The Widow's Confession

by Sophia Tobin

  I had thought myself unobserved on my morning walks – apart from Solomon, who could be trusted, you knew from looking in his eyes – but now I know nothing passed unobserved in a place like Broadstairs. Politeness was the key, of course; we were visitors, we brought money, we were to be served, after a fashion. But they had seen us all before, and stripped us clean of our pretensions with their eyes.

  I was different, though. I was the Widow of the Sands. And after the body of Catherine Walters was found, I became something else – not just a stranger, not just a widow, but a bringer of bad luck. I will never know who began that rumour. Was it a mutter of something, late night, in a tavern? Was it a charwoman on her doorstep, with her arms folded across her chest? Or was it someone I knew, a member of our group? But I will not enquire too deeply. I cannot bear to think of it.

  ‘Did you come here to watch for corpses?’ said the landlady of the Tartar Frigate, acidly. ‘A fine holiday you’re having.’ And she glared at Edmund, as if he was in some way to blame. Her gaze softened a little at the sight of Theo, who had stood for a moment on the doorstep, looking out at Main Bay, so peaceful in the morning light, though the water was high, claiming most of the beach.

  ‘Solomon found her,’ she said, polishing a glass. ‘I’ve put him over there with a tot of something to calm him. At least, I think he found her – he carried her here. Sol?’ she called. ‘Did you get sight of that widow today? Was she there too? Or anyone else?’

  Solomon shook his head, knocked back his drink and rose to acknowledge Theo and Edmund. ‘Just me found her,’ he said. ‘Poor little thing. Mr Gorsey came along when I was dragging her out, and helped me carry her here. But he has gone back to the Albion now – he has no stomach for this.’

  ‘Understandably,’ said Theo. ‘My aunt is staying at the Albion, and she had it at breakfast from Polly.’ He glanced at Edmund. ‘Word travels fast here.’

  ‘Do you not think it strange,’ said the landlady in a low voice to Edmund and Theo, ‘how all these things have only started happening since that widow came here – that widow Solomon sees every morning? I watch her from my window sometimes, walking as slowly and deliberately across the beach as if she were in some procession of her own devising, and it chills me through and through.’

  ‘I am sure Mrs Beck has nothing to do with this,’ said Theo.

  Edmund’s gaze rested on the object of their discussion; for a few feet away, the body of the girl lay on the trestle table that Amy Phelps had occupied only a few weeks before. She was covered over, for decency’s sake, but he saw, from beneath the cloak that shielded her from people’s eyes, a few chestnut ringlets. He was of half a mind to ask the landlady for a drink, but wasn’t sure that she would react kindly to such a request.

  ‘I will bless her,’ said Theo, and Solomon gave a grunt of approval. The landlady uncorked a bottle and poured the hoveller another drink.

  Edmund felt he should support Theo in some way, so he stepped forwards, but kept a little way back. He saw Theo recoil when he lifted the cloak.

  ‘She’s bashed up, Mr Hallam,’ said Solomon. ‘I should have mentioned it – I am sorry, sir. I figure she must have gone into the water last night, and when the storm churned up all the water, so it did its worst to her, too.’

  Over Theo’s shoulder, Edmund saw her face. She looked to be around the same age as Amy Phelps; perhaps a little younger, twelve or thirteen. Her face was covered with dark smudges – storm clouds of bruises – and there was a bloody gash down one side of it. Her long chestnut ringlets were shot through with scraps of seaweed and fragments of shells. From the small section of her torso Edmund could see, her dress had been torn away.

  ‘She must have gone into the water alive,’ he said, ‘for all those bruises to be so livid.’

  ‘Is it anything to do with the Goodwin Sands?’ said Theo suddenly, his hand lying on the table beside the girl’s head.

  ‘No,’ said Solomon. ‘Everyone is accounted for from the boats last night.’

  ‘My husband’s gone for the constable,’ said the landlady, with a sigh. ‘If he comes, he’ll be sure to put handbills out. We’ll find out soon enough who she is.’

  Theo began to pray, his hand raised in blessing.

  That night, Edmund went into the town to escape the mournful atmosphere of the parsonage. Theo had gone to his study and was guarded by the terrier-like Martha, who told Edmund it was best to leave him alone, as she put on her cloak to go and check that the ladies in Victory Cottage had their supper. Thinking of Julia, he walked down Harbour Street a little way, then up the passageway on to the promenade. Here and there, the windows were lit by the softness of candlelight. A dance was being held, and he heard the stamp of feet and the scrape of a fiddle as he passed the assembly rooms. He went to the railings of the promenade; looked out at the sea. The smell of burnt sugar and frying potatoes was cut through by the salty air, and the competing smell of seaweed. The only trace of the storm were banks of sand built up against the cliffs, dug by the locals as a defence against what Solomon had referred to as ‘more weather’. There were still people on the beach. He wondered if these last hangers-on, clinging to the scraps of the day’s heat, were people on the last night of their holidays, breathing in the clean sea air, trying to set the horizon in their minds as they pointed and said, ‘Can you see the cliffs of France?’

  The light was fading. He passed one girl, walking alone, and she smiled broadly at him and let her shawl drop from one shoulder. The shawl, worked in a way that it was a criss-cross of strong cords, like a fisherman’s net, the colour of the red brick of the parsonage in the setting sun, lay like a grille across her white skin. He smiled back, for he had seen her working at the Albion Hotel, but did not slow his step, and he was several feet along the promenade before he realized her intention. He was baffled by it, and slightly flattered; he thought himself too old to be worth a second look, but he knew that he bore his father’s looks, a kind of youthfulness which played counterfeit to his actual age.

  He found Solomon in the back bar of Neptune’s Hall, a tavern whose polished woodwork resembled that of a ship’s deck. The front bar was bare boards, but clean and wholesome, newly lit by gaslight; the back bar was carpeted in a dense dark pattern which swallowed up the light. Solomon was seated near the fire. Edmund ordered a beer from the landlady, then pulled up a chair and sat down beside the hoveller. ‘I thought you might be at home tonight,’ he said.

  ‘My wife is the understanding kind,’ said Solomon. ‘She knows what happened this morning, and that I must be on my own for a while. What would I say? We are not allowed to speak to women of such things. Even if she gave me leave to, I do not think I could bring the words from my mouth, to tell her of that ugliness.’

  Edmund shifted in his seat. ‘I am sure your wife is a woman of good sense,’ he said.

  ‘I talk of my character as well as hers,’ said Solomon.

  They sat in silence for several minutes. Then Edmund took an extra large gulp of beer.

  ‘She was just like the other girl, the one we found on the beach,’ he said. ‘Young, but not so young that she could have wandered into the sea without knowing what she was doing.’

  ‘Her name is Catherine Walters,’ said Solomon, his lips puckering as though he might weep. He took another mouthful of his drink. ‘Someone came looking for her. She’s not a local girl. An orphan. She’d been here two days, brought down with a group of other orphans by a wealthy lady staying near Stone, the charitable type. She had been unwell, and was told the sea air and bathing in the water would help her. She slipped out with two other girls, but went off without them. They returned when the storm came, but she did not.’

  ‘She means nothing to Dr Crisp, I suppose?’ said Edmund. ‘Does he think there is a natural explanation?’

  ‘The sea is hazardous, especially for those who are not used to it,’ said Solomon. ‘It is possible – nay, likely – that she was swept in last night if she was foolish eno
ugh to walk too near the edge. The waves came in high over the pier last night, sir – you should have seen it.’

  Edmund leaned closer, and spoke low. ‘I cannot help but suspect a pattern – Amy Phelps, now Catherine Walters, and a few years ago that young girl, drowned in a rock pool.’ He did not wish to add that they were all poor, and unimportant to Crisp; nor venture that as long as no duke’s daughter or baronet’s wife was killed, the doctor would have no truck with the idea of foul play.

  ‘Dr Crisp will do what he thinks is best,’ said Solomon gently. ‘He said your group gave him trouble about the couple at the chalk pit.’ It had been proved, from conversations with family, that the man – a married labourer – and the girl – a young seamstress from Margate – had both gone to the Ranelagh Gardens and been seen there, drinking and dancing. The coroner’s inquest had agreed that they had both sustained head injuries in their fall into the chalk pit, and died there in the night as a result. Edmund had read of it in the newspaper.

  ‘Dr Crisp was right about that,’ said Edmund. ‘But still, do you not see there is something to be looked into?’

  Solomon drained his glass. ‘You’re a good man, sir, and I truly commend you for taking trouble over all of this. But all of these deaths are near enough to be accidental. People are often washed away, on nights like the last.’

  ‘And Amy Phelps?’ said Edmund.

  Solomon shook his head. ‘Let us pray it’s over, this run of deaths. You will not convince Dr Crisp otherwise.’

  ‘Just one more thing,’ said Edmund, as Solomon rose and signalled to the barmaid. ‘Was there any writing at the scene, this morning? Anything unusual?’

  Solomon’s expression was full of pity as he looked at him. ‘There was a storm,’ he said. ‘I pulled the girl’s body from the water, water which was almost up to the door of the Tartar Frigate. You know it, sir. There was no “scene”, as you call it. Everything was washed away.’

  Edmund went out onto Harbour Street, pulling his hat on, astonished by the severity of the chill in the air. Glancing behind him, he saw lights on the pier and wondered who he would find if he went there now. As he turned back, a couple passed him, and he recognized the woman he had seen on the promenade, the brick-red shawl huddled tight around her, her laughter ringing in the air. Mr Gorsey’s daughter, he thought, and remembered a slighter version of her smile as she had handed him tea after the shell-collecting. Her male companion was swaddled against the cold night air, dressed in black, a scarf around half of his face, and his hat pulled low. With one glance at the man’s eyes, Edmund felt sure it was the painter, Mr Benedict, though he had heard he was in Ramsgate with his wife and children. He opened his mouth to hail the man, but the couple were moving fast, and there was something about the way in which the man turned away and pulled his pretty young companion along which made Edmund decide to leave it.

  He ascended Harbour Street with quick steps, passed Holy Trinity, which sat in stately flint-covered stillness and darkness, and was about to turn up the drive to the parsonage, when something made him stop and turn around. He was just a few steps away from Victory Cottage, and there was light behind the curtains of the front parlour. He knew the correct thing to do would be to return to the parsonage. But he longed to speak honestly to someone. Before he could change his mind, he crossed the road, opened the gate and rapped sharply on the door of Victory Cottage.

  Delphine opened the door; she was carrying a candle in a glass shade, and the sight of it reminded Edmund of his first night in Broadstairs, and how seeing a light on this step had made him think of ghosts and spirits.

  ‘Mr Steele! We haven’t seen you for a good while,’ Delphine said. She looked out at the evening. ‘There is a sea mist drifting in again. Come inside.’

  He was grateful that she had not blanched at the sight of him, nor hinted at the impropriety of him turning up at her door at this hour of the evening. Instead, she only opened the door wider for him to come in. He glanced behind him as he did so, and saw that she was right: the air was thickening, as though a light smoke had been breathed over the town, and he saw it in the beam of the new lamps that lit the road.

  He was surprised at the smallness of the parlour. Delphine and Julia’s singular elegance – an elegance which, to him, set them apart from all of the others in their party – had meant that he had pictured them in a larger house. Even though he had known they lived in the cottage, his mind had somehow created for them an elegant room within, large, well-appointed, with paintings and ornaments that went with the neatness of their clothes and deportment. He saw only the parlour of a furnished seaside house, a small clock, some books, a handful of cheap ornaments, and two faded sofas. Delphine settled on one, and he realized that she was no longer wearing her day dress, but a plainer gown without corseting, a dark blue silk robe over the top of it. Her hair was still up and dressed, but she looked tired, and after a moment’s thought he recognized that the careful veneer of politeness and brightness which she wore in society had slipped from her face. She was alone with him in the room, and as he sat down he felt suddenly as though this was very intimate indeed. Except for the fact that he felt no attraction to her at all, he would have been embarrassed to look upon her.

  ‘I did not mean to intrude,’ he said to her.

  ‘You have not,’ she said, taking out a cigarette case, opening it and offering him one. ‘They are Turkish,’ she said, when he looked at her questioningly. ‘I gained the habit in Paris, last year.’

  He took one, lit it from the lamp beside them, then offered to light hers. She shook her head, and lit her own. ‘You may look me in the eye,’ she said. ‘I think we are friends. I have trusted you from the first moment I saw you; or, at least, trusted you as far as I trust anyone. Julia is resting. She will be cross with me when she sees I have let you in, but I do not think you care whether I am respectable or not.’

  Her words should have made him feel more awkward, but in fact Edmund felt his cares slipping away. He felt comfortable with her; a hundred times more comfortable than he did at the tea table of the parsonage. The smoky taste of the cigarette comforted him. He watched her tired gaze wander over the room.

  ‘I have just been with Solomon,’ he said. ‘They pulled another girl from the sea.’

  Delphine drew on her cigarette. ‘I know,’ she said. ‘Martha told me today. Her distress is equal to the effort she inflicts on our house. Today she blackleaded the fireplace, polished all of our boots, and would have baked a fruitcake the size of Margate if we had not stopped her.’ She looked down. ‘Forgive me,’ she said. ‘I should not be flippant about such a terrible thing.’

  ‘I have been at the tavern,’ said Edmund. ‘Solomon bids me to be sanguine, but I begin to suspect that foul play is involved.’

  ‘At the tavern?’ she said, with a knowing glint in her eye. ‘I admire a man who can drink, and take comfort in it. I am not sure I ever could; it only makes me more restive, and angry.’ She saw that propriety stopped him from commenting. ‘What troubles you so deeply?’

  ‘The two girls are similar in age,’ said Edmund. ‘They are both of the labouring classes, and they have both been found in the sea. Then there is the writing we both saw, near the body of Amy Phelps: WHITE, and White as snow. What could it mean?’

  He glanced at her; she shook her head.

  ‘I admit,’ he said, ‘I would not be so worried about it if I did not have an older story lodged in my mind. Mr Hallam told me that some ten years ago, a young girl was drowned in a rock pool. She was Martha’s niece.’

  ‘Oh.’ Delphine seemed shocked. ‘Oh dear. I had wondered about their carefulness over Sarah – and I thought there was something.’ She pressed her fingers into her brow. ‘Poor, poor Martha. How terrible.’

  ‘It was never solved,’ said Edmund. ‘And perhaps it is because I have too little to occupy me here, but it troubles me.’

  Delphine looked at him steadily. ‘Does this small town have a murderer in it?’
she said.

  ‘I do not know,’ said Edmund. ‘I hope not. I believe I am worried for you and Miss Julia, if so.’

  Delphine put out her cigarette neatly before its time, folding it on to itself. ‘How do you know I do not carry my own pistol in my trunk?’ she said. ‘I am not frightened, Mr Steele, though it is very worthy of you to think of us here. I have already endured death, in America; another will not pain me so very much.’

  He thought she must be speaking of her widowhood. ‘The loss of a husband must be a terrible thing to bear,’ he said.

  Delphine blinked, and looked at him for a moment with a lack of comprehension. ‘Yes,’ she said. Then she stopped, and said, ‘No.’ She looked him full in the eyes. ‘I will not lie to you, Mr Steele.’

  ‘Della?’

  They both looked up to see that Julia was standing in the doorway of the parlour. She was dressed in a pale tea gown, and her blonde hair was loose down her back. Edmund was unused to seeing her without the veil across her face and encased within the layers of her elegant clothes. Like Delphine, she looked unmasked in this small room – pale, a little tired. Edmund did not even see the red stain across her face; to him it was another shadow in this room full of shadows. There was nothing extraordinary about her, this tired young woman, but the outline of her stillness in the doorway, her tallness, her grace, everything about her – took his breath away. But he also saw that she was afraid. She was looking at Delphine.

  ‘My darling,’ Delphine said. ‘I told you, Mr Steele, she would be cross with me for letting you in here. All is well, my love.’ There was a slight tremor in her voice. Julia stayed in the doorway; she did not move or come to join them. Edmund realized he was holding the cigarette out in his hand – he, like her, frozen, the cigarette gently disintegrating and ash dropping on the floor. He started, and more fell, and he put the cigarette out on the glass ashtray, moving to scoop some up from the floor.