James studied his pale reflection in the gilt-framed mirror above the fireplace. He hesitated, trying to clear his mind, struggling to bring some order to the events of the previous evening. He could remember, well enough, planning their strategy for the coming card game, with Frank, over dinner at The White Hart. Then Frank’s friends had arrived, a group of well-connected people. He could even recall some of their names.
They had all been in good humour, he recalled, when they had set off together for Southgate Street but when he tried to picture what had happened there, his memory flooded with hazy faces, and half-remembered conversations, until he could not be sure what was real and what was imagined. Of the thirty pounds he had taken with him, he had found only a few coins in his pocket that morning, yet Frank had paid for dinner, with his winnings from the ratting contest. It was as though the night had become some half-remembered dream.
James sat and turned to Richard. ‘We went to The White Hart Hotel and then a group of us to some ale house, in Southgate Street. I don’t recall its name.’
‘That explains your condition,’ Richard said. ‘Have you any idea of how they adulterate the beer in the ale houses around Avon Street? It’s full of foxglove, henbane, opium and God knows what other concoctions. They use chemicals so that they can water down the beer, keep its taste and appearance, but make it stronger, and still sell it cheaply. It’s little wonder that you look so poorly.’
‘The ale was strong,’ James said, ‘and it certainly seems to have affected me badly. But what’s done is done, and now I must pay the price.’ Inside he felt a sense of relief that Richard had offered at least some explanation of why he should feel as he did; that there was some rational explanation of his condition. Yet still the lost hours worried him.
‘I don’t think you realise how much you have changed of late,’ Richard said.
It was half statement, half question and it took James by surprise. Yet he knew all too well that it was true. He shrugged. ‘And I don’t think you realise, my friend, how difficult it was to be accepted into Bath society, as an “Oirishman”, or how hard it was to find work and achieve some standing. The law is a profession seemingly favoured by bigots. I am not by nature so outgoing as you might think me.’
‘But you have no trace of an Irish accent.’
‘Thanks to a good education, and years of disciplining my speech.’ Where else but Bath, James wondered, could his transformation have been so easily executed, or so readily accepted? One could be whoever one chose to be in Bath, with the correct manners, and upbringing, and opinions, and enough money to maintain the façade. It was a city of wealthy migrants where the right address, and furnishings, and tableware, and servants, could all be hired for the season, or for as long as they were required, a city where appearance was all, and substance mattered little.
‘You make too much of your ancestry. I never thought any less of you, because you are Irish,’ Richard said.
‘But you are not like others,’ James replied.
‘It’s a wonder that you can support yourself from your work, with your socialising and gambling, but of course you have your annuity; six hundred pounds a year, is it not?’
‘Perhaps I’ve been somewhat distracted of late. But I have always taken pride in my work, particularly when I believe in the justice of a case. I am a good advocate.’
‘But half of them never seem to pay. Has that housebreaker Maggs paid you yet?’
James resented the question. ‘You know damn well that drawing up deeds and contracts holds little appeal to me; and no, Charlie Maggs has not yet paid me, though I’m sure he will. He was innocent and I proved him so. He visits sometimes and we play chess together, and when he has the money, he will pay me.’
‘He has charmed you out of your fee,’ Richard interrupted. ‘I hope you do not keep money in the house.’
‘Charlie Maggs would not rob me,’ James said. ‘He is too old for house-breaking now, and besides he is an honourable man, in his way.’
‘Well, it’s not for me to tell you how to live your life.’
James laughed. ‘You’ve done little else lately, though rarely perhaps to this extent. What’s put you in this mood?’
Richard looked a little embarrassed and seemed to stumble over his words for a moment. ‘I’m truly sorry, James. I say what I do, because you are my closest friend and because I care about your wellbeing.’ He paused as though ordering his thoughts, rubbing his eyes and forehead vigorously. ‘You think it a gentleman’s adventure, to explore the dens around Avon Street, but I see what that place does to those who struggle to survive there. There are houses, less than half the size of your own, with half a dozen families living in them, and hardly a wage between them. Children sleep on floors, with straw for a bed, and rats, and mice, and cockroaches for company. When they’re not working for a few pennies a day they’re sent out begging, or rummaging in the river or in piles of rubbish to find something to eat, or something they can sell. When they have time to play it is in streets that flood each time the river rises, and where the gutters run with effluent and waste from overflowing cesspits. There are flop-houses where old people and itinerants sleep standing up, with their arms hung over a rope and they pay for the privilege of hanging there. And you think you know Avon Street?’
‘I have no illusions concerning the place,’ James answered, his mind still busy trying to digest what Richard had said.
Richard stared at him for a moment, and then looked distractedly into the flames of the fire. ‘I had to examine a man and his daughter in the morgue of the Mineral Hospital on Sunday morning. They had drowned in the river on the previous night.’ His words were slow and soft spoken and he paused, as though lost in thought, for a moment. ‘I surprise even myself, sometimes.’
‘In what way?’ James asked.
‘I’ve seen so much death, yet its cruelty still has the power to shock me. God knows why it should be so. Perhaps because it forces me to realise my own limitations, and reminds me how tenuous the hold we have on life truly is.’ He hesitated as though looking for the right words, but unable to find them.
From where he sat in the brocade, wing-backed armchair, James caught sight of the portrait of his mother, reflected in the mirror above the fireplace, as though she was watching him, just out of sight across the room, a face so full of youthful compassion and hopes for the future. ‘I understand your feelings, better than you might think,’ he said.
‘Some have the ability to see only what they want to see, yet the more I perceive of the world, the less I understand.’
‘But you’re a doctor. The truth of life and death confronts you every day.’
‘You’ve always been a good friend,’ Richard said, smiling. ‘I am sorry that I preach to you sometimes, like some pious vicar.’ He paused and his expression became serious again. ‘The girl was the same age as my own little Charity. Underneath all the river mud and weeds, her hair looked just like hers. When I washed her clean, her face was disfigured and bruised beyond recognition, and I kept seeing Charity’s face. How could any God allow such a thing to happen?’
‘I have a friend who knows the Avon Street area well and all that goes on there,’ James said. ‘Shall I try to discover more?’
‘Stay away from Avon Street, James,’ Richard said. ‘I’ll discover soon enough all I need know. I’m to give evidence to the Coroner’s Court on Thursday. All I needed from you was a sympathetic ear, and that you have given me. It’s best you don’t involve yourself.’
Chapter 5
When Belle and Molly returned from the park, Jenny was already sitting at her work- table sketching vigorously. A small pile of coins sat in front of her and she was still wearing her best Sunday dress. Pieces of fabric lay scattered around her feet undisturbed from the morning. The flames in the fireplace roared up the chimney, as if in celebration of the unaccustomed feast of good fuel, never normally lavished on the fire in the middle of the day.
Belle took off
her own gloves and then helped Molly take off her woollen mittens. The two of them began warming their hands in front of the fire. ‘I take it you sold a bonnet?’ she said, and then smiled.
Jenny laughed. ‘Jolly’s took all three and paid a good price.’ She picked up the coins, jingling them in her cupped hands. ‘And they said they would take as many as I could make. I wonder now if I should have asked for more.’
‘That’s wonderful news. It’s a well respected shop, too.’ Belle picked Molly up and sat her on the corner of the bed to take off her coat and shoes, before tucking her under the bedclothes. She was asleep, almost before she had lain her down. ‘I’m afraid Molly wore herself out running about the park,’ she said, as she crossed to the window. ‘It’s just begun snowing again.’
Jenny stooped and began hurriedly picking up the discarded pieces of blue silk brocade, scattered around the base of the table on which she had been working. ‘I should have cleaned up this mess before I went out.’ In her excitement, some of the fragments of material spilled from her hands as she ran to the window and smiled at the sight of the swirling snowflakes.
‘Don’t be silly,’ Belle said, ‘it’s spotless, as usual. I don’t mind the cloth. It’s your living.’ Belle knew the ritual well by now. Jenny cut and tacked, layered and pleated material, with the precision of an engineer and the skill of an artist. No matter how strictly the materials were issued to her, or how rigorously they checked the remnants she returned, Jenny always managed to spirit away some material for future use. She would work twice as long, if at the end of the day she was left with precious material for her bottom drawer.
‘I hate scrimping like this,’ Jenny said. ‘When I was a daily dressmaker I used to earn two or even three shillings a day and I wasn’t short of customers willing to pay. There was none of this mess then, I’d visit them at home, making their dresses and doing the difficult work, while they passed part of the day doing the simple sewing themselves, so they could boast about their dressmaking skills and how much they had saved their husbands or fathers.’
Belle watched as Jenny dutifully folded each remnant and placed them in a pile on the table before selecting the preferred piece, and placing it in the bottom drawer of the chest which stood beside the window. The remnant would re-appear as trimmings on a simpler dress bought second-hand, or as the decorative fabric of a bonnet or hat which she would then sell.
The bottom drawer of ‘rescued’ fabrics was Jenny’s provision for the bad times; her escape and Molly’s future. It seemed only fair, Belle mused. Jenny was paid little more than a shilling a day now to take work in and that was when she could get the work. If it wasn’t for her skill and reputation she’d have got no work at all.
‘Molly looks so well,’ Jenny said, ‘she spends too long shut up in this room with only me for company. It’s good to see her with roses in her cheeks. Thank you for this morning.’
‘I enjoyed it,’ Belle said, ‘and it cost us nothing. Besides all I did was give you an hour or two to sell your hats.’
‘It’s a long time since I day-dreamed,’ Jenny said. ‘I walked the length of Milsom Street, looking in at the displays in the shop windows and seeing the outfits that the young ladies were wearing as they paraded up and down. I realised that there wasn’t a dress that I couldn’t make myself and in most cases, make better.’ She blushed and fidgeted nervously with her hands.
‘Then why don’t you?’ Belle asked, although she already knew the answer.
‘I can’t afford the materials and even if I could, it would take me weeks. I would need someone to do the cutting and the basic sewing so that I could spend time on the patterns and the finishing and how would I sell what I made? But that doesn’t matter. I have something I can dream about. That will do well enough for now.’
Belle looked around the room, taking in all the drawings on the walls, admiring their skill; a few simple lines and loops and light shading and yet each was the perfect reproduction of the look of a dress or hat. Sometimes when a ball or concert was held, Jenny would stand outside the Assembly Rooms or the Guildhall, studying the outfits, working out in her mind how the materials were cut and layered, flounced and pleated, stitched and finished, until she knew how she would have made each of them and how each could be improved. The drawings, she did from memory, or imagination.
‘We both have dreams,’ Belle said. ‘I want more than anything to be a great actress.’
‘And to be rich and famous and courted by the nobility,’ Jenny said, with a barely controlled giggle.
‘No. It would be enough to know that my talent is real, and not just a delusion.’
‘But you are a good actress. You have shown me the pieces from the newspapers, saying how good you are.’
‘Yet I know I can do more. The applause is like a drug that satisfies you for a moment and then leaves you hungry for more, but sometimes the applause is in your heart and you know that it is real.’
‘Don’t you dream about meeting a nice young man and having a family?’ Jenny asked.
‘Perhaps,’ Belle said, ‘in time. But I need to prove myself first and I don’t believe I could ever give up acting for a man. Besides, my choice of men has not been good in the past.’
‘You tell me to believe in myself and yet you find it just as difficult,’ Jenny said. ‘Who do you need to prove yourself to? You look for the good opinion of those who you don’t even respect. I wish you could reject the insults as easily as you reject the praise. We both recognise the truth in our minds, yet we cannot accept it, we look for reasons why we should fail. But my reasons are real; yours are your own imaginings.’
❖ ❖ ❖
The hard knock on the door took them both by surprise. They had heard no step on the stairs. No one was expected. They looked at each other, and then at the money on the table. Jenny crossed to the door, looking over her shoulder. Belle ran to the table and covered the coins with a piece of cloth from the floor.
As Belle turned, Jenny opened the door. ‘Tommy Wood,’ she said. ‘But it’s not collection day today. Why are you here and where’s your brother?’
Tommy walked into the room, closing the door quickly behind him. His jacket looked damp where snow was melting into the thin fabric. Belle recognised him at once. He was one of the men who had called last Friday; one of the debt collectors. He nodded to her, seeming a little disconcerted at her presence, as he had been on the last occasion she had seen him. Belle nodded back.
‘I’ve come to warn you,’ Tommy said, to Jenny. ‘Harry don’t know I’m here. No one knows.’
‘Warn me of what?’ Jenny asked.
‘It’s my boss, Nat Caine. He says we’ve got too friendly with our customers, and he’s moving us all around, changing who we collect from.’ Tommy looked over at Molly asleep in the bed. ‘I’d hate anything to happen to you, or little Molly.’
‘You’ve always been good to us,’ Jenny said, touching Tommy’s arm with her hand, allowing her fingertips to rest for a moment on his sleeve. ‘You’ve given me more time to pay when I’ve needed it, even let me off a few pennies now and again. Don’t think that I haven’t noticed, or that I haven’t been grateful.’
Tommy smiled. There was genuine warmth in his smile, Belle thought.
‘But I’ve let you borrow more, when I should have said no,’ he said.
‘That was only because I asked you,’ Jenny interrupted.
‘Aye, but I did you no service,’ Tommy said, ‘and now it haunts me. They’re not all like me and my brother, the others. I know Harry can seem cold at times, but he’d never hurt young ‘uns or women.’ He paused, brushing his damp hair back with his hand. ‘But Jeb’s a different kettle of fish, and he’s the one who’ll be collecting from you next time. I just needed to know as you’ve got enough to pay. Jeb’s a bad sort.’
‘Don’t worry,’ Jenny said. ‘I’ve enough to pay this week. Perhaps then we’ll have to move.’
‘They’ll find you wherever you move
to, in Bath.’
‘I don’t mean to run and hide,’ Jenny said, ‘just that we might need to find somewhere we can better afford.’
‘I must go,’ Tommy said, opening the door. ‘Harry will be looking for me. Have this,’ he said, before adding, ‘for Molly.’ He pressed something into Jenny’s hand. ‘Don’t tell anyone I’ve been here or it’ll come back on me with a vengeance. Take care.’
‘What did he give you?’ Belle asked, as soon as Tommy had closed the door behind him.
‘He gave me two shillings.’ Jenny smiled. ‘He’s such a good lad, not a bit like his brother.’
‘Did you mean what you said about moving?’ Belle asked.
‘It’s always been a struggle affording this place,’ Jenny said. ‘Now that your wages are cut, perhaps we should give up and look for a new place, as long as it’s nowhere near Avon Street.’ She paused, looking around the room. ‘But this place holds so many memories. Molly’s father set us up here. He made me stop work when I was expecting her, rented this room for us and furnished it and bought me pencils and paper for my drawing. When he stopped coming, I didn’t know what to do.’
‘Was he married?’ Belle asked. ‘It’s just that you usually avoid talking about him.’ She felt embarrassed, uncertain for a moment if she had said too much. ‘I don’t want to pry.’
Jenny’s expression was distant for a moment. ‘No, he wasn’t married, though he might as well have been. When he stopped coming, and I had no money left, I plucked up courage to go to his home.’ She sighed, a long sigh, and glanced towards Molly. ‘He wasn’t there and I was surprised when his mother agreed to see me. She was all smiles and pleasant at first. She took me into the morning room where I used to work, where I first met her son. She told me he had been sent to the Indies and that he would settle there. Then she told me that the room was paid for, for a year and she gave me a sovereign and began showing me advertisements she had cut out from the newspaper. All the advertisements were from homes offering to adopt a baby; some for fifteen pounds others for twenty pounds. She said she would pay to have Molly adopted.’
Avon Street Page 4