God's Children

by Mabli Roberts

  Her husband put his hand on her arm, sensing her distress, for she was a tender creature. ‘But all hope for them is not yet lost,’ he said. ‘Not while there are people such as Nurse Marsden in the world.’ He smiled at his wife and then asked me, ‘Have you an idea of where you will go next to help these sufferers? I understood you have talked of going to India.’

  ‘It is true, the larger portion of the world’s lepers reside there, and I had indeed intended to seek them out. In fact, a colleague of mine, a dedicated nurse who shares my passion to take God’s care to these poor people, she is already in India, working at a hospital known for giving what treatment there is for this disease. But…’ here I hesitated and glanced at Nell, who gave me a small smile of encouragement. ‘I believe I have found another group of lepers who are even more in need of our help. These outcasts inhabit the remote and desolate wilderness of Siberia, and are beyond the reach of either Christian solace or medical treatment. It is to them that I intend travelling.’

  Mr Harris gave a gruff bark. ‘Siberia! I’ve heard tell of it. ’Tis the other side of the world, and a place men fear to tread. There are wild animals and people near as wild themselves. Hundreds of acres of nothing, save snow and air so cold it could kill you in an hour. Forgive me, Miss Marsden, but it is no place for a woman.’

  ‘And yet women live there.’

  ‘Aye, women born to it. An English woman such as yourself? No, it would be folly to go there, I have to say it.’

  ‘I am confident God will provide me with both the courage and the people necessary to succeed in my mission,’ I told him. He refrained from commenting upon this theory, so I was able to say more. ‘I am not afraid of hardship, and I know that others will want to assist me in doing God’s work. Nell and I are to go to Paris and Berlin to raise funds for the expedition.’

  Mr Rawlings looked surprised. ‘You cannot find supporters closer to home?’

  ‘I hope to do so, but I must spread word of the mission as far as I can before I leave for Russia.’

  Mrs Rawlings took on an eager countenance. ‘We would like to offer our support, Miss Marsden.’

  Her husband nodded his agreement. ‘Indeed we would. You must come to our house. We shall hold a dinner and invite others who might be willing to contribute. There are many like-minded people in England. I think you’ll find it an unnecessary use of your time and resources to travel around Europe.’

  Mr Harris put in his halfpennyworth. ‘I’m with Rawlings on this, Nurse Marsden. There’s much effort can be spent in such tours, and often there is little to show for it. I know plenty as would be happy to put their name to a venture such as yours. I count myself among them. It does a business no harm at all to have itself allied to a worthy cause. Makes folk feel better about paying for their own leisure if they think a portion of that money is doing good works. And it is no more than good business sense after all: the more money you can save in the raising of it, the quicker your mission can get under way.’

  Beside me I felt Nell stiffen slightly. This was, after all, what she had feared on several fronts. That my time would be taken up with other people, that my leaving for Russia might come sooner rather than later, and now that our cherished idea of travelling to Paris together might be lost. I could not afford to disappoint her, nor did I wish to. However, I had, it appeared, struck upon people who could provide vital investment in my endeavours, and I could not let such a chance slip away.

  ‘I should be delighted to visit you, Mr Rawlings. And Mr Harris, a man of such sound business acumen as yourself would indeed be an asset to my fundraising efforts, for where others see such good sense and philanthropy happily wed they will wish to follow.’

  ‘Ha!’ Mr Harris at last removed his cigar so that he might wave it in the air for emphasis. ‘I see you are a woman with an eye for opportunity, Nurse Marsden. You might be just the woman to tame that wilderness after all!’

  As I wake up I become aware that I am not alone. I have another visitor. This one does not hide in the shadows, nor linger shyly on the periphery of my vision. She sits, straight backed and elegant as ever, in the chair beside my bed. She is wearing the brown woollen dress with the russet velvet collar that suited her so well. It flatters her skin and her warm eyes. She was never a beauty, but had poise and a handsome face. I imagine, many years ago, she made a sophisticated bride. Mr Duff Hewitt would have been rightly proud.

  ‘You are here to see me at last, Nell. I wondered when you would come.’

  ‘You knew that I would.’

  ‘I thought if you were not careful you might leave it too late.’

  ‘I thought I might see you when you returned from your mission. I thought after you left St Petersburg you would come back to me.’

  ‘Truly, Nell? Had you not cast me out from your heart long before then?’

  ‘I wanted you to miss me. I hoped that you would.’

  I give a long sigh. My body is full of aches and pains this morning, and I find I have little inclination to persuade Nell of things that I can do nothing to change. I do my best to sit up a little so that I can at least look at her more easily, but in truth I am no longer able to command the movements of my own, frail limbs. Nell does not move to help me. She was not a nurse, after all. And this aged version of her lost love has not the power to charm her now.

  ‘You never loved me,’ she says suddenly, looking only at her hands in her lap.

  ‘I cared deeply for you.’

  ‘But it was not love,’ she insists. ‘Whatever it was.’

  ‘I never treated you with anything other than sincere affection and respect.’

  ‘What cared I for your respect?’ she snaps. ‘It was not your respect I wanted.’

  ‘I gave all that I could,’ I say. ‘I hoped it was enough.’

  ‘It was not.’ Still she will not look at me, and I know it is not from timidity, but because she does not want me to see the tears that threaten to spill from her eyes. She does not want me to witness her lose her composure again.

  ‘I am sorry,’ I say, ‘that I caused to you much sadness. It was not always the case. Do you remember? When we first met we shared such hopes for the future. You were so supportive of my work.’

  ‘I was supportive of you. I did not care about your precious lepers, but that they mattered to you.’

  ‘Without your help I would never have reached St Petersburg, let alone Yakutsk. None of it would have been possible without you.’

  ‘But it was not me you loved.’

  I can find no response to this that would not hurt her. She waits, but I stay silent, and at last she stands up and walks towards the door. Before leaving she turns and looks at me one last time.

  ‘It was always Rose,’ she says plainly. ‘Rose you loved. Never me.’ And then she goes, letting that thought linger after she has left. And I know it to be the truth. And I know it to be the thing for which she was never able to forgive me.

  The Reverend Alexander Francis had agreed to meet me at the hotel in which I was residing. I had been in Philadelphia for some time following my tour of America, and was considering settling there. Until I could find a suitable house I had taken rooms at a modest hotel in a quiet area of the city. It was wet that morning, with grey skies and slanting rain, casting a gloom over the day that seeped into the sitting room of my suite. I had the lamps lit and a fire burning in the hearth, but still there was a sombre mood to the place that would not be lifted. When the Reverend arrived I called for tea, and we sat on the small sofa by the fire, side by side. I should have suspected, when he did not choose the chair opposite me, that there was a reason why he did not wish to sit facing me. I should have known then that he had come to talk to me on a matter that caused him such discomfort that he would rather not confront me with it at all. But it seemed he saw no alternative. And such was the upsetting nature of our dialogue that I was unable to realise how catastrophic it would prove to be, for me, and for everything that mattered to me.


  After a brief exchange of niceties, he came to the point.

  ‘I am afraid I have received some… unsettling news,’ he said, choosing his words with care. ‘Some reports, of disturbing talk, about your conduct.’

  ‘My conduct?’

  ‘I confess, Miss Marsden, this is not an easy subject for me to raise with you, but raise it I must. As treasurer of the Leper’s Hospital Association, and as, I hope, your friend…’

  ‘You may speak plainly, Reverend. You know me well enough to know that.’

  ‘Indeed, and yet I hesitate to do so.’ He picked up his teaspoon and stirred the tea in his cup with great concentration.

  ‘Since my mission I have met with great support and appreciation, both in England and here in America. However, I have also had to suffer having my integrity brought into doubt, both where funds for the association are involved, and even as to the details of my journey through Siberia.’ I sought to reassure him that I was accustomed to having my word challenged, and that it did not shake me, nor my belief in what I was doing. ‘There will always be those,’ I went on, ‘who out of jealousy or perhaps out of some personal malice, will seek to cut down those who must stand tall for something that is dear to them. Rest assured, Reverend, I have already withstood slanderous accusations whilst on my tour, both directly and through the newspapers.’

  ‘Of course, regarding the monies raised… Yes, I am aware of this, and as you know I have defended you publicly on this matter. And as to the charge that any part of your account of the mission is… exaggerated…’

  ‘Falsified, Reverend Francis. Might as well say it. I am called a liar and required to defend myself regardless of the fact that these claims are unjust and utterly without foundation.’

  ‘And you have done so successfully,’ he said, nodding, a little relieved, I think, to be able to acknowledge his admiration for me on this point. But then he set down his spoon in his saucer and stared hard into his bone china teacup. ‘I am sorry to say the matter on which I am compelled to speak with you is of an altogether more delicate nature.’

  We both sat perfectly still. The low, colourless light of the day and in the room seemed to match the feeling of dread that now descended heavily upon me. I looked for a question to put to him, a way in which to challenge what I feared I knew was coming, but I had neither the courage nor the words. The silenced stretched to breaking point and then he spoke again.

  ‘I have received letters. Letters which, when I questioned their authenticity and truthfulness, well, they appeared to be genuine.’

  ‘Might I know the author of these letters?’

  ‘They were sent on to me by Mrs Hapgood…’

  ‘Ah, that woman.’

  ‘…and the letters themselves were written by a journalist employed by the Wellington Times,’ he explained, and then paused.

  ‘I have had dealings with the newspapers of New Zealand many times before, Reverend. They have never succeeded in ruining me yet, thought that seems their aim. No doubt in Mrs Hapgood they have found a willing conspirator, for she declared herself my enemy from the outset.’

  ‘The other letter was written by a woman.’ He hesitated again, and the hiatus was filled with the skipping of my own heartbeats. ‘Her name is Mrs Ellen Duff Hewitt.’

  For a moment I could not think rationally, only endure the turmoil bubbling up inside me. There could only be one reason Nell would write a letter about me and not to me. I waited. Reverend Francis put his cup down on the table in front of us and placed his hands on his knees as if bracing himself for what was to come.

  ‘Please understand,’ he began again, ‘that I have always held you in the utmost esteem, Miss Marsden. I have ever been your supporter, and will always be somewhat in awe of what you have done. It is because of my respect for you that I find these accusations so impossible to believe, and yet I cannot ignore the weight of evidence.’

  ‘Evidence?’

  ‘Mrs Hewitt is able to reinforce her statements with dates, names, places, identities of other people who were involved.’

  ‘You have only her word, still.’

  ‘Her most damning evidence must surely be in what she confesses to herself, for no woman would lightly, nor even maliciously I believe, ruin her own reputation without cause. No woman held in high regard by those who know her, such as I understand Mrs Hewitt to be, would sacrifice her own good name without truth as her witness. It is no small thing, after all, to lay oneself open to the charge of having had an immoral relationship.’

  I had known the reverend for some time, and I do not doubt that what he expected from me was a vociferous denial. Strong words of indignation, refuting these calumnies and slanders. What he got, instead, was the weeping and sobbing of a woman distraught and broken by shame. I folded forwards, my cup and saucer dropping to the floor, tea spilling forth, as I clutched my arms around my stomach to prevent myself falling apart utterly.

  Reverend Francis did not reach out a hand and place it on my shoulder in an attempt to comfort me. Rather I felt him recoil. It was a small but significant movement, as he shifted his position minutely, already eager to put a distance between himself, the good clergyman, and this sinful, shameful woman.

  ‘Nurse Marsden,’ he said at last, though his words were barely audible above my sobs. ‘Am I to understand that you do not deny these claims?’

  ‘I tried to atone!’ I wailed through my tears. ‘After Rose everything I have ever done has been in God’s service!’

  ‘Rose? I am not familiar with that name…’

  ‘I knew Nell would help me with my mission. I had no money. No one else would support me. And what was to become of Mama if I did not find a way, find someone to assist us?’

  ‘So you admit that you and Mrs Hewitt were… sinfully intimate?’

  ‘I needed her. Not for myself, I did not desire her. I needed her support. Who else was there?’ I turned my face to him, but my despair only deepened when I saw revulsion in his expression as he watched me.

  ‘But, surely, you might have gained Mrs Hewitt’s assistance without, well, without giving in to your baser desires.’

  ‘I tell you I have never desired anyone besides Rose! It was Rose that I loved. I tried to give her up when Jessy was jealous, though she and I never became close, not in that way.’ I gulped air, trying so very hard to steady myself, to explain myself, for I badly needed the reverend to understand. ‘And then I met Nell, and I knew what she wanted. I don’t deny that. Perhaps I should not have encouraged her feelings for me, but I reasoned we could help each other. Do you see? She was so very lonely, and I offered her a warmth that had been missing from her life for so long. She in turn could remove from me the wearisome problem of how Mama and I were to live.’

  ‘You mean to tell me you manipulated this grieving widow, you played upon her confusion and her loneliness, in order to obtain her financial support?’ The shock in the reverend’s voice was unmistakeable.

  ‘Oh, it was not as you describe it, you must believe me. Nell was happy with me. I made her happy. She became devoted, and she willingly supported my plans for my mission. She drew great happiness from being a part of what I was trying to do. I could never have reached St Petersburg without her assistance.’ I took a handkerchief from my pocket and attempted to dry my eyes and control my tears.

  ‘It seems to me,’ the reverend spoke without looking at me now, ‘that Mrs Hewitt is a good woman… was a good woman. I believe as such she would have helped you out of good Christian kindness. She would not have seen you or your mother penniless and on the street in any event. There was no necessity for you to use her for your own personal gratification in the way that you did. You knew full well that what you were doing was a sin. Could you not have found the strength of will to deny yourself?’

  ‘I denied myself Rose! I gave up my only chance of true happiness. I never loved another, nor ever will. Whatever I shared with Nell was what she required of me, never for my own fulfilment. Nell wou
ld have me; she would not have given money to the mission otherwise. I did not take her for my own desire, for she kindled none in me, only affection. Whatever I did was in order to do God’s work.’

  ‘Nurse Marsden, that is an outrageous thing to say! To claim God would have wished you to commit a sin in his name is blasphemous!’

  ‘Surely you can see my motives were honest, were good?’

  ‘I see a woman who preyed on someone vulnerable for her own ends,’ he insisted, getting to his feet.

  I threw myself onto my knees before him. ‘But if you cannot see the good in what I did, I know that He will! He sees into my poor, imperfect heart, so that I know He sees the truth. And I know He will forgive me. He will forgive me, Reverend, will He not?’

  But Reverend Francis did not reply. He merely stood, looking down at this heartbroken, sinful wretch, and his face told me that he believed I was wrong. I was wicked. I was immoral. And God would never forgive me, no matter how far I travelled, no matter what I faced in His name, I was forever lost.

  At the end of that day’s ride we came to a clearing in the trees. The heat of the day was lessening slightly, but still we were all greatly fatigued by it, so that the men were cheered by knowing we could now stop and make camp. I myself was overjoyed – not simply for the imminent rest, but because we had at last reached those lepers rumoured to be living in the area, and whom I had begun to fear we might never find. Their settlement was so remote as to be hidden from any who did not know of its existence, and even then all the skills of our guides had to be employed for him to lead us to it.