Devil in Spring (The Ravenels #3)(88)

“I think so,” Gabriel replied.

“We’ll take my carriage. I’ve already sent word to my staff physicians—they’ll meet us at Cork Street. There’s a new surgery and clinic in the building next to my store.”

“I’d rather take her to my family doctor.”

“St. Vincent, she needs to be seen by someone quickly. Cork Street is only a half-mile away.”

She heard Gabriel curse quietly. “Let’s go, then.”





Chapter 20




Nothing Gabriel had ever been through had felt like this, real and yet not real. A waking nightmare. Nothing had ever made him afraid like this. Staring down at his wife, he wanted to howl with anguish and rage.

Pandora’s face was strained and white, her lips blue-tinged. Blood loss had weakened her severely. She was propped in his lap with her legs extended across the carriage seat. Although she was weighted with coats and lap blankets, she shivered continuously.

Tucking the coats around her more snugly, he checked the bandage he’d fashioned with a pad of clean handkerchiefs. He’d bound it with neckties that went around her arm, crossed over the joint of her neck and shoulder and wrapped beneath her opposite arm. His mind kept returning to the moment when she’d collapsed in his arms, blood welling from the incised wound.

It had happened within seconds. He’d looked up to make certain Pandora had crossed the short distance to the carriage. Instead, he’d seen Dragon fighting his way through the crowd and running full-bore toward the corner of the building, where Pandora was standing with an unfamiliar woman. The woman had been pulling something from her sleeve, and he’d seen the telltale shake of her arm as she flipped open a folding knife. The short blade had flashed in the reflected theater lights as she’d raised it.

Gabriel had reached Pandora just a second after Dragon, but by that point the knife blade had already driven downward.

“Wouldn’t it be strange if I died from this?” Pandora chattered, trembling against his chest. “Our grandchildren wouldn’t be at all impressed. I’d rather have been stabbed while doing something heroic. Rescuing someone. Maybe you could tell them . . . oh, but . . . I s’pose we wouldn’t have grandchildren if I died, would we?”

“You’re not going to die,” Gabriel said shortly.

“I still haven’t found a printer,” Pandora fretted.

“What?” he asked, thinking she was delirious.

“This might delay my production schedule. My board game. Christmas.”

Winterborne, who was sitting with Helen in the opposite seat, interrupted gently. “There’s still time for that, bychan. Don’t worry about your game.”

Pandora relaxed and subsided, her fist closing in a fold of Gabriel’s shirt like a baby’s.

Winterborne glanced at Gabriel, seeming to want to ask something.

On the pretext of smoothing Pandora’s hair, Gabriel settled his palm gently over her good ear, and gave the other man a questioning glance.

“Was the blood spurting?” Winterborne asked softly. “As if in time to a heartbeat?”

Gabriel shook his head.

Winterborne relaxed only marginally, rubbing the lower half of his jaw.

Removing the hand from Pandora’s ear, Gabriel continued to stroke her hair, and saw that her eyes had closed. He propped her up slightly higher. “Darling, don’t go to sleep.”

“I’m cold,” she said plaintively. “And my shoulder hurts, and Helen’s carriage is lumpy.” She made a pained sound as the vehicle turned a corner and jolted.

“We’ve just turned onto Cork Street,” he said, kissing her cool, damp forehead. “I’m going to carry you inside, and they’ll give you some morphine.”

The carriage stopped. As Gabriel lifted Pandora with care and brought her into the building, she felt terrifyingly light in his arms, as if her bones were hollow like a bird’s. Her head rested on his shoulder, rolling slightly as he walked. He wanted to pour his own strength into her, fill her veins with his blood. He wanted to beg, bribe, threaten, hurt someone.

The interior of the building had recently been renovated, with a well-ventilated and brightly lit entrance. They went through a set of self-closing doors to a large block of rooms identified with neatly lettered signs, including an infirmary, a dispensary, administrative offices, consulting and examination rooms, and an operating room at the end of a long corridor.

Gabriel had already been aware that Winterborne employed two full-time physicians for the benefit of the hundreds of men and women who worked for him. However, the best doctors usually attended upper-class patients, whereas the middle and working class had to make do with practitioners of lesser talent. Gabriel had vaguely envisioned a set of shabby offices and a mediocre surgery, occupied by a pair of indifferent physicians. He should have known that Winterborne would have spared no expense in building an advanced medical facility.

They were met in the surgery lobby by a middle-aged physician with a shock of white hair, a broad brow, penetrating eyes, and a handsomely craggy face. He looked exactly how a surgeon should look, capable and dignified, with decades’ worth of knowledge earned by vast experience.

“St. Vincent,” Winterborne said, “this is Doctor Havelock.”

A slender brown-haired nurse strode briskly into the lobby area, waving away Winterborne’s attempt at introductions. She was dressed in a divided skirt and wore the same kind of white linen surgeon’s gown and cap as Havelock. Her face was young and clean-scrubbed, her green eyes sharp and assessing.