Convenient Women Collection

by Delphine Woods

  Her arrival had caused something of a stir. The two tables of women stared at her blatantly; the middle classes could sniff out a working-class girl a mile off. But Luella seemed not to notice, or at least she did not care. She slipped between the tables easily with her narrow skirt and sat on the chair opposite me without saying a word. I had risen to greet her, but I sat down again when it was clear we were not there to be polite with each other.

  She unlaced the bow under her jaw and pulled off her bonnet. Her hair was gold and red, though it frizzed at the scalp in an ugly manner – I supposed that was due to the heat. She scratched at her parting with her gloveless fingernails and sighed. She never looked at me, but instead her gaze flitted around the items on the table, and her tongue pushed against her upper lip.

  ‘Could we have some more tea, please?’ I said to the waitress behind the counter, and I smiled again at the women who stared at me and my odd companion. I let the smile fall on Luella as I said between my teeth, ‘You are late.’

  She nodded distractedly, and her hand dropped from her parting and clutched at the chain about her neck. I waited for her to speak – for after all, it was she who had arranged this meeting – but she remained silent even after the waitress had set another pot of tea and another clean cup and saucer on our table. I poured the blissfully weak tea into our two cups, dropped a cube of sugar into hers because she looked like she needed it, then pushed it in her direction. She took it, and I saw that her hands were slightly cracked and a little rough in the creases of the knuckle, not soft and white like my own despite the chores Miss Grey had me do too often.

  I let her drink before I said, ‘I have fifteen minutes before I must return. What do you want from me?’

  My comment did not hasten her. She drank again, and with each gulp, she seemed to grow calmer until another five minutes had passed and there was nothing in her cup but some undissolved grains of sugar. She put the cup in its saucer, and finally her blue eyes looked up at me.

  ‘You don’t remember me,’ she said.

  I shook my head; I would not admit she seemed familiar.

  ‘You knew my father.’

  ‘Did I? Who is he?’

  ‘Were.’

  ‘Sorry?’

  She wet her lips. ‘Your question should have been, who were he?’

  She was intense for such a small thing. She reminded me of a ferret as it claws down a rabbit hole, and I didn’t like the feel of it.

  ‘Who was he?’

  ‘Samuel Blyth.’

  The name rolled over my mind like waves over the ocean. It had been a long time since I’d heard it. How long? I tried to think. How many years had passed; how many Christmases had I seen; how many ladies had I been companion to since then?

  She saw me frowning, and a glimmer of triumph shone in her face. Then I realised it was Samuel whom I had seen in her yesterday; it was Samuel’s turn of the nose and full lip that I had recognised in her dainty features.

  I thought of the child I had seen with Samuel all those years ago, running circles around him as they walked up the long, cobbled path, the dust from another hot summer swirling about them. She had been a plain girl back then. Her hair had been copper, not as light as now, and she had been plump in the limbs and cheeks. I remembered Samuel shooing her away from him so she would go and see Mrs Campbell inside the house. I remembered her running for the back door, straight past me, smiling and showing her teeth as she bounded into the kitchen whilst I waited for her father.

  ‘Luella,’ she said, and startled me out of my thoughts. ‘My name is Luella.’

  How could I have forgotten? I had never heard that name before I went to Mrs Campbell’s and had never heard it since. I thought it too pretty for a girl like her back then. Now I saw she had grown into it, and for a moment, I wondered if she had actually been born on a Monday, for she certainly wasn’t fair as a child. Perhaps she was Wednesday’s child, considering what happened.

  ‘What do you want, Luella?’

  She leaned back in her chair. I took the time to study her dress more closely. It had tight patterns of faded yellow flowers on the white cotton, and parts of it were thinner and more frayed than others; it was nothing like the finer dresses she used to wear.

  ‘A name.’

  I laughed. It was an ominous meeting for something so simple as a name.

  ‘The name of the man you worked with at Mrs Campbell’s.’

  ‘You will have to be more specific.’

  ‘You only worked with him and my pa. I know my pa’s name. What’s the other man’s name?’

  Somehow I managed not to stumble. I thought ignorance would be the best tactic. ‘How should I know?’

  ‘His first name were Frank. You knew him.’

  ‘Did I?’ The laugh broke out of me again. ‘You know more about me than I know about myself.’

  ‘He looked after the horses and the gardens for Mrs Campbell. And Bonnie’ – the way she said my name made me shiver – ‘don’t patronise me. Tell me his name.’

  The smile dropped from my face. ‘I cannot remember him.’

  ‘Tall, he was, at least I thought him tall, but I suppose I were just a child then. He had hair to his shoulders – I remember that. It looked dirty and greasy. He were quiet too; I never heard him speak much.’

  I shook my head, and she sighed disappointedly. I thought she might have accepted my forgetfulness, nodded, and thanked me for my time. I did not know her well at all.

  ‘You’ll tell me his name, Bonnie, or I’ll tell Miss Grey about the trinkets what you’ve been stealing from her.’

  So it was not a lucky guess. The heat in the room vanished. I must have flinched, for she continued unperturbed: ‘I only need his name.’

  I cleared my throat. ‘How did you find me?’

  She smiled and showed her teeth like she used to do, though the smile didn’t touch her eyes. ‘I remembered you, and your name, and I went round asking. You went to Mrs Massey after Mrs Campbell, then Mrs Davey, then Miss Hall, then Mrs King, and now Miss Grey.’

  Again, I shivered. ‘You really do know me well.’

  ‘You have what I want.’

  I raised my brows. ‘You did all that searching, just for a name?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And you have been watching me?’

  ‘For a while.’ She scratched her parting again, and flakes of skin fluttered from her scalp. ‘It don’t matter to me what you take from Miss Grey; she’s a stranger to me.’

  ‘Why bring it up then?’

  ‘Leverage. I need that name. Give it me, and you’ll never see me again. Don’t, and I’ll go to Grey or the police. I ain’t bothered about which.’

  My lips felt tight. I did not want to give her the name, for I thought that as soon as I did, something terrible would begin. But neither did I want to be found out for a thief, and I had no doubt that she would be true to her word.

  It was only a name, after all.

  ‘Adams, I think it was. Frank Adams. But it was a long time ago; I might have remembered it wrong.’

  She pushed out her chair, rose from her seat, and fastened her bonnet. The air of madness had evaporated from her; she was sedate, calm, and even more disturbing. ‘Thank you for your help.’

  She turned to walk away, and I stood to stop her. My crinoline caught the edge of the table and made the cups and saucers rattle. Everyone in the tea room faced me, and so I patted my skirt and waited for them to lose interest as Luella craned her neck to listen to what I had to say.

  ‘I can’t be sure that was his name.’

  ‘I think it were; it sounds familiar to me now you’ve said it.’

  ‘Why do you want it?’

  ‘I’m going to find him.’

  ‘What? Why? He could be anywhere.’

  She shrugged. ‘I’ll find him.’

  It was a ridiculous notion. She could never possibly be successful, but still I asked, ‘How?’

  ‘The same way I fo
und you.’

  I tried to laugh at her confidence, but it was her confidence which was so unnerving. ‘That could take forever.’

  ‘Then I will look for him forever.’

  ‘And if you do find him’ – I lowered my voice so the women, who were being too quiet, could not hear – ‘what will you do?’

  ‘I will kill him.’

  Her answer had stunned me. I found myself staring at the space she had been standing in for ages after she had gone. The waitress coughed and startled me; I hadn’t seen her come so close. She was a middle-aged woman, unused to smiling, and she stared pointedly at my purse. I found her the coins she required and stumbled out of that horrid, poky place, casting over a chair with my skirt as I went.

  Outside, I breathed the cooler air and closed my eyes against the glare of the sun. I should have brought a parasol with me. I raised my hand to bring my eyes into shade and searched Giles Street for a sign of Luella. I was too late; I had stood too long in the tea room. There were no peculiar girls with white dresses milling around.

  I tried to recall the time on the tea room clock; it must have been nearly four. I needed to return to Miss Grey soon to be there to wake her, for she complained of headaches if she slept too long in the afternoons. I swivelled to my right, resolved to head back to the house, but my feet would not move in that direction.

  I needed to find Luella.

  I strode deeper into Stowmouth. I had never liked the seaside town. It seemed like it was trying to be something it was not. New hotels had been built along the seafront, their whitewashed faces gaping out at the water, their new windows gleaming in the sunlight, turning their backs on the Elizabethan town in distaste. There was a mixture of people in this place which was once nothing but a small fishing port where many a smuggler’s ship had been wrecked on the rocks beneath the waves. It was possible to tell the people whose ancestors had lived here, for they had a certain look: stocky and broad and weathered, always ready with a mean glare for any newcomer. The newcomers were those who thought the sea air would cure them like Miss Grey. They lived in the newly built houses on the edges of the town or took long residences in the hotels. And then there were the people who worked in the cities and used the railroads to take them for days out with their children who swamped the pavements and dug holes in the sand for unsuspecting victims to fall into.

  It was these kinds of people who littered the scene before me now. Low- to middle-class families, the women wearing dresses from a decade ago but shaped around a crinoline, the men who had acquired walking canes and bowler hats though they had no need of them, the children who demanded items out of shop windows as if it were their right to have them. They ambled down the narrow streets and blocked my view of any girl in white. I swerved them all, leaving them in clouds of perfume and dust as I marched past, panicking that I had lost Luella forever.

  Then I rounded a corner, and a white flash as bright as a shard of glass glinting in the sun caught my eye. I grabbed my skirts and walked as fast as I could until my armpits grew damp and my chemise stuck to my back. Men parted for me, ogling me as I broke into a trot to reach her.

  ‘Luella!’

  She stopped by a grocer’s shop and turned to smile at me. I was panting by this point and finding it hard to fill my lungs. I rested my hands on my knees for a second and gulped in the air.

  ‘Are you all right, Bonnie? You want to sit?’

  I shook my head and straightened. My cheeks were throbbing – I dared not think how red they must have been – and I retrieved a handkerchief from my bag and wiped my brow underneath my hat. She was still smiling at me, laughing at me, I thought.

  ‘What do you mean, you’ll kill him?’

  ‘What I said.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because my pa were innocent. Because Frank Adams did something evil, and I won’t let him get away with it no longer.’

  ‘No.’ I licked my dry lips. ‘No, Luella, you are wrong.’

  ‘What do you mean? You saying my pa were guilty?’

  Guilty. The word echoed in my mind. ‘No. Perhaps. I don’t know.’

  ‘Say my pa were guilty again and I’ll go to the police right now and tell them about your thieving!’

  I couldn’t speak for a moment. I did not know what to say or how I might be able to reason with her. I needed time to think.

  ‘All right … sorry. Where are you staying?’ I said as I tried to slow my breathing.

  She looked at the window above the grocer’s shop. ‘Why?’

  ‘When will you start looking for … Frank?’

  ‘I’ll leave tomorrow, first thing. Don’t worry, Bonnie.’ She went to touch my arm, but her fingers wavered an inch from me before she put her hand by her side again. ‘I won’t bother you again.’

  ‘You kill him, Luella, and they’ll hang you.’

  She looked me straight in the eye. ‘I don’t care.’

  ‘Please, Luella. You are so young.’ How old must she have been? Certainly no more than twenty. ‘You have your own life you must live.’

  She kicked a box of cabbages in front of the grocer’s shop, and the green globes shook and wobbled like so many chopped-off heads. ‘You don’t know anything, Bonnie.’

  We were causing a scene; the grocer inside was looking at us through the window, and the delivery boy, who had an armful of vegetables, was watching us as he placed his produce in his basket.

  ‘Please.’ I took her by the elbow and brought her closer to me so she would hear my whisper. ‘Please just stay here for a few days and think about what you are doing. Perhaps we could meet for tea again? I should like to know about you, what you have been doing since …’ I was saying all the wrong things in my panic. I pinched the bridge of my nose and took a deep breath. ‘Just wait while I think things through.’

  ‘This has nothing to do with you, Bonnie. You don’t need to think about me or my father or Frank Adams ever again.’

  ‘I do,’ I sighed. I would scare her off if I was not careful. ‘I will not stop you going after him, if only you will wait for two more days.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because …’ What was I doing? I was so desperate for an end to this bizarre meeting. If only I had never agreed to see her! But I had, and now I was stuck with her and the notion that she intended to murder someone. I could not let her leave Stowmouth and carry out her plan, and so I promised, ‘I will help you find him if you will let me.’

  I had to go then, for the church clock struck four. I strode away, checking over my shoulder every few seconds to see if she was still there, still watching me. She was. I hesitated on the corner of the street and looked at her again. If only I could have glued her to the spot! I had no conviction that she would wait for me, but just before I walked on, she nodded, and I could do nothing but hope she would still be in Stowmouth in the morning.

  Miss Grey was foul with me when I returned. She had dreamt of disease, had woken in a frenzy, sweating and screaming, and Cook had seen to her.

  ‘Filthy woman,’ Miss Grey said, as I was helping her into her chair in the drawing room. ‘No wonder I am so ill. Write to my brother and tell him I will need a new cook by next week.’

  ‘Can I make you some tea?’

  She was scowling at the light from the window. ‘Shut those curtains.’

  Below, with the heat from the sun finally abating for the day, women had returned to parade about the green. I scanned the view as I clutched the heavy silk curtains, my eyes resting on the mass of grey and white buildings, trying to pinpoint the location of the grocer’s shop. Luella was there somewhere, brooding no doubt.

  How would she know where to look for Frank? Where would she start? It was an absurd notion, and I told myself that there was no way she could possibly find him no matter how long she searched. But then, I reminded myself, she had found me.

  ‘Are you sick?’ Miss Grey said.

  I turned and found her cowering against the light, her eyes wide as she sta
red worriedly at me.

  ‘No.’ I drew the curtains and plunged the room into darkness.

  ‘That’s better.’ Miss Grey rested her head against the back of her chair whilst I lit the oil lamp and sat in the seat opposite her. A book was on the table beside me, and I found the page I had finished yesterday and began to read aloud. It was not long before Miss Grey’s mouth fell slack and revealed her grey tongue. Everything about the woman was grey, as though she would not allow the glow of life to penetrate her.

  I set the book on the table and listened to her heavy breathing. I was picking my lips before I knew what I was doing, making them bleed before I could stop myself. Mother used to smack me whenever she saw me do it, for it showed me to be worried or upset, and I was never allowed to be either of those things. I shoved my hands under my legs to keep myself still.

  Why should I have been so scared by this girl, anyway? I tried to shrug my fears away, casting them and Luella off as ridiculous. Luella could search all she liked for Frank. She could even find him; there was nothing to say she would be able to kill him. Thinking and doing were very different things.

  I closed my eyes. The air was hot and was pressing down on me as it had been in the tea room on Giles Street. I unfastened the buttons at my neck and felt sweat trickle onto my collarbone.

  I was underestimating Luella, and I knew it.

  Silently, I left Miss Grey in the drawing room and descended to the morning room where she kept her papers. The air was lighter in here, for I had opened the window earlier, and a pleasant breeze blew into the space. I sat at her desk, took a sheet of thick, waxy paper, and dabbed the pen into the ink pot.

  Mr Grey,

  I am writing on behalf of your sister. Miss Grey requests a new cook, for she is displeased with the current woman who has the position and fears the food is making her ill.

  She will also need a new companion, for my own aunt has become gravely ill, and I must leave to care for her. She has no other family besides myself.

  My deepest apologies,

  Bonnie Hearn