by Iris Cole
She knocked and took a step back.
The door creaked open a few moments later, to reveal the face of an older woman with stove-reddened cheeks and a tangled bird’s nest of hair upon her head. But she smiled as she looked upon Clary, and there seemed to be a joviality about her.
“Can I help ye, me girl?” the woman said, drying her hands upon a ragged cloth.
Clary tried to peer into the hallway behind the woman. “I’m looking for the Tennyson family. I believe they live here… or they did, seventeen years ago.”
“Not anymore, me girl.” The woman stuck out her hand. “The name’s Harriet. I’ve lived in this house for nigh-on thirty years now. I remember the Tennysons well, but they haven’t lived under this roof for… well, for around that time. Sixteen or seventeen years.”
Despair threatened to bring fresh tears to Clary’s eyes. “Did you know Rebecca Tennyson?"
“Oh, that sweet girl.” Harriet dipped her chin to her chest. “She were a beauty, that one. Could’ve charmed herself a lord if she’d wanted to. I think she was engaged, if I’ve got me memories right. A sailor or a merchant. Something like that. Marriage never happened though, poor mite. Died of a fever, she did. She were probably about your age, I’d say. We all mourned for a week, we did—hung black cloth in our windows. Brought what food we had around for her poor ma. Any death is sad, but… oh, I’ve never seen anyone so heartbroken. She were like a ghost, wandering about with this blank look on her face. It were probably for the best they moved away, in the end. Too many bad memories.”
She’s… dead. She died. She died when she was my age, right here in this house.
Clary had assumed as much, but there was a vast difference between an assumption and hearing it spelled out in plain, crushing words. It was made all the worse by hearing that Rebecca’s mother—Clary’s grandmother—had been so utterly bereft at the loss of her daughter.
On the journey over, Clary had tried to think of a reason why her mother would have been forced to seek refuge at a boarding house instead of having her child at home. The obvious probability was that her family had cast her out, or that she had been terrified of being cast out, but Harriet’s description of grief did not fit that notion.
“Cross! That was the boy!” Harriet clicked her fingers. “Freddie Cross. There’s a name I’ve not spoken in years. Handsome fella, he was. They’d have made a pretty pair if she hadn’t got sick. Not sure what happened to him, though. I suppose he didn’t want to hang around after Rebecca passed.”
Clary could not speak. All she could do was stare down at the cobblestones, trying to come to terms with the fact that her search was over. If Rebecca was dead, and Freddie had gone elsewhere, there was nowhere else to look. Unless…
“Do you know where the Tennysons went?”
Harriet canted her head. “Oh Lord, no. One day, the family were here. The next, they weren’t. I couldn’t tell ye where they went, but I hope they found some peace.” She squinted at Clary. “What were ye wanting with them?”
“They’re… family of mine, but I only recently found out,” Clary replied, without thinking.
Harriet surged forward and took hold of Clary’s hand. “Ye’re her daughter, aren’t ye? I knew it wasn’t just any sickness. When ye’ve lived as long as I have, ye get to know these things.”
Clary nodded. What harm would it do to be honest? It was not as though the revelation would ruin her mother’s reputation, for she was buried six-feet under the ground.
“Frederick Cross is my father,” she murmured. “I suppose I came here seventeen years too late.”
Harriet squeezed Clary’s hands tighter. “Well, why didn’t ye say so?” She yanked Clary down the street, striding across the cobbles as though she reigned over this part of London. Clary had no idea where they were going, but she lacked the strength to resist.
They marched all the way to the bottom of the row of terraces, past startled children and whispering women.
Curious eyes followed, no doubt intrigued by this sudden turn of events in their otherwise quiet street. A few men, smoking tobacco, watched Clary walk by with interested eyes, but she barely noticed them. She was content to concentrate on her shoes, and the forward motion of her legs, in a vain attempt to stop the tears from rolling down her cheeks once more.
Harriet paused outside a different door and went straight in, not bothering to knock. As Clary found herself being dragged into a hazy hallway that smelled of bacon grease and woodsmoke, another older woman poked her head out of the nearby doorway, which branched off from the main corridor.
“What’s this now?” The woman mopped her perspiring brow on the corner of her apron. “Did you smell the ham cooking, Harriet? You’ve always had a nose on you.”
Harriet pushed Clary towards the stranger. “This girl just came to me door, asking after the Tennysons.” She raised an eyebrow. “Just told me she’s Rebecca’s Tenyson’s daughter. I told ye, didn’t I, that she didn’t die from no normal fever. I said, didn’t I—girls don’t just disappear for weeks on end, only to come back with a fever. I told ye at the time, Brenda—I said that girl’s had herself a wain, but ye told me to mind me own business.”
“I told you to keep that big, gossip-sniffing nose out of it,” the woman, apparently named Brenda, replied. She turned to Clary, passing a scrutinising gaze across her. “Is that true, what my friend just said? Are you Rebecca’s wain?”
Clary nodded. “I am.”
“And Freddie Cross is the pa, Brenda!” Harriet interjected. “I said it were his doing! I said he were no good for that beautiful girl, but everyone said, “He’s a right’un, Harriet—you don’t know what you’re talking about.” He must’ve tricked her, the sly dog. I’d stake me life on it.”
Brenda rolled her eyes. “Freddie and Rebecca were engaged, you old fool. His ship was waylaid, and he came back to see Rebecca as soon as he returned, so they could wed. The poor boy arrived just in time to see her die, so you keep your slurs to yourself. He deserves your sympathy, not your idle mutterings.”
My father watched my mother die…
Clary felt as though someone had reached inside her stomach and tried to wrench out her innards, as she stumbled into the nearest wall.
Without its firm support, she feared she might have crumpled to the ground again, and she truly did not want these two strangers watching her descend into a sobbing, wailing mess.
“And you’re sure it’s Freddie that’s your pa?” Brenda brought Clary out of her private pain.
“It said so in the documents,” Clary replied. “I was left at the Foundling Hospital, you see.”
Brenda clicked her tongue. “Ah, the silly girl.”
“Pardon?” Clary felt a flicker of defensiveness.
“Your ma, Rebecca, must’ve found herself in the family way after Freddie went to sea. Poor creature must’ve thought he wasn’t coming back,” Brenda explained, softening her tone slightly. “It’s a familiar story round this way. A girl is charmed by a sailor, he coaxes her into his bed with promises of marriage, and then he disappears without a trace, leaving the girl with a wain and no husband to make it right. But Freddie wasn’t like that.”
Clary’s ire settled, for she had thought Brenda intended to cast judgment on her mother.
Instead, it really seemed as though the old woman sympathised with Rebeca’s plight. And yet, the old woman’s words came with a slight twist of envy. These two knew all about Rebecca Tennyson. They had lived in her proximity. They had no doubt spoken with her a thousand times. They had seen her smile, and heard her laugh, and watched how she walked, and how her hair shone in the summer sunshine. They had seen her fall in love, and they had seen her pass from this Earth… and Clary had seen none of it. She never would.
Brenda put her hand upon Clary’s shoulder. “You look like them both, my girl. Exactly like them both.” She smiled sadly. “How long have you been searching for them?”
“All my life,” Clary whisper
ed, biting back a sob.
Brenda nodded. “I can only imagine, but you’ve come to the right place.” She paused. “The trouble is… ah, I don’t know how to tell you, my girl.”
“What?” Clary squeaked.
Brenda exhaled slowly. “I can take you to your pa, but you might not like what you see.”
A million worrying thoughts stampeded through Clary’s mind. What was that supposed to mean?
Had her father turned into a violent, wretched drunk? Did he have a different family now? Had he received some affliction that had left him addled in the head?
“He isn’t well, my girl,” Brenda continued, offering a sliver of an answer. “Got himself some sickness in his chest. He’s living not far from here, at a boarding house. I know you won’t remember him at all, and maybe that’s a good thing. You’d be shocked if you could remember what he used to look like.”
Clary grabbed Brenda’s forearms tightly, her eyes widening to the whites. “Take me to him!” she begged. “Please, take me to him!”
She would not suffer the same fate as him, arriving too late at the bedside of someone that meant so much. Even if he did not believe who she was or lacked the capacity to hear her or speak with her, she would stay beside him and she would tell him her story. The only thing that mattered was that she got to see him, at least once, before she lost the chance forever.
After all, she had a coin to return.
Chapter Twenty-Three
After following Brenda through a labyrinth of identical streets, Clary arrived outside the grim, dilapidated façade of the boarding house. At first, Clary thought Brenda was mistaken about the address, for this did not even look like the kind of place a stray dog would deign to call home. Rickety planks served as the exterior wall, with no windows whatsoever, and additional boards hammered into place over holes and gaps that had either crumbled of their own accord or had been kicked into submission.
“This is where my father is?” Clary stared in disbelief. How could anyone be living within?
Brenda nodded. “He is, my girl. You’ll find him up the stairs—last room on the right.” She hesitated. “I’d come in with you, but I’ve got my grandchildren to think of, and this place is rife with disease.”
“It’s all right. You should go back. I’ll manage on my own.” Clary sounded more confident than she felt. The churn in her belly warned her not to enter, but she had come this far—she could not turn away now.
Once Brenda had departed, Clary steeled herself. Taking a few steadying breaths, she walked up to the thin rectangle of wood that served as a door; the entire thing swinging off its hinges. She pushed on through, entering a bleak, dark corridor. It was hard to see even a few paces ahead of her in the dim light, though she was somewhat glad of that when her foot slipped in something viscous.
Pressing on along the corridor, listening to the steady drip of water leaking from above, and trying to avoid it splashing upon her in case it was not water, she reached the staircase.
Grabbing the flimsy, splintered banister, she pulled herself up the steps, careful to keep to the outer edges of each one, where the frame offered more support.
She did not fancy crashing through the warped, rotting wood, or getting her leg trapped in a shattered snare of wooden shards.
She moved up through three floors, trembling at every loud bang and roared expletive that came from the surrounding rooms. With few exceptions, men terrified her. Unpredictable, strange men terrified her most of all.
At the top floor, she crept along a creaky landing, until she came to the last door on the right, just as Brenda had instructed. Although, to call it a door seemed laughable. It was nothing more than a stained, motheaten blanket that had been hung from a sagging doorframe.
Seventeen years… seventeen years I’ve looked for you, and it ends here.
For a moment, she could not bring herself to knock upon the jamb and enter, petrified of what she might find. All her life, she had let her imagination do the bulk of the work, conjuring up visions of the mother and father who had created her. She had created countless stories to explain why they had not returned to the hospital, but they had always been alive and well in her mind.
Now, she had to face a dead mother, who she would never meet, and a sick father who might not have much longer in this world. In truth, it was the farthest thing from the heartfelt reunion she had pictured.
You have to do this, Clary. If you don’t, you’ll regret it for the rest of your days, she told herself sternly.
With that sentiment circling in her head, she took those terrifying steps forward and rapped her knuckles against the jamb. She did not even wait for a reply as she flung the blanket aside and walked into the room.
A gasp escaped her throat as she looked upon the wretched chamber, tucked into the sunken eaves of the attic. Pigeons roosted freely, their excrement patterning the floor, and though there were no windows, the sun streamed in through great, gaping cracks in the roof.
Buckets had been arranged here and there to catch the worst of any leaks, but she could smell the mould of the floorboards, where the rain had saturated the wood. As for the walls—the mould flourished there, smattering the ancient whitewash until it looked as though it had deliberately been painted black.
“Who’s there?” a small, rasping voice whispered.
Clary’s eyes darted to the cot on the ground, in the far corner of the attic. She had not even realised it was a bed, for it looked like an abandoned pile of festering laundry. But then the pile moved, and she knew her father was beneath it.
Forgetting her fear, she hurried to the cot and knelt beside it, pulling back the rancid blankets to reveal the face of the man who had once loved her mother.
Nothing could have prepared her for the skeletal features, the sunken eyes, the rash-dappled, grey-toned skin, or the lank, greasy hair that might have been the same coppery shade of hers if she could see it washed. His lips were cracked and bleeding, a furred tongue poking out to lick some moisture into them. And his bluish-grey eyes did not seem able to concentrate on her.
“Are you Freddie Cross?” Clary forced the words out.
He winced, as if in pain. “I… am. Have you… come to bury me, at last?”
“Not if I may help it.” Clary eyed the room, looking for a pitcher of water, or something she might be able to feed him. When she found nothing, she knew she would have to take matters into her own hands.
She was a healer, was she not? And this man was in need of her care. “I’ll be back soon, do you hear? Just… stay as you are until I return.”
She jumped up and sprinted back the way she had come. A few coins jangled in her pocket; it would not buy much, but it would buy enough to give him a nudge towards strength. She only hoped that he would still be alive by the time she got back to his filthy bedside.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Half an hour later, Clary had her father propped up against one of the mouldering walls, while she steadily urged a soggy mixture of bread and milk into his parched mouth. He had already drunk most of a pitcher of water, that she had drawn with her own two hands from the pump down the street. Already, he seemed more lucid, though she did not know how long it might last.
“Did someone… send you here?” her father asked, after swallowing a mouthful of the sodden concoction.
Clary offered him some more water, which he took gratefully. “I’ve been looking for you for a long time.”
“You have?” he wheezed. “Why’s that? Do… I owe you… money?”
Clary shook her head. “Do you remember someone by the name of Rebecca Tennyson?”
Immediately, her father’s entire demeanour changed. His eyes turned sad, and his hands dropped back down into his lap, almost upending the tin cup that had been half-drained of water. His shoulders hunched, and he seemed to retreat into himself, as he stared down at his thin legs.
“Why would… you ask me… a thing like that?” he rasped. “Only… woman I’ve ever… lov
ed. If you’re looking… for her, you’re years… too late. She died. Died before… I could say goodbye.”
Clary held back tears. “I’m her daughter, Freddie. I’m your daughter.” She unfastened the chain around her neck and slipped her father’s disc off it. Laying it flat in her palm, she held it out to him. “She left me at the Foundling Hospital with this, and I’ve been searching for you ever since.”
His gaze lifted to the coin, whilst his thin, bony fingers reached out for it. He did not take the coin out of her hand.
Instead, he brushed his fingertip across it, as though feeling the indents of the carved saints. A sad smile turned up the corners of his lips.
“I wondered… where that had gone.” He turned his rheumy eyes up to Clary. “Rebecca never… took it off, but… it wasn’t there when she… died. I thought she’d… lost it.”
“She didn’t,” Clary urged. “She left it with me. Your daughter.” She did not know if he had heard her the first time. “Rebecca was with-child when you went away to sea. She mustn’t have known until you had already gone, and… I think she was worried she might be cast out if you didn’t come back and marry her, so she went off, alone, to have me by herself. She truly must have thought you’d gone missing, or she would never have given me up, however temporarily.”
Her father’s eyes widened a touch. “You are… my daughter? Rebecca’s daughter?”
“I am,” Clary replied, struggling with the weight of her emotions.
For so long, she had wanted to say that she belonged to someone, but this was not the situation she had envisioned.
“Seventeen years ago, she left me at the Foundling Hospital. Your name was on my documents. I hoped I would find you both, but I only recently discovered that my mother is… no longer here.”
Her father’s gaze flitted between the coin and Clary, his brow furrowing in confusion. “Is that… really true?”