[The Victorian Detectives 08] - Fame & Fortune

by Carol Hedges

  Izzy’s face falls as she remembers why she came here in the first place. Sighing, she relates what happened. She has let her teacher down. She has let herself down. Now, instead of buttered toast and sweet tea, she will eat and drink the bread and water of affliction. She waits, head down, hand clasped in her lap, for the scolding.

  It does not come. Izzy raises her eyes. To her amazement, her teacher is looking at her with such love and compassion in her eyes. The response is so unexpected that, all at once, Izzy cannot bear it. She covers her face with her hands and sobs as if her heart would break.

  Silently, Maria lets her cry, merely passing a clean handkerchief across the table. Unbeknown to Izzy, she is remembering a similar journey: a bright, curious child of whom nothing was expected other than dull obedience and as much absence from the parental sphere as possible. It was hard growing up in the shadow of God Almighty and the church Elders.

  Eventually, when Izzy reaches the sniff and gulp stage, Maria leans across the kitchen table, covering the small damp hand with her own. Everything about her young pupil screams neglect and waste. She chooses her words with care.

  “Izzy, I know how sorry you are. It doesn’t matter about the book. It wasn’t your fault and I do not blame you. I have plenty of other books you can borrow. But Izzy, have you ever thought of your future? You could go to school: there is a wonderful school not far from here called Queen’s College. They have classes for girls your age. Anybody can attend.”

  Izzy stares at her. “Don’t it cost?”

  “There are fees to pay. But I’m sure we could find the money from somewhere. It must be possible. There are charitable institutions galore all over London. Think of it, Izzy: a new world! A better life.”

  Izzy shakes her head. “I know you mean well, Miss. But places like that ain’t for girls like me. I have to work, and besides, there’s Ma to consider. If I don’t bring home a wage, we’ll lose our place and be out on the street.” She stands. “Thank you for the tea and such. And for not being cross about the book.”

  “Would you like another book, Izzy?” Maria suggests.

  Izzy shakes her head. “Better not.” She wraps her shawl around her shoulders. “I’ll be off now, miss. See you next lesson time, perhaps.”

  Maria accompanies her to the kitchen door. “Izzy, if you ever need a friend, or a place to stay, this door is always open to you. You know that?”

  Izzy nods. Then she stuffs Maria’s handkerchief up her sleeve and goes out into the gloom of the city.

  ****

  At this time, there are still a few lunatic asylums that live down to the worst the human mind could imagine: long gloomy corridors leading to bare wards or unheated cells, where the air is rent by wild, passionate, despairing cries; where the mad are left to gibber and rave for the amusement of the general public, deprived of liberty, deprived of dignity, locked in after nine at night, and chained and strait-waistcoated during the day.

  Such places might have manacles, socklets, and cold baths; they separate the inmates according to class, gender, and keep the ‘excitables’ well away from the non-violent. In 1867, among a population of approximately 23 million souls, 63,743 individuals were certified as insane, the majority confined to public institutions like county asylums, or to workhouses as pauper lunatics. For them, the only way out was rescue, escape or death. It was like being buried in a living tomb.

  But Cedar House Private Asylum is not like that. Set amidst pleasant grounds, with walks and benches, it is home (if such a word can be used) to six wealthy women, placed under the care of Dr John Foster, a specialist in the treatment of ladies whose husbands have decided, for various reasons, that Cedar House is best suited to lodge and look after them.

  There are no locked doors within Cedar House Asylum, no padlock on the gates and no spiked railings, for none of the inhabitants have ever attempted to escape, (a reflection, maybe, on the sort of terrible home lives they endured previously). There is, moreover, a piano, and a tennis court, and carriage rides are occasionally permitted, the patient always accompanied by one of the attendants. For at £420 a year, it is important to their husbands to maintain before the world the fiction that these women are enjoying the same standard of living as heretofore. Only somewhere else.

  Lucy Landseer has strolled past Cedar House Asylum on several occasions, each time accompanied by a small toffee-coloured spaniel called Flush. Flush is a playful little dog, and has run onto the lawn to retrieve a red rubber ball, thrown by his mistress, much to the delight of the patients and their attendants, who have clapped their hands and laughed at the little dog’s antics.

  Now here they are again, Lucy in a fashionably trimmed bonnet and brown coat with brass buttons, and Flush wearing a blue collar, his coat shining like copper flame. They make a handsome pair. Lucy throws the ball; Flush scampers after it, picks it up in his soft mouth and deposits it at her feet. While praising the dog for his agility, Lucy is covertly scanning the ground-floor windows, the conservatory and outdoor benches, almost as if she were seeking out someone.

  A final throw. The dog hurtles joyously after the ball. Lucy steps forward. She falls! The ladies gasp in horror! The two attendants rise and run over. They hoist her to her feet, asking whether she is alright. But Lucy is not alright ~ she cannot put her weight upon her left ankle. Oh dear! What should she do?

  The attendants support her by an elbow and conduct her gently to a bench. Lucy dimples her thanks, agrees that a cup of tea would be most welcome, and indicates to Flush to sit at her feet. She closes her eyes, letting the warm Autumn sunshine caress her face.

  The only other occupant of the bench is a pretty woman in her early thirties. She has a cloud of fair hair, a small retroussé nose and large liquid blue eyes. But her complexion is very pale, and she has an air of melancholy about her. She wears a kind of shapeless russet gown ~ the sort of attire that Lucy has seen on some of the arty women who frequent the British Museum and gawp at the Egyptian mummies.

  Lucy opens her eyes, turns and gives her a brave smile. The woman returns it sympathetically.

  “That was a nasty fall,” she says in a low, but pleasant voice.

  “I was clumsy; I should have looked where I was going.”

  Flush, deciding that he is being unjustifiably excluded, gets to his paws and strolls over to the woman, who reaches down to stroke his velvety head.

  “I used to have just such a pretty dog,” she says wistfully, fondling his ears.

  “You have been here long?” Lucy asks, casually.

  “Ah. That is an odd question, coming from a complete stranger.”

  Lucy introduces herself and the dog, extending her gloved fingers as she does so. Lady Georgiana Lackington (for of course, it is she) reciprocates, then regards her with keen interest.

  “A writer? I have never encountered a writer before.”

  “I have never encountered a member of the aristocracy before,” Lucy dimples her reply.

  Lady Lackington draws in a quick breath. “Thank you for saying that, my dear.”

  “But it is true. Why thank me?”

  “Because you know what this place is for, and why we are here. You must do, it is common knowledge. And your question suggests it. Yet you have chosen not to remind me. For that, I thank you, Miss Landseer. Indeed, I do.”

  Lucy gives a dainty little lift of her shoulders, indicating that it is of no account. Flush places his head on Lady Lackington’s lap and utters a sigh of contentment. A cup of weak tea is brought, and Lucy receives it gratefully.

  The next twenty minutes pass in polite chit-chat, punctuated by dog-worship. At the end, Lucy promises that she will return soon, with Flush. And indeed, she does. The very next day she and her canine companion turn up at exactly the same hour, to be met with much joy by Lady Lackington. It seems to Lucy that there is now more colour in her cheeks, and a slight but perceptible sparkle to her blue eyes.

  On her third visit, Georgiana, (things move fast socially whe
n there is nothing to impede their progress) in response to Lucy’s artful probing, confides some details about her removal to her current place of sanctuary.

  Lucy learns with horror of the cold, brutal aristocrat who whipped his dogs, his horses and his wife in equal amounts. Of her father’s determination to marry her off to him, despite her own wishes. Of cruel and demeaning words that slowly seeped into her mind and sapped her life of any enjoyment; of the gradual cutting off of former friends and family, until, one fateful day, when a certain good-looking young artist was hired to paint a portrait of Lord Lackington, the inevitable happened.

  “I was so lonely, my dear Lucy,” Lady Georgiana says, her eyes brimming with tears. “And he ~ oh, he was everything I desired: kind, affectionate, a gentleman ~ though, of course, he came from a completely different class to my brute of a husband.”

  “Why, then, has he not come to rescue you?” Lucy inquires, her romantic soul thrilling to the tragic tale, even as her writer’s brain is mentally filing it away for future consideration.

  “He has left England for good. My husband threatened to destroy him if he ever sets foot in this country again. He is living abroad in Paris, and I, if I only could, desire more than anything else to join him. But I have nothing ~ Lackington has taken every penny I own, ruined my standing in the public eye, got me wrongly declared insane and placed me here. He is an extremely powerful man, with many influential contacts in all the higher echelons of London, so no former friends will help me. They are all too fearful for their own reputations.”

  “But you have me,” Lucy says quietly.

  Lady Georgiana turns a disbelieving gaze upon her companion. “You? How can you help me?”

  Lucy beams back at her. “I can come up with a plan, Georgiana. That is what we writers do. Leave it to me. Trust me. By our next meeting, I will have devised a way of getting you out of this place, and then out of the country.”

  ****

  A London fog is like no other fog on earth. Its ingredients are made up of a million chimneys breathing forth smoke, soot, water vapour, carbonic acid and sulphur, the effect being similar to a vast crater, below which the unhappy inhabitants must creep and live as best they can.

  On some days, the smoke hangs about in a grey pall just above the rooftops, resisting the rays of the sun. It is on such a day as this that Mrs Hemmyng-Stratton makes her way to the small tea-room off Bond Street where she has arranged to meet fellow writer and hopefully, saver of her literary reputation, Miss Lucy Landseer.

  The Author arrives first and selects a table as far from the door as possible. She has heard nothing from her publisher, despite handing over to him the results of Lucy’s research, and the sense that this foul dishonour of her literary integrity is creeping ever nearer is affecting her greatly.

  She orders a pot of tea, but no cakes. To indulge in treats at a time like this seems unnecessarily frivolous. No heroine in any of her books would ever partake of nourishment when in the throes of some bitter agony of the soul. So, neither will she. Così va il mondo.

  By the time Lucy breezes in through the door, minus dog, but plus notebook and radiant smile, the Author has sat for a full ten minutes staring at a cup of weak cooling tea and, metaphorically, at her own doomed future.

  “My dear fellow scribe,” Lucy says, unpinning her hat and removing her gloves. “What a foul day! A man on the omnibus was smoking some awful tobacco ~ I could barely breathe! I am ready for a cup of tea. Let me drink it, and then I will tell you what I have discovered. It is truly astonishing!”

  Mrs Hemmyng-Stratton studies the buttons on her gloves while Lucy pours, sugars and sips her tea. Then she lifts her pallid face and burning eyes to the young writer’s face.

  “I await your revelation with great hope, Miss Landseer,” she murmurs. “I admit that I am currently suffering such agony of soul. I have shed bitter tears over my predicament. Rest and sleep have become strangers to me. As for taking nourishment ...” She lets the sentence fade away, bringing her hand to her forehead in a tragic gesture.

  “Ah. I am so sorry. But I shall not disappoint! Oh, where to start? Here, I think. Volume one: The Casual Introduction. Since we last met, I have become acquainted with Lady Georgiana Lackington ~ and no, in answer to the question I see in your face, she is quite definitely NOT mad. Not in the slightest. No more than you or I. She has been wrongfully detained by her cruel husband, though the place she currently inhabits is a blessed relief from his persecution.

  “And now, here comes the best of my news: she has confided in me and told me how she used the ideas in your novel to arrange meetings with her lover! Is that not proof positive that you are completely innocent of the accusation made by her husband?”

  “It may well be so,” Mrs Hemmyng-Stratton says slowly. “But I do not see how it will advance my cause, as she is ‘mad’ and incarcerated in an asylum. Therefore, her testimony would not be regarded as valid in a court of law, would it?”

  “Indeed, you are quite right. But you do not have to rely on it, for she has the actual copy of your novel with her! Yes ~ she keeps it upon her bedside table! She told me she packed it, along with a change of clothing, when the doctor in charge and his attendants came to take her away in a carriage. She could not possibly leave it behind, as every page reminds her of her beloved and the happy times they spent together.

  “Now ~ and here is the thing that will clinch the matter: she told me she was given the copy of your book by one of her former friends as a birthday gift: they were all wild about it apparently, and, listen: the giver has signed the front of the book with birthday wishes, adding the date and year! So, you could not possibly have based your story upon Lady Georgiana’s affair, because, do you see, your book preceded it! There, fellow scribe, have I not done extremely well? Did not I tell you I would help you?”

  The Author is speechless!

  “But,” she says, when at last, the ability to speak returns, “unless I can produce the book itself, I have only your word, and hers, that it is so.”

  Lucy Landseer wafts the problem away as if it were a pesky fly.

  “And so we reach Volume two of the story: The Clever Plan. And here, I will need your assistance. Lady Georgiana wishes to leave the Asylum and join her beloved abroad. But she has no money. I propose offering her enough funds to procure a ticket from London to Dover and thence to Calais, and payment for lodgings and food in France when she reaches the continent, in return for her copy of Cecil Danvers. If I enlighten her about what her husband is trying to do to your reputation, I believe her desire for revenge, coupled with her desire to escape, will be motivation enough for her to agree to my suggestion.”

  “You have thought it all out, Miss Landseer,” the Author says, opening her eyes wide. “You are to be congratulated, indeed.”

  “But the thought must be translated into the deed. And I have no money,” Lucy says simply. “My meagre earnings barely cover my rent, my food and the odd bonnet.”

  “Ah, I understand. Luckily, my earnings, as a result of the unwelcome glare of publicity, have recently grown incrementally. Name the sum and it shall be yours.”

  Lucy beams at her. “I so hoped you would be able to foot the bill. Shall we say fifty guineas? It sounds a nice round sum and I like guineas. So much more pleasant than mere pounds.”

  Mrs Hemmyng-Stratton swallows. Truth to tell, she has been stashing away bits of money ever since her first published book, with the aim of buying herself a little cottage in the Lake District (home to the late Mr. William Wordsworth and his friends), to use as a bolthole to escape the noise and unpleasantness of the city.

  She has always been sure she would be able to write even better books in the vicinity of the great poets of the not-so-distant past. But, she reminds herself, if she loses the upcoming court case, her home may well be the walls of a prison, and her writing days, good or bad, will be a fleeting memory.

  “Let it be so, then,” she sighs. “If you care to accompany me t
o my bank, I will arrange to withdraw the necessary funds.”

  Lucy claps her hands. “Excellent. I shall finish my tea at once.”

  “But how on earth do you plan to spirit her away from the Asylum?”

  Lucy raises her delicate eyebrows and smiles in a mysterious manner. “Ah. That is for me to work out. Volume three: The Great Escape.”

  ****

  Alas, there is no escape for Gerald Daubney, mentally or otherwise. Here he is, his black suit unbrushed, his cravat badly tied, his shoes in need of a good shine, entering the portals of the Antiquaries and Collectors Club. It is an unlikely sighting, given that Daubney has no particular craving for the society and conversation of others, but he has been lured here by the promise of a talk on Travels in Oriental China and Japan by Colonel Liversedge Pittkethly.

  The Colonel is not one of the members of the Club, but has recently returned from a long sea-voyage to distant parts, so has become a person of interest to the members. As these distant parts are also where much of Daubney’s collection originated, he has been drawn out of seclusion. Perhaps he will learn something that might bring consolation to him in his misery? It is a long shot, but anything is worth a try.

  Daubney enters the hallway, hands his outer coat, his umbrella and his top hat to the doorman, and mounts the staircase to the assembly room. The brightness of the chandeliers dazzles his eyes, used as they are to the dim gaslight of his quiet rooms. The noise of boots, the chatter of his fellow antiquarians falls like breaking rocks upon his ear.

  For a moment, he contemplates flight. Then his presence is noticed by Charles Warren and Augustus Roach-Smith, who bear down upon him like galleons in full sail. It is clear from their red faces, straining waistcoats and the cigars and balloons of brandy in their hands that they have attended the ‘pre-talk dinner’ downstairs.