“Safer from what?” Whatever that Danzig situation turned out to be, did the chief really think that this mutilated corpse was going to make a comeback?
Murphy didn’t answer that, but she certainly didn’t like the look in his eye, or the pair of handcuffs—handcuffs?—that she now saw dangling from his back pocket. “Give me a minute alone, will you?” he said. “I’ll be right out.”
Charlotte went outside and stood on the ramp. The wind had really kicked up—a storm was blowing in. What in the world was going on here? Two dead in a matter of days? And though she felt terrible even thinking about it that way, on a personal note she did have to wonder—was this going to look bad on her record as resident medical officer of Point Adélie?
“All squared away,” Murphy said, coming up behind her and securing the door with a padlock and chain, wrapped in a tight plastic sleeve to keep the moisture out. “Needless to say, I’ve told Uncle Barney that this unit is off-limits till further notice.”
Charlotte vowed, just to be on the safe side, never again to use a Heinz condiment of any kind.
“And I don’t need to tell you, I want all of this kept on the q.t. At least until we’ve got a better grip on things—Danzig in particular.”
December 16, 2 p.m.
Eleanor was only vaguely aware of what was going on. She remembered being helped, nearly carried, to the door of the church, then being placed atop a cumbersome machine, on a sort of saddle. She had been encouraged to put her arms around the man sitting in front of her—Michael Wilde, he’d said his name was; she wondered if he was Irish—but that would have been far too forward and with her remaining strength she had resisted.
The other man had then tied a rope around her, made of some thin but sturdy fiber, and fastened the hood of her coat down tightly around her head. The machine had roared off across the snow like a stallion, but the wind, and icy spray, was so strong that, like it or not, she had had to lean her head down and rest her cheek against Michael’s back. And before long, just to keep her stability, lift her arms around him.
If not for the hood, the noise might have been deafening, and as they rumbled across the barren landscape, she felt herself oddly lulled. All day, she had been growing weaker, and fighting to resist the allure of the black bottles Sinclair had left in the rectory, and now she felt the last of her energy ebbing away. Her eyes closed, and her limbs relaxed. She felt powerless, but not unpleasantly so. The rattling of the machine reminded her of the thrumming of the engines on the ship she had taken to the Crimea…under the ever-watchful eye of Miss Nightingale. But oh, what would her employer make of a scene such as this? She knew perfectly well that Miss Nightingale disapproved of her nurses fraternizing with the soldiers or breaking with most of the social conventions. Scandal was to be avoided at all costs, and for all of her natural ease with the troops, Miss Nightingale often seemed humorless and inflexible with her female staff.
On the morning after finding Frenchie among the wounded, for instance, Eleanor had known enough to rise an hour early and creep, as quietly as she could, out of the staff quarters. The stairs were still dark, and she nearly tripped twice as she made her way down out of the tower and back to the ward where Lieutenant Le Maitre lay. But in addition to a clean shirt, she had in the pocket of her smock a sheet of folded paper and the stub of a pencil.
Although some of the men were still asleep, many others lay rocking in their beds, sick with fever or racked with pain, their eyes glazed and lips parched. Two or three of them reached out to her as she hurried by, but she had to neglect their entreaties and keep to her mission. She would have to be back at her regular post in less than an hour.
As she approached the ward, she passed one of the surgical carts being set up for the day’s bloody business. Two orderlies—one with jug ears and a cowlick standing straight up—said, “Morning, Missus. You’re up bright and early.” The other, a burly fellow with a badly pitted face, said, “Care to join us for a cup of tea?” He lifted a battered kettle from the cart. “Still hot.”
Eleanor declined, then swiftly crossed to the far corner, where she found Le Maitre wide-awake and staring up through the broken window at the early dawn. She crouched down beside his bed, and it was only when she said, “I’ve come back,” that he seemed to take any notice of her. “And look what I’ve got,” she said, displaying the paper and pencil.
He licked his lips, and nodded at her. “And this, too,” she said, holding up the clean shirt. “We’ll get that old one off of you, and this new one on, just as soon as I’ve found some water for a wash.” He looked at her as if he barely understood what language she was speaking. The night, she realized, had taken its toll on him.
“Frenchie,” she said, in a low voice, “I’m ashamed to admit that I don’t even know your true first name.”