The Shifting Tide

FIVE

Hester arrived at Portpool Lane by half past eight on the third morning after Monk accepted the job for Clement Louvain. The first thing she did was sit down with Bessie in the kitchen and have a hot cup of tea and a slice of toast while she listened to the report of what had happened during the night.

In its time as a brothel very little cooking had been done there. Most of the prostitutes who inhabited the place had eaten what meals they had somewhere in the street, before their working hours began. There had seldom been more than three or four people to cater for at any one time: just Squeaky Robertson himself and a few women kept on and off for cleaning and laundry; and a couple of men to deal with any customer who got rough and needed throwing out, or who was a trifle slow in settling his bill. It had never been necessary to enlarge what was essentially a family kitchen. The laundry was another matter; that was enormous, and excellent, with two boiling coppers for the vast numbers of sheets used, and a separate room for drying them.

Bessie looked profoundly tired. Her hair was scraped back so tightly it looked painful, but large strands were looped over her ears carelessly, as if she had pushed them back in irritation, simply to get them out of her way. Her skin was pale, and every now and then she could not stifle a yawn.

“Been up all night?” Hester said, more as a statement than a question.

Bessie took a third mouthful of her tea with a sigh of satisfaction. “Them two from a couple o’ nights ago are gettin’ better,” she replied. “One poor little cow only needed a spot o’ food an’ a couple o’ nights’ proper kip. Put ’er out again termorrer. Knife wounds ’ealin’ up nice.”

“Good.” Hester nodded. However, she expected the woman Louvain had brought in to be worse—in fact, she was afraid she might be one of those they could not help beyond giving her as much comfort as possible in her last hours. At least she would not have to die alone.

“But we got up of a dozen in, an’ there’s a bleedin’ lot o’ washin’ ter do,” Bessie answered. “I bin up all night wi’ that Clark woman. In’t much yer can do fer ’er, ’ceptin’ cool towels like yer said, but it seems ter ’elp. She still looks like the undertaker should ’ave ’er, but ’er fever in’t so bad, so I s’pose she’s on the mend. Temper in ’er, mind! Ruth’s too good a name for ’er. I’d a called ’er Mona if it’d bin up ter me.”

Hester smiled. “I expect she was christened long before she could speak.”

Bessie grunted. “Pity we can’t take ’er back ter then!”

“Rechristen her?”

“Nah—just keep ’er mouth shut!”

“Finish your breakfast and get some sleep,” Hester advised. “I’ll do the laundry.”

“Yer can’t do that all on yer own!”

“I won’t need to; Margaret will be in later. I’ll just get it started.”

“Yeah? An’ ’oo’s gonna fetch the water fer yer?” Bessie asked.

Hester smiled more widely. “Squeaky. It’ll do him good. A bit of fresh air and exercise.”

Bessie laughed outright. “Then tell ’im if ’e squawks I’ll come an’ beat ’im over the ’ead wi’ a saucepan!”

When Hester spoke to Squeaky ten minutes later he was horrified.

“Me?” he said incredulously. “I’m a bookkeeper! I don’t fetch water!”

“Yes, you do,” she answered, handing him two pails.

“But it’ll take ten loads o’ that to fill the bleedin’ copper!” he said furiously.

“At least,” she agreed. “And another ten for the other one, so you’d better get started. We need them washed today, and dry by tomorrow or the day after.”

“I in’t a bleedin’ water carrier!” He stood rooted to the spot, indignation filling his face.

“Right, then I’ll fetch the water,” she said. “And you change the beds. Remember to pull the bottom sheets straight and tight, and tuck in only the ends of the top ones. You’ll have to work around the sick women, but I expect you know how to do that. Then you can mix the lye and potash and—”

“All right!” he said angrily. “I’ll get the water! I in’t dealin’ wi’ sick women in bed!”

“Bit modest, aren’t you, for a brothel-keeper?” she asked mockingly.

He gave her a filthy look, picked up the two pails, and stormed out.

Smiling to herself, Hester went back upstairs with a pile of clean sheets and pillow slips to begin changing the beds. Fevers made people sweat, and it was inevitable that linen soiled quickly.

She began with the girl who had come in exhausted, and who was already so much better she could be sent back out again today or tomorrow.

“I’ll ’elp yer,” she offered straightaway, rolling over and getting to her feet. She steadied herself with one hand on the bed frame, then wrapped a shawl around her shoulders.

Hester accepted. All such duties were a great deal easier with two. They changed the linen on that bed, then went to the next room, in which rested the woman with more severe congestion. She was feverish and in considerable discomfort. They took off the damp and crumpled sheets, easing her from one position to another and replacing the old with new. It was an awkward task, and at the end of it, when the woman sank back, dizzy and gasping for breath, Hester and the girl were also glad of a moment’s respite.

Hester helped the sick woman to take a few sips from the beaker of water on the table. The water had once been hot and was now tepid. Then they left her and went to the next room, and so on until they were all finished.

“Can I help yer wash ’em?” the girl offered, pointing to the sheets.

Hester looked at her pale face and the slight beading of sweat on her brow. “No, thank you. Go back to bed for a while. It doesn’t take two to do this.”

That was not strictly true—it would have been much easier with someone else to assist her—but she stuffed the soiled linen into two pillow slips and put them over her shoulder, then carried them downstairs.

Once in the laundry room, she checked the coppers and found the first one more than half full. Squeaky must have been working swiftly, in spite of his complaints. She put all the linen into the copper, stirring the sheets around with a long wooden dolly until they were thoroughly soaked. She brought another scuttle of coke across and added it to the boiler, then carried the empty scuttle back.

Next she took the last of the soap to add to the water in the copper, and set about one of the jobs she disliked most, the making of more soap. It was not a difficult task so much as a heavy and tedious one. They bought the potash from a dealer a few hundred yards along the street, in Farringdon Road. It was made from burned potato stalks, not necessarily the best, but the cheapest because it produced a dozen times as much potash as the same weight of any wood. One pound of caustic potash combined with five pounds of clear grease would make five gallons of soft soap. For their purpose the smell of it was unimportant, and funds did not run to adding perfume.

While she was working, Squeaky came in with two more loads of water, scowling so hard she was surprised he could see where he was going. “I ’ate that stuff!” he said, wrinkling his nose. “When we was a proper brothel, we bought soap!”

“If you’ve got money to spare I should be delighted,” she replied.

“Money! Where’d I get money?” he demanded. “Nobody around ’ere makes bleedin’ money! Yer all just spends it!” And before she could make any reply he tipped the pails of water into the second copper and marched out again.

They admitted two more women in the middle of the day, and in the early afternoon Margaret came in and willingly helped scrub the kitchen floor with hot water and vinegar. Later she took another two pounds and went to pay the coal merchant’s bill, and brought back a pound of tea and a jar of honey.

Another woman came in with two broken fingers on her right hand which took all Hester’s skill to set and bind. The woman was exhausted with the pain of it, and it was some little time before she was composed enough to leave.

At quarter to six Margaret went home. Hester intended to take a few minutes’ sleep herself, then see Ruth Clark again before heading home, but she woke with a start to find it completely dark outside and Bessie standing over her with a candle in one hand, her face creased in concern.

Hester pushed her hair out of her eyes and sat up. “What is it?” she said anxiously. “Another admission?”

“No.” Bessie shook her head. “It’s that Clark woman. Wot a miserable piece o’ work she is, an’ no mistake! But she’s real poorly. I think as yer’d better come an’ take a look at ’er.”

Wordlessly, Hester obeyed. Without bothering to pin up her hair she put her boots back on and followed Bessie to Ruth Clark’s room.

The woman lay half on her back, her face flushed, her hair tangled. The sheet was crumpled where her hands had clenched on it. Her eyes were half open but she seemed only barely conscious of there being anyone else in the room.

Hester went over to her and touched her brow. It was burning.

“Ruth?” she said softly.

The woman made no answer except to move her hands fretfully, as if the touch bothered her.

“Get me a fresh bowl of cold water,” Hester directed. The woman’s condition was serious. If her fever didn’t decrease at least a degree or two, she might well become delirious and die.

Bessie went immediately, and Hester picked up the candle on the bedside table and looked more closely at Ruth Clark. She was breathing erratically, and her chest seemed to rattle as if it were full of congestion. Pneumonia. The crisis might well come tonight. Hester could not leave to go home. If she did everything she knew, she might save her. She looked a robust woman, definitely someone’s mistress rather than one of the women who walked the streets selling their bodies to anyone with the money to pay. Often the latter spent their nights cold and hungry, and in the bad weather with wet feet and possibly wet clothes altogether. She put the candle back.

Bessie returned with the water and cloths and set them down on the floor.

Hester thanked her and told her to go and see what she could do for the other patients, then take a chance to sleep herself.

“Not while yer tendin’ to ’er all on yer own!” Bessie said indignantly.

“This isn’t a job for two,” Hester answered, but she smiled at Bessie’s loyalty. “If you rest now, you can take a turn in the morning. I’ll call you if I need you, I promise.”

Bessie stood her ground. “I’ll never ’ear yer!”

“Take the room opposite, then you will.”

“Yer’ll call?” Bessie insisted.

“Yes, I will! Now get out of my way!”

Bessie obeyed, and Hester put the cloth in the cold water, wrung it out, and placed it on the sick woman’s forehead. At first it seemed to irritate her and she tried to turn away. Hester moved the cloth and gently put it over her throat. She wrung it out again and tried her forehead a second time.

Ruth groaned and her eyelids flickered.

Again and again Hester dipped the cloth in the water, wrung it out, and bathed the woman with it, at first only her face and neck. Then, as that seemed to have little effect, she stripped back the sheet and blankets and laid the cloth over the top of her chest as well.

The time crept by. She looked at her watch and it was ten in the evening.

Then some time around midnight she became aware that Ruth had not moved for a while, perhaps ten or fifteen minutes. Hester leaned forward. She could not see the rise and fall of Ruth’s breathing. She was far too familiar with death for it to frighten her, but it never left her without a sadness. She put out her hand and touched the woman’s neck, just to make sure there was no pulse.

Ruth’s eyes opened. “What is it?” she whispered crossly.

It was the first time Hester had heard her speak, and her voice was startling. It was low, soft, and pleasing, the voice of a woman of some education and culture. Hester was so startled she flinched. “I . . . I’m sorry,” she apologized, as if rather than ministering to a sick patient she had crept into someone else’s bedroom. “I wanted to see if you were still feverish. Do you feel better? Would you like something to drink?”

“I feel awful,” Ruth answered, still speaking as if her throat were parched.

“Would you like some water?” Hester repeated the offer. “I’ll help you sit up.”

Ruth frowned at her. “Who are you?” She looked around the room as much as she could see without moving her head. “What is this place? It looks like a brothel!”

Hester smiled. “That’s because it is—or was. Now it’s a clinic. Don’t you remember coming here?”

Ruth closed her eyes. “If I remembered coming, I wouldn’t ask!”

Hester was taken aback. She realized with a shock how used she had become to gratitude from the sick and injured who regularly found shelter there. She had come to take it for granted, and this woman looked at her with no admiration at all, no sense of respect towards a rescuer.

“Do you remember Mr. Louvain, who brought you here?”

The change in Ruth’s face was subtle, so slight it could have been no more than the struggle to focus her mind, or the fear that she was losing control of what was happening to her.

“He brought me here?” Ruth said quietly.

“Yes.” Hester should have asked again if she wanted water, but curiosity stayed her for another moment, waiting.

An odd smile touched Ruth’s face, ironic, as if there was a terrible humor to her situation that even in her state of wretchedness she could still appreciate. “What did he say?” Her eyes, meeting Hester’s, were hard and angry. She would accept help, but she would not be grateful for it.

“That you were the mistress of a friend of his who had put you out because you were ill,” Hester replied. The answer was cruel, but surely a woman who had followed such a path, chosen or not, must be used to facing truths.

Ruth closed her eyes as a wave of pain washed over her, but the smile did not fade away entirely.

“Mistress, is that what he said?” she whispered derisively.

“Yes.”

“Did he pay you? Is that why you sit here nursing me?”

“He did pay us, yes. Or more accurately, he gave me a donation sufficient to cover the cost of caring for you, and for several other women as well. But we would have taken you anyway. We have plenty here who have nothing to give.”

Ruth was silent. She was finding it difficult to breathe again, and her face was flushed. Hester stood up and fetched half a glass of water from the stand and brought it back. “You should take this. I’ll help you to sit up.”

“Leave me alone,” Ruth said irritably. “You’ve been paid to look after me. Consider yourself acquitted.”

Hester controlled her tongue. “You’ll feel better if you take some liquid. You have a high fever. You need to drink.”

“A fever! I feel worse than I ever thought a human being could—”

“Then stop being so perverse and let me help you take a little water,” Hester insisted.

“Go . . . go to . . .” Ruth was gasping for breath again, and her face was scarlet.

Hester put the cup down, leaned forward, and put her arms around Ruth’s shoulders, heaving her up and sliding another pillow behind her. With great difficulty she put the cup to Ruth’s lips. The first mouthful was lost, sliding down her neck onto her chest; of the second she swallowed at least half. After that she yielded and took almost all of the rest, and finally lay back exhausted.

Hester took away the pillow and helped Ruth lie back, then began again with the cloth and the cool water.

A little after two she left Ruth for a while and went around to the other patients, just to make certain that everyone else was as well as was possible, then she went down to the kitchen and boiled the kettle. She made herself a cup of tea and had drunk most of it when there was a banging at the front door. She roused herself to go and answer.

There were two women on the step: Flo, whom Hester had seen many times before; and leaning against her, white-faced and holding her arm in front of her, cradling it with the other, was a younger woman with auburn hair and frightened eyes. The sleeve of her dress was scarlet and blood was dripping onto the step.

“Come in,” Hester said instantly, stepping back to make room for them to pass her. Then she closed the door and bolted it, as she always did after dark. She put her arm around the injured woman and turned to Flo. “Bessie’s asleep in the room to the left at the top of the stairs,” she directed. “Please go and waken her and ask her to put more water on to boil, and get out the brandy—”

“She don’t need no more brandy,” Flo interrupted her, glancing at the injured woman impatiently.

“It’s not to drink,” Hester replied. “It’s to clean the needle if she needs stitching up. Just get Bessie, please.”

Flo shrugged, pursing her lips. She was somewhere in her mid-thirties, dark-haired, and with a mass of freckles. She had a long, rather lugubrious face, and no one could have called her pretty. But she was intelligent and had a quick tongue, and when she could be bothered, she had a certain charm. She had sent or brought a number of women to the clinic, and once or twice she had even brought one with money. Hester was grateful to her for that.

“I’ll put the water on,” Flo said gruffly. “Yer think I don’ know w’ere ter find it or I can’t lift a pan!”

Hester thanked her and helped the other woman to sit down in the chair in the main room, still nursing her arm, her face pasty white at the sight of so much of her own blood.

Hester lit more candles and began to work. It took her over an hour to stop the bleeding, clean and stitch the wound, and bandage it. Then she assisted the woman, whose name was Maisie, into a clean nightgown and to a bed.

“Yer look ’orrible yerself,” Flo observed when the two of them were alone in the kitchen. “I’ll make yer a cup o’ tea. Yer fit ter drop, an’ if yer do, ’oo’ll look arter the rest of us then, eh?”

Hester was about to refuse, instinctively, then she realized the stupidity of it. She was so tired the room seemed to waver around her, as if she were seeing it through water. She did not want to disturb Bessie, who had more than earned her sleep.

“Then yer should catch a bit o’ kip yerself,” Flo added. “I’ll wake yer if anythin’ ’appens.”

“I’ve got a very ill woman upstairs; I must see how she is. We have to keep the fever down if we can.”

Flo put her hands on her hips. “An’ ’ow yer goin’ ter do that, then, eh? Work a bleedin’ miracle, are yer?”

“Cold water and cloths,” Hester said wearily. “I’ll look in on her, then maybe I’ll take an hour or so. Thank you, Flo.”

But that was not how it transpired. Hester drank her tea, looked in on Ruth Clark, and saw her sleeping, then went to a room two doors along and sank gratefully onto the bed. Pulling the blankets over herself, she allowed oblivion to claim her.

She woke reluctantly—she had no idea how much later—to hear women’s voices raised in fury. One was louder than the other, and unmistakably Flo’s; the other was quieter, deeper, and it was a moment before Hester could place it. Then it came to her with amazement as she sat up. There was no light except the small amount that came from the candle in the passage. The other voice was Ruth Clark’s, and the language was equally robust and abusive from both of them. Words like whore and cow were repeated often.

Hester stood up, still dizzy with tiredness, and stumbled toward the passage. She blinked as she reached the brighter lights. The noise was worse. How could Bessie sleep through this?

The commotion was coming from Ruth’s room—of course it was! She was far too ill to be out of her bed. Hester strode along and pushed the door wide. Helpful or not, she would tear Flo to pieces for this!

The scene that met her eyes was extraordinary. Ruth was propped up on several pillows, an empty cup in her hands. Her hair was wild, her face pale but for the hectic flush in her cheeks, and her expression was one of unmitigated rage.

A few feet away from her stood Flo, her lips drawn back in a snarl. Her hair was half down, as if someone had torn at it, and the front of her dress was soaked in water.

“Stop it!” Hester said in the tone of voice she had heard used during her time on the Crimean battlefields.

Both women stared at her. It was Ruth who drew breath to speak first. “You’re paid to look after me,” she said raspingly. “Get this whore out of here!”

“Who are you callin’ an ’ore? Yer nothin’ but a fancy slut yerself, fer all yer airs!” Flo retorted. “That’s ’cos yer lies wi’ sailors—does that make yer summink diff’rent? Well, it don’t. Yer an ’ore, jus’ like the rest o’ us. An’ keep a civil tongue in yer ’ead an’ speak nice ter Mrs. Monk, wot’s keepin’ yer from dyin’ in the gutter where yer belong, or I’ll fetch a bucket o’ slops an’ toss it right back at yer, yer manky bitch.”

“I’m sure you have plenty of slops to spare,” Ruth said icily. “You smell as if you bathe in them.”

“Silence!” Hester raised her voice sharply.

But it was to no effect. Flo lost her temper and hurled herself forward onto the bed, landing on Ruth, then raising her hand to hit her.

Hester grabbed at it, catching it almost across her own face, and was dragged forward and off balance half onto the floor. Both Flo and Ruth were still cursing each other, but Ruth had no strength to lash back physically.

It was at that moment that Bessie burst in, saw the scene, and charged across to pick Flo up bodily, swing around with her, and drop her on the floor.

“Wot the bleedin’ ’ell d’yer think yer doin’, yer crazy lard arse?” she yelled, first at Flo. Then, turning on Ruth, she went on. “An’ as fer you, yer spotty slag, you mind yer tongue or I’ll put yer out inter the gutter, money or no money! In’t surprisin’ yer lover threw yer out, yer iggerant mare! Yer got a mouth on yer like a midden! One more order out o’ yer an’ I’ll throw yer out meself. Just shut yer face, y’ear me?”

There was total silence.

Slowly, Hester climbed to her feet. “Thank you, Bessie,” she said gravely. She stared at the woman in the bed. Ruth was flushed and weak, but her eyes were spitting venom. “Miss Clark, go back to sleep. Bessie will come to see you in a while. Flo! You come with me!” And seizing Flo by the arm, she strode out, half dragging her along, down the stairs and into the kitchen before she spoke again. “Kettle!” she commanded. “Make some tea.”

“In’t surprised ’e threw ’er out, the turd,” Flo retorted, but she did as she was told. “Din’t give yer much of a kip, did she! Ungrateful trollop!” She took the kettle from the stove. “Thinks ’cos one man keeps ’er, not twenty, that she’s suffink special! Talks like she was a lady—she’s a common slut, like the rest of us.”

“Probably,” Hester agreed, too tired to care what the fight was about this time. It had been thirty-five minutes since she lay down on the bed upstairs. She felt as if she could have slept on the kitchen table—or the floor, for that matter.

“An’ yer got rats,” Flo called, pouring water out of the pail into the kettle. “Yer’ll ’ave ter get the rat catcher in. D’yer know one?”

“Of course I do,” Hester said wearily. “I’ll send a message to Sutton in the morning.”

“I’ll take it,” Flo offered. “Yer don’t want no more tea, or yer’ll be up an’ down all night like a dancer’s knees.”

“What night?” Hester responded bitterly.

Bessie came into the room, her hair restored to its tight knot at the back of her head and her face scrubbed and ready for business.

“I’ll go an’ see ’er in a couple of hours,” she announced, looking at Hester. “Me an’ Flo’ll take care o’ the rest o’ the night.” She glared at Flo. “In’t that right?”

“Yeah,” Flo agreed, grinning at Hester and showing several gaps in her teeth. “I won’t kill ’er, ’onest! Swear on me mother’s grave!”

“Yer ma in’t dead,” Bessie growled.

Flo shrugged and put the kettle onto the stove, then bent to open the range and poke the coals to make them burn. “Yer need more coke,” she said with a sniff. “S’pose that’s why yer ’as ter take that kind o’ pig.”

Hester went back upstairs with profound gratitude, and sank into a dreamless sleep until nearly seven o’clock, when the day’s duties began. Mercifully, when she looked in on Ruth, she seemed to be quietly asleep, hot but not delirious, and breathing fairly well.

Downstairs in the kitchen, Bessie was making gruel for those who were well enough to eat, and Flo was asleep in one of the chairs, her head fallen forward onto the table.

When Margaret arrived shortly after ten o’clock, she took one look at Hester’s face, and then Bessie’s. “What’s happened?” she asked, her eyes wide with alarm.

“We need more ’elp,” Bessie replied before Hester could say anything.

“And the rat catcher,” Hester added. Flo was already fetching more water from the well along the street.

Margaret made a slight flinch of distaste, but she was not surprised. Rats were a condition of life in places like Portpool Lane.

“How’s Ruth Clark?” she asked Hester.

“She’ll live, more’s the pity,” Bessie replied. She jerked her head towards Hester. “Bin up most o’ the night, wot wi’ m’lady Clark, ’er an’ the poor bint wot come in wi’ a knife cut in ’er arm. Which ’minds me, I in’t never took ’er no breakfast yet.” And suiting the deed to the word, she ladled out a dish of gruel and went out of the room with it, leaving Hester and Margaret alone.

“We do need more help,” Hester admitted. “But we’ve got no money to pay anyone, so it’ll have to be voluntary. Heaven knows, it’s hard enough to get money. I’ve no idea how we’re going to persuade someone to give up their time to a place like this.” She glanced around the candlelit kitchen with its stone sink, pails of water, and wooden bins of flour and oatmeal. “Unfortunately, heaven’s not telling me!”

Margaret made tea for both of them, and toast from one of the loaves of bread she had brought. She even had a jar of marmalade, taken surreptitiously from her mother’s kitchen. She had left a note in the larder, in case the cook or one of the other servants got the blame for its disappearance.

“I’m not sure where I’ll ask,” she said when they were both sitting down. “But I have one or two places at least to start. There are women who have no money they can dispose of without their husbands’ approval, but they do have time. It is possible to be very comfortably well-off and bored silly.”

Hester was in no position to quibble. She would be very grateful for any help at all, and she said so.

It was a hard day. Two more women were admitted with bad bronchitis, and a third with a dislocated shoulder which took Hester and Bessie considerable difficulty to reduce, and of course was extremely painful for the woman. She let out a fearful scream as Hester laid her on the ground, put her foot as gently as she could into the woman’s armpit, and then pulled steadily on the hand.

Flo came rushing in, demanding to know what had happened, and then was furious to discover it was nothing she could do anything about. The woman, gasping to cry abuse, staggered to her feet and only then realized that her shoulder was back to normal.

Just before five there was a knock on the back door and Hester opened it to find the costermonger in the yard, his barrow behind him.

“Hello, Toddy. How are you?” she asked with a smile.

“Not bad, missus,” he replied with a lopsided grin. “Just got me usual. Yer don’t think as it’s summink serious, do yer?” A flicker of anxiety showed for a moment in his eyes.

She affected to give his aches their proper consideration. “I’ll get you some elder ointment that you can rub in. Bessie swears by it for her knees.”

“That’s right nice o’ yer,” he said, obviously comforted. “I got ’alf a dozen pounds o’ apples it in’t worth me takin’ ’ome. More trouble than it’d be worth. D’yer like ’em ’ere?”

“That would be very nice,” she accepted, going inside to fetch the ointment. She returned and gave it to him in a small jar, and found him standing there with the apples and a small sack of mixed potatoes, carrots, and parsnips.

Margaret left to go home at eight o’clock, and it seemed a long night. Hester was able to snatch no more than an hour or two of sleep, in bits and pieces, catnaps when the chance arose. Flo fetched and carried, but her quarrel with Ruth Clark rumbled on, and by daylight everyone was exhausted. The best that could be said was that none of the patients gave cause for fear that they were close to death.

At half past ten Margaret arrived, bringing with her two women. They walked into the clinic behind her, then stood in the main room, the first staring quite openly around with a look of disdain. She was a tall, rather thin woman with dark hair, and she was considerably broader at the hip than the shoulder. Her face had been handsome in her youth, but the marks of discontent detracted from it now that she appeared to be in her middle forties. Her clothes were smart and expensive, even though she had clearly selected her oldest skirt and woollen jacket in which to come. Hester knew at a glance that they were well made and of good fabric. Five years ago they had been the height of fashion.

The woman behind her was different in almost every respect. She was at least two inches less in height. Her face was soft featured, but there was great strength in the broad cheekbones and the chin. Her hair was honey-brown and had a heavy natural curl. Her clothes were also of good quality, but less fashionable in cut, and looked to be no earlier than last winter’s in style. She seemed to be the more nervous of the two. There was no discontent in her face, but a profound apprehension, as though she feared the place as if there were something in it which was dangerous, even tragic.

“This is Mrs. Claudine Burroughs,” Margaret said, introducing the older woman to Hester. “She has very generously offered to help us at least two days a week.”

“How do you do, Mrs. Burroughs?” Hester responded. “We are very grateful to you.”

Mrs. Burroughs looked at her with growing disapproval. She must have seen the exhaustion in Hester’s face, her hair untidily caught up and her hands red from scrubbing the floor and feeding hot, wet sheets through the mangle. There was a tear in the shoulder seam of her blouse from reaching to winch up the airing rack to try to get the bed linen dry before they needed to put it back on again the next time the beds needed to be changed.

“It isn’t the sort of charity work I usually do,” Mrs. Burroughs said coolly.

“You will never do anything which will be more valued,” Hester replied with as much warmth as she could manage. She could not afford to offend her, full of misgivings as she was.

“And this is Miss Mercy Louvain,” Margaret said, introducing the younger woman. “She has offered to be here as long as we need her. She will even sleep here if it would be helpful.” She smiled, searching Hester’s eyes and awaiting her approval.

Louvain! Hester was incredulous. Was she related to Clement Louvain? She had to be. It was hardly a common name. Was it possible she knew Ruth Clark? If she did, it might be an embarrassing situation, especially if Ruth really was Louvain’s mistress and not that of some fictional friend.

She smiled back, first at Margaret, then at Mercy Louvain. “Thank you. That is extraordinarily good of you. Nighttimes can be hard. We would appreciate it very much indeed.” Not once had Mercy looked around the room as Mrs. Burroughs did; it was almost as if she had no interest in the surroundings.

Hester did not express her gratitude to Margaret in words, in case the depth of her feeling alarmed the two new volunteers, but she allowed it to show in her eyes for a moment when their glances met. Then Hester showed the women the house and introduced them to their first tasks.

“For heaven’s sake, don’t you have servants here of any sort?” Mrs. Burroughs demanded when they were in the laundry. She gazed at the stone floor and the pile of linen on it, awaiting washing, and then at the huge copper with the steam rising off it, her nostrils flaring at the vinegar and caustic in the air. She looked at the mangle between the two deep wooden tubs as if it were some obscene instrument of torture.

“We don’t have money for it,” Hester explained. “We need all we can get for medicine, coal, and food. People are very unwilling to give to us because of the nature of our patients.”

Mrs. Burroughs snorted but made no direct reply. Her eyes went further around the room, noting the pails, the sack of potash, the vat of lard, and the large glass flagons of vinegar.

“Where do you get water?” she asked. “I see no taps.”

“From the well down the street,” Hester replied.

“Good heavens, woman! You want a cart horse to labor here!” Mrs. Burroughs exclaimed.

“I want a lot of things,” Hester said ruefully. “I’ll accept what I can get, and be most grateful for it. Bessie usually fetches the water. You don’t need to concern yourself with it.”

“Bessie? Is she the big woman I saw on the landing?”

“Yes. She would do most of the laundry usually, but we have a lot of sick and injured here right now, and she has learned a little nursing, so I need her to help with that.”

“Skilled, is it?” Mrs. Burroughs asked disbelievingly.

“Yes, some of it is,” Hester replied, again finding it difficult to remain civil. “Some of it isn’t, like cleaning up blood or vomit, emptying slops—that sort of thing.”

Mrs. Burroughs jerked up her chin. “I’ll do the laundry,” she stated.

Hester smiled back at her. “Thank you,” she accepted sweetly.

If Mercy Louvain saw any humor in Mrs. Burrough’s reaction there was no reflection of it in her grave face. Hester showed Mrs. Burroughs where everything was, and the exact proportions to be mixed and put into the coppers. She demonstrated how to use the wooden dolly to move the linen, how long to leave it, and at what temperature. She would have to return in order to help her move it all to be rinsed and then mangled and folded, and the airing rack winched down, the linen put on it, and winched back up again and lashed tight. It was obvious Mrs. Burroughs had never so much as washed a handkerchief. She had a great deal to learn if she was to be of use.

Mercy Louvain was of a totally different character, but it did not take long to see that she also was completely inexperienced in any domestic work. She had seldom visited a kitchen, but when Hester showed her the saucepans, oatmeal, salt, flour, and vegetables, she seemed to grasp the essentials at least willingly, even if she needed to ask a great many questions. Hester finally left to go back upstairs, wondering if it would not be easier to do it all herself than accept such unskilled help.

However, in the middle of the afternoon she was grateful to be able to leave Bessie to teach Mrs. Burroughs how to clean up the laundry, and Flo to give Mercy Louvain a lesson in peeling potatoes, and go upstairs to rest.

Darkness was coming earlier each evening as autumn moved towards winter, and by six o’clock it was both dark and cold. They bolted the doors at eight, and Hester thought with a shiver of those outside walking the streets, hoping for the trade which kept them alive.

She went upstairs to see how Ruth Clark was.

She had been well enough to take a little thin broth, and had expressed her disgust with the quality of it. Hester wondered again how much of her temper was really directed at the man who had apparently loved her, or at least desired her, and then when she was ill had put her out on the street to depend upon strangers and the pity of those who wished to do good. Were Hester in the same position, she might have resented it just as deeply, and with as bitter a tongue. Had Ruth loved the man? Or was he no more than a means to live well? If she had cared for him, had even hoped there was something real in their relationship which would last, then no wonder she was raw with pain.

Hester retired to her room, then she heard Flo shrieking again, and she strode back into Ruth’s room to find Flo standing over Ruth’s bed swearing at her. Ruth had malice bright in her eyes, and her fist was clenched on long black hairs.

Hester lost her own temper. “Stop it!” she shouted, exhaustion draining her voice until it was sharp and high-pitched. “Stop it this moment! This is a hospital, not a bawdy house!”

“Of course it’s a bawdy house!” Ruth snapped back. “It’s a house full of whores—and thieves!”

“I’m no thief!” Flo said furiously, her body shaking with emotion. “I never stole nothin’ in me life! An’ yer in’t got no right ter say I did!”

There was a slight noise in the doorway, and Hester swiveled around to see Mercy Louvain standing behind her.

Flo started forward to attack Ruth just as Mercy Louvain stepped past Hester to stand between the two women—only it was Ruth she was facing. Flo nearly fell over her, instead veering sideways and bumping into Hester, who gripped hold of her arms.

“Hold your tongue!” Mercy said in a hard, quiet voice. “You’re sick and in need. These women have taken you in to look after you. They owe you nothing. They have no need to sit up all night caring for you, and you’d best remember that. You can be put back out on the street to be alone, and there’s no reason except kindness why they shouldn’t do exactly that. So unless you want to exchange this bed for the street corner, you’d better mind your tongue.”

Ruth stared at her in disbelief. It seemed she could hardly comprehend what had happened.

“Do you hear me?” Mercy said sharply.

“Yes . . . of course I hear you,” Ruth replied. “I haven’t—”

“Good,” Mercy cut her off. “Then behave as if you do.” She turned away, apparently amazed, and now self-conscious, at her own words. She looked at Hester in some embarrassment. “I’m sorry. Perhaps . . .”

Hester smiled at her. “Thank you,” she said quietly. “That was most effective. Flo, you had better go and see to the rest of the women—and keep out of here.”

Flo glared at her. She took it as a reproach, a granting of Ruth’s wishes. “I in’t no thief!” she said hotly. “I in’t!”

“I know that,” Hester answered her. “Do you think you would be welcome here if I thought you were?” She could not afford to have Flo walk out.

Somewhat mollified, Flo stared once more at Ruth, then swept out, whisking her skirts behind her. Hester and Mercy set about changing the linen on Ruth’s bed and making her as comfortable as possible. She was still an extremely ill woman, and running a high temperature.