She Be Damned

by M. J. Tjia

  “I have a letter for you, Miss Carter, from your father,” he says, taking an envelope from his coat pocket.

  Eleanor takes it swiftly from his fingers, tears it open and reads. The hopeful expression on her face fades, and she replaces the note neatly. “He does not wish to see me. He insists I continue on to Shropshire.”

  “Miss Eleanor has told me that she is still of the same mind as when she ran away originally. She does not desire to go to Shropshire,” I inform Sir Thomas.

  He looks a bit startled. “I am not sure what the alternative can be,” he replies.

  We’re quiet as our meals arrive – a plate of bread, some boiled potatoes and three bowls of steaming, aromatic turtle soup. I sip the broth, which is hearty and well-seasoned, but Eleanor, after pushing about some of the glutinous substance with her spoon, pushes her bowl away.

  “I have an idea for the short while,” he says, eventually.

  We look at him expectantly.

  “I think it might be best if Eleanor stays with you in the meantime, Mrs Chancey, until we decide what is best. At least then we will know she is safe and well-looked after and most importantly of all,” he smiles kindly at the girl, “we will know exactly where you are.”

  It’s like a pebble sinking in my chest. Sir Thomas continues to slurp up his soup and even Eleanor looks more cheerful than I’ve seen her all of the afternoon and evening, and starts to nibble at some of the bread and butter. But what of me? I was looking forward to this assignment being over, to returning to the luxuries of Mayfair, the attentions of my admirers. I watch Eleanor as I sip my soup. She’s spent the last week or so in the company of whores, yet she still seems untouched, genteel. What a bore it will be to have to continue to look after her.

  Calling for the bill, Sir Thomas thanks me again and says he must rush home to have tea with his wife. “It is the only time of the day that we meet each other,” he laughs.

  He escorts us out into the alleyway where a fog has crept in, as dense and hazy as the water in the turtle’s aquariums. He stands by the roadside, whistles sharply and in a few moments, his coachman parks a smart, two wheeled carriage polished the colour of burgundy, in front of us.

  “Ladies, allow me to take you home,” he says, with a bow.

  I have to laugh. “Sir Thomas, that is a very pretty carriage indeed, but it is impossible that the three of us would fit along its seat.” I’m polite enough to not point out Sir Thomas’ wide girth, but gesture towards our full skirts. “You are very kind, but I will take Miss Carter home in a cab.”

  He agrees, shouting up to his driver to summon a cab. He makes sure we’re neatly packed in, pays the driver and waves us on.

  “What a kind man he is,” murmurs Eleanor.

  “Yes.” I reply absently, as I look out the window, listening to the crunch of the cab’s wheels across the cobblestones. The fog is so thick now it’s hard to see the people walking on the pavement. I don’t know how our driver can even see other vehicles on the long drive home to Waterloo. The cab lumbers along and once in a while the driver, in a heavy, guttural accent I can’t quite place, shouts directions at loiterers or other coachmen who impede his way. There’s a pause in the traffic when a heavy whack to the side of the cab throws Eleanor against my shoulder. The cab lurches sideways as the sound of screeching wheels and the splintering of wood fill the air.

  It’s dark in the carriage and I have to feel for Eleanor’s arms. “Are you alright?”

  Her soft voice answers, “I think so. Although I do believe my cheeks will be bruised.” I can just make out Eleanor prodding at her own face.

  “Well, as long as no bones are broken.” I test my own feet and legs before pushing open the cab door and hopping down onto the road. Taking only a few steps I observe that a coach, bulky and dated, from which a querulous old man, with ruddy, round cheeks is shouting instructions, has side-swiped our own cab. His coachman, a skinny rat of a man, is poking his finger into the cab driver’s chest as he snarls up at him.

  “You were s’posed to gi’ me righ’ o’ way, ya grea’ clotpole,” shrills the smaller man.

  “It was your fault,” bellows our cab driver, shoving the other on the shoulder. “You’f smash’t my cab. De springs on my veel is bent to buggery now, dank you fery much.”

  By this time a small crowd has gathered around the broken vehicles. Still holding their beers, working men find the source of the noise, having picked their way through the fog to the broken vehicles. A few vendors, holding their sacks or carts of goods, have moved in close to add to the commotion, and in the distance the thin, reedy sound of a policeman’s whistle can be heard. The stragglers from the tavern let up a roar of encouragement when the cab driver strips off his jacket ready for a brawl. I’m not averse to watching a scrap, knowing full well the excitement and horror of watching two men set upon one another. However, I’m conscious of my responsibility to the young woman still waiting in the cab so I squeeze through the throng until I reach the cab door again.

  “Come,” I say to Eleanor. “Gather up your bag and shawl. We had better leave. Sir Thomas has paid the man, and he is of no help to us now.”

  I draw Eleanor through the crowd, ignoring the leers and suggestions from a couple of the revellers as we pass, until we reach a quieter part of the street.

  The street lamps only give off a dim halo of light in the fog, too pale to see clearly by. There are no other bloody cabs to hire so, linking arms with Eleanor, I steer her towards the Frazier Street house. Our shoes slide on the dewy cobblestones as we walk and the fog’s mist lingers over my face and throat.

  There’s little traffic for the road is clogged by the two damaged vehicles. The din of the cheers and the constables’ whistles become quieter the further we walk. Everything is grey – the vendors who are folding away their produce and the workers who are slouching homewards. Even our own footsteps are muted by the thickness of the fog. Just as we reach the next crossroad an ominous, steady trundling of a carriage’s wheels creeps behind us. I quicken my step, and fear creeps its cold fingers up my spine. I glance over my shoulder, and sure enough, its black paintwork gleaming, the crimson curtains swaying, the carriage follows us at a steady pace. Who’s in the bloody carriage? Is it one man, two, three?

  Ever since I first noticed the carriage following me I’ve been having nightmares again about that night, that terrible night those bastards picked me off the street. I was still a girl when it happened, a helpless, skinny girl. I wasn’t a virgin, no, but what was forced upon me that night was not right. Sometimes I watch those young ladies in Hyde Park, strolling with their nannies, trotting along in their father’s phaeton. Pretty parasols to guard their skin, servants to guard their cleanliness, tightly buttoned gowns to guard their virtue. And I could almost choke on the envy I feel. Every eye – covetous, jealous, fascinated – might now be on the alluring, incomparable Heloise Chancey, but beneath the shallow layer of make-up and expensive attire is that grubby, greedy girl who didn’t even know this type of life existed. And here I am in the nightmare again, trying to flee, but never quite fast enough.

  Fear rings in my ears as I pull Eleanor along, until we’re nearly running over the uneven, slippery ground. She trips and asks, “Is something the matter, Heloise?”

  “No, it’s nothing, dear, just let’s hurry.” I peer over my shoulder again at the carriage, which is gaining on us.

  Eleanor limps a little as we walk, slowing our passage. I support her under the elbow as she hobbles forward, and I hold back my impatience. The horse’s hooves clop closer.

  “Why is that carriage following us so closely?” she asks.

  “I don’t know,” I say, and even I can hear its grim tone.

  What am I so afraid of? I’m not sure if it’s because I’m with Eleanor, or if the fright has fuelled my anger, but I’m fed up. I stop short. My street is a short distance away, but I know the closer we are to home, the more vulnerable we will become on that quiet, deserted road.
I stare up at the coachman, who ignores me just as he has each time, and then I look hard at the crimson curtain. It twitches, which spikes my anger even more. Why doesn’t the coward show himself?

  I move swiftly towards the carriage door. I don’t even have my pistol, but that doesn’t worry me. I’m determined to see, once and for all, who is in the damned, black carriage.

  Wrenching open the door, I peer into the shadowy interior until my eyesight adjusts. I’m so stunned by what I see it takes me a moment to speak. “Amah! What are you doing? You scared the arse off me.”

  “I am driving somewhere, as you can see,” says Amah Li Leen, a defensive note in her voice.

  “You’re spying on me, you mean,” I say. I realise my hands are still shaking with adrenalin and clamp them on my waist. “You can bloody drive us home then.” I call out for Eleanor to follow and jumping up into the body of the carriage, sit down opposite Amah.

  As I help Eleanor through the doorway, I ask, “Where on earth did you rustle this carriage up from? And where’s mine?

  She lifts her chin. “I had to hire this carriage at a considerable cost. Taff would not let me use yours.”

  “Didn’t approve of you spying on me?”

  “It would seem not,” she answers with dignity. “He doesn’t have your well-being at heart, like I do.”

  I sniff. “Well, now that you’re here, you bloody well had better’ve brought my red petticoats.”

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  It’s well into the evening when the door knocker raps. Eleanor pauses in tying the ribbon of her cotton night dress and turns anxious eyes towards me.

  “Do not worry, Eleanor, I am expecting someone.” I look at Amah and my tone is playful when I say, “Now that my maid has decided to join us, I have sent to my home for some necessities.”

  “This is not your home?” asks Eleanor.

  “I am surprised Miss Heloise has lasted this long here,” says Amah, gingerly opening a drawer of the shabby dressing table.

  “I am only here until we have decided what is best for you, Eleanor. Ignore my maid,” I call, as I skip down the stairs.

  I pull open the door and stand back. “Bill.” I usher him into the sitting room. “I was expecting my coachman, but you will do just as well.” I grin up at him. “You will never guess who I have upstairs.”

  “That Oriental woman who stared at me from the landing? She gave me quite a turn.” He shrugs off his coat, and places it over the back of the sofa.

  Casting my eyes to the ceiling, I click my tongue. “No. That’s my lady’s maid. She’s tracked me down.”

  “You’re very game to have an Oriental sleep under the same roof as you. You’re not scared she may cut your throat from ear to ear one night, all to avenge her pagan gods or some such?”

  “Don’t be ridiculous, Bill.” I turn away and pour glasses of madeira to hide the irritation that I know will be flickering across my face.

  “How did she find you, if you didn’t want to be found?”

  “She knew I was in Waterloo somewhere.” I grin again. “It was she who was following me in the carriage, would you believe. Scared the life out of me, the hornet.”

  He frowns. “That doesn’t make me any more comfortable with her presence in your house. Less so, in fact.”

  I take a seat next to Bill and cosy up to his side. “But now you must guess who I do have upstairs, right now, in my bedroom preparing for sleep.”

  “Don’t tell me you’ve found her? Miss Carter?”

  “Yes.” I clap my hands together. “I finally found her.”

  “Her family must be very happy.”

  I agree, thinking of Sir Thomas, ghastly Mr Priestly and the underserving Mr Carter. “She is safe. I am so relieved she is safe, at last.” I tell him of Mrs Donnelly and Mrs Sweetapple and my plot that reclaimed Eleanor.

  “Very clever.”

  “Yes, and my adventures for tonight are not done. So what with one thing and another, I cannot invite you to stay,” I say to him regretfully.

  “No, I am too busy to stay, as well.”

  “Then why are you here, sir?” I curl my hand into his, my fingers sweeping his skin. I press a moist kiss into the palm of his hand.

  His eyes cloud momentarily, but he smiles as he says, “Firstly, I have a gift for you.” He pokes around in his waistcoat pocket before pulling forth something small wrapped in a handkerchief. “I saw it in a shop near my home. Thought of you.” He hands me a tiny, pretty snuff bottle made of cranberry-coloured glass. The ruby red vessel has an ornate, silver lid on a hinge and is strung upon a thin piece of leather. “It’s just a little bit of nonsense I thought you might like.” He tries to sound off-hand, yet I’m aware of his gaze upon my face, eagerly gauging my feelings for the simple gift.

  And I’m touched. The pretty bauble doesn’t nearly measure up to the presents of diamonds and gold (and guineas) I’ve become accustomed to receiving, but I’m touched he thought of me. I immediately put it around my neck with his assistance, a shiver of pleasure passing through me as his fingertips brush the nape of my neck.

  “I have placed some of my special snuff mixture within it,” he explains, smiling. “To help you relax when I am not around.”

  The cold glass of the pendant rolls against my skin. “Thank you, sweet man.” I kiss him on the mouth, catching his bottom lip between mine. His moustache bristles against my skin. “What else did you want to discuss with me?”

  “Well, I wanted to let you know that I couldn’t find that poor woman, Prue, who you told me about.”

  “Oh, that’s sad.” I think of her greying hair, the blood she coughed up and fear the worst.

  “And I wanted to ask you some questions about Mme Silvestre’s.”

  I sit back. “Oh? What questions?”

  “There’s a barman there. At least, he dresses up as a woman when he works at the bar, but he is a man, nonetheless. Do you know him?”

  “Henry? Yes, I’ve seen him. I don’t know much about him. We’ve only really talked once and that was when he was preparing drinks.”

  Bill nods and thinks for a moment. He feels in his pockets and brings out a crumpled piece of paper which he presses flat on the table. “I had a hunch about him. There was something not quite right when I went to Silvestre’s after the Dutch girl was found. He slipped off before I had a chance to ask any questions.”

  “I remember that day. I saw you there and he rushed by.” I lean over to look at the piece of paper. Underneath a sketch of a man with a beard and longish, straight hair, is an offer of ten pounds.

  “That man is said to have swindled a lot of money out of people in Bloomsbury when he posed as an apothecary with access to miraculous medicines. Said he could cure all kinds of things but he was especially interested in women’s problems.”

  “What problems?”

  Bill shrugs. “Hysteria, mania, regulatory.”

  “For women who didn’t want a baby?”

  “It would seem so. But it was soon found out that his famously expensive tonics were nothing better than sugar water, although one pill he sold as a regulator was made of irregular amounts of arsenic and herbs which caused severe and life-threatening symptoms in the women. In fact, one woman did die, hence the end of his career in medicine and his flight from the law.”

  I squeeze his hand. “Yes,” I say. “I’d forgotten. Tilly was telling me the other day that the girls in Mme Silvestre’s brothel do not always go to the doctor to be…” I almost say ‘scraped’, but think better of it, “regulated. Sometimes they rely on Henry and an evil tasting draught he gives them.”

  I pull the picture to me again. “Henry’s eyes are very like those in this picture – a little sunken and dark. And his nose is straight, just as it is here. I guess it could be him.” A memory snags so that I slap the piece of paper and bounce up from my seat. “Now I know who he is.”

  “What do you mean?”

  I’m so excited I can barely say the words
sensibly. “I saw him. Henry. I didn’t know who he was. I mean, I recognised him, but couldn’t place him. Without his curls. Of course. He was leaving Dr Mordaunt’s premises.”

  “When?”

  “That day I pinched the notebook.” My thoughts rush ahead. “Do you think he could be in this with the doctor?” My voice is hushed with triumphant hope.

  “Well, that is now what I am wondering,” he says. “Might he be venturing further into the world of medicine? His tonics have failed. Has he turned to surgery?”

  Suddenly I remember Agnes whinging about the messy sheets. Were they nastier than a night of dissipation could account for? However, I can’t deny I find it a little hard to believe Henry could be a part of this butchery. But, of course, if he is under the sway of that bastard, Mordaunt… “He seemed quite nice, though, at Silvestre’s.”

  Bill smiles and tucks the flyer back into his pocket. “You women will trust anyone.”

  The poor thing really has no idea.

  “Well, I won’t do it, Miss Heloise,” says Taff, backing out of the kitchen. “I won’t’m.”

  “You must, Taff, you foolish man,” I snap, bearing down on him. “Give me that sack at once.”

  I tug the bag from his hands and peer inside at the screwed up pieces of clothing.

  “I would never have bought those old rags if I knew’m what you had in mind, Miss Heloise,” he says, shaking his head slowly. He looks over at Amah Li Leen. “What do you think, Amah?”

  The older woman’s mouth is pinched at one side. “She always does what she pleases.”

  “Well, if I’m to wait out on the street in the dark,” I say, looking out the window, “and it’s well past midnight already, I cannot be dressed as a woman. I will blend in best if I am disguised as a man.” I pull out a tattered pair of trousers. “A vagrant, no less.”

  “Why don’t you just let’m me do it, Miss Heloise?” asks Taff.

  “Because I want to feel the thrill of the catch, not have it relayed to me,” I answer, stepping out of my shoes. “Taff, we won’t need you again tonight, so take the horses home and rest. We might need you tomorrow.” It’s only when I curl my stockings down from my thigh to my ankle, determined to undress in the kitchen, that Taff stops hesitating and leaves.