The Unquiet Heart

by The Unquiet Heart (retail) (epub)

  ‘My aunt won’t even let me have cocoa,’ I sighed. ‘She says it excites the nerves.’ Personally, I blamed a recent issue of Cornhill magazine, which described it as ‘the undergraduette’s hot beverage of choice’, complete with illustrations of girls drinking the offending liquid while clearly planning some unladylike sedition such as loosening their corset laces.

  ‘I’m surprised she doesn’t just lock you away in a padded cell like a madwoman,’ Alison said. It was on the tip of my tongue to confess that my family had tried just that before giving up and abandoning me to a university education. God knows what my aunt would do if I failed to come home in favour of drinking brandy from a teacup and reading the Ladies’ Enquirer.

  ‘I’m sorry I’ve been distant,’ I sighed. ‘I’m trying so hard to be all things to all people that I’m neglecting what I came here for in the first place.’

  ‘An education?’

  ‘And the company of like-minded women. If I have to listen to another complaint about how difficult it is to hire reliable servants, or someone bragging about their latest haul at a shoot, I’m going to scream.’

  ‘So don’t. Come back to our boarding house and we’ll have an evening of intellectual conversation and putting the world to rights.’

  I thought about Calhoun, my uncle’s driver, dispatched to shuttle me from lecture theatre to doorstep every day, lest I get some foolish notion in my head about freedom. I thought about my aunt and her dressmaker and the myriad faults they would find with my figure the moment I walked through the door.

  ‘That’s a wonderful idea. I’ll send Aunt Emily a note immediately.’

  ‘Will she let you?’ Alison looked doubtful.

  ‘Not if I lie about where I’m going.’ I grinned wickedly. ‘Elisabeth! I have a favour to ask . . .’

  That evening saw me curled up on a lumpy armchair, sipping hot cocoa liberally laced with brandy, as Julia critiqued the intellect – and physique – of the male students.

  ‘And Barrowman! The only exams he hasn’t failed are the ones where he was a patient.’

  ‘You know, this isn’t half bad,’ Edith pronounced, topping up her bone-china teacup.

  ‘Drinking alcoholic cocoa with a fallen woman?’ I asked, tartly. Perhaps there was a little more brandy in this than I had realised.

  ‘How would you know?’ Julia gave Edith a lazy, teasing smile. ‘Your parents never touched a drop of the demon drink.’

  Edith kicked her illicit paramour. ‘We weren’t all raised by bohemians who drank champagne at breakfast.’

  I snorted. ‘Julia’s parents were only bohemians by London society standards. I suspect actual bohemians would have found them rather tame.’

  ‘How well did you know each other?’ Caroline asked curiously, brandy blunting the edge of her usual shyness.

  ‘Friends of friends. My people found the Latymers altogether too liberal for their tastes.’

  ‘And my mother thought your mother was a prig.’

  ‘She must be disappointed with you, then.’ The words left my mouth before I could stop them. ‘Moralistic lectures, temperance, and judgement that would make a preacher proud? Not exactly the Latymer way, as I recall.’

  ‘She doesn’t understand,’ Julia said fiercely. Her colour was high but her knuckles were white where she gripped her cup and saucer. ‘It’s all very well to entertain artists and poets and degenerates when all you have to do is make sure your party is more gossip-worthy than the next. But when you’re a doctor, you have to be above reproach. And when you’re a lady doctor, you have to be twice as pure just to prove you haven’t been corrupted by your knowledge of human anatomy.’

  ‘Yes, all those dissected male limbs do get a girl’s pulse racing,’ Alison said drily. We collapsed in hysterical giggles.

  ‘So what happens tomorrow?’ Moira asked. ‘Do we put our dreary cloaks of respectability on again and go back to hating Sarah for bringing down our collective moral standing?’

  ‘Sarah doesn’t care either way,’ I said obstinately. ‘She was perfectly happy without being inducted into your coven of judgemental witches.’

  ‘Then leave,’ Edith groaned. Julia shot her a look.

  I thought about my aunt’s house, the ghost of my mother’s disapproval still lingering in the air, and topped up my cup.

  ‘I’m not spending time with you. I’m spending time with the brandy.’

  ‘Rather a lot of it, as well. Leave some for the rest of us, you drunkard.’

  With everything that had happened in the past year, I was no longer certain if I believed in a glorious afterlife with angels and ambrosia, but I knew one thing: if heaven did exist, it was a room full of women arguing about politics and drinking hot cocoa.

  Chapter 27

  Hours later, Moira was trying to pick an argument about the suffrage movement, Carstairs had nodded off over a botany textbook, and somewhere along the line we had run out of cocoa.

  ‘You know, it was a year ago today.’ I raised my cup in a mock toast.

  ‘It?’ Alison frowned.

  ‘It. The end of all my mother’s hopes and dreams. In memory of my virtue, ladies.’ I downed the dregs of my brandy in one gulp.

  ‘Maybe you shouldn’t drink any more.’

  ‘That’s what my mother said. Maybe I shouldn’t enjoy myself quite so much, maybe I shouldn’t talk endlessly about medicine to whomever would listen. Maybe I shouldn’t be alone with a man in a library at a party. Well, she was right about that one.’

  ‘Did it hurt?’ Moira looked at me frankly.

  ‘I had bruises for a week. Five fingertip-shaped marks around my thigh where he held my legs open. He bit my lip until it bled and then he licked the blood. And yes, Moira, you voyeuristic cat, it bloody hurt. I thought I was being ripped apart. I didn’t even know what was happening until he started . . .’ Grunting. Thrusting. I could feel his sour, liquor-laced breath on my cheek, hear him taking his pleasure through gritted teeth and injunctions to be quiet.

  ‘Oh Lord.’ I heard Julia’s voice as though it were very far away. ‘Alison, get that hatbox.’

  I vomited profusely.

  When I woke, Alison was sitting on the edge of my bed. Well, someone’s bed at any rate.

  ‘Julia gave up her bed and went in with Edith. She said you could take hers but that she was billing any damage to you.’

  I winced, and then winced again because that made my head hurt.

  ‘Was I an utter fool?’

  ‘You were just enjoying yourself. Until, well, until you weren’t.’ Alison paused, uncertain of how to proceed. ‘Sarah, you said something last night . . .’

  Cold horror curdled inside me. I had spilled my secrets, but who else’s had I told? Merchiston would never forgive me if I had spoken about Lucy – and if I had mentioned how Fiona Leadbetter had died, he would be facing a short trip to the hangman’s noose. As I had survived the night in one piece – every part of me hurt enough that I could be sure of that – at least I hadn’t mentioned the real reason why Julia was happy to share a bed with Edith, or how often it presumably happened.

  I racked my brains, but everything was fuzzy. ‘What? What did I say?’

  ‘You were clearly in your cups . . .’

  I winced, rubbing my pounding head. ‘I think I was in everyone’s cups.’

  ‘True. But you had a perfectly good reason. Why didn’t you ever tell me what that bastard did to you?’

  I felt raw, exposed. Why had I told them? It was bad enough that they had thought me loose, immoral. Now they knew I was weak.

  ‘Does it matter?’ I asked in a small voice. ‘He still did it. Took my virtue and left my good name in tatters. Everything Julia says about me is right, you know. It all happened.’

  ‘But you didn’t want it to.’

  ‘Didn’t I?’ God, I must still be drunk. I felt my cheeks turn wet with tears, but I couldn’t stop myself. ‘He chose me. Out of all the girls at that party, all the girls in London
, he did that to me. He must have seen something that made him think I’d want to . . .’

  Alison hugged me tightly, and let me cry like I hadn’t in months.

  ‘Well, I don’t think it counts,’ she said stoutly. ‘He did something to you, but he didn’t take anything.’

  ‘He took everything! My reputation, my family. My home. I’m being forced into a marriage I don’t want because no one else will have me. My parents didn’t want me to become a doctor like yours and Moira’s did; they wanted me out of the way and off their hands. And now, thanks to Aunt Emily and the Greenes, they might actually manage it if Miles is found innocent.’

  ‘Everyone is forced into a marriage they don’t want. That’s the way of the world. The only escape is to lock yourself up in a nunnery or a university.’

  ‘Would your parents rather you married?’

  ‘I think they’ve given up hoping. They think I’m batty, but they love me for it.’

  I smiled. ‘So do we. Now leave me alone to suffer in peace before I throw up over more of your wardrobe.’

  When I awoke hours later, dehydrated but feeling slightly more robust, it was to Elisabeth Chalmers standing at the end of the bed, looking unimpressed and flicking water from a glass at my face.

  ‘Finally!’

  I scowled. ‘I’ve seen you get giggly over one too many glasses of champagne, Mrs Chalmers. Your judgement doesn’t work on me.’

  ‘You threw up into Alison Thornhill’s hatbox!’

  I paused. ‘Did she remove her hat?’

  ‘I believe she did not.’

  I groaned. ‘Judge away, Elisabeth. I’d spend the rest of my life in sackcloth and ashes if it meant not moving from this bed.’

  ‘You’ll have to. I’m bundling you into the carriage and dunking you into a scalding-hot bath until you stop smelling like . . . like . . . that.’

  ‘Give me five minutes to make myself look vaguely presentable.’

  I quickly plaited my hair and straightened my dress before scrawling an apology to Alison on the back of an aborted Biology essay.

  ‘You look terrible.’

  Julia was leaning against the door frame, studying me.

  She glanced down at the note. ‘Is that your idea of an apology? “Sorry about the hatbox. And the hat. Will repay you as soon as I can. PS Can I borrow your notes from today?” If I hadn’t met your mother myself, I’d suspect you were raised by wolves.’

  ‘I’ll send her a proper apology on scented notepaper.’

  ‘Don’t bother. I’ll rewrite it and copy your handwriting.’

  ‘You can forge my handwriting?’

  ‘I can forge anyone’s. How else did you think I got out of being late to last week’s anatomy lecture? I doubt the university chaplain could pick me out of a crowd, let alone invite me to speak to his prayer circle.’

  I was starting to think that Julia Latymer had some very well-hidden depths.

  She looked at me with an unreadable expression. ‘You were brave last night.’

  ‘That wasn’t bravery, it was brandy.’

  ‘Your secret made people pity you. Mine would make them hate me. And Edith! My family would be appalled, but hers would cast her out completely. You know how that feels. Please don’t do that to her.’

  ‘Isn’t your family so frightfully daring?’

  ‘On the surface. But it doesn’t matter how many witty, flamboyant playwrights they have to dinner; if they found out their only child was a Sapphist, they’d be mortified. It’s bad enough I’m a scholar – they think all female students are tweed-clad and monocled and have whiskers. Men of that sort have flair. Women like me are just mannish and ghastly.’

  ‘Neither you nor Edith is mannish, and it wouldn’t matter a jot if you were. You’re brilliant and loyal – even if what you’re being loyal to is a grudge – and Edith’s mad about you, although I can’t for a moment imagine why. Poor girl, she has worse taste than Carstairs with her pash on that porter who brings in the dead frogs to dissect.’

  ‘She goes bright red and looks as though she’s going to be sick! I thought it was the frogs until I saw the way she stared at him.’

  ‘Are frogs’ legs a known aphrodisiac?’

  ‘Even if they are, I don’t think their guts have quite the same effect.’

  It was strange, to laugh with someone I thought I hated. Alison had once told me that the reason Julia and I drove each other mad was because we had so much in common, and I was starting to wonder if it was true.

  A horrifying new thought occurred to me.

  ‘Are we . . . friends?’

  She raised her eyebrows. ‘Perish the thought. If we were friends, I’d feel guilty about trouncing you in next week’s chemistry test. As it is, I’m quite looking forward to it. But don’t worry, she smirked. ‘I promise I’ll be generous in victory, Gilchrist.’

  ‘Not if I have anything to do with it, Latymer.’

  Somehow I managed to make it back to Warrender Park Crescent without losing the contents of my stomach again, and by the time I had bathed, drunk copious quantities of coffee and attired myself in one of the spare dresses I kept in Elisabeth’s armoire in case of chemical spillages or the wear and tear from chasing murder suspects, I could finally face the world again. I realised that although I still felt physically dreadful, I was more at peace than I had been for quite some time – at least until I found the letter tucked into the bottom of my bag.

  Miss Gilchrist

  It has come to my attention that your behaviour prior to commencing your studies has not been what one would expect from a doctor – and certainly not from a lady. Your illicit relations with Paul Beresford and the fact that you are no longer, shall we say, virgo intacta, means that you are, as you doubtless know, in breach of the morality clause you signed on matriculation. Should this be made public, your studies would be at an end. However, this could be avoided with the payment of the sum of fifty pounds delivered in cash to the address below.

  I couldn’t bear to read on. My fists crumpled the paper and I thrust it back in my bag, but its presence lingered as painfully and insistently as a megrim. As the carriage swayed down North Bridge, I felt sick from more than just the brandy. I hadn’t intended to open up to the others about my past, to correct their assumptions about me by dredging up a secret so painful I would have done anything to forget it. But I had, and now I was to be repaid like this. With a vile note threatening to expose me to the entire medical school unless I paid the writer a sum more than three times my monthly allowance. Clearly whoever had written it had not been present for my litany of complaints about my lack of funds, or realised how dependent I was on my relatives for even bed and board. That was why I lived with Aunt Emily and Uncle Hugh – not out of a desire for home comforts, but because even if it cost me the freedom my friends enjoyed, it came at a price I could at least afford.

  Anyone could have had access to my bag the previous night. None of us had exactly been keeping track of our personal possessions – hence the ruined contents of Alison’s hatbox – and it would have been easy for someone to discreetly slip out, pen the hideous thing and then slip it into my bag. But why now, when we had come to a truce? When every woman there knew that I wasn’t the slut the note described, but the recipient of a drunken man’s ardour and entitlement? It couldn’t have been one of them. And besides, I wasn’t the only one to have been blackmailed recently.

  Summoning my courage, I read the letter to the end and what I found chilled my blood.

  In addition, your unladylike curiosity around the death of COLONEL GREENE and his servant reflect poorly on you and your family. Should you cease these activities immediately, further correspondence will not be required. If, however, you fail to do so, further monies may be required.

  I banged on the carriage roof and called the driver to change direction. There had been only one person who could have had access to both my bag and the Greene household. It seemed that my trust had been betrayed after all.<
br />
  Chapter 28

  I could have climbed the steps to the Greenes’ town house and been escorted to the drawing room to wait in comfort, but that wouldn’t have given me the answer I wanted. Instead, I stamped my feet trying to ward off the cold as I waited by the kitchen door for the cook to emerge. I lurked there for nearly an hour, trying not to breathe in the stink of rotten vegetables and household refuse. I was flicking through my anatomy textbook with freezing fingers when the door finally creaked open and the hatchet-faced woman stepped into the street. I wasn’t close enough for her to see me, but I was downwind. Was that Aurora’s scent she was wearing? I had ascertained that Mrs Parry took a walk in the early afternoon and that, several doors down, the butler chose that same time to take his daily constitutional. I wondered what her mistress would think of a servant liberally dousing herself with expensive perfume for an illicit assignation with a man. Then again, she had bigger concerns – and so did I.

  Once I was satisfied that Parry was far enough away, I slipped through the door she had left from. Sure enough, it led to the kitchen, where my latest line of enquiry sat drinking tea and darning a pair of stockings.

  ‘Good afternoon, Blackwell.’

  Had I not been standing between her and the door, I think the maid would have run the same way as her superior, but seeing the expression on my face, she seemed to collapse in on herself.

  ‘Would you like to be shown in, Miss Gilchrist?’ she asked listlessly, as though I had entered the usual way to pay a perfectly normal social call. The question was rhetorical, and we both knew it.

  ‘It’s you I’ve come to see,’ I said, trying to make my voice sound as cheerful and confiding as possible. ‘Could you spare a moment of your time? I know that with Clara Wilson gone you’ll all be at sixes and sevens . . .’

  Blackwell snorted. ‘They cannae get a replacement for love nor money. And the tweeny left this morning, saying her father wouldn’t let her stay in the house one minute longer.’