Chapter Thirty-Eight
Throughout the night Marie and John dozed intermittently in the fireside chairs while Annie paced the room like a caged animal. And then at last at almost seven o’clock in the morning someone knocked at the shop door and Annie flew downstairs to answer it.
She found two uniformed police officers there and before they could say a word she asked shakily, ‘Have you found her?’
‘We’ve had a report of a young woman who fits the description you gave us who has been badly beaten and admitted to St Bartholomew’s,’ the older of the two told her. ‘She was found unconscious in an alley off Dock Road. Would it be possible for you to go and identify her?’
‘Of course, but how bad is she?’ Annie asked tremulously.
The officer shook his head. ‘That I can’t tell you, miss. Do you have a means of getting to the hospital?’
‘Yes, she does, I’ll take her in my car.’ John had come down to stand behind her. ‘And of course as soon as we have ascertained if the person is Nancy or not, we shall let you know.’
‘Thank you, sir.’ The policeman tipped his helmet as John led Annie back upstairs to get her coat.
‘But I can’t leave Adam alone,’ Annie panicked.
‘I will stay with Adam. Come, get ready quickly and get to the ’ospital,’ Marie urged.
The city was coming to life and the journey seemed to take forever as they crawled through the traffic.
‘But why would anyone want to harm Nancy?’ Annie said as they drove along. ‘She’s so inoffensive!’
‘It was probably just down and outs after her bag,’ John said sensibly. ‘It happens all the time. I’ve even known people to be robbed of their clothes and shoes, so don’t be surprised if your lovely new coat is missing. That’s if this person is Nancy.’
‘I don’t care about my coat! I don’t care about anything so long as she’s all right,’ Annie said tearfully. She couldn’t bear the thought of Nancy being hurt.
At last, they arrived at the hospital and after parking the car rather haphazardly they entered the foyer.
It took some time for the person on the reception desk to trace where Nancy had been taken but at last they were directed to a ward where they were met at the door by a stern-faced sister in a stiff navy uniform.
‘I’m afraid visiting times are not until this evening,’ she told Annie in a snooty voice.
John stepped in. ‘Excuse me, Sister, but we are here at the police’s request to see if the person who has been admitted is someone we’re searching for. Would you like me to tell them you refused us entry?’
The sister’s chest swelled as she rose to her full height. ‘In that case, I suppose I shall have to allow you in,’ she said. ‘But only for five minutes. I must think of the wellbeing of my other patients! Follow me.’
John gave Annie a reassuring wink and took her elbow as they followed the sister down the ward.
Along each side of the room were rows of beds full of patients whose blankets were tucked in so tightly about them that it was a surprise they could breathe.
They came to one bed with the curtains drawn around it and the sister told them stiffly, ‘This is the young person that was admitted. I’m afraid she hasn’t gained consciousness yet.
’ She yanked the curtain aside and as Annie forced herself to look at the figure on the bed a sob caught in her throat.
‘Oh Nancy, my poor little love,’ she gasped. Nancy’s face was so swollen and bruised that she was almost unrecognisable and she was lying so still that Annie feared she was already dead.
‘I gather this is the person you were looking for?’
Annie nodded numbly, too full of emotion to speak.
‘There was nothing to identify her in her belongings,’ the sister told them, nodding towards Nancy’s clothes and bag that had been placed neatly on a chair at the side of the bed.
John frowned. If Nancy’s coat, hat and bag were there, it meant that whoever had attacked her hadn’t done it to steal.
Annie sat beside Nancy and took her hand gently. Very slowly the girl opened her eyes.
‘Ah, it looks like she’s coming round, I’ll go and fetch the doctor. Could you wait outside the ward please?’ The sister hurried away and Annie and John reluctantly followed.
Half an hour later they were summoned into a solemn-faced doctor’s office and ushered to some seats.
‘Well, I think the young lady has actually been very lucky,’ he informed them. ‘X-rays indicate that she has two cracked ribs and a concussion as well as multiple cuts and bruises, but luckily nothing else is broken so I have every hope that she will recover completely with time and bed rest.’
Annie breathed a sigh of relief. ‘Thank you, when can we take her home?’
‘I shall need to keep her under observation for a few days, but it could have been much worse. I think the police will want to interview her next.’
‘Thank you, Doctor.’ Annie rose from her seat on legs that felt as if they’d turned to jelly. ‘May we go back in to see her?’
‘Just for a few minutes,’ he responded. ‘As I said, the best cure for her now is rest. Good day.’
Annie and John made their way back down the ward and as they drew the curtain aside Nancy’s frightened eyes stared up at them.
‘Oh, my poor girl, how are you feeling?’ Annie leant over to gently kiss her forehead.
‘Like I’ve been hit by a train,’ Nancy muttered through swollen lips. She tried to sit but it was too painful, and she flopped back against the pillows.
‘Do you have any idea who did this to you, Nancy?’ John asked.
Tears filled Nancy’s eyes as she shook her head.
‘No, I was walking to meet Jamie when suddenly someone grabbed me from behind and yanked me into an alley.’ She gulped deep in her throat before going on.
‘The next thing I knew they were beating me, but it was too dark to see anything and that’s the last I remember until I woke up here. ’
The curtains parted yet again and Jamie appeared looking fearful and pale. Marie had sent word to him of where Nancy might be and he’d set out immediately.
‘Oh, my lovely Nance,’ he said in a small voice. ‘You scared me nearly to death disappearing like that!’
Sensing that the young lovers needed some time alone, John gently took Annie’s elbow and led her back into the ward.
‘I’ll be back at visiting time,’ Annie promised as they left, but Nancy only had eyes for Jamie and Annie wasn’t sure she’d even heard her.
‘Why would anyone do something so brutal to Nancy?’ Annie questioned. But then a thought suddenly occurred to her, and she stopped in her tracks. Nancy had been wearing her hat and coat last night. Could it be that in the darkness someone had taken Nancy to be Annie?
Glancing at John, she told him what she was thinking and he looked shocked. ‘But why would anyone want to hurt you any more than they’d want to hurt Nancy?’ he questioned.
She thought of the shadowy figure in the empty doorway across the road from her shop and chewed on her lip.
She’d seen them far too often for it to be a coincidence, but what proof did she have?
There were so many homeless people sleeping rough in London that it could just have been someone who was seeking shelter there.
She’d never told John of her fear of Reggie, but what if it was him?
The thought made her shudder. She was a strong, independent woman, but she knew her strength couldn’t match his if he attacked her again.
‘Look, let’s get you home and get some breakfast inside you,’ John said kindly, breaking into her thoughts. ‘You look all in, and it’s been a very long night for all of us.’
‘Yes . . . yes it has. And I need to pack a bag for Nancy,’ Annie agreed as he led her from the hospital.
Marie was waiting for them when they got back. Adam was up too, tucking into a bowl of porridge.
‘Was it her and is she all right?’ Marie immediately questioned.
Annie left John to fill her in on all the details as she went into Nancy’s room to start packing a bag for her.
She would need nightclothes and toiletries.
Suddenly she sank down onto the side of the bed and buried her face in her hands.
Things could have been so different if Nancy hadn’t been found when she had.
The night before had been bitterly cold and being out in such temperatures on top of the beating she’d taken might easily have killed her.
She didn’t know how she would have been able to live with herself if she’d lost Nancy.
She took a deep breath and tried to pull herself together. Nancy was alive and was going to be all right again eventually – that was the important thing.
That evening, Annie joined the queue outside the ward with the other visitors and was pleased to see that Jamie was at the front of the line holding an enormous bunch of flowers, which must have cost a fortune.
He looked flushed and worried as Annie smiled at him.
At last, the doors were opened and the visitors streamed inside.
The curtains were no longer drawn around Nancy’s bed but as Annie and Jamie approached, they saw that she looked even worse than she had that morning.
Her face was even more swollen and the bruises were darkening to a vivid blue and purple.
Jamie’s eyes filled with tears at the sight of her.
‘If I could get me hands on whoever did this to you I’d kill ’em,’ he said vehemently.
‘It’s all right, it’s not as bad as it looks,’ Nancy said bravely through cracked lips. Only an hour before the poor girl had spat a tooth out. Luckily it was one of her back ones so at least the gap wouldn’t show when she smiled.
Annie didn’t know what to say. Whoever had done this had thrashed her to within an inch of her life before leaving her for dead in the freezing cold.
‘I’ve brought your things in,’ she said, trying to remain calm as she loaded them into the locker at the side of her bed.
It was breaking her heart to see Nancy like this and she couldn’t shift the thought that this beating had been meant for her.
Once again John had run her to the hospital while Marie stayed behind to watch Adam, and she wondered what she would have done without them.
‘Have the doctors been to see you again yet?’ she asked.
Nancy nodded. ‘Yes, an’ it’s as they thought.
Just cracked ribs an’ cuts an’ bruises. The police ’ave been too but I couldn’t tell ’em much.
It all happened so fast and once they’d dragged me into the alley it were too dark to see anything.
I seem to remember they had some sort o’ pipe they were hittin’ me with though. ’
‘The low life scum,’ Jamie ground out, his fists clenched at his sides.
Annie took the flowers he’d laid on the bed and went to find a nurse to put them in water, giving the young couple a few moments alone.
When she returned Jamie was clutching Nancy’s hand and feeling in the way, Annie told her, ‘I’d best get back to Adam, but I’ll be here again tomorrow. Is there anything I can bring you?’
‘No thanks.’ Nancy gave her a grateful smile and after bending to give her a peck on her swollen cheek, Annie went to find John, who was waiting in his car outside for her.
‘How is she tonight?’
Annie sighed as she settled back into the passenger seat. ‘She’s black and blue, but as the doctor’s said, it could have been a lot worse. I just wish I knew who did this to her.’
He started the car. ‘I doubt we’ll ever find out,’ he said. ‘Unfortunately, things like this are all too common in London. It does seem odd that they didn’t take anything from her though.’
Wasn’t it just? Annie thought as John turned the car towards home. A picture of Reggie’s scarred face flashed into her mind and she shuddered.