The Flower Girl

by Maggie Ford

  ‘So you have come, as I expected you would,’ he said quietly.

  As he’d expected she would? Annoyance flooded through her. ‘I just thought I’d take it into me mind ter see if yer was ’ere, that’s all,’ she said sharply.

  ‘Dear girl!’ His voice was filled with exasperation. ‘Listen to yourself. How can you assault the ear with such vile abominations? If you’ve decided on being my assistant, it’s time I began teaching you how to speak.’

  Emma stood dumbfounded as he bent to pack away the hurdy-gurdy. It all sounded so outlandish that she burst out laughing. The sound made him look up to regard her with slow deliberation so that she squirmed.

  ‘You have a most delightful laugh, Amelia, do you know that?’ he said quietly, without a semblance of a smile on his own lips. ‘You also have quite a pleasing voice when you bother yourself to use it properly.’

  Laughter had died the instant it began, seemingly inappropriate, but she was flattered by his remarks and she liked the way he called her Amelia.

  ‘Why are yer … Why are you doing this?’ she asked as they walked off, she with one eye on her surroundings after what she’d learned about Ben. ‘Why have yer … have you changed your mind about going back to conjuring? And why choose me to be your assistant if you’re not going to?’

  Already she was becoming aware of what she was saying and the way it should be said. She wasn’t stupid, and it wasn’t hard to put on the posh talk when she wanted, even if it didn’t flow naturally as it did with the toffs who passed her on their way into theatres. It had always been fun to mimic them, making her friends laugh. But she’d never tried incorporating it into everyday conversation. She’d have had everyone laughing at her if she had. Now of course, there could be another goal in sight, and it was imperative to let him see that she could do it.

  Reaching the place where he lived, she hurried inside behind him, with a prior glance around lest she was being spied on. Closing the door, he put the hurdy-gurdy on the table and her empty flower tray beside it.

  ‘Sit down, Amelia.’ He indicated the one rickety chair.

  She did as ordered, thinking that every request of his seemed like a command. But she liked being called Amelia. It made her feel special.

  He was looking at her, his blue eyes steady and unblinking, holding her attention almost against her will. He’d seen her consternation, for he relaxed his gaze and allowed a smile to touch his lips.

  ‘Don’t be alarmed, Amelia,’ he said, his tone soft. ‘I am not about to hypnotise you. I will never do that – never take away another’s will, although I know from past experience that I am capable of it. Now, my dear, as I have already explained to you, everything a conjuror does is trickery. There is no mystery about it. Even mind-reading is a trick, although I regret hypnotism is not. That is something not to be taken lightly. I am telling you all this because if you are willing to learn, I can teach secrets such as others could never believe are mere tricks. But first, you must learn to speak properly.’

  ‘I know how to speak properly,’ she said, immediately mimicking the tones of the elite as she described their mannerisms and the haughty way they conducted themselves.

  He did not smile now. ‘That is not you, that is someone else.’

  Emma frowned. She thought she’d done it well. ‘What d’you mean, someone else?’

  ‘You are aping what you have heard. I want you to find your own voice, your own mannerisms, to move naturally as becomes you. You must be yourself, so please do not copy those you hear, the foolish, empty-headed creatures prattling on their way into a theatre or a party. The gift you will find will be your own.’

  She sat very still as he moved closer to her. ‘I have it in mind to take your advice and try my skills first on those in the street, to entertain them with magic instead of playing that thing.’ He waved a dismissive hand at the instrument on the table, but his expression had grown wistful.

  ‘However, after all this time I will require an inordinate amount of practice, months perhaps, for my fingers to again become supple enough to manipulate the simplest moves.’

  He made small rippling movements with fingers that she’d never truly noticed before as being amazingly slim for a person of his build. They appeared as dainty as any woman’s, yet somehow possessed power.

  ‘I cannot do it alone, however,’ he continued, his voice a monotone. ‘This is a huge step for me, you understand. I had vowed never to go back to it. Now, thanks to you and your charming presence, I have decided it is time to put behind me all that has happened in the past.’

  He paused, giving her a long, searching look. ‘But to do this, I shall need the support of someone I can trust. You, Amelia. I would like you to be my assistant. I would never contemplate taking on someone with whom I am not familiar for such an intense profession. Martin, of course, knows my work implicitly, but I cannot bring myself to consider him, even though as time has gone on I’ve often wondered, was I mistaken about him and my …’ He broke off and began again. ‘With you I’d have no qualms.’

  ‘But I don’t know nothing about conjuring.’

  ‘I will teach you.’ His lips broke into an indulgent smile. ‘And the phrase is, “I don’t know anything”, or “I know nothing”. You understand?’

  She nodded obediently, but it didn’t matter. Her heart was pounding with excitement. To be with him, entertaining in the street; if he was as good as Martin said he was, who knows, she could end up on a proper stage with him, in a proper theatre, she who’d stood outside so many, wishing she were one of those elegant ladies alighting from a carriage on the arm of an escort in opera hat and cape, white gloves and silver-topped cane.

  If this man succeeded, she’d certainly benefit, far better than selling flowers and being looked down on by toffs. Yet though every fibre of her cried out, yes please, it needed thinking about. It was all too good to be true.

  Then there was her mother. And Ben. She knew how they’d receive it. And if it all came to nothing, she’d be on the receiving end, looking a fool; worse still, having reaped their anger all for nothing, find her every move watched, never trusted again, her freedom curtailed. No, it wasn’t worth it.

  ‘Mr Barrington, I’ve got ter go. Me mum’ll be wondering where I am.’ Her attempt at fine vocabulary all went in her confusion, but if it jarred on him, he made no sign.

  ‘Will you think about what I have said?’

  No, it was too good to be true. She was just dreaming, and so was he. ‘You’d have to practise too much,’ she said as an excuse. ‘I don’t think you’d ever make it work, not after all this time.’

  Why had she said that, she who wanted so much to get out of this deprivation all around her?

  Grabbing up her tray, she wrenched open the door to the alley and fled as fast as boots and skirts allowed, one hand holding her straw boater down on her head. Unaware of the looks her flight brought from passers-by and even children playing in the street, she didn’t stop until she reached home all breathless, and it wasn’t just from running. What if all he’d said did come true? What a wonderful life could be lying in store for her.

  Chapter Nine

  Why was it taking so long? Mr Barrington had warned that it could be some while before he felt ready. But nine weeks? It was already June and Emma could feel her patience beginning to wear thin. All those expectations of something exciting happening were melting away, and here she was, still selling Mum’s paper flowers.

  Just talk. He hadn’t meant a word of it. Or perhaps he had, dreaming like her. And that’s all it had been. To have something like that dangled before her eyes and then to have it dissipate into thin air, made it all the more galling. Yet he continued to keep her on tenterhooks, dangling on a piece of string.

  ‘Come here on the Wednesday of each week,’ he’d said imperiously in April. ‘Without fail. But no more than that, for I shall be working and not wish to be disturbed. I shall inform you how I am progressing.’

  She lik
e a fool had done as he’d asked, glancing over her shoulder in case Ben, beginning to wonder about these regular outings, decided to follow her. Ben seemed to have forgotten those earlier intentions of his, for which she was grateful, but she had no wish to awaken his curiosity, which hopefully she wouldn’t, because she was usually back home inside of ten minutes at the most.

  It was an odd situation. She sometimes wondered why she bothered when all that Barrington ever did was to open his door to her knock, never letting her in, but telling her that he was not ready yet, that he’d see her next week, and then close the door in her face. Nine weeks of this and she was getting thoroughly fed up and frustrated. Yet somehow, she felt unable to not go, ever on alert that on one of those visits he might invite her in and there it would all be, his conjuring tricks laid out before her, he in his magician’s clothing, saying he was ready to teach her how to be his assistant.

  At the end of the second week of June, Theodore knew this was the time he had been waiting for. He had known it for the past fortnight as his fingers began to go through their manipulations no longer with need for him to think about it, every movement having now become instinctive. But he’d had to be certain. And now he was.

  There were two more days of practice until Amelia knocked once more on his door. Never again would she need to keep rigidly to that command. On Wednesday he waited. And there was her knock. Drawing in a deep breath, he stiffened his back, drew up his shoulders until his full six feet one inch of controlled muscle was reached. Then he went slowly to open the door to her.

  Emma found herself brought into the room. It was the most bizarre of any invitation she could have imagined. He hadn’t spoken, hadn’t held out a hand for her, not even any movement of the head, but the faintest alteration of expression in those penetrating blue eyes, and she just knew she was being asked to enter.

  The evening June sunshine seemed to leap about the room as he spoke in a low voice. ‘Watch,’ he said.

  The entire bed was covered with a gleaming red cloth, spangled with quarter moons and shooting stars, and it was these that caught the sunlight slanting through the tiny window to throw glints on to the walls.

  Barrington reached out with one hand, no other part of his body appearing to move, and whipped off the scarlet cover.

  There, on a dark, polished wooden board laid across the bed, were packs of cards, sets of small containers, square and round, a mound of brightly coloured silk handkerchiefs, an array of red and white balls and coloured wooden cups, and so much more that Emma’s amazed gaze could not entirely take it all in.

  ‘There’s such a lot,’ was all she could say.

  ‘And more,’ he said, his tone low and even, as if he were already performing. ‘But this will do to start with.’

  ‘What am I suppose ter do?’ It was a little alarming, seeing all this. To think that all the while he’d played his hurdy-gurdy, these had been sitting here in boxes. There was no sign of the hurdy-gurdy. On the table where it had once resided there was now a large leather Gladstone bag. She would have liked to ask what he’d done with it but her eyes were too taken by the wonders laid out before her.

  ‘Simple tricks,’ he said quietly. ‘Come here tomorrow evening when I will begin showing you what I require of you.’

  Emma walked back home past The Flying Swan, her mind in a daze. She hardly glanced at the groups of customers lounging outside the pub, taking advantage of the warm evening air after a hot, sunny day. The men with their collarless shirt necks open, caps on the back of their heads, jackets off to reveal well-worn, unbuttoned waistcoats, were enjoying their pints and ignoring the stinks a hot day in London could raise.

  Women too, idled over a much needed drink, even though the beer would be lukewarm, chatting with each other with one eye on their kids, who raced about, ragged but eager, causing Emma to sidestep once as she passed so as to avoid a collision.

  A barrel organ played where once the hurdy-gurdy man had stood. No one seemed to miss his presence as Emma passed and the children cavorted around the organ player as much as they had once cavorted around the other.

  Those housewives of Mitre Street and Church Row, unable to afford a beer, had come to sit out of doors to gossip and find a bit of fresh air between the puffs of smoke from trains trundling past on the Blackwall railway above them. It was an hour or two to be enjoyed, but Emma’s mind was more full of excited anticipation, fear and indecision.

  Now it looked like happening, was she prepared? Did she want this? What was expected of her? He hadn’t explained anything, had just said be there tomorrow. Maybe she would know more then. But she who could stand in a busy street trying to tempt people with her tiny bunches of paper flowers, who without a qualm put up with being ignored or having her offered wares rudely thrust aside, or being regarded with pity while only few stopped to buy; she who could put up with that, now trembled in her boots at being in the critical eye of the public in helping an entertainer.

  Maud Beech’s eyes lit up as they always did when presented with the empty tray. ‘Yer got rid of ’em all then.’

  ‘It’s been such a lovely day,’ Emma said, dropping the tray behind the door. ‘I could of sold twice as many.’

  ‘Looks like I’ll ’ave ter start making a few more than usual then.’

  Maud picked up a fork and turned the bit of meat she was cooking on a flat pan on the trivet before the fire. On top of the low flames, potatoes and carrots simmered in a saucepan. Here in this place summer brought as many problems as did winter. In cold weather a fire did at least warm the room as well as cook food but in summer it still had to be lit for cooking, turning the place into an oven. With cheap bits of meat needing to be cooked slowly to be anywhere near tender, there was no escaping the heat.

  She’d opened the sash window as far as it would go, six inches, until the sash cord had stuck as it always did, and had sat near it as often as she could, trying to avail herself of what small draught came through, fanning herself with her apron or the cloth she used to handle the hot meat tray.

  She envied those whose doors opened on to the street, allowing them to take out a chair and sit outside for a breath of air. From her window she could see neighbour chatting to neighbour while they peeled potatoes or shelled peas. Earlier this afternoon as the room became oppressive from the sunshine pouring through her window, even before she had lit the fire to cook, she’d gone downstairs to stand awhile by the open front door. The woman living in the room underneath her, Mrs Lovell, had joined her.

  She was fat, slovenly, cuddling her little boy of some seven or eight months; her three-year-old daughter had died two months ago from some illness or other. She had been a weak child, never clean, suffering from impetigo and frequent bouts of vomiting. Maud had never asked what she’d died of and Mrs Lovell didn’t seem to know, merely saying that the doctor who came had said it was a stomach thing, but she’d gone to the funeral, the child being put into a parish grave without a headstone, and the coffin a wooden box borne on a parish barrow. She’d made Mrs Lovell a little wreath of paper flowers, the best she could do for her. The trouble was that since then she couldn’t move without Mrs Lovell trying to make up for her help by going out of her way to start up a conversation.

  Maud had been glad to come back indoors, preferring to be stifled by heat rather than conversation. Besides that, the woman smelled of something unpleasant, a body odour that wasn’t all to do with being unwashed. Her baby, a little boy whose name was George, smelled equally odd. How people ever paid her to take in washing for them was beyond Maud.

  ‘I’d best get a few more bunches of flowers done after supper ready for yer to take out termorrer,’ she said to Emma as she turned the sizzling bit of meat yet again. Ben had the lion’s share, but even the tiniest portion for her and Emma made all the difference to a meal of vegetables.

  ‘One thing about these light evenings,’ she went on, ‘yer can get a lot more done and yer don’t ’ave ter strain yer eyes. I can sit b
y the window an’ do ’em. Maybe you can ’elp me, luv.’

  She didn’t see her daughter’s eyes widen uneasily at her reference to making a lot more flowers. In Emma’s mind was the question of how was she going to combine selling flowers with helping Theodore Barrington.

  ‘Up the West End, was yer?’ Maud queried as Emma sat down on Ben’s sofa.

  Ben was at work, and Maud thanked the Lord for that. There was money coming in, hence decent meals for once, the rent paid on time, and even a bit over so Emma could take a bus or a tube all the way to the West End and back without having to walk part of it. Life was a lot easier lately.

  ‘I only went as far as the Bank,’ said Emma, taking off her straw boater. ‘I stood outside the tube station and sold the lot.’

  She said it with some pride, but Maud stopped probing the potatoes in their pot for softness to glare at her. ‘Yer mean yer paid a full tuppence an’ only went as far as the Bank? Gawd blimey, Em, yer can go all the way ter Shepherd’s Bush fer that. It’s why they call it the Tuppenny Tube.’

  ‘I sold ’em all, didn’t I?’ came an exasperated sigh. ‘Besides, it was stuffy and I needed to be up in the open air. They were gone in no time.’

  Emma got up from the sofa and put the tin of coins on the table. Maud eyed them without as much satisfaction as she might have. ‘Yer could of come ’ome and I could of given yer another lot.’

  She saw the look of rebellion on Emma’s face and quickly checked herself, turning back to lift the potatoes off the fire. No doubt Emma had spent the rest of her time looking round the shops. She was entitled to a bit of life. She worked hard, in all weathers, and who could begrudge her time to herself? She might even find herself a nice young lad. Though once a young man came along, would she still be willing to go out selling? And what when she finally got married? Maud only hoped that when that day came, the young man of Emma’s choice would be in work and with prospects. She didn’t want her suffering the life that had been forced on her.