The Sins of the Wolf - Anne Perry [8]
But the relationship with Monk was far too complicated to try to explain, and certainly not something likely to recommend her to a highly respectable family like the Farralines as a suitable companion for their mother.
Deirdra was still waiting, her eyes on Hester’s face.
“Sometimes,” she admitted, “I am delighted to miss the conditions, but I miss the companionship also, and that is hard.”
“And the challenge?” Deirdra pressed, leaning forward over the table. “Is it not a wonderful thing to try to accomplish something immensely difficult?”
“Not when you have no chance of success, and the pain of failure is other people’s suffering.”
Deirdra’s face fell. “No, of course not. I’m sorry, that was heartless of me. I did not mean it quite as it sounded. I was thinking of the challenge to the mind, to the inventiveness, to one’s own aspirations—I …” She stopped as the door opened and Oonagh came in. Oonagh glanced from one to the other of them, then her face softened in a smile.
“I hope you are comfortable, Miss Latterly, and being well looked after?”
“Oh yes, indeed, thank you,” Hester answered.
“I have been asking Miss Latterly about her experiences, or at least some of them,” Deirdra said enthusiastically. “It sounds most stimulating.”
Oonagh sat down and helped herself to tea. She looked across at Hester doubtfully.
“I imagine there are times when you must find England very restricting after the freedom of the Crimea?”
It was a curious remark, one that betrayed a far more intelligent consideration than was usual. It was no idle piece of conversation made merely for something to say.
Hester did not reply immediately, and Oonagh sought to explain herself. “I mean the weight of responsibility you must have had there, if what I have read is anywhere near the truth. You must have seen a great deal of suffering, much of it quite avoidable, had more sense been exercised. And I imagine you did not always have a senior officer to hand, either medical or military, every time some judgment had to be made.”
“No—no we didn’t,” Hester agreed quickly, startled by Oonagh’s perception. In fact, now that she sat here in this quiet dining room with its polished table and handsome carved sideboard, she realized that the trust and responsibility, and the power to act for herself, were two of the aspects of the Crimea that she missed the most profoundly. Now so many of her decisions were trivial.
It must be even more so for a woman like Oonagh McIvor, whose responsibilities were largely domestic. What should Cook serve for dinner? How should she resolve the squabble between the kitchen maid and the laundry maid? Should she invite so-and-so to dine this week with the Smiths—or next week with the Joneses? Should she wear green on Sunday, or blue? Looking at the intelligence and the resolve in Oonagh’s features, Hester saw that she was not a woman to waste her energy on such things, which mattered not in the slightest, even today, never mind in the course of one’s life. Was it envy she could hear in the curious timbre of Oonagh’s voice?
“You have a remarkable understanding,” she replied aloud, meeting Oonagh’s steady gaze. “I don’t think I had even phrased it to myself so well. I confess that at times I have found myself almost suffocated by the necessity of obedience, when I had been used to action, simply because there was no one else to turn to and the urgency of the situation did not allow us to delay.”
Deirdra was watching her closely, her face quickened with interest, her tea forgotten.
Oonagh smiled as if the answer in some way pleased her.
“You must have seen much waste, and a fearful amount of pain,” she observed. “Of course there will always be deaths, when one is occupied with medicine, but there can be