Wasp

by Ian Garbutt

  Wasp sits on the edge of the bed. ‘Taking Moth’s room feels like stealing. She’s only been gone a day and you’d think she’d died the way it’s been cleaned out. What will happen to her possessions?’

  Hummingbird shrugs. ‘We’ll find out after she’s brought back.’

  Wasp thinks for a moment. ‘Did you ever tease her? Or play any sort of prank.’

  ‘Whatever makes you say that? Moth and I became the best of friends.’

  Cracks in the Plaster

  Moth is apprehended at the Meldrum coaching inn, ten miles out of the city. Wearing stolen clothes, she bluffed her way onto a southbound stage, ordered supper from the innkeeper and tried to skip paying. He locked her in his ale cellar and sent for a constable. According to Hummingbird, she’s in the town jail. No one is allowed to see her until the tavern’s debt is paid.

  Later that day Red Orchid, Moth’s one-time tutor, is ordered to accompany the Abbess on a visit to their prodigal Sister. Red Orchid pleads a bellyache. ‘A very convenient malady,’ the Abbess observes, but Red Orchid remains unrepentant. ‘I’ll not stand by and watch one of our own in chains. I’ve felt manacles and heard the mob baying in my ears. I can’t bear those ugly, dirty places.’

  Instead of punishment she’s given leave to fetch a draught from the Fixer then sent to bed. The Abbess tells Wasp to change out of her day gown. ‘You will come instead, unless you too are gripped by a sudden discomfiture?’

  Wasp leaves the House feeling that her own gut is full of cannonballs. The Abbess’s private chaise, driven with whip-cracking enthusiasm by Leonardo, makes short work of city traffic. No dramatic arrival at an imposing courthouse or prison, but a jiggling journey through back allyes to a former tollhouse standing at the junction of three streets. The turnkey’s office is a gin-smelling box, the man himself a grim-faced ape with cracked spectacles perched on his bent nose. He nods at another fellow who’s busy warming his rump at the fire. He’s the landlord of the Meldrum inn, and he wants a reward.

  ‘I reckoned she was more than a common thief,’ he says, winking. ‘I get all kinds tumbling through my door. They can order pigeon pie and a glass of claret as haughtily as the rest of ’em, but no matter how fancy they look, I know a runaway when I see one.’

  The Abbess turns to the jailer. ‘How is the girl?’

  ‘Been howling since we brought her in. We had to keep the chains on.’

  ‘Wasp, go with this man. Try and get Moth to settle if you can.’

  The turnkey takes Wasp downstairs and along a fetid passage. Three cells are built into the mould-spattered walls. Two lie empty. ‘Been taken and hanged,’ the turnkey says as if guessing her thoughts.

  A low sobbing issues from the furthest cell. The jailer unlocks the door and pushes it wide. Immediately a rotten stench hits Wasp in the face. A figure, indistinct in the shadows, springs back on the metal bed frame to which it has been chained.

  ‘I ain’t here to do ye harm,’ the jailer growls. ‘Ye’ve got a visitor.’

  Wasp squints in the gloom. ‘Do you have a lantern?’

  ‘Lantern, my arse. The cost o’ candles comes out o’ my wages. There’s a window high up on the wall. Give it a minute and yer eyes’ll get used to the light. If ye want I can fetch a stool. Just don’t get too close and don’t try to sneak her anything.’

  ‘No, no stool.’

  ‘Suit yerself. I’ll be back after I’ve done business with yer mistress. If ye want anything just yell. I’ll hear ye.’ He ducks back out and locks the door. Wasp listens to his heavy feet tramp back down the passage. The window he mentioned is no more than a slit in the masonry that allows a finger of light to filter through. The figure on the bed has stopped whimpering and is bundled up at one end, watching her. No blanket, just a layer of coarse sacking. Apart from a pisspot the cell is otherwise bare.

  A whisper. ‘Bethany, is that you?’

  Ignoring the turnkey’s orders, Wasp sits on the edge of the bed. She grasps Moth’s hands only to let go on hearing a gasp of pain.

  ‘Sorry, I didn’t mean to hurt you.’

  ‘I knew someone would come, from the House I mean. I didn’t think it would be you. You’re going to take me back, aren’t you?’ She leans her head against the wall. In the gloom her face is the colour of fat clouds about to sick rain onto the streets. Creases spider-web the corners of both eyes. Her lips are thin and white in a mouth that’s never going to smile again.

  ‘I’ve come because you need a friend.’

  Moth lets out a sigh. ‘When were you ever my friend, Bethany?’

  ‘I’d like to think things have changed.’

  Metal clinks as she shifts her feet. Her gown is torn. It smells of earth and rusty shackles. ‘She’s here, isn’t she? The Abbess?’

  ‘Yes. She’s going to pay for your release.’

  ‘Release? I want to die, that’s all. Let them hang me. Or measure me for chains and have the crows peck my eyes out. I don’t care. Anything would be better than that House.’

  ‘You don’t know what you’re saying.’

  ‘Is that so? You spend your whole life dodging death while people around you drown, go under a cart, or catch some foul pox and wither before your eyes, and for what? I know exactly what I’m saying. I’ve grown up fast. I’m an old woman. A crone. You can’t stay a child after what I’ve heard.’

  ‘I don’t understand.’

  Metal clinks again. A hand, ghostly in the gloom, snatches Wasp’s wrist. She feels Moth’s breath whisper against her cheek.

  ‘The things she told me. The words she whispered into my ear. There is a place other than the House, a place we’re not meant to see. Hummingbird said it’s easy to find when you know where to go, which knobs to turn, the doors that will open and the ones that won’t. The House can offer more than a pretty girl to put on your arm or take to the opera. Those who want it, get it. Dear Lord, they get everything. Watch where you walk, Bethany. You don’t want to tread in the wrong place.’

  She stares at her manacles, at the swollen wrists beneath the cuffs. ‘I’ll never leave here. My bones will be buried in the back yard and no one shall ever know I lived.’

  ‘Hummingbird loves to tease,’ Wasp says. ‘That girl could convince you the world is made of suet pudding if she chose. We all know how exhausted you’ve been. Your imagination can play whatever games it likes and Hummingbird will always be around to stoke it. She can be a nuisance but means no real harm.’

  ‘You believe that?’

  ‘Of course. She’s the closest I’ve had to a real friend since arriving at the House.’

  Moth leans back against the wall. ‘I couldn’t become a Masque. Not for a lifetime of pretty gowns and dancing lessons. The Fixer can parade me in front of those mirrors as much as he likes and it won’t make any difference. In my heart I’d still run away. Or perhaps go mad. What a sweet escape that would be.’

  ‘Is life with us so terrible?’

  ‘Do you see my brand? When I first arrived the Abbess asked whether I would be a slave or a predator. I’m nothing but a common thief. I can’t help it. Whenever I see something pretty I have to have it. I’m a magpie. Many times I’ve sat with my plunder and had no notion what to do with it. Usually it’s too late to give it back, and even if I did I’d likely steal something else. It’s a feeling that rises suddenly inside me, as if I become a different girl.’

  ‘Is it worth such a risk?’

  ‘I don’t just steal their goods, I steal a part of them. I think if I do that they can’t hurt me, and if I do it enough times nobody can. People believed me too mousy to misbehave, and so I got away with it. Once, twice, then many times after. Even when I was caught with someone’s fob watch in my hand it was thought I’d made a silly mistake, until my victim turned out to be a lawyer. Don’t you understand, Bethany? I can’t scrub floors or wash dishes in the House for the rest of my days. It’s the thought of not stealing that brings the snakes slithering out from under my bed.’
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  Moth makes a hollow sound at the back of her throat. ‘I was too quiet in my nature to say anything. Always too quiet, but the House has given me time to think.’

  ‘Moth, I’m sorry.’

  ‘Far worse tales are told. You’ll hear things that’ll make your ears bleed. Never forget that you’re among killers, thieves and whores. Hummingbird will tell you. She knew all about me. And she knows about you too.’

  Wasp finds herself shrinking away from this pale girl with the dark, dead eyes. ‘How can she know so much?’

  Moth sighs. ‘Hummingbird flies higher than anyone except perhaps Nightingale. I don’t know what she wants but it can’t bode good for any of us.’

  ‘I thought Nightingale was the one with the black heart. She’s sour enough towards me.’

  ‘Have you ever seen her bedchamber? No, I suppose not. You’ve no call to go to that part of the House. One of my chores was stripping the linen on her bed. What a strange place to be, piled with a hundred pairs of gloves and a box on a shelf no one’s allowed to touch.’

  ‘That means nothing. I’ve shared with Hummingbird since my first night in the House and she has her peccadilloes.’

  ‘Don’t notice much, do you? Nightingale turned absolutely poisonous when I fetched this brand on the back of my hand. She and the Abbess near had a catfight over it and Nightingale is the only girl who can get away with that. She makes more money than the rest of you put together, but she’s not as spoiled as you think.’

  ‘But she—’

  ‘I saw her at the posting house when I was on the run. Her face was caked with paint and she wore a plain gown, not much better than a servant’s. Even so I couldn’t mistake her. You’ve seen the way she moves — a sort of half-glide. She was trying to hide it, but that’s like a horse trying to walk on its hind legs. At first I thought she’d been sent after me, but she boarded a private coach, one I’ve never seen before. And she looked desperate. Whatever is going on, you might need to think about who your friends truly are.’

  The door swings inwards. The turnkey stands framed in the lantern light from the passage. He steps aside and the Abbess walks into the cell. Moth scrabbles to the end of the bed, her bare feet slithering on the sacking.

  ‘I think you two have talked enough,’ the Abbess says.

  Wasp grinds through the rest of the day with a dozen different thoughts shouting for space in her head. The Abbess had sent her back from the jail in a hired chair. Running upstairs, she’d found the bedchamber door locked. Rattling the doorknob achieved nothing. Eventually she went in search of Eloise, finding her in the maids’ parlour with her feet propped up in front of the hearth and a coffee cup on the table beside her.

  ‘No mistake, chérie,’ Eloise explained. ‘The time has come for you to fly the nest. Here, let me show you to your new palace. You will enjoy having a place to yourself, oui?’

  Wasp followed the maid along the passage until she stopped outside Moth’s bedchamber.

  ‘I don’t want this,’ Wasp protested.

  ‘Well, you’ve got it,’ Eloise said, leaving Wasp standing at the door.

  Fresh linen covered the bed, a fire was already crackling in the hearth and a clutch of fresh flowers had been placed next to a ewer brimming with water. Towels were piled beside the basin and a clean day gown hung in the wardrobe. Wasp tugged open the top of the dresser. Brushes, scent bottles, a pot of rouge and some powder. She slammed the drawer closed and sat on the edge of the bed. Could dark horrors really live behind these cream-plastered walls? Or were they rattling about, like the chains that bound her, inside Moth’s own head?

  Afternoon fades into dusk. Wasp tries to catch up on a few society magazines but finds it impossible to settle. Finally a weary-looking Eloise waddles into Wasp’s new bedchamber and sets a tray of tea and buttered scones on the fireside table.

  ‘Any news?’ Wasp asks.

  The maid tucks a few loose strands of hair back under her mob cap. ‘Moth is home and with the Fixer. She keeps trying to send a message to the Abbess but no one will listen to her.’

  ‘Will she be branded again?’

  ‘Truly, enfant, I do not know.’

  After Eloise leaves, Wasp sits on the fireside chair and stares at the pots of butter and blood-red jam. Her belly squirms at the thought of eating anything. The tea tastes sour and she spits it into the fire. Finally she slips out of her day gown, pulls on a fresh shift and blows out the candle. This room and its furnishings are nearly identical to the bedchamber she’d shared with Hummingbird, yet everything feels different. The sheets are stiff, the mattress hollowed in all the wrong places. She tries tossing her pillows every which way but still can’t get comfortable. In the grate, the fire crackles and dies. Shadows soften and are swallowed by the dark.

  I miss Hummingbird, she thinks. I miss her soft hair brushing my cheek. I miss her cold feet shivering the backs of my knees, and her tickly little snore.

  Finally, alone in that barren room with the moon cycling in the sky outside like a pitted shilling, Wasp finds a door into sleep.

  She wakes with a splitting headache and grit-encrusted eyes. She turns over to speak to Hummingbird then remembers with a clarity every bit as painful as the hammers thumping away at the front of her skull. Pulling herself to a sitting position, she rubs both eyes and tries to adjust to the sunlight streaming through the open curtains. A new fire crackles in the grate and last night’s uneaten supper has been taken away.

  ‘Eloise, with such quiet feet you would make a good cutpurse,’ Wasp mutters. A splash of cold water and a fresh day gown puts her in the right mood to face the day. The day brings an Assignment.

  Wasp stares at the name. Initially thinking it must be Richard, that he’d kept good on his word in the carriage that day, she’d slipped away from breakfast at the earliest opportunity and taken the scroll upstairs. But it isn’t her bold admirer. It’s Mother Joan. And the Assignment is for that afternoon.

  Instead of Leonardo or Kingfisher a hire carriage arrives with a starched driver on the bench. His glance bites as she climbs inside.

  Fine, she thinks. I’ll wager I eat at a better table than you.

  Mother Joan waits in her usual chair, a yappy white dog perched on her lap. The same old nonsense spills out of her mouth. ‘Dear Polly’ this and ‘Darling Polly’ that. Wasp’s headache bangs inside her skull. She forces herself to drink the insipid tea and eat the cakes Constance brings in. Carriage wheels clatter outside and set the dog barking. It tries to leap out of Mother Joan’s lap while she burbles soothing words. Wasp regards those sagging, powdered cheeks and thinks of Moth sitting white-faced and chained in a stinking jail cell. Mother Joan’s mouth more and more resembles a ragged hole. Cake crumbs have lodged between her teeth. Her voice seems to gain in pitch until it becomes a ceaseless whine. Wasp feels as if needles are being shoved into her ears. She chokes on a lump of lemon cake and bends over, coughing.

  ‘There, there, dear.’ Mother Joan plucks a blue kerchief from the fireside table. ‘Take a sip of water then dab your eyes with this. Look, it’s your favourite colour.’

  Wasp tears open her bodice in a shower of fastenings. ‘These aren’t my clothes and I am not your daughter. Neither am I your sister, cousin or grandchild. I have no place here and I don’t belong with you. Blue is not my favourite colour, I hate this tea and your cakes turn my stomach.’

  Off goes the dog again. Yap-yap-yap. Mother Joan shrinks into her chair. ‘You are upsetting Belle.’

  ‘As for that beast, I’d like to wring its flea-bitten neck for the way it makes me scratch. It stinks like a privy, and eyes everything I eat as if it didn’t already have enough to stuff its fat belly with. Why d’you make me come here? Why do this to yourself? For pity’s sake let the past die.’

  There. That’s it. Wasp falls back against the sofa, torn material flapping around her exposed breasts. To add to her indignity, the borrowed dress rips at the thigh.

  Now I’ve done it. I’ll
get thrown out. No carriage to take me back. I’ll have to walk. The Abbess will hear of it and I’ll fetch a brand. Maybe on the back of the hand like Moth. Maybe somewhere worse. I might lose my Emblem. I’ll have a scar on my cheek like Eloise and spend the rest of my life cleaning out fireplaces.

  ‘Does my game really upset you so?’

  Mother Joan’s voice is evenly toned, as if she’s simply asking the time of day or the state of the weather. Wasp buries her face in her hands. ‘It’s wrong. Polly should be allowed to rest in peace. You can’t cling to someone by dressing a stranger up in a badly fitting gown.’ She strokes her brow. ‘I feel my head will burst.’

  Mother Joan regards her with a hint of a smile on her lips. ‘I’ll wager your pride hurts more.’

  Wasp takes the offered kerchief and blows hard, thinking of how the Fixer wouldn’t approve of such an unladylike gesture. Mother Joan indicates the chair on the other side of the hearth. ‘Come and sit over here. It’s time we had a real talk. No games. No masks.’

  What else have I to lose? Wasp does as she is bidden. Cushions sink beneath her weight.

  ‘I take it you’ve had your fill of tea,’ Mother Joan continues. ‘Is there anything else you would prefer? Water? Lemonade? Perhaps a nip of Madeira? It’s wonderful for settling the nerves. I speak from experience, believe me.’

  Wasp shakes her head.

  ‘Give me a moment to put Belle somewhere quieter. I’ll also need to settle Constance. She’ll be concerned.’

  ‘I’m sorry. ’

  ‘Don’t be. As a little girl I was never very good at playing Charades.’ She rises from her chair in a rustle of petticoats and carries the dog, whimpering now, out of the room. Wasp closes both eyes and massages her temples. The headache softens from a roar to a dull thump-thump like an extra heartbeat inside her skull. A moment later her hostess is back, a cup in her hands.

  ‘This is a herbal draught,’ she explains. ‘Cook makes them. She’s no apothecary but her family is gifted when it comes to natural remedies. I always keep some nearby. It will help settle you.’