Mrs Violet Charlsworth, Alice’s sister, reminded Hope of an apple dumpling, short and fat but with a very sweet nature. Her husband had been the pilot of a tugboat that helped big ships up the river to the docks, but he had died of pneumonia three years earlier. Violet’s tiny but cosy cottage reflected her husband’s passion for ships. Water-colours of them, ships in bottles, some brass and some carved from bone, a collection of old navigational instruments and a ship’s bell decorated the walls. There were other exotic items too, brought from sailors back across the seas: frightening-looking African statues, fans, snuff boxes and daggers. Every one of them was carefully arranged and dusted.
The roaring fire was most welcome as it was very cold outside, and Violet’s welcome had been equally warm. She said there was nothing she liked better than a houseful of guests.
Over tea and toasted buns, which she held out to the fire on a long toasting fork, she fired questions at Alice and Bennett, her bright blue eyes sparkling with delight at having company.
‘So Hope is your young lady,’ she said pointedly to Bennett. ‘No wonder you haven’t been down to see me in six months!’
Hope blushed furiously, and attempted to explain she was only a friend.
Violet just chuckled. ‘He wouldn’t bring you here unless he had plans for you, my dear,’ she said and laughed so much her many chins wobbled.
‘Mrs Charlsworth!’ Bennett said reprovingly, but he didn’t deny what she said and Hope sank back in the comfortable chair feeling extraordinarily happy.
The chair and the warmth of the room made her feel sleepy, and though she tried to fight it off as her three companions chattered, she lost the battle and must have nodded off for a while. Maybe it was the sound of her name being mentioned that brought her round, for suddenly she became aware they were talking about her.
‘She’s been carefully brought up, I knew that as soon as I sawher,’ Alice said. ‘She might have been wearing rags, but she wore them like a duchess. And look at that face, will you! When did you ever see such beauty before?’
Hope knew she ought to show she was awake again, but as their conversation about her appeared to be so complimentary she couldn’t resist hearing more.
‘She’s exhausted,’ Bennett said, and his voice was as soft and tender as a caress. ‘If you could see the way she works, no job too tough or dirty. She was born to nurse, and I can only think she dropped out of heaven at our greatest hour of need.’
‘But what does Dr Cunningham think about your friendship?’ Violet asked.
‘He doesn’t approve,’ Bennett said sadly.
Suddenly Hope didn’t want to hear any more. She stirred and made a pretend yawn. ‘I’m so sorry, Mrs Charlsworth,’ she said. ‘How rude of me to fall asleep, it was the warmth of the fire and the comfortable chair.’
‘We were glad to see you dozing,’ Alice said. ‘Bennett was just saying how hard you’ve been working at the hospital. I should think you’re worn out.’
‘I’m fine,’ Hope said, feeling awkward and wishing she hadn’t woken until they’d finished discussing her. ‘Perhaps I need a walk to blow the cobwebs away.’
‘There’s a path beside the river which is always pleasant even on a cold day,’ Bennett said. ‘Would you like me to show you?’
‘That’s right, you two take a walk and work up an appetite,’ Violet said. ‘I’ve got an oxtail stew simmering on the stove, but it won’t be ready for a couple of hours.’
It felt very cold outside after the warm cottage and Hope pulled her cloak tighter. She had left the hospital full of confidence that morning, as she had a new red plaid wool dress that she’d bought in one of the second-hand dress shops in the Pithay, and a jaunty red hat trimmed with feathers. But her grey cloak was the same old one she’d left Briargate with, worn so thin now that the wind went straight through it. As they walked down through the tiny village with its straggle of small stone cottages, the cloak which had been made by Nell was a timely reminder that although Hope’s circumstances had improved dramatically since she first met Bennett in Lamb Lane, some things would never change.
No one but Bennett thought much of nurses. Like soldiers and constables, they were considered the dregs of society, only valued in times of trouble.
Bennett talked animatedly as they walked. He had heard the Corporation were calling an emergency meeting to discuss health and sanitation in the city, and he hoped this might mean they would pull down places like Lewins Mead and build new houses with piped water and sewers.
‘And I suppose that will mean that they’ll throw all my old neighbours out on to the street,’ Hope retorted. ‘Will they ask anyone along to this meeting who actually knows and cares anything for those who will become homeless? I think not. It will be a meeting of only those who will profit from the new houses.’
Bennett looked surprised by the venom in her voice. ‘I’m sure that won’t be so,’ he replied. ‘What’s got into you, Hope? I thought you’d be glad to hear that a place that harbours so much disease will be swept away.’
‘Not if it means people will have to be swept away too,’ she snapped. ‘They should build new houses first, at rents those people can afford. If they don’t, the problem will just shift to Bedminster, St Philips, Montpelier, or, heaven help your uncle, to Clifton! I bet he won’t be overjoyed if tens of thousands of guttersnipes like me end up as his neighbours!’
‘Why do you mention my uncle?’ Bennett asked, facing her and taking hold of both her arms. He had that stern look he always wore when he was concerned. ‘And why do you call yourself a guttersnipe?’
‘That’s how he sees me, doesn’t he?’ she said. ‘He wouldn’t like it if he knew you had brought me here, would he?’
‘No, he wouldn’t,’ Bennett admitted. ‘But he is not my keeper. I am my own person, I don’t allow him to control me.’
‘But you live in his house, and therefore you must be beholden to him.’
‘To a certain extent, yes. But only as far as deferring to his greater experience in the practice he built up, and treating his home with respect. I do not allow him to choose my friends.’
‘But you have to hide ones like me away. You couldn’t invite me to Harley Place if he were there, could you?’
Bennett neither denied nor acknowledged that was true. He continued walking, saying nothing. Hope trotted after him, aware she’d already said too much, and not in a manner that would endear her to him.
When they got to the banks of the river, Bennett stopped, staring out at the water which was just a sluggish strip between vast swathes of greasy-looking mud. With the leaden sky above and the few trees growing along the riverside bare of leaves, looking skeletal and grim, the scene had none of the beauty it would have at high tide in sunshine.
‘I haven’t hidden you away,’ he suddenly burst out. ‘The epidemic was so bad there were no opportunities to do anything more than try to fight it. My first thought as the last cases either died or went home was about you, in particular your future and my feelings for you. That’s exactly why I asked you to come here with me.’
Hope didn’t know how to reply to that, so she said nothing.
‘Well?’ he said sharply. ‘No sarcastic comment?’
‘I’m sorry,’ she murmured. ‘I spoke out of turn.’
His chin was jutting out as if he was angry, and his eyes seemed to be boring right into her.
‘I am in a dilemma, Hope,’ he said. ‘It is the circumstances of how we met which make it so very difficult. If I’d met you at a party or a dinner, I’d know exactly how to behave with you. I’d come calling, I might give you a book of poetry, I could even ask my uncle to arrange some function so we could talk and be seen enjoying each other’s company. I would then invite you to the theatre or a concert, and provided you had a suitable chaperone, and you and your family didn’t take an immediate dislike to me, we could then embark on a courtship.
‘But I can’t do any of that with you, Hope. You don’t live with your family, you have no suitable person as a chaperone.’
‘I don’t have the right clothes or manners either,’ Hope said glumly.
He made a kind of exasperated growl in his throat. ‘That isn’t it, Hope! Not your manners, background or anything like that. Don’t you see it? I love you.’
Hope blinked in astonishment.
‘I fell for you almost the first minute I sawyour beautiful face,’ he went on. ‘Every moment with you since then has confirmed that you are the only girl in the whole world for me. All those social niceties mean absolutely nothing to me. But I am trapped in a situation where they are important to everyone else, and if I flout them, you would be the one who would suffer.’
Hope had been sure when he was talking about chaperones, concerts and families that he was just trying to show her why she could never fit into his world. But then he’d said he loved her, and that cancelled out everything else.
‘You love me?’ she whispered, bubbles of delight running down her spine. ‘Truly?’
He looked at her with the mournful eyes of a spaniel. ‘Yes, Hope. Truly! Madly and deeply. I spend all day thinking of you, I invent excuses to see you, I can’t sleep at night for imagining kissing you.’
‘Oh, Bennett.’ She flung herself into his arms impulsively. ‘I love you too, it’s just that way for me too.’
She stood on tiptoe to kiss him, and as her lips touched his, his arms went round her so tightly he almost took her breath away.
Hope had never kissed a man on the lips before. Over the last year or two she had often idly wondered what sort of feeling people got out of pressing their mouths together, for it seemed an unlikely source of pleasure.
But as his warm, soft lips met hers, all those strange yet delightful sensations she had when she lay in bed thinking about him came spurting up in her, twice, three times as strong and sweet.
She didn’t care that they were on a river bank, that they could be seen by anyone who chanced along. It didn’t matter that he was a doctor and a gentleman, while she was just a kitchenmaid turned nurse. All she could think of was that he loved her, and she loved him. Nothing else was important.
‘Hope, my dear, sweet, beautiful girl,’ he murmured as they broke for air. ‘I have wanted to kiss you for so long.’
There were many more kisses. They would walk a few yards holding hands, then all at once they were kissing again and again, not noticing the cold wind or the mud beneath their feet. His arms went beneath her cloak, drawing her closer still, caressing her in a way that made her feel she was melting. It was only when they realized they had been out for over two hours, and their feet and hands were frozen, that they turned back to Violet’s cottage.
‘I don’t know how I’m going to hide this from Alice and Violet,’ Bennett laughed as they got nearer to the cottage. ‘I’m sure it must be written on my face.’
‘And I don’t know how I’m going to be able to sit making polite conversation for the rest of the day when all I want to do is kiss you more,’ Hope replied.
In the months that followed the visit to Mrs Charlsworth’s cottage Hope was to think on that last remark to Bennett over and over again. Everything had seemed so simple then; they knew they shared the same feelings for each other, and therefore it followed that before long they would find a way to make them public. But it wasn’t that simple.
As Bennett had pointed out that day, the standard route of courtship was closed to them. Hope had no family home for him to call at; Bennett couldn’t invite her to Harley Place. Without mutual friends to offer chaperoned opportunities for them to be together, they were left with little more than walks, sitting in coffee shops, and hurried chats at the hospital when Bennett came in to see patients.
Over Christmas Hope didn’t see him at all, for his uncle had invited guests and expected him to be there to help entertain them. As church bells rang out for the New Year of 1850, she was helping Sister Martha deliver twins, and it was two days before Bennett came into the hospital to wish her a Happy New Year.
He didn’t have to point out to her that it was inadvisable at this stage for anyone to know how they felt about each other. She knew that. Dr Cunningham would almost certainly make sure she was dismissed from the hospital and he might also end his partnership with his nephew. But if they bided their time and let Dr Cunningham find out for himself that Hope had become a very good nurse, with a blameless character, he was likely to become far more receptive to her.
Hope was now nursing in the lying-in ward which she had come to love. Aside from the occasions when there was a very difficult birth, or a mother or her baby died, it was mostly a satisfying, joyous ward to be on. Like all the wards in St Peter’s it was overcrowded, and the other nurses were either lazy sluts with a fondness for drink or stern nuns who had little compassion. Yet whatever the faults of these two groups of nurses, Hope soon realized they had a wealth of experience she lacked. As the youngest in her own family she had never witnessed a birth before; her only knowledge of babies had been gleaned from Matt and Amy’s brood. The only attribute she brought to the ward on her first day was the knowledge that dirt bred disease, and a conviction that if she made sure the ward was clean, more new babies would survive.
Each time she washed a newborn baby she was humbled by the miracle of birth, and it was pure instinct which guided her. Yet she was also frightened that she had been given responsibility for their well-being, when she knew little or nothing about babies, childbirth, or even anatomy and biology. She borrowed books from Bennett, and although she often worked a fourteen-hour day, she would then spend another two or three hours studying these books, desperate to solve the mysteries of how the human body worked.
Perhaps if she had been on any other ward she’d have found it easier to put Bennett out of her mind, for at least part of the day. But the very nature of the lying-in ward was a constant reminder of physical union. Most of the mothers were bawdy characters who spoke openly and graphically about their sexual experiences. Sometimes she was deeply shocked, at other times she found their stories amusing, but hardly a day passed without her learning something new.