Delivering the Truth (13 page)

eighteen

I waited fifteen minutes,
then half an hour for my one o'clock client to appear. I had arrived right when the clock struck one. I'd laid the dress across Faith's bed upstairs to keep it clean and out of the way and then rushed back downstairs.

The client was a lady whose husband owned a profitable mill in Newburyport. Another client had recommended me to her. We had a good rapport and she thought it worth the trip across the river to attend appointments. She'd never been late before, and I hoped she was well.

As I rose to fetch something to eat from the kitchen, I still puzzled at my client's tardiness. Through the front window I saw a boy run up and slip a note through the mail slot in the door. Could it be another letter from David so soon? I eagerly picked it up off the hall floor and opened it.

Miss Carroll,

My wife is withdrawing from your practice. I cannot have her care be with a midwife who provides murder weapons to criminals. I regret to inform you of this decision but I feel I have no choice.

I remain,

Yours respectfully,

And he had signed his name. What? I read the note again and stood staring at it, stunned.
Provides murder weapons to criminals?
The couple couldn't really think I had knowingly given away my knitting needle to be employed in a crime. Could they? I should write a response. As I sat, I read the note one more time and shook my head. I doubted a written explanation from me would change this husband's mind. He seemed to be making the decision for his wife, as many husbands did, so it wouldn't matter if she thought I was guilty or not.

I paced to the rear of the house and back to the front. And again. And again. Who would have talked about the knitting needle in public? Surely not Kevin. Most surely not Guy, since his house was one of the places I'd brought the needle to in the days leading up to the murder.

And the news had already traveled across the river. Others right here in Amesbury might fear I was a risk, as well. My busy practice could shrink to nothing in a week if this murderer weren't found, this killer who used my own precious
hand-painted
implement to stab a man. I wished I could talk the matter over with David, but I had another client coming soon and was sure he was busy with his own work.

I sat at my desk once more, astonished to see the unfinished letter I had been writing to my parents that very morning, when the sun shone and spring seemed on its way, when I had felt a world better than I did right now. I hurried to sign it and prepare it for the afternoon post. Except there was no afternoon post at the moment. I set it to the side so I could put it out in the morning. I searched for the list I had drawn up of suspects and motives. Where was it? Ah, there, sitting under my client notes.

The columns and rows told me nothing. I had begun this task before Thomas was killed. It had been all about the fire, not the murder. I added what new information I had, including my knitting needle becoming an instrument of death. I sat back, staring at the paper. How had my needle gotten into the hands of a killer? Perhaps I had forgotten a place I'd stopped with my satchel, or had neglected to remember a visitor to this parlor where I keep the satchel when I was at home. Scrolling back through my memory, though, I came up with nothing other than what I had told Kevin.

I glanced up only when there was a rap on the front door. I glanced at the clock. It had to be my two o'clock client, Isabel. I shoved the papers out of the way, ran a hand over my hair, pushed up my spectacles, and prayed I wouldn't be fired by this lady, as well.

I welcomed her in. It was her fourth pregnancy and she'd put on a good deal of weight, so she waddled into the parlor with her hands on her lower back. She sank onto the chaise with a sigh.

After I examined her and listened to her concerns—which, being the mother of three, included a measure of fatigue in keeping up with the little ones—she cocked her head and gazed at me.

I smiled and waited for what I knew was coming.

“I hear young Parry was killed with your knitting needle. Can that be true?” She cocked her head.

“It's true, I'm afraid.”

“How did it come to happen?”

“Either I lost it somewhere or the murderer stole it out of my bag.”

“You carry that satchel about everywhere, don't you?”

I nodded. “Believe me, I've been thinking hard about where those knitting needles have traveled to.”

“Well, I also hear talk you have some fault in the matter, and I want you to know I don't believe a word of it.” She reached over her belly and patted my hand. She smiled the
full-faced
,
high-color
smile of a woman close to term. “You're a fine midwife and an honest woman. Don't pay them any mind.”

“I thank thee, Isabel.” I helped her up and saw her to the door. “Earlier today a client's husband removed her from my care, so I appreciate thy faith in me, truly.”

Her mouth turned down and her eyes widened. “I'll spread the word around my friends that no one is to do any such thing. In fact, there's a newly pregnant young wife who lives in the house next door to me. I'll recommend you and your practice.”

I thanked Isabel again and watched her make her way carefully down the stairs and into a waiting buggy. At least one person didn't think I was an accomplice to murder. Gossip among women could be a powerful force for good as well as bad. Having a client who was an ally, a supporter who trusted me, could go a long way toward keeping my practice intact.

I walked into Samuel J. Brown's an hour later. Machinery clacked and whirred from the back room, as shoes were no longer made purely by hand. I picked up one pair of fancy slippers after another but I barely saw them. My cheeks still burned from the stares and muttered comments I'd gotten on my way to this shoe and boot establishment on Elm Street a little beyond Market Square. I'd first stopped in at Collins' and found the corset, long gloves, and fine stockings I needed, but even there the girl behind the counter had looked wary of helping me.

Samuel himself now appeared. “What may I help you with?” The diminutive proprietor gave a little bow and smiled at me. “It's Miss Carroll, isn't it?”

I had delivered his wife of a baby boy only a few months earlier. The baby had arrived early and was born quite small, but he had survived and thrived.

“Indeed it is. How is thy son?” I asked. “And thy wife?”

He beamed. “So very well, both of them. All thanks to your expertise.”

“I'm glad to hear it. But now I need a nice pair of slippers. It's for a dinner dance, and my frock is rose colored.” I picked up a black pair with a fairly high heel and a huge bow at the ankle. I put it down again. “But I'd prefer something more simple than these, and in a lighter color.”

The proprietor gazed down at my feet. “That'll be a size eight or so, I wager.” He opened a box from the top shelf of the rack. “How do these look?”

He proffered a pair of simple low heels. I took one in my hand. It was covered in a
cream-colored
silk, and the inside was as soft as a baby's cheek.

“How lovely. If I purchase these, I should hope I encounter no muddy puddles on my way to the party or they would be ruined in an instant.”

“Please sit, Miss Carroll, and we'll make sure they're a good fit. They're made of a
high-quality
kid leather.”

I sat and unlaced my shoes. He perched on a stool in front of me and daintily slid a slipper onto my right foot and then onto my left. He stood and offered his hand to help me up.

“A mirror is there.” He pointed. “Walk around a bit on this runner and see how they feel. If you're going to be dancing, they must be comfortable.” He pointed to a narrow Oriental rug that ended at a mirror leaning against the wall.

I did as he said. The slippers pinched my toes a little on my right foot, but otherwise were soft and felt like they would soon mold to my feet. And when I glanced in the mirror I saw how pretty they were. My feet were larger than many women's, but these made them appear nearly petite, not an adjective anyone had ever applied to me. I wasn't accustomed to this focus on fashion and an ostentatious display. But if I was going to the dance with David, I'd better make a good show of it.

“What is their cost, please?” I asked him, sitting and removing the slippers.

“They're very reasonably priced at one dollar and ten cents.”

I could afford them at that price, since my practice up to now had been thriving. “I'd like to take them, but can thee possibly stretch the right one a bit? It pinches on my small toe.”

“Certainly.” He bustled the shoe behind a curtain at the back of the room. “I'll just be a moment.”

While he was out of the room, I donned my plain shoes again and idly browsed through more pairs of fancy shoes. I supposed women of great means owned more than one pair of dancing slippers, and fancy
going-out
shoes, and who knew what else. I had always been satisfied with my single pair of serviceable
lace-up
shoes, which I replaced when necessary with another pair exactly like the first.

Two women in dark work dresses emerged from the back. One tugged on gloves, while the other pinned her hat firmly to her hair. They were nearly at the door to the street when the first one glanced over and saw me. The look on her face changed in an instant from a pleasant “my shift is over and I'm going out with my girlfriend” to one of horror. She pulled her friend's arm, who also turned her eyes to me. She whispered something, then they both rushed out the door.

“Don't you worry, now.” Samuel's voice came from behind me. “I know you weren't involved in that terrible affair. And the whole town will, too, when the authorities find the killer.” He extended a package wrapped in paper and string to me. “You have a good time at your party and ignore those gossips.”

“I thank thee, Samuel.” I paid him what was due and pulled on my cloak. I wished it would wrap me in invisibility and shield me from a town's worth of accusing eyes on my way home.

nineteen

The three youngest Baileys
burst ruddy-cheeked through the back door a few moments after I arrived home from my shopping. I
had been forced to endure a few more comments and stares as I walked and was glad to be in the privacy of home again.

“Rose, a p'liceman's here!” Betsy exclaimed, pushing her bonnet off her head so it hung down her back by its ties. She ran to the window of the sitting room and pointed.

“Good heavens, are they visiting me on a daily schedule now?” I set my hands on my hips.

“But it's not the detective,” Matthew added. “The one who gave me his hat to wear.”

I joined them and checked the street. A uniformed Guy Gilbert stood with hat in hand. He shifted from one foot to the other, as if uncertain whether he wanted to be there or not. I went to the front door and opened it. The children crowded behind me.

“Guy Gilbert,” I called. “Is thee coming in or am I wanted for more questioning?”

He gazed down the street and back at me. “I'll come in.” He walked up the front steps.

“Children, back up and let the policeman in.”

They obliged, but barely. Three pairs of eyes were bright at the prospect of speaking with yet another man in uniform. Perhaps First Day School would need another lesson on the peaceable ways soon.

“Hello, Miss Carroll. Hello, you young ones.” Guy smiled at them, but his mouth twitched and his eyes sported dark shadows under them.

“Please come in and sit down,” I said. “Betsy, Mark, Matthew, run along and wash up. We'll have our tea in a bit.” Mark lingered, his eyes fixed with fascination on the billy club affixed to Guy's belt, but he ran after the others when I gave him my stern auntie look.

I ushered Guy into the parlor and shut the door firmly. “Thee looks uncertain, Guy. What can I help thee with? Is this an official call?”

“Oh, no, not at all.” He remained standing, rotating his hat around and around in his hands. “I need to speak with you. On a personal matter.”

I waited, certain it would be about Nell's health.

“It's my wife. You saw how sad she seems. It's like a darkness took her over. Sometimes she simply sits and weeps. She seems not to care about Lizzy. Or me, for that matter.”

“It's the postpartum melancholia. Some new mothers experience it lightly and some not at all. But Nell seems to have a bad case.”

“Is there nothing that can be done?” He spread one hand open. “No medicine that can fix it?”

“I prescribed her a tonic that is high in iron and I took her some calming tea. But I don't believe that will be enough.” I rued the lack of medical help available. “The depressive state should pass with time, do know that.”

He opened his mouth as if about to speak, and then shook his head.

“What is it?” I asked, wearing my imaginary pastor's hat. “Something else troubles thee.” I clasped my hands in front of me.

“The thing is, she went out the other night. Alone, at night! I tried to stop her, but she turned on me and then ran out.”

“Is that when thee got this?” I reached up and gently touched the scratch on his face.

He nodded. “She was like an animal with claws.”

“What night was this?”

His face twisted with anguish. “The night Thomas Parry was killed.”

Oh, my. This wasn't welcome news. I thought for a moment. “Surely thee doesn't think Nell would kill Thomas,” I said. “Would she have a reason to do so?”

He paced a few steps away and turned back, like an animal yearning to escape a cage. “Parry had courted her before she married me. She rebuffed him and he was mean to her, called her some right unpleasant names.” He kept rotating his hat. “I tried to make her happy. And she was, all throughout the time she was carrying Lizzy.”

“Yes, she seemed well.” I had seen her throughout her pregnancy and had detected no problems, had heard no complaints from her. And Guy had been the picture of a doting husband and
father-to
-be. “Had she seen Thomas Parry recently?”

“I don't know, you see.” He ran a hand over his brow. “I'm at the station every day doing my job. She could have encountered him somewhere in town, I'm sure.”

As I had seen her encountering Jotham in town—the same Jotham who found the body. I did not raise this with Guy, however. It might upset him even more.

“I expect thee came here because thee does not want to relate this story of Nell's going out that night to thy superior.” I raised my eyebrows.

“Oh, Miss Carroll, what am I to do? I need to tell Detective Donovan. But what if he arrests my Nellie? How will I live?” He swallowed hard, seeming to fight back tears. He shook his head and straightened his back.

“Does thee think her capable of murder?”

“Not the Nell I married, no. But she's someone different now. When she rouses herself out of that sad dark place, she can act cruel. Or insane, more like.”

“But how would she have gotten her hands on my knitting needle?” I took in a sharp breath and clapped my hand to my mouth. I knew well the answer to my own question.

“What is it?” Guy's eyebrows shot up.

“When I visited your home on Second Day, I carried my satchel with me. As is my habit. And those long needles often poke out of the top. Nell was alone with the bag once when I carried Lizzy into the other room.” My heart was a cold stone in my chest. This was information we were obliged to share with Kevin. And if Nell Gilbert had killed Thomas, then Lizzy faced an existence without a mother and Guy would lose his dear wife.

I had dispatched an anguished Guy with firm instructions to go at once and tell Kevin Donovan what he knew about poor Nell. I hoped he would oblige, because if he didn't, I would have to and it would go all the worse for the young officer.

As soon as I began to fire up the stove for supper, Hiram Henderson appeared again, looking nearly as upset as he had when he'd fetched me on First Day evening to attend his wife's labor.

“The baby is ailing. Can you come right away?” He stood twisting his hands, his eyes full of anguish. “He's very sick.”

“Of course.”

Faith arrived home as I came out of the parlor after fetching
my bag.

“I'm sorry, Faith,” I said. “I was going to help thee with supper, but now I'm called away.”

“Not to worry, Rose.” Fatigue lined Faith's forehead over reddened eyes, and it was only Fourth Day. “We will do it, right, Betsy?” She put an arm around her little sister's shoulders.

Betsy nodded, and I hurried away with Patience's husband, a chilly rain now wetting our heads. My stomach complained of emptiness, but a meal would have to wait. My advice to Faith about keeping herself strong first was becoming a case of, Do as I say, not as I do.

Once in the Henderson flat, with all thoughts of a bloody knitting needle vanished from my brain, I held a critically ill
four-day
-old baby. He slept, but his breaths were rasping and fast, and his skin burned.

“He's so hot, and he won't take the breast,” Patience whispered, her face etched with fear. “What's wrong with him?” She wore a wrapper over her nightgown and her flaming hair hung down in a braid, as if she'd never gotten properly dressed that day.

“When did this come on?” I asked.

“He was fussy yesterday, but I thought it was a touch of the colic. Last night he began to scream and was hot.”

“Did thee try to cool him?” I unwrapped him down to his diaper, which I was glad to see was fastened with one of the new safety pins, much better than the straight pins that sometimes pierced a baby's skin.

“I took him outside into the cold air, but it didn't help. And then today he became listless. He's not screaming anymore, but he hasn't nursed since yesterday.”

“Bring me a basin of cool water and a towel, perhaps a piece of flannel.” His diaper was dry, always an alarming sign in an infant. He needed fluids badly. I wished she'd sent for me earlier, but there was no reversing the past, and it would help not at all to lay guilt upon her at a time like this.

With shaking hands, she set a basin and a towel on the table. I laid him down, removed the diaper, and began to swab him all over with cool water. His little arms and legs moved, and he let out a soft cry. I wet his head. When I wiped his neck and chest, the cool cloth warmed too fast. I wet it and wiped him again, leaving the water on his skin. After he was wet all over, I picked him up.

“Try to nurse him now.” I handed him to his mother.

Patience sank into a chair and exposed her left breast. “Come on, Timmy. Please drink for Mama,” she urged. She coaxed his cheek with her nipple. Her husband hovered behind her, wringing his hands. He raised a handkerchief to his mouth and coughed.

I laid a freshly cool cloth on the baby's forehead. When he turned toward the breast and opened his little mouth, Patience pressed the nipple into it. He sucked once but then flopped back into the crook of her arm.

Patience looked up at me, tears in her eyes. “See, Rose? It's like our first Timmy, except he was already six months old when we lost him.”

I tried to help her express some milk into his mouth but it only dribbled out the side, a tiny trail of fluid crying down his burning cheek.

“I think it's time to take him to the hospital,” I said. “Do you have a conveyance?” I gazed from one parent to the other.

Hiram shook his head, hard. “But I can pay for one. I'll fetch a hansom cab.” He coughed again.

I stood and laid an arm on his at the door. “Hurry.”

He threw me a look, his eyes full, and rushed down the steps. I brought a new cool cloth to Patience and knelt to wipe baby Timmy's head and face. She stroked his cheek.

“Come on, sweetie. Drink for me.” A tear dropped on his face and mixed with drops of milk leaking from her full breast. “He was so well the first couple of days. I don't understand what happened.” She looked at me.

“He was a healthy newborn,” I agreed. “But their little systems are fragile at first. I'm afraid babies sicken in their first months far more often than anyone wishes.” I dared not try to raise her hopes. Even if Timmy made it to the hospital, his chances were slim. And what more would they do there than we were doing here? We had to try to lower his temperature so he would feel strong enough to drink. It was simple and, at this point, seemed unlikely to happen. I held him in the Light as I wiped his hot head again.

“What do you think ails him?” she asked.

“Some kind of infection. I know not what. Unfortunately there are sicknesses that abound. Consumption, scarlet fever, influenza, even typhoid. And pneumonia, as thee knows.” I thought her husband's cough might be the culprit, no matter what its cause. He'd probably had a high temperature earlier, too.

The baby's arms and legs began to shake.

“He's convulsing. Turn him on his side and hold him,” I told Patience as her eyes widened. “It's from the fever.”

The shaking continued. His eyes flew open but they were unseeing. His breathing grew noisier. His mouth hung open. He exhaled with a rattle and didn't inhale for a long moment. He took a labored breath in and out, and did not breathe again.

“No, Timmy!” Patience clutched him to her. “Breathe, my son. You can't leave us.” She sobbed over his tiny body. “No, no, no.”

As she rocked back and forth with him, the pinkness of his skin grew pale. The change traveled up from his hands and feet. The color faded out of his face. Finally his torso lost its rosy hue. I had seen this moment before, when the soul takes its leave and the body becomes a waxen shell. But it always brought tears to my own eyes and a great lump to my throat, especially in a person so new to this world.

Hiram burst into the room. “I've got a cab! He's waiting—” He caught sight of Patience rocking, weeping. He stared at me.

I nodded with sorrow.

“We've lost our boy.” He let out a great cry of anguish and rushed to his wife's side. He wrapped his arms around both of them.

Leaving them to grieve together, I went to tell the hansom he was no longer needed. Instead I asked him to return in an hour to pick me up. I didn't care to walk the streets of our town alone at night, and darkness was falling.

I trudged back up the stairs. I now had to guide this devastated couple through summoning the undertaker and burying their second Timmy. Not to mention helping Patience to bind her breasts and cope with a body still producing ample sustenance for an infant who was no longer of this world.