The Favourite Child (11 page)

Jinnie was shaking her head, the sickness now making her feel giddy and light-headed in her fear, quite unable to think straight. She longed to turn and run as fast as her skinny legs could carry her but knew they’d be nowhere near fast enough for the job, not to escape Billy Quinn. There wasn’t a person born could run that fast.

As if to remind her of this fact he grasped her arm and twisted it up her back. ‘Ye weren’t thinking of running off again, were ye now?’

Jinnie could hardly draw breath, let alone speak. One more tweak of her arm and she was sure it would come right out of its socket. She shook her head and with a little chuckle he released it. Jinnie gave a cry of pain as it fell to her side which only made him laugh all the more. Knocking her back against the wall he pushed one knee between her legs, rubbing it up hard against her groin. ‘We’ve had some fun, you and me. And I don’t easily let go of what’s rightly mine. Didn’t ye realise how much I’d miss ye, Jinnie lass? How much I’d need ye.’

Jinnie began to whimper. ‘Let me go, Quinn. You don’t need me. I’m worth nowt. There’s plenty of women who’d give their right arm to be with you.’

‘Aye, but I don’t want plenty of women. I want you, me little treasure, and I’ve got yer right arm already, have I not?’ Taking hold of it again he tucked the arm, now blue with bruises, into his own in a parody of friendly companionship. ‘I’ll tell ye what I’ll do. I swear me lips are permanently sealed. This new chap of yours will never hear a word about your little difficulty from me if...’ He paused, smiled his handsome, devil-may-care smile. ‘Ye do have a new chap, d’you not? Is that not the way of it, Jinnie? I know ye well, so don’t t’ink to tell me any porkies,’ and Jinnie could do nothing but nod in a dazed sort of way. ‘Well then, we don’t want to spoil such a promising future for ye both, now do we? I’m sure we can work out some way fer ye to repay my generosity, if we put our heads together. Why don’t we go and have a bite of dinner and see what we come up with. What d’you say, girl?’

With her arm grasped so tightly within his own and the fear so tight in her belly, Jinnie had little choice but to go along with his plan and agree.

By the end of January, Bella felt overwhelmed with despair at ever returning to anything like a normal routine. She felt sick to her stomach with the constant smell of camphorated oil and lineament, of emptying chamber pots and of lifting her mother on and off them. Fortunately, or unfortunately, depending upon your point of view, Emily had partly regained the power of speech though she had not, as yet, agreed to demonstrate this skill to the doctor. Nevertheless she would constantly whine to Bella to fetch Edward, who she complained rarely visited her.

‘H-have been - g-good m-mither, not?’ she’d complain, the words often slurred or jumbled. ‘Why dush he defy me?’

‘Don’t worry about it, Mother. All you have to do is to get well.’ But Emily, as was her wont, showed no sign of patience and on one occasion threw such a tantrum of rage, screaming and yelling and foaming at the mouth, that Tilly was sent running to the mill to fetch Edward upon the instant. He came at once and sat by her bed for hours, holding his mother’s hand while she simpered with love for him.

Bella was nauseated by this display of control on Emily’s part and explained the distressful scene to the doctor when he arrived prompt at ten o’clock the next morning, as was his custom. ‘I feared for her sanity, yet the rage left her the moment Edward came.’

He stood holding Emily’s limp wrist while he counted her pulse. Like many of his profession he still seemed able to carry on a conversation at the same time.

‘Unfortunate indeed and, as you say, most distressing, but at least her son came when needed. Most commendable. She is well blessed. And you, my dear, are fortunate to have such a brother who is able and willing to give up his work and offer the care your mother undoubtedly needs.’ The usually mild tone sounded marred by the slightest drip of acid.

Surprised, yet Bella felt bound to agree. ‘I don’t deny it but Edward can’t make a habit of coming home in the middle of the day. He must work, as must my father. Jinnie does what she can but she too has taken a job at the mill, as she is eager to pay her way. On the other hand, I cannot be with Mother around the clock.’

‘Whyever not? You showed no sign of needing respite the other day, when I invited you out for supper.’

So that was the way the land lay. Bella sighed, swallowing a natural inclination to retaliate. ‘Are you sure you can’t find a nurse to help me?’

‘Is our patient eating properly?’ Ignoring the question he spoke over her mother’s head, as if Emily were deaf as well as paralysed.

‘Why don’t you ask her? She can speak for herself now.’

‘Fooling yourself that your dear mother doesn’t need your full time care, will not ease your conscience indefinitely, Miss Ashton,’ he coldly remarked as he tucked the limp wrist beneath the covers, smoothing down the sheet before proceeding to peer into the eyes of his patient.

Emily glared back at him in mute fury while Bella sighed her frustration. ‘Speak to the good doctor, Mother. You know that you can, if you try.’ The patient, however, remained obstinately silent and Dr Lisle’s expression revealed his disbelief that she was even capable of it.

‘You fancy yourself as some sort of medical authority do you, Miss Ashton?’

Bella wasn’t sure whether he mocked her or not but she answered with all due seriousness. ‘I wouldn’t presume to class myself as a professional since I have no qualifications of any kind, but I do what I can to help those in need. There are many women out there who perhaps need me more than my mother.’ She jerked her head in the direction of the street. ‘I do what I can to help because people trust me.’

‘Ah, a lady of charitable good works. Of course.’ Nodding and smiling rather dismissively, the next instant he was shaking his head as he frowned at the thermometer. ‘Dear me,’ he tutted. ‘Temperature normal but I had hoped we would be out of bed by this time. You
are
giving your poor dear mother the massages I mentioned?’

‘Every two hours,’ Bella agreed, smarting at having her most earnest endeavours so casually tossed aside, as if she were not truly sincere in her work. ‘I have the aching arms to prove it.

‘Splendid, splendid. I’m sure we’ll see some benefit soon.’ Leaning closer, he addressed his patient in ringing tones. ‘We’ll have you up out of this bed for one hour every morning, Mrs Ashton. We’ll enjoy that, won’t we? Do us the world of good.’

Emily made a spluttering sound, very like fury, deep in her throat.

As he stepped away from the bed to collect his bag, Bella stubbornly returned to her own defence, ‘The women in these parts are in need of whatever help they can get, since their doctors give little enough attention to female problems.’

He raised a pair of mildly enquiring brows. ‘You have some criticism of the medical profession, Miss Ashton?’

‘I merely criticise standards which seem to be deeply rooted in the dark ages.’

‘For instance?’

Casting an anxious glance at her mother, Bella led him smartly from the room and briskly closed the door. In truth, she felt rather caught out, since he’d already admitted to working for nothing on occasions for those in greatest need, and she could hardly blame him for the behaviour of his less altruistic colleagues. Even so, Dr Lisle seemed determined to find fault and demand from her a devotion which surely ranked far beyond the call of duty.

Out on the landing, Bella hesitated only a fraction before making up her mind to grasp the nettle. Adopting a pleasantly professional tone, she calmly announced, ‘Birth control. So many women I meet are desperate to learn more about it. Their health, in many cases, depends upon it yet who will explain to them the facts? Certainly not their doctors who seem to imagine the woman would be committing some crime against humanity by using any kind of preventative measure. The only crime is against the women themselves, inflicting unnecessary ignorance upon them so that a man may enjoy his “rights” at cost of his wife’s health, even her life.’ She stopped, mainly through want of breath.

Dr Lisle was staring at her as if she had grown two heads. It took several moments before he found his voice. ‘The general view is that these matters should best be decided on moral rather than medical grounds.’

‘How bad must a woman be to procure the help she so desperately needs? I have witnessed prolapsed wombs, procured miscarriages, fevers, stillbirths, frequent haemorrhaging and dreadful pain, not to mention exhaustion and varicose veins by the score. You may dismiss me as a lady of charitable good causes if you wish, but I have seen more real distress than most young women my age.’

Clearly embarrassed at mention of such personal female matters, Doctor Lisle’s pallid cheeks turned a dull red as he closed his eyes and held up one hand in a peremptory fashion, as if to ward off further disclosures, or perhaps to remind her of the presence of their patient, separated from them by only a door. ‘I can see you have strong feelings on the subject but this is neither the time nor place for such a debate.’

Tossing her head so that the coppery skeins floated behind her as if with a life of their own, Bella preceded him down the stairs, a flounce in her step as she descended. ‘And I see that you take the usual masculine view that a single woman should continue in the fanciful notion that babies are found under a bush, or perhaps that they come with nightly prayers, though clearly praying for the opposite will do nothing to help such as poor Mrs Stobbs.’

‘Mrs Stobbs?’ He sounded out of breath in his efforts to keep pace with her.

‘A patient of mine who...’

‘
Patient
, Miss Ashton? I thought you said you had no qualifications.’ His voice was irritatingly agreeable.

‘I mean friend, client, a woman in desperate need of help.’ Bella pulled open the front door with a flourish, furious at her slip, and stood back to allow him to pass.

Dr Lisle smiled at her, gracious as ever. ‘Abstinence is the most moral victory of all, Miss Ashton. And extremely effective. I will say that you are surprisingly vehement on this,
harrum
, rather delicate matter for one who has clearly chosen to remain, as I have myself, on the shelf.’ And before she had time to frame any sort of cutting reply to this, he bid her a polite good day, collected his hat, and departed.

Bella flew back upstairs in a storm of temper, pausing at the top to draw breath and calm herself. Perhaps a walk in the fresh air might calm her shattered nerves but first she really must peep in on Mother, just to check she’d suffered no ill effects from this unprofessional squabble conducted over her prostrate figure.

Bella pushed open the bedroom door only a fraction, wary of disturbing Emily if she were sleeping. The bed was empty. Stunned, Bella stepped into the room, gazing about her in cold panic. Had she fallen out of bed? Had she somehow become trapped beneath the bedclothes? There was no sign of her, and then Bella heard the tap running in the adjoining bathroom. Moving quietly forward she could see Emily standing at the sink. She felt as if someone had slapped her in the face.
Her mother could not only move, she could get out of bed and walk to the bathroom unaided for a glass of water
!

Very quietly, without making a sound, Bella slipped out and softly closed the door behind her.

The very next day, all sense of guilt now gone, Bella engaged a night nurse to sit with her mother.

The afternoon was a dull cloudy grey with a few spots of rain on the wind but Bella pulled on a warm coat, wrapped a scarf around her neck and set out, striding along the street with a lift to her step and a happy tilt to her chin.

A day nurse had also been engaged and at last she was free to pursue her own interests. She felt like a child let out of detention. If Mother imagined that she could win the argument against her newly rebellious son by playing the invalid, how wrong she was. Bella had seen the light of certainty in her brother’s eye. He would not give Jinnie up, not for anyone, certainly not for a manipulating old woman.

But Bella was regretting her outburst of temper with Dr Lisle. She’d handled it all wrong and gained not a jot of information as a result. If she was to be of any value to her ‘ladies’, she must acquire some degree of diplomacy and put the matter right without delay. The little doctor meant well, in his narrow-minded way and he too had been taken in by Emily. Even if Mother had indeed suffered a slight stroke, she’d made it out to be something far worse than it actually was. In Bella’s opinion, it would do her no harm at all to be left to stew in her own juices for a while.