The Case of the Diamond Murderer
Author: williz
Summary: Officer William Turner lost his memory due to a strong bout of pneumonia, thereafter losing his job at the London Police Department. One year later, now that he is a private investigator, living from paycheck to paycheck, he finds himself involved in a theft and murder case simultaneously. With the help of nurse Elizabeth Swann and victim of the theft, Captain Jack Sparrow, can he prevail in the case of the Diamond Murderer?
Disclaimer: William Turner and Elizabeth Swann do not belong to me. Nor do any other characters used that are recognizable in the Pirates of the Caribbean trilogy. I do own all characters that are not in the movie. I borrowed some character situations, as well as some of the time period ideas from Anne Perry, the amazing authoress of the William Monk mystery series.
The folder lay upon his desk tauntingly, a few of its contents peeking up around the edges, practically begging to be investigated.
Turner had been attempting to think of how he would outsmart both Elizabeth and Jack in his further inquiries on Doctor Banks, but Beckett's files seemed to constantly be haranguing his brain. Would it really bother his investigation all that much if he just looked at them once?
He turned from where he sat in his overstuffed maroon armchair and peeked at the folder on his desk again. There must have been a reason why he hadn't shoved it into a drawer by now, why he was leaving it there to taunt him.
Perhaps a part of him felt he owed it to Elizabeth.
That must be it, he reasoned, standing up and going to the folder, lifting it and shoving it into the drawer, slamming it shut and sighing with relief. Maybe now he could concentrate.
All concentration went out the door a moment later when he heard a brusque knock on his front door.
Smoothing his vest down at his front, Turner strode from his office and into the entry way, swinging open the door. He blanched when he found not only Jack Sparrow standing on his steps, but a giant as well.
"May we come in, Mr. Turner?" Sparrow asked civilly, setting his gold-handled cane just within the door jam, making it hard for Turner to close the door on him. What the captain didn't know was that William Turner had somewhat expected a visit of this sort, but Jack's particularly large friend…that part was slightly surprising.
"Of course, Captain Sparrow. And you are?" Turner asked, raising an eyebrow as he addressed the six and half foot, beefy individual dwarfing the very short, well-dressed captain of the Black Pearl beside him.
"He 'asn't got a name…as it were." There was a flash in Jack's eyes as he leaned forward.
With a slightly amused smile, Turner backed up and opened the door wider, allowing Jack and the unnamed giant step into his home. He shut the door behind them and turned, shrugging.
"What can I help you with, Jack?"
"Captain," Sparrow answered, turning to meet the younger man's eyes. Turner just nodded to him. "Listen, yeh can use the pitiful amnesia garbage wit' the pretty li'l nurse, but no' wit' me."
"What are you talking about, Captain?" Turner could tell his sarcasm was disarming.
"I know no one talked abou' Cutler Beckett on the damnable ship wot took me diamonds. An' I know yeh were lyin' ter me when ye said it. I don' fancy ye like Miss Swann does. I can see righ' through yeh." Jack had stepped closer, his face mere inches from Turner's.
Turner paused, wondering if he should tell Jack the whole truth, part of the truth, or deny everything altogether. He weighed his options. Jack would be frustrated and angry with him if he found out he still planned to investigate Robert Banks. He would probably fire him as well.
If Turner denied everything, Jack would certainly be able to tell, and a good beating by his giant would get that out of the detective…he could hold off for awhile, but sooner or later, it wouldn't even be worth it.
Then again, if he managed to persuade Jack that he had lied about hearing Beckett's name mentioned on the thieves' ship, but was still investigating Beckett, he might get away with it.
Of course, he would wait for just a little while longer and let Jack get his frustrations out, if need be.
"Did yeh 'ear me, lad? I said I brought me rather large friend wit' me ter make sure you're tellin' me the truth. Wot say yeh ter tha', hm?" A satisfied smile leaked across Sparrow's handsome lips.
"I heard you," Turner answered quietly.
Captain Jack Sparrow turned his back on his private investigator and immediately Turner felt a large hand against his chest. He stumbled backwards into the wooden stand beside the stairs, knocking the blue and white glass vase from its top.
Luckily it toppled forward into Turner's waiting hands. He clung to it tightly, eyes wide. He hadn't been expecting to be pushed just then. He reached back and felt a small bump growing on his head where it had connected with the wood stand. He winced. At least the vase had been saved.
"Look, mate. I don' want this to be 'ard fer you. So I'll try an' make it easier. Wot is it yer 'iding from me? Wot are yeh plannin'?" Sparrow leant down closer to the young man sitting on the wooden floor with his legs sprawled out before him. "These are my diamonds we're talkin' abou'. I paid yeh ter find 'em. Me."
Turner inwardly grinned. Sparrow wasn't angry, frustrated, or upset. He was business. He was getting his diamonds no matter what.
What he hadn't realized that part of that inward grin had snuck onto his features. With a sigh, Jack backed out of the way again, strolling a few feet away.
Again, Turner felt the two paws of the giant clutch at his vest and shirt, pulling him to his feet roughly. The vase slid from his grip and crashed onto the floor, breaking into a few pieces at their feet.
"What—? Come on, gentlemen. That was my—"
"That vase innit th'only thin' tha' will be broken if yeh don' fess up. Now…tell me."
"Tell you what?" Turner asked, finding it hard to concentrate with his feet dangling a few inches above the ground.
He felt his back slammed into the wall beside his grandfather clock, the loud dong reverberating through not only the home, but his very head as well. The fists of the giant were pressing him so tightly he thought his ribs would bust.
Clearing the stars from his vision, he forced himself to shudder. "Alright, fine," he murmured.
The servant looked to its master. In his peripherals, Turner saw the shorter man nod slightly at his pet giant.
Immediately, his feet made contact with the floor, causing him to stumble forward. The crony purposefully stepped away so that Turner flopped hard onto his chest and face. He sat up and saluted him. "Thank you," he muttered sarcastically.
"And?" Jack probed, crossing his arms and staring down at the young man.
"I lied about the—hearing Beckett's name on the ship. I lied. I didn't hear his name. I didn't hear anything. I just found those diamonds." He took a deep breath, smoothing down the distorted (probably torn, too) front of his vest and shirt.
"Why th'ell would yeh lie abou' tha'?" Turner could tell he was more confused than angry. It was a confusing prospect, unless one knew the truth.
Turner allowed himself to look away, to the broken pieces of the vase that were strewn about him, the white and blue glass clashing horrifically with the dark wood of the floor. "It's—what Elizabeth said about Beckett…" He paused. "What he did to her family."
"We don' know what 'e did to 'er family," Jack mumbled.
Turner nodded. "I know, but still…"
"Mate, lemme try an' make some sense of wot yer tryin' ter say…" Sparrow cleared his throat, crossing his arms and leaning down closer to Turner, eyeing him sideways. "Basically, you're following this lead—which isn't even a lead because you swiped it out o' thin air—for a nurse with a nice-lookin' face."
Turner stood from the ground, brushing nonexistent dust from the seat of his trousers. He motioned for Jack to follow as he strode purposefully into the office and to his desk. "I did follow the lead because I…" He paused, glancing over his shoulder to make sure the captain and his giant were following. "She's a friend, Jack."
All he got was a meaningful snort out of the other man. Ignoring it, he pulled open his drawer and lifted Cutler Beckett's folder from its depths. He slammed it on the table before Jack. "But I found this."
Raising an eyebrow, the older man tentatively reached down and set a hand on it. "Wot is this?"
"A very poorly guarded file—many files that is—on one Cutler Beckett. Where is all of this police information on the bastard coming from, Jack, if he doesn't have some sort of criminal record. Do you know what this means?" He placed both hands on his desk and leaned forward on them.
"Tha' Beckett isn' as innocent as 'is public image would make 'im seem? So wot? Neither am I. Neither are you." Jack shrugged. "No one is."
Turner was beginning to sweat. He hadn't actually looked at the file yet. He couldn't use its contents to support his reasoning. "All I'm saying is that it's not hard to imagine him having something to do with illegal trade rings along the Thames. And if that's the case, he might know something about your diamonds."
It was a long-shot explanation, but Jack nodded, apparently having been satisfied with his reasoning. "Alrigh', it's worth a try. S'not like yeh 'ave anythin' else to go off of."
Turner shrugged. It was true.
"Well, then," Jack continued, dropping his cane from where he had tucked it under his arm back to the wood floor. "We'll be off. You 'ad better 'ave results that aren' jus' pleasin' ter Elizabeth. I wan' some satisfaction as well. I want me diamonds."
With that, Jack and his giant left Turner's home without turning back to say their farewells.
He sighed loudly in relief, plopping down into his chair and wincing, feeling behind him where his tailbone was. That shove to the floor hadn't been in want of strength.
With a jolt, he remembered that there was a shattered vase on the floor of his entryway. He found himself sighing again as he stood up slowly and walked out of his office. He stopped and stared down at what remained of his vase. It hadn't been an important vase, or a particularly lovely vase. But there had been something about it that made his house feel like it was his house. His home.
Carefully stepping over the shattered glass, he crossed behind the staircase and pushed the swinging door to the kitchen open. As he entered, he glanced around for his broom and dustpan.
He grabbed them from where they were wedged in between the stove and countertop, then walked into the other room. For a split second, he halted in the doorway. Tucking the dustpan under his armpit, he grabbed an empty glass bowl from the counter, then continued to the broken vase.
It seemed as though the pieces had multiplied since the last time he had looked down at them. With another sigh, he bent down and cleaned it up, sweeping the pieces into the dustpan and dumping them into the glass bowl.
As he was finishing, a knock sounded on his front door again. He rolled his eyes. If it was Jack and the giant again…
Haphazardly setting everything down, he stood up, brushed his trouser knees, and answered the door.
To his surprise, Elizabeth Swann stood there with a small, slightly shy smile on her lips. It had been a few days since he had seen her, when he had told her he was pursuing Cutler Beckett in his investigation, when she had stood up for him to Jack Sparrow, one of the most powerful traders in London.
"Good evening, William," she said politely, nodding her head.
"Good evening! What—?" He stopped himself. "I mean, please…come in."
He stood back and opened the door for her to enter. She did so and immediately saw the shards of glass on the wood floor next to the stairs and the turned over stand that the vase had once stood upon. "Thank you," she muttered.
Without further invitation, she walked right up to the mess.
"Be careful," he warned, shutting the door behind her and rubbing a hand down his face.
"What happened?" She peered at the overturned stand again, then at the glass, and turned to regard Turner. It looked almost as if there had been a struggle, and his shirt front was rather untidy…even for him.
"I tripped," he shrugged. She eyed him suspiciously, then leant down gracefully to lift the bowl of blue and white glass shards.
"Why are you keeping this in a bowl? Just throw it out." She turned around and wrinkled her nose at him.
"I liked that vase," he replied with another shrug.
She just giggled and set the vase back down as he walked up behind her and finished cleaning the glass from the floor. She watched in silence, her gaze settling on his office door, which was propped open.
When she turned back to him, he was nowhere to be seen, the glass on the floor gone, the bowl of vase pieces set elegantly on his entryway table, beneath the elegant mirror that hung on his wall. The broom and dustpan was gone.
He walked back in through the swinging door with a thump and clapped his hands together. "What can I do for you, Miss Swann?"
She dropped her eyes to her feet, then looked back up at him. "Call me Elizabeth, please, William. I think we're beyond Miss and Mister."
He bowed his head politely. "Elizabeth. What can I help you with?"
"Well, I—I started nursing again yesterday."
"Oh?"
"Yes. I'm much better."
He smiled up at her distractedly, she thought.
"That's good," Turner answered, sticking his hands in his pocket. There was a bit of awkwardness hanging in the air, and both could feel it, though Turner was less aware than his companion. He was pondering how to continue his investigation on Banks without the woman in front of him discovering. She couldn't be privy to that knowledge until he had proved the man to be the perpetrator. Or one of the perpetrators.
"They have actually brought in a new nurse that Gertrude has been training. Her name is Josephine. She's only eighteen, but she seems to be very…" She paused, realizing Turner wasn't really listening to her, despite his gaze being turned towards her. What was boggling his mind so?
"William."
He snapped to attention. "I'm sorry, Elizabeth. I was just—I'm being awfully rude, aren't I?" He smiled, giving her his full attention. "Can I make you some tea? Soup?" With that his grin turned cheeky.
She shook her head vehemently, eyes wide, a smile on her face. "No soup, thank you. But I'll gladly drink your tea."
He nodded in a friendly manner.
"Go ahead into my sitting room and I'll join you in a moment with a tray of tea and biscuits."
"May I help you?" she asked, finding the prospect of sitting idly in his sitting room less appealing than seeing his kitchen. She had an inherent curiosity about the man before her. Was he cluttery? Clean? Was his kitchen ostentatious, with contraptions he most certainly didn't need? Or was it simple, like him?
She scoffed at herself. William Turner—simple?
He seemed slightly taken aback, but not entirely. He just nodded again. "I'd love some help—if you're sure. You can tell me more about going back to nursing while I make the tea."
"Of course!" She followed him into the kitchen and found herself smiling. He had a fire stove, countertops, a few knick knacks of old spices in metal cans (probably for show more than anything else), and a small wooden table with two rickety chairs in the middle of the room. He was in need of most modern amenities, like a water pump for instance.
Turner pulled a metal tea kettle from his cupboard and set it on the stove, the coals seeming to already have been heated, as if he would be preparing tea whether or not he received his guest.
Excusing himself, he walked outside with a bucket in his hands, heading for the water pump on the corner and pushing the handle down a few times. Water sputtered inside of the tall black pump, rattling as it surged up from the ground and down the spout, splattering down into his bucket. When he filled it halfway, he walked back inside and to the kitchen.
Elizabeth had meanwhile found a few biscuits that were rather tough in his pantry, wrapped in cloth that looked to be a stolen restaurant napkin. She set them on a plate as she heard him stumbling in with the water.
Helping him pour some water into the kettle, they stepped back, put the lid on, and continued with the preparation.
Not fifteen minutes later, they munched on biscuits together in his sitting room, Elizabeth filling the private investigator in on her busy day at the clinic. She told him of Doctor Leighton and his fear of spiders. She giggled as she recounted how not one of them had known of his fear until he was setting a young boy's arm and a small green spider snuck across the bed sheets. Priscilla, the middle-aged nurse who was working with him at the time, said he had jumped clean out of his skin.
"And she had to kill it," Elizabeth finished, laughing brightly.
Turner just smiled, letting out a small chuckle as she quieted down.
"Doctor Norrington called it Arachnophobia. I fear he couldn't help but laugh as well." She shook her head. "And he's usually such a quiet, rather taciturn fellow, I've found. Can you imagine? These phobias…Norrington says there must be a phobia for just about everything. He's a very smart ma—"
"Doctor Norrington?" Turner asked, sitting up straighter. "Was he not the doctor who came to me nearly every day to check on me when I was a patient at your clinic?"
"Yes," Elizabeth smiled. "He knows an awful lot about medicine, anesthesia, and a lot about…Well, I'm assuming I bore you with all of this." She paused meaningfully. "Have you found anything out about…him?"
Turner didn't even waste time asking who she meant. He knew who she meant. He shrugged. "It's slow going, unfortunately, but I stole a file from Scotland Yard."
She nodded for a moment, then froze. Her eyes widened as she nearly dropped her biscuit straight into her lap. "You what?"
"Well, it wasn't exactly that I stole the documents. I managed to persuade an old acquaintance to let me down into the archives and I…took a wrong turn, is all. And found Beckett's files that the police have been keeping on him." He innocently sipped his tea.
"William, you could be arrested for something like this!" she nearly shrieked. She was appalled that he would stoop to break the law for this case. That was what separated his methods from Captain Sparrow's. Then, almost out of thin air, small giggle escaped her lips, before she stifled it with a dainty hand to her mouth.
"I just—I suppose I can't believe you did it," she amended from behind her hands.
His grin was rather cheeky as he leant forward to refill his cup of tea, reaching over to refill hers as well.
"It was rather risky, to be sure. And I'm disappointed with the security in Scotland Yard, frankly. They had one guard." He moved closer to her, his face close to hers. "One guard!"
She met his gaze seriously. "M-May I see the files on him?"
Turner sat back in his chair and placed his fingers against the rough patch on his chin. To the outside observer, Turner seemed rather crooked in his scheme to fool both Elizabeth and Sparrow into believing he was pursuing Beckett, when in actuality, he meant to continue his pursuit of Banks.
But at this very moment, William Turner sought to protect Nurse Elizabeth Swann from herself. And he sought to protect her from something she was not yet prepared to see. Perhaps it had been a few years since Elizabeth's parents had died, but he wasn't willing to see her hurt again as she was brought face to face with the man who caused their deaths.
Despite not actually looking at the file on Beckett yet, he had a feeling whatever was in it would be hard for Elizabeth to see. This was the man who she attributed to the deaths of her parents.
Leaning forward again, he reached over and let his fingers lightly touch hers as they clutched the handle of her teacup. She looked up at him, slightly curious.
"I'm sorry Elizabeth, but you can't see them." She looked away, down at her lap. "Not just yet, anyways," he softly added. He could tell by the way she looked up at him and nodded, a small smile on her lips, her eyes drawn with fatigue, that she understood why he made the decision he had.
She thought she might say thank you. But it sounded strange and tinny, almost fake, in her mind. And so she kept it there, deep within the recesses of thought. She had no way of knowing that in the small tilt of her pursed lips, he had seen her thank you.
Doctor James Norrington weaved his way through the hospital beds in the main part of the clinic. It seemed as though the gods were against them on this particular night.
To begin with, it seemed that while four of their nurses had ended their shifts, only one had replaced them. On top of that, five new patients had stumbled in for care; one had a bad cold, another had fallen off of a fence and had cracked his cranium, three others had a stomach bug and seemed to be vomiting all over themselves.
Besides himself, only Leighton and Hightower were here. Banks and a few of the other regular doctors had taken the night off.
And now three doctors (Norrington technically didn't count, as he specialized in medicines) were on duty, with only four nurses. He glanced across the room at Priscilla, who was voraciously stitching the fallen man's head. Not a few moments earlier, Norrington had etherized him so that he wouldn't feel the needle working its way in and out of the skin atop his head.
For an insane moment, the young doctor almost chuckled at the prospect of the man being chagrined when he woke to find a large strip of his heavy, coarse black hair shaved from atop his head.
Shaking himself, he sat at the bed of the thirteen year old boy with a cold. The boy turned over and groaned, blinking his nearly sealed shut eyes groggily at the doctor sitting above him. He mumbled something incoherent, and lost himself to the fever again.
"Miss O'Farrell?" He called quietly to the nearest nurse to him. She looked up from the brow she was mopping with a cool cloth and nodded, setting the cloth down and hurrying to the bedside of the child.
"Miss O'Farrell, his fever is running rather high. I fear he may get worse if his temperature continues to increase. If you could bathe his body with cool water. I may have a remedy for his cold." He stood as the tall brunette nurse nodded, rapidly preparing a bowl of fresh, cold water and a washcloth.
Stepping into his office, he hastened to his medicinal cabinet and pulled it open. Running his finger passed all of the native herbal medicines he had collected, both from the Far East and from the Americas, he finally stopped upon the one he had been looking for.
Pulling the small pouch from the cabinet, he took his stone mortar and pestle out from where he had it stored and set it on his desk. Sprinkling the Echinacea flowers into the stone bowl, he ground it into a soft powder. He then replaced the pouch to where it lay in the cabinet and took an empty vial out of the next cabinet over.
Dipping the vial into the glass of fresh water as Miss Priscilla had left him at his request not a half hour before, filling it three quarters of the way. Then he sprinkled a perfectly measured amount of the Echinacea flower into the water.
Twisting the cap back onto the vial, he shook it vigorously, hurrying back down the hallway to the main patient room where the ill boy lie, his limbs being stroked gently by the nurse with a cool cloth.
He stopped at the boy's bedside and knelt down beside him. The boy turned his hazy gaze to the doctor again.
"I need you to drink this, Oscar. For your mother. She's so worried about you and this will make you feel better." He smiled, working to make his features friendlier to the boy.
The boy's features clouded. "Me mum don' care," he breathed.
As James looked up, he noticed Miss O'Farrell eyeing him meaningfully and shaking her head subtly.
Oh.
It seemed that Oscar was a forgotten child. That explained how he would come down with a cold in the first place. The boy's mother was either a sex worker or she was dead. Either one was usually the case when a sick child came into their clinic without an adult. This meant the clinic would receive little to no pay for their services. The doctors and nurses didn't particularly mind, of course. For this particular clinic made it a point to make ends meet without robbing its patients blind.
"Now come on," James said softly, outwardly ignoring the boy's comment about his mother. "Drink this up and you'll be alright in no time."
He tipped the vial back as the boy wrapped his chapped lips around its mouth. The liquid slid down into his throat and his Adam's apple bounced up and down as he swallowed.
"Tha' dinit taste ter bad!" the boy acknowledged with a happy smile. "I though' med'cine wos s'posed ter taste lik…fish guts an' tha'. Nasty, like!"
With that, he nodded off again, his head lolling to the side and his smile losing its luster in sleep. With a dismal sigh, James stood from where he knelt.
"Thank you, Miss O'Farrell."
"Ya're quite welcome, Sar," she stated in her soft, lilting Irish accent.
It seemed as though the three siblings in the other half of the room had settled stomachs now and were sleeping off their identical food-poisoning diagnoses. The man who fell from the ladder had since fallen asleep (which seemed, to James, a much better alternative). Things had quieted down.
James turned and walked past the occupied, but silent, hospital beds and out into the hallway, sighing in relief. Now he would have time sit in his passably comfortable office chair and look at his notes from his travels. James Norrington liked to reminisce over the places he'd been to in the past. And if he closed his eyes on silent nights, he could almost imagine himself in those exotic places.
Perhaps he could nod off and take a small nap until his shift was over.
He glanced at the clock hanging beside the door at the end of the hallway, setting his grip on the handle of his office door. He only had an hour left until his shift was over. If the gods were on his side on this dreary night, his patients would sleep restfully 'til morning.
Opening the door and entering his office was usually a pleasant feeling, but for some reason, on this particular night, James Norrington was uneasy. In fact, for some reason, he was altogether nervous. The doctor had a pressing hunch that a hoard of patients would be wheeled in any moment and his last hour would be spent flurrying about patients' beds, cool cloths and thermometers, anesthesia and laudanum, and lots of rum and brandy.
Shaking his head with a small smile, he flopped down in his chair and sighed again, leaning back and stretching. There was a small flurry of voices outside of his door, then.
James rolled his eyes and sat back up. Perhaps he was right in worrying over a resurgence of patients. Perhaps ten new patients had dragged themselves in all of a sudden.
He stood up from his chair and rounded his desk, straightening the front of his lab coat. As he opened the door, he watched as Priscilla rushed past. "Miss Priscilla?"
She stopped in her tracks and spun to face him. "Miss Priscilla, what's happening?"
Priscilla's red, plump face moved closer, her honey-colored hair dropping from her cap in tangled wisps. "Doctor Norrington, sir, another patient 'as been brought in, but yeh aren' ta worry over 'er. She's just got th'bruises an' might 'ave a broken rib needin' ta be set."
"Shall I come see to her treatment, then?" he asked, stepping out of his office and turning to shut the door behind him.
"No! No, sir. Leighton is there."
"Can I do anything at all?" he asked, wondering why he hadn't been alerted, when they must have brought the patient right past his office.
"Well, the thing is—well, we thought you migh' wanner talk to 'er. See, we think she's—we know she's—" Priscilla paused, uncomfortably.
"She's a prostitute, is it?" he asked, without the timid blush or embarrassment one would expect. The amount of sex workers who came through this particular clinic was overwhelming at times. Word had traveled across London that the clinic cared for prostitutes just as they would any other paying patient.
As far as Norrington was concerned, these women deserved medical care just as much as the next person, however they made their wages. Only one or two of the nurses came from disadvantaged backgrounds. These particular nurses were less obvious about their opposition of aiding the battered women, and with intense pity in their eyes, they would set broken arms, stitch cut thighs, and ice bruised faces. The rest of the nurses had less pity and more disgust as they treated the streetwalkers and brothel employees. These particular nurses were silent in their work, their lips pressed together in a thin, tense line.
Miss Swann, of course, didn't fit into either of the categories. She seemed completely at ease in those situations, not overly kind out of pity for the women, and not silent in disapproval. She was fastidious and hardworking, chatty when she needed to distract the women from the stitching of their wounds, and kind when they needed kindness. Just as if they were the same as every other patient.
In fact, at this point in time, Doctor Norrington wished Miss Swann was on-duty so that she could speak with their latest patient instead of him. More than anything, he was tired. And he wanted to go home to his bed and sleep. She was almost as good with patients as he was and she would have been glad to talk to the girl.
"Yes, Doctor. She isn't talkin' to us abou' wot is achin'. An' she won' let us under th'dress. Course yeh know why," she grunted, rubbing her hands on her apron. James was silent as he nodded and walked down the hallway to follow where they had brought the patient.
Yes, he knew why. When girls from the brothels came in to have broken bones and bruises treated, it was because they had been beaten by either their clients or their employers. For some of them, especially the younger girls who were new to the trade, the embarrassment of the situation was more prominent than the pain they suffered from their wounds. To undress in a room full of strangers (albeit licensed nurses) was a mortifying prospect.
He entered the room at the end of the hall, where the rest of the patients were, and walked to the bed in which they situated the injured woman. He went to the curtain surrounding the bed and pulled it back, stepping into the private shroud and shutting the curtain behind him.
The two nurses had eased her back against the pillows.
She was small, very small, and thin. James assumed she was perhaps in her early twenties—twenty-one or twenty-two—her curly black hair pulled up into a messy, tangled bun atop her head. She had a scratch on her cheekbone and a purplish-blue bruise beneath it.
She stubbornly looked away from him as the nurses backed away, allowing him to move into the vacant space beside her bed.
"Hello," he murmured kindly, pulling the stool close to the bed and sitting on it.
She turned back to him, surprise in her eyes at the tone of his voice. And she nodded, reaching down to modestly pull her skirt down to cover more of her legs.
"My name is Doctor James Norrington. I work here—"
"I thought you might," she interrupted, wryly, raising an eyebrow. There was vulnerability and shame behind the teasing mask and he saw it plainly in the candlelight washing over her broken face.
He chuckled, turning around to motion for the nurses to leave him with the patient. They both nodded and ducked out, pulling the curtain back in place behind them. He turned back and smiled again. "What's your name, Miss?"
"Helen."
"Ah, Helen. Like Helen of Troy, hm?"
She tilted her head, her lip curled. "Of what?"
He pursed his lips and rubbed his hands together. "Nothing." James cleared his throat. "So what part of London are you from, Helen?"
"East of here," she answered. She would be vague with all of her answers, he realized. They mostly were.
"I see." He clapped his hands together, getting down to business. "So what can I help you with tonight? Broken arm?"
"No," she mumbled, her green eyes looking away.
"Hm, I see. Well you've got quite a bruise on your face. Is that why you're here?"
"Yessir. And…" She paused. "My stomach hurts."
"Your stomach? Where on your stomach?" She didn't answer and he scooted the stool closer, lifting both of his hands before him. "Will you point to where it hurts? I promise I won't touch you unless you tell me I can. We need to know how to make you feel good as new," he finished with a kind smile.
She seemed taken aback by his lack of disgust or pity. So she raised her arm with a wince and used her other hand to point to her side. Miss Priscilla was right, either Helen's rib was bruised or cracked.
"Ah, so your side is smarting! Would you mind if we took care of that for you, Helen?" He reached over and patted her hand. "I promise my nurses will take wonderful care of you and in a day or two, you'll be well again."
Her eyes shot back to him, panic seeming to take over her features. "No! Sir, I—I can't spend more than tonight here! If I don't get—" She halted, aware of what she was about to admit, and shamefully dropped her gaze to her lap. Suddenly, a stubborn flash of anger settled in her gaze. "I have to go."
"Wait, please, Helen." He backtracked, holding up his hands in defense. "Helen, we mean you no harm. But if your ribs are injured like we think they are, you need to have them at least wrapped. I promise I won't make you stay longer than warranted."
"I need to go tomorrow morning, or I'm leaving now."
He smirked. She was giving him an ultimatum.
With a nod, he gave up. "You may leave in the morning, on one condition, Helen. You must let my nurses dress your wounds and give you a clean robe to sleep in. We'll give you back your own clothes tomorrow morning and you may be on your way."
She looked at him suspiciously and adjusted her position. She winced, grabbing at her side in pain. This seemed to persuade her. "Alright," she squeaked.
"Alright. And if you need anything, you tell them to get me." He patted her hand again, then stood from the stool.
"Thank you, Sir."
He left through the curtain and nodded to the nurses who were patiently waiting outside. "If she gives you trouble, come and find me," he said. "I'm not sure if her ribs are cracked or bruised, but I trust you both to find out."
"If she don' wan'er be 'ere, why don' we let 'er go?" one of them grumbled, but turned with the others and entered Helen's private curtained bed.
James looked up at the nearby clock and saw that his shift was over in five minutes, so he slowly sauntered down the rows of patients, making sure they were still sleeping soundly. He checked each one without waking them, and rounded back to the door, entering the hallway again.
With a relieved sigh, he entered his office again and shrugged his lab coat from his shoulders. Hanging it on the coat rack by the door, he went to his office chair pulled his jacket and coat on, buttoning them securely to protect him from the cold outside.
Reaching under his desk, he lifted a dark brown leather briefcase into his arms and held it securely. He checked his desk, scanned the office for anything he might be forgetting, turned down the lamp on his desk, and left the room, shutting the door behind him.
He strolled down the hallway, then heard the sound of a door opening near the front. The somber rumble of male voices sounded and a gurney was rolled into the hallway. A white sheet was pulled over what James assumed was a dead body. Doctor Hightower, the oldest of the clinic's doctors, walked beside the gurney that the police officer was pushing. Another officer who looked to be in a position of superiority walked on the other side. All three had morose features as they met Norrington's gaze. Hightower nodded to him in a polite manner as they strode past with the body.
He stopped in his tracks and turned to watch them walk slowly down the hallway towards the operation theater. If police officers were escorting the body, it meant foul play. Perhaps a murder victim.
Against his better judgement, James Norrington slowly moved after the men. Leighton also stepped out from the patient room at the end of the hall and watched the gurney as it was pushed past.
"Norrington!" James heard barked from behind him. He spun and came face to face with Doctor Robert Banks, probably having just arrived for his shift. His coat tails flew behind him as he quickly moved to James' side. "What is it that's going on?"
"Some police officer rolled a gurney in with what I assume to be a murder victim."
"Hm," Banks murmured, staring after the gurney. "Duty calls, I suppose, eh?" He sighed bitterly and rubbed a hand down his face.
James watched as Banks disappeared into his office, likely changing into his lab coat to perform his autopsy on the body. Without properly thinking of the consequences, Norrington curiously headed down the corridor and to the operation theater, pushing open the door and stepping inside.
Doctor Leighton had already beaten him, curiosity also shining in his dark features. He stood with a frown on his face and looked up at James as he entered.
James scooted to the side of the door along the wall and out of the way, knowing that in a few moments, Banks would come in to look at the victim. Leighton and Hightower backed away to a professional distance for the same reason.
When Robert Banks finally entered the theater, he went straight to the victim and pulled his gloves on. He looked up and met eyes with the high-ranking officer. James' eyes widened. For the first time since he'd seen the police officers enter, he realized what this particular body meant.
The diamond murderer had struck again.
Banks curled his fingers over the white sheet and pulled it away from the face. He staggered a step away from the body, dropping the sheet and shaking. Leighton and Hightower gasped.
Norrington didn't have a proper view, so he moved forward a few steps until he could see the face.
He stopped.
Lucille.
He felt as though a train had rammed into him head-on, and he looked away quickly. Without making a sound, he backed out of the theater into the hallway and shut the door. Numbly walking through the hallway, James heard the door open behind him.
Ignoring everything else, he hurried down the hallway and pulled the front door to the clinic open, stepping outside.
The cold air shocked him as it hit him in the face. And he slowly walked home.
(A/N): I hope you all enjoyed this chapter. I'm luckily on my Spring Break, which is finally enough time for me to gather my wits about me and do some more writing! Like I have said before, the chapters are slow going...but they're DEFINITELY going! Thanks ever so much for your patience, all of you!
Cheers!
williz