William Monk 04 - A Sudden Fearful Death

who advocated them. Even the name of Florence Nightingale held no magic for her.
    Callandra alighted and instructed the coachman when to return for her, then climbed the steps and went in through the wide front doors to the stone-flagged foyer. A middle-aged woman trudged across with a pail of dirty water in one hand and a mop in the other. Her face was pale and her wispy hair screwed into a knot at the back of her head. She banged the pail with her knee and slopped the water over onto the floor without stopping. She ignored Callandra as if she were invisible.
    A student surgeon appeared, scarlet arterial blood spatters on his collarless shirt and old trousers, mute evidence of his attendance in the operating theater. He nodded at Callandra and passed by.
    There was a smell of coal dust, the heat of bodies in fevers and sickness, stale dressings, and of drains and undisposed sewage. She should go and see the matron about nurses’ moral discipline. It was her turn to lecture themagain. Then she should see the treasurer about funds and the disposition of certain monies to hand, the review of charity cases. She would do these things first, then she would be free to go and see Kristian Beck.
    She found the matron in one of the wards filled with surgical patients, both those awaiting operations and those recovering. Several had developed fevers during the night or become worse, their infections already well advanced. One man was comatose and close to death. Although the recent discovery of anesthesia had made all sorts of procedures possible, many who survived operations died afterwards of infection. Those who survived were a minority. There was no way known to prevent septicemia or gangrene, and little that would treat even the symptoms, let alone provide a cure.
    Mrs. Flaherty came out of the small room where the medicines and clean bandages were kept; her thin face was pale, her white hair screwed back so tightly it pulled the skin around her eyes. There were two spots of angry color on her cheeks.
    “Good morning, your ladyship,” she said brusquely. “There is nothing you can do here today, and I do not want to hear anything more about Miss Nightingale and fresh air. We’ve got poor souls dying of fevers, and outside air will kill the rest if we listen to you.” She consulted the watch hanging from a pin on her thin shoulder, then she looked back at Callandra. “I’d be obliged, ma’am, if next time you talk to the nurses about morals and behavior, you would particularly mention honesty. We’ve had more thefts from patients. Just small things, of course, they haven’t got much or they’d not be here. Although I don’t know what good you think it will do, I’m sure.”
    She came out into the ward, a long room with a high ceiling, lined on both sides with narrow beds, each blanketed in gray and with someone either sitting or lying in it. Some were pale-faced, others feverish, some restless, tossing from side to side, some lying motionless, breathingshallowly, gasping for air. The room was hot and smelled stale and close.
    A young woman in a soiled overall walked down the length of the floor between the beds carrying an uncovered pail of slops. The odor of it, strong and sour, assailed Callandra’s nostrils as she passed.
    “I’m sorry,” Callandra replied, snatching her attention back to the matron’s request. “Lecturing them isn’t the answer. We need to get a different kind of woman into the trade, and then treat them accordingly.”
    Mrs. Flaherty’s face creased with irritation. She had heard these arguments before and they were fanciful and completely impractical.
    “All very nice, your ladyship,” she said tartly. “But we have got to deal with what we have, and we have laziness, drunkenness, thieving, and complete irresponsibility. If you want to help, you’ll do something about that, not talk about situations that will never be.”
    Callandra opened her mouth to argue, but her attention was distracted by a woman halfway down the ward starting to choke, and the patient next to her calling out for help.
    A pale, obese woman appeared with an empty slop pail and lumbered over to the gasping patient, who began to vomit.
    “That’s the digitalis leaves,” Mrs. Flaherty said matter-of-factly. “The poor creature is dropsical. Passed no urine for days, but this will help. She’s been in here before and recovered.” She turned away and looked back toward her table, where she had been