William Monk 04 - A Sudden Fearful Death

bymatrons, bullied by dressers, grumbled at and abused by patients, insulted if old, treated with flippancy if middle-aged and agreeable-natured, seduced if young.” He raised his thin eyebrows. “Is it any wonder they are such as they are? What manner of woman would one expect to take such employment?”
    “I read the same piece,” she agreed, moving to keep level with him as he began to walk toward the distant operating theater. “You omitted to mention that they are also sworn at by surgeons. It said that too.” She ignored the momentary flicker of temper in his eyes. “That is perhaps the best of all the arguments for employing a better class of woman, and treating them as professionals rather than the roughest of servants.”
    “My dear Lady Callandra, it is all very well to talk as if there were hundreds of wellborn and intelligent young women of good moral character queuing up to perform the service, but since the glamour of war is past that is very far from being the case.” He shook his head sharply. “Surely a moment’s investigation would show you that? Idealistic daydreams are all very pleasant, but I have to deal in reality. I can only work with what there is, and the truth is that the women you see keep the fire stoked, the slops emptied, the bandages rolled, and most of them, when sober, are kind enough to the sick.”
    The hospital treasurer passed them, dressed in black and carrying a pile of ledgers. He nodded in their direction but did not stop to speak.
    “By all means,” Sir Herbert continued even more brusquely, “if you wish to provide covers for the pails, do what you can to see that they are used. In the meantime, I must report to the operating theater where my patient will come any minute. Good day to you ma’am.” And without waiting for her to reply, he turned on his well-shod and polished heel and went across the foyer to the far corridor.
    Callandra had scarcely drawn breath when she saw an ashen-faced woman, supported on both sides by solemn-eyed men, making her painful way toward the corridorwhere Sir Herbert had gone. Seemingly she was the patient whom he had expected.
    It was only after a tedious but dutiful hour with the black-coated treasurer discussing finances, donations, and gifts that Callandra encountered one of the other governors, the one of whom Mrs. Flaherty had spoken so approvingly, Lady Ross Gilbert. Callandra was on the landing at the top of the stairs when Berenice Ross Gilbert caught up with her. She was a tall woman who moved with a kind of elegance and ease which made even the most ordinary clothes seem as if they must be in the height of fashion. Today she wore a gown with a waist deeply pointed at the front and a soft green muslin skirt with three huge flounces, scattered randomly with embroidered flowers. It flattered her reddish hair and pale complexion, and her face with its heavy-lidded eyes and rather undershot jaw was extremely handsome in its own way.
    “Good morning, Callandra,” she said with a smile, swinging her skirts around the newel post and starting down the stairs beside her. “I hear you had a slight difference with Mrs. Flaherty earlier today.” She pulled a face expressive of amused resignation. “I should forget Miss Nightingale if I were you. She is something of a romantic, and her ideas hardly apply to us.”
    “I didn’t mention Miss Nightingale,” Callandra replied, going down beside her. “I simply said I did not wish to lecture the nurses on honesty and sobriety.”
    Berenice laughed abruptly. “It would be a complete waste of your time, my dear. The only difference it would produce would be to make Mrs. Flaherty feel justified that she made an attempt.”
    “Has she not asked you to do it?” Callandra asked curiously.
    “But of course. And I daresay I shall agree, and then say what I wish when the time comes.”
    “She will not forgive you,” Callandra warned. “Mrs. Flaherty forgives nothing. By the way, what do you want to say?”
    “I really don’t know,” Berenice replied airily. “Nothing as fiercely as you do.”
    They came to the bottom of the stairs.
    “Really, my dear, you know you have no hope of getting people to keep windows open in this climate. They would freeze to death. Even in the Indies, you know, we kept the night air out. It isn’t healthy, warm as it is.”
    “That is rather different,” Callandra argued. “They have all manner of fevers out there.”
    “We have cholera,