The warm weather held for several more days, prompting an impromptu visit from Mr. P. T. Barnum and a few of his famed performers.
“Those patients who are well enough may come down to the lawn to enjoy the performance,” Nurse Hatfield told Una and the other trainees that morning at breakfast. “Those of improving health who are yet too enfeebled for the stairs may sit out on the balcony. Make sure everyone has a blanket in hand should a breeze stir off the river. Under no circumstances are patients afflicted with pneumonia or hospitalism to attend. When in doubt, defer to the doctor’s judgment.”
The women hurried through their breakfast, chatting excitedly. The daily routine at Bellevue was rarely broken, especially for so merry an occasion. Many of the women—Una included—had never seen one of Mr. Barnum’s shows. The crowds that flocked to his big top events were ripe pickings for pocket divers, but if you were caught, rumor was, Mr. Barnum didn’t bother with the police but fed you to the lions instead. Una never put too much stock in rumors but had stayed away just the same.
“This is perfect,” Dru whispered to her as they trailed behind the others on their way to the hospital. For once, it had been Dru who’d woken late, rising so sluggishly that morning they’d nearly missed breakfast. And she hadn’t uttered a peep about Nurse Hatfield’s announcement—or anything else for that matter—until now.
“Perfect for what?” Una asked.
“To sneak down to the alcoholics’ ward.”
They’d talked over their plan a few times since that night when Dru had read her “The Murders in the Rue Morgue.” Each time, Dru had grown more excited to put their observation and deduction skills to the test. Una, on the other hand, had grown warier. If there were a killer lurking behind Bellevue’s walls, was it wise to go looking for him? And wasn’t Una supposed to be lying low? There was also an unpleasant niggling in her stomach—akin to drinking curdled milk—when she considered how she
was embroiling Dru in such a dark and unsavory task. As much as Deidre’s murder haunted Una, she’d half hoped that Dru would forget their plans and go back to pestering her about ligaments and bones.
“As soon as we’ve gotten our patients settled for the show,” Dru said, “we can meet in the main hall and head downstairs. Everyone will be so preoccupied by the performers they won’t notice we’ve gone.”
“What are we going to tell the ward attendant when we get there? She’s bound to get suspicious if she catches us sniffing around.”
“I hadn’t thought about that.”
“And what are you going to tell the second-year on your ward if she asks where you’re going? Or Warden O’Rourke when he finds you loitering in the main hall?”
“Well, I’ll . . . I’ll say that . . .”
Una pulled Dru aside as soon as they passed the laborers at work on the gatehouse. The morning sun glinted sharply off the river. Una tented a hand over her eyes to block out the light. “This isn’t some fancy. We can’t just traipse around here like storybook characters. Maybe we should call off the plan.”
“And never know? What if you’re right and the killer strikes again? I couldn’t live with myself knowing I might have prevented it. And neither could you, Una Kelly.”
Una looked down at the gravel drive beneath their feet. Dru was wrong; Una could live just fine knowing that, thank you very much. But somehow, she didn’t want to tarnish Dru’s good opinion of her by saying so. Besides, it was clear Dru was not to be dissuaded. “Fine. Once you’ve got your patients settled on the ward, grab a blanket, and tell the second-year you’re going to check on the patients on the lawn. One of them might have forgotten a blanket and be cold. If anyone stops you on your way down, tell them the same thing. And don’t wait for me in the main hall. It’s too conspicuous. Take the stairs beside the drive down to the cellar and wait for me in the lodging room. It should be empty at that time of day. Got it?”
Dru nodded—too eagerly for Una’s liking—and they hurried to their wards.
* * *
Midday, with the lawn awash in sunlight, Mr. Barnum’s troupe of acrobats and curiosities gathered to begin their show. A long rug had been unraveled over the newly sprouted grass. Beside it stood a table strewn with props. Chairs circled the makeshift stage, and those patients well enough to leave the ward crowded in. Behind them stood the staff. Nearly everyone had turned out to see the exhibition—orderlies, nurses, doctors, washerwomen, kitchen staff. Even Warden O’Rourke and Miss Perkins were in attendance.
The balconies overlooking the lawn were crowded too, with patients leaning over the railing to get a better view.
“Leave the flying to the performers,” Una said, coaxing the patients from her ward back from the rail. She made sure each man had a blanket and stool, should he grow weary of standing. The delight on their faces—such a welcome change from that of pain or boredom—made Una linger. She watched the men, even as the show began, smiling not at the daring feats of the performers but the marked improvement in the men’s spirits. Surely there was some medicine in this too.
A moment later, Una remembered herself. She grabbed a spare blanket and hurried off, telling the second-year she’d spied a patient down on the lawn shivering with cold. The hallways and stairways were empty, the wards uncannily still. From outside rang cheers and applause, punctuated by long stretches of awe-filled silence.
Una passed through the main hall and out the door just in time to see one performer climb onto the shoulders of another and another until they formed a tower four men high. She clapped with the rest of the audience as she descended the stairs onto the drive that abutted the lawn. With everyone’s attention glued to the acrobats, now was the perfect time to slip down to the basement. But when she saw the top performer stretch to his full height then bend his knees and leap off the shoulders of the man beneath him, Una stood transfixed. He somersaulted through the air, making two complete rotations before landing solidly on his feet. A roar of cheers and applause rose from the crowd.
“Quite the show, eh?”
Una tore her gaze from the performers to find Conor standing beside her. “I’ve never seen anything like it.”
“No? Don’t they have circuses up north where you’re from?”
Her eyes drifted back to the show. The next acrobat in the tower of men leaped from his perch in similar fashion, spinning head over heels twice before landing on his haunches. “Hmm? . . . No . . . er . . . I mean, yes, of course, I’ve just never had the pleasure of attending.”
“This whole island feels like a circus if you ask me. Head down to the waterfront or Mulberry Bend, and you’ll see. Freaks and swindlers and other odd folk.”
Una’s fingers clenched around the blanket. For a former bogtrotter himself, he sure had high-minded ideas. “It’s easy to criticize the poor when you’ve got a full belly and sound roof above your head. It can’t have been easy when you first left Ireland.”
“T’weren’t. Not one day of it. But if you and I can stay away from sin, so can our kith.”
Not for the first time, Una imagined how low his opinion of her would sink if he knew who she really was. All the more reason not to argue with him and risk exposing herself. Her fingers loosened around the blanket, and she flashed him her prettiest smile. “Of course, you’re right.”
Conor returned her smile—men like him were always easy to assure— and they both turned their attention back to the performers.
Not long after, Una spied Dru from the corner of her eye slip through the main doors of the hospital and tiptoe down the stairs. Like Una, she’d grabbed a spare blanket, but instead of holding it nonchalantly, she clutched it to her breast like a shield. Her posture was stiff and eyes darting. When an orderly passed her on the steps, she gave him a too-wide smile. “Don’t mind me, I’m just bringing a blanket to one of my patients,” she said unsolicited and loudly enough that Una could hear several yards away.
Una winced and shook her head.
“Something paining you, Miss Kelly?” Conor asked. “Yes, yes . . . Just a little toothache.”
“Eating too many sweets, are you?”
Una tried to smile, even as Dru shuffled awkwardly past them.
“Top of the day to you, Nurse Lewis,” Conor said to her, tipping his cap. “Don’t mind me, I’m just bringing a blanket to one of my—”
“Look at that!” Una said over her. “A snake charmer.”
When Conor turned to look at the performer, Una shot Dru a sharp look and nodded to the basement steps.
“I best be getting back to the ward,” Una said to Conor.
“Shame you can’t stay. I heard they got a man who can swallow a knife long as my arm.”
“Maybe I’ll be able to catch it from the balcony.” “See you at mass on Sunday?”
Una nodded and took a few backward steps toward the hospital. The snake charmer held the audience enthralled. The flutelike instrument he played filled the hushed quiet with its melodious tune. Una seized the opportunity to change direction, heading away from the main entrance to the narrow staircase that led to the basement.
Reaching the bottom, she glanced over her shoulder to be sure no one had followed, then opened the door to the lodging room and slipped inside. The snake charmer’s song disappeared as the door closed behind her. So too did the light. Una groped along the wall for a gas lamp, stumbling over a small table before finding one. She turned the gas valve and lit a flame with matches from her pocket. With the room now illuminated, she set aside her blanket and looked around. The stench of sweat and urine struck her nose, fainter than the last time she’d been here but still as sharp. Just when she thought the room was empty, Dru popped up from behind a chair in the far corner. Una strangled back a scream.
“What are you doing hiding in the dark?” “I was afraid someone might see me.”
“No one’s admitted here till nightfall. You know that.” She walked over to Dru and brushed away a cobweb from her shoulder. “Besides, hiding is only a last resort. Better to blend in. Act like you belong.”
“Right,” Dru said, still clutching the blanket.
“Leave that here, and let’s go. We don’t have much time.”
Una led them through the foul-smelling room and down a dimly lit hall. Dampness clung to the walls, limescale and slime discoloring the stones. Behind her, she heard Dru’s breath hitch and falter before evening out.
“It’s ghastly down here,” Dru said as they passed the staff quarters, which smelled only mildly better than the lodging room. “Miss Nightingale would never approve.”
“Beats the workhouse on Blackwell’s Island . . . er, or so I’ve heard.” When at last they reached the alcoholics’ ward, Una’s muscles stiffened.
The dank air, the low cries from the cells, the meager light—it was as if she were stepping back in time, learning of Deidre’s murder all over again. A warm hand grabbed her own and squeezed. Dru’s.
“Which cell was she in?”
Una nodded to the end of the hall, her throat too tight to speak.
Hand in hand, they progressed onward. Una’s feet itched to beat dirt to the cell. The quicker they got there, the quicker they could leave. But Dru walked with interminable slowness, her gaze drifting from floor to ceiling and back, lingering over the cell doors—their locks, hinges, and peepholes.
Near the end of the long hall, they found the cell Deidre had occupied. Another woman was in there now, asleep and snoring on the straw-strewn floor. Dru examined the interior of the cell through the peephole and fingered the rusty padlock on the door.
“Who has the key?” Dru asked. “The ward attendant, I’d guess.”
“Odd that we haven’t seen her. I was quite ready to explain our visit so as not to illicit the least bit of suspicion.”
Una couldn’t help but snicker. “Did the explanation begin, ‘don’t mind me’?”
“Why, yes. And then I was going to explain in detail how—” “See, right away that’s suspicious.”
Dru frowned.
“Maybe just leave the truth stretching to me.” Una turned back to the cell. “Now, what are we looking for?”
“Clues.”
“What kind of—”
But Dru had already crept farther down the hall before Una could finish. Una sighed and followed. They rounded a corner, and the hall ended in a small room. The ward attendant—the same woman Una had met when she’d come in search of Deidre—teetered atop a stack of crates, peering out a sliver of a window high up in the wall. She was so enthralled, likely by the circus performers on the lawn, or what little she could see of them, that she hadn’t heard their footfalls. Nearby stood a small desk cluttered with papers, a stack of dirty breakfast plates, a mug of coffee, and a ring of keys. An open door at the far end led to a flight of stairs.
Not wanting to startle the woman into falling from her precarious perch, Una began to back out of the room. Dru, however, walked boldly to the desk and snatched the ring of keys, somehow managing not to make a sound.
“Sneaky as a thief,” Una whispered once they’d rounded the corner and were back in the long hallway of cells. “Where’d you learn to do that?”
“Miss Nightingale says unnecessary noise is the cruelest absence of care which can be inflicted on either the sick or the well.” She unlocked the door of Deidre’s former cell with equal quietude. The slumbering woman inside didn’t wake.
Una stepped inside and peered around. She wasn’t sure what she’d been expecting to find—a clue of some sort—but the cell looked the same as it had through the peephole. The smell, that of sweat and vomit, was sharper inside, as if it had seeped into the stone walls and could never fully be washed away. The woman’s snores were far louder than they’d sounded from the hall. The air felt colder too. Damper. A shiver whispered over Una’s skin.
Deidre had died here. In this very cell. Alone with her killer.
Yet there was nothing in the cell to suggest who that person might be. She backed out and waited in the hallway, rubbing her arms for warmth. It was hopeless to try to figure out what happened to Deidre when so much time had passed since her death. Half a dozen women must have occupied this cell since then. If the killer had left any clues behind, they were long gone now.
Dru lingered a minute longer in the cell, then closed and locked the door. They tiptoed back to the room around the corner at the end of the hall. The attendant was still at the window, craning her neck to see out the filmy glass. As Dru crept toward the table to replace the keys, she tripped on a loose stone and stumbled into a nearby pail. The pail toppled, clattering against the floor.
The attendant shrieked, twisting around and toppling to the ground. “What in the hell are you two doing here?” she asked, scowling in their direction and rubbing her backside.
“D-don’t mind us,” Dru stammered, “we’ve just—”
“We’re lost.” Una hurried to Dru’s side, grabbing the keys from her hand before the attendant could see them. She nodded to the open door at the far end of the room. “Do those stairs lead up to the main floor of the hospital?”
“’Course they do.”
Una offered the woman a hand and helped her to her feet, the keys hidden in her other palm. “You see the sword eater yet?”
“Sword eater?”
“I heard it’s over two feet long, and he swallows it clear to the hilt.”
“Really?” The attendant hurried to restack the crates she’d been standing on. Una seized on her distraction and slipped the keys back onto the table. She grabbed Dru’s arm and dragged her to the steps.
“Sorry about the fright,” Dru said over her shoulder, but the woman was already back atop the crates, too eager to see the sword eater to pay them any mind.
When they reached the top of the stairs, they found themselves in a short hallway adjacent to the warden’s office near the main hall. Dru closed the door and leaned against the plaster wall, her eyes fluttering shut for a moment. She looked as exhausted as she had that morning when they’d hurried down to breakfast. “That was close.”
Too close, Una thought. And for what? They hadn’t learned anything. Dru opened her eyes and smiled. “But it was exhilarating, don’t you think?”
“Stupid is what I think. And a complete waste of time.”
“But we discovered so much.”
“What, that it’s cold, dark, and stinky? Let’s get back to our wards before we find ourselves in real trouble.”
Una started off, but Dru grabbed her hand. Her skin was clammy, but her grip was firm. “No, silly goose. We learned two very important things. One, it wasn’t that difficult to sneak past the attendant. The keys were left on the table for the taking. The cell door opened without a squeak, and the walls were thick enough to muffle sounds of a struggle.”
“That doesn’t tell us anything about the killer.”
“No, but it does explain how he could have gotten in and out unnoticed.”
“And two?”
Dru lowered her voice to a whisper. “If there is a killer, he likely works here at the hospital. The ward isn’t a place you’d stumble upon by accident. He’d need to know his way around to avoid being seen.”
“You mean like a doctor? Surely, you don’t think—”
“Dupin says we mustn’t confine our thinking or reject any deduction out of hand. A doctor, an orderly, or even the warden himself can’t be excluded.”
