𝐒𝐎𝐌𝐄𝐃𝐀𝐘 peaky blinders

xiii. WHO'S THE CULPRIT?

ACT: TWO
CHAPTER xiii: ' who's the culprit? '

Eli was nursing a cup of tea and a sore head, sat at the table in the parlour of the Shelby home beside a blood soaked Arthur, and wondering if it made her a bad person to be considering telling Arthur to stop bloody groaning so loudly. She was supposed to help nurse him back to health — that being the reason why Ada had came looking her in the first place — but Ada had quickly demoted her to observation duty after realising Eli was too drunk to do anything other than sober up. Hence why she was shoved into the chair next to Arthur and a cup of tea was forced into her hands.

John, on the other hand, had already slept off his hangover in the Garrison, just leaving him in a foul mood after he'd found out "some bloody copper" thought he could get away with hurting his big brother.

Ada had the sensible head it seemed as she set about boiling some water on the open fire and giving out commands while she prepared to clean her brother's wounds. "John, wipe the blood out of his eye."

But John only scoffed around the toothpick between his teeth, leaning against the doorframe with a sneer on his face. "Since when did you give orders?"

Looking up from her tea, Eli watched the exchange with mild mirth before watching the way Polly was bandaging Arthur's broken thumb. Huh, that's how you're supposed to do it, she gave an inward huff of approval, her thoughts going back to how badly she'd done in first aid.

"I'm a trained nurse." Ada said in an offended tone.

Arthur groaned from the pain of stretching the cuts on his face at the involuntary smile that was threatening to spread across his lips. "Don't make me laugh, it hurts my face."

Ada snapped her glare to him. "I bloody am."

John's face lifted from his previous frown as he sent her fleeting figure an amused look. "You went to one first aid class in the church hall and got thrown out for giggling."

Eli looked up from her tea and shot Ada a half-surprised look. She'd been at the very same first aid class in the church hall and despite not knowing each other properly at the time, the two had formed a brief alliance to get kicked out of the god-awful boring class. But they had done a whole lot more than simply giggle for the nuns to go that red faced and shoo them out of the hall at once. "That's what you told them got us thrown out?"

A curious look passed both Arthur and John's faces as they arched their eyebrows in question. Eli had peaked their interest by alluding there was more to the story that Ada had initially let on and the way Ada purposely ignored Eli only amplified it. "Not before learning how to stop somebody from choking."