“Come back later,” the matron snapped to him.
“You imbecile!” the man screamed at Pip, and before Beau could move swung on her like a longshoreman, knocking her right down into the mess on the floor.
“Here, now!” Beau protested, running around the matron to get to them. “There’s no call for such as that!”
He came within an inch of serving the man his own punishment.
“Who are you?” the doctor demanded.
“Who areyou?” Beau countered as he crouched to a wincing Pip. “Ta harm a wee soul such as this. You all right, miss?”
“I’ve ‘ad worse, sir,” she answered, a hand to the rising bruise on her jaw, and then in a tone so low no one but Beau could hear. “Don’t drink the tea.”
Even caught in such a mad tableau, he almost laughed. Winking at her, he helped her to her feet. One side of her uniform was soaking, and tea dripped from her hair.
“Clean up the floor or get out,” the matron hissed. “We need another urn!” she called to one of the passing staff, somebody above Pip, if her tidier outfit and starched apron was any indication. Matron only got a nod on the way by before disappearing around the corner herself.
“Please, sir,” Pip whispered when Beau didn’t let go. “I need to clean…”
“Are ya sure?” he asked, peering down at her. “Ye’re welcome to work in one o’ me mills in Birming’am. Can always used a good strong girl there.”
“No, sir,” she said, pulling away. “I need to clean now. Wet floors is dangerous.”
So, for the moment Beau turned to the gentleman. “Now, ‘oo might you be again, a man who’d strike a wee girl. I have plenty o’ girls in my mills, and ha’n’t served one of them so in fifteen years.”
“I am Dr. Whaley,” the man said, leading Beau back toward the front door. “The administrator of Richmond Hills.”
When the man gave a general wave of his hand to indicate the institution, Beau caught sight of a signet. A red ruby with some kind of carving. Beau remembered the sign out front. Tasteful, simple. The name and a red Tudor rose. Oh, hell. Why hadn’t he noticed? The Lions used the Tudor rose as a signal.
Turning back to Whaley, he smiled. “Ye wouldna strike my missus, would ye?”
Whaley was just straightening and puffing out his chest to respond when he was interrupted again.
“Who has been in the pantry?!” the matron yelled, running back out. “It’s gone! It’s all gone, and we haven’t any more!”
Every staff member stopped in their tracks and turned towards her, some looking frightened, some angry, some bemused. Pip was studiously mopping up the lake of tea that pooled over half the floor. She only looked up briefly, but in that time, Beau was certain she knew. What was gone? What exactly was enraging the matron?
One of the men pointed right at Pip. “Saw her in the pantry not an hour ago. Want I should find out?”
Not the guard Beau had chastised, but another that didn’t look much more civilized. The other guard, though, was coming up behind him, and suddenly both looked far too avid.
Pip didn’t even look at him. “The pantry?” she asked, blinking like a child. “o’course I was in there. Missed me lunch and ‘ad some bread and cheese, didn’t I?”
“Did you now?” the Matron said, her voice slithery as she approached. “And what else did you do? Let me smell your hands, girl.”
Pip looked surprised. “My‘ands?There’s naught there but lye soap and piss.”
Beau rose on the balls of his feet, suddenly feeling the real threat. What did the matron want?
“Where is it?” she growled as she grabbed Pip’s hands and lifted them to her own face to sniff. “You’ve taken to stealing laudanum now, girl?” she demanded, pushing them away again. “And foxglove? For what, I wonder?”
“You can smell that on somebody’s hand?” the irrepressible Pip demanded, sniffing her own palms. “Not mine. Don’t hold with the stuff.”
“Laudanum?” Beau echoed. “Foxglove? What kind of place are you running here? That’s poison, that is!”
Suddenly, a back door slammed open and yet another player entered the stage holding a teapot in one hand. “The quieting rooms are empty! Somebody’s let them out!”
“Don’t think I want ta leave my Myrtle here after all,” Beau said, watching everyone freeze again and give him a pointed look. “Queer doin’s, ya ask me.”
