A Murderous Malady

by Christine Trent

  I agreed that Mr. Bent was exactly whom I needed to see. I felt unsettled as I left the room with Nichols. Had I really learned anything from her, or had her interminable theatrical performance been a complete waste of my time?

  I was fresh from solving a murder at the Establishment that had sprung from unrequited love. Based upon what Nichols had just told me, I hoped I wouldn’t be facing the same situation again so soon.

  * * *

  After my odd meeting with Alice Nichols, I sought out the brave young Isaac Bent who had steered the Herbert carriage to safety. A servant offered to fetch him from the stables for me. I made my way down to the kitchens to meet him, as I didn’t think Sidney would approve of my interviewing a servant with straw, dust, and the odor of dung clinging to him in the family parlor.

  He was a bit old for a tiger—probably about fourteen, I surmised, given his small, wiry frame and coltish movements. However, he now wore a coachman’s uniform of a white shirt beneath a black vest, with camel-colored breeches and black boots—not quite the typical striped livery of the tiger. Isaac was still in the throes of excitement over his brush with danger and his newly acquired fame at having rescued his mistress and her father from danger. His cheeks were flushed, and his gaze of radiant joy was barely able to focus on me, almost as if he were in the thrall of a deeply mystical experience. I introduced myself to him and invited him to sit with me at the large dining table in the servants’ hall. I sat in the middle chair on one side of the table. Isaac placed himself at the far end of the table, making it impossible to have a normal conversation together. I realized that he was used to being seated at the opposite end from the butler or whoever was the highest-ranking servant in the Herbert household. Without a word, I got up and moved down until I was directly across from him.

  “So, Isaac, I understand you were responsible for taking your mistress to safety yesterday,” I began.

  “People call me Ike, miss,” he said with a grin, demonstrating an enormous gap between his two front teeth. “Rhymes with like, don’t it? I’m pretty popular around here now.” His narrow chest puffed out in pride, and I smiled. He gazed around the room as if hoping someone else would enter and notice his heroic presence.

  “Then I shall call you Ike. I was wondering if you might answer some questions for me.”

  “Sure I will.” Ike wasn’t even curious as to who I was.

  It was then that I noticed a delicious, spicy aroma in the air. Ike must have noticed it, too, for his nose was up in the air as he sniffed at it like a terrier who had caught the scent of a rabbit. Both our gazes locked on a loaf of walnut cake cooling at the other end of the table. However, neither of us had the authority to partake of it.

  I tapped the table to bring Ike’s attention back to me. “Can you tell me exactly what happened yesterday before you rescued your mistress and the General?” I asked.

  “Oh yes. I were very brave. Mr. Pagg, he fell off the carriage, so I jumped down, ran to the driver box, and grabbed the reins. Yes, I did. I’ve not seen him since, have you? Everyone says he’s gone to visit his mama in York, but that can’t be right.” He frowned, the first sign of clouds on his sunny face.

  “Why is that?” I asked gently.

  “Because, miss, she went to heaven last year.” He glanced down the length of the table again at the cake stand.

  This was not a conversation I wanted to have with him. Besides, if this was how Liz or the head coachman was handling relaying the troubling news to Ike, it was not my right to change the story. “I hope you don’t miss him too much,” I offered kindly.

  He frowned as he brought his attention back to me, then in an instant was all smiles again. “Not so much. I’m already getting some of his ’sponsibility while he’s away.” He pointed to his chest. “I’m in charge of caring for all the saddles now, and I’m to be the General’s driver while he’s here.”

  “That is certainly a great increase in responsibility,” I said. “You must be proud.”

  He nodded, grinning. “The master is giving me more money for what I did. I used to have eight pounds a year, but now I’m to have ten pounds a year.” He held up all of his fingers for emphasis.

  It was a considerable increase in income for the boy, a testament to Sidney’s gratitude for his efforts.

  “Very good,” I said, praising him. “Now, can you tell me what happened in more detail?”

  Unfortunately, Ike wasn’t really able to tell me much, other than that everyone was calling him the hero of Herbert House. I pressed him further as to what he had heard or perhaps seen, but all he remembered was his own heroism. I was disappointed, but I supposed I couldn’t blame him a whit for his boyish, immature recollection.

  The cook, recognizable by not only an apron but a face permanently reddened from peering into boiling pots and fiery ovens, entered the kitchen. She winked at Ike. “You haven’t touched my walnut cake, have you, boy?”

  “No, Mrs. Flowers,” he said, folding his hands on the table as if to prove he had been good.

  “Well, then,” she said, immediately getting out a knife and slicing an enormous hunk of it for him. “Good boys must be rewarded. Go on with you.”

  Ike loped out with a wave as I stood with the cook, watching him go with the cake already half devoured in his hand.

  “He’s a sweet boy, but already eighteen and not showing any signs of becoming a man. A little simple.” With a knowing look, the cook tapped the side of her head. “But he’s very obedient, and everyone from the master down to the parlor maid likes him, even if he blathers on too much.”

  Eighteen! The boy was only half again as big as eleven-year-old John Wesley, the Establishment’s errand boy.

  I stayed back to interview Mrs. Flowers, but she clearly spent all her days and most of her evenings toiling away in the kitchens and rarely left the house. I gleaned nothing of interest from her but proffered her a card identical to the one I had given Alice Nichols with a request that she let me know if she heard anything suspicious.

  I took my leave and traveled back to the Establishment, where, upon walking through the door, I encountered complete bedlam.

  CHAPTER 3

  Most of my nurses were huddled together in the library, believing themselves to be whispering, but I heard them chattering the moment I came into the entry hall. Pausing only long enough to toss my bonnet onto a hook, I went to see for myself what was causing such a dither.

  The Establishment’s library was a glorious benefit of my position here as superintendent. It had rows of bookshelves filled with novels and travel books for the patients, as well as some rather impressive medical texts for me. The best part of the library was the pair of alcoves at one end of the spacious room, which had been a ballroom in the building’s previous incarnation as some Georgian aristocrat’s London home.

  I loved to retreat here to read, study, and work on my statistical charts of disease, even though the library had once been the scene of a nurse’s demise. Sidney had mentioned a cholera outbreak in Soho. If it were true, I would be preoccupied with gathering data on it. For the moment, though, I concerned myself with the present turmoil in the room.

  I clapped my hands sharply together. “What is the source of this babbling? What could be so important that all of you are neglecting your duties?”

  As I surveyed the library, I realized that not only were my five nurses there, but so were Mrs. Webb, the cook; the hospital’s manservant, Charlie Lewis; and even John Wesley was part of the fuss and clamor.

  In fact, he hobbled over to me. “I’m glad you’re not dead, maum,” he said to me in great earnest.

  John Wesley had been injured about a year ago, suffering a broken kneecap. He had been treated by a surgeon and had—thank the Almighty—survived without infection, but his ability to walk had never been the same. With a child’s resilience, though, he had taken his infirmity in stride and had resumed his duties as soon as he could. I do confess that I continually worried about him.


  John Wesley had simply shown up at the Establishment one day, offering to do anything for a penny. I had no idea if he had a home, had escaped a workhouse, or was simply a street urchin. We kept a trundle bed for him in the kitchens and let him be. He seemed to prefer his freedom.

  “Now why would you be fearing that?” I asked, tousling his blond hair with great affection.

  Clementina Harris, my most-trusted nurse, stepped away from the others and gravely announced, “King Cholera has arrived, Miss Nightingale.”

  So what Sidney had said was true. I now saw the fear and distress in everyone’s eyes. I was unsettled myself. Cholera was notorious for starting in a neighborhood for no apparent reason, sweeping through, and claiming not only the young and old, but also the healthy and sick. Victims could die within mere hours of contracting the illness.

  Then, after several weeks of devouring nearly everything in its path, cholera would disappear as quickly as it had arrived, leaving a trail of misery, grief, and putrid bodies in its wake.

  “Where?” I inquired, dreading the answer.

  “Soho. People are contracting it at least in Broad Street, Berwick Street, and King Street. Should we prepare to take in additional patients?” Harris had thick auburn hair, done in serious, precise loops around her head. Her coiffure matched her disposition.

  “Does Dr. Killigrew know?” I asked. “Was it he who told you of it?”

  Harris shook her head. “No, miss. That Constable Lyon stopped by, looking for you. When we told him you were out, he decided to tell us instead. So that we would know straightaway.”

  I was glad I had missed Constable Douglas Lyon. I had encountered him while working on a previous investigation. He possessed the curling hair, broad shoulders, and intelligent mind of Richard, and it pained me to be in the man’s presence. I was thankful that he had thought to notify the Establishment, but seeing him always set my emotions on edge and seemed to dredge up my past.

  I set my mind firmly to considering the potential trouble at hand. “If it’s as far as King Street, we may run the risk of it reaching us here if it then goes into Regent Street and beyond. Our first responsibility will be to prevent our existing inmates from getting sick. They also must not be alarmed. All of you, return to your work and refrain from talking about this.”

  They all started to file out of the library when I heard one of them screech in the corridor.

  “Now what is it?” I called out. I couldn’t seem to keep the vexation from my voice. “There is nothing to be afraid of within the Establishment’s walls.”

  Everyone ignored me in the commotion, and in a few moments I saw a streak of fur run past me and disappear somewhere within the shelves. “What was that?” I yelped, immediately irritated by my own loss of control.

  Another of my nurses, Marian Hughes, returned to the room, breathless. “A squirrel, miss. We think he came in through an open window.”

  As if there wasn’t enough to deal with, now I had a potentially vicious rodent in my hospital. It had to be dealt with immediately.

  For the next hour, we all worked together, turning the library into a garbage heap, trying to find the animal.

  In the end, John Wesley was the only one small enough to reach into the tiny space the creature had found between two bookcases. By the time he had successfully captured the quivering young creature, he had decided it was his pet.

  So in contradiction to any rational sense I might have had in my head, I permitted John Wesley to cage and keep Dash the red squirrel in residence.

  * * *

  I was once more in the library with Mary the following day, sitting in my favorite alcove with her as we prepared some blank charts in which I would document any cases of cholera we might encounter when we traveled to Soho. I had not yet informed Mary that we would be taking this trip. It seemed to me that the next fitting thing to do would be to interview anyone who might have witnessed what happened in the carriage attack, and it wouldn’t hurt to collect some information about how the cholera was spreading while we were there.

  Poor Mary seemed very distraught. “What is it, Goose?” I asked, putting down my own pen. “You’re jumpier than that ridiculous creature John Wesley is carrying around in the cage Mr. Lewis made for him. Is it the heat? Shall we open the window?”

  “Sorry, Miss Florence. It’s just—do you think we might see cholera arrive here? In the building?”

  “I hope not. We will do all we can to prevent it. You’re probably safer here than anywhere else in London.” I tried to sound reassuring, but the truth was, nothing could stop King Cholera once he decided to knock on your door. It would take all our collective nursing skills to try to keep alive whomever he visited.

  She swallowed and nodded, then returned to drawing lines to form an empty chart. She was going to be beside herself when I announced my plan to head directly into the outbreak area.

  We had continued with our charts for about an hour when Charlie Lewis appeared in the doorway of the alcove, worrying his cap in his hands.

  “M-m-m-miss?” he said. Charlie had an unfortunate stutter that only cleared up when he talked about his time in the Navy, a time that had been cut short because of his unrelenting seasickness. Nevertheless, he had been aboard ships long enough that his face was weathered and he possessed a stoop. He was around thirty years old but looked nearly twice that.

  “Yes, Mr. Lewis?”

  “Y-y-y-you will want to come quick l-l-l-like. There’s a m-m-m-man down in the kitchens.”

  I didn’t understand. “What do you mean? What does he want?”

  Charlie shook his head. “He’s h-h-h-hurt. He’s a-a-a-asking for you.”

  My thoughts flew to the Herbert family and servants. I hoped it wasn’t anyone from that household. I didn’t waste time asking any further questions but jumped up and fled the room. Mary was close on my heels, as was Charlie. Nurse Hughes saw us racing down to the kitchens and instinctively joined us. I was glad for her clever intuition.

  I did not recognize the man who had stumbled into the Establishment, but I did recognize his problem.

  Cholera.

  He was slumped in a chair, dried vomit making a large stain on his shirt. His clothing suggested a high-level servant to me. He looked up at me, bleary-eyed. “Water,” he rasped.

  “Mrs. Webb, go pump some water.”

  “Miss Nightingale,” she protested. “This isn’t the sort of illness we accept here at the Establishment, is it? Much less in the kitchen! We should send him away, back to his own home. This man’s miasma will infect us all!” Mrs. Webb’s eyes bulged in fear as her voice rose in alarm.

  I did not want panic spreading through the hospital. If the inmates realized there was a cholera sufferer here, I could be facing a revolt, if not outright bedlam.

  “Get a pitcher of water for me,” I instructed calmly, “and you can be relieved of any other duties for the remainder of the day.” My nurses were trained in how to prepare invalid food; they could certainly manage meals for themselves.

  The woman happily scurried away from the scene of pestilence, and I returned my attention to the man. His breathing was now shallow and labored.

  “Sir, what is your name?” I asked him.

  He mumbled something indecipherable.

  “I am Miss Nightingale,” I said. He nodded his understanding even as he swayed unsteadily back and forth.

  “Can you repeat your name for me?”

  He seemed to be summoning great strength as he endeavored to sit up straight and look at me. “Fenton.” The effort to say it seemed to exhaust him, and his chin lolled against his chest.

  “Nurse Hughes, go fetch my stethoscope,” I said.

  She immediately ran to do my bidding.

  While waiting, I sat next to him and took one of his arms into my hand. He didn’t resist me. I could see that he must be a fairly young man, perhaps my age, yet his skin was shriveled and papery to the touch and his lips protruded noticeably from his face.
I gently pinched some of his skin between a thumb and forefinger, lifted it, then let go. The skin dropped slowly back into place. This man was exceedingly dehydrated, most likely because he had violently and repeatedly evacuated his bowels and purged his stomach.

  He certainly stank as if that were the case.

  “Do you need to visit the closet?” I asked.

  He shook his head no. His misery was palpable. “Nothing more,” he rasped.

  Which explained why his skin was so very dry. I was estimating that he had been infected for at least eight hours.

  “Mr. Fenton, do you have family I can send for?” I asked.

  He grunted as he looked in my direction, his eyes trying to bring me into focus. “My master …” he began.

  “Who is your master?” I asked urgently.

  We were interrupted by Nurse Hughes’s arrival with my wood stethoscope. I put the narrow tip to my ear and the flared end to his chest. His heartbeat was wild and erratic, another sign of the dreaded disease.

  There was no longer any doubt whatsoever. All I could do was make the poor man comfortable.

  But it was too risky to move him into an inmate room. We needed to fill him with water, tea, and broth, then isolate him from the other inmates.

  “Mr. Fenton,” I said again, handing the stethoscope back to Hughes. “Who is your master? Where do you live?”

  “Herrrrb,” he slurred. “Devil’s Dice.”

  Devil’s Dice? “Where is that?”

  The man named Fenton summoned enough energy to snap at me, “No, damn you, the murder. Tell Mr. Herbert …”

  The man’s dehydration was causing him to be delirious, but he gamely persevered. “Help … Mr. Maddox.”

  He raised his glassy gaze to my own, staring at me with those sunken, desperate eyes.

  “Maddox?” I said. “Who is that? Where will I find him in order to help him?”

  Fenton replied with a wracking cough and managed to grunt out, “Might be too late.”

  Before my eyes, and those of my nurses, Fenton slumped forward for the last time, no longer breathing.