The Nightingale Sisters (39 page)

‘Did she know about your husband’s violence towards you?’

‘She not only knew, she took pleasure in seeing me suffer.’ Violet’s voice shook with anger at the memory. ‘There were many times when she could have stepped in and saved me from humiliation. But she didn’t. And the few times I appealed directly to her for help, she brushed me off as if she didn’t know what I was talking about. Sometimes I genuinely wondered if she even allowed herself to acknowledge how cruel Victor was. Surely no human being could have allowed it to go on otherwise.’

Violet drained her cup, and Matron refilled it immediately.

‘I’m surprised you wanted to have a child with him,’ she remarked, passing it back to her.

‘Like everything else, that wasn’t my decision.’ Violet’s gaze drifted towards the window. The sun was going down outside. She began to feel nervous at the idea of the descending twilight, knowing Mrs Sherman was lurking nearby. ‘Victor was obsessed with the idea of being a father. He desperately wanted a son to continue the Dangerfield name. I think that’s one of the main reasons he married a young girl like me.’ She stirred her tea slowly. The sound of the spoon rattling in the teacup seemed to echo in the silence of the room. ‘He was extremely – frustrated – that I didn’t conceive immediately.’

Frustrated. It was such a small word for the world of pain that he had inflicted on her for her failure.

‘Then, finally, two years into our marriage, it happened. And my life changed overnight.’ She smiled, remembering. The nine months of her pregnancy were the most peaceful of her whole marriage. ‘Victor stopped beating me, and treated me as if I was the most precious thing in the world to him. He simply couldn’t do enough for me. But even though I tried to be happy, I couldn’t help dreading what might happen after the baby was born. I started to have nightmares that I’d given birth to a daughter. I just couldn’t imagine what Victor would do if I didn’t give him the son he expected.’

She tugged at her thumbnail between her teeth, a habit she had developed during her pregnancy and had not been able to shake off since.

‘But you had a boy?’

‘Yes, I did. But it was a horrible, difficult labour, and I was confined to bed for a month afterwards to recover my strength. By the time I was well enough to get up and start looking after my son, I found it was too late. Mrs Sherman had already taken over.’

The housekeeper looked after every aspect of the baby’s care, directing the nanny and nursery maids as if she were his mother. Only reluctantly did she give him up to be fed, and even then she would watch Violet jealously from the doorway of the nursery, itching to snatch him away from her as soon as she could.

‘I tried to fight back, but with her and Victor ranged against me, it was almost impossible,’ Violet explained helplessly. ‘I was utterly wretched and miserable. The only pleasure I had were the moments I managed to steal with my son. But even those were denied me when Oliver started to get older. I began to realise that if I didn’t want my boy to turn into a monster like his father, I had to get away.’

And so she had planned her escape. She secretly applied for another job, arranging for letters to be delivered to a post-office box in Bristol so Victor wouldn’t know what she was doing.

‘I didn’t apply to hospitals but to private individuals instead,’ she said. ‘I applied under my maiden name, and claimed I was a widow. I felt wicked writing the words, but then I began to wish they were true.

‘At first I was turned down because of Oliver. But finally I found a job looking after an elderly lady in the Midlands. Even then, I wasn’t sure I would be able to get away.’

The memory of that day still haunted her. She’d planned her escape for Mrs Sherman’s day off, knowing the housekeeper was due to visit a friend. But at the last moment, Oliver had gone down with yet another chest infection, and Mrs Sherman had decided to stay and nurse her little angel.

‘I panicked, told her there was no need, but she insisted. I’d ordered a taxi to pick us up. I could see the time drawing nearer and nearer – I knew if it arrived while Mrs Sherman was there then the game would be up for ever. I would probably end up dead,’ Violet said flatly.

She had told Mrs Sherman to go out to the chemist for some Friar’s Balsam. Mrs Sherman argued. For once panic had made Violet fearless. She stood up to her, pointed out that she was the nurse and Mrs Sherman should do as she was told, for Oliver’s sake. Or would she rather Mr Dangerfield was told that she had left the child to suffer? Mrs Sherman rather huffily set off into town on her bicycle, assuring Oliver she would only be gone for a few minutes.

As soon as she left, Violet hastily dressed Oliver and gathered up her few belongings in a couple of cases. The taxi was late, and she was terrified Mrs Sherman would reappear over the hill before she could get away.

‘But you managed it?’ Matron was on the edge of her seat, her expression tense.

‘By the skin of our teeth, yes. I spotted her cycling back up the hill as we were heading down to the village. If that train had been delayed by just a minute, I dread to think what would have happened.’

Violet looked down at her wedding ring. She had sold her original one soon after she’d run away, not realising how much she might need the badge of respectability in the years to come. The one she wore now was a cheap ring she had found in a pawnshop in Wolverhampton. ‘But even after we’d escaped, I was terrified that Victor would track down the taxi driver and somehow find out where I’d gone. I knew he would never stop looking for us.’

From then on her life had become a game of cat and mouse all across the country, using different names, different stories, to try to throw her husband off the scent. She had lived so many different lives in the space of the last five years she could hardly remember who she was supposed to be from one day to the next.

‘But I knew it would only be a matter of time before he found us. And now he has.’ She turned unhappy eyes to meet Matron’s. ‘Now do you see why I can’t stay?’ she pleaded.

Matron stared back at her. ‘I see why you can’t go,’ she said.

‘But Mrs Sherman knows I’m here. It’s only a matter of time before she brings Victor here, and then—’

‘And then we will deal with him,’ Matron said firmly.

Violet laughed. ‘Oh, Miss Fox,’ she said, almost pityingly. ‘Do you really think you will be equal to my husband?’ She shook her head.

‘I know that you will stand a better chance against him here than if you run off on your own.’

‘And why should that be?’

Matron frowned at her. ‘Because here you are amongst friends.’ She rose to her feet. ‘It’s your choice, of course. If you want to leave, I can’t stop you. But I urge you to reconsider.’ She smiled. ‘Don’t underestimate us, Violet.’

SUICIDE.

Millie seemed to hear the word wherever she went on that cold, grey morning.

‘Sleeping pills,’ the ward maid whispered as she made up the fire. ‘They reckon she saved them up to finish herself off. Must have been planning it for a long time.’

‘I don’t understand it.’ Millie heard two first years discussing it in whispers outside the sluice door as she tested the rack of early-morning urine samples. ‘How could it even have happened? The patients are always supervised taking their medicines, aren’t they?’

‘There’s nothing to stop them sticking a pill under their tongue and then spitting it out when the nurses have gone, is there? I bet that’s what she did, the cunning old cow.’

‘Don’t talk like that! It’s wrong to speak ill of the dead. I don’t know how she even managed it with her hands the way they were. It must have taken a lot of effort.’

‘Maybe someone did it for her? I would have shoved a few pills down her throat if I’d known.’

‘Don’t say that!’

‘Why not? Don’t forget how she used to torment us and call us names. I’m not sorry she’s gone!’

Unable to stand it any longer, Millie burst out of the sluice and confronted them. ‘Haven’t you two got anything better to do than gossip?’ she snapped. They both stared at her; Millie was known to be the most easy-going of the seniors and never one to pull rank. But today she wasn’t feeling sunny-natured.

‘You,’ she addressed the second girl, ‘have you finished with those bedpans?’

‘Not yet.’

‘Then you’d better get on with it, hadn’t you? Go on!’ They both glared sullenly at her but knew better than to argue. Easy-going or not, Millie was still senior to them, and answering her back could earn them a trip to Matron’s office.

Millie closed the sluice door and leant against the counter top, fighting the urge to be sick. She could hardly bear to be on the ward this morning. Maud’s empty bed was like a silent reproach to her. The place seemed depressingly silent without her imperious voice ringing out, summoning a nurse to complain about something or other. When the porter brought up the newspapers, Millie had found herself searching through it for Maud’s copy of
The Times
, ready to start on the crossword when she had a spare moment.

She had pulled herself together with effort and forced herself to start testing the samples, determined to get on with her work. But grief still ached in her chest, making it hard for her to breathe.

She felt totally alone in her sadness. No one else seemed to mourn Maud’s passing. They gossiped about it, but only because they had precious little else to talk about and a suicide on Female Chronics was such a novelty. Sister Hyde went about her business, handing out work lists and giving orders, as if there was nothing wrong at all.

No one seemed to care that it was Maud who had died. Irascible, infuriating Maud, with her sharp tongue and even sharper intelligence, who had a lifetime of stories to tell and no one to listen to them.

She had tried to tell Millie, though. On Saturday night – was it really only thirty-six hours ago? It felt like a lifetime. Millie remembered Maud’s strange mood, how she had wanted to talk about her childhood hopes, her dreams. She must have known she was going to end her life that night.

Why hadn’t Millie realised what was happening? A good nurse would have known, she felt sure of that. A good nurse would have spotted the warning signs.

That night Maud had wanted Millie to stay with her. It was odd for her to ask for anything, and yet she had begged her to stay. Would it have made any difference if she had, Millie wondered. If she hadn’t been in such a hurry to leave, perhaps Maud would have known there was someone who cared about her, and it would have given her the strength she needed to carry on . . .

But she hadn’t. She had been selfish, too keen to get off duty. Desperate to go to a silly dance she hadn’t even enjoyed.

What was the last thing Maud had told her? Not to have any regrets.

Too late, Maud, she thought bitterly. Because she knew she would regret walking out of that ward for the rest of her life.

Helen came in as she was washing up the specimen glasses.

‘Have you finished the testing?’

‘All done.’

Helen looked around. ‘Where’s Mrs Weaver’s sample? You haven’t thrown it away?’

‘Of course. Why?’

‘Didn’t you check her notes? It’s a twenty-four-hour sample. You were supposed to put it with what we collected yesterday.’

‘I didn’t know, did I?’ Sweat broke out on Millie’s brow. ‘Maybe no one will notice?’

‘Benedict, this is a patient we’re talking about. It doesn’t matter if no one notices, the results will still be wrong.’

‘What am I going to do?’

‘Only one thing for it, I’m afraid – you’re going to have to come clean to Sister.’

Sister Hyde’s brow was already furrowed with irritation, even before they explained what had happened.

‘I suppose this is your doing, Benedict?’ Millie stared at the polished floor, her hands knotting behind her back. ‘I might have known. Why is it that disaster always seems to follow you around, Nurse?’

‘I don’t know, Sister,’ she mumbled.

‘I do. It’s because you are thoughtless. You spend far too much time daydreaming about engagement rings and nights out, and do not pay nearly enough attention to the task in hand—’

Millie didn’t hear the rest of what she was saying. A strange buzzing sound filled her ears, like a swarm of angry bees inside her head. She stared at Sister Hyde’s face, saw her thin lips moving as she listed Millie’s failings yet again. She didn’t need to hear them, she already knew them all off by heart. She was thoughtless, muddle-headed, untidy, completely incompetent. She would never, ever make a good nurse as long as she lived.

But she didn’t need Sister Hyde to tell her that. It was staring her in the face, every time she looked at Maud’s empty bed.

The angry buzz still filled Millie’s head. She could feel pressure building up, as if her brain would burst. Before she knew what she was doing, she was pulling off her apron.

Sister Hyde stared at her. ‘What do you think you’re doing, Benedict?’

‘Something I should have done a long time ago, Sister.’ She yanked the grips from her cap, tore it off her head and stuffed it into Sister Hyde’s hands.

Then she walked down the length of the ward, letting the doors swing shut behind her.

The air in the Porters’ Lodge crackled with tension as the two men squared up to each other.

‘What did you just call me?’ Harry Fishman muttered.

He was big and solid, brown eyes scowling from under a shock of blue-black curls.

Five minutes ago he had been laughing and joking with the others as he waited for the kettle to boil.

‘Fancy a cuppa, new boy?’ he’d called out to Peter, who was playing cards with Nick.

‘No, thanks, I’ll make my own.’

Nick stiffened, instantly alert to the tension in the room. The other men felt it too. They stopped talking and looked from one to the other, waiting.

‘Oh, yes? And why’s that, then?’

Nick flashed a warning glance at Peter. Harry was a good bloke, ready to have a laugh with anyone. But he had fists like ham hocks, and even Nick would have thought twice about taking him on.

‘Because I don’t take anything from dirty Jews.’