Chapter Thirteen
Mr. Black went to Stepcote Hill by hackney, leaving Nell at the inn. She wasted no time being annoyed with him. She didn’t have time to be annoyed with highhanded males. Her birthday was in four days, and her Faerie godmother would grant her a wish and she would know where Sophia was—but if four days was a short time, it was also a very long time if one was penniless and with a young baby. And even though Mr. Black had refused to allow her to go to Stepcote Hill, there were things Nell could do. Someone must have helped Sophia give birth. Had she been tended by a midwife? Gone to a lying-in hospital? Did Exeter even have a charitable lying-in hospital?
She posed that last question to the innkeeper, who told her that a very good lying-in hospital for poor women had recent
