No Cure for the Dead_A Florence Nightingale Mystery by Christine Trent

Author:Christine Trent [Trent, Christine]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction, Mystery & Detective, Women Sleuths, amateur sleuth, Historical, General
ISBN: 9781683315452
Google: BBU4DwAAQBAJ
Publisher: Crooked Lane Books
Published: 2018-05-08T02:25:36+00:00

CHAPTER 12

My body was still sore, but my mind was instantly alert as I listened to the scuffling and cries of pain below me. I rose as quickly as I could, one hand pressed to my temple to quell an oncoming headache. I dressed faster than I ever had in my life and hastened down the staircase.

It seemed that everyone else was awake, too, and crowded around a prone figure in the entry hall. The dawning sun, uninhibited by yesterday’s clouds, which had dissipated, filtered through the windows and door transom and illuminated who lay there in an almost ethereal halo.

John Wesley.

“What has happened here?” I demanded.

John Wesley turned to face me. He clutched one knee. “Miss Nightingale, I’m sorry to wake you. Please don’t send me away.”

I moved toward the boy, and the others stepped back to give me room. I noticed Mary was part of the assembly. Why wasn’t she back at the lodgings?

I knelt next to John Wesley and saw there was blood seeping through his fingers as he maintained a grip on his knee. The poor boy’s ashen face glistened with sweat.

“No one is sending you away,” I said in a soothing tone. “We are going to help you.”

I looked up. The nearest nurse to me was Nan Wilmot. “Make sure the inmate room I was just in is clean. Go now,” I snapped, when she continued to stare down dumbly at the injured boy.

She certainly wasn’t my first choice for anything, but preparing a room wasn’t that difficult. Of course, for someone as sloppy as Wilmot, it might be. My regret doubled as I watched her saunter down the corridor of rooms with no urgency at all in her steps.

I pointed to Charlie Lewis. “Go fetch Dr. Killigrew.”

I turned my attention to Polly Roper. “A nice big bowl of bone broth right away, if you please.”

To the other nurses I gave instruction to check in on the inmates to calm anyone who might be upset. If John Wesley’s pained yelling had awoken me with a start, I could only imagine how terrified the patients might be.

Nurses Hughes, Frye, and Harris moved off to do my bidding, but on impulse I stopped Harris. “You will help me move John Wesley,” I instructed her.

Harris nodded in that reserved way she had and wordlessly knelt to assist me with the boy. I couldn’t help but admire his courage, since it was obvious he was in great pain, and just as obvious that he didn’t want to cry out in front of me.

Mary also remained in the entry hall, looking unsure of herself. Had she not ever gone to her bed, or had she returned here for some reason? Surely not—the streets of London were no place for a woman to traverse in the pre-dawn light.

“Mary,” I said. “Get your notebook. You will need to record my questioning of John Wesley.” I figured anything unusual that happened inside the walls should be noted, even if it was as inconsequential as a boy banging up his knee.

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