' 'Oo did wot?' the woman said irritably. 'Are you talking about the treasurer groping after Mary Higgins again? 'Oo knows? And 'oo cares? She asked for it anyway- stupid cow!'
'Actually I meant Sir Herbert,' Hester explained. 'Do you think he killed Barrymore? The papers say the trial will end soon, then I suppose he'll be back here. I wonder if he'll have changed?'
'Not 'im. Snooty sod. It'll still be 'Fetch this'-'Gimme that'-'Stand 'ere'-'Stand there'-'Empty this'-'Roll up the bandages and pass me the knife.' '
'You worked with him, didn't you?'
'Me? Gori I just empty slops and sweep floors!' she said with disgust.
'Yes, you did! You assisted him with an operation! I heard you did it very well! July last year-woman with a tumor in her stomach.'
'Oh… yeah! An' in October-but never again after that. Not good enough-me!' She hawked and spat viciously.
'So who is good enough, then?' Hester said, investing her voice with a suitable contempt. 'Doesn't sound like anything very special to me.'
'Dora Parsons,' the woman replied grudgingly. 'Used 'er 'alf the time, 'e did. An' yer right-it weren't nothin' special. Just 'anding 'im knives an' towels an' such. Any fool could've done it. Dunno why 'e picked Dora special. She didn't know nothin'. No better than I am!'
'And no prettier either,' Hester said with a smile.
The woman stared at her, then suddenly burst into a loud, cackling laugh.
'Yer a caution, you are! Never know what yer'll say next! Don't you never say that to ol' Cod Face, or she'll 'ave yer up before Lady Almighty for immorality. Although God knows if 'e fancied Dora Parsons 'e'd not be safe wi' the pigs.' And she laughed even louder and longer, till the tears ran down her roughened cheeks. Hester emptied the pail and left her still chuckling to herself.
Dora Parsons. That was what Hester had wanted, although she wished it had been anyone else. So Sir Herbert had still lied to Rathbone-he had used one nurse more than the others. Why? And why Dora? For more complicated operations, or ones performed later in the pregnancy, when it was more likely the nurse would know what the operation was? More important patients-perhaps ladies of good family, or maybe women who were terrified for their reputations? It looked as if he trusted Dora-and that raised more questions.
The only way to answer them was to find Dora herself.
That she accomplished after dark when she was so weary all she longed for was to sit down and relieve the ache in her back and her legs. She was carrying blood-soaked bandages down to the stove to burn them (they were beyond any laundress to reclaim), and she met Dora coming up the stairs, a pile of sheets on her arms. She carried the weight of them as if they were merely handkerchiefs.
Hester could not afford to wait for a better time or to get up her courage and prepare. She stopped in the middle of the stairs, under the lamp, blocking Dora's way, trying to look as if she had done it unintentionally.
'I have a friend who is attending the trial,' she said, not as casually as she had wished.
'Wot?'
'Sir Herbert,' she replied. 'It's nearly over. They'll probably bring in the verdict in the next day or two.'
Dora's face was guarded. 'Oh yeah?'
'At the moment it looks as if they'll find him not guilty.' Hester watched her minutely.
She was rewarded. An expression of relief lit Dora's eyes and something inside her relaxed. 'Oh yeah?' she said again.
'The trouble is,' Hester went on, still blocking the way. 'Nobody knows who did kill Prudence. So the case will still be open.'
'So what if it is? It weren't you an' it weren't me. An' looks as if it weren't Sir 'Erbert.'
'Do you think it was?'
' 'Oo-me? No, I don't reckon as't was.' There was a fierceness in her voice, as if she had suddenly forgotten to be so careful.
Hester frowned. 'Not even if she knew about the abortions? Which she did. She could have made things pretty hard for him if she threatened to go to the law.'
Dora was tense again, her huge body balanced carefully as if to make some sudden move, if she could only decide what. She stared at Hester, hovering between confidence in her and total enmity.
A prickle of sharp physical fear tightened Hester's body, making her gulp for breath. They were alone on the steps, the only light the small oases of the gas lamps at top and bottom and the one under which they stood. The dark well of the stairs yawned below and the shadows of the landing above.
She plunged on.
'I don't know what proof she had. I don't know if she was even there-'
'She weren't.' Dora cut across her with finality.
'Wasn't she?'
'No-'cos I know 'oo were. 'E wouldn't be daft enough ter have 'er in. She knew too much.' Her big face puckered. 'Damn near as good as a doctor 'erself, she were. Knew more than any of them student doctors. She'd never 'ave believed they was operations for tumors and the like.'
'But you knew! Did the other nurses?'
'No-wouldn't know stones from a broken leg, most of 'em.' There was contempt in her tone as well as a mild tolerance.
Hester forced herself to smile, although she felt it was a sickly gesture, more a baring of the teeth. She tried to invest her voice with respect.
'Sir Herbert must have trusted you very deeply.'
Pride lit Dora's eyes. 'Yeah-'e does. An'e's right. I'd never betray 'im.'
Hester stared at her. It was not only pride in her eyes, it was a burning idealism, a devotion and a passionate respect. It transformed her features from their habitual ugliness into something that had its own kind of beauty.
'He must know how much you respect him for it,' Hester said chokingly. A flood of emotion shook her. She had wept more tears than she could remember over dead women who had not the strength left to fight disease and loss of blood because their bodies were exhausted with bearing child after child. She had seen the hopelessness in their eyes, the weariness, the fear for babies they knew they could not cherish. And she had seen the tiny, starving creatures come into the world ill before they started, sprung from an exhausted womb.
In the pool of light on the stairs Dora Parsons was waiting, watching her.
And neither could Hester forget Prudence Barrymore, her eagerness and her passion to heal, her burning vitality.
'You're right,' she said aloud in the silence. 'Some women need a far better help than the law lets us give them. You have to admire a man who risks his honor, and his freedom, to do something about it.'
Dora relaxed, the ease washing through her visibly. Slowly she smiled.
Hester clenched her fists in the folds of her skirts.
'If only he did it for the poor, instead of rich women who have simply lost their virtue and didn't want to face the shame and ruin of an illegitimate child.'
Dora's eyes were like black holes in her head.
Hester felt the stab of fear again. Had she gone too far?
' 'E didn't do that,' Dora said slowly. ' 'E did poor women, sick women… them as couldn't take no more.'
'He did rich women,' Hester repeated gravely, in little more than a whisper, her hand on the stair rail as if it were some kind of safety. 'And he took a lot of money for it.' She did not know if that was true or not-but she had known Prudence. Prudence would not have betrayed him for doing what Dora believed. And Sir Herbert had killed her…
' 'E didn't.' Dora's voice was plaintive, her face beginning to crumple like a child's. ' 'E didn't take no money at all.' But already the doubt was there.
'Yes he did,' Hester repeated. 'That's why Prudence threatened him.'
'Yer lyin',' Dora said simply and with total conviction. 'I knew her too, an' she'd never 'ave forced 'im into marryin' 'er. That don't make no sense at all. She never loved 'im. She'd no time for men. She wanted to be a doctor, Gawd 'elp 'er! She'd no chance-no woman 'as, 'owever good she is. If you'd really knew 'er, you'd never 'ave
