Chapter 3
Estelle
No one could have predicted that my position as governess would fall through shortly after I arrived in London.
I had gone directly to the Governesses’s Benevolent Institution to apply for a new position but had yet to be hired.
In my desperation, I had come to the newspaper office and submitted a discreet advertisement.
Reginald could not learn how far I had fallen.
At least I had made it to the post office before the establishment closed.
Did that not prove my resilience? Worry built in my chest, and the confidence I had left home with wavered like a ship balancing precariously on the tip of a rock.
Unfortunately, resilience would not feed and house both Nora and me.
“One year,” I whispered, retracing my steps to Nora’s side. One year as a governess. That’s it. Then I would reach my majority, return to collect my inheritance, and then convince a fine man to overlook my reputation and marry me. Why were my plans being thwarted so soon?
“What was ‘at, Miss Lowry?” Nora asked, tugging her shawl around her thick shoulders.
It was difficult to admit my failings—despite how obvious they were. “Nothing, Nora. All is well.” My mumbling was going to be the first thing I changed in my new life. Yet another reason not to give up. Indeed, I would starve before I relented.
Though I really hoped it would not come to that.
Patting Nora’s arm, I silently reassured her. After all my declarations that I could do this alone, I was grateful she had insisted on staying by my side. These were trying times, facing the consequences of one’s decisions. Her familiarity gave me strength.
“Oh, Nora? Please try to remember to call me Miss Palmer, remember?”
Nora seemed distracted when she answered, “It’s ‘ard to change a lifetime of habit.” She glanced warily around the cold, unfamiliar street. “We’d best be off, miss. Will we be walkin’ then?”
“I am sorry to say yes. We must be prudent until I receive my first wage.” Surely, it would not take long . . .
“But it will be dark soon, miss.” Nora hated how exposed I kept making myself.
“I know we both miss the comforts of home—my bed, Cook’s dinners, the library—”
“Carriages,” Nora added.
“Yes, especially that, but we can endure a little longer.”
“We could always write to Mr. Lowry for help.” Nora’s gray-blue eyes weren’t asking, they were begging.
I sent Nora a quelling look, one she had no doubt expected since this was the fortieth time she had offered the same suggestion.
“I will not, under any circumstance, ask for monetary assistance from my brother—even if he has it in hoards.” I shook my head, pain twinging in my heart as I recalled his betrayal.
“It would immediately alert him to our position, and he will whisk me back home to marry this nameless gentleman he has found for me. No, I will walk as long as it takes.”
Nora fell quiet for two blocks. I was silently bemoaning my tired feet when a groan sounded from somewhere behind me.
My head whirled in every direction as I searched the muted brick-and-stone storefronts for the source of the sound.
It had carried on the wind like the Ghillie Dhu from Mother’s bedtime stories.
I peered in every direction, but the few people lingering in the vicinity acted as if nothing were amiss.
“What is it now?” Nora gripped my arm.
I shivered and leaned forward. “Did you hear that?”
“No, miss. I ‘eard nothin’.”
I tried to shake it off. No woodland ghoul would survive the streets of London, that I can attest. Still, I clutched my reticule tighter to my stomach.
When the strange breathy sound did not return, we pressed by a sleeping haberdashery shop, the windows dark.
My steps were cautious, my eyes darting up and down the cobblestone road.
Despite the closed shops, a fashionable gentleman spoke to an older, equally well-dressed man on the other side of the street.
Neither acted as if they had heard any strange noise.
Through a carriage window, I glimpsed a middle-aged woman with an elaborate feathered hat who must have been waiting for someone. She did not so much as glance in my direction.
“Help me.”
The words were clearer this time. Gruff but unmistakable. The sound drew my head to the alley between the haberdashery and the cobbler’s shop. Nearly hidden behind a stack of wooden crates, I could make out a partial form of a man prostrate on the ground.
Gasping, I clutched Nora’s arm. “There! Do you see him?”
Nora cried out. “Look away, miss. It ain’t a sight for a lady.”
Ignoring Nora, as I was prone to do from time to time, I glanced to the others, who appeared completely remiss of the situation. “Excuse me, sirs!” I called to the two men. “There is a man in the alley in dire need of aid.”
The younger man laughed. “Indeed, I would not be surprised if he has been there for days.”
“D-days?” I stuttered.
The older man nodded. “Don’t worry, miss. The constable was sent for to take his body to the deadhouse.”
“If there’s room,” the younger man responded. “I heard they cannot keep up with the burials. Even with the famine over, those blasted Irish are still dying like flies.”
I had never taken lightly to any disparagement toward the Irish—not when my own mother, despite how she tried to hide it, was as Irish as they came.
But I had been fairly protected from the cruelness of Society, and this was far worse than anything I had experienced before.
“But he’s still alive,” I exclaimed. “Why would they take him to the deadhouse?”
“He won’t last much longer.” The younger man shrugged before eyeing my fashionable bell-shaped dress. “But I wouldn’t linger here, miss. It’s not the most respectable part of town, or whoever did that to him wouldn’t have dumped him here.”
I squirmed with the reminder of my reputation—or what was left of it, since I had decided to take up employment. “Can you not help him?”
The men looked at each other. “Sorry, miss.” The older man tipped his hat toward me, put his hand on his companion’s back, and led him away.
Sorry? I scoffed. That was the word of a gentleman? Where was his honor? Had all the deaths of the starving Irish and disease made them immune to others’ suffering?
Angered, I rushed to the obscure carriage and rapped smartly on the door. Nora hurried to catch up with me.
The middle-aged woman inside startled, her feathered hat slapping against her seat as she flung her head up. From this position, I could make out a maid inside as well.
“Yes?” the genteel woman said through the open window.
“There is a man in need of medical assistance,” I explained, borrowing Mother’s assertive voice she used with our housekeeper. “Can you offer him any aid?”
The woman balked. “I am not a doctor.” Then she shut the shade on the window, abruptly ending our conversation.
I looked up at the driver, who gave me an apologetic look before averting his gaze.
The world was not at all a friendly place, was it? How I missed Norwood Hall.
Once more, the frail voice from the alley croaked for help.
My heart raced as I deliberated. If I lingered, would the proprietor of my rooms lock me out?
It was a respectable place, and I had been fortunate to secure it on such short notice.
But regardless of my situation, I could not in good conscience walk away and leave this man to die.
I put my gloved fingers to my lips. If only I knew someone in London I could call on for help.
I had not been permitted a Season with our extended grieving of Father and Mother.
Beside my brief interaction with Lord Winterton, where he confessed to have hired someone else while waiting for my overdue response, there was no one here for me to turn to.
I glanced back down the alley and felt an unmistakable pull. Whoever he was, he needed me.
I made what was probably another reckless decision in a long line of reckless decisions and marched into the alley.
“Miss,” Nora cried after me. “Miss!”
I could not answer her. She would have a list of reasons why I should leave the alley that very minute, but this man required immediate assistance—and regardless of being the least qualified to help, I was the only one willing to give it.
Behind me, I heard the carriage wheels grind against the road and pull away.
I did not look back, my eyes arrested on the trail of blood dotting the dirt.
A smell of rotting potatoes punctuated the air, and I put my hand to my nose.
Rounding the crates, I prepared myself for the worst. It was good I did, because the sight before me was by far the most horrific I had seen in my entire life.
Nora whimpered as she came up beside me.
The injured man lay prostrate on his stomach, wearing only his drawers, which were filthy and stained with his blood, as was every inch of his person.
He was no small man either. I wagered he was taller than Reginald’s six feet.
And though he was beaten and battered, he had a strong frame and broad shoulders.
I could not see his face, since his sandy hair was matted to it with a mixture of something dark .
. . good gracious, more dried blood. Besides the shocking abundance of dark bruises, the worst from this angle seemed to be his head wound and a few small gashes along his side.
I lowered myself into a crouched position, my gown pooling wide around me. “Excuse me, sir? Sir?”
“Help.” His voice scratched out the sound as if it pained him to do so.
“What is your name? Can I send for your family?”
“Help.”
“Is that all you have to say to me? Couldn’t you tell me how to help? I haven’t the faintest idea.”
“Help,” he repeated.
“I know, I know. I am thinking, sir.” My mind raced through all the books I had read, searching for some detail that might tell me how to aid this man.
“Don’t think too hard, miss,” Nora said from behind me.
She knew me too well.