Sweet Songbird

by Sweet Songbird (retail) (epub)

  ‘Sorry—’ She hurried to the bar. The climax of Potty’s act was approaching – always he ended with a ribald comic song. Tonight’s offering was particularly salacious. There were roars of approval and shouts for more. ‘Give us The Old Man an’ the Milk Maid, Potty—’

  ‘Black Maria’s Curse—’

  ‘Same agen, girl.’

  ‘’Nother pint, love.’

  ‘Rum fer me an’ gin fer the little lady—’

  ‘Pie an’ mash on ternight?’

  * * *

  She scurried about her tasks. Matt signalled with a friendly wave from the bar. She nodded. As always she had to trust that he had enough common sense not to try his cocky skills on the hardened members of this brotherhood of villains and under Moses Smith’s very nose—

  ‘Ssh!’

  ‘Sh-shh!’

  A sibilant hush fell. She turned. Poised upon the stage in the uncertain glow of the footlights, Lottie looked a princess from a fairytale. She had let down her golden hair and it fell, curling, about her pale, shadowed face and smoothly rounded, pearly shoulders. Her eyes were wide and limpid, incredibly blue in the smoky light and fixed upon the only man in the room of whom she seemed aware. Luke leaned back in his chair, raised a glass, brimful and sparkling, in gentle salute, and drank from it. To the side of the stage a man passed a comment and guffawed loudly. Luke stirred very slightly and turned his head. Silence fell.

  The piano tinkled, a little off-key. Lottie lifted her head, fixed her eyes on some point above the heads of her attentive audience, her hands clasped before her like a child’s. ‘Sweet maiden, where do you go this day—’ Kitty did not know the song, but gathered from the expressions around her that it was a well-liked favourite in Lottie’s repertoire. ‘Kind sir, I travel in love’s lost cause—’ Lottie had a good voice, true but light. It did not fill the spaces of the hall around her but rather dropped into the quiet like small, fragile, chiming notes of glass hanging upon a summer breeze. Kitty stood as if turned to stone, watching the small figure on the stage, fighting something so unexpected, so bitter and so terrifyingly strong that it all but took her breath away.

  ‘And if my love should be waiting there—’

  Very, very carefully Kitty put down the tray she had been carrying, then straightened, breathing deeply. It struck her like a blow that this feeling that had so suddenly assaulted her was envy, pure and deadly. To her horror it came to her with sudden, astonishing force that in that brief moment she would have seen the other girl dead and stepped over her corpse in order to stand there in her place and sing.

  ‘Then nothing will part us again, oh no, oh nothing will part us again.’

  Kitty turned her head away and found herself looking directly into a pair of dark, disturbing, narrow eyes. The look was speculative.

  She turned away.

  ‘No, nothing will part us again.’

  (iii)

  ‘Can anyone sing?’ Kitty asked Pol next day, apparently casually, ‘at the Rooms, I mean?’

  Pol was patching a ragged skirt. She bit through the thread, held the garment doubtfully up to the light. ‘This damn’ thing’s failin’ ter bits. Don’t know why I bother. Yes, I s’pose so. If yer can sing – yer can sing. Why?’

  ‘I—’ Kitty shrugged a little, gazed at the tattered skirt as if it were the most fascinating article she had ever come across. ‘I can sing,’ she said abruptly.

  ‘Yer can?’ Pol stopped, and turned her head, interested. ‘Yes – yer’ve got a nice enough speakin’ voice. You ever sung in public?’

  Kitty shook her head.

  Pol stood up, held the skirt to her, shaking out its crumpled folds. ‘Why not ’ave a word with Midge? Catch ’er in a good mood – yer never know—’

  ‘Pol.’ Lottie stood in the doorway. ‘Moses is downstairs. You comin’?’

  Pol sighed, reached for the pile of coins she had set upon the table. ‘Good old Moses. Gives it with one ’and, takes it back with the other. Wish I ’ad ’alf ’is style. You comin’, Kit?’

  Kitty glanced at the stone-faced Lottie. ‘No. I’ll come down with Matt.’

  ‘Right-oh. See you later.’

  The thought would not leave her. It was as if that blinding, unexpected moment of envy as she had watched Lottie upon the stage had shown her a door beyond which, if she could but find the key and open it, lay hope in a hopeless world. And yet, for fear, she could not bring herself to approach Midge. Each day she rose with the determination to do so, each evening her courage failed her and, cravenly, she held her tongue. Pol did not mention their conversation again – obviously she had not taken Kitty’s diffident claim seriously – and so Kitty wrestled alone, torn between a dream that as the days wore on came close to an obsession and the intimidating and terrible fear of failure. Yes, she could sing, she knew it. But here? On that stage? Before that audience? Nothing in her life had prepared her for that. And each evening as she watched George Milton’s sure and confident handling of his difficult audience, or suffered for Potty when his drink-inspired genius failed him – as it was doing more and more often – and he lost them, it was brought home to her forcefully that more than mere talent would be required to survive more than five minutes on that stage, and she doubted herself.

  She found herself studying the performers. George simply dominated his audience apparently effortlessly with his presence and his fine if failing voice. Potty, on a good day, slyly invited them into a camaraderie of shared obscenity or provoked them into a conspiracy of laughter in which he was the leader. Yet more and more she saw the effort of the performance telling upon him, and ever more often he failed, and was himself mauled by his merciless followers.

  Lottie on the other hand relied instinctively upon her fragile beauty and undisguised vulnerability to beguile the savage beast that lurked beyond the footlights. It did not always work, and Kitty was quick to notice that Lottie rarely sang if Luke were not there to quell with that dark, uncharitable glance any graceless interruption. Despite herself she could not deny that she watched these two, and with mixed feelings, Lottie’s ill-will notwithstanding, yet the sight of the girl’s total and obvious infatuation with Luke Peveral she found painful, recalling as it did her own experience with Amos Isherwood. When Luke was near Lottie’s eyes followed him as if she could never have enough of the sight of him. His word and his desire were the limit of her world. That he treated her as he might a pet or a favoured child seemed not to worry her at all. If he wanted her, she was there, ready; if he ignored her she submitted, watching and waiting for the crumbs of his attention.

  Kitty, with memories fresh enough still to bring the warm flush of humiliation to her cheeks if recalled, found herself fostering a slight, unwelcome sympathy for Lottie and an often exaggerated hostility towards Luke. Not, she knew, that her attitude to either of them mattered – Lottie detested her, and Luke barely knew she existed – yet nevertheless she often found herself angry both for and at Lottie for her submissive acceptance of Luke’s casual and capricious treatment of her. There was no doubt that she was by no means the only woman in his life, and he made no attempt to hide the fact. Though usually when he availed himself of the services provided beyond the draped door – which he did, if not often, at least at fairly regular intervals – Lottie was his chosen companion, there were many others eager and ready to claim his attention, and his resistance to their charms, Kitty noted acidly, could not be described as strong.

  She herself kept out of his way. She also kept her feet firmly from any path that might lead to that draped door and the squalid rooms beyond – and to her surprise, as Pol had predicted, no one forced or even questioned her. There were more than enough willing and warm bodies about Smith’s Song and Supper Rooms for a cool, unwilling fish to slip through the net almost unnoticed. The place had a good name – as in everything else, Moses ran it according to his own lights and his girls were known to be clean, safe and willing, a rare thing in this part of the world. If the tall, o
dd-looking girl with the stuck-up voice wanted to stay out of the game, who cared? Who, indeed, would want her? Everyone knew that Moses only kept her on to humour that rascal brother of hers—

  Yet she knew that here was just one more difference, one more cause for resentment against her – another reason to hesitate before rashly stepping onto that stage and exposing her soul to the whips of their scorn. She could have no illusions; if, as she feared, she failed, there would be no tolerance and less pity for a girl that most considered arrogant and unfriendly. Her downfall, she knew, would afford positive and heartless pleasure to others than Lottie, and the knowledge daunted her. Two full weeks after her conversation with Pol she still had not approached Midge. She would wait, she told herself, despising herself for her weakness, until the time was right.

  In this, however, she reckoned without Fate, Lottie’s spite and – again and infuriatingly – without her brother’s mischief.

  The evening, she always remembered afterwards, began on a sour note. A seaman, drunk, picked a fight with another and thirty seconds later there was a throat cut and a body to dispose of. Sickened, Kitty averted her eyes as the dripping corpse was unceremoniously bundled out of the door and towards the river, another mutilated, nameless obscenity to be washed with the tide, unmourned, to an unknown grave. The killer, bloody knife still in his hand, watched with puzzled, drunken eyes.

  ‘Get rid of him,’ Moses said.

  Bobs, with the faint look of interest that only the prospect of violence could bring to his face, lumbered forward. Kitty turned away. Moments later apparent normality had returned and the Rooms buzzed again with rough talk and laughter – yet it was as if the violence had stirred something, like mud at the bottom of a clear pool of water, that hung dangerously in the air, sharpening voices and edging glances. Matt, together with Croucher and the acrobatic Springer, the only three of the urchin gang that Moses would allow in the Rooms, stood by the bar. From the corner of her eye Kitty saw Luke Peveral appear in the doorway, smiling, lifting a hand in greeting to an acquaintance.

  She did not see her brother move.

  A moment later there came through the hubbub a crash, a sharp, pain-filled cry and then sudden silence fell. She turned, and froze. Luke Peveral’s dark face was savage. He held Matt in a vice-grip by wrist and elbow, the arm twisted to breaking point behind the boy’s back. Matt’s face was agonized. She took a step forward. A firm hand gripped her and dragged her unceremoniously back, the fingers biting painfully into her arm. ‘Leave it!’ Pol hissed into her ear. ‘You’ll do more ’arm than good.’

  Luke twisted harder. Matt let out a shriek of anguish.

  ‘You stupid little bastard.’ The light, hard voice was quiet, yet the words carried to every corner of the watching room. ‘I’ll teach you to try to thieve from me.’

  Matt shook his head. ‘I was only—’

  ‘You were only,’ Luke supplied pleasantly, emphasizing his words with another tightening of his grip, ‘attempting to relieve me of a watch of which I am inordinately fond.’

  Matt was very still. To Kitty, watching, it seemed that the slightest move might break the abused arm. The boy’s teeth were clamped into his lower lip. Luke held him so for a moment, then very slightly relaxed his grip. It was a mistake. With a sudden, agile twist Matt was free and diving for the door. But not fast enough. Like a striking snake Luke’s hand shot out, catching the boy by the collar, all but ripping the shirt from his back in the violence of the movement, and jerking him back into the man’s strong grasp. The vicious pattern of welted scars that marked the pale skin of the young back shone ugly in the light. There was a moment’s quiet, then Luke let Matt go so suddenly that the boy staggered a little. A lean, dark hand flashed, clipping the boy’s ear painfully. ‘Nothing I can do to you that hasn’t already been done from the looks of it. Learn a lesson, lad. Never try to out-harlot a better whore. You’re good. Use your skills on those that know no better.’

  Matt rubbed his ear ruefully. Moses was pushing his way through the crowd, Bobs at his heels. Matt glanced at their coming, apprehensive.

  ‘What’s going on?’ Moses’ brow was thunderous.

  Luke smiled easily. ‘Nothing, old friend, nothing at all.’

  ‘But—’

  Luke put a hand under the fat man’s elbow, guiding him to the round table, winking at Matt as he went. Matt stood staring after him, a strange look in his expressive eyes. Kitty began to elbow her way towards him. Moses lifted a plump, imperative finger. ‘Girl! Here!’

  She stopped.

  ‘Champagne,’ he said. ‘Now.’

  ‘Yes, Mr Smith.’

  When she returned with the bottle Lottie was standing, alone and unnoticed, behind Luke’s chair. She looked unhappy and ill-tempered. As before the room had apparently reverted to normal, yet still that thread of brutal excitement occasioned by blood and the stimulation of violence seemed woven into the smoky air. When the lights dimmed and Potty Masters, in braces and baggy trousers, his shirt hanging out like one of Croucher’s urchins, slouched onto the stage, the sound that met him was more a growl of anticipation than applause. Kitty flinched. Poor Potty was in for a bad time tonight. And from the look in his eyes and the set of his shoulders he knew it. George Milton was nursing a sore throat. His was the stage, with no help or support. He struck a stance, eyed his audience, could not, for Kitty, disguise his terror.

  ‘I say, I say, I say—’

  ‘You’ve said enough. Get orf!’

  Roars of applause.

  ‘Give us a chance, gents—’

  ‘What, another? What d’yer take us for, Potty? Yer soddin’ gran’pa—?’

  ‘’E probably was,’ called some other wit from the back. ‘That accounts for Potty—’

  The laughter was vicious.

  Pathetically and obstinately Potty tried again. ‘’Ave you ’eard the one about the copper ’oo’s mother fucked a—’

  ‘’Eard it? I bleedin’ told you it—’ They were not going to give him a chance. A pie sailed through the air, and caught him on the chin. The place exploded into dangerous hilarity. More missiles were hurled. Moses was making testy movements with his hand. ‘Get off, man! Get off! Before we have a riot!’

  Potty stood his ground for one bitter moment before retreating under the hail of pies, potatoes and other projectiles. Reaching the edge of the stage he turned suddenly, and fled to safety. But not before Kitty, aching with sympathy, had caught sight of his tears.

  Midge stepped onto the stage. ‘Gents – please—’

  The uproar continued.

  ‘Where’s George?’

  ‘We – want – George!’

  ‘Send for George!’

  ‘We want a bloody song! That right, lads?’

  A shout of approval.

  ‘Then bloody sing it yerselves. George is sick.’ Midge was not intimidated.

  The invitation was taken up happily and inebriatedly in several corners of the room. One man clambered onto the stage and struck a drunken pose. ‘Dear Mother, I remember well – the parting kiss you gave to me—’

  Someone blew a loud raspberry and made a filthy gesture. Feeding on its own excesses the mob shrieked with laughter.

  From the corner of her eye Kitty saw Lottie bend to Moses’ ear and whisper, earnestly.

  On the stage Midge was fighting a losing battle for control.

  Moses crooked a small finger at Kitty, and Lottie smiled.

  She knew, before she reached him and bent to hear his words, what he would say.

  ‘Lottie tells me that you can sing?’

  Dumbly she shook her head.

  ‘Oh, yes!’ Lottie said. ‘She told Pol an’ me. She’s told everyone. Bragging about it, she was. Makin’ us other girls out to be nothin’.’

  Kitty opened an astonished mouth.

  Moses Smith’s eyes were dangerous. ‘That so?’

  ‘No!’ she got out, ‘no, I didn’t—’

  Satisfaction in her face,
her mischief done, Lottie turned aside. ‘All mouth,’ she said. ‘That’s what I thought.’

  Trembling with fear and humiliation, Kitty could say nothing. Moses’ small mouth had tightened. The chaos about them grew. ‘It seems to me,’ he said, ‘that you and your brother are two of a kind after all. I’ll deal with him – and I’ll deal with you – later. I’ll teach you to brag when you’ve nothing to brag about. To set trouble among my girls. You see if I don’t.’

  She was aware suddenly of Luke Peveral’s eyes upon her, not mocking now but oddly pensive. From behind him Lottie grinned at her, purely and triumphantly malevolent. The red mist of temper shimmered behind her eyes. ‘I can sing,’ she said.

  ‘What?’ Moses had half-stood. He looked at her. The faintest of smiles glimmered upon Luke Peveral’s gypsy face and was gone.

  ‘I can sing!’ she shrieked above the hubbub. Already she was regretting it. Already her throat was tightening in protest, dry as the dust of the desert, but she faced him, head up. ‘I can sing,’ she said again. ‘Try me.’

  His face was pink with anger. ‘By God I will!’ he snapped. ‘They’ll save me some trouble. They’ll bloody tear you apart!’

  She watched him step up on the stage beside Midge. The drums of pure panic were thundering in her ears. What had she done? What in God’s name had she done?

  Moses held up his hands for silence, and such was his power a semblance of silence fell.

  ‘Give us a song, Mose?’ The muffled cry came from the back. A ripple of laughter echoed through the crowd.

  ‘Better than that, lads. A treat for you—’ All eyes were on him. He gestured, widely. ‘A new talent. Discovered here, right here, under our noses—’

  ‘Under Moses’ noses—’ The drunken wag was at it again.

  ‘—and you, my lucky fellows, are going to be the first – the very first – to hear her. Ladies and gents – I give you your own – your very own – Kitty’ – he hesitated, shrugged, his voice dropping – ‘whatsername.’