The Shadow and the Star by Laura Kinsale Page A

cell roll over and shift about on the floor, as if trying to make herself more comfortable. The woman made a low moan. As she turned over onto her back, her swollen shape made it obvious that she was very much… ah… in a condition of imminent fructation, as Miss Myrtle would have put it, speaking in a whisper behind her hand.
    "Oh, dear," Leda said, straightening up from the little stove, "Are you quite well, ma'am?"
    The woman made no answer. She was breathing heavily, arching her back. Behind Leda, Inspector Ruby gave an inquiring grunt. "Mac? What have we here?"
    "Book says disorderly, sir." Sergeant MacDonald cleared his throat. "They took her up on the afternoon beat. Turned away from Oxslip's in the Island, she was. Made a row. Scratched Frying Pan Sally's face."
    Leda turned round in surprise, in time to catch the men exchange glances. "Oxslip's?" she asked. "In my street? That's where they take in the orphan children."
    Inspector Ruby gave her a queer frown. He chewed his upper lip, pulling at his mustache with his teeth. Sergeant MacDonald looked nonplussed.
    "Orphanage," Inspector Ruby said roughly. "Yes, that's right, miss."
    She watched the prisoner clutch at her back and groan. When Leda looked closely, it was easy to see that the woman really was little more than a clear-skinned girl, barely out of her middle teens. "Perhaps—Inspector Ruby—I believe—" Leda hesitated to put forward an opinion, knowing nothing of midwifery, but the girl was making some very significant noises now. "Should a doctor be called?"
    "A doctor, miss?" The inspector peered at the girl. "You don't mean—Lord help us—she's not about to—"
    The prostrate figure in the cell interrupted him with a moan on a rising note, then broke off suddenly into a whispered torrent of profane words.
    "MacDonald," the inspector snapped, "send to find if the medical officer is still abroad. She won't have money enough for any doctor."
    "Yessir. I'll see to it right away, sir." MacDonald sprang into a quick salute and disappeared out the wicket door with admirable haste.
    "MacDonald!" the inspector bawled after him. "
Send, I
say—you're not to go! There, the great stupid lump of a fellow; a pox on him, he heard me plain as day. Frightened of female things, he is." Inspector Ruby grinned at her. "Sweet on you, miss. Asks after you every day. Hardly could contain himself that you spoke to him last evening." He took off his jacket with the bright buttons and began to roll up his sleeves. "And what d'you think of this poor girl, then? I suppose we shall have to take a closer look at her."
    Leda backed up against the wall, hesitating as he opened the cell and motioned her in. "I'm afraid I don't know much about it," she admitted. "She seemed to be in affliction, and I thought perhaps a professional man ought to be brought in."
    "Bless you, miss, we don't see professional men down here, you know. Not for this sort. Perhaps the medical officer will send a midwife… perhaps not." He went into the cell and knelt beside the girl. "Here now, what's to be done, little lady? Are you having your birth pains? How long you been hurting?"
    Leda couldn't hear the girl's mumbled answer, but the inspector shook his head at the answer. "All day, is it? Silly child—why'd you not speak up?"
    "I don' want it," the girl panted. "I don' want it comin' yet."
    "Well, it's coming, for all that. Your first?"
    The girl made a whimper of assent.
    "Why'd you go to Oxslip's? You wasn't hopin' to be brought to bed there?"
    "Me girlfriend… she asked around for me… give me to expect they'd take the babe." The girl swallowed and rolled her head to the side. "I'd pay for its keep. I swear I would."
    The inspector shook his head. "You shelter your own babe, my girl," he said. "You give it over to them baby-minders, you've as good as murdered it, take my word. A maidservant, was you? Got a young man in the city?"
    "I… can't find him."
    "That's bad luck. But they don't want an