A Place to Call Home

by Evie Grace

  Rose stared at her brothers. Their clothes were stained and wet from where they had been dragging the butts between the pits.

  ‘I haven’t been paid this week,’ he went on. ‘They say I’m not entitled to anything above a worker’s weekly wage minus deductions for my keep. It’s a relief that I have no wife to support. They have stitched us up, taken us on for their servants, and purloined everything we owned. I don’t know what to do.’

  ‘We will think of something,’ Rose said, her heart aching for him. He was no longer the gaffer, his white coat of authority replaced by the stained cowhide apron of one of the workmen. He had fallen back to where he had been before Ma and Pa had adopted him.

  ‘I want you to write to Aunt Marjorie again,’ Arthur said. ‘She will know what to do.’

  ‘I’ve said before, she’s getting old and frail, and I don’t want to worry her. I’d feel guilty if we made her unwell with our troubles. I feel we’ve imposed on her enough.’

  ‘But I don’t want to live like this.’ He grasped Rose by the shoulders and gazed into her eyes. ‘I can leave all this behind, but you and the twins have nowhere else to go, no other means of support or protection.’

  ‘Oh Arthur, it’s a hard life, but we aren’t in any physical danger.’

  ‘I’m not so sure.’ He frowned.

  ‘You’re being overdramatic.’

  ‘While you are too complacent. Our situation is going from bad to worse.’

  ‘The Kingsleys are cruel and mean, but they wouldn’t hurt us – they’re family.’ As Rose said these words, she remembered Baxter and his father. They had been family too, and his pa had thumped him. ‘I’m sorry, Arthur – I’m so tired I don’t know what to think.’

  ‘I know what I think – they have no affection for any of us,’ he said angrily. ‘I’m not staying for dinner. I’m going out.’

  Rose could guess where he was going, because when he left, he had washed and changed into clean clothes and oiled his hair. She hoped that he and Tabby were going to set a date for the wedding soon – it would give them all something to look forward to.

  An hour later, on hearing Arthur’s footsteps on the stairs, she put the book she’d been reading down on the kitchen table and followed him to his room. She knocked on the door.

  ‘Arthur, it’s me. Please, let me come in.’ When her brother didn’t answer, she pushed the door open and found him lying face down on his bed, his body convulsing with sobs.

  ‘Leave me alone,’ he gasped as she reached out and grasped his shoulder.

  ‘Look at me,’ she whispered. ‘What’s wrong? What’s happened with Tabby?’

  ‘I’ve broken it off with her,’ he said, his voice breaking.

  ‘Oh no. Why?’

  ‘Why do you think? I can’t possibly go through with this marriage now.’

  ‘You still love each other. Nothing has changed.’

  ‘I will love her for the rest of my life, but everything is different now. How can I provide for a wife and family?’

  ‘People manage. The other men at the yard are married. Look at Mr Jones – he’s been at his wife’s beck and call for years.’ Rose forced a smile. ‘Tabby has never struck me as someone for whom money is a priority. She’s no gold digger, Arthur.’

  ‘Ah, that is true,’ he sighed. ‘She is a beautiful soul, an angel without avarice.’

  ‘Her father is quite a different kettle of fish,’ Rose observed.

  ‘I don’t blame him for wanting the best for his daughter,’ Arthur countered.

  ‘Go back to her and tell her you’ve made a mistake.’

  ‘I can’t, because I’ve done the right thing by her. I have no hope of being the gaffer now that Mr Kingsley is installed as head of the business. My current situation is in the hands of a drunkard who thinks he knows all there is to know about making leather.’ Arthur buried his head in his hands. ‘Tabby hates me for it, but I’ve set her free so she can marry somebody else, someone who can give her everything she deserves.’

  ‘What about love? You love each other. Doesn’t that count for anything?’

  ‘The only thing that really counts in this life is pounds, shillin’s and pence,’ Arthur said bitterly. ‘Rose, much as I appreciate your concern, I’d be grateful if you’d leave me alone.’

  ‘Yes, of course,’ she said quietly, getting up and walking out of the room, her heart broken for a third time at the thought of Arthur’s sorrow, and losing a future sister in Tabby. For whom would she and Minnie make the patchwork now?

  1876–1877

  Chapter Eleven

  An Ill Wind Blows Nobody Any Good

  Autumn turned to winter and there was no respite from Aunt Temperance’s nagging and Mr Kingsley’s drunkenness. Rose looked forward to the late evenings when they had finished washing and putting away the dishes. She and Minnie would go upstairs to their room and huddle together in the flickering light of the stubby remains of a candle. Donald would leave the door of his bedroom open and they would talk to each other across the landing. As for Arthur, he would return home late and retire straight to bed. At first, she worried that he was frequenting the inns to drown his sorrows, but he was always stone-cold sober.

  Winter passed, then gradually the days lengthened until it was still light when they went to bed, but the hours were filled with work nonetheless. One morning in early July during a summer storm when the winds were whistling between the timbers and lifting parts of the roof, Rose was on her knees, scrubbing the floor in the hall. She had turned seventeen in May, yet she felt about one hundred with her aching muscles and joints, unable to see a future beyond slaving for the Kingsleys. She dunked the brush back into her bucket, picking up more suds on the bristles, and scrubbed harder, wondering what the day would bring. More of the same, she guessed with a sigh as she heard her aunt’s voice from the landing above.

  ‘Hurry along, Minnie.’

  ‘I am hurrying,’ Minnie said.

  ‘You have been deliberately going at a snail’s pace. I have better things to do than follow you around. If you did things properly in the first place, you wouldn’t have to do them again. You are worse than useless.’

  ‘I’m sorry, Aunt.’ Rose could sense the fear in her sister’s voice. ‘This basket is very heavy.’

  ‘Oh, do stop whining. You’re giving me an earache.’

  ‘Please let me go at my own pace, I—’

  Rose looked up to see a basket of laundry tumbling to the ground, a sheet settling across the floor, and heard Minnie crying out as she came falling against the banisters to the foot of the staircase where she landed with a crack and a thud, her leg twisted beneath her.

  Rose leapt to her feet, crying, ‘My poor sister! What have you done?’

  ‘She pushed me,’ Minnie gasped, her eyes filling with tears as Rose tried to help her move to the bottom step and sit down. ‘She shoved me in the back,’ she went on, pointing to their aunt who stepped past them and started to inspect the floor tiles.

  ‘You must put your leg straight,’ Rose said.

  ‘I can’t,’ Minnie grimaced. ‘It hurts too much.’

  Rose glanced at her aunt as she shifted her sister’s weight on to the step and took hold of her ankle. Minnie screamed when she pulled her leg forward. The pain was all the worse for knowing that Aunt Temperance had inflicted it.

  ‘Anyone would think the sky had fallen in,’ Aunt Temperance said. ‘You have only yourself to blame, you clumsy girl.’

  ‘You pushed me down the stairs.’

  ‘You tripped on the laundry. I told you to take care with that basket, but would you listen? Stand up, child.’

  ‘I can’t,’ Minnie moaned, her face pale and her teeth chattering.

  ‘There’s no such word. Get up, or I’ll whip you.’

  ‘Look at her leg – it’s impossible,’ Rose said, wrapping her arms around her sister’s shoulders. There was no wound, but the lower part of her limb was bent where it should have been straight
. ‘Please help me get her upstairs to bed, Aunt. I can’t manage alone.’

  ‘I can’t do anything, not with my lumbago. You’ll have to wait for Arthur or Donald.’

  ‘May I go and fetch them?’ Rose asked, knowing it would be another hour before Donald returned.

  ‘If you wish. They can make up the time later.’

  Rose didn’t like to leave her sister alone with their aunt, but she had no choice. She fetched Minnie a blanket, wrapped it around her shoulders, and ran as fast as she could, hindered by the weight of her skirts and petticoats, to the yard where she found Donald tipping a batch of ground bark from the mill into one of the pits.

  ‘Donald, Donald!’ She almost fell into his outstretched arms as he caught hold of her before she ran into the pit.

  ‘Rose, what is it?’

  ‘I need your help. Minnie is hurt.’ Catching her breath, she went on to explain what had happened. ‘Where is Arthur?’

  ‘He is with Mr Kingsley. Rose, they have not stopped arguing today. One of the curriers – Pa’s best customer – has complained about the quality of the leather he ordered. He’s talking of taking his business elsewhere.’

  ‘Really? That’s never happened before.’

  ‘Our uncle thinks he knows best – he’s ordered the hides to be removed from the loft before they’re ready. He believes that by hurrying the process, we can produce more leather. He’s an idiot.’

  ‘Don’t say that. We have enough to contend with without you upsetting him. You’ll lose your job.’

  ‘I don’t care.’ Donald bit his lip, his eyes dark with worry as Rose slipped her arm through his and they hurried back to Willow Place.

  ‘How did it happen?’ he asked as they reached the door.

  ‘She came down the stairs.’ Rose didn’t go into detail – she didn’t want him confronting their aunt and making things worse – but as it turned out, Aunt Temperance had made herself scarce, leaving the two of them to carry Minnie up the two flights of stairs and put her to bed.

  ‘That looks bad,’ Donald observed as Rose made their sister as comfortable as possible. ‘Where’s the doctor? The old bat has sent for him?’

  Rose shook her head. ‘You go back to work – there’s nothing more you can do here. I’ll speak to her.’

  ‘I’ll give her a piece of my mind,’ he said angrily.

  ‘Don’t antagonise her. Let me deal with this. I’ll take care of Minnie,’ she promised.

  ‘If you’re sure.’ He leaned in and stroked a stray lock of hair from his twin’s cheek. ‘I’ll be back as soon as I can.’

  Rose followed him downstairs, but when she found her aunt in the parlour, her entreaties fell on deaf ears.

  ‘We aren’t made of money,’ she kept saying. ‘Minnie is young and her leg will soon mend.’

  Wishing that she could ask Ma for advice, Rose spoke to Arthur when he returned home that evening, but he had no success in persuading his aunt either. He had his own troubles, Rose thought, feeling sorry for him. He hadn’t stopped loving Tabby even though he had broken off their engagement, and he was struggling to cope with taking orders from their uncle at the tan yard. Without a stake in the tannery, he had no authority whatsoever over Mr Kingsley.

  The next morning, having tried to soothe her sister as she cried and moaned through the small hours, Rose got up, splashed her face with cold water and quickly brushed her hair.

  ‘Don’t leave me,’ Minnie begged as she stirred in her bed.

  ‘I won’t be long. I promise.’

  ‘Don’t go.’

  As Rose kissed her cheek, Minnie put her arms around her neck and clung on for dear life.

  ‘I’ll be back. Trust me.’ Having extricated herself from her sister’s grip, Rose went downstairs to find her aunt in a mean temper in the kitchen with a pile of dirty plates on the table.

  ‘Where have you been? I expected you down here at six to cook Mr Kingsley’s bacon. He’s had to go to work on an empty stomach, thanks to you.’

  Rose didn’t see why Mr Kingsley couldn’t make his own breakfast, but she bit her tongue.

  ‘Aunt Temperance, I’m asking you again. Please call the doctor. Minnie is suffering terribly.’

  ‘It serves her right for behaving like a snivelling brat. She was too busy arguing with me to look where she was going and she tripped over those lanky legs of hers. Tell her to get up – she can’t lie abed all day when there are some of us working our fingers to the bone.’

  ‘She can’t get up.’ Rose tried to still the trembling of her lip. ‘Her leg is broken.’

  Her aunt shrugged.

  ‘What will you tell your friends at the cathedral if she should end up dying from it? Minnie has always been a sickly child.’

  ‘What do you know? You aren’t a doctor,’ Aunt Temperance sneered.

  ‘A funeral is expensive, as we know to our cost,’ Rose went on, finding her courage.

  ‘That’s true. When your ma told me how much she’d spent on my brother’s send-off, I was horrified. I said to my husband, Mr Kingsley, you are in the wrong trade.’ She paused. ‘Oh, don’t look at me like that with those big blue eyes. Fetch my purse and go and buy the wretch some medicine.’

  ‘Wouldn’t the doctor be more appropriate?’ Rose dared to ask.

  ‘An apothecary will do. Doctor Norris didn’t do your father any good, and I don’t want him knowing our business.’

  It was better than nothing, Rose decided as she put on her bonnet and shoes while her aunt took a few coins from her purse and counted them out on to the chiffonier.

  ‘Thank you,’ she said, taking them before her aunt could change her mind.

  She left the house and hurried along the dirty streets, passing the hovels where the windows were stuffed with rags or boarded over to keep out the weather. A young girl was washing the doorstep into one of the houses, a fruitless occupation, Rose thought, when she had to lift her skirts to cross the puddles of filth that lay across the cobbles.

  ‘Rose, is that you? Miss Cheevers?’ An elderly woman stepped out from one of the houses, her face half hidden by a parasol trimmed with feathers.

  Rose quickened her pace, not having time for an inquisition, and kept walking until she reached the Miskins’ apothecary shop. She stopped and looked in through the window at the bottles of colourful potions on the shelves and the advertisement for surgical bandages, elastic stockings and enemas on the hoarding outside.

  Would it be indelicate to go inside, considering what had happened between Tabby and Arthur? She thought she heard Pa whispering into her ear, ‘Better the devil you know than the one you don’t.’ She swallowed hard, composed herself and pushed the door open, making the bell ring, and catching the attention of Mr Miskin who was behind the counter, dressed in a white coat.

  ‘How can I help you, miss? Oh, it’s you, Rose.’ He frowned. ‘I didn’t expect to see your face again.’

  ‘Perhaps I shouldn’t have come,’ she said, backing away.

  ‘No, no. Wait! I didn’t mean …’ He moved around the counter towards her, stopping in front of a poster for Thierry’s Marvellous Balsam.

  ‘I’m sorry for the troubles that have struck your family down. I was angry when Arthur broke off the engagement with my daughter. Any father would have felt the same, but I’ve had time to reflect on the situation, and although it grieves poor Tabitha deeply, your brother did the right thing in freeing her of any obligation. She will meet a young man with better prospects in future. Now, how can I help?’

  ‘My sister has met with an accident and broken her leg. I’d be very grateful if you could recommend a medicine to numb the pain.’

  ‘Ah, you have come to the right place. The relief of pain is one of our specialities. We have laudanum or extract of willow bark, along with various bandages and splints for comfort.’ He frowned. ‘Did you say “broken” the leg?’

  Rose nodded.

  ‘Have you consulted with a doctor or considered taking the patie
nt to the hospital?’

  ‘We have no money for doctors and hospitals.’

  ‘Of course. Let me see.’ He rang the bell on the counter and Tabby appeared from the rear of the shop. She smiled when she saw Rose.

  ‘My dear,’ the apothecary said. ‘I’m going out the back to the dispensary. Please show Miss Cheevers the range of bandages that we have in stock.’

  ‘Yes, Father.’ Tabitha turned away and opened a drawer in the cabinet behind the counter as her father walked away, leaving the two of them alone.

  Was it safe to speak openly? Rose hesitated, then the words came out in a torrent.

  ‘I’m sorry. Arthur has been laid terribly low by the loss of our parents and the thought that he had to let you down. He had no intention—’ She suppressed a sudden wave of sorrow. ‘He still loves you, you know. There has been no one else.’

  ‘I know,’ Tabby cut in. Glancing over her shoulder, she went on, ‘My father says I should be thankful because bad luck follows Arthur around and I’m better off without him. He says that to lose three parents shows excessive ill fortune. Anyway, he’s forbidden me to see him, and I’ve been crying myself to sleep over it for months because I can’t get away, not even for a second. He watches me like a hawk.’ She pulled out several different bandages and laid them on the counter. ‘Rose, there is still hope. Will you give your brother a message from me?’

  ‘Of course. What shall I say?’

  ‘Tell him I’m prepared to do anything, even run away with him if that’s what it will take for us to be married. I could never contemplate marrying anyone else. Arthur has my heart now and for ever.’

  ‘This is …’ Rose couldn’t describe how joyful she felt about Tabby’s romantic declaration, ‘… wonderful.’

  ‘Promise me you’ll tell him. And say that I will be on the bridge on Tuesday evening at six o’clock. My parents are going out.’

  Rose nodded as Tabby continued, ‘Hush, I can hear my father – he’s on his way. Where exactly is the injury you wish to bandage? Is it an open wound, or closed?’

  ‘Oh, it’s for Minnie. She’s broken her leg, but there is no break in the skin.’ She pointed out roughly where it was on her own leg, keeping it covered with her skirts.