by Edie Cay
“Higher!” Bess yelled at Violet.
The burlap bags of sand were held up by a rope on a pulley. Violet held one end of the rope, but she always got distracted so the bags sagged lower and lower to the ground. Tonight was supposed to be a rest night, time to give her body a chance to heal and rebound from the strenuous workouts she’d been pursuing. But what else was she supposed to do? John was laid up with his new babe, Os was gone, and Violet was easier to watch when she was confined in the gym.
The girl yanked the bags back up to the correct height and Bess continued her work, dancing around the swing of the bags as they recoiled from her jabs. This felt comfortable. This was home, where the world felt normal and easy. It would feel better on the day Os returned. It would feel better when she met the Irish lass, Bridget Kelly, and could size her up in person. The world would feel the best when she beat her opponent, fair and square, and was paid like the fighter she was.
How much sweeter would it be to have Os there, cheering her on, pulling her into a sweaty, victorious embrace? She wanted the fantasy so bad she could almost taste it.
But it slowed her down. Focus was better than imagination. Clarity better than intelligence. Grit better than deliberation. Once in the ring, she had to blind herself in a way she’d never had to before. She’d never fought a woman without having at least some idea of her reputation. That slimy bastard O’Rourke purposefully kept her in the dark.
Bess was focused enough that it took her a moment to hear Violet speaking. When she came out of her concentration, she saw Miz Penny sitting on the steps. She was not yet in her night rail, so the hour wasn’t that late. The sandbags drooped another half a foot.
“I guess I need a break anyway,” Bess said, taking a step back. “Violet, you can let go.”
The sandbags dropped so hard she thought they would burst. At least her foot hadn’t been under there. She untucked the sleeve of her dress and used it to wipe the sweat from her forehead.
“How are you, Miz Penny?” Bess asked, catching her breath.
“Doing well, dearie. I thought you’d want to know that the Irishman was in tonight.”
“Irishman?” Bess shook her head.
“Yes.” Miz Penny nodded her head, wispy gray hairs coming out of her bun. “The Irishman and his lady boxer.”
“Mr. O’Rourke?” Bess asked. A pit formed in her stomach. Bridget Kelly was real and she was here.
“Sounds right. The lass was tall, but right pretty,” Miz Penny said. “Hard to believe she was a fighter.”
The comment stung, even though it wasn’t supposed to. Miz Penny associated the look of fighters with her, and she was ugly. A pretty lass couldn’t be a fighter because fighters were ugly. Why else were they fighters?
“Does Tony know?” Bess asked.
“Oh, yes,” Miz Penny said, getting to her feet. “He’s out with them, showing her off to the neighborhood.”
“He’s doing what?” Bess yanked at her dress. Tony was not allowed to hawk fights for another female fighter.
“I think they were headed to the Lion,” Miz Penny said. “Just a quick tipple before helping them get settled.”
“Let’s go, Violet,” Bess said. “Get Abigail.”
The girl scooped up the cat from her place on a bench against the wall. Bess finished the buttons at the neck of her dress and shook her arms into the fabric.
“Oh, no need to go after Tony,” Miz Penny said. “Let me get you a pasty.”
“I don’t want a pasty,” Bess snapped. The look of fear on the older woman’s face chilled the fighter. It was easy to forget that her size was an implied threat. Even a harsh word sent many scrambling for safety. “I’m sorry, Miz Penny. But I need to go see this Bridget Kelly for my own eyes.”
“I just thought you would want to know. Size up the lass, but save the fighting for the ring,” Miz Penny said, her chin tucked under, as if she were still uncertain of Bess’s intentions.
Bess grunted her assent and pushed Violet out of the pub.
Manchester made Os feel like a stranger. He had looked in at a number of churches, asking after the Society for the Brotherhood of Mankind, but received wordless head shakes from little old ladies tending the dusting. Finally, he set out to the section of town that was meant for people like him, a place where he had tried to live but ultimately failed.
It was disheartening to think the people who had once helped him were no longer about, no longer working on the behalf of those trapped on the islands. He didn’t believe the Society and its members had vanished, of course, but where were they? Why couldn’t he find them?
Discouraged, he let his feet lead the way. As he wound his way through familiar narrow streets, he finally came upon what he was looking for: Horace. The older man’s face creased slowly, his dark eyes squinting with a genuine smile that took his entire face.
“Never thought I’d see you again,” Horace said from his perch on the steps of his home, a tight two-story thatched-roof building wedged between two identical houses.
“Never thought I’d be in Manchester again,” Os said, extending his hand.
The older man batted his hand away and embraced him fully. Holding him close, Os could feel the thinness of him, weight stripped away, the blades of his shoulders protruding underneath his shirt. Horace had aged more than Os had expected. There was no doubt that his hair had turned from salt-and-pepper to a distinguished white froth, but the new frailty was alarming.
“Have you returned?” Horace asked.
Os shook his head. “I leave tomorrow.”
Horace looked up and down the street. His dark skin used to shine with energy but had faded to an almost dusty hue. “Sophia will be unhappy with you.”
His stomach lurched. “Has she not found someone new?”
Horace shrugged. “For a time, but the mine is a perilous place.”
Os winced. Cave-ins weren’t common, but they happened. “Anyone I know?”
“I doubt you would have known him. Fine fellow. Bit dull, but we can’t all be blacksmiths.” Horace winked and shuffled away. “You need a place to stay tonight? We’ve a room if you’d like it.”
The sweating of Os’s palms almost made him say no. “I’d be obliged, thank you.”
“Anything you need, Mr. Worley, I will provide,” Horace said, the old smile reappearing on his face.
Os followed him up the stairs, looking forward to the reunion with his erstwhile family and dreading it all the same.
Later on, the people stuffed in around the dinner table roared with laughter. Even Os chuckled as Horace recounted another one of his times as a traveling performer. Many of them had heard the tale before, but it didn’t matter—it was clear Horace made sure his home was everyone else’s, too.
There weren’t many he recognized anymore, as the gathering was a younger crowd. This was a place for the lonely, the widowed, and the injured. It had been Os’s haven when he was lonely, and this was just the newest batch of orphans. Each of them with skin of a darker hue, some from all over the world, some born in England, but all of them in need of family.
Mary Reed cleared the dishes without comment, a task she’d done for what must have seemed a lifetime. As Horace’s common-law wife, she kept quiet while he regaled, provided food while he provided succor. Why they never married in a church, Os didn’t know, but it didn’t seem to bother them, so it was no concern of anyone else’s.
Os stood to aid Mary Reed, but she gestured for him to stay and sit. Reluctantly, Os dropped himself back down on the bench between Donovan, a scrawny factory worker, and Mr. Ashford, a light-skinned man who tutored middle-class children in mathematics. Though it was unimportant, Os couldn’t help but note that he was still the biggest man in the room, unable to keep his shoulders from pushing against both men. If he were less stoic, he might have let the fact crease his face with a smile.
Horace started up on a new story, this time a tale that even Os remembered. A few groans came from around
the table, but Horace kept on telling about how he had chased Mary Reed when he was a younger man. Horace was almost at the part where he ended up locked inside a pub overnight when the front door of the boarding house creaked open. Light footsteps came down the entryway, and the one woman Os had dreaded seeing again walked into the room.
She was still beautiful, in her way. Older, yes. The lines at her mouth had deepened and smaller ones were apparent at her eyes. She wore a headscarf like the women on the islands did, even though most women in Manchester didn’t. Maybe she remembered how much he had liked seeing her like that. Maybe she didn’t, and this was just how she was now.
Os looked down at his plate just as Mary Reed whisked it away from him. She nudged him with her hip, pointing out Sophia’s entrance, as if every man in the room hadn’t noticed. The men surrounding the table watched Sophia come in, carrying a hamper full of some kind of treat. Two women rose from the table and joined Mary Reed, following her and Sophia into the small kitchen.
Horace continued his story, never wavering from the punchline. “And now here I am, sitting at her table!”
A few of the men gave some chuckles, but it was too familiar of a tale to be as riotously funny as the other ones he’d told that night.
“Os,” Horace singled him out. “Why don’t you see if the ladies need you to go carry some water up here. I have a feeling they’re going to be wanting to serve some coffee.”
Os stared the old man down, but it didn’t seem to bother him a bit.
“I can,” Donovan said, standing.
Still maintaining eye contact with Horace, Os got to his feet. “It’s the least I can do for a place to sleep tonight.” He clapped his hand on Donovan’s shoulder, understanding that he’d been set up.
Horace had maneuvered him to sit next to Donovan, knowing Sophia would come. He wanted to point out how broad Os was, showing how much healthier he was than Donovan, if that was in fact her newest suitor. Some loyalties didn’t fade with distance or time. It made Os feel unworthy of this man’s faith. He’d left them behind when he moved to London. He’d left all of them without so much as a backwards glance.
Mary Reed tossed another small shovel’s worth of coal into the stove, stoking the fire to heat a kettle full of water. Os stood in the doorway. There was no room for another person in the small kitchen, even one who wasn’t of an unusually large size.
“I’ve come to offer any assistance,” Os said, trying not to look at Sophia.
“Thank you, but we’ve plenty of hands,” Mary Reed said. “Though you might help Sophia with the oatcakes.” Mary Reed was as thin as Horace and just as mischievous.
The other two women shuffled around, allowing Os access to Sophia. It was easy to look everywhere but at her face, the one he had found, years before, to be the loveliest he’d ever seen. Her light brown eyes pinned him despite his best efforts. She would have been an extraordinary beauty had she not had a scar across one side of her face. While she often tried to hide it, Os had always told her that it made her more beautiful, as she was far more interesting with the scar than without.
But she didn’t hide it tonight. She wore it like her badge, proud and plain on her face. He wondered if she had come to terms with that part of herself, letting it make her stronger.
“It’s good to see you,” she said, her voice low, as if the other women couldn’t hear them.
“And you,” Os said.
“Is it?” she asked. “I couldn’t be sure.”
Os shrugged. “Water under the bridge.”
She reached out and squeezed his arm, as if to thank him. Her touch sparked his body, a flood of warm memories of their time together. She had wanted more and he had wanted to leave. The damning words she had yelled at him the last time she saw him had hurt, but just like his ardor, the pain of that had cooled as well.
Years were sometimes short and sometimes long, but Os didn’t know if he would have been able to grant forgiveness without having Bess back in London. Being with her took the sting out of so many things, and while he rarely thought of Sophia anymore, his feelings for her had been nothing compared to what he felt now for a different woman.
“We’ll need more water,” Mary Reed announced.
Os turned. “I’ll go pump another bucket,” he offered.
Mary Reed waved her bony hand. “I wouldn’t dream of asking a guest to do such a thing. It isn’t like I haven’t hauled a bucket of water already today. Ladies?” She gathered up the other women, leaving Os and Sophia alone in the kitchen.
Sophia watched them go before looking back up to Os. “She means well.”
“She thinks you’re lonely,” Os said.
Sophia shrugged. “I am.” She unpacked another row of oatcakes from the tin, lining the plate, orderly and straight. “Are you?”
He had always appreciated her need for straight lines, despite his own urge to find a spiral where she looked for rows. “Manchester makes me lonely.”
She turned and put her hand on his chest, over his heart. “Do you mean to stay?”
Os shook his head. How to tell her that while her touch was warm and welcome, it was like a cooking fire compared to the iron-smelting furnace that Bess awakened? “I have a life in London. A foundry, an apprentice.”
“A woman?” she supplied.
He winced. It wasn’t that he didn’t want to tell her about Bess—he did—but how to do so gently? How to do it without parading Bess in front of strangers, something he knew that she would hate? He stuttered, instead. “Yes,” he said, finally. To deny Bess’s existence would be a worse offense.
“You aren’t certain?” Sophia teased, the pressure of her hand over his heart intensifying.
He put his hand over hers, wrapping her small limb in his, so unlike Bess’s large, lethal hands. “Very certain.” He plucked her hand off his chest.
She pulled back and turned to the biscuit tray. “Then all of Mary Reed’s machinations are for naught.”
“The gentlemen in the dining room will be relieved,” Os said.
Sophia gave him a smirk. “They’re young yet, charmed by only half of a pretty face.”
“You’re likely the most fascinating woman they’ve ever met,” Os said, turning to lean against the wall, arms folded.
“In Manchester? Of course,” she said, picking up the tray of oatcakes. “But I guess not as fascinating as the women in London.” She left him there in the kitchen, swaying into the dining room with a swish of her hips that he suspected was meant to remind him of what he’d once had with her.
Maybe he should have not told her he had found someone else. Or perhaps softened the blow somehow. He had forgotten how alluring Sophia could be.
Bess counseled herself to remain calm. Violet was there, in tow, as always, and she needed to be a good example for the girl. There was no need to cause a scene—Tony was likely just being courteous for the first time in his slimy, self-important life.
The door to the Lion was likely just weak in the hinges, for as she burst in, it managed to fall off the bottom hinge, leaving it to hang until it a patron jumped up to hold it in place. Tony stood at the bar with Mr. O’Rourke and a large blonde woman who could be no other than Bridget Kelly. She had curly, straw-colored hair, and she cut a fine figure, though she was tall like Bess.
“Oi! Wot’s the meaning of this, then?” Bess said. The other patrons stopped the chatter and stared at her. She could feel their eyes and their fear, but she didn’t care. In some ways, it was not unlike a fight night.
“Or you can meet her now,” Tony said to Bridget Kelly, as if he were finishing a sentence.
Bridget Kelly turned, and Bess saw that Miz Penny had been right. The lass was not what Bess expected. Bess had anticipated a lifelong fighter, with evidence of such all over her face. A badly healed nose, cauliflower ears, a neck that wouldn’t snap like a twig. But no, Bridget Kelly was beautiful. Her eyes were large and green, and her nose was small and clearly unbroken. It wasn’t fair. T
he only thing she had in common with Bess was her height.
Her figure was far better, too. Her breasts were large, balanced by the width of her hips, which weren’t too narrow, nor too wide. Her dress was a simple country frock, but in a shade of green to match her eyes. It was as if O’Rourke and Tony had seen all the things that Bess was not and funneled them into a different woman.
Had she thought about going up against a woman who looked like this, Bess would have assumed she would enjoy fighting her. The glee in knocking out a couple of teeth seemed obvious. But now that she was faced with such a pretty opponent in the flesh, Bess only felt insignificant and dirty.
“Mr. O’Rourke you’ve met,” Tony said, stepping around Bridget Kelly to make introductions. “And this is Miss Bridget Kelly. May I introduce your opponent, Miss Bess Abbott.”
“Miss Kelly,” Bess managed to say.
“Miss Abbott,” her opponent greeted her in return.
A thousand incomprehensible insults swirled in her mind, but Bess kept her mouth shut. This was not the time to pick a fight. Os would have advised prudence, as would John. There was no need to start animosity here, and especially not in front of Violet. But Bess couldn’t hide the violence in her mind, knowing her expression was likely murderous.
“Miss Kelly will be needin’ to get some shut-eye, if you don’t mind,” Mr. O’Rourke said, guiding the fighter by her elbow, placing himself in front of her.
“Let me show you to a boarding house,” Tony said, leaving a coin on the bar for his drink. “Miss Abbott, I’ll go over the details with you in the morning. Get some rest.”
Miss Abbott her foot. The trio passed Bess, none of them looking her in the eye except Bridget Kelly. She had the decency to give a nod in greeting. As she passed, Violet grabbed Bess’s skirt.
“She’s so pretty!” Violet said in a loud whisper.
Bess’s stomach lurched. It shouldn’t have felt like a betrayal, but it did.