinic's funds they'd raised.
Fenwick frowned. "How much is the owner asking?"
"Twelve, but the agent thinks we could offer a thousand."
"Offer them eight, settle at nine, and I'll give you the down
payment. Twenty percent should do it. And you may use me as a guarantor
on the mortgage."
India was nearly speechless. "Seriously, Professor? You'd do that?"
"Consider it done."
"But why?" India asked, amazed by his generosity.
He looked at her over the top of his glasses. "Student I once had--
absolute ninny of a girl--told me she wanted to become a doctor to make a
difference. I think I'd like to see what that's all about."
India flung her arms around her teacher and hugged him tightly.
"Oof! That'll do, Jones," he said.
She released him, beaming, then embraced him again, despite his
protests, then the four of them took another look around the building,
noting its strong points and its weaknesses. Fenwick said that the Royal
Free Hospital was getting rid of some old beds, and if they could get a
carter to pick them up, he was sure they could have them for free. And
he'd heard Dean Garrett Anderson talking about modernizing the library.
He would be sure to have her save any unwanted furniture for them.
"It wouldn't be ideal, of course," Fenwick said. "The tables from the
library are old. The beds from the Royal Free are wooden, not the new
metal ones with the sanitary finishes, I'm afraid."
"The poor can't wait for ideal, Professor Fenwick," India said
briskly. "They need care, even if it's rudimentary care, and they need
it now. Old beds are better than no beds. We'll give them a good scrub
with carbolic and hot water."
Harriet raised an eyebrow. "That makes a change. Aren't you the girl
who set off for Varden Street armed with a bag of porridge and pictures
of smiling fruits and vegetables? What happened?"
"Whitechapel happened," India said, laughing. "Now I think myself lucky if the chickens stay out of our examination room."
The agent returned. India took him aside and made an offer of �800.
He shook his head, told her it was far too low, but said he was
duty-bound to convey it to the building's owner. Then he hurried them
out, saying he had another appointment to keep.
Fenwick watched him scuttle off, and said, "He doesn't have another
appointment. He's going straight to the owner. You'll get it for nine.
Mark my words."
As India and Ella half-walked, half-ran back to Brick Lane, they
tried to figure out how they would come up with the money for the
monthly mortgage payments and the renovations. The �2,400 they had
wouldn't cover it all. "We'll just have to take up where Wish left off
and start knocking on doors," Ella said.
"And try to get that Point Reyes land sold," India added.
"But then there's the problem of staff," Ella said, frowning. "How will we pay them?"
"I think I might have an answer to that," India said. "The London
School of Medicine for Women. The students there are desperate for
clinical training. If I talk to the dean, once we're up and running,
maybe she'll send some of the students to us."
"That's a wonderful idea!" Ella said.
India stopped. She took Ella's hand, and squeezed it. "We can do
this, Ella. We can! Maybe not the way Wish planned. Maybe not the right
way..."
"But our way," Ella said, grinning.
They walked into the Moskowitzes' flat, excitedly calling for Ella's
mother, eager to tell her the good news. As Mrs. Moskowitz joined them
in the hallway, wiping her hands on her apron, Solomon informed them
that India had received a package.
"From whom, Solly?" India asked.
The little boy shrugged. "Doesn't say."
"It must," Ella said. "There's bound to be a return address."
"There isn't. I looked. It came in a carriage. The driver handed it to me."
"Maybe Freddie had second thoughts. Maybe he's returned your jewelry," Ella said.
"Maybe you're the one sniffing the ether," India replied.
Posy skipped into the hallway. "It's a present for India!" she sang. "Open it! Open it!"
"I bet it's another doily," Miriam grumbled. "We only have five hundred of them."
The door opened and Mr. Moskowitz came inside, followed by Yanki and
Aaron. "What is the reason we are all standing in the hallway?" he
asked.