Little Bones (3 page)

Doctor’s assistant! Was that the same as a nurse? Nurses wore very smart uniforms, but they did all the dirty work, they did not just wipe clammy foreheads and straighten up the bed-sheets. So far, she had only ever sorted beads, run errands, swept floors, cleaned, and been a general dogsbody. How would she manage? Pressing her face into her hands, Jane tried picturing the worst bloody injuries in order to prepare herself. Gouged eyes. Mangled limbs. Burns. Only last month, she had heard of the girls in the Wilson Hat Factory fire jumping through windows, skirts billowing like yacht sails as they escaped the thunderous flames, only to be killed outright on landing. ‘Skulls split like eggshells,’ Agnes had told her. ‘The pavement was scarlet for weeks.’ And, blowing out her candle, Jane could see those desperate girls, their skirts whirling in the thin trail of smoke, their arms entwined, dancing.

Now the room felt very empty, and the moonlight made shadows like kites across the wall. Every so often she could hear the wind banging into the window. She could feel it on her face. It made a high, thin, singing sound.

*

The doctor held his fists across his desk, asking Jane to choose one, which he opened.
Empty!
Her little heart sank. Then with a short puff of breath he reached behind her ear, and sitting in the upturned palm of his hand was a small glass paperweight patterned with coral.

‘You must keep it,’ he told her. ‘It fell from the sky as I walked down Chancery Lane; it very nearly killed me.’

‘Thank you, sir,’ she said, quickly examining the bony white branches and the fine green bubbles before slipping it into her pocket, where the weight of it dragged down her skirt.

The doctor smiled and Jane could feel herself blushing, because in all honesty he appeared to be a gentleman, and nothing like those doctors she had visited for her bones – charlatans she supposed, with their boxes of veterinary instruments, pots of cure-alls and greasy white coats. Around Dr Swift, with his sharply trimmed beard, there was the scent of tobacco, boot polish and limes.

‘Things often fall from the sky,’ he warned her. ‘Last week I caught a very pretty teacup. It was more or less perfect, not so much as a hair crack in it.’

They were sitting in the small back room. Mrs Swift had called it ‘the consulting room’, though with the messy desk, the large mahogany bookcase and clumpy swivel chair, Jane wondered how the doctor might reach towards the patient to do any consulting at all.

‘I am a visiting doctor,’ he explained. ‘I go into the world of the theatre, treating chorus girls, West End stars, and everything in between.’

‘West End stars?’ Jane suddenly felt giddy.

‘It has been known, though discretion must be used in all cases, because I have sworn an oath, and you must do the same.’

‘I would not tell a soul, sir, about anything.’

‘Then good. I will take you at your word, and trust in your God-given honesty.’

‘Is that my oath, sir?’ she asked.

‘Did you mean it?’ said the doctor. ‘Do you swear to keep what you will see to yourself?’

Jane nodded. ‘Yes, sir.’

‘Then that is your oath,’ he said.

He explained that gossip was rife, especially in the fragile itinerant world of the theatre, and as his assistant she would see all manner of things that were often very personal, or indeed, unusual.

‘Like tattoos,’ he said. ‘Last Wednesday evening, I was treating a respectable-looking soprano. The girl was young, shy and demure, yet when she lifted her chemise I came face to face with a ruby-eyed dragon penned in indelible ink.’

Jane reddened. ‘But I thought only salts had tattoos, or wrestlers and the like? Why did she have a tattoo?’

The doctor leant towards her, narrowing his eyes. ‘I did not ask,’ he said. ‘I did not mention that inky beast at all, because we are discreet with the patient and discreet with the world. Understand?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘Then good,’ he smiled, the skin around his eyes crinkling like paper. ‘It is almost seven o’clock and we should proceed to Axford Square.’

‘You have a trap, sir? A fly? Should I call for it?’

The doctor shook his head. ‘I have nothing but my boots. The traffic in town clogs up the lanes: why sit in a carriage twiddling your thumbs when you could be wending your way on foot?’

‘What if it was an emergency, sir?’

‘If it was an emergency, then I would run.’

And so they walked, through the early theatre
crowds
, past a winding hurdy-gurdy that set Jane’s teeth on edge. The streets were busy, and most of the shops still open for business: the ironmonger’s, the purveyors of sporting goods, Mr Locke the book man, his covered stall spilling with what appeared to be dictionaries and guides to flora and fauna, the print-maker next door in his black splattered apron, wiping ink from his red and blue fingers.

In St Martin’s Lane, where the buildings rose in dirty gingerbread lines, the chop houses squeezed next to drinking clubs, and where a tail of tatty stalls offered cheap second-hand items, a man the size of a wardrobe was selling tiny bird-shaped whistles, his rubbery lips making the most delicate sound. Jane smiled at him. He waved his little bird, and she almost tripped around the corner into a boy with scabs and rotten teeth touting for dog races and cockerel fights. ‘All hush-hush, and no harm done to anyone but the cocks, who let’s face it, might look the worse for wear when they fall into the soup pot.’

Quickly doffing his hat, ignoring the boy’s spit and grimace, the doctor turned into Axford Square, a crescent of tottering houses – said to remind people of Bath – in very reduced circumstances. By now Jane was almost breathless, legs aching, her neck slightly cricked in case something else should fall from the sky, a fan perhaps, or a lace-trimmed hankie, nothing too weighty or life-threatening.

The doctor stopped at the door and knocked. They had to wait a couple of minutes before the door was opened by a harassed-looking serving girl.

‘My dearest Nell, I think you will find I am expected.’

*

When the girl and the doctor disappeared, Jane shuffled along the hall with its faded threadbare rugs, and, standing precariously on tiptoe, peered into the large foxed mirror to examine her teeth, which if truth be told were the least crooked part of her body. She studied the pictures, the gilt-framed scenes of the sweet idyllic countryside, with its gambolling lambs, red hens, and doe-eyed herds of cattle that made her think of Kent. When the doctor came through the door, the remnant of a cigar squashed between his fingers, Jane smoothed down her apron and pulled her cuffs straight before folding them back (thrice) over her childlike hands.

‘Upstairs,’ he said. ‘Follow me.’

It was a tall, narrow house, its windows edged with cracked coloured glass. The walls on the staircase had been papered, and the paper had not been properly aligned, so the flower and trellis pattern broke off in all directions and when Jane pressed her finger against it, she could feel a soft bubble. Eventually, they reached a closed white door at the end of a landing. The doctor knocked, and a very soft voice answered back.

‘In we go,’ he whispered, pushing at the handle. Stepping into the room they met with a thin woman in a billowing nightgown sitting propped like a doll in a bed.

‘Miss Martha Bell?’

‘Yes.’

The doctor bowed, and Jane followed suit, making the woman smile. ‘So you’re a double act?’ she said. ‘A distinctly comic turn.’

Smiling indulgently, the doctor pulled a chair towards the bedside, telling Jane to clear all the mess from the sheets – the open periodicals, damp handkerchiefs, the plate of greasy cake crumbs – which she did, all the time glancing at the patient, with her dull inky hair, jittery fingers, her skin the colour of slightly rancid milk.

The doctor washed his hands with a piece of yellow soap, and Jane was there to pass him things, an ointment, a flannel, and something resembling a spoon.

‘You are certainly inconvenienced,’ the doctor said afterwards.

‘What can I do?’

‘You must not be hasty,’ he said, reaching for a towel. ‘It’s an important decision, and you must sleep on it.’

‘When will you be back?’

‘Tomorrow. Or the day after that.’

‘Can the girl stay?’ she asked.

He looked at his watch. ‘I can give you ten minutes,’ he said.

After Dr Swift had left the room, Jane suddenly felt awkward, and not knowing quite where to put herself, she moved around the room, tidying things.

Miss Bell asked, ‘What exactly ails you?’ What do the doctors have to say about it?’

Jane stopped. She could feel her face burning. ‘That my bones, miss,’ she stuttered, ‘when they were trying to grow, didn’t know what they were doing.’

‘Poor bones. I once knew a man whose wife played his ribcage like a xylophone, they were a very popular act.’

‘I like the music hall.’

‘You do? Haven’t you heard?’ said Miss Bell. ‘The
music
hall is dying. It’s a slow and painful death, and I am sick of it.’

They said nothing after that. Miss Bell closed her eyes, Jane watched the clock, and a few minutes later the doctor was calling her downstairs.

The side streets were empty. A cold wind whipped through the clouds, revealing all the crooked constellations of the stars. ‘A rare sight in London,’ the doctor whistled. ‘Reminds me of my time in Brighton, where the sky was a picture every night.’

‘You lived by the sea, sir?’

He nodded. ‘The house was almost touching the shingle, the waves drumming like a heartbeat, like the constant steady ticking of a clock.’

And though Jane thought he sounded like the sickly-faced poet Agnes had once taken a liking to, she knew what he meant about the waves, because she had lived by the river, she had visited Margate, eating winkles with the rest of them, laughing at the puppets, digging the sand, and all to the sound of the sea.

That night Jane added Martha Bell to her prayers, saying them quickly, because her knees were sore from walking and the air felt very cold. In her pocket the paperweight was frozen, and she breathed on it before pushing it under the mattress. She would spend ten minutes looking out of the window for Agnes. No more than that. It was late. The clock was chiming midnight.

‘Where is he?’ said Miss Bell. ‘Where is the doctor?’

‘At a lodging house, miss. The Good Fairy Cockleshell in
Robinson Crusoe
has been taken very badly.’

‘And how long will Swift be with this mollusc?’

‘It was an emergency, miss. He’ll be here as soon as he can.’

When Miss Bell had settled with a cup of tea, three ginger biscuits and a dog-eared novelette, Jane tried to stir the smoky fire into some kind of life. Gently lifting the edge of the curtain, she looked to see if there was any sign of the doctor, but the street was almost empty, and the lamps were being lit. It was just past six o’clock.

Jane knew the house belonged to a woman called Miss Silverwood – the patients paid Miss Silverwood, who then paid the doctor. The serving girl Nell told her this. Nell said the women paid a small fortune, though she wondered where the money went, because there was never enough coal, and the butcher wanted paying.

When the doctor eventually arrived, he was stumbling a little, spouting apologies, bringing the damp inside and the scent of his cigar.

‘I have heard such horror stories,’ said Miss Bell. ‘Do you use knitting needles doused in bleach? Or a syringe perhaps? Carbolic?’

‘I am a physician, not a butcher,’ he said, placing his smouldering cigar on the lip of a saucer, warming his hands, then pressing so hard on her navel he left the pale ghostly imprint of his fingers on her skin. ‘I will administer the tincture, I will palpate the area. It might take several hours for the obstruction to remove itself.’

After comparing his watch to the mantel clock, the doctor left Jane with the tincture and the patient. ‘Send for me when the trouble starts,’ he told her. ‘I will run if I have to.’

While Miss Bell slept, Jane cleaned the small tincture spoon over and over again on the hem of her apron. She picked crumbs from the carpet. She sat by the fire, feeling the heat pressing onto her legs.

When Miss Bell finally woke, she asked Jane to walk around the room with her, saying walking might help to ease the pain.

‘At this moment I am willing to try anything.’

Jane took the hand she was offered. It felt very light and warm. Chatting to distract herself, the actress talked of touring and the music halls, having a preference for Manchester, where the crowds were so eager and jolly, whatever the price of their seats.

‘Do you know Charlie Chat?’ asked Jane.

‘Does he wear very large shoes? Or is he the balladeer with the mouse in his pocket?’

Jane couldn’t help feeling disappointed. She wondered if Miss Bell knew any other famous people, like Jimmy Jinx, the rubber-necked clown, or the girl who pulled pennies from her throat.

‘I loved him you know.’

‘Yes, miss?’

‘I loved him like I was sick.’

It was in the early hours of the morning when the doctor eventually returned, wiping globs of frozen sleep from his eyes, shirt-tails flapping, a bootlace trailing behind him. By now Miss Bell was in agony, her face dripping sweat as she sank onto her knees.

‘I’m dying,’ she moaned. ‘Can’t you see I’m dying?’

Jane felt afraid, grinding her teeth as the doctor breathed deeply, rubbing the back of his neck. ‘We
must
get you onto the bed,’ he said. ‘Jane, if you could take one arm, I will take the other.’

Of course it was a struggle, a lopsided lurch to the bed, Miss Bell’s legs giving way at every small step, and then Jane’s, until eventually Miss Bell fell hard across the mattress. ‘I can’t stand the pain,’ she said. ‘Give me something.’

The doctor, slowly loosening his collar, fished inside his bag, but it seemed there were no more tinctures or powders, and instead he listened carefully to Miss Bell’s erratic heartbeat.

‘It is all well and good,’ he said. ‘All well and good.’

Twenty minutes later the obstruction was removed. Doctor Swift wrapped it in newspaper, which for now he pushed beneath the bed, where it sat between a teacup and a blue satin slipper.