The Winter Rose (66 page)

"How?"

"My mad aunt Edwina. She's my mother's elder sister. She's a spinster
and a suffragist. Deadly anti-marriage. She says it's an
institution--same as a prison or an insane asylum. She says that young
women should have choices, but you can have choices only if you have
money. So she's given me some. Five thousand pounds in a trust. I can
have it when I turn eighteen. It won't finance an expedition like
Scott's, but it should get me around the world a few times."

Seamie was amazed. "You're really going to do it, aren't you? Leave home, leave your family, to go exploring."

She nodded, her gaze hard and determined. "Yes, I am."

He thought of Mrs. Alden and how upset she became every time Willa
climbed a hill or went rambling and came home with scrapes and freckles.
"It won't be easy, Wills."

"Don't I know it." She was silent for a few seconds, then she kissed
him again, and the touch of her lips on his felt bittersweet, for he
knew he might never feel them again.

"Meet me there, Seamie," she said.

"Where?"

She raised her face to the night sky and smiled. "I don't know
exactly. Somewhere out there. Somewhere in this wide world. Somewhere
under Orion."

Frankie Betts knew what had to be done. And he knew he had to do it.

He walked toward Spitalfields Market at a leisurely pace, stopping
for a morning pint at a porter's pub, buying a crimson rose for his
buttonhole.

He was dressed like a workman today, like Sid usually dressed, in
denim trousers, a collarless shirt, a seaman's jacket, and a wool cap.
The red rose stood out on his navy jacket. Sid wouldn't have liked that,
Frankie knew, but he needed to draw attention today. Just a bit. Just
enough so that a man drinking at the pub where he'd stopped, or the
flower seller with whom he'd flirted, would recall him.

He crossed Commercial Street, jogging to avoid an oncoming coal
wagon. The revolver in his breast pocket banged against his chest as he
did. It was Sid's revolver, the one he'd left in the Bark when he'd told
him he was leaving.

A haberdasher's window reflected his image back at him as he passed
by. He caught sight of it and smiled. At a glance he was the spitting
image of Sid. Right down to his hair, which he'd bound into a ponytail
under his hat.

The man he was going to see knew what Sid Malone looked like, but
Frankie would have wagered a thousand quid that no one else around him
did. That was important. He had to leave a witness or two, or his plan
wouldn't work. Someone had to be left standing to tell Old Bill what had
happened and who was to blame.

Frankie walked into the doorway of 8 Commercial Street, read the
directory in the foyer, then skipped up the stairs to room 21. The door
was set with a frosted-glass panel. A glazier was scraping a painted
name off it-- F.R. Lytton, Member of Parliament.

"Pardon me, mate," Frankie said, making a todo of stepping around the
man and his tools. A charlady, carrying a bucket of water, followed him
in. He winked at her.

Inside the office, another woman was busy filling bookcases and
filing cabinets with the contents of several crates and boxes. Her back
was to him. The nameplate on her desk said Miss G. Mellors.

"What's the G for, luv?" he asked loudly. "Gorgeous?"

Miss Mellors jumped. She turned around. "May I help you?" she asked frostily.

"I'd like to see Joe Bristow."

"I'm sorry, sir, but Mr. Bristow is unavailable to his constituents right now. His office doesn't open for another hour."

"Give him my name, missus. I think he'll make an exception."

"Sir, I cannot--"

"Give it a go, eh, luv?" Frankie said, cutting her off. "You don't
want your guv angry with you when you tell him I've come and gone."

"Very well. What is it?"

"Malone. Sid Malone."

"One moment, Mr. Malone. Have a seat, please."

Frankie sat down, hands on his thighs, and stared at the pattern in
the carpet. His breathing was even. His heartbeat steady. Oz would be
sweating buckets. Des's hands would be shaking. Ronnie would be shitting
himself. But he was calm and cool. Sid always said he didn't have one
nerve in his whole body.

He looked up, gauging the distance from the door of Bristow's office
to the stairway. He'd have to make a bloody quick exit and hope like
hell Old Bill wasn't strolling by as he hit Commercial Street. Once he
was on the street, though, he'd be all right. He'd head east, into
Whitechapel. There were dozens of places he could hide there, plenty of
rabbit holes he could disappear down.

It would work, this plan, he was sure of it. It would bring Sid back
from the straight world. Back to the Bark. Back where he belonged.

"Mr. Malone, sir?"

Frankie smiled. "That's me."

"Mr. Bristow will see you now."

"Ta very much."

Miss Mellors ushered Frankie into Joe's office, then closed the door
behind him. Joe was seated at his desk in his shirtsleeves. He stood.
"Frankie Betts," he said flatly, his hands on his hips. "Trudy said Sid
was here. Where is he?"

"He's right here," Frankie said softly, reaching into his jacket.

Joe never had a chance. Frankie aimed the revolver and fired. The
gun's kick raised his hand slightly. Worried that he had missed his
mark, he fired again. Joe staggered backward into the wall, two bullet
holes in his chest, and sank to the floor. Frankie threw the gun down
and strode out of the office.

"What's happened? What was that noise?" Miss Mellors shrilled.

Frankie didn't stop to answer. The charlady was mopping near the
door, blocking his exit. He grabbed the back of her dress and threw her
out of his way. The door was closed. He wrenched it open.

"Oi!" the glazier yelled. "I'm working here!"

Frankie shoved him backward. The old man hit the banister, windmilled
his arms, and fell over it. There was a shout and then a thud and then
nothing.

Frankie took the stairs two at a time. He paused in the foyer,
wrinkling his nose at the matter leaking from the old man's skull.

"Come on, come on..." he muttered, glancing back up at the first floor.

And then he heard it. A woman screaming. Loud enough to shatter glass.

Frankie smiled. And ran.

"India, you can't possibly be serious," Harriet said. "You just got the clinic open and now you want to leave it?"

"I don't want to leave, Harriet," India said, pacing the narrow
confines of their office. "I don't have a choice. I have to go away. I
want you and Ella to take over."

"For how long? A week? A month?"

"Permanently."

Harriet shook her head. "I don't understand this! You worked so
bloody hard to make this clinic a reality and now you're going to turn
your back on it?"

India thought of Sid. He had done something she feared he never
would--he had left the life, left everyone and everything he'd known.
For her. He'd come to see her at the Moskowitzes' two days ago and told
her that he had to get out of London for good--the quicker, the better.
They'd decided they would leave for America in a fortnight's time.
Meanwhile he would lay low in East London and she would continue to stay
with the Moskowitzes. They'd thought about going to Arden Street, but
it was so far from the East End that the journey took hours out of the
day, and India needed to spend every spare minute at the clinic now to
ensure that it opened by the time she left.

Sid, too, had business to finish in East London. She had seen him
this morning. He'd come to the caf�or breakfast, and they'd had time
for a quick word before she had to leave. She hadn't felt well. Her
stomach had been troubling her and she hadn't been able to eat a thing.
Sid had noticed, he'd said he was worried about her, but she'd told him
it was only nerves. He told her he had to go back to the Bark today, to
tie up some loose ends. She'd told him she didn't want him to go, that
it made her anxious, but he assured her he would be fine. In and out,
and then he was done. Forever.

She'd kissed him, then watched him go. His step was lighter as he
walked now, his head higher. He looked like a different man. He'd told
her that he'd gotten out of prison years ago, but he only now felt free.
His words had made her so happy. She couldn't wait until they were on
the ship with London behind them and their whole lives ahead of them.

"I mean, really, Indy. It makes no sense at all." Harriet was still
railing at her. "What could possibly make you leave the clinic?"

"Not what, Hatch, who," India said quietly.

Harriet gave her a long look. "Well, it's certainly not Freddie. Is it who I think it is? Ella says it's--"

"Don't ask me that."

"It is. Jesus bloody Christ!"

"Harriet, please--" India began, but she was interrupted by the
pounding of boot heels in the hallway and the appearance of a breathless
young nurse in the doorway.

"Dr. Jones, Dr. Hatcher, come quickly! A man's been shot."

India and Harriet were out of their chairs, and their office, immediately.

"Why has he been brought here?" Harriet asked. "We're a women's clinic and we're not even open yet!"

"The officers said they heard there were doctors here. They said the hospital's too far. He's very bad, Dr. Hatcher."

"Where is he?" Harriet asked, striding down the hallway alongside the sister.

"In the surgery. Matron's with him."

"But the surgery's not ready yet!" Harriet cried.

"Looks like it's going to have to be," India said.

The three women fiew downstairs, then ran through the foyer and into
the surgical ward. Pandemonium greeted them. Two officers were standing
inside the doorway, trying to restrain a hysterical woman, whose
clothing was covered in blood. Two more were lifting a man onto the
operating table.

"Mr. Bristow! Mr. Bristow!" the woman keened. "Oh, help him, please!
Somebody help him!" She grabbed Harriet and refused to let her go.

India pushed past them and ran to the operating table. A man was
stretched out upon it, unconscious. Ella, already scrubbed and masked,
was cutting his shirt off.

"My God, Ella. That's Joe Bristow, the MP."

"He's almost gone, India. For God's sake, hurry," she said.

Joe's bare chest was covered in blood. India could see two bullet
wounds through the crimson wash. She ran to the sink to scrub, calling
out to Ella for his vital signs. As Ella shouted them, the other nurse,
Dwyer, began loading scalpels, clamps, scissors, needles, and suturing
thread into the autoclave.

Behind her, India could hear Harriet shouting at the woman. "Calm down! We need quiet here! Quiet!"

She turned to India. "You all right?" she shouted.

India gave her a quick nod.

"Officers, come with me," Harriet yelled. "This way, please." She
somehow managed to usher the constables and the wailing woman out of the
room, giving India the peace she needed to work.

"India, quick. I need you!" Ella shouted.

Joe Bristow had regained consciousness. He was thrashing his head from side to side. His eyes were open, but unseeing.

"Dwyer! Chloral!" India shouted.

Scrubbed and masked herself now, she raced back to the operating
table. Dwyer already had an anesthesia mask over Joe's face. He fought
it at first, then his eyes fluttered and he was still. When Dwyer
removed the mask, blood--bright and foamy--oozed from his nose and
mouth.

"His lungs have been damaged," India said. "How many exit wounds?" she asked Ella.

"None. One bullet's in the spine. I'm sure of it."

India swore. "Is the spinal cord severed?" she asked.

"I can't tell. Reflexes are nil."

India called for a retractor and a scalpel. She would leave the
spinal wound for now--it was bleeding, but not gushing--to concentrate
on the second bullet hole. It was far more worrying. It was directly at
heart level and the damage the bullet had wreaked was horrifying. Two
ribs had been shattered, and the shrapnel-like bone shards had torn the
fiesh apart. The resulting mess made it impossible for India to see the
position of the bullet.

She had only seen a handful of gunshot patients during her training,
but she knew that bullets usually entered the body at an angle and could
be slowed by tissue or deflected by bone. The bullet hadn't entered
Joe's heart. If it had, he'd be dead by now. That was the good news. The
bad news was that it could be anywhere. A hairbreadth from the delicate
pericardium or buried in his liver.

India knew she had to get the second bullet out, and she knew if she
wasn't careful, she could push it farther in and do more damage. Working
quickly, she cut away as much damaged fiesh as she could and picked out
the bone shards, but she found she still could not get a good look into
the wound. It was too deep, too narrow.

She asked for tweezers and handed her retractors to Ella, telling her
to stretch the wound wide open, but she still couldn't locate the
bullet.

"I need more light," she said.

"We've got the gas lights on as high as they'll go, Dr. Jones," Dwyer replied.

"Get me a table lamp, then."

Dwyer shot out and returned with a kerosene lamp, its wick blazing.

"Hold it low," India ordered.

Dwyer did so, but still India couldn't see deep enough into the wound.

"Lower!"

"I'm afraid I'll burn you, Dr. Jones."

"Lower!"

Dwyer moved it lower, and India felt the heat on her cheek, smelled
the stench of her own singed hair. And then she saw it, or thought she
did. A bit of a glint. Not the bloody glisten of tissue or bone, but the
hard, dull shine of lead.

"Pull back a little harder. Just a little," she told Ella. Ella,
expertly maneuvering the retractors, did so. India took a breath, held
it, then inserted the tweezers into the wound. She grasped the bullet,
squeezed, and then the tweezers slipped and she lost it. The wound was
deep, the tweezers were short, the bullet was slippery with blood. It
was nearly impossible to get any purchase.