Rack & Ruin

by Carol Hedges

  Sometimes when the nurse is off duty, the engineer walks stiff legged to the door. He opens it, and stands on the landing clutching the bannister rail giddily. From there he can hear the distant sounds of the family taking their meals, or the pretty rippling piano music, or the servants coming and going, and answering the door.

  Recently he has noticed them opening the door with increasing regularity to an elegantly dressed young man, sometimes accompanied by a rather untidy young woman with a loud voice and a horsy laugh. He has seen his beloved Angel walking down the road with the man, her hand laid lightly upon his arm.

  Every time he thinks of this, the engineer feels a fear rise in him, physical as vomit. He sits in the chair, scoured out, empty. Of late, his dreams have become more vivid and even more terrifying.

  He cries out, clawing the bedclothes until the nurse wakes him, gives him more of the soothing drugs. In one of these wakings, he is sure he has seen Lawton standing by his bedside, his expression grave.

  The engineer hears the sound of horse and carriage. He heaves himself upright and hurries to the window. He sees the family carriage standing in the street below, the footman helping down a thin pale-faced young woman dressed in deep mourning.

  It is not the young man. His relief is almost palpable. He walks to the desk that has been provided for him, and takes out a sheet of paper from the folder that has been brought over from his previous lodgings along with the rest of his possessions.

  He is working secretly on a drawing of his Angel, constructing her features with the precision and accuracy that he brings to all his work. Today, he will draw her rippling hair. He lays out pencils, eraser, ink bottle and pen. When he has finished the drawing, he will return to work. But he will take her with him into the uncertain future.

  Meanwhile downstairs in the parlour Daisy and Letitia sit side by side on the striped Regency sofa. Daisy leans forward and pats Letitia’s arm affectionately.

  “How pale you look, Tishy dear. Are things still as bad for you?”

  “They are certainly not improving.”

  “And that horrid woman?”

  “Is still as horrid. But I have my own front door key, so she cannot stop me from leaving the house. And it is my intention to leave for good, one day.”

  Daisy’s eyes widen.

  “You have a secret admirer? Oh, do tell.”

  Letitia laughs.

  “No, nothing as grand. But I hope to take an important exam at the end of the year which will allow me eventually to earn my own living.”

  Daisy’s alabaster brow furrows gently.

  “I ... am glad for you. If it is what you want.”

  “It is, Daisy. I can think of nothing better than earning my own bread and paying my own rent and being dependent upon nobody but myself.”

  “But what on earth would you do?” Daisy asks, puzzled.

  Letitia smiles at her.

  “Anything I wanted to. I could become a teacher in one of the new ladies’ colleges. I should like that, I think. The main thing is to gain some qualifications. The more I get, the more I can earn.”

  “But don’t you want to get married and have children?”

  Letitia takes a deep breath, reminding herself before she opens her mouth, that Daisy’s experience of what marriage is like is very different to hers. Here is no bullying, no fear and that other thing that she can barely name, but knows went on in the privacy of her parents’ bedroom.

  “Oh Daisy,” she laughs lightly. “Who would have me? I am plain and I am poor and I have opinions. No man in his right senses would take me on.”

  Daisy pouts, sighs, stares at her friend in perplexity, then signals to the maid to pour the tea. The conversation steers itself into safer waters, much to Letitia’s relief. A discussion about clothes and bonnets and fans might be as incomprehensible to her as her preoccupations are to Daisy, but at least she can join in, albeit at a fairly primary level.

  Eventually the tea is drunk, and every aspect of Daisy’s wardrobe has been brought under scrutiny. Letitia is just thinking about going, when Daisy suddenly takes her hand.

  “Well now Tishy, I still haven’t told you my news. You will never guess, so I shall come straight out with it: I am about to receive a proposal of marriage!”

  “Aha! your handsome Dragoon officer has declared his undying love?”

  “Oh no, it is not him,” Daisy shakes her head dismissively. “It is from a young man called Mr Digby Barnes Baker - we met at a ball. His Mama and mine are old friends. He is very handsome too, and has quite the most impeccable manners. And his linen is beautiful. He is going to be a Member of Parliament and do all sorts of good things for the poor people he represents. That is what he says and I believe him. See - under his influence, I am becoming quite political.”

  She glances at the little carriage clock on the mantelpiece.

  “He will be here very soon - I hope you do not have to hurry away for I so want you to meet him.”

  Letitia sets her teacup carefully down in its saucer.

  “I am delighted for you, Daisy,” she says, choosing her words with care. “If you love him dearly, then that is all.”

  “Oh, I haven’t received the proposal yet. But I think I may accept him when he proposes and I’d hardly do that if I didn’t love him, would I?”

  “I expect not. But it is very sudden. A few weeks ago, you were in love with someone else.”

  “Oh, that wasn’t love, not at all. You are so droll!” Daisy laughs.

  She pauses, her head on one side.

  “Listen, I hear a carriage drawing up. It is him. Now Tishy, you must like him, I insist upon it.”

  “I shall adore him on sight, I promise you.”

  “It may be quite a long engagement - Mama says she does not want me to marry until I am eighteen and he is yet to secure a seat in Parliament.”

  “I shall come to the church whenever it is, and wish you a long and happy marriage,” Letitia says, as the door opens, and the parlour maid announces the visitor.

  Later, as the Lawton carriage carries her back home, Letitia thinks about Mr Digby Barnes Baker. Obviously, nobody could ever be good enough for her dear friend Daisy, that is a given. Equally obviously, the young man she has just met possesses good looks and charm in abundance and she can quite see why Daisy is smitten with him.

  And yet. Letitia is not entirely convinced by Mr Digby Barnes Baker and his impeccable linen. She noticed that he seemed excessively fond of his own voice and his own opinions, and when she ventured one of hers - on the subject of female education, a bemused expression crossed his handsome features, and he ignored her.

  She is going to have to be careful and diplomatic when she and Daisy meet next. The young man is Daisy’s choice, and she has no reason nor business to speak against him. Maybe it was just a case of first impressions and she will warm to Mr Barnes Baker upon further acquaintance.

  The carriage drops Letitia outside the house. She has an essay to finish and hurries up the path, eager to get back to her studies. Unlocking the door, she manages to make it to the top of the stairs before the parlour door is flung open and Mrs Briscoe, arms folded, appears on the threshold.

  “Ah, there you are,” she exclaims angrily. “I have been waiting to go through the linen cupboard.”

  Letitia pauses, turns and regards her coolly.

  “I was not aware that my presence was required. Surely, if you believe it is your business to sort through our family linens, you could perform the task yourself.”

  Mrs Briscoe advances a few steps closer, planting her feet firmly on the linoleum floor covering.

  “Where have you been?”

  Letitia pinches her lips.

  “I insist upon knowing your whereabouts at all times, miss! I am here at your father’s request to safeguard his family name and reputation. Answer at once. I will not tolerate any more of this wayward behaviour nor any further insolence from you.”

  “My father’s reputati
on - as you call it - is hardly going to be enhanced by your constant presence here,” Letitia says, stung (unwisely) into responding.

  “Meaning what, exactly?” Mrs Briscoe says quietly, advancing to the bottom of the stairs.

  “I think you know very well what I mean. My Mama has barely been buried a month.”

  “And who was responsible for her death, I wonder? Who left her unattended? Who was gadding out and about while she suffered and died alone?”

  It is too much. White-faced with fury Letitia descends the stairs. The words pour forth, hot and angry,

  “How dare you speak of my mother? You are not fit to mention her name! You are a vile vile woman and I hate you! And for your information, my Mama died from a weak heart - not from anything I did or did not do. And that has been confirmed by a qualified surgeon.”

  Without pausing for breath, Letitia lifts the lid that has only barely been holding down an entire young womanfull of anger and slaps Mrs Briscoe hard around the face. Then she rushes upstairs and unlocks her bedroom door.

  Only when she is on the other side does she finally give way to tears of rage and mortification. She hears the hated enemy mount the stairs, then rattle the door handle.

  “Your father shall hear of this,” Mrs Briscoe shouts through the keyhole. “Oh yes indeed he will. And I wouldn’t like to be in your shoes when he does!”

  ****

  Inspector Greig awaits the return to Bow Street of his colleague Atherton. As soon as he arrives, smelling richly of brandy and cigar smoke, Greig beckons him into his office.

  “Well?” he queries.

  In response, Atherton brings out the gold watch from an inner pocket and drops it onto the desk. Greig picks it up, turns it over.

  “How did you get her to part with it?”

  Atherton laughs.

  “By the time she’d drunk her fill, I could have taken whatever I wanted from the silly bitch. I left her asleep and snoring on the pub table. When she wakes, she’ll presume one of the regular customers robbed her. That’s if she even remembers she once owned a gold watch. What’s your interest in it?”

  “I’m pretty sure it belongs to the young engineer Fred Grizewood, the man who was stabbed and robbed. If he identifies it, then your Freda could be the link to his attacker. I’d value knowing the name of the man who gave it to her ... and where he says he got it.”

  “Ah. I see. I’ll ask her then. Hopefully she’ll remember his name. Mind you, the stupid cow doesn’t know if she’s on her arse or her elbow most of the time. Brain totally rotted by gin. Well, the fact that she talks to me is proof, isn’t it?”

  Once Atherton has left, Greig pockets the watch and sits for a while thinking through his next move. Suddenly it looks as if he might be about to catch both Grizewood’s attacker and the baby killers in one fell swoop.

  Greig has no illusions. He knows that the best laid schemes can go awry in an instant. But this is as close as he’s come to success, so close he can almost touch it. It feels as if a door has unlocked itself and blown wide open. All he has to do, is walk through.

  A short while later Greig arrives at the Lawton house, where a maid takes his card into the drawing room. A few seconds later, Mrs Lawton appears in the hallway.

  “I am afraid my husband is not back from the hospital, inspector,” she says.

  Greig explains the reason for his visit.

  “Ah, that poor young man,” she says. “Yes, he is still here. My husband was hoping he’d be well enough to return to his lodgings and to his work long before now, but ...” she hesitates.

  “He is still unwell?”

  “It is worse than that,” she lowers her voice, “the blow to his head is causing him to have seizures .... fits. They are quite severe, I gather and have left him somewhat confused as a result. It is impossible for him to leave at the moment, my husband tells me. I shall ask the nurse to take you up to him - perhaps the return of his watch may lift his spirits.”

  Greig follows the grey-uniformed nurse up two flights of stairs and then into a bright attic room. The engineer sits at a desk, bent over a drawing. He hurriedly covers it over as they enter.

  “Mr Grizewood, I hope I find you well,” Greig says.

  He tries not to let his expression belie his words. The engineer seems to have declined physically since they last met in the hospital. His face has an unhealthy waxen hue, with two hectic spots of colour on each cheek. His dark eyes dart about the room, settling momentarily here, then there.

  “I am well - though I do not enjoy the same health that I did,” the engineer says. “I am awaiting an important letter from Mr Bazalgette - once it arrives, all will be as before. Yes. And it will come, the letter, I know it.”

  “Ah,” Greig nods.

  Behind his back, out of the engineer’s sight, the nurse shakes her head.

  “Now Mr Grizewood, we mustn’t excite ourselves. See - your visitor has brought you something.”

  Greig produces the watch and hands it to the engineer, who stares at it wonderingly, turning it over in his hand to read the inscription. He glances up at Greig, his face suddenly elated.

  “I believe this is yours, is it not?” Greig says.

  “It is mine. My mother gave it to me. She is dead, you know.”

  Greig acknowledges the remark without speaking.

  “My father has rejected me, did you know that also?” the engineer’s voice is high, wild.

  The nurse steps up to him, makes soothing noises, measures some drops from a bottle onto a spoon, offers it to him.

  “But you have your watch back - and soon we hope to catch the man who attacked you and bring him before the courts,” Greig says.

  The engineer mutters something, then sighs and closes his eyes. His shoulders slump.

  “It would be best if you left him now, sir,” the nurse whispers. “He will sleep soon.”

  Greig takes a final look at the young man, now sitting sideways in his chair, his mouth slightly ajar, the watch dangling from his fingers by its chain. Increments of light and shadow cross the floor from the casement window, gilding his cheekbones with gold. There is something both pitiful and monstrous about him: a presence and an absence at the same time.

  He follows the nurse downstairs.

  ****

  It feels late. Not quite night, as there is some kind of daylight outside the window shutters. Letitia Simpkins crouches in a corner on the floor of her room. If she doesn’t move, if she breathes very quietly, then this thing she cannot acknowledge has happened will go away, and all will be as before.

  It was a strategy she adopted at boarding school, when the misery of being overlooked, of not being taken home for the holidays, overwhelmed her. She clasps her knees in her hands, wincing as the bruise to her left wrist sends stars of pain shooting up her arm.

  She rocks to and fro gently. A sound escapes between her teeth. She is crying but there is nothing to be done. She swallows, her throat clicking on the tears. She feels like one who has turned around in a dream, knowing that something terrible awaits.

  For a while after the shouting and the beating had stopped, and the door had been slammed shut, she’d heard the twins scuttering about on the landing, calling her name softly. She had not been able to answer.

  Her life has fallen away into itself without plot or premonition. Everything is external, the details withdrawn. Her head is empty as the volute of a shell. Her world is reduced; it has become frightening, impossible in its thinness.

  Now there is nothing. Just the darkness and the unravelling of everything and the silence, rising and rising around her.

  ****

  Alone in his room, the engineer bends over his drawing, totally absorbed in conjuring up blonde curls with his set of pencils. Only when he is completely satisfied that he has every strand of Daisy’s hair accurately down on paper does he open the bottle of ink and start to go over his outline. At some point the nurse comes in with his supper; he consumes it greedily. She s
eems pleased at the return of his appetite.

  Later he will go to bed, tired out by his exertions, the watch placed on his bedside table like a talisman. The light above his bed will hiss and choke on its own gas. He will reach up into its glare and turn it out.

  Tonight, he falls asleep quickly, moonlight twitching across his face, ghosting his pale features. He dreams of blonde hair, soft and glowing like molten gold.

  ****

  Letitia wakes early, segueing from dream pain to actual pain. She rises with difficulty. Her left wrist and side are bruised. The left side of her face feels tender and swollen. She dare not look in the mirror. Instead, she hobbles to the door and descends sideways, step by difficult step down to the basement kitchen.

  She drinks some water and splashes her face. For a moment, it hurts so badly she can hardly breathe. It is impossible to fill and lift the big black kettle, so she resorts to a couple of saucepans instead. While they slowly come to the boil on the hob, she leans against the scrubbed deal table and considers her position.

  Last night she was given two choices: either she comply with her father’s wishes to the letter, or she will be thrown out of the house and left to starve in a gutter. She has no doubt whatsoever that her father will fulfil his threat if she does not accede to his demands.

  Letitia recalls the way her mother’s face changed at the sound of her father’s footsteps in the hallway, the way all life drained out of it as she tried to become small and insignificant, her eyes darting nervously from side to side in anticipation of his appearance, fingers plucking at her sheet.

  She pours hot water into the twins’ jug and carries it carefully upstairs, setting it down outside their room. She opens the door, to be greeted by the familiar fusty smell of sleeping boys. She goes to each bed, shakes them gently awake, pours their water into their bowls. The boys sit up, regarding her with horrified expressions.

  “What’s wrong with your face?” William asks, wide-eyed and staring.