Читаем A Dangerous Fortune (1994) полностью

"Perhaps you ought to stay until the end of the financial year, like me," Samuel said. "It's only a few months. By then Edward will have been in charge for a while and people will be used to it, and you can go with no fuss."

The butler came back with the port. Hugh sipped it thoughtfully. He felt he had to agree to Samuel's proposal, much as he disliked the idea. He had given them all a lecture about their duty to their depositors and the wider financial community, and he had to heed his own words. If he were to allow the bank to suffer just because of his own feelings, he would be no better than Augusta. Besides, the postponement would give him time to think about what to do with the rest of his life.

He sighed. "All right," he said at last. "I'll stay until the end of the year."

Samuel nodded. "I thought you would," he said. "It's the right thing to do--and you always do the right thing, in the end."

Section 2

BEFORE MAISIE GREENBOURNE finally said good-bye to high society, eleven years before, she had gone to all her friends--who were many and rich--and persuaded them to give money to Rachel's Southwark Female Hospital. Consequently, the hospital's running costs were covered by the income from its investments.

The money was managed by Rachel's father, the only man involved in the running of the hospital. At first Maisie had wanted to handle the investments herself, but she had found that bankers and stockbrokers refused to take her seriously. They would ignore her instructions, ask for authority from her husband, and withhold information from her. She might have fought them, but in setting up the hospital she and Rachel had too many other fights on their hands, and they had let Mr. Bodwin take over the finances.

Maisie was a widow, but Rachel was still married to Micky Miranda. Rachel never saw her husband but he would not divorce her. For ten years she had been carrying on a discreet affair with Maisie's brother Dan Robinson, who was a member of Parliament. The three of them lived together in Maisie's house in suburban Walworth.

The hospital was in a working-class area, in the heart of the city. They had taken a long lease on a row of four houses near Southwark Cathedral and had knocked internal doors through the walls on each level to make their hospital. Instead of rows of beds in cavernous wards they had small, comfortable rooms, each with only two or three beds.