by Lee Jackson
She puts her candle down, sits upon the covers, and takes up the needle and thread that she has by her bed. But it is a half-hearted effort; the thread seems reluctant to approach the needle and, once it is finally pulled through the eye, she repeatedly pricks her fingers in the half-light. She had hoped to repair a frayed chemise, a garment that, if truth can be told, warrants replacing in its entirety. Instead, she reluctantly puts it down upon the bed and shifts herself so that she sits by the window. Outside she can dimly make out the rooftops of Doughty Street and beyond, a forest of brick and sloping tiles, half-hidden by the fog that forms a dense sooty canopy about the houses. She presses her face against the glass to see how cold it is, and feels the draught of chill air on her cheek.
In a matter of moments she is asleep.
Agnes White walks for an hour or two more before she crosses the canal bridge between the East London and London Docks. In the pitch-darkness, she can smell the pungent river, the dirty tidal flood that washes past Wapping Reach, and she smiles to herself.
She takes a brief rest; her feet are sore. Then, after a few minutes, she carries on, hobbling past the warehouses on Old Gravel Lane, then on to the High Street. Here, a dozen or more publics and gin-shops vie for the trade of the innumerable river workers, dockers and sailors who make Wapping their temporary home. Here, too, as in every neighbourhood of the capital, each of these merry establishments appears to be in competition as to the size of the gas-light projecting above the door. She passes one familiar place after another; the raucous shouts and the smell of porter remind her of a time, not long ago, when she would have readily stepped inside.
‘How much?’ says a German-accented man, a sailor who splits from a gang of men coming in the opposite direction, putting his arm around her waist as she walks. ‘How much?’
It must be two months or more since she has heard such words. It used to be a simple business, she thinks to herself, picking up the trade on Wapping High Street. A quick fumbling down the nearest alley, or by the shore when the tide was out; it was all done in a minute or two, and a good shilling or maybe two, depending how drunk the man.
But something has changed. She feels uncomfortable, though she cannot say why. Perhaps, she thinks to herself, she has grown too old. Or was it something her daughter said?
She looks round. The German has gone back to his friends, cursing her in guttural eruptions of a language that she cannot fathom.
It does not matter, she thinks. She must keep going.
What was it Lizzie said?
‘I want to go home.’
Lizzie Hunt lies beside her husband on a rough woollen sheet, laid out neatly on the floor of Bill Hunt’s little room. The latter is sound asleep, still in his work clothes, lying upon the bed in the corner. Her husband, upon the other hand, buttons his flies and sits up, leaning against the wall; she straightens her skirt and sits beside him, resting against his arm.
‘We ain’t got no home, remember? Not since they chucked us out. That’s why we’re here.’
‘And it’s shaming, with him ’ere,’ she says, looking at the prone figure of her husband’s cousin.
Tom Hunt smiles. ‘He’s dead to the world. Where’s the harm?’
Lizzie says nothing but curls up next to him, nuzzling against his chest for warmth.
‘You should wash,’ he says.
‘He ain’t got any water.’
Tom looks around to confirm this suspicion, and grunts acknowledgement of the fact.
‘You’d better be going then,’ he continues, touching her cheek lightly.
She starts a little, sitting up straight. ‘Do I have to, Tom? Not tonight?’
‘In particular tonight, after this morning. We need the bloody money. Go on.’
He pushes her away, not too hard, but enough to dislodge her from his side. ‘And don’t come back after five minutes neither.’
Lizzie nods, a look of resignation on her face; she gets up, finds her boots and puts them on.
‘Here,’ says Tom, beckoning her back to him.
‘What?’ she replies wearily.
‘You do think about me when you do it with them, don’t you? Like I said.’
‘Yes,’ she replies.
He smiles, and gets up to kiss her on the cheek.
‘Good girl. That’s the best way.’
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
A CONVERSATION:
‘Born? I was born in Wapping, sir. A place by the river. The Black Boy.’
‘In a public house?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘A curious place.’
‘It were my mother’s doing, sir. She was drinking there.’
‘I see. What is your mother’s name?’
‘Agnes, sir.’
‘Agnes White, is it not?’
‘You know her?’
‘I have met her. Tell me, what does your mother do?’
‘I don’t like to say.’
‘Come, speak up. You may be frank with me.’
‘Well, she’s always been a sloop, sir.’
‘What? Ah, that is the river slang, is it not? Sloop of War?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘And your father?’
‘He was most likely sailing on an East Indiaman that was moored at St. Kats. That’s what my ma reckoned. I only know that much, sir, nothing more.’
‘A sailor? I see. And have you any brothers or sisters?’
‘Only one that lived more than a twelvemonth. Lizzie.’
‘A sister? And she is still alive? How old is she?’
‘Fourteen now.’
‘And your mother raised both of you, relying on her own devices?’
‘And my gran’ma – she had a big house by the river, near Wapping Stairs. Gravehunger Court. She took in lodgers, and we stayed with her, on and off.’
‘And tell me, Clara, do you like this life that you have now? Do you take to it?’
‘No, sir. I don’t like it much.’
‘And would you change, if you had the opportunity?’
‘I would change, sir, quick as you liked, if there was something better for me. But there ain’t.’
‘You are a good girl. It is a good thing I chanced upon meeting you, my dear. A very good thing for you, rest assured. Now, my name is Harris.’
Alice Meynell tiptoes into the Doughty Street attic bedroom, and sees her room-mate slumped by the window, an exhausted candle sitting upon the bedside table. She puts down her own light and she gently persuades Clara’s semi-conscious form to lie properly upon the bed, teasing out the blankets from beneath her, so that she can then cover her body and get in beside her. She herself then unties her boots, removes her own dress, corset and petticoat, and, in her chemise, climbs into the bed, which they are obliged to share.
In the darkness, she looks for a moment at Clara’s face, and wonders what she might be dreaming about.
Clara frowns.
The questioner has melted away and, as often happens in the unconscious hours after midnight, she finds herself standing outside a house by the river, upon the first floor, her grandmother’s house in Wapping. It is an old dilapidated place. Once it was the home of some prosperous merchant. No more. Now it is ‘dry lodgings’.
It changes again.
She looks through the window. Outside, in the courtyard where she stood, the river water has risen to ankle-deep. The water is rich in silted London mud, the primitive sludge of the river-bed, intermingled with the refuse of the residents of the surrounding buildings, and much worse besides.
How did this happen? she thinks to herself. Ah, yes. Grandmother refused to leave. Mother is shouting at her. ‘Now we’ll all be drowned and damned together.’
She watches the water. It comes in earnest, but not in raging torrents. It seeps in, steady and stealthy, drooling between cracks in the brick-work, up the old landings and steps. Gradually, it becomes so deep that the current flows steadily between buildings, and, piece by piece, washes the de
tritus of daily life out along the Thames. Chairs, tables, pots, pans. A skirt, a dress, a copy of the Daily News. Everything flows away.
But it is an awkward cleansing. She knows there is never cause for celebration when the tide subsides. How long does it take? She is not sure. None the less, in every house, and in all the warehouses and store-rooms that line the quays, the ousted inhabitants return to find that the river has left an indelible mark, signifying the limits of water’s ambition. And everywhere Clara herself looks there is mud, a grimy syrup that adheres to the walls, inside and out, a filthy black sludge that must be thanklessly scraped and scrubbed away.
It stinks of dirt and decay, and Clara’s mother cries. She does not often cry.
Outside, she can hear her little sister screaming.
‘Lizzie?’
‘What? Clara, wake up.’
‘Lizzie?’
‘Clara, wake up, you’re dreaming.’
Clara White turns over, looking at the sloping ceiling of the attic, recalling the room and the voice of Alice the kitchen-maid, who lies beside her in the bed.
‘You were dreaming about your sister, weren’t you?’
‘I’m sorry. Did I say something?’
‘You were calling her name.’
Clara pauses, as if trying to recall her thoughts. ‘She came yesterday, and saw my mother.’
‘You said. What’s wrong with that?’
‘I thought she’d fallen out with her.’
‘What for?’
‘It don’t matter. She ran off with someone, a man what we used to know, and we haven’t heard anything of her, not for a twelvemonth.’
‘Who was he then, this someone?’
‘Tom Hunt.’
‘That it?’
‘What do you mean?’
‘What was he? Butcher? Baker? Good-looking? Thin? Fat?’
‘Tom? He’s no good to anyone. Lord knows how she’s fixed, or what she’s doing.’
On the rise of Saffron Hill, Lizzie Hunt stands, glum-faced and bare-headed in the clammy night air, clapping her arms to her sides to keep warm, peering through the fog. A figure approaches her, indistinct at first, then becoming more visible, walking with a hesitant gait; he is a rough-looking man, with bushy unkempt whiskers and the familiar hint of gin on his breath.
‘Can we go somewhere? Will two bob do it? I ain’t got no more.’
She nods. ‘I know a good little place, if you like. It’s not far.’
She takes hold of his arm, and leads him away, turning towards Victoria Street.
PART TWO
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
MORNING.
The fog has lifted a little, but there is still a perceptible black-brown mist that dogs the streets, occluding roads and alley. Moreover, during the night, the outside atmosphere has crept into private homes, a stealthy intruder through letter-boxes and ill-fitting sash windows, and the smell of it clings to cloth and curtains. Indeed, as breakfast appears upon the diningtables of the metropolis, so omnipresent is the residual stench of the night’s ‘London particular’, that the pleasant aromas of the kitchen are generally mingled with an all-too-familiar scent of coal-dust and sulphur.
In the dining-room of the Harris household, however, Clara White is too preoccupied to give the ravages of the fog a second thought. Instead, she frowns in concentration as she strategically lays out the morning’s copy of The Times upon the dining-table, aligning it precisely with the toast rack, a fine example of Sheffield plate, which takes pride of place amongst the Harrises’ pre-prandial silverware. She only leaves the paper alone when she is quite sure that its positioning will not interfere with Dr. Harris’s enjoyment of his breakfast, nor prevent him from casually perusing its pages. She then positions a tea service, also of burnished silver, to the left of the paper, in accordance with the household usage, with space remaining for an arrangement of plates and cutlery. If the teapot lid rattles somewhat as Clara deposits it upon the damask tablecloth, it is only because her worthy mistress, unlike the good doctor, has already come in and sat down at table. Mrs. Harris, in fact, observes her maid-servant’s movements with the same critical attention that a lesser woman might reserve for discussing the talents of the Opera House’s corps de ballet, and it comes as no surprise to Clara, therefore, when she learns that the position of the knives is ‘altogether wrong’, and her situation of the anchovy paste ‘utterly remarkable’. Indeed, the pronouncement of such discerning judgements is an almost daily occurrence in the Harris household, and the prospect of such scrutiny fills Clara with dread every morning. It is only the sound of Dr. Harris upon the stairs, and his appearance in the doorway in his navy-blue dressing gown, that signals the end of her ordeal. A curt nod from her mistress, and Clara is dismissed, in order that she might hurry down to the kitchen, to retrieve the morning’s boiled eggs, bacon and cold cuts.
Clara performs this task with admirable speed, such that, as she comes back into the parlour, the bacon still sizzles from its scorching, and the eggs still steam from the pan. And yet she does not get a word of thanks from her mistress, whose attention has turned to perfecting the drapery of her dress’s pagoda sleeves, which are of sufficient breadth to be in danger of trailing over the toast rack. Clara’s only encouragement is, rather, a smile from the cherubic doctor, who regards his prospective repast with satisfaction, and remarks with relish, ‘Eggs!’
This simple and heartfelt comment is sufficient to send her back downstairs marginally more cheerful. The clock in the hall chimes nine o’clock as she descends the steps, and she smiles pleasantly at Cook as she enters the kitchen.
‘Any bacon left?’
Cook looks at her with a certain degree of complacency and satisfaction, and dabs her salty lips with a dish-rag.
‘Sorry, dear, no.’
As in any house, there are chores to be done after breakfast, and it is past ten o’clock before Clara White, wrapped in her winter shawl, can excuse herself, under pretence of pursuing Dr. Harris’s missing book. Indeed, she climbs the area steps and sets off briskly along Doughty Street with a sigh of relief, thinking all the while of her mother.
Outside, the fog has nearly lifted. There are still a few office boys and copy-clerks on their way to Gray’s Inn, but it is past time for them to be at their desks; the streets, in fact, are quite empty but for these occasional stragglers, and the odd delivery man on his rounds. There is still, of course, the constant rumble of traffic, the endless reverberation of iron-shod wheels in neighbouring streets, and it is not long before Clara hears the far-off shout of some itinerant street hawker, in the business of selling and mending old clothes. None the less, there is no-one to impede her as she goes along Jockey’s Fields, the old mews that leads down by the high stone wall of Gray’s Inn, and thence to Lincoln’s Inn Fields. She walks quickly and, in her apron pocket, hidden beneath her woollen wrap, she keeps one hand carefully protecting the bottle she purchased for her mother.
Even as she climbs the steps to the refuge, however, she falters a little, since she can hear a pair of raised voices inside. In itself, this is not an unusual occurrence in Miss Sparrow’s establishment, where some friction between the residents is an almost daily event. What is remarkable, however, is that one of the women speaking sounds akin to Miss Sparrow herself. Still, Clara goes up and rings the bell, conscious of the fact that she is well past visiting time. The door is slow to open, and reveals the nurse who spoke to her the previous day, her face a little flushed.
‘Oh, Miss,’ she says, startled, ‘I wasn’t expecting you.’
‘No, I am sorry, I know it’s past visiting, and I cannot stop. It’s just that I have something for my mother,’ Clara says, taking out the bottle. ‘The medicine we talked about?’
The girl looks perplexed for a moment. ‘Oh, I see. Yes, Miss, I think you had better come in. Have a word with Miss Sparrow.’
‘No, really, there is no need for that. If you could just give it to her?’
‘I
think there is, Miss, if you will . . . it’s a bit awkward.’
Clara White, confused, reluctantly follows her indoors, and waits in the hall as the nurse hurries into Miss Sparrow’s office, exchanges a few hasty words, then comes out again, and bids her to go inside. Philomena Sparrow stands there waiting for her, with her hands behind her back, and her head held high. But her eyes do not quite meet those of her visitor, and she seems far from comfortable.
‘We were not expecting you, Miss White.’
‘I am sorry, ma’am. I did not ask to come in at all. I know the hours. I was asked in.’
‘Well, in fact, I am glad Jenny did so. I am afraid I have to tell you that I have some bad news. Your mother, it appears, has once more seen fit to abscond.’
‘Abscond?’
‘She has gone, Miss White. Taken off without a by-your-leave.’
‘But she is ill. When did this happen?’
‘Last night.’
‘She was allowed out?’
‘We are not a Bastille, Miss White. As it happens, I was absent upon some other business, and I have remonstrated with Jenny. Nevertheless, we do not imprison our charges, as well you know.’
Clara frowns. Before she can gather her thoughts, however, there is a resounding knock at the front door of the house, where she herself was standing moments before. It echoes loudly through the hall. She watches as Miss Sparrow hurries to the window, and peers out at the step. When Philomena Sparrow turns back to face her, Clara cannot help but notice how firmly she grips the back of her chair as she speaks, with her arms held rigid as iron railings.
‘I can say nothing more, Miss White. This is the last time. You may tell Dr. Harris that we can no longer keep a place for her here.’
‘Really, ma’am, I promise you . . .’
Clara’s pleas are interrupted by a knock at the study door, and Jenny cautiously enters the room. She is accompanied by the bulky figure of Decimus Webb, his features a little red from a swift progress, on two wheels, through the city streets.