The Gilded Lily

by Deborah Swift

  It was the sound of clinking metal as if someone was fiddling with the lock. Sadie went over to the door and, half fearful, put her ear to it. She could hear someone shuffling outside.

  ‘Ell, is that you?’ she whispered.

  ‘Course it’s me,’ came the short reply.

  ‘Is the door still stuck? What’s the matter with it? I can’t open it.’

  Just then the door swung open and Ella came in.

  ‘It’s not stuck,’ she said. ‘I locked it.’

  Sadie was dumbfounded. ‘With this,’ continued Ella in the low voice they always used at home. She held up a new iron padlock, from which a large key protruded. Sadie stood aside to let her pass, still a little confused.

  ‘Where did you get that from?’

  ‘The ironmongery. Last night.’ She lifted it up and held it out. ‘Four shilling, it cost me.’

  Ella kicked off her snow-crusted clogs onto the floor where the snow began to pool in a dark stain. Sadie noticed her lips had been smeared with a red paint. ‘You mean . . . you mean you locked me in on purpose?’

  ‘Well, I couldn’t have you roving all over London.’

  Sadie looked at the lock in disgust. ‘Four shilling for that? You’re mad. Fancy locking me in. What if there was a fire? I wouldn’t have been able to get out.’

  ‘Then you’d have been warm for a change!’ Ella giggled at her own joke. ‘There won’t be a fire. I reckoned someone might recognize you and follow you home. And then they’d have us both by the necks. So I took precautions.’

  ‘Well, I won’t be locked in again, d’you hear?’

  ‘Stop bellyaching. It was only a few hours. Look what I’ve brought us.’ She held up a basket. ‘Peace offering,’ she said, pulling back the cover to reveal some cold pasties.

  ‘I don’t want any. Where were you last night?’

  ‘I went back to the night market by the bridge. Stayed awhile to listen to the ballad singers. You were snoring like a horse when I got home.’

  ‘I was not.’

  ‘Please yourself. I’m going to bed. I’m that tired I could sleep for a hundred years.’

  Neither of them mentioned their falling out. Ella washed her face then made a great fuss of getting undressed, struggling with the lacing of her bodice, unable to twist to undo the points in her stiff busk. Sadie did not offer to help as she usually did, but let her curse and strive. In her shift Ella looked like the little girl Sadie used to know, with her calves and ankles showing like they did at haymaking when the weather was hot and they cooled off their feet in the trough. Sadie watched her gather up the folds of the shiny gown from round her feet before hanging the whole rig from the back of the door. Ella wrapped herself in a blanket and climbed into bed without a word.

  ‘Night,’ Sadie said.

  Ella ignored her, pulled all the blankets and the knitted coverlet up to her chin and shut her eyes, leaving the bare palliasse at the other end. Sadie wondered how her sister could sleep like that – she slept upright now, stiff as a scarecrow, lest her hair spoil.

  Chapter 24

  The next day the weak morning sun filtered through the window as Sadie watched Ella, mirror in hand, apply white paste to her skin. She must have brought that home from Whitgift’s, Sadie thought, wondering how much it cost and how many vegetables it would have paid for. But she said nothing. Ella was quivering with cold and looked tired and wan even before she started. It was as if she was trying to obliterate every trace of her natural self.

  ‘Is that the same cream you gave me?’ Sadie asked as Ella’s cheeks disappeared under a coating of white. ‘What’s in it?’

  ‘It’s ceruse. White lead.’ Ella dabbed blots of cochineal paper onto her cheeks so that they flared suddenly pink.

  ‘It smells like metal. Who’d want that on their skin?’

  ‘Oh, for heaven’s sake. Everyone does. There’s no harm in it. I wish you’d bloody do it. Instead of sitting here your whole life. Pass me that comb, will you.’

  Sadie handed it to her, feeling a stab of guilt. ‘Sorry, Ell,’ she said, ‘about the other day. Let’s be friends, shall we?’

  ‘Who’s not friends?’ But her voice was cold.

  Sadie took a deep breath. ‘Dennis was up. He wanted to give us notice. Said you’d been shouting at his ma.’

  Ella did not look up from her ministrations to her complexion. ‘Poxy old crab. She yaps at me every time I pass. I can’t bear to listen to her droning on. She collars anyone who goes past her door.’

  ‘Happen she’s lonely, on her own all day.’ Sadie knew how that felt. ‘She only wants a bit of company.’

  Ella ignored this and, drawing out a brush from her muslin washbag, began to paint in fine lines where her eyebrows used to be. ‘You told him we’re staying, right?’

  ‘He was serious. Said you’d to go and beg pardon. If we make any more noise, we’re out.’

  Ella gave a small snort.

  ‘He really meant it. Won’t you call on her on the way down? Smooth things over, like?’

  ‘Hmm.’ Ella’s voice was non-committal. She bundled her pots and potions back in the bag and threw it down on the bed. She brushed down her skirts. Her face was like a mask, her painted eyebrows lacked the expression her real ones had and the ceruse seemed to make her face stiff. Already there were fine cracks around the nose and lips.

  ‘Right. I’m going to work,’ she said, sweeping up the padlock from the table.

  Sadie saw her pick it up, realized what she was doing and leapt after her. ‘No,’ she whispered, ‘no, Ella. Not again, don’t lock me in.’

  But Ella was already on the outside of the door.

  ‘Ella!’ Sadie grabbed hold of the edge of the door with both hands, wrestling to keep it open as Ella tried to pull it shut.

  ‘Be quiet. Do you want to wake Ma Gowper?’ Ella hissed.

  For a moment there was a wordless struggle as both girls pulled at either side of the door. Sadie could not get a grip on the dusty floorboards and she scuffled to keep her footing, her fingers clamped round the door. It began to creak shut, but still Sadie clung on, trying to keep it open. The iron padlock cracked down hard on Sadie’s hand. Sadie instinctively let go and brought her smarting fingers to her mouth. In an instant Ella had shut the door smartly behind her, and she heard the rattle of the hasp and the grate of the key being turned in the padlock.

  ‘It’s for your own good,’ Ella’s low voice said from the hall.

  ‘Please, Ella, don’t lock me in,’ whispered Sadie, ‘I’ll stay here, honest.’

  ‘Then it don’t matter if the door’s locked.’

  ‘But, Ella –’

  ‘I said I’d be back, didn’t I. After I finish work.’

  ‘What time’s that? Ella?’

  But there was no answer, just the noise of Ella’s feet tapping downstairs. She heard Ma Gowper’s faint call from below. Sadie listened to see if she could hear Ella knock at her door. But no, moments later she heard the creak of the front door and the click as it shut.

  Ella walked as quickly as she could to Whitgift’s, given the icy conditions. Sadie was safe indoors now, out of sight. Dennis would already be at work, so there was no one to know she was locked in. And Ella could breathe easy for now. She tried to walk with small steps, and kept away from the overhangs of the buildings, where the icicles were sharp as teeth and snow slid off the roofs to land on your head and shoulders in an icy shock. She jostled for the wall with the other pedestrians, picking her way over the slippery cobbles in her new heels. Although she hitched up her skirts, the hem still got soaked by a passing cart spraying slush from the drains, where the horse dung, peelings and other refuse made a permanent midden in the middle of the street. Swearing at the departing tailgate, she tried to brush off the worst of it with her fingers just outside the yard.

  Still, she felt a pang of pride as she entered Whitgift’s. Not for her the snaking queue of women in homespun fustian, pawning their only pair of shoes to
buy a few loaves. She knew she did not look like a serving maid any more. She had gone up in the world. It would be hard for anyone to recognize the girl from Westmorland. She was yellow-haired ‘Miss Johnson’ now, of the Gilded Lily on Friargate, not plain ‘Appleby’. She threw back her cloak and held her head up high, noting with satisfaction the sullen stares of the bundled women standing in line.

  As she reached the door, a flutter of apprehension seized her and she paused to take a deep breath and compose herself, in case Jay should be about. He was in her thoughts all the time. She had stopped calling him Jay, or even Mr Whitgift, because there was only one man ever in her thoughts, and to call him by his name to others seemed to give away too much about her feelings for him.

  The image of him seemed to sit in the back of her mind, burnt there like a brand with a white-hot iron. It gave her a kind of pain, the same kind of pain she had when looking in the glass, a sort of nameless longing. The way he walked – with his slightly swinging gait, the narrowness of his long fingers when he rested them on the counter. The image of his face loomed behind all she did, the thin lips with his slightly wolf-like white teeth, the impeccable cut of his clothes.

  Yesterday he had implied she was a little too wide round the waist, so when she got to the Lily she had Meg haul on the laces of her stays, and now they were so tight she was almost breathless.

  ‘It is important,’ he had said to her, ‘that you set an example. Fashionable ladies are already looking to you. Not for breeding or manners, for they already have those, but for your appearance. You are the living example of every pot and potion the Gilded Lily has to offer. So you must take pains to be immaculate. Gain their confidence, for we must keep them coming, the ladies of quality.’

  ‘Yes, Mr Whitgift,’ she had said, blushing furiously beneath her ceruse, because he had called her beautiful.

  ‘Perhaps take a little less refreshment with the customers, though, and tighten your stays, I think your waist is thickening a little.’

  She had nodded, but it had hurt. She had steadfastly refused all food and drink since, and it made her feel a little light-headed. But the tightened stays pushed up her bosom even higher and gave a satisfying curve to her hips, so she supposed it was worth it. And if he wished her to have a narrow waist, then she would have a narrow waist.

  It was true, though, that since she had taken her appearance in hand, the customers were more inclined to ask her advice, and items she recommended were racing out of the door. She had imitated the refined way of speaking as much as she was able, learnt to talk of music and painting and whist, merely by repeating another’s words to someone else. She had never painted or played – never touched a spinet or sat down to cards. It was lucky, she thought, that she had always been a good mimic. And she had learnt to talk of their jewels. Jay’s eyes lit up whenever she talked of these.

  So today the chambers were thronged with young ladies, all of them wanting to know which skin whitener she used, which shade of red on the lips, how she had such a smooth complexion. Of course she could not tell them it was because she was brought up in the country where epidemics of the pox were rare, so she pointed to Whitgift’s Rare Elixir and told them it was guaranteed to keep the pox away, and smiled sweetly and wrapped the little jars in paper and straw, and felt the delicious cool coins run through her fingers. Whilst Mrs Horsefeather puffed back and forth with messages for the gentlemen, Ella was kept busy – showing pomades and hair restoratives, demonstrating how to crush rose petals into a kerchief to provide a pleasant scent, and telling ladies how much better they looked since buying the Lily’s Patent Skin Dew.

  An instinct, a slight jump of the heart, alerted her to Jay’s presence almost before he opened the door. He arrived just after midday, followed by the ruffled silhouette of Mrs Horsefeather.

  Ella was attending to the Misses Edgware, back again for some arrowroot tooth-powder and a nettle hair rinse. When they saw him saunter in they looked as if they might swoon at any moment, scooping their purchases hurriedly into their bags lest he should see them. They cracked open their embroidered fans, hiding behind them with a flutter of their charcoaled eyelashes. He smiled and raised his hat to them, occasioning more flurrying.

  Ella stood to attention as he approached, and breathed in so that her waist should appear smaller. He waved Mrs Horsefeather to behind the counter and indicated Ella should follow him upstairs with a twitch of his eyebrow. She followed, waving for Meg to accompany her, aware that the Edgware sisters immediately began whispering behind their fans.

  ‘I am expanding the business,’ he said, not bothering to sit down. ‘I talked my father round and he has agreed to it.’

  Ella smiled and nodded.

  ‘It has been a runaway success. His takings are up. So I am going to have the Lily open at night, as well as in the daylight hours. It seems there is a demand. Several gentlemen have said their wives would like a place to feel safe in town whilst their husbands play at cards or do their business. But I know men, and I know that often their business can go on until all hours. And Mrs Horsefeather is no earthly use in the evenings. So I will need to take on another hand, because one maid cannot be lively all that time . . .’

  Ella felt her face fall. ‘Oh no, not another maid. You don’t need anyone else, Mr Whitgift.’ The words were out before she could prevent them. ‘I mean to say – I can do all those hours. Let me work the evenings too.’ Another maid? In her shop? Not if she could help it. The new maid might be pretty.

  Jay twirled a signet ring round and round on his little finger, and then shook his head. ‘You have done well, started to make a reputation as a beauty, and the women confide in you. And that means you are able to give me the information I need.’

  She nodded. She knew that when he asked about the women’s jewellery – what gems they wore, what new purchases they had made for their houses – his consuming interest was not in securing its safety, but she played his game with an unspoken understanding.

  He sat on the bed, his long legs pushed out towards her. ‘You may sit,’ he said. ‘I wish the current situation to continue. It is good for business. No, we will need extra help. You will start to look tired if you are at the counter all that time, and besides, a little variety . . .’

  ‘I’m sure I can manage it. And I’d like the extra hours. It wouldn’t tire me, I know it wouldn’t—’

  ‘Enough. I have decided. You will work afternoons and evenings, when we are busiest. The new maid will work the mornings when our customers are, how shall I say, less well-to-do. In exchange for working evenings, and for convenience, you will lodge here in this room.’

  ‘This room?’ Ella was dumbfounded. Was he really telling her she could live here, at the Gilded Lily?

  ‘You will be on call in case we require extra help in the Lily. I always had it in mind, but I was not sure whether you would be satisfactory. But now I know for certain you will not let me down. After all, I know you would not wish to return to the per-ruquier’s. We understand each other, do we not?’

  He looked directly into her eyes. She flustered, and fiddled with the lace at her neck. He was leaning on her, she knew. She felt hemmed in, trapped. But she shook the sensation away, for surely he did not mean it in that way. He only meant to compliment her, surely.

  ‘I would never let you down,’ she said, ‘but it’s a bit awkward. There’s my sister, you see.’

  He brushed this aside. ‘Naturally, you may have arrangements to make, notice to give and so forth. You may move in immediately if you wish. Here are the keys. Mind them well. The main gate is always kept locked outside hours, you will need to ring the bell for admittance, but these are for the chambers at the Lily.’

  He held them out to her. She stared at them as if they were a manifestation from heaven above.

  ‘No money will be kept on the premises overnight.’

  She coloured.

  ‘The Lily will be open tomorrow evening,’ he continued, ‘and I expect you to be
there. One of the delivery carts will be at your disposal tomorrow afternoon for you to bring over your things.’

  Ella did not know how to react. She opened her mouth to ask if she could do the work but still live at home, but then she shut it again. She didn’t want to live in the tiny damp box with Sadie, she wanted to live at Whitgift’s, in these warm dry rooms, and more than anything she wanted to be close to Jay. She didn’t know how it could be done, but she was not going to give away the chance.

  He dangled the keys on his index finger. ‘You don’t look taken with the idea.’

  She leapt to reassure him. ‘Oh, don’t say that, I am. But it’s bowled me over. I never expected it, that’s all.’ She held her hand out for the keys. He dropped them into her palm from his pinched finger and thumb.

  ‘Good, then it’s settled. And by the way, that green dress is something – very à la mode. It is more subtle than the red. Who did it belong to?’

  ‘Me, sir.’

  ‘You? It’s not from the clothing bay?’

  ‘No. I bought it myself. With last month’s wages. Chose the stuff and all.’ She brushed her hands proudly over the folds at the hips. ‘I went out in my snap time and had a draper make it to fit.’ Then she added, ‘I didn’t want to be beholden to anyone no more.’

  He smiled, seeming to find this amusing. ‘I see. Very laudable. Turn around, so that I can see the back.’ She turned, and heard the clack of his shoes as he came up behind her. He placed a hand on the small of her back. She tried to swivel around to face him, but he turned her away again by the shoulders.

  ‘It is pretty well done. The fabric is not top quality, but it is very neatly sewn.’

  To be this close to him gave her a shiver of anticipation. His breath was light on the back of her neck. She waited motionless, hoping he might embrace her, but instead he took hold of some of the hair that had come loose from her topknot. She felt the slight tug as he twisted it around his finger and tucked it into one of the hairpins, before turning her back to face him.