Janey patted Nell’s arm, and Elizabeth’s face grew grim as she tilted her head to the right. Nell refilled her own glass and looked around the table.

“I’ve never told ye girls how I got the pox, ’ave I?”

“I imagine you got it the same way anyone else does, and there’s no terrible shame in it,” Mrs. Wilcox said.

“Aye, there was no shame. Not on me own part, anyways. But the boy who got me with it, ye see, ’e was me mother’s boss’s son, and their name was gold back in Pennsylvania. And there weren’t no one who was going to speak up for the washerwoman’s daughter, least of all ’im.”

“Would no one help you?” Janey asked.

“I went to me ma, straigh’aways when I knew somethin’ was wrong. She was right sore wi’ me. Said she didna leave Ireland behind to raise a whore in America. I’m the last of ten bairns, and I think she was wore out with the rearin’ of us all. She tol’ me I made me own bed and I was to lie innit. Said the mercury treatments was so expensive they may as well be made on the moon.”

“Couldn’t the boy in question afford it?” Mrs. Wilcox asked.

“’E could afford it well enough, no doubt. But when I went to ’im ’e said I didna catch it from ’im but from a stable boy or vagrant—‘one of yer own kind’ was ’ow ’e put it. I knew well enough it was from ’im, as I’d not been with anyone else and ’e was my first. And ’e knew it too. I could see the fear in ’is eyes as to ’is own welfare and still ’e tossed me out o’ the ’ouse, landed on my rear in the back garden I did, gave me a jolt straight up to me skull.”

Grace was utterly still, as were the other women, lost in the lull of Nell’s voice as she spoke, her own eyes staring into nothing.

“’E was me only chance of savin’ meself, and I well knew it. Me mum and da ’ad turned me out, and there I was with scraped knees and the pox roarin’ in me blood. I knew ’twas all up, but damned if I was lettin’ the likes of James Cavendish get the better o’ me. I knew the fam’ly, knew all their ’ouses from years of ’elpin’ me mum cart their dirty sheets ’ome, never knowing I was to leave a blood spot on one someday meself.

“So I found me way into the bedrooms of all ’is menfolk. One by one they all ’ad me, each unbeknownst to the other and me makin’ noises like it’s me first toss each time. Them so proud of themselves, so ’appy to have a young, pretty thing moanin’ underneath ’em, the whole time I’m givin’ back to them what their own relation delivered unto me. From ’is cousins and uncles and grandfather, right down to the youngest brother, who only got but a minute or two of pleasure from it, I ’ad ’em all. And their pride will keep ’em from the doctor, and their sores will keep ’em from their wives, and their cocks will rot right off and they’ll be wiped from the face o’ the earth. And it’s Nell O’Kelly that’s done it to ’em.”

“Amen,” Mrs. Wilcox said, raising a glass.

“Amen,” Elizabeth confirmed, raising hers for her first drink of the night.

“Amen to that,” Janey said, tapping her glass alongside Grace’s, who raised her water and met Nell’s eyes, coldly nodding in agreement before tossing back what was left of her drink, warm now from the fire. It slid into her belly but barely touched her throat, parched with the need to comfort her friend.

TWENTY-SEVEN

“The kitchens are a wreck, I’ve never seen the like,” Elizabeth complained a week later over dinner. “All this fuss over one man.” She clucked her tongue and looked at her own plate regretfully.

The kitchen had been holding back on the patients’ dinner the whole week, reserving the best of everything for the upcoming party. Grace stared at her plain bread, dry chicken with no gravy, and rather small carrot. Still, she hadn’t had to fight anyone for it like in Boston. She concentrated on eating, her fingers rubbing the key to the west turret through the folds of her skirts for comfort.

“Aye, I’m none too happy meself,” Nell said. “I been down in the root cellars findin’ the best potatoes, as if I grew them for this Mr. Mae in the first place. Which I didna, and I’ve ’alf a mind to tell ’im so.”

Grace grabbed her friend’s wrist and shook her head violently.

“Oy, now, feisty lass.” Nell pulled away from her. “I’ll not be misbehavin’. Come tomorrow night I plan to make meself scarce, unless they try to put us all to work. Not that they’d let me in the kitchens, anyway.” Her hand went to the trail of sores that worked its way from the corner of her mouth, marring her once porcelain complexion.

“They’ve hired out the work,” Elizabeth said, mouth tight as if she found it offensive. “The insane aren’t good enough to prepare Senator Mae’s food, I suppose.”

The sound of her father’s name in her friends’ mouths made Grace’s stomach clench shut, her hands form fists. His impending arrival had weighed heavy on her mind, causing nightmares that interfered with her sleep. Their dark fingers dug for purchase into the daylight hours, where sudden movements caused her to jump and she found herself wishing there was a lock on her bedroom door after all.

“There’s nothing to fear, physically,” Thornhollow had repeated that morning. “Your father believes you are dead. He has no knowledge of me or our connection. There’s no reason for him to suspect a thing. You’ll be safe with Nell and Lizzie. The only thing that could go wrong would be if I happen to punch him in the jaw.”

Grace smiled to herself as she remembered Thornhollow’s words, his own tension showing through the joke. The trio of girls left the dining hall, shooed out early by attendants who needed to put everything in order early, in case the senator could be enticed into a tour of the asylum. This sort of hospitality was exactly what Grace feared. Even if he were kept to the public areas, his presence was a stain she’d be able to sense long after he’d gone.

Janey met them in the hallway, eyes alight. “Girls, you’ll never guess—I’ve been invited to the reception this evening. The dinner is only for a few of the politicals in town of course, and our own doctors, but the superintendent said the head ward nurses could come to the reception, if we’ve got the proper clothing for the thing.” She fell in beside them, her happiness at the thought overwhelming the fact that she was an employee and they patients. “I half think he assumed we’d not have the right wardrobe, but Mother always insisted I keep the church dress for church only, and I suppose if it’s good enough for God, it’s good enough for Senator Mae.”

Grace squeezed her eyes shut, fingers on her temples. Elizabeth’s hands were on her shoulders instantly. “Are you all right, Grace? Is it a headache?”

Grace nodded and Janey herded them all into Grace’s room, her excitement about the dinner overwhelmed by concern for her patient as she leaned Grace back on her bed. “Is it the dinner? So many strangers being here? Sometimes I know that can send you quiet ones over the edge. But don’t you worry none. The super said that he’ll be happy to show off the common places, but nobody’s to see your private rooms. He said you’re not to be paraded about for their entertainment, fancy-pants politician or not.”

Grace kept her eyes closed, fingertips on her scars. That Janey had guessed somewhat correctly left her nerves more frayed than soothed. If the night was to pass uneventfully, she had to get herself under control. Weights settled on both ends of the bed as her friends nestled in with her.

“We’ll stay with ’er, Janey,” Nell said, one hand rubbing Grace’s foot. “You go put on yer pretty things. Have a night without thinkin’ o’ the mad, fer once.”

Janey remained in the doorway, hands working each other in her indecision. “I don’t much like leaving with Grace being in a state, though.”