A Match Made for Murder Iona Whishaw (pride and prejudice read .TXT) 📖

is. I think it’s significant that it would have been done by someone behind him. He could have been caught by surprise, gasped, which involves a good strong breath, and speeded up the action of the sedative and the poison.”

Ames furrowed his brow. “That might account for that strange smell in the car. I can see the strychnine because it’s basically rat poison. Lots of people have it around the house. But how would someone get hold of chloroform? Isn’t it for medical use?”

“Things do go missing from hospitals all the time. But, failing that,” Gilly added with a slightly ghoulish air, “just mix some household chlorine bleach with rubbing alcohol. It’s volatile and dangerous, but it can be done.”

Lane was lying on the bed, reading and waiting for her turn to have a bath to soothe the stiffness from their day on horseback, when the phone rang. Puzzled—and worried because Lord Peter was even now climbing into the bell tower, a manoeuvre she already knew would do him no good—she put her book down, pulled her robe around her, and went to answer it.

“Lane Winslow speaking.”

There was a hesitation at the other end of the line and then a worried voice. “I was hoping to reach a Mrs. Darling. Is she at this number?”

“Oh, yes, of course. I am Mrs. Darling. I don’t usually use my married name. Who is calling?”

“My name is Martha Yelland. I’m the head nurse at the St. Mary’s Hospital. I’m calling on behalf of one of our patients.” Martha lowered her voice. “Mrs. Paul Galloway was brought in very late last night. She’s in quite a bad state. She didn’t want me to call unless things became really bad, but while she’s not on death’s door, I feel like someone should know.”

“My God! But what about her husband?”

“He brought her in,” she said, her voice sounding very compressed.

“Yes, so he must be there with her,” Lane tried to understand what was underlying the nurse’s strange communication.

“Ma’am, I’m calling because I think she needs a friend right now, and you’re the only contact I have. She’s in very bad shape, but she managed to tell me you’re the only person she can trust. She asked me to call you. I’d best be getting along. It’s a busy ward.”

Lane hung up the receiver. Why was she the only person Priscilla could trust? She began to throw her clothes on, calling out to the bathroom door, “Darling, something has happened to Priscilla. She’s in hospital. I’m going to just pop down and make sure she’s all right. You won’t mind?”

“Of course I’ll mind. Was that Galloway? Why do you need to be hauled out in the middle of the night?” The splashy sound of an irritated man quitting his bath came through the door.

Lane opened the bathroom door just enough to put her head through. “It’s not the middle of the night. No, it was a nursing sister from the hospital. Don’t get out, darling. It’s just the nurse was behaving rather peculiarly. I think she was trying to say something without saying something, if you know what I mean.”

“I haven’t the first notion what you mean,” Darling said, subsiding. “I should come with you.”

“No,” Lane said hesitantly. “I think this might be something I have to do. I get the feeling Priscilla might barely want me, but certainly not you. It all seems a little cloak and dagger, and Galloway isn’t with her. I think—but no, I won’t say until I’ve seen her. The front desk will get me a cab. Don’t worry about a thing.”

Darling, who felt fully unconvinced about not worrying, grunted and then issued directions for her to hurry home.

Lane was dropped off in front of an imposing set of buildings far west of the town.

“Not the round one, ma’am. That’s for the tuberculosis patients. Do you want me to wait for you? Visiting hours are over; they’ll probably kick you out.”

“Oh, yes. Please. Do you mind?” Lane said gratefully.

A nurse at reception looked primly at the clock on the wall. “You’ve left it quite late. There won’t be time for a long visit.”

“I know. I’m terribly sorry. The person attending my friend called me and asked me to come right away. Sister Yelland I think her name is.”

The receptionist smiled suddenly. “I nursed in England during the war. We say nurse here, not sister. If she called you, it must be important. Up the stairs on the left to the second floor to our critical ward. We’ll look the other way if you need a bit more time.”

Lane pushed through a set of swinging doors, feeling the claustrophobia the smell of hospitals evoked in her.

“Nurse Yelland?”

A tall, angular woman, made taller and more severe-looking by her starched cap and tightly pinned hair, looked up when Lane introduced herself. “You’ve come. Thank you. She might still be awake. She’s been going in and out of sleep. Morphine does that.” Yelland got up and indicated that Lane should follow.

“But what happened to her?” Lane asked. “Was it a car accident?”

Yelland turned to face her and said stiffly, “It wasn’t a car, and it wasn’t an accident.”

“But what, then?”

“I cannot say. Mrs. Galloway refused to say. When Mr. Galloway came in, he said she’d had a bad fall. Slipped on a rug at the top of the stairs. That is what we have on our records.” She turned to continue down the hall and then stopped. “She needs rest and quiet. Please don’t be too long. I just want her to know she has a friend.”

Lane was ushered into a room where the dominant colours were pale beige and green. It was disheartening in its starkness. She stifled a gasp of dismay. Priscilla lay on her back with her eyes closed and her arms outside the covers. Her face was swollen and bruised, her left eye inflamed and puffed shut. Her arms were black and blue, and there was a bandage