Convenient Women Collection

by Delphine Woods

  ‘After you, Miss Davies.’

  ‘I just wanted to say what a beautiful home you have.’

  ‘Thank you. It is over two hundred years old, you know.’ He gazed at the room around him. ‘Nothing but a stone hut, more or less, when my great, great–’ he shook his head, ‘I forget how many greats – grandfather bought it and the land. He was a merchant, a good one at that. And here it is now.’

  Cat smiled, unsure of how to respond. She sipped her wine.

  ‘I was going to say,’ Osborne frowned at his empty plate, ‘that I have some news. About the man who attacked you.’

  The glass tingled on her lip.

  Dixon and Mrs Lewis entered the room carrying silver trays of food and placed them around the table. She did not miss the stare of contempt that Mrs Lewis shot her as the housekeeper ladled out a small bowlful of soup, nor how she banged it on the table so that the liquid came perilously close to spilling on Cat’s dress. Osborne did not seem to notice.

  She copied how he used his spoon, waiting for him to resume his speech. ‘You were saying?’ she prompted when she could not bear the silence.

  ‘Yes … Yes, the man who attacked you. Obviously, I had to get the police involved. I told them everything that happened that day, how I found him trying to kill you and that I shot him in your defence.’

  Cat nodded as his gaze bore into her.

  ‘So,’ he sucked his soup off the spoon and swallowed. ‘They took his body, and I thought that would be the end of it. I have since been informed that the man was wanted for murder. They’ve recognised his face from a description some poor fellow gave after finding a body in a house in town.’

  The soup sloshed coldly in her mouth. She forced it down. ‘What happened?’

  ‘Some brawl – a robbery, they think. That swine had stabbed the fellow in the neck with a shattered bottle of whisky. I should suspect he was on the run to Liverpool when he found you and did not want to leave a witness as to his whereabouts.’

  Cat nodded. The soup bowl swirled in her vision.

  ‘Miss Davies, are you well?’

  His touch roused her. She stared at his naked flesh on her gloved hand, and sickness gripped her gut.

  ‘How foolish of me, to mention murder in front of you, bringing the whole ghastly experience up again.’

  His hand disappeared. She could breathe again.

  Regaining herself, she heard him dab his napkin to his lips then throw it on the table. He crouched beside her and took her hand once more, though this time the sickness stayed away.

  ‘Miss Davies, forgive me. Would you like to rest?’

  ‘Sorry,’ she whispered, trying to focus on the darkness of his eyes. She must not be weak, she said to herself again. ‘Talking about that man …’

  ‘Forgive me, I should not have said anything.’ He lowered his head and hissed some indistinguishable word.

  ‘Dixon,’ Osborne called for his man, ‘I think Miss Davies needs to return to her room.’

  ‘It is fine–’

  But he insisted, and in the end, she was grateful she did not have to sit through the whole dinner, pretending – her strength had not recovered enough for that ordeal just yet.

  Together, Osborne and Dixon helped Cat from her seat and led her through the hall, up the stairs, and to her room. ‘Fetch Nelly, would you?’ Osborne said.

  Dixon vanished through the wall.

  ‘Sorry. We were having such a nice night.’

  ‘The fault is all mine, Miss Davies. It is me who begs your forgiveness.’

  His face had grown clearer. He stood just a few inches away from her, his hand cradling her bare elbow. She felt the touch of his hot skin keenly.

  ‘You have my forgiveness, Mr Tomkins. I am in your debt for saving my life, after all.’

  She edged a little closer to him. She would not have the night – nor the dress – be a complete waste. She could not afford for him to lose interest in her, as Mrs Lewis had warned he would.

  ‘Please, I would like it if you would call me Catherine.’

  ‘Catherine,’ he said, swilling the word around his mouth.

  His face inched closer until she could feel the heat of it vibrating against hers. With each exhale, she could smell the wine on his breath, and taste it on her tongue. His grip on her elbow tightened.

  ‘Sir. Miss.’

  They broke their stare to find Nelly beside them, her chin touching her chest, her hands clutched before her waist. Osborne released Cat and stepped back.

  ‘Miss Davies is feeling a little unwell, Nelly. See her to bed and bring her a small plate of hot supper.’ He turned to Cat, a smile in his eyes. ‘Goodnight, Catherine.’

  Chapter 5

  December 1850. Birmingham.

  Cat bent over her table, pushing the thin strip of metal along, clamping the jaws of the machine together, sliding out the circle of copper. Over and over again. All day. She didn’t need to watch what she was doing anymore. She could have done the job in her sleep, and often felt like she did.

  Sometimes she saw the ghosts of her sisters gliding around the shop floor, their little fingers picking up the linen. She prodded them with her stare like her mother had done to her when she saw them stop to take a breath. There was no time for air for any of them.

  Outside, she squeezed their sticky hands and dragged them along on the wave of the crowd, and under the blur of the streetlight, she made sure they were all covered from the cold and the eyes of strangers. She led them through the town, through the sludge of muck and snow, cringing as the icy wetness seeped up her stockings. She had learnt the way home now, though there were still times when she thought she had got them all lost, like tonight.

  She hesitated, her eyes wide as she searched for a familiar sight or smell that would tell her she was on the right path. Her sisters fidgeted, sensing her panic – she could not linger. She strode on, faking her confidence, biting a thin strip of her tongue and tasting metal once again, until she recognised the way a particular pane of glass reflected a shard of gaslight, then the familiar house with its half-rotten door hanging crookedly in the frame.

  Inside their house, Helen and Lottie fixed their wet clothes close before the fire and rushed upstairs. Cat set a pot of water over the flames and dropped in the bones she had bought from the butcher yesterday. She cut the bread as she waited for the water to come to a boil, and poured small beer into their cups.

  Michael flung the door open, making it bang on the wall. She glared at him as her knife sawed through the bread, but he didn’t take any notice. He threw off his cap and shook his head. Dried clay and red brick dust fluttered to the ground, and more came when he drew off his coat. When he washed his hands and face it looked as if the bowl was filled with blood.

  He slumped in his chair. Since Father’s death, he’d lost the chubbiness of childhood. He was taller than Cat now, and thinner. His skin was more translucent than white, the blue veins on his temples as clear as if worms meandered across his skull. He had not taken to work as much as he had said he would, and now that he had no choice but to go, he resented the kindness of Father’s boss, who’d offered him a job in the brickyard after Father’s murder.

  Cat placed his two slices of bread and dripping before him and handed him a cup of beer. He took it without thanks and chewed it in silence.

  ‘Girls,’ Cat called to her sisters, who came trotting down the stairs to eat their tea.

  The water was now on a rolling boil, the white bones bobbing in the liquid. She stirred it around, breathing in the scent of beef and letting the steam thaw her face.

  ‘I’ll have some of that,’ Michael said.

  ‘It’s for Mother.’

  ‘She won’t eat it all.’

  ‘She needs it.’

  ‘Fill me a cup.’

  She faced Michael. His lips were a black line in his face. He watched her without flinching, testing her.

  She clenched her jaw, marched towards him and snatched his c
up from him. She filled it only to halfway and slammed it on the table before him. He raised it to his lips and slurped it slowly.

  She could not stand to look at his face. She sloshed the broth into a bowl, found a spoon, lit a candle, and went upstairs.

  If she had not known her mother was in bed, she would not have been able to see her. Mother had grown so thin that she barely made an impression under the blankets. The only clue that something was living in the room was the rattle of breath in clogged lungs; the sound of someone drowning.

  ‘Ma?’

  Cat set the candle on the bedside table, then eased herself onto the mattress and searched for her mother’s body. The flame picked out her mother’s eyes as they struggled to open.

  ‘Eat this.’

  Cat sat Mother a little more upright and began to feed her. After only a couple of mouthfuls, her mother started to cough, and the whole bed frame shook as her body convulsed. A great lump of some vile poison belched from her mother’s lungs, and her mother spat it into her soiled handkerchief. As it caught the light, Cat saw the red tinge of it.

  When Mother had recovered, Cat dipped the spoon into the broth again.

  ‘Shouldn’t waste your money on this for me.’

  ‘It’s to make you better.’ Cat lifted the spoon to Mother’s lips, and Mother winced as the hot liquid hit the rawness of her throat.

  ‘Better to let me go.’

  The spoon clinked against the bowl. ‘Don’t talk daft.’

  Cat fed her until half of the broth was gone, until Mother closed her lips and could take no more. She placed the bowl on the bed stand then felt the heat of her mother’s forehead.

  ‘Shan’t be here for long.’

  ‘None of that. You’ll be better by the new year.’

  Mother’s hand crawled out from under the covers to grasp Cat’s. With her touch, Cat’s anger and bitterness and exhaustion suddenly overwhelmed her. Her spine crumbled, and she sobbed as she held her mother’s skeletal fingers.

  ‘Eh,’ Mother whispered and stroked her thumb over Cat’s knuckles. ‘Don’t cry, love.’

  ‘Don’t leave us, Ma.’

  Water glistened in her mother’s eyes. ‘My clever little girl. The prettiest in town.’ Mother’s grip tightened, and her breath groaned in her chest as she leaned forward. ‘Find yourself a good husband, one who’ll take care of you. Promise me?’

  Cat’s tears dripped onto the blankets. It seemed an impossible task, but she would not argue. She nodded, and Mother fell back into her pillows, panting for air.

  ‘I’ll take care of the girls, I swear.’

  Her mother’s lips quivered into a smile. ‘I know.’ Her eyelids fluttered like birds’ wings, trying to stay open but failing.

  Cat sniffed, straightened. Her mother did not need to see her like this.

  ‘Rest now, Ma.’ Cat got to her feet, pressed her lips to her mother’s wet forehead, and dropped her cheek onto the familiar, crinkled hair. ‘I’ll bring you more broth in the morning.’

  A brief rest in the snowy weather, the ground crisp and hard underfoot, made the walk home not quite so intolerable. Footsteps raced along the cobbles, for it was the end of the working week, and men were rushing for public houses and women for home to get the clothes ready for service tomorrow.

  Cat ushered Helen and Lottie along – they were blowing their breath in front of their faces and running through the clouds.

  ‘Come on,’ Cat said, tugging on their hands and feeling a little mean in the process.

  An hour later, she would wish that she had stayed out with the girls and let them play, let them enjoy their childish games, their innocence, their last moments of happiness. An hour later, she would wish that they had run home all the way so they might have stopped what had happened.

  The fire was too low in the kitchen when they got home. Cat raked through the ashes, searching for embers, and placed a chunk of coal over any that she found. She waited, crouched, her hands stinging from the cold, and watched for the flames to take.

  Half of the beef broth remained in the pot, and once the fire had returned, she set the stew over the flames to warm through. She leant against the table, let the fire warm her stiff skirts, and closed her eyes. The week had taken too long to pass. She rolled her shoulders back, feeling and hearing the crunch of her spine as it straightened after days of being bent over. She had a searing pain between her eyes, and she pinched the bridge of her nose, liking the way the pressure made the blood pulse loudly in her ears, muffling all the other sounds as if she was underwater in another world.

  Helen tripped over her feet and crashed onto the floor. She picked herself up, brushed the dust off her, and stared up at her big sister, unusually still at this time of night when she should have been making tea and setting the place straight for Michael’s return.

  ‘Cat?’ Helen said, pulling on Cat’s sleeve. ‘You all right?’

  With effort, Cat peeled her eyes open and forced a smile. ‘Fine. Go and get your clothes ready for tomorrow, make sure they’re clean.’

  The girls did as they were told, clattering up the stairs, chattering between themselves. Cat never understood how they could find so much to talk about, so much to be continually upbeat about. For a moment, she resented them. If she had been Helen, then this responsibility would not have fallen on her shoulders. If she had been Lottie, she would be giggling in the snow, not worrying about cutting bread so thin that it stretched to four slices. But it did no one any good to think such thoughts.

  She checked the pot. The water was not yet boiling though tiny little bubbles floated up and popped on the surface. She leant over the water, inhaled, and imagined she was sitting in a grand kitchen, where herbs and spices hung from the ceiling and perfumed the air, and a leg of beef turned on a spit, its fat collecting in a dish, ready to smear over thick slices of white bread. Her stomach moaned, and by the time the fantasy had fizzled away, the broth was bubbling.

  ‘Cat!’ Lottie’s strangled voice rang through the house.

  Cat raced up the stairs two at a time, her mind flashing with the worst sorts of bloody imagery. She collided with the girls at the foot of their mother’s bed. Their round, white faces turned to her, their eyes watery, their mouths open.

  She didn’t want to look. If she didn’t see, she could walk downstairs and get on with tea as if nothing had happened. If she didn’t look, she could preserve the idea of her mother, alive, in her mind, just having a sleep, about to wake up at any minute.

  ‘She won’t open her eyes,’ Helen said, sniffing as she clung to the leg of the bed. ‘Why won’t she open her eyes?’

  ‘Go downstairs, girls.’

  ‘What’s wrong with Ma?’ Lottie said. ‘Why won’t she wake up?’

  ‘Downstairs!’ Her voice made the room shudder. The girls ducked their heads instinctively, as if their father had shouted the instruction, then scampered away.

  Still, Cat could not look at the bed. She examined the floor, and noticed, for the first time, the state of the rug, the way the scraps of fabric were squashed into each other, the colours dulled by grease and soot and dust. When was the last time she had beaten it? When was the last time Mother’s bare feet had stepped onto it and shivered at the uncleanliness of it? Cat’s cheeks burned. When had everything started to get too much?

  ‘Ma?’ she whispered, gaze trained on the frayed cotton of the rug, the whole thing coming loose. ‘Ma?’

  No reply. Not the reassuring wheeze of her chest, no crumpling of blankets. Nothing.

  Cat squeezed her eyes shut. Tears spilled over her cheeks and splattered on the wooden floor. The silence was all-consuming. Deafening. She imagined the girls clinging to the banister, their ears pricked, waiting to be told what was happening, that everything was going to be fine.

  Before she had time to stop herself, she forced her eyes open.

  Mother’s mouth gaped at an odd angle. Her skin, in the weakness of the candlelight, was grey.

  C
at tiptoed towards her and touched a finger to her forehead. Cold.

  She slumped on the bed and reached under the covers to grab her mother’s hand. She pulled it out and rubbed it, thinking that if she could only warm her mother that she might come back to life. ‘Come on, Ma.’

  She dropped onto her knees beside the bed, furiously rubbing her hand up and down the white, gnarly streak of her mother’s arm. She would make her mother live! She would will her mother back to life, for how could they survive without her? It was impossible.

  ‘Don’t leave me, Ma. You can’t leave.’

  She rubbed faster until she was scared she might tear her mother’s thin skin, until the wedding ring – too large now for her mother’s finger – shot off into the room. She cursed under her breath and searched for the bit of tinged gold. Where had it gone? It could not just vanish! She was on her hands and knees when a voice startled her.

  ‘What you doing?’

  Cat gawped at the dark shadow at the foot of the bed, and for a moment her heart stopped as she imagined it to be the reaper come for her mother’s body, but as the figure lifted his eyes to her, she saw it was only her brother. She rested back on her heels, wiped her hair out of her face, and stared at him.

  ‘She’s dead,’ he said, his voice emotionless.

  Cat crawled to Mother and started rubbing her hand again. She was not going to give up on her.

  ‘She’s dead, Cat.’

  ‘I know!’ She jumped to her feet, ready to pounce at Michael, to strike at his cheeks, to make him do something other than just stare; he was as lifeless as their mother’s corpse. She saved herself just in time and slammed her foot into the door, liking the distraction of the way her toe throbbed in agony.

  ‘Don’t just stand there!’

  He shrugged, and red flakes of brick dust fluttered to the ground. More dust. More filth. He turned away from the bed, his face blank as he walked past her.

  ‘One less mouth to feed.’

  Chapter 6

  October 1853. Wallingham Hall.