A Debutante in Disguise

by Eleanor Webster

He hadn’t realised this. He hadn’t thought he could still love, not like this. He had perhaps imagined a duty-bound sentiment, more about his estate and England than any deep feeling. Or perhaps a light flirtation, if he healed sufficiently.

  But not this. Not this big, confusing and all-encompassing emotion.

  The idea of a life without her stretched bleakly. ‘Letty, I don’t need a certain type of wife. I want you.’

  ‘Eventually you will,’ she said. ‘Your life will have purpose again.’

  ‘It has now—’

  She shook her head. ‘Maybe as Teddy’s uncle. But you have an estate. Oddsmore was greatly loved by your father and brother. You will assume that role and you will need a helpmeet.’

  He went to her, the movement swift, despite the pain in his side. There must be words. He could not lose this woman. He could not lose this feeling of hope...of rebirth. He sat at the table, leaning forward to hold her hand, small but capable.

  ‘Letty, I don’t care about being a peer. I don’t want some simpering debutante.’

  Lifting his arm, he leaned further to touch the tendrils framing her face. The movement dislodged the papers. They fell from the table in a scattering of rectangles across the floor. Each sheet was covered with neat script, tables and diagrams. He frowned, puzzled.

  Loosening his hand, she bent to get them, the movement oddly urgent.

  ‘What is all this?’ he asked.

  Colour washed into her face. She took them from him. ‘I was just recording Teddy’s treatment.’

  ‘All this is about Teddy?’ He glanced over what appeared to be hundreds of pages.

  ‘Some,’ she said.

  ‘And the rest?’

  ‘It is a project I’ve been working on. I—um—tend to take the notes with me.’ She spoke with uncharacteristic hesitation.

  ‘What is the project about?’

  She bit her lip and then gave a wide smile which was always the more striking by its very rarity. ‘I’ve always wanted to understand why some women die after the delivery of a healthy child due to fever. The birth goes smoothly. Everything looks positive and then, often around the third day, she sickens and dies.’

  ‘Puerperal fever. I have heard of it. You are looking for a cure or a way to prevent it?’

  ‘Yes. Both. I am sure there is a way.’ Her eyes sparkled behind the thick lenses, her enthusiasm contagious and overcoming her previous hesitation. ‘That is what medicine is about—learning and discovering. I don’t know if I will find the reason or if it will be found in my lifetime or even Teddy’s. But I believe every illness has a physiological cause and therefore a physiological cure.’

  He sat, the movement heavy as though suddenly too tired or overwhelmed to keep himself upright.

  ‘So you are trying to find a cure for childbed fever?’

  ‘And maybe the antecedent, how to prevent it. Why do some individuals contract it and others do not?’

  ‘Explain it to me,’ he said. ‘Help me to understand.’

  She stilled. ‘Do you really want to know?’

  He was reminded of that first question so long ago in Lord Entwhistle’s library. ‘Yes,’ he said.

  Very carefully, she collected the pages. She placed them on the table, arranging them as though they were infinitely precious. He watched her gentle fingers and the precision of each movement.

  ‘You see these are all the live births from the villages close to here,’ she explained, pointing to a column in a neatly drawn table.

  ‘And you have identified the attending physician or midwife.’

  ‘Yes—Jeffers, Hedley, Marcham, Belrose, Simons.’ She tapped each name as she spoke.

  ‘And these—’ She pulled forward a second sheet, again neatly organised with the names of women, villages and physicians. ‘These indicate births where the mother or the child died.’

  He nodded, gazing at the list, which was too long, his hand tightening reflexively against the chair arm. ‘It makes me so thankful for Elsie and Teddy.’

  ‘But these are the cases I am most interested in.’ She pulled forward a third chart.

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because the child and mother were both healthy after the birth. These women should not have died. There were no complications, no great blood loss. The child was not in a breech position.’ Again, she smoothed out the page, her fingers almost reverent. ‘They are the cases of puerperal fever.’

  ‘So you are trying to see if there is a particular doctor or midwife who attended those births?’ He pointed to the column with the heading ‘physician attending’.

  ‘Jeffers, Hedley and Simons. They are all doctors, not midwives.’

  He leaned back, in his chair. ‘So you think that a mother is more likely to contract a fever if a doctor attends the birth, as opposed to a midwife? That doesn’t make sense.’

  ‘I know. But science does not lie. I must believe that. I mean there are instances when a mother contracts fever when attended by a midwife, but they are consistently less frequent and that is across several communities and involving a number of different doctors and midwives.’

  ‘Do you have any ideas why this might be?’

  ‘It doesn’t seem to matter if the doctor is young or old, experienced or inexperienced. I even controlled for the mother’s age and social standing. In fact, the wealthier the individual, the more likely she is to take ill because these families can afford a doctor.’

  ‘Perhaps a doctor may have further to travel and is unable to provide the help as expeditiously as the local midwife,’ he suggested.

  She shook her head. ‘The deaths occurred several days after the birth. The births were successful and uncomplicated.’

  ‘Are doctors less efficient? Do they drink too much?’

  ‘Dr Hedley is quite puritanical and Mrs Belrose drinks like a fish. The biggest difference is that doctors often come from another sickbed or the morgue whereas midwives deal only with birth.’

  He straightened. He pictured Letty in her Hatfield disguise, standing belligerently in front of Jeffers at Teddy’s birth. ‘My God, hand washing. That is why you are so insistent on the hand washing!’

  ‘It is a hypothesis.’

  ‘You think that the doctors are transmitting the illness?’

  ‘Unwittingly. Maybe. Midwives do not go to the morgue as often and usually not immediately before a delivery. As women, they tend to wash more frequently, even if it is only due to the activities of cooking, washing or childcare. I still don’t know the exact reason, but these records are consistent over years.’

  ‘Years? How long have you been working on this?’

  ‘Ten years.’

  ‘Ten? But you wouldn’t have even trained then? You would have been a child.’

  ‘As an adolescent,’ she said, ‘I’d slip out and attend births with the midwives. One time there was a young mother with her first child. The birth was uncomplicated and she was so happy and everything seemed well. Then the next day she got a fever. Within a week she was dead. Her husband—he was a tall man—not much more than a lad. I remember him holding the baby in his huge hands like he didn’t know what to do with it—as though it was a bizarre and foreign object. I asked the midwife what had happened and she said she didn’t know. She said sometimes a mother just takes ill. It just happens, she said. She spoke as though it was expected. I couldn’t accept that.’

  ‘There are things one can’t accept,’ he said. He remembered the field, the mud and the dead faces.

  He remembered the boy with the bayonet in his gut.

  ‘I had to do something. At that time, I didn’t think I would ever be able to train or get medical knowledge, but I knew I could record births and deaths. I could make charts and graphs. I could look for patterns. I could see if there were similarities or commonalities between those who liv
ed and died. Sometimes, you just have to start somewhere.’

  Her face had flushed pink. Her eyes sparkled and he saw her excitement, the quickness of her breath, the pulse beating along her collarbone and that smile which always transformed her usually serious demeanour.

  ‘Most girls look like that when describing diamonds,’ he muttered.

  ‘Diamonds? What have they to do with anything?’

  ‘Apparently nothing.’

  He stared at the papers. He felt oddly as though he had gained a peek into a strange, unknown world. He could not imagine being so interested, so passionate, so determined and so persistent.

  About anything.

  He’d spent his youth in lively and pleasurable pursuits and his present staring down the neck of a bottle.

  He was in awe of her dedication.

  Oddly, he felt both hopeful and despairing. For humanity, he felt a lightness. She had worked her whole life towards knowledge and discovery, against the odds. It was not only a part of her, it was her. These neat notes, the tables, the headings, the illustrations and her scrupulous attention to detail—they were her life’s work.

  And while people like her existed, with this drive, this intelligence and this compassion, hope existed.

  But he felt also heaviness and loss.

  Letty had brought him back from the mud of battle. Without fully knowing it, he’d constructed vague but wonderful plans in a mind formerly blank with despair. And she was central to his every plan and happy daydream. He’d cast her as wife and mother, a role she did not want.

  And by fulfilling this dream, he would take away her own.

  He lifted his gaze from the papers and stared out of the window at the green expanse of Beauchamp’s well-tended park. He had not worked his whole life towards anything. Edgar cared about the estate. George, too. But Tony had passed through life with interest, always seeking pleasure and entertainment but never with any great purpose. He’d gone to dances, house parties, fox hunts and horse races. He’d laughed over cards and flirted with pretty girls.

  Yesterday, as they’d made love and later curled together within the warmth of her bed, he’d thought he’d found that purpose; to love her and to be with her.

  But he would not ask her to live at Oddsmore. He could not take her from her practice. He could not tie her to children.

  That would not be love.

  And he loved Lettuce Barton. He loved every eccentric hair on her eccentric head.

  He got up. He must go. The maid might come in any time. Slowly, he bent, picking up his shirt and pulling it over his head.

  ‘Thank you,’ he said. ‘Thank you for telling me about your research. It is amazing. You are amazing. It helps me to understand why you can’t marry. I see that this—is bigger than me or you.’

  He walked to the door, placing his hand on the knob.

  What did one say? Thank you for last night? I love you? I love you with every fibre of my being? I love you enough to set you free?

  ‘I will go to Oddsmore as soon as Elsie and Teddy are fully recovered. I need to live up to my responsibilities—but if you ever need anything, you can find me there.’

  He opened the door and stepped into the corridor. The door closed behind him. For a moment, he stood quite still. He exhaled, aware of the lingering pain in his torso and the smart of tears. Letty had woken him from a nightmare and, for a moment, a split second, an infinitesimal fraction of time, he’d believed in the daydream of a happy ending.

  * * *

  It was the first time Letty had shared her research with anyone. She’d explained it to Ramsey, but never shown him. She’d mentioned it at Guy’s, but had largely met with dismissal.

  But Tony had listened. He’d given her his full attention. He studied her ideas with intelligence. He hadn’t scoffed or disparaged.

  She’d always feared scorn. Everyone was so busy debating the issues of purification, bloodletting and inflammation that her own theory would seem simplistic in the extreme. But she’d seen Tony’s expression. He understood. He was impressed even.

  Yet, as Letty heard the door close, and his footsteps retreat down the hallway, something hurt, deep under her breast bone.

  There was an intensity to the pain which she had not known was possible. She stood, walking to the window and squeezing her eyes tight.

  As always, in times of uncertainty or stress, she reminded herself of her patients. She pictured children not yet born; the injuries she could set and the fevers she might heal. In general, such contemplation proved a pleasant diversion. Indeed, she’d often comforted herself when walking through London’s streets or listening to yet another of her mother’s lectures on bonnets or tea or etiquette.

  But now Letty could not stay still. She paced the bedchamber. She went from one side of the room, turning swiftly, like a soldier on patrol.

  She had never realised what it meant to be a woman. It sounded foolish. She was four and twenty. She knew more about female physiology, conception, childbirth than any other woman.

  And she knew nothing. She’d thought that science and logic were more important than feeling or emotion. Sentiment was for those who were weaker or less disciplined.

  But last night...

  Tony made her feel whole, alive, vibrant, joyful, loved in a way she had not anticipated, as though she’d been existing in a shadowy half-life.

  Return to the calmness, the routine and order of her life within her twin houses should appeal and it didn’t. The hope that she might be able to continue as Dr Hatfield should engender joy, as opposed to this slight relief that was largely overshadowed by numbness.

  Even her scientific tomes did not lure her.

  Or her correspondence with Sir Humphry Davy. Quite recently he had replied to her enquiry about nitrous oxide and yet she felt no immediate urge to reply.

  It felt as though she were going mad or that the landscape she knew, or had always known, had changed, morphing into something entirely unfamiliar. She’d never wanted a husband, love, or marriage. Moreover, it would be entirely selfish to even consider Tony’s proposal.

  She could not be a suitable chatelaine to his estate. She could not plan meals or invite the right people and ensure that the numbers of dinner guests were suitably balanced.

  With sudden frustration, she turned from the window. She pulled out the valise. Grabbing her few belongings, she stuffed them into the case. With quick, angry energy, she pulled it closed, snapping it shut.

  She needed to get away from this house. No wonder she could think of nothing except Lord Anthony. Memories surrounded her. The bed was still rumpled from their lovemaking, the musky scent of him still lingered, even his cravat lay dishevelled, mixed within the linen.

  Pausing, she looked at the silk fabric as it lay, dark blue against the white. Slowing for a moment, she picked it up. She ran the fabric between her fingers, feeling it slide softly against her skin.

  Then she tossed it into the valise. It would not do for the maid to find it.

  * * *

  Home did not bring comfort. Letty still could not concentrate. Nor could she rest. Indeed, she continued to pace with such speed and heaviness of foot that Sarah came up to her bedchamber.

  ‘Good heavens, you’ll end up coming through the ceiling at this rate,’ her maid said, folding her arms across her ample chest and narrowing her gaze.

  ‘I’m thinking,’ Letty said.

  ‘Indeed. And would these thoughts be medical or personal in nature?’

  ‘What? Both—I mean—I never thought there would be a difference. I mean being a doctor is at the heart of everything I do and everything I am. And I never thought I would want anything else than to be a doctor.’

  ‘And now there is something else you would want?’ Sarah asked, advancing into the room.

  ‘What? No. Absolutely not.�
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  ‘I might say “I think she dost protest too much”.’

  ‘Please don’t, I never liked Shakespeare. All his characters say everything in such a convoluted fashion. I am quite certain if they spoke plain English, there would be fewer misunderstandings. And I do not think that there is any potion which would feign death as was described in Romeo and Juliet.’

  ‘I always knew it would happen,’ Sarah said with a comfortable certainty.

  ‘What?’ Letty grumbled. ‘Romeo would die?’

  ‘You’d fall in love.’

  Letty drew to an abrupt halt, putting her hands at her waist and glowering at her servant. ‘Good heavens, Sarah, what a load of—of nonsense. I think you have been nipping at the cooking wine. I am surprised at you. Indeed, you are letting your imagination entirely get the better of you. If anything, I am still overtired because I was up for days fighting for Teddy. I am certainly not in the least bit in love. Indeed, I don’t even like the expression. It sounds like a cheap romance and so very unscientific.’

  ‘You may not like the expression and you may find it unscientific, but that doesn’t mean it is not true.’

  ‘It is total nonsense,’ Letty repeated. ‘And let me make myself crystal clear—it is completely and totally false and I will not tolerate any more suggestions which are so ludicrous in nature.’

  ‘Now I know it’s true. You always get on your high horse and sound like your mother when you’re trying to pull the wool over my eyes.’ Sarah bent over the valise, starting to unpack it. ‘As I recall, you used to do that as a child. You never were so haughty as when you were in the middle of some odd experiment you hoped to hide.’

  ‘I don’t hope to hide anything and I am not sounding like my mother and I am not pulling the wool over anyone’s eyes and I am certainly not harbouring any affection for Lord Anthony. Besides, even if I were, I am not the sort of wife Lord Anthony needs. I mean, he is a peer. He needs a proper wife. Someone who can host parties and dance and say witty things and go to London. Besides, I can’t give up medicine. I could never live a life where all I did was sit around and sip tea or discuss bonnets. I don’t know anything about bonnets and I only tolerate tea. And certainly not in those foolish delicate cups which are meant for people with miniature fingers. Besides, he doesn’t love me and would only marry me for honour and—’