The gentleman shook his head as if to say, Think nothing of it. Smooth-shaven, his lean figure clad in an elegance of dove-grey morning coat, top hat and cape, he was the very picture of aloof aristocracy, despite the chalky pallor of his skin.
‘Joe,’ whispered Tina. ‘That’s the strange man from the auditorium. See his cane?’
Joe nodded absently, his attention still fixed on the carriage driver, who was regarding him with frowning interest. Abruptly, and without any kind of regard for his status, the driver leaned over and cut across Simmons’ conversation with his master. ‘Cornelius,’ he demanded. ‘Look at that boy.’
Mr Simmons was rendered momentarily speechless with horror, but the gentleman just turned in the direction pointed and gazed at Joe. The carriage driver did the same, and Joe found himself frozen in place, the unwilling object of their combined scrutiny.
‘Do you see it?’ said the carriage driver.
The gentleman tensed, as if suddenly realising what he was being asked. ‘No,’ he said sharply, turning away.
‘Is it not Matthew?’
‘Please, Vincent. No.’
‘But …’
Abruptly, the gentleman retreated to the carriage and slammed the door. He turned his face from the window even as he snapped the blind shut. The driver spent another moment gazing at Joe; then he pulled the carriage into the street and drove away.
‘Well,’ drawled Harry, ‘it’s just like a penny drama! The Finding of the Prodigal Son. Play your cards right, Matthew, and you might be set to inherit a fortune.’
Joe huffed. ‘He’s bloody hard up for a son if he has to resort to the likes of me.’
‘I don’t like those men,’ said Tina. ‘There’s something not right about them.’
‘Miss Kelly!’ Mr Simmons’ voice had them snapping to attention like soldiers.
‘Yes, Mr Simmons?’
‘Is Miss Ursula still within?’
‘Yes, Mr Simmons.’
‘Very well. I shall speak with her. I want you back here bright and early tomorrow, Miss Kelly.’ At Tina’s puzzled look, the theatre manager almost smiled. ‘There are to be auditions.’
‘Auditions?’
This time Mr Simmons did smile. ‘A tour, Miss Kelly! A fortuitously timed tour! An extravaganza for the Christmas season!’
Fran the Apples
and the Lady Nana
HARRY SINCERELY HOPED he wasn’t headed for a smashed skull and emptied pockets in the slime of a Dublin alley. The places through which this vivacious girl and her slouching alley cat of a chap were leading him were so narrow and mean that it was difficult to believe they could exist this close to the well appointed theatre district. At some point along the way, the girl had covered her bright-blue bonnet with her shawl. Harry thought it right that she had – in these surroundings that bonnet would have seemed wrong, somehow; it would have seemed vulnerable. Her chap, striding silently at her side, had a cut-throat walk to him here, a stone-eyed I’ll-mind-my-business-if-you-mind-yours expression, which Harry recognised all too well from the slums of New York.
‘Say,’ he murmured, fighting the urge to look back over his shoulder, ‘have we much further to go?’
‘No,’ said Tina, smiling. ‘We’re right here.’
Harry followed Joe’s example and scraped his shoes clean of horse muck and street filth at the boot-scrape; then he followed Tina up stone steps to the gloomy arch of a front door. As she squinted in the almost-dark to find the lock, Harry eyed the scarred wood and Tina’s smile widened.
‘It’s a bit battered, isn’t it? When we first started locking up, the dossers got angry and tried to kick it down. But we were sick to the teeth of them sleeping in the hall and pissing on the stairs, so we refused to give up. Every morning, Miss Price and Fran’ – she glanced at him – ‘that is, the landlady and my aunt Fran, they’d come out and fix the damage; then we’d lock it up all over again.’
She and Joe went inside. Darkness swallowed them as soon as they stepped from the threshold, and Harry hesitated. The house breathed out a rich, wholesome, welcoming smell, not at all what he’d expected – not the usual stench of a tenement. There was damp, certainly, and the unavoidable taint of human waste, but there was also the tang of apples and fresh turnips, the satisfying scent of bread, pipe-smoke, coal-fire and carbolic soap. This place almost smelled good. It almost smelled like home.
There was a tap-a-tap-tap way off down the hall, and Tina’s voice called out in the darkness.
‘Miss Price? It’s Martina. I’ve come for me lamp.’
There came the cracking of a lock. A door opened, and there was Tina, outlined in candlelight. Harry saw that she was surrounded by a flock of metal prams. They were filled with old breadboards and baskets of fruit and vegetables, and Tina smiled against the backdrop of humpbacked shadows they threw against the wall. The ticking of clocks and mewing of cats filled the narrow hall as an inordinately tiny old woman peered around the door of her apartment.
‘Come in now,’ murmured Joe, surprisingly close in the dark, and Harry stepped inside.
The old woman squinted up at Tina. ‘Frances said you’ll have a boy with you. I don’t care for boys, Miss Kelly. I don’t care for them at all.’
‘I know, Miss Price, but Mr Harry Weiss is a very quiet fellow, very mannerly and reserved.’
Stepping closer and removing his hat, Harry tried to look mannerly and reserved. The tiny woman scowled, clearly unimpressed. Joe stepped to Harry’s side and the woman shrank back.
‘Who’s that?’ she cried. ‘Someone’s lurking!’
‘It’s just me, Miss Price. Joe.’
The wrinkled old face melted into tenderness. ‘Ah, Joe,’ she crooned. ‘I’m sorry. I thought you were a boy.’
Joe sighed, and Harry had to bite his lips against a smile.
‘Well,’ said the tiny woman, ‘if Joe’s with you …’ She reached to a shelf by the door, touched a taper to a wick. ‘Here you go, Miss Kelly,’ she said, lifting down a heavy oil lamp. ‘No need to fetch a pail of water or bring up coal; Fran did it all when she got home.’ She handed the lamp to Tina, smiled fondly at Joe, scowled suspiciously at Harry, then shut the door in their faces.
‘Be ready to be on display,’ whispered Tina, and she hoisted the lamp and led them upstairs.
Doors opened on every landing. Women’s faces appeared. Framed in candlelight, they clucked and cooed with questions. Tina greeted them all without stopping, the lamp held high so they could get a good look at Harry. ‘Howyeh, Miss Mulvey. Howyeh, Miss Crannock. Howyeh, Norah, how’s Sarah? Ah, that’s lovely. Yeh, this is the boy. No, he’s only staying for dinner … Yeh, from the theatre. Yeh, he’s Joe’s friend.’
Joe snorted quietly at that one. Harry nodded to each passing face, and smiled and did his best to look charming. Are there no men here at all? he thought.
Finally Tina took them up a last narrow flight of steps. ‘None of them will sleep a wink ’til you’re gone,’ she whispered. ‘They’ll be gossiping about you for weeks.’
She touched Harry on the arm. He turned to look at her, and was surprised at the anxiousness in her expression. She leaned close. ‘You can say you’re a magician, Harry, if you like. Nana used to love a good magic trick, so she did. But please don’t go doing any mind-reading or fortune-telling or anything like that, all right?’ She flicked a glance over his shoulder at Joe, then back again. ‘My aunt wouldn’t approve.’
Harry was taken aback. ‘Okay,’ he said. ‘Sure. I wouldn’t want to upset anyone.’
Tina smiled and straightened, obviously relieved. She went to open the door, hesitated and turned once again. Her voice was lightly teasing this time, her eyes bright. ‘Watch out for Daniel O’Connell,’ she warned. ‘He bites.’
With that, she pushed open the door and led the way into warm light, the scent of candles and the heady smell of food.
‘BET YOU’VE NEVER seen such a lovely little room as this, have you, Harry?�
�� The network of wrinkles that made up the Lady Nana’s face formed itself into a broad and toothless grin. ‘It’s a proper little home, isn’t it? A real gem.’
She clamped her gums onto her pipe and stroked Daniel O’Connell’s wiry fur with a work-seamed hand. The terrier bared his teeth at Harry from the comfort of the old woman’s lap. Harry was pretty sure the little savage had bitten straight through his tendon. He indulged a brief fantasy of catapulting the dog out the window, then beamed his very best smile at the Lady Nana. ‘It’s a darned pretty home, ma’am,’ he said. ‘I’ve never seen prettier.’
On the opposite side of the fire, Tina exchanged an eye-rolling glance with Joe and went on with her knitting. By her side, the silent, dark-eyed woman she had introduced as Fran the Apples squinted narrowly, as if suspecting Harry of lying. He wasn’t. He thought the little room was charming, with its well scrubbed floorboards, glittering metal bedstead, and host of religious pictures on the walls. Even the huge statue of the Virgin Mary, with her multitude of warmly melting candles, had a serene comfort to her that made Harry feel welcome. Of course, the feed of stew that nestled in the pit of his stomach had a lot to do with it. Harry rubbed his ankle and smiled contentedly around him.
‘How’s your leg, Harry?’ smirked Joe. ‘Still a bit sore?’
Harry grimaced at him.
Joe grinned. He was standing at the room’s only table, pouring black beer into enamel mugs. After dinner, to the women’s delight and Harry’s admiration, the thin young man had produced two big bottles of the stuff, one from each of the hidden pockets inside his jacket, and he was now dividing the contents between three mugs and two large jam jars.
‘Ah, thank you, Joe!’ sighed the Lady Nana, accepting her mug of beer. ‘Nothing like a little porter to build you up for the cold.’ She raised her mug. ‘To Miss Price!’ she cried.
‘We were blessed the day we found her,’ agreed Fran the Apples. ‘Blessed. You don’t catch her upping the rent every time we buy a new bedspread or fix a broken window.’
‘Amen,’ said Tina, and they all raised their drinks.
Harry couldn’t help but notice that Joe did so with a certain wry reluctance. ‘To Miss Price,’ Joe said. ‘Despite what she thinks of boys.’
‘Ah now, you can’t blame her,’ said Nana, tipping her mug so Daniel O’Connell could take his share. ‘Sure, aren’t men the ruin of the tenements? Never short their beer money while their women and childer starve.’
‘I’m not like that,’ said Joe softly.
‘Ah, you’re not at all, Joe,’ crooned the Lady. ‘You’re not at all.’ She reached and squeezed his chapped hand. ‘And don’t you pay for it? Don’t they give you a terrible time? You poor gossun.’
Joe flushed. ‘I do all right.’ He flicked a glance at Harry, and Harry couldn’t help but prickle in sympathy for his pride.
‘But there’s no avoiding it,’ mused Nana. ‘Men are bowsies, pure and simple.’
‘Ah, Nan,’ admonished Tina, glancing at Fran the Apples, who was frowning into her beer.
‘Not all men are like that, Nana,’ said Fran.
‘Oh, ho!’ crowed the Lady Nana. ‘I know who you’re thinking of! But you give him time, Frances love! They’re all gents until they have their boots under your table; then you see the man in them! Useless shower of gurriers.’
‘Say now,’ cried Harry, ‘that’s just not true! My pa for one. He isn’t like that. He works hard, and he’d do anything for my ma! It’s not always a man’s fault when times are tough!’
A stunned silence fell over the women. Joe shifted uncomfortably, his eyes flicking to the Lady Nana, and Harry instantly regretted his outburst – he didn’t know these people; he didn’t know the delicate balances of their relationship.
‘Of course,’ he ventured, ‘my pa might be a rare specimen of a man.’
‘Well,’ murmured the Lady Nana apologetically, ‘it’s more the drink, you know. The drink’s a terror for emptying a man’s pockets. I’m sure your pa’s a grand fella for staving off the drink, Harry. Just like Joe here … and yourself, no doubt.’
‘Are you all theatre folk, Harry?’ asked Fran the Apples. ‘Your dad and your mam and all?’
Tina lowered her knitting. ‘Is your dad an artiste, Harry?’
‘Uh …’ Harry hesitated. On his travels, he had learned that there was an astonishing amount of kindness in this world – but he’d also learned firsthand how easy it was to find oneself out in the cold. The statue of the Virgin Mary gazed placidly at him over Tina’s head, her plaster face set in sweet inquiry. Well? she seemed to ask. What does Papa do?
Harry glanced at Joe. Joe’s best friend, that was what Tina had called Saul. Joe’s best friend. Harry set down his jam jar. ‘Uh, no,’ he said, ‘my pa’s not an artiste. He’s a rabbi, actually. In New York.’
‘Whassat?’ asked the Lady Nana, her brow furrowed. ‘A rabbit?’
Joe released one of his now familiar sighs. ‘Not a rabbit, Nan,’ he explained patiently. ‘A rabbi. A Jew priest.’
‘Oh,’ said Fran the Apples, her head turning sideways in frowning uncertainty.
‘Oh!’ said Tina, her eyes bright with questions.
‘Ah,’ nodded the Lady Nana. ‘A Jewman.’
‘Yes,’ said Harry carefully. ‘A Jew.’
‘Ah, there’s nothing like a good Jewman,’ said Nana. ‘Next to the pawn, there’s nothing like him.’ She nodded sagely, petting the sleepy Daniel O’Connell. ‘You can always make a deal with them, you see. Not like them lousy loan sharks. It’s very rare a woman’ll get a black eye off a Jewman.’
‘Your folks must be rich, then, are they, Harry?’ asked Tina, leaning forward in genuine inquiry.
It was Harry’s turn to sigh. ‘Not that I’ve ever noticed.’
‘Oh,’ she said, disappointed. ‘Ah, well. I suppose you can’t all be.’ She went back to her knitting.
‘Joe knows a Jew,’ said Fran. ‘Says he’s a very nice kind of fellow. Maybe you know him, Harry?’
As Harry shook his head to say no, he didn’t know Joe’s Jew friend, Joe met his eye. Harry couldn’t help but smile at the rueful apology in the young man’s face. They mean no harm.
Harry shrugged. It’s all right, I’m not offended.
Joe nodded and raised his jam jar of porter in silent salute.
Somewhere downstairs, deep in the heart of the tenement house, someone began playing a violin. Fran the Apples settled back. ‘There you go,’ she said quietly. ‘Miss Crannock’s at it again.’
‘Lovely,’ murmured Nana, re-lighting her pipe.
Tina tilted her head to listen. ‘Max Bruch,’ she said. ‘Concerto No. 1 in G minor.’ She sighed, her knitting forgotten again, her expression dreamy. Harry couldn’t help but smile at how Joe was watching her, his eyes gentle with affection. ‘Oh!’ she said suddenly. ‘Joe!’
Joe jumped and blushed.
‘Your book!’ Tina cried. ‘He rented a new book, Nan! Joe, read your book!’
Joe set down his jam jar and fumbled in his pockets for his ‘new book’. All anticipation, the women rearranged themselves into positions better suited for attentive listening. Daniel O’Connell opened his one eye and growled at Harry. Harry raised his jam jar of porter.
L’chaim to you, too, you little jerk.
He stretched back, enjoying the fire. Even considering the fact that he was jobless, penniless and miles from home, this wasn’t too shabby. Not too shabby at all. Joe opened his book, and Harry smiled.
And for once in my life, he thought, I’m not the poor schmuck singing for his supper.
Waiting in the Dark
VINCENT STOOD AT the hotel window and watched the moon rise above the city, illuminating the trees of a small park across the street. It brought him back to a night over two hundred years earlier, when he’d first arrived in this country. He had left the ship hidden at anchor behind some remote islands, and as his crew sculled the boarding boats through the flat, s
low-moving plains of the estuary, the shallow water had reflected a similar moon in all its idiocy.
They had emerged from the reeds onto the wide river that would carry them to the manor house, and Luke had turned anxiously to him. ‘You will get my land back, won’t you, Captain? You’ll rid us of Wolcroft’s bloody reign?’
Vincent did not recall answering, but he remembered Cornelius had grinned, a sharp white flash in the shadows of his tricorn hat. ‘We will win you back your land, dear,’ he’d murmured, his fingers closing tight on Luke’s shoulder. ‘As long as you have told us true, of course, and brought the Captain to his cure.’
‘CAPTAIN?’ THE UNCERTAIN whisper dragged Vincent down through centuries and back to the confines of the hotel room. The scent of coal and candle-wax overpowered the memory of salt and free air. The heavy furniture crowded in. At the sudden rush of confinement, Vincent flung wide the window and leaned far out. Closing his eyes, he seared his lungs with sea-tinged air.
‘Captain?’ whispered Cornelius again. ‘Is something wrong?’
Vincent hung his head. Yes. I am suffocated. I am trapped.
He did not share this thought. It would only serve to distress his friend, who lay curled in a shivering ball on the sofa behind him.
‘I … I know how this looks,’ whispered Cornelius, ‘but it is not what you think. I have not succumbed to my old vice.’
‘I know that. I do not condemn you.’
‘It is my own fault. Without the Angel’s presence, I am weak. I revert to wicked thoughts, and I am punished.’
Vincent could not help the flare of irritation this brought him. ‘Is that so? And should my disease reoccur? Would that be because I am wicked? Will that also be a punishment?’
‘Captain, no! I would never for a moment think that!’
‘Then cease to think it of yourself. You’ve spent too long away from the Bright Man, Cornelius. That is all. Your body has replaced one dependence for another, and now it suffers as it used to suffer when you tried to forgo the opium. This has nothing to do with God. Your body is simply screaming at you for more of what it craves.’
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