“Father is soft. Lets the blighters have ’em for laughable rates.”
“I would rather see the land usefully tilled. We get the use of the rainwater. That is what matters.”
“For your wild experiments,” Wilfred huffed. “Electrocuting eels.”
“Those eels were already electric, Wilfy.” Roxbury sighed. “That’s why they didn’t survive the journey.”
“Parakeets, then. Monkeys.” Wilfred looked from Molly to Roxbury, as if he was plotting something. “I’ll bet your young drawing mistress is against vivisection. I’ll bet she’s in league with journalists, plotting to expose your cruel experiments.”
Roxbury looked tired. “Wilfred—”
“I’m in league with no journalists,” I said. I felt the pang of guilt, knowing I was in league with Watchman.
“Aren’t you curious?” Wilfred turned to me, eel-like. “Do you know what goes on in our scientists’ quarter?”
I paused. I dislike a barefaced lie, but often try a misdirection; I would like nothing more than to be invited around the scientific quarter, but I fear seeming too curious. I angled for a wider tour. “I’m interested in the whole estate. The Walled Garden, for instance,” I said. “And the east wing.”
A bloomer. Nobody spoke. The heating system gurgled in the room behind us. The river rumbled through the gorge below the east turret, the waterwheel whirring: chak-ke-ta chak-ke-ta.
“Do you know,” said the earl, “I’ve something I’d forgotten to do.” And off he went.
Leaving me alone with the son of the household. Indecorously alone. I ought to have followed the earl and turned in, but I was thrown. I stayed rooted to the spot.
To fill the silence, I resorted to my stupid comment. “A strangely loveless household.”
I grew up poor, amid beastliness and cruelty, but I knew love, even there; not maternal, but brotherly, companionable, and loyal. Here at Roxbury, people are pitched together like a glasshouse, the framework of panes held by frail stanchions, individually fragile, easily warped, but together sturdy against the buffeting rains. I was just muttering to myself, without meaning nothing.
Wilfred heard me. “I’ll teach you a thing or two about love.”
I ducked away from his grasp and made my escape.
In the menagerie, an animal screamed.
* * *
I’ve revelled in my melancholic tours; at least, I revelled in them until today and Wilfred.
I’ve discovered the reservoir, where I reflect; the gorge, whose torrents delight the soul; and the Pump House, below the dam, where I descend from the Shepherd’s Refuge. I contemplate from on high the Iron Bridge and the glasshouses glimmering in the sun, where Jem toils among the fruit trees amid the cries of his wayward animals; I imagine the whirr of machines within, flashes of electrical experiments, inventions for the good of mankind—or at least the profit of Roxbury Industries.
I always enjoyed my solitude in London. There one can be always alone, whatever the crowd. One can vanish away, befriend and betray, and never be seen again in the vast multitudes I was brung up among. Here in the country, neither solitude nor security. House riddled with servants, grounds stuffed with scientists, toing and froing with their productions for the earl to approve, everyone hither and thithering wildly.
Out of doors, I have found my peace. Why did I stray near the Iron Bridge?
“Why, fair maiden. So alone?” Wilfred stood in country clothes, shoddily styled, on the far bank. “You resemble the sorrowful virgins of Rossetti’s daubings. Not going to do an Ophelia on us, are you?”
This allusion doubtless carried some ribald undertone I missed. “Not I, sir.”
“No need to ‘sir’ me, young lady.” To my dismay, he strolled over the Iron Bridge towards me. Something in that idle saunter disturbed me. “Call me Wilfred. My friends call me Wolfie.”
* * *
How strange is our society. When I was an urchin, there was no question of impropriety, whosoever I consorted with, or eavesdropped on, or cleared up after. Even as a servant girl, there would be nothing unusual in my being alone with the young man of the household (nothing unusual; I do not say no risk). Now I am thrust into another class, by dint of my drawing, everything is wrong. Wilfred should not approach me so; I should not allow him to approach. This swarm of social mores pricks my conscience.
In London, I could slip away from any situation; I knew the alleyways better than any copper, better than any flash gent. To be frank, I backed myself to repel an unwanted advance. Our gang was never bested, not by ’Dilly Boys nor Rude Boys, nor even those mucksnipe Clapham Crabs on forays northward. But the Burnfoot gorge is a different venue to the Blackfriars shoreline, and my drawing mistress’s heels no match for the boots I grew up in.
“I can see you are a lover,” said he, “of nature.”
“I’m fond of Roxbury.” I looked about for my escape. “Roxbury House, I mean.”
“I have viewed your paintings. Romantic.” He ran his finger along the balustrade, smiling, as if he had a secret at his disposal. “One might say, passionate.”
“I had you down less as fanatical of art,” I said, backing away along the river bank, “and more as a gun-toting nabob.”
He mistook this for a compliment, and mistook my walking away as an invitation to walk with me: his gentlemanly sensitivities were so undeveloped. He fixed me with his arrogant eye. “I like a bit of art. I done life drawing, y’know, out in India.” Pronounced to rhyme with “ginger”. “Willing models, I tell you.”
I looked around for a sure exit. The trees around us were dark. I drew my scarf tighter against this first chill of autumn.
“Ain’t you done a spot of modelling yourself?”
“No fear.” Was he teasing? “I mean, I shouldn’t think it appropriate.”
“Only I saw a drawing of Nico’s which made me think he must have studied you quite intimately.” Catching me up, he saw the disgust this thought invoked. “I pity those who wash the socks at Harrow. Of course, a boy of Nico’s age will indulge in forbidden imaginings.” He made a gesture with his hand. “Imaginings which, to those a little older, may in some pre-Raphaelite dell become real—”
One moment spouting bilge, the next tugging me to him for a kiss—and no notion of my disgust. Agh! His Piccadilly weepers against my cheek; that stink of cheroots. I am not one for intimate greetings at the best of times, but I gave up hope of absenting myself politely.
I ran.
THE WALLED GARDEN, PART THE FIRST [MOLLY]
Through the trees, and I found myself trapped between the river and the Walled Garden. Skirtle has told me this was Lady Elodie’s preserve. I had no wish to intrude on her memory. Was Wilfred pursuing me? I stumbled along the walls, scraping my hands on the stones.
There: tall gates, padlocked shut. Trapped again.
I heard him coming.
But the padlock—belated discovery—was loose. I pushed one of the doors, pulled the other, creating the slimmest of gaps. Despite all my grand dinners of late, I squeezed myself through. Only my blasted dress held me, caught by the buttons; then my stupid bonnet. Still he was coming. I tore and squashed, clothes, head, shoulders lowered, hands protecting my chest.
I burst through. I pushed the gates to.
What a changed atmosphere. Within those walls, it was already wintry. Different from the rest of the grounds. Poppies and wild roses overran the forgotten flowerbeds. Purple-headed flowers swayed on their rigid stems, shrugging off fluffy white seeds as I crouched back from the gateway, listening. He would never get his bulk through.
Muttering. A wry chuckle. He stomped away.
I tiptoed through the tangle of flowers. The chill went down the back of my dress. I felt—what did I feel? That I was trespassing. That I was not alone?
I looked up at the house. Strange. Most of it could not be seen above the walls. But the turret of the east wing had a clear view down upon me. I found myself staring up at the windows ag
ain, willing the curtains to move again, wondering what business Patience Tarn had to be there—
Thud. My knee banged against a stone, upright among the flowers. What was this? Glory be, a gravestone? How I hate graveyards. And Wilfred had surely retreated. I emerged into a clearing, a copse I’d never found before, like a witches’ assembly, circled by bare trunks, with spindly branches reaching into the sky. Nothing like the lush trees that covered the rest of the rockery. In the middle, a wooden bench upon a patch of lush green. I gazed around, as the horror of the Walled Garden receded from my bones. I dusted off my hands, sighed, and stretched the tension from my neck.
Wilfred leapt from the shadows. Whoosh! Like an electrified badger, bristles and toothy roar. He pinned me upon the bench. I struggled to free myself, but he had not wasted his time in the army; he proved stronger than he looked. His hands on my arms, his fingers pinning down my hair. I had the ghastly feeling he had used this place before. How often have I heard tell of servants’ ruination by posh boys who think they are entitled to favours, as they expect hot dinners and fresh sheets. I have read such romances of Holywell Street publishers; I’ve read Skittles’s autobiography, which sweetens the tale of her seduction to make the pills palatable.
Wilfred dragged me, struggling, to the centre of the grassy circle. I could see in his eyes that hunger that sometimes comes over men at the theatre, or the opera, or strolling the Haymarket when the lamplight gilds the flesh. So fast it happened, quicker than they lift your purse at Covent Garden. I felt in his grasp he was about to throw me to the ground. The sequel to that I could imagine.
Failing to free myself, I yielded to his tugging. I let him think he was the stronger; indeed, he was. Worst of all, he had been enjoying my resistance. But I have other strengths.
“Why, sir!” I exclaimed, like a Shakespearean orator in Regent’s Park. A scream might lead to scandal, or be mistaken for a sick animal. The greenhouses were not far off. I might be heard. I might be. “How strong you are. You have the advantage—oh, but look!”
One of my talents is the conjurer’s art of making his audience pay attention to the wrong thing: we call it misdirection. He had pinned one of my arms; with the other, I pointed through the trees at the far bank, where I hoped for a rescuer to appear. Simultaneously, as he turned to look, I slapped his hairy cheek as hard as I could.
He turned upon me like some deranged beast, at the very moment that I brought my elbow down on his forearm. Not enough to break it, but the impact freed his hold on me.
He lurched forward at me in the nick of time to meet my elbow coming up, right into his eye socket, with a satisfying crunch.
Before his howl of pain, I had already scrambled aside. I clambered through the trees, down the bank toward the Iron Bridge and the greenhouses.
“Guttersnipe slattern!” he wailed, like a foul-mouthed ninny, and started after me.
Damnable clothing. Had I but worn the rags of my childhood, instead of this dreadful crinoline, I would have been clean away from the beast. As it was, he was after me. He scrambled down the slope without hesitation. I could hear the panting in my ear, sure my ruination was at hand—when I ran slap into someone.
“Molly!” Jem rushed out from the glasshouse. He had heard my shouts, and Wilfred’s caterwaul. He held my shoulders to stop me from collapsing. “Miss Molly, I mean. Art thou all reet, miss?”
I looked back to see Wilfred draw to a stop on the bridge behind me. “Jem. Yes. Quite all right, Jem. We were just…” I looked round.
Wilfred was glaring at us.
I straightened my skirts. I put my hand to my hair, finding it disarrayed; the fibbing gigglemug had hurt my arm with his grabbing. To feel safe, I took hold of Jem’s hands, affecting an intimacy beyond what we shared. “Wilfred was just… showing me around, Jem.”
In Wilfred’s eyes I saw, for the tiniest moment, the vengeance he was already planning. He turned, face blotchy red, and marched off up to the house.
Shillibeer’s Guide to Funereal Households
The width of the hatband depends upon the relationship.
Worn by the husband for the wife, hatbands are seven inches wide. By fathers for sons, five inches; sons for fathers, the same. For other relationships, the hatband width varies from two and a half to four inches.
One should wear mourning apparel as soon as possible, not waiting until the funeral. Deep mourning is worn by the widower or widow for a year. Occasionally, half mourning is worn by widow or widower for six months longer.
Choose envelopes and notepaper edged with a deep border of black. Friends too should employ black-edged paper and envelopes, but the black border narrow.
Present the relations and friends of the deceased persons with memorial cards, stating name, age, date of death, where interred, and an apposite verse of Scripture. Although, among the poor, females attend the funeral, this custom is by no means to be recommended, since they destroy the solemnity of the ceremony with sobs or fainting.
In many cases—especially in the summer—the corpse is retained too long. This is injurious to health. Funerals in winter should take place within one week after death, and in summer shorter. We caution against giving spirits and liquors to the undertaker. Tea better suits the proper performance of funereal duties.
HARMONIOUS DIALOGUE ON A TRAIN [LAWLESS]
The dining car of our train to the frozen north (as Molly styled it) was quiet.
Ruth and I enjoyed one of those wonderful exchanges that happens rarely in a lifetime. It was a renaissance of our tearoom meetings, with the pot already brewing, but with a new intensity and directness. Anyone who has been in love will know what I mean: when you feel so close that everything they say sparks revelation.
Ruth took from her bag a file of Molly’s letters. “To prepare. Make the most of our trip.”
I’d read them, of course, for the most part. Ruth deciphered Molly’s brief messages to me, then read the letter first, but never censored anything. Not until now, however, with our new intimacy, did she disclose her deeper interpretations.
“The word ‘intelligence’, Campbell, means ‘reading between’,” said Ruth. “It’s Latin: ‘inter-legens’. And I have been reading between the lines of Molly’s texts.”
She had been reading with insight that amazed me, and made me love her more.
* * *
First, knowing that Roxbury himself was my focal point, she showed me how much more of the earl Molly had told than I had understood. That he used to run his own business, Roxbury Industries, travelling exhaustively to every outpost, but had now handed all the wider responsibilities over to Lodestar.
“That is telling of something.” Ruth, frowning, looked out the window. The suburban hamlets were giving way to open fields. “A withdrawal.”
From his pinched cheek and white complexion, Molly was emphasising that this withdrawal was a symptom of something more; having worked with every type of visage, Molly would not comment on appearance unless she thought it a malaise.
This fresh interpretation took me aback. In my knowledge, the earl had been an outspoken member of the House of Lords, dedicated to progress, unafraid of conflict, and eager to aid country and empire. Was he really loafing all day in his gardens, barely seeing even his children?
“What has happened to him?” said I.
“Think, Campbell.”
I looked blankly at her.
Ruth sighed. “Who is missing from the family picture?”
“Oh, his wife, you mean?” I gazed out at the passing fields. “Yes, I suppose, if you were to die suddenly, I would—”
“You would get straight back to your detecting.” Ruth smiled. “I have no doubt.”
I was indignant. “As the earl has returned to his experiments. But I might do it with a new recklessness, in my grief for you.”
“Ah, yes? With no thought for convention or colleagues?” Ruth was warming to this declaration of devotion. “You’re normally so conventional and collegi
ate.”
I made no attempt to rebuff her irony. “When did she die?”
“Odd that we don’t know, isn’t it?” Ruth crinkled her nose, and delved into her travelling bag. “I scanned the births and deaths in the periodicals—”
“British Museum Library, reference section? Strictly no borrowing, you told me.”
She ignored my dig. “It took me a deal of searching. The briefest of obituaries. January 1862.”
Roxbury
Lady Elodie Margaret née Loth.
5 January
Lamented by her family.
I frowned. “It doesn’t actually say she’s dead.”
“It’s in the obituaries.” She rolled her eyes. “Have you never read obituaries?”
I shrugged off my gaffe. “Two and a half years gone.”
“Yet she is never mentioned.”
“It’s a while now.”
“To have lost your wife? Your mother? Your ladyship employer?” Ruth shook her head. “No, Campbell. Whatever our discomfort in this modern age with death, with mourning dress fripperies and public grief shamed, this is not right. That the children not mention her to Molly, ever?”
“A little strange, I grant.” I glanced at the magazine page. The notice of Lady Roxbury’s passing was dwarfed by overblown obituaries of forgotten generals, actors and governmental hangers-on, alongside lurid notices of death by misadventure.
“A little? They call themselves orphans, when Roxbury is still at hand.”
“Norphans Practickly.” I chuckled. “But it is a brief notice, for such an eminent lady.”
Ruth leant forward. “You have no idea. Why, she was a force in the reform movement. My aunt admired her terrifically. Without her agitations, there would barely be a single course available to women in London’s universities.”
“Might it speak of some quarrel, that the notice is small?”
“It might. But I heard they were a devoted couple.” She narrowed her eyes, “There is something more to this.”
We would keep our ears open for mention of the earl’s wife. But we must not draw attention to our interest, if there was something untoward within the family. More usefully, we might refocus Molly’s detective faculties. She was tight with Skirtle. No gossip could escape her.
Lawless and the House of Electricity Page 13