by DM Bryan
“I took nothing,” said my mother so that I could hardly hear her.
A knock at the door interrupted this game. Bogus, the first constable, opened it a pinch and then full wide. A person entered in a coat that twinkled in the link light. I’d never seen so many buttons, and I knew he was a very fine gentleman indeed.
“We found her, sir,” said Mr. Janus to the fine gentleman. “Look,” and he brought the link close to the blood. Bright red it was. But the fine gentleman would not look.
“Have you recovered anything,” said this splendid person, addressing himself to Bogus. “Anything at all? My sister had silver money in a leather purse and a hundred and fifty pounds in a drawer besides.” A folded page emerged from his coat, which he opened to read, “Also missing: a tankard, a silver spoon, one square piece of plate, one pair of sheets, five shifts, and a ring looped with thread.”
Mr. Bogus came away from the door to take up my mother’s coffer box, knocked from its accustomed place under the bed. The thin brass lock gave away easily upon the first prying of the constable’s knife.
From his place on the bed, Nathaniel said, “That’s death when a poor man does it, but if a constable breaks a lock, it’s called justice.” But then, he was obliged to hold his tongue, for from the box Bogus drew a ring looped with thread.
“My sister’s own,” said the fine gentleman, coming forward to cradle it in his palm.
“I took nothing,” said my mother, but then she set about groaning.
The coffer box held a little more: a silver spoon, a tankard, a pair of shifts.
“I am innocent,” said my mother. “Given me for the keeping, all of it.”
The constables looked at the gentleman, who looked very sad. They passed him the contents of the coffer, and he went away, no happier than before.
“Search her hair,” said Bogus, and Janus used his free hand to root through my mother’s hair, his fingers feeling obscenely beneath her tight-pinned cap. “I knew a woman once,” said Janus while he worked, “who hid thirty-six moidore coins, eighteen guineas, twenty-three shillings, and seven crowns, all tucked in her coiffeur.” He pulled out his hand, empty.
A woman peered in through our open door. I recognized her as one who sometimes went to and fro at night with my mother. “What a noise,” said she. “I’m sorry to see you taken.”
My mother said nothing, but Janus said, “Never mind. You may visit her at Newgate.”
“Surely not,” said the lady at the door in some surprise. “She only picks the pockets of those she lifts her skirts to.”
“Nay,” said Mr. Janus. “It’s murder. Her skirts are covered in blood.” And with this Janus spun my mother to once again reveal that continent of red in a sea of linen.
“Does that not strike fear into your tender heart?” said the man, his mouth jagged and wet.
“You fool,” said the lady in the door. “It’s only her courses. She would not come out with me tonight on account of them.”
“It’s murder,” said Janus, dropping my mother’s limp arm. “You know nothing of the law.”
“Suit yourself,” said the lady at the door and went away.
“Doll?” said Glossolalia, interrupting the girl again. “How do you remember so much? You are a child now and must have been an infant then.”
“Nat taught me everything that happened: first came the constables with links, then they sat in the dark, and so on. And he used to tell me the story himself, when we were cold or had not enough to eat. I had a hundred questions and he was able to answer every one.”
“What happened to your mother?”
“The parish prevented us from following her to Newgate, but the fame of her murderous actions put her name in all the broadsheets. An artist came to paint her portrait and make printed pictures for sale, and for a time, we saw our mother’s face in whatever direction we turned. We stole a print, but we lost it later, and in truth, I have little need of a piece of paper to remember her by. Nat taught me to say every night, like a prayer, that I killed our mother, and her death is a charge upon my account.”
At this, Mrs. Malcolm turned back to face the company. “Never,” she said, her tired eyes red. “She is blameless. I would have her believe me.” And the good woman clasped her hands together and could not say more.
“Nat and I haunted Newgate’s walls, standing at its doors daily, and when the time came, we followed the cart from the open gate to the countryside. The crowd pressed us all about, but still we followed. And she saw us from the cart and wept and cursed her misfortune, and Nat said I might receive her absolution now. But then, the procession reached the Bowl Inn, and after that she would not lift her head.”
“They make them dead drunk,” said Mrs. Malcolm, “so they suffer less,” and she crossed her arms hard against her chest.
“Nat and I were footsore and hungry, but we would not leave off, and we reached Tyburn in time to see the cart trundle to a stop near the gallows. They made us stand in the crowd with the others, and all were prevented from approaching the wagon, lest any criminal was helped to escape. Nat spoke to a man holding back the crowds, and my brother said he was our mother’s son. But the man only scolded him for a liar and told him he’d have his turn on the tree soon enough. Nat cut his purse to reward him for his lack of kindness, but then we needed to move further away, for we did not want to be near when the man discovered his loss.
We heard the Ordinary’s speeches only as the wind allowed, but we heard enough. We heard how our mother, like the other prisoners, repented most heartily of her crimes against God, and how she hoped to find forgiveness in the world to come. We hoped so too. Then the men geed the horses and caused the wagon to roll away from the gallows, and we saw our mother twitching upon the line like a fish. She still wore the green mantua, you see.”
“Stop, child,” said Glossolalia, “You have told me enough. I was wrong to let this tale continue.”
But Doll would not be stopped. She said, “Everywhere at Tyburn people sold good things to eat, and we saw a man with a dogcart selling rides to other children. Nat said I might, for he had the unkind man’s purse, but when I came closer, I grew fearful of such large dogs, and said I would not get in, lest they run away with me. The dog man laughed at what he called my folly, and Nat paid instead for oranges.”
Now the child stopped, and she gazed up at Glossolalia, who could not rightly say what she saw in the girl’s expression.
Then it was that Mrs. Malcolm rose to her feet and stood before Doll. “Did you like the oranges?” asked that lady.
“I never tasted anything so sweet before.”
“And was the sweetness punishment?”
Doll was silent.
“Nat bought you oranges. The money was stolen. The oranges were sweet. I can see no judgment in any of this, Doll.”
Doll wrapped her hands in her apron and sat with her head bowed.
“Think on this, child,” said Mrs. Malcolm. “It is no sin to cry out for your mother, no matter the sequel.”
No noise from Doll. Mrs. Malcolm stood with her hands on her hips. She looked, Glossolalia thought, now more angry than distressed, but not with the young person at her feet. As for Glossolalia herself, she felt something go adrift in her heart.
The boy had bent his head close to Doll’s, and with the privilege of childhood, lifted her chin so that he might see her face. “She cries,” he announced.
Discovered, Doll showed them her face, which indeed was streaked and snotty. A little unsteady, she got to her feet, and went to Mrs. Malcolm, where she buried her face in the dark skirts. It was easy enough for Glossolalia to see how little that good woman cared that her apron would be dirtied. Her hands fluttered like pages on a breeze, then settled softly on Doll’s head.
[
It was only a short time later that the sunlight passed from the wi
ndows, and the little room began to sink into gloom. Glossolalia, recognizing that the time had come for her departure, took Mrs. Malcolm aside. At first, she did not know how to begin, for Doll’s story had put a fresh idea into her head, but at last she went direct to the heart of the matter.
“Mrs. Malcolm” said Glossolalia, “I have seen with my own eyes how you are the best kind of warder these children could hope for. But Bridewell is a vast place, with many stairs and a great deal of trouble for one as conscientious as yourself. I imagine you could use an apprentice housekeeper to run up and down the stairs for you?”
“Those stairs are wearisome, it’s true, but ask yourself, madam, whether a body goes to work in such a place as Bridewell unless she finds herself pressed to it by hard necessity. An apprentice must be paid in meat and drink and apparel and lodging and washing. She must be kept from being a charge to the parish, and when she is grown, she must have a second suit of clothes, so that she has one for the working days and one for the holy ones. A poor woman could never afford all that.”
“You know the obstacles to a nicety—I think you’ve thought before on this matter.
Mrs. Malcolm said nothing.
“The child Doll would make a suitable apprentice? Say yes or no, madam, and nothing else.”
“Yes,” said Mrs. Malcolm. “Truthfully, I would give much to have her stay with me and be my legs and eyes and ears.”
“That’s rather more than yes.”
Mrs. Malcolm’s look confirmed all Glossolalia suspected.
“But,” said the housekeeper, “I love the child too well to wish to keep her in a place such as Bridewell. She deserves better.”
“That’s as may be,” said Glossolalia, “but Doll does not agree—her story tells us as much. However, if we put into her head that an indenture to a Bridewell housekeeper is both salvation and punishment all in one, do you think we might convince her?”
Mrs. Malcolm thought on the proposition rather longer than Glossolalia thought necessary, but at last she nodded her head. “I do,” said that good woman. “But, the meat, and drink, and apparel, and lodging, and the second suit of clothes?”
“Let me take care of that,” said Glossolalia, who at last understood that the gentleman in the yard had been right all along. She need make no excuse—she had come to help at last, and that fact was sufficiency itself.
[
Afternoon turned to evening. Glossolalia asked the boy to lead her to the warden. In a splendid chamber, a stark contrast to the wardrooms above, she requested that man’s permission to put into practice the much-desired scheme. The warder was a brisk gentleman in a grey coat and square wig, whose chief pleasure lay in removing names from the parish books. With the gentleman’s quick agreement, and Glossolalia’s promise to supply everything needful for the term of Doll’s apprenticeship, plus a little more besides, the indenture was drawn up. All that remained was to put the question to Doll.
Accordingly, Mrs. Malcolm and Doll were now asked to join the others in the gleaming room. Together with Glossolalia, the housekeeper described the apprenticeship in just such terms as they had previously discussed. To this discourse, Doll listened very gravely, her hands behind her back, but when all was said, the child looked from face to face, uttering nary a word.
“What do you think, Doll?” said Glossolalia. “It is hard service to stay with Mrs. Malcolm and learn her trade—no picnic, I’ll warrant.”
Glossolalia did not like to guess what answer the child might make—she had a mind of her own, to be sure. But Doll’s only reply was more silence.
“Mrs. Malcolm will expect a great deal of you.”
Still, the child said nothing.
“You must tell me the truth, child,” said Mrs. Malcolm. “Would you not rather be gone from this place forever?”
This made Doll speak. “Then, I can choose to go?” said she.
“You might, Doll,” said Mrs. Malcolm, “for this lady will find you a better place than Bridewell. Of this, I am certain.”
Doll took a single step closer to the housekeeper. She did not look up, but said, “If I might choose, I choose to stay and by choosing make Bridewell no more a prison to me.”
“Oh, well put,” cried the warden, “very well put.” And for all he was a man of business, he seemed to put a finger to his eye and wipe something away.
For her part, Mrs. Malcolm suffered no such wetting of the cheeks. Instead, she put her hand on Doll’s cap, as she had before, but this time she fixed it there as a token of her permanent attachment.
Seeing her new friends happy, Glossolalia judged the time had come for her to leave. She picked up her skirts and made her intentions known, but Mrs. Malcolm earnestly stopped her. The housekeeper said, “Before you depart, might I know your name, madam, for I would like to know to whom Doll and I owe our good fortune.”
At this request, Glossolalia hesitated, but she did not take long before she complied, giving the name she had not used in many years. Why that name seemed her own again, she could not have said, but whatever the reason, she gave her right title and felt better for it. Then, with a smile for each of the company, she again prepared to leave Bridewell.
This time, as she bade them goodbye, she found herself prevented from leaving a second time—this time by the boy. “Madam,” said he, “if you’ll wait just a little longer, you might hear a second story that would do you some good.”
“Another story?” said Glossolalia, not at all pleased by the lad’s interruption, for she was tired, and she longed for her own hearth and a pot of tea. In this frame of mind, she thought the boy looked a more hardened criminal than Doll, and she suspected him of some stratagem. She said, “I have given the warden the contents of my purse against Doll’s upkeep and have only a little coin left to spare. I will give it you freely, but you need not pay me with a song.”
“Ballad singing was Doll’s cheat, not mine.”
Glossolalia frowned at the youth’s interpretation of her words. “I only meant,” she said, “you may have whatever I have left, but in return, I beg you hold your tongue. I am not so innocent that I must purchase every fiction laid at my feet, and you cannot hope to better Doll’s true history. Its imitation will only test my patience—not my goodness.”
“As to that,” said the boy, “you must be the judge.”
“You are determined to speak?”
“I am.”
And so, he began.
Chapter 19
The History of Glossolalia:
Or, Virtues Various.
The Boy’s Tale.
London, 1746.
The boy said, “My story will not take long to tell, for much of it occurred before my birth and so is outside my knowing. I know only my mother was born into a good family but that she made a bad marriage and so lost her fortune while I was yet an innocent infant—”
“Boy,” said Glossolalia, who had exhausted her charity. “I detect no especial wit in your opening, and I will not be made an audience to a romance fobbed off as ordinary life. Such a substitution is a cheat, and besides, I have read many of these amusing tales, and I am certain I recognize this one. Is it not by Mrs. Aubin or perhaps Mrs. Davys? Does not the Reform’d Coquet begin in a similar manner? What say you, Mrs. Malcolm?”
Mrs. Malcolm replied, “I do not know, madam, for in truth, I have not read any of those books. At home, we are reading Mr. Richardson’s Pamela, but in five years we have only reached the scene where her master conceals himself in the closet.”
“That is a very little way to read in five years,” said Glossolalia.
“Indeed, I fear we might not finish before I die.”
The boy, Glossolalia noticed, listened closely to this exchange, neither scowling at her outburst nor demonstrating any other kind of impatience. He stood close to her elbow, waiting to resume his speech. She turned back to
him, saying “We might pass over the details of your birth to know only this: have you a locket or a cup to prove your inheritance. This is invariably the case in every romance.”
“No locket or cup,” said the boy.
“No birthmark? Then, I’ll tell you what—if you can go to the gatekeeper and secure me a hackney coach, you might earn a coin honestly.”
To her satisfaction, the boy got up at once and vanished into the yard.
Then Glossolalia took a friendly leave of Mrs. Malcolm and Doll, with many promises to visit made on both sides, and when the boy reappeared to tell her a coach waited in the yard, she was glad enough to follow him. He led her outside, where she found Bridewell’s confining walls vanished in the dark of night. Only windows, yellow with taper light, marked the existence of that high barrier. For the first time in her visit to that place, Glossolalia sighted the mass of Bridewell’s inmates, now released to the yard and walking to and fro in little groups. Beneath the arched doors of the chapel, women huddled close together, talking, while children played half-heartedly with stones in the mud. As her eyes adjusted, she saw, congealing from the shadows, more women, leaning up against the walls, arms crossed, and watchful. From her arrival, she’d been conscious of bells and, once or twice, the sounds of feet and voices, but the sight of so many unfortunates in one place alarmed her.
“This yard is full of inmates. Should they not be confined?” she said to the boy, who stood close by her elbow to help her climb into the carriage.
The child shrugged. “The walls stand still, missus,” he replied, “and the guardroom under the arch bristles with keepers.”
“Yes, but there are so many.”
Our employment ends early at this time of year. The cold numbs us where we stand, and Bridewell’s governors will not heat the workrooms. We are given an hour between the ending of our labours and supper to warm ourselves with walking. And some of us come out just to see the sky.”
A bell rang distantly, and the yard altered like a face changing its expression. Watchfulness straightened the slack lines of bodies. The gathered women fell silent, and the silent women stretched. The squatting children gathered up their stones and filled their pockets, a squabble or two erupting over ownership. Then, slowly, heavily, a river of figures formed and began to flow into an arched passage leading to a little, steepled chapel.