tonic. She didn’t want to have to discover what worked, though. If she contracted the disease and succumbed, who would help Mother and the rest? Should they even come to London if the cholera was spreading through town?
There was always the possibility, however, that Mrs. Woodbridge was mistaken. She seemed the sort of woman who might panic. There was only one way to be certain. Mrs. Mainprice would know.
She found the housekeeper out in the garden, clipping chives for the evening dinner.
Mrs. Mainprice straightened from her task, kneading the small of her back. “Och, Miss Dunne. This is a sad excuse for a kitchen garden.”
“The garden will be better at Finchingfield House, I expect.”
“Indeed, it will.” She bundled her clippings and stepped onto the gravel path. “You’ll be able to see for yourself, miss. Glad to hear you’re coming with us.”
“So am I.” Not that she could have refused Dr. Edmunds’s somewhat brisk request.
Mrs. Mainprice handed Rachel the chives, green as fresh lichen and spicy smelling, and descended the stairs leading into the kitchen. Rachel followed her into the dim recesses of the kitchen, hot and sticky from the laundry hanging suspended before the fire. In Ireland, the linens would be hung to dry outside on a day as fair as today. In Ireland, the air wouldn’t turn freshly cleaned bedsheets black from soot and smuts in a half hour, however.
“So what were you needing, child?” the housekeeper asked, peering at Rachel as she took the bundle of herbs and spread them on the table.
“I wanted to know if something were true.”
“If what were true?” Mrs. Mainprice slid a knife from its block and began chopping the chives.
“That the cholera is spreading through town.” Rachel crossed to the other side of the table so she could see the housekeeper’s face. “I have heard that the Castletons are leaving London out of worry. Mrs. Woodbridge came to talk to Dr. Edmunds about it.”
“Och.” The knife flashed in her hands. “I’ve heard the disease is bad in St. Giles parish, miss. And that’s none too far from where Mrs. Woodbridge lives. She should be worried. Poor lass.”
Lass? Sophia Woodbridge? “But do you think it will spread further?”
Mrs. Mainprice’s attention stayed fixed on the herbs, rapidly being reduced to a pile of chopped green. “There’s those who claim ’tis just a matter of time. Heard from the housekeeper down at Mr. Pratt’s that the newspapers one day claim it’s the Lord’s vengeance, then the next they’re tamping down any rumors that we’ve got ourselves another epidemic.” She swept up the herbs and dropped them into the iron pot suspended over the fire. “You’ll be safe while you’re in Finchingfield, Miss Dunne.”
“I shall only be there for a day.”
The housekeeper glanced over her shoulder. “You could ask the master if there is a position in the house and stay with us. Until the disease passes. Or longer if you’d like, and he’d agree.”
And be a servant forever, Peg glaring, Molly hateful . . . Dr. Edmunds close but ever out of reach? Her only true choice was to stay in London and hope for the best. “My family is depending on me. I will make more money as a teacher here in London, helping children as I have always intended.”
Mrs. Mainprice clucked her tongue and nodded. “I will pray for you every day, Miss Dunne. Know that I will.”
Rachel rolled her lips between her teeth. She would need those prayers.
“So you’ve had no cases of the cholera, Peterson,” James repeated.
The man at his side, robustly officious in his doctor’s dark coat and trousers, jiggled a thick chin in affirmation. “As I’ve said, Edmunds, I had heard of the case near St. George’s, but that fellow had, shall we say, unclean habits. An older gentleman who was a bit of a drinker, and you know how that weakens the system.”
“Nothing here, though.” James took in the length of the hospital ward, the lines of spindly-legged beds on each side, the ward mistress moving among her charges like a dog overseeing the flock, a medical student accompanying her, notes in hand. A man groaned in his laudanum-induced sleep. Another was losing a battle with pleurisy, the burbling wheeze of his breath a telltale marker. The smell of vinegar, rising off the floorboards, failed to escape through any open windows, stagnated in the close air, and burned James’s nose.
“Not a single case. A fellow at the end down there,” the doctor paused to gesture with his head,