The Winter Rose (35 page)

"No thanks, Freddie. I don't need your crumbs anymore. I'm quite well
looked after these days." She turned and shook her head, making a pair
of sparkling diamond earrings dance. "A gift from my flanc�They're
real," she said.

"They aren't," Freddie said. They couldn't be. They were enormous.

"Certainly are. Ten carats apiece. I had them appraised."

"Well, stone me. Who is he? Prince Edward?"

"The prince is nowhere near as rich as this bloke," she said,
laughing. She bit her lip, then, unable to keep her secret any longer,
said, "It's Sid Malone."

Freddie sat back in his chair. A jealous rage, white-hot and choking, surged through him. Malone. Again.

He had shown him up in front of India, he'd made a laughingstock out
of him in the Commons, and now he was fucking Gemma Dean--whom Freddie
sorely wished he was still fucking.

What did it take to put the man away? He'd lit into Donaldson just
the other day, asking him why he still hadn't arrested the bastard, but
Donald-son said he had to have something on him first, something that
would stick. Malone was too clever, too cautious, to get himself caught.
Donaldson had said that he was putting on the pressure, though. He'd
destroyed one of Malone's pubs, the Bark, with a trumped-up warrant, and
had arrested two of his associates--Nicky Lee and Charlie Zhao--for
peddling smuggled opium. They would both do time.

"Patience," Donaldson had said. "We'll get him yet. You'll see."

"Gemma, you can't be serious," Freddie said now, working to keep his voice even. "Malone's a bloody criminal!"

"You want to watch your mouth. Sid Malone's a gentleman. He treats me
a lot better than you ever did. And I'll tell you something else. I'm
not your only woman friend who keeps company with him."

"What are you talking about?"

"Your intended was with him the other night."

"Who?"

Gemma rolled her eyes. "Blimey, Freddie, the woman you're marrying? Remember her? The doctor?"

"India? With Sid Malone?" Freddie laughed out loud. "Maybe you ought to pawn those earrings for a pair of specs, Gem."

"I know it was her. She came to the Bark. I saw her leave."

"I'm sure you did."

"I can prove it. She wanted him to do something for her. I'm not sure
what. Sid wouldn't tell me. All he'd say was that they had a business
deal. I know one of the blokes who was sitting near them, though. He
overheard their conversation and said it had to do with rubber johnnies.
Hardly sounds right, though, does it? Her coming all the way to the
Bark to ask the likes of Sid Malone for rubber johnnies?"

Freddie stopped smirking. It sounded exactly right--exactly like the
sort of women's welfare bollixy do-gooding rubbish India would get
involved with.

"I guess he must've told her a high price for whatever it was she
wanted," Gemma continued. "And she must not have had the dosh because
she gave him her watch. I saw it on his night table. It had Think of me
on the back. Now, am I right or not?"

"Yes, Gem, you are," he said slowly, turning this piece of news over in his mind.

Gemma lifted her chin. "He's going to marry me, Freddie. Sid Malone is going to make me his wife."

"Congrats, old girl," he said, forcing a smile. "Let's see the ring."

Gemma hesitated. "I don't have it quite yet. I haven't picked it out," she said.

Gemma was a good actress, not a great one, and Freddie could see that
she was lying. Sid Malone had no intention of marrying her, but she
wanted to hurt him. She wanted to make him jealous. He would let her. It
might get him what he wanted.

He leaned forward, elbows on his knees, and took her hand. "I'm happy
for you, Gem," he said, smiling ruefully. "Sad for myself, though. If
only my life were my own, things would have been different. So very
different."

"What are you on about?"

"You and I. We could have made a go of it."

"That's not what you said a few weeks ago, Freddie. You told me you were getting married--and not to me."

"I don't love her, Gemma, you know that. I love you, but it's impossible," Freddie lied.

"Why?"

"Because I need India's money. MPs don't make much. The job is about
public service, not private gain, but it's hard to fight the good fight,
to try to make England, and indeed the world, a better place when you
can't even pay the rent on your own flat."

"Oh, Freddie, how absolutely full of shit you are. You can't fool me.
I know you, remember? You're a competitive, power-mad man who needs
money to finance his ambitions. You don't want to make the world a
better place, you just want to rule it." She leaned forward and kissed
him. "And you will one day. So I'd better get into your good books now.
I'll do what you ask. I'll get some girls together on Saturday. Cause a
few ructions."

"Really, Gem? You'd do that for me?"

"No, but I'd do it for fifty quid."

He wanted to slap her. It was an outrageous sum. Instead he said,
"Thanks, Gemma, truly. I'll have the money for you next time I see you."

"You'd better."

He kissed her goodbye and left the Gaiety. Out on Commercial Street
he searched for a hackney. Where was he going to get fifty quid for
Gemma? The dinner he'd hosted at the Reform Club a few weeks ago had all
but bankrupted him. The thought of his debts weighed heavily on him, as
did Joe Bristow's campaign, but more troubling than any of those was
Gemma's news about India. She was trying to get her hands on
contracep-tives. She must be forging ahead with her mad scheme for a
clinic--which could mean only one thing: that she wasn't pregnant, for
she obviously didn't intend to stop working any time soon.

"Damn it!" he swore. Everything had been going so well, and now it
was all wrong again. The Home Rule debacle had nearly destroyed him. He
was broke. And Isabelle was being troublesome. She was pleased that a
wed-ding date had been set, but was adamant that no monies would be
paid, or property transferred, until India had given up medicine.

"What the hell am I going to do?" Freddie asked himself, pacing in the street, his arm outstretched for a cab.

He tried to think of an answer, but all that came to mind was rubber
johnnies. What a thing to be thinking about at a time like this. But he
couldn't get them out of his head. There was something in all this,
some-thing he was missing, but what?

A cabbie driving in the opposite direction noticed him and signaled
that he would turn around. Freddie nodded at him. "Calm down, old boy.
Calm down and think," he told himself.

He reviewed it all again. He still couldn't believe that India had
enlisted Sid Malone's help. Malone of all people. She despised him. So
why had she gone to him? He would ask her. In fact, he would take her to
task for this. Tell her that someone had seen them together and had
told him. It was completely unacceptable, her consorting with the likes
of Malone. It was utter madness.

There must be a reason, a damn good one, for her to have taken such a
measure. But what was it? The more Freddie thought about it, the more
he saw that his assumption that India would use the devices in her
clinic was wrong, because there was no clinic. Not yet. He knew she was
putting aside money from her wages to fund the clinic, and he knew that
those savings did not amount to much. Why would she spend the precious
little money she had on supplies when the clinic wasn't even open?

Was she going to use the devices at Gifford's surgery? That was a
more likely explanation. But if she was, why hadn't she just ordered
them from a medical supplier?

And then it hit him. She doesn't want Gifford to know.

Gifford must be against it, he thought. It would make sense that he
was. He was terribly upright. A bit of a relic, actually. India must be
planning to prescribe them without his knowledge.

Freddie watched the hackney carefully turn around in the middle of
the street, and decided to do a bit of an about-face himself. He
wouldn't con-front India about this. Not yet. He would bide his time.
Something inside him told him to stow this information away for now. It
would serve him better later.

The cab finally pulled up beside him. As he climbed in, he felt a bit
calmer. He thought of Gemma and her promise to help him. At least he'd
come up with a solution to Joe Bristow. What cheek Bristow had, waltzing
into his constituency, denouncing him to all and sundry. Freddie had
tried fair means of stalling Joe's progress--arguing the issues,
pointing up Bris-tow's lack of experience--and foul. He'd also paid
Donaldson to get some of his lads to smash up Joe's headquarters and rip
down his flyers. They'd be at the Labour rally, too. Some in street
clothes ready to stir things up; others in uniform waiting to arrest law
breakers. With any amount of luck, Donaldson's lads and Gemma and her
friends would turn the event into a free-for-all.

As the cab rolled west down busy Commercial Street, Freddie glimpsed a
pub called the Red Earl. There were more than a few of them in England.
They were named in honor of his ancestor, Richard Lytton. The sign
outside this pub showed Lytton in armor, holding a sword. His expression
was heart-less, fearless, remorseless. He looked like a man who could
do whatever it took to get what he wanted. A man who would win no matter
the cost.

It comes in handy to be a Lytton at times like these, Freddie
thought. He had no conscience whatsoever about scheming to break up the
Labour rally and disgrace Joe Bristow. All was fair in love and war. And
the contest for the Tower Hamlets seat was indeed turning into a war.

As he passed by his ancestor, he smiled at him. "Buck up, old boy,"
he said to himself. "A Lytton brought the Scots to heel, and the Welsh.
And a Lytton will bring East London to heel, too. No matter the cost."

"Ah, Whitechapel in the summer," Ella said, sidestepping a heap of freshly deposited horse manure. "There's no place lovelier."

India, following her, waved her hat in front of her face as she
walked, trying to cool herself. "Why am I doing this?" she wondered
aloud. "I'm only fanning the stinks."

Privies and drains, the odd dead dog, market refuse, and the July
heat had combined to create an unholy stench. During summer's first hot
days, India had felt like retching as she'd walked through the narrow
streets and alleys. She'd gotten used to it, however. She'd had to.
Whitechapel was not about to accommodate her, so she'd learned to
accommodate it.

She walked without her jacket now, and with her sleeves rolled up.
She hadn't bothered to roll them down after seeing her last patient, and
didn't intend to do so now. It was cooler this way. Her cheeks were
pink with the heat, her hair was springing loose from its twist. Her
blouse was sodden. She was sweaty and exhausted. She and Ella looked
less like doctor and nurse and more like two charladies.

"I could murder a lemon squash. I hope my mother's made some," Ella said.

"I hope she's made a tubful. I could bathe in it," India said.

It was late afternoon. She and Ella were in Stepney, walking back to
Whitechapel after seeing their last patient of the day, a child with
dysen-tery. They were seeing many such cases these days as the heat,
combined with the unsanitary conditions in so many shops and homes,
meant that children were eating tainted food. India knew from several
studies, and now from her own experience, that the mortality rate among
Whitechapel's children would skyrocket before leveling off again in the
autumn.

"Ella, look at this," India said, tugging on her arm. She pulled her
over to an old brick building. It was enormous. Five stories tall. At
least forty feet wide. "It's for sale. See the sign?"

They both read it. The building was a former bakery and the owner was asking �4,000.

"We don't even have four hundred pounds," Ella said. "And even if we
did have four thousand, Wish wouldn't let us buy it. It's too dear. He
told us we have to stick to the plan. Weren't you listening?"

"Yes, I was," India sighed. "But it's such a nice, big place."

"We'll find another nice, big place. First we need to raise twenty-five thousand pounds."

India and Ella had met Wish again two nights ago at the caf�He had a
banker's draft for �100 with him, donated by an old school friend of
his, and a rudimentary business plan. He would triple the �5,000 India
had invested in his Point Reyes project and put it into an account.
Meanwhile they would all work like demons to solicit another �10,000 in
donations. Once they had that, Wish would require them to add �5,000 of
it to India's �15,000--giving them a total endowment of �20,000. That
money he would never allow them to touch. It would go into an aggressive
investment ac-count which would return ten percent annually. They would
use that return, roughly �2,000, to run the clinic--to pay staff
salaries, utilities, and rates, and to buy supplies.

He would allow them to spend the remaining �5,000 of donation money
thus: �2,000 on a building, �2,000 on repairs, and �1,000 on furnishings
and supplies. He made no bones about the fact that for the first few
years of its life the clinic would be run on a shoestring, but he also
said that once it was open they would continue to seek donations. These
would be added to the endowment. The original �20,000 would grow, the
returns on it would grow, and so would the clinic's operating budget. He
saw no reason that the endowment wouldn't one day reach �200,000,
giving them �20,000 a year to spend on their patients.

"Twenty thousand a year to spend," India said now, peering into one
of the building's windows. "Can you imagine? Think we'll ever get
there?"

"Not if we don't get busy and get ourselves more money," Ella said. "Come on, let's go."

They crossed Shandy Street, with its Saturday market, planning to
head to Ella's house. The restaurant would be closed today for the
Sabbath, when cooking, and work of any nature, was forbidden, but they
were hoping there might be some leftover brisket from the Moskowitzes'
Friday night supper.