A Lady in Disguise

by Sandra Byrd

  Ruby pretended to stick hair-pins in her head, and Charlotte, encouraged to join in the fun, pretended to totter on high-heeled slippers before sitting down at her machine once more.

  “You laugh, my girl, but it’s a good thing Lady Tolfee insists on being elegant, or the lot of us would be on the street,” I teased. My affection for them swelled. I would have enjoyed helping any young girls in need but . . . theater girls, as I was . . . we were of one cloth!

  “Yes, miss, I know. We will work hard.” Charlotte looked up, blinked her eyes, which I knew grew cloudy from long hours examining close seams.

  Tolfee House, in St. James, was stunning; the May sun illuminated the lime-washed stone exterior; the house commanded an entire corner of the block. I knew from my years designing for Lady Tolfee that the home, all told, had seventeen bedrooms, fourteen reception rooms, and a conservatory. It was anchored by one of the grandest ballrooms in London, perhaps seventy-five feet long and connecting with a magnificent picture gallery, decorated in gilt, like the hall of mirrors at Versailles. Lady Tolfee meant to keep the pride of place in that ballroom, and it was my commission to ensure she did.

  We alighted and made our way to the door, where her butler showed us in; her lady’s maid, whom I rather liked, showed us up to Lady Tolfee’s suite.

  She sat on a chaise, her combing jacket pulled around her shoulders to protect her hair whilst we measured her and then decided on gowns for the Season.

  “Lady Tolfee,” I said, walking into the room. She stood to put me at ease, and then looked toward Mother Martha.

  “Mother Martha,” I said, “please meet my patroness, Lady Tolfee. Lady Tolfee, my master beader, Mother Martha. She’ll be measuring your hands for the new gloves, and beading them in such manner as London has not yet seen!”

  Lady Tolfee graciously extended her hand, and Mother Martha, hers, in return. Mother Martha’s hands were covered with a set of her beaded gloves. Lady Tolfee’s eyes widened in admiration, and then she turned to smile at me.

  “I’ve heard you’ve been awarded the commission for the Cinderella gowns,” she said as we walked toward her dressing dais.

  I grinned. “There is little you do not know.” My having been chosen would reflect well on her.

  She laughed, and when she did, she reminded me for a moment only of my mother, with whom she would have been of an age. “This is true. Lord Tolfee and I delight in our arts patronage, so we are often the first to be told. I mentioned to several friends that you were designing for me as well this Season, and reassured them that you were exclusively mine.” She locked eyes with me. “Is that still true?”

  I could afford to lock eyes with her but not to lock horns. As of now, she kept me fully employed. Perhaps after Cinderella . . . “Of course,” I said. “My expenses will have risen, of course. I have my home in Hampshire to think of now.”

  “Do not concern yourself with rising expenses,” she said. “I shall ensure that is taken care of. Congratulations on your new country home. Winton Park? What an interesting turn of events for you.”

  I smiled, warily, hearing the bite in her compliment; the highborn did not like to see anyone raised to their orbit. “Yes, Lady Tolfee. I was there, just recently, burying my father.”

  She took my hand in hers. “I’m so sorry, my dear.”

  I wrapped my tape round her while we talked. “My near neighbor, Lord Lockwood, has said he’ll keep an eye on it till I can visit again. He’s mentioned you. Or Lord Tolfee, in any case.”

  She turned round on the dais at my nudge. “Oh yes. We know the family well. He’ll be in attendance at several events this Season. Kind man.” She glanced down at me. “Very attractive.”

  In spite of my efforts, I blushed. Caught! She smiled at me, but it felt empty.

  “Very keen on investments, sharp mind. Has a special interest in land. His wife’s family has significant holdings.”

  My hand froze. “His wife?”

  Stella, her lady’s maid, knocked. “Tea brought up?”

  Lady Tolfee shook her head. “No, dear, not with the fabrics about.” She turned back to me. “She’s dead now, of course, poor mouse, some years past. Died not a year after they married. Of course, that was long enough, one would imagine, for him to have buttoned up the rights to her land and other holdings. Lord Lockwood was very happy to have arranged such a prosperous marriage for his son. He had a title; she’d had the land.”

  I pretended to concentrate on the measurements, but my mind reeled. His wife was dead. She’d inherited a lot of land.

  “But I don’t bother myself with such things, and, I’d imagine, neither do you. The Vernissage, Miss Young?”

  I shook my head clear, opened my sketchbook, and brought the conversation back to her question. “Yes,” I said. “I have an idea I hope you’ll like, as it’s already under way.” Vernissage, or Varnishing Day, was the opening of the Royal Academy of Arts for the Summer Exhibition. Lord and Lady Tolfee were principal patrons of the Academy, and as such acted as hosts of the event. Varnishing Day was so named because the artists would place final touches on their pieces, or, indeed, varnish the oils, in front of the oh-so-exclusive invitees. I could not let her down.

  “As Mr. Robinson is just now publishing his book The English Flower Garden to bright acclaim, I thought of a light-green silk gown with embroidered flowers and vines. Then Mother Martha”—I glanced toward my dearest find—“can embroider beads which shall shine in the evening lights like stars over your country garden. It’s very ‘of the moment.’ Impressionistic.”

  “Delightful, dear. A perfect idea. Spare no expense.”

  Although I sometimes envied the women I sewed for their freedom with their purses, I did not mind in the least their ability to provide me with the best materials, and I did my best to transform them into the dazzling, but tasteful, spectacles they desired to be.

  We remeasured Lady Tolfee’s daughter for a gown, too. She would not look toward her mother, nor did she speak. I would ensure her dress was stunning, but not as stunning as her mother’s dress, which I knew without it being spoken is what Lady Tolfee would prefer. In fact, it was already under way. Within the hour, the butler showed us out, and Mother Martha and I were on our way to Drury Lane.

  “Are you weary?” I asked her.

  “Not at all, please do not worry about me,” she reassured.

  “I’ve a few items I need to leave at the theater. Would you like to come in and see the inside?”

  She nodded. “Yes. But it is not new to me, I’ve been there many times over the years.”

  I had no idea she’d worked with the pantomime children at my own theater!

  The opera Esmeralda was just ending its run and a youth revival was about to begin. I had promised to sew a few small pieces as a donation, the least I could do. I left them for Wilhelm and then headed back out of the theater. I noticed that Mother Martha tarried beside one of the dressing rooms.

  “Are you all right?” I called. When she did not come toward me, I returned toward her. Then I noticed which room she was standing in front of. The wiggery!

  “Yes! Why had I not thought of this?”

  She smiled widely. “You have the same idea.”

  “Ruby!”

  I quickly returned to Wilhelm’s workshop. “May I take a wig? To borrow? And perhaps some strands of hair to fashion a few more?” In case the original style did not suit, we would have something to work with.

  “I will be driven out of business by the greed of my principal designer and seamstress!” he said.

  I caught my breath. He’d called me his principal designer and seamstress. Already! And not a stitch had yet been sewn for Cinderella. Some may have used that to ease off, but not I. The vote of confidence would drive me to perfection. “I shan’t if you prefer . . .” I said.

  He grinned. “Nothing too costly, please. And whatever you do, do not cover your lovely flaxen hair.”

  “It’s not for me,” I said. “
But thank you. Thank you!”

  Once home, Mother Martha and I could barely control ourselves from racing up the steps. Ruby hunched over yards of fabric, her little scalp looking like nothing so much as a smooth field with young wheat waving as her head bobbed.

  I looked at Mother Martha. It had been her idea, after all.

  “Go ahead,” she encouraged.

  “Ruby, stand in front of the dressing mirror, if you will,” I said.

  She looked at me wonderingly but did as I’d asked. I pulled the wig out of a linen bag and settled it on her head just so.

  She turned and looked into the mirror, and when she did, she smiled. “I’m a real lady!”

  I gasped. Mrs. W gasped. Ruby was stunningly beautiful. I looked once more at Mother Martha, who nodded knowingly. It had been a blessing that Ruby had cut her hair before one of the men looking for young women had found her and offered the “life of leisure” they so readily lied about.

  “You are beautiful,” I said. She took the bag from my hand and looked at the other hair swatches. She put a few on my head, and I curtseyed in jest.

  Everyone broke out in laughter. When it quieted, Ruby spoke up. “Miss, with those on, you look like one of them watercress sellers near Covent Garden.”

  “ ‘Cool! Fresh! Picked this mornin’!’ ” I teased, and they laughed. We soon got on with our work on Lady Tolfee’s gown.

  But Ruby had given me an idea.

  I would not ask questions. Nell Gwyn, the lowborn orange seller who had captured the heart of the King, would.

  CHAPTER TEN

  In the early evening I let it be known that I preferred not to be disturbed and that I would have Louisa send supper upstairs to the rest of them. I waited till things had grown quiet and then I changed into an old dress, one that barely fit, was stained, and that I had planned to have torn into rags. I snatched some hair extensions and other strands from the drawers upstairs where we had left them after returning from Drury Lane and placed them under a well-worn bonnet, so that I appeared to have dark brown hair. I left my gloves off. For once, my hands, rough and red from working with cloth and needle, would not have to be hidden. Instead, they would help me disguise myself accordingly.

  I went downstairs through the kitchen and snatched a basket used to carry flowers along with some oranges from the larder. If only Lady Lockwood could see me now! I looked the part. I had clearly been followed and noticed at King Street; I would not go out through my front door. Instead, I stopped by the coal room and smudged myself and my clothing, just a little. Then I exited through the Area, used exclusively by servants and sellers.

  I walked down the darkening street, which was filled with a toxic blur of coal smoke, fog, and disdain. Many women curled a lip in disgust when I finally came into view. Men leered at me and the carriage drivers did not seem to care that they came too close to me, splattering my hem with filthy puddle water. No one nodded a pleasantry. I was unsettled: at best I was ignored, at worst, reviled.

  I had become unsuitable, and their disdain and revulsion reverberated through me. I liked myself less, at that moment, a sentiment I did not understand and was not proud of. The apparel oft proclaims the man.

  Yes, I had wrought a costumer’s profession from Shakespeare’s truth.

  I eventually made my way through the smoky haze of dusk toward alleys that splayed out like grubby fingers from the palm that was the thoroughfare. I positioned myself just a few row houses away from the King Street house on Papa’s card, just down the alley. There were sweets sellers and cigarette hawkers crying their trade, gasping in the filthy air, coughing out the smoke, shouting out once more. They hovered near the streets that would bring people to the theaters, and people were lying rough against the wall, passed out from fatigue or drink.

  “Ouch! Who? No!” I cried. An arm reached out and grabbed my waist, pulling me toward him. I smelt him before I saw him: the knife seller who had been positioned directly across from the house last time I’d been here. I stood next to him, holding out my orange basket as I imagined an orange seller might.

  “Who are ye, lovely lass? I’ve not seen ye here before,” he said, leaning in to try to kiss me, which, fortunately, he did not.

  He did not recognize me as the “toff’s woman,” then.

  I wriggled away, revolted. “Selling oranges, sir. And looking for a friend. I think she lived there.” I pointed to the neat house among the other neat houses on King Street.

  “That house, then.” He looked wary, but I shifted my oranges to remind him, hopefully, that I was one of them.

  I fished in my linen pocket and withdrew the picture. “Here.” He looked at my hands and nodded. Then he took the picture in his own. He was missing fingers on each hand. Knife injuries, perhaps.

  “I seen her. We sees everything and everyone, watching from the shadows. They think we don’t, but we do. Her? She’s gone now. Hasn’t seen her for months. She’s gone.”

  “Gone?” My heart beat in my throat.

  He shrugged. “There’s plenty others. You want to work there?” He cackled and spit, his spittle tobacco brown. “The toffs and their protectors, they likes ’em a little younger than you are, so I’se thinking you wouldn’t be their type. Yer my type, though.” He drew close and breathed on me; I nearly fainted from the fetid mothball breath that passed through his rotting teeth.

  I drew away. “Younger women, then?” The voice that had whispered at my door had suggested Ruby and Charlotte might be snatched and brought here if I didn’t quit sleuthing.

  “Course. They’re supposed ta be clean. It don’t matter to me if yer poxed.” He tried to paw at my dress. “It’ll matter to them, though.”

  I stepped aside. “I’ve got to sell these.” I hurried away from him, throwing a glance at the King Street house.

  A brothel. A brothel for young, clean women, and the woman in the picture I’d found in Papa’s cupboard, near the address, had been there.

  How young?

  I once more hurried down the street. A well-dressed man reached toward my orange basket, his grasp coming uncomfortably near my person. I put the basket down on the pavement and crossed my arms over my chest, protectively, fighting the impulse to retch.

  Passersby avoided me on the street, stepping aside as they would from horse muck. I understood, just in part, what it felt like to be reviled and unprotected, like so many women were. I understood in a fresh and personal manner why my mother had been so defensive of them, her drive to help them find safe places to sleep and eat and work. I recognized, just a little, the despair a woman must feel when she understands she has no other means to provide for herself.

  And Papa. He must have been working to protect those girls somehow.

  Mustn’t he have? Perhaps he was guiding them to the Cause, like Mamma may have done.

  But he hadn’t shown any interest in the Cause after her death, blaming them, I knew, for the typhus that she caught tending the poor. If he had only been helping, why had Papa kept a photograph, then, as a treasure? And why only of the one young woman? A young woman who could not be traced because the studio name remained unstamped, unusually, on the photograph itself. My dinner threatened to reappear.

  The knife seller’s comment haunted me. I withdrew the picture and looked at her. She’s gone, he’d said. She’s gone.

  I picked up my basket and started out again. The streets were dark and uneasy, and I was at risk dressed as I was and walking alone. People seemed to appear and then disappear in the dark, foggy haze. By the time I could make clear the figure of any who came near me it would be too late to learn if they were found to be friend or foe. What had seemed like a good idea and perhaps an adventure of a kind at home now seemed foolhardy and upsetting. I had learnt nothing that advanced my knowledge but plenty that had deepened my anguish.

  And now, my person was at risk. I heard footsteps closing in. Someone was definitely following me.

  My chest heaved as I tried to draw a clean
breath through the dark miasma of coal smoke and mist. Fear further squeezed my lungs. The men who had, I dared assume, killed my father would not regret harming me if they could. Did they wonder how I knew about King Street? Did they believe it implied I knew much, much more than I did?

  I dared not turn around, but slowed my step, and the man did, too. I could not ignore it any longer. I gathered what little courage I had from the four corners of my mind and turned around, bracing myself to confront whoever stalked me.

  He ran smack into me at my sudden stop. “Excuse me, miss.”

  It was the lamplighter. I nearly cried.

  The streetlights, which had not yet all been converted to electricity, were being lit one by one like eyes opening one at a time. As the lamplighter moved his way down the road, I wished, once more, for the blessed relief that the darkness of ignorance can bring.

  What good could come of further enquiry? Much harm and sorrow could, that I knew; Collingsworth and Roberts had both said so.

  I rounded the corner to Cheyne Gardens and ran toward its safety. Once inside, I closed the front door, leaning against it to catch my breath, thinking back to the danger I’d just escaped outside the brothel and the girls who had not escaped but were trapped within.

  Please, Papa. Had you been helping them somehow? You must have been. It’s the only explanation.

  It was certainly the only explanation I could live with, and so I settled upon it.

  • • •

  The trip to King Street had given me courage to call directly upon Mr. Pilchuck. He had ignored my two notes, and I very much needed to know where my accounts stood and that I was financially secure. The following morning, I took Mrs. W with me and presented myself to Mr. Pilchuck’s assistant at his office in the City.

  His assistant was most dismissive. “You do not have an appointment?” His words were as drawn out as his lean frame.