The Dressmaker of Draper's Lane

by Liz Trenow

  ‘You did not leave me,’ she said, hastily. ‘The warmth of your kindness remained with me, even when the Hospital turned me away.’

  ‘You took a black ball?’

  She nodded. ‘I had no idea what it meant, until they explained.’

  ‘But you did not come back to me for help.’

  ‘It took me a few weeks to gather my courage again. My plan was to leave him on the steps with your note and hope that if he was taken in, your name might be enough of a reference. Then I hid behind some bushes to wait. If he was not retrieved by nightfall, I promised myself, I would go back to retrieve him. Happily, within an hour, a well-dressed older lady came by and picked him up. I did not see him again, until a week ago.’

  ‘You were fortunate. That lady was a friend of mine who volunteers for the Hospital. Her late husband was a governor. She persuaded them to take the baby in because she recognised my name. Otherwise, it would have meant nothing.’

  ‘Then you are right, we were very lucky.’ She stroked the boy’s forehead with the back of a forefinger. ‘Afterwards, even though my heart was breaking, I returned to my employers and pleaded for my old job back. I hoped, in time, to save enough to find my son again one day. The housekeeper there had kept Femi’s letter, so at least then I knew where he had gone and that, God willing, he would return.’

  He took up the story. ‘Just as soon as I got off the ship I went to find her, and she told me the story. I’d saved enough to rent two rooms so that we could all live together and get the baby back. I hope to find a job onshore as soon as possible, and Pearl is taking in needlework. Our little family is complete.’

  ‘Femi adores his nephew,’ she said, fondly.

  ‘No wonder. He is a beautiful little boy. What is his name?’

  ‘He is Jelani,’ she said. ‘After his grandfather. It means full of strength. But he has another name too, an English name, Charles.’

  ‘That is a very English name,’ I said, laughing.

  ‘It is after you, Miss Charlotte,’ Femi said.

  My cheeks burned. A second baby named after me in as many weeks, a little dynasty. ‘I am most honoured. May I hold my namesake for a moment?’

  I took the baby into my arms, curious to feel his heaviness after the featherweight of baby Charlotte. ‘Hello, little one. What do you make of this world now, after all your adventures?’

  It must have been the unfamiliar voice that woke him. His eyes opened, dark brown with curled eyelashes, and fixed me with a steady, serious gaze. As I looked back his lips curled into a smile.

  ‘Look, he knows you,’ Pearl said. At that moment, something deep and intense welled up inside me, a powerful memory of the love I had felt for my own baby. A mother’s love.

  ‘Thank heavens you were able to get him back.’

  ‘The Hospital seemed suspicious at first,’ she said. ‘They wanted proof, but fortunately I kept the other half of this.’ She pulled a scrap of linen and lace from her pocket. As she held it out I could see that it had been torn in half, and then sewn back again to make a whole, although it took a practised eye to notice since the stitching was so fine.

  ‘It’s your handkerchief, remember?’ Pearl said. ‘You gave it to me to dry my eyes. Forgive me, but in my distress I forgot to give it back. So when it came to leaving him on the steps I tore it in two and left half with him. When I went to claim him, it had been pinned to his record. I was able to show them the other half.’

  ‘You knew about the token system?’

  ‘You told me, that day.’

  I laughed. ‘Ah yes, so I did.’

  ‘I remember wondering how you knew so much about the Hospital’s rules.’

  How much did I want to share? They were strangers just half an hour ago, but now they felt more like friends, people I had known for years.

  ‘It is a long story, but all you really need to know is that I am also a foundling.’ They gazed at me in astonishment. ‘Yes, I grew up in that Hospital. They educated me, they helped me grow. I’m not saying that it was easy, but I am alive because of them, just like little Jelani here.’

  ‘But . . .’ she hesitated. ‘May I ask, were you ever reunited with your mother?’

  ‘Sadly not,’ I said. ‘But I have my sister, and my nephew, and that is really all the family I need.’

  They wrote down their new address, and we said our goodbyes with promises to meet again. I told Pearl that I had noticed the delicacy of her stitching on the handkerchief, and that if I should ever have a vacancy for a seamstress, I would certainly get in touch. Afterwards I went back into the parlour to take a few moments alone before returning to the sewing room.

  Just the day before, grateful for Anna’s recovery, I had determined to be satisfied with what I already had: my family, good friends, a successful business. But seeing Pearl again so bonny and well, reunited with her child, had brought me face to face once more with that most powerful of emotions: the powerful, complicated and even sometimes contradictory love of a mother for her child, the love that, if thwarted or denied, can quickly become the deepest pain of all. What agony it had been to give up Peter to ensure his future happiness and security, and how much it still hurt, not being able to acknowledge him as my son. How much pain Pearl had endured to make sure her child was safe, and what lengths she had gone to get him back.

  Of course, Louisa and Peter were all the family I really needed. They made me happy in so many ways. I was fortunate to have them with me. But needing is not the same as feeling. Femi had spoken about their family being complete. Not knowing my mother left me feeling incomplete.

  I would try just one more time, to find out more.

  That night it came to me: might Monsieur Girardieu be able to help? Perhaps if I approached him with a more personal plea, explaining what the pagoda silk had meant to me, he might remember more about it, or be able to give me some clues about how a piece of it came into my mother’s hands?

  After the shop had closed I hastened to Spital Square. Dusk was falling, and candlelight beamed from the windows of the houses as I passed. But number twelve was in darkness. The shutters were open, but the windows gazed blankly out into the square. I knocked, and waited. And knocked and waited again. Then I walked around to the window and, standing on tiptoe, peered inside.

  Even in the half-light from the street I could see all I needed. The room was empty, cleared of all those papers, those books, all furniture, those sad remains of a once successful business. Monsieur Girardieu and the old lady were gone and with them, so I thought, my last hopes of ever tracing my mother.

  26

  Tabby: the most basic of weaves, of which there are many varieties: plain, basketweave and balanced plain, also known as chequerboard.

  By early August both baby Charlotte and her mother had recovered sufficiently to contemplate a journey to Suffolk.

  ‘Henri is so busy at the moment he cannot take the time to accompany me,’ Anna said. ‘He will be free to go in September.’

  ‘That is but a few weeks away,’ I said. ‘He works so hard, a visit to the country would probably do him good, too.’ Then she passed me a piece of paper, a letter from her father’s devoted neighbour Mary Marshall.

  Dearest Anna,

  Your father has told me news of his new granddaughter, and I send my congratulations to you all. He and Janey are delighted and cannot wait to meet her.

  Theodore is much recovered from his bad turn but the doctor has diagnosed a weak heart (for which there is no cure, alas) and has warned that he must not exert himself. He is certainly not allowed to travel. Of course he has told everyone not to fuss, and continues his usual routines as though nothing is awry. Yesterday, Janey told me he is planning a trip to London to meet the new baby.

  I do not wish to alarm you, dearest Anna, but I do hope that you can find a way to discourage this. Perhaps, if you are well enough, you could visit here instead?

  ‘What do you think? Should I wait until Henri is free, or go at once
?’

  We both understood the message between the lines of Mrs Marshall’s letter: Theodore might not have much time left. ‘I think you should go as soon as possible,’ I said. ‘And if Henri is unable to get away and if he agrees, then I shall accompany you. You cannot make that journey on your own, dearest.’

  Her relief was evident. I had told her what she needed to hear.

  ‘Thank you, Charlotte. I am sure Henri will agree. We will see to the arrangements as soon as possible, and write to my father. Would next weekend be too soon? We could leave on Friday and return by Wednesday so you only miss a few days’ work. Clothilde has offered to look after Jean, but I know that Father and Janey will want to see him as well. Can you bear to share a carriage with a toddler and a crying baby?’

  How could I refuse? With much of society fleeing London for the summer season in Bath and elsewhere, trade was always slow in August. It was our usual habit for Mrs T. and the seamstresses to take two weeks’ holiday at the height of each summer.

  ‘Let us plan to spend a whole week, Anna. Travelling will be tiring so soon after your illness, but the sea air will do all of us good. Let Theodore have his fill of his grandchildren.’

  ‘He’d be glad to see the back of us, after that,’ she said, smiling at last.

  The journey with two young children in a fully packed coach was as gruelling as we had feared.

  It began well enough, with the other passengers cooing over little Charlotte and patting Jean on the head, complimenting Anna on her beautiful children. It was clear they assumed I was the nanny, and there was no reason to disabuse them. The baby, now known to everyone as Charlie, slept for much of the way. When she woke Anna managed to feed her, concealed beneath a shawl so that no one even noticed.

  But little Jean is rarely still, except when asleep. For him, having to sit for several hours at a time is torture and before long our fellow passengers were clearly changing their minds about the ‘dear little lad’. We tried every trick to entertain him: plying him with food, producing his favourite toys and making up stories, but what he most wanted to do was run from one side of the carriage to the other, pushing his way between the cramped knees of the passengers, who soon made it clear that this was not acceptable behaviour.

  Happily, after a couple of hours of this he would fall asleep on my lap, so heavy that my legs went to pins and needles and my arms cramped with the effort of securing him against the sway of the carriage.

  Thus the two-day journey proceeded, punctuated by a stop at the coaching inn in Chelmsford where we all slept soundly, exhausted by the enforced inactivity. At last we arrived in Halesworth to be met by the carter, who transported us along the high ridge that affords such a spectacular view of the wide river estuary. Even Jean was silenced for a short while by the sight. Although it was nearly sunset the fields were still busy with men scything swathes of grain made golden by weeks of sunshine, collecting and tying the stalks and setting the stooks in perfect rows reaching as far as the eye could see.

  As we watched the western sky change from blue to pink and orange and finally to deep purple, the stresses of the journey – and indeed all the concerns of daily life – seemed to lift from my shoulders.

  On our arrival at the vicarage it was immediately apparent why Mrs Marshall had written with such urgency, and I was grateful that she had spurred us into visiting immediately.

  Theodore was a sadly diminished man. Illness had visibly reduced him, by half a foot in height and many pounds in weight. Worse still, the self-assured demeanour I’d always attributed to his quiet certainty of faith seemed to have been undermined: his gait was hesitant, his face lined with anxiety, his voice strangely light and querulous.

  David Garrick’s recitation about the seven ages of man slipped into my mind. Mr Shakespeare’s observations of what he called the ‘sixth age’ seemed to capture Theodore so perfectly: his shrunk shank and his big manly voice turning again toward childish treble . . .

  Yet later, as he held little Charlotte in his arms with Jean at his knee, a proud smile filled the hollows of his sunken face and, as he spoke of his delight in seeing us all, his voice recovered some of the warm resonance that had so charmed me long ago.

  Anna’s sister Janey seemed unaffected by concerns over her father’s health: as ever, she bounded like a puppy to greet us, embracing both of us with the joyful lack of inhibition of the child she still is, in her mind, even though she is now twenty years of age. Her smile and cheerful good-heartedness are hard to resist, but as she reached for Jean he wriggled away squealing, running to hide in his mother’s skirts.

  ‘Doesn’t he like me?’ she wailed.

  ‘He’ll get used to you soon enough, dearest.’ Indeed, within the hour Jean had become entranced by his Suffolk auntie, insisting that she show him around the house and now much neglected garden before engaging her in a serious construction project with the wooden bricks she had managed to unearth.

  The following day being a Sunday, the household was up at dawn.

  Theodore insisted on taking Holy Communion before breakfast, but agreed to let his curate take the mid-morning service so that he could sit with the family in their pew. ‘Humour me, let me play the old patriarch,’ he joked, gathering his grandson beside him, his daughter and her baby the other side.

  What he would not delegate, he insisted, was the sermon. ‘They complain terribly about old Marcus,’ he said. ‘He goes on far too long, and is dull as ditch-water.’

  It was clearly a struggle to climb the stairs up to the pulpit, but as he began to speak the energy seemed to flow back into him. Quoting from Corinthians, he said that love for our fellow man, and most particularly for our family, comes without condition: it is kind, does not envy, boast or dishonour others. After elaborating on the theme, he concluded that those of us who have family – and in that he included close friends and community – are the most fortunate people in the world.

  ‘God tells us we must love one another as he loves us,’ he said, glancing fondly at Anna and myself, Janey, Jean and little Charlotte in the pew below. ‘Reflect His love to your own and you will be doubly rewarded. Cherish your loved ones and value them above all else, because they are those who will bring you the greatest happiness for the rest of your days.’

  Bidding farewell to Janey and Theodore was heart-breaking. As Anna suspected, he’d dismissed the notion of coming to live with her in London, although he promised to visit ‘very soon’. But his increasing frailty was obvious and though neither of us acknowledged it, we both knew this might be the last time we would see him.

  After several blissful days in the fresh air and freedom of the countryside I did not relish the prospect of returning to a crowded, malodorous city. Being in the lap of a loving family and the two demanding but ever-delightful children, among a community where everyone regarded their vicar with such obvious affection and high esteem, seemed to highlight everything that was missing from my life.

  The journey went without incident and, to my relief, the shop was just as I had left it. It is never wise to ignore the ever-present dangers of a city where many people have barely enough to live on: premises will be watched for several nights and will be fair game for thieves if reckoned to be unoccupied. Despite having secured all the shutters and locked away from view anything of great value I entered with some trepidation, but happily nothing seemed to have been disturbed.

  I took up the bundle of letters and flyers pushed under the door and went downstairs to the kitchen, setting the fire and unwrapping the remaining bread, cheese and apples Theodore’s cook had pressed upon us for the journey. Waiting for the milk to boil, I glanced casually through the mail. Among a dozen others was an envelope addressed in Louisa’s hand, which I ripped open at once with a glad heart, hoping for – indeed expecting – an invitation, or a promise to visit. After being with Anna’s family for a week, I longed to see my own once more.

  That this letter might contain the worst news in the world could no
t have been further from my mind.

  27

  Taffeta: a fine, crisp plain woven silk with a gloss finish that holds its shape well and is thus suitable for formal gowns, as well as curtains or wall coverings.

  My sister’s handwriting, never graceful at the best of times, was even more spidery and inconsistent as usual. The letter was dated five days previously; it must have arrived shortly after I’d left for Suffolk, and consisted of these few terrifying words:

  Dearest Agnes, please come at once. Peter is dangerously ill. Your loving Louisa.

  Even though they were as plain as they could possibly be, I read these words over again and again like a dullard. The milk boiled over with a great hiss of steam followed by the acrid smell of burning. Moving automatically, I lifted the pan and took a cloth to wipe up the stinking mess.

  The shock must have made me light-headed, for I found myself clasping the edge of the table and moving towards the chair. I must have sat there for minutes, my thoughts spinning like a top. Peter is dangerously ill. What was this danger? Was he still ill, or on the way to recovery? Or was he . . .? The alternative was too appalling even to contemplate.

  At last I pulled myself together: my task was to get to Westford Abbots as quickly as possible. But it was already after six, well past the departure time of the last coach of the day. Although it might be possible to hire a private gig for a very large sum, I had no idea how to go about it. Jane, to whom I would have turned had she been in London, would surely have lent me hers, but I knew for certain that she planned to spend the whole of August in Chiswick. None of my other friends, not even Monsieur Lavalle, were wealthy enough to have their own horses.

  There was no choice: I would have to wait for the first coach of the morning. I dragged myself up to the attic with limbs like lead weights, trying to prepare for the interminable hours ahead. Even small, mundane tasks felt like a sacrilege when my future happiness hung in the balance. I lay down, but whenever I closed my eyes terrifying devil-like figures flickered in the shadows of the candlelight, shaking their fists and threatening me with unknown evils. I blew out the candle to deny them, but this made it even worse. In the darkness, chilling scenes crowded my mind: Peter dead, in his coffin, being lowered into the ground. At last, the tears came.