William Monk 14 - The Shifting Tide

omnibus back towards his home. He should not spend money on hansoms anymore.
             
    It was nearly seven o’clock by the time he alighted from the final leg of his journey, with the two pounds that Louvain had given him still unbroken. He was in Tottenham Court Road with only a hundred yards or so to walk. The mist had settled, obscuring the distances. There were the smells of soot from the chimneys and of the horse manure which had not yet been cleared, but he knew the way almost to the step. It would be warm once he was inside.
    There would be food prepared if Hester was in. He tried not to hope too fiercely that she was. Her work at the clinic was of intense importance to her. Before they had met seven years ago, she had nursed in the Crimea with Florence Nightingale. On her return to England she had worked occasionally in hospitals, but her independence on the battlefield had made her intolerant of being reduced to cleaning, stoking fires, and rolling bandages. Her temper had cost her more than one position.
    As a private nurse caring for individual cases, Hester had been far more successful. More recently she had turned her attention to helping prostitutes who were injured and homeless in the course of their trade. Hester had first set up the clinic almost in the shadow of the Coldbath Prison—then, in a stroke of brilliant opportunism, moved it to a large house nearby in Portpool Lane. Monk’s only objection was that the very urgency of the need for such a place meant that Hester spent many late hours there.
    He reached the front door and slipped his key into the lock. Inside the lights were on, only dimly, but it must mean she was at home. She would never have left them to burn otherwise.
    He walked through quickly, a surge of pleasure welling up inside him. It was far more than simply the warmth of being protected from the wind and enclosed by his own home, or even knowing that a long, comfortable night lay ahead of him.
    She was in the sitting room, which was always tidy, always heated because it was the room in which he saw clients. It was Hester, years before they were married, who had insisted it be so. It was she who had placed the chairs on either side of the fireplace and put the bowl with flowers on the table.
    Now she dropped her book and stood up, her face full of pleasure. She came straight to him, expecting him to put his arms around her and to kiss her. The sheer certainty of it was almost as sweet to him as the act itself. He held her closely, kissing her mouth, her cheek, her closed eyes. Her hair was untidy. She smelled faintly of carbolic from the clinic. No matter how much she scrubbed, it never entirely went away. She was a little too thin to be womanly. He had always thought it was something he did not like, and yet he would not have changed her gangling grace or her fierce, tender emotion for the most beautiful woman he had ever seen or dreamed. The reality was always better, sharper, more surprising. In loving her, he had discovered a fire and delicacy within himself that he had not known existed. She infuriated him at times, exasperated him, excited him, but never, ever bored him. Above all—more precious than anything else—in her presence he could not be lonely.
    “The shipowner gave me the job,” he told her, still with his arms around her. “His name is Louvain. He’s lost a cargo of ivory, and the thieves murdered the night watchman to get it.”
    She pulled back to look at his face. “So why doesn’t he call in the River Police? Is it even legal not to?”
    He saw the anxiety in her eyes. He understood it uncomfortably well.
    “He needs the ivory back more quickly than they’ll be able to get it,” he explained. “There are thefts up and down the river all the time.”
    “And murders?” she asked. There was no criticism in her, but there was fear. Did she know how narrow their finances were now? The bills were paid for this week, but what about next week, and the one after?
    She loved the clinic. It would be a defeat of all they had tried to do if she had to give it up in order to earn money as a paid nurse again. The clinic would not survive without her. She was not only the one reliable person there with any medical experience; she had the will and the courage behind the whole venture.
    They had managed through the harder, earlier times with the financial help of Lady Callandra Daviot, who had been a friend to Hester for years, and to both of them