The Walworth Beauty Page 15

  Joseph prodded his kipper with his fork. Footsteps thumped. Milly yelled from the hall: down in just a minute. Save me some coffee!

  Cara said: oh, goodness, I forgot, I left the coffee-pot boiling on the stove. And the loaf from yesterday warming up. Just let me go and see how it’s doing.

  Joseph mangled the crinkled, gold-black fish enough to make it look as though he’d eaten some of it at least. He ran upstairs, found his hat and coat, opened the front door to let out the odour of over-grilled kipper and over-boiled coffee and to let in the smell of the street. Bacon frying, rain-wetted dust, rotting fruit, sweating animal. Fresh, steaming heap of straw-packed horse dung: the milk-cart must be on its rounds.

  Sunlight washed over the house fronts. The postman, walking up from two doors along, hailed him, thrust out a bundle of letters. Joseph took them, nodded his thanks. The postman tipped his fingers to his hat, made off.

  Joseph drew the front door almost shut. He thumbed open the first three letters, scanned their contents. A terse note from the landlord, enclosing another copy of his last quarter’s bill for rent. A dunning note from the furniture shop where he’d bought the sideboard. Another from the auction house, enquiring about payment for the piano. He thrust them into his trouser pocket.

  The fourth envelope bore Mayhew’s handwriting. That characteristic black scrawl of his thick-nibbed pen. Joseph’s stomach somersaulted. If this was the boss’s response it was swift work. On reading Joseph’s report, delivered yesterday evening, he must have dashed off his reply immediately, caught a late post.

  Cara came up, pink-faced, from the kitchen: but you’re not staying for the bread!

  Her wrapper was faded, her brown slippers down-at-heel. He would buy her a new dressing-gown for her birthday, and some new slippers. Mules, perhaps. Why not? Something dainty, trimmed with fur, and to hell with the cost.

  Cara wiped her brow with her sleeve. She said: I’ve decided you’re right. I absolutely must find a maidservant.

  Joseph said: at last! I’m very pleased to hear that.

  Cara put out a hand and brushed a scrap of thread, silky-looking and golden, from his lapel, twiddled it between her fingers. She said: we could advertise. That’s how we found Kathleen.

  So that was the name of the Irish girl who sauntered in weekly to do the scrubbing. Joseph had caught sight of her once or twice, hunkered down over her brush, singing to herself as she worked. A pair of heels, an aproned bum, an outstretched red hand. Grey soapy water sluicing across the floor, a filthy rag draped over the back step.

  Cara said: Milly and I can go to the newspaper office this afternoon. That will make a nice walk with the children.

  She began twining the gold thread round her finger; a soft ring. Joseph said: no need for you to bother with newspaper offices. Much easier for me to attend to all that, while I’m out. I know the very place to begin making enquiries.

  Cara pulled off the gold thread, thrust it into her pocket.

  Where had he picked that up? From a tassel, it must have been. From the braid on those fancy gold satin cushions in Mrs Dulcimer’s drawing-room. Yesterday. He’d leaned back on those cushions fat as the pillows on a newly made bed. She’d sat there, wrapped in blue wool.

  He tore open Mayhew’s letter. The boss’s writing was decipherable, just, despite being dashed off with a scratching pen that left a trail of ink blots. Heavy black scorings-out, underlinings. The words jumped up and hit Joseph like fists. Incoherent. Not clear. Over-involved and over-subjective. These notes are of little use and these interviews must be repeated.

  The sour smell of burning erupted from the kitchen below. Cara cried: oh heavens, the bread! She rushed to the basement stairs.

  Joseph fetched his notebook from his desk. He picked up the new notebook too. Safer taken with him than left at home. He slammed the front door behind him and made off down the street.

  He strode south towards Blackfriars, weaving in and out between other pedestrians. Women in crinolines churned along like paddle-steamers, knocking him with their shopping baskets, their umbrellas, then glaring at him. Excuse me, ma’am, he repeated: excuse me.

  One woman strolling towards him slowed her pace to let him pass. Lively grey eyes. No bonnet, no gloves. Curly fair hair piled up loosely on top of her head. Long blue skirt of crinkled silk. Memory flared: that woman spotted in the cemetery yesterday. A trick of the light she’d been, a phantom composed of shadow and dazzle. Yet here she was again. As they came face to face she caught his eye, gave him a quizzical glance. Was she going to speak to him? Instinctively he put out a hand to halt her but she wheeled away, she was lost to him, the crowd behind caught him, carried him along.

  He’d walked too fast. His chest tightened, a powerful hand clenching him inside, squeezing him. Damn Mayhew and his fiddle-faddle criticisms. Just you try and do better.

  The wind pushed across his shoulder-blades, almost blew his hat off. The smell of Smithfield Market assailed him: meat grease and fat, warm blood, bones. He skirted a toppling heap of refuse, ripe and stinking, walked on down through Farringdon. Gutters strewn with yellow-green leaves of watercress. The fruit stalls were setting up, men hefting big baskets, building pyramids of apples. Workers shouted overhead, lowering containers of rubble from scaffolding. Ladders lifted themselves, fell.

  Barging past the bottom of Ludgate Hill, hearing St Paul’s bells boom out the hour, Joseph looked up at the great smoke-blackened façade. On impulse, he turned towards it.

  Climbing the five hundred-odd steps to the Golden Gallery restored him. The cold, fresh air blew about his head and calmed him. He stood among the clouds lively with bird’s wings, seagulls swooping and cawing. He looked down.

  Still early enough for clear, pearly light to remain. London not yet covered over by smoke. Long queues of omnibuses, miniatures, like the tin toys he’d played with as a child. Crowded with tiny dolls climbing on, climbing off, jerking their arms back and forth. Rounded fat shapes like sugar mice: the rumps of brewers’ drays. London was an engraving, black lines that moved. Black dots: people hurrying along in opposite directions. A scribbled black mass, swaying to and fro: carts and cabs, every driver intent on his business.

  This high up, from this lofty perspective, he could find detachment. Blackened breakfasts became grey pencil-shading, then faded. Rubbed out completely. Bills, Mayhew’s letter, floated away on the wind. Lean over the parapet, survey that mass of anonymous people, understand how at the same time each man in the crowd was an individual, struggling for existence, grabbing for life, determined to survive. Mayhew floated like a black-suited angel above the city. Mayhew cherished each of those individual black-dot lives, wanted to hear each person’s story; like some master novelist giving expression to all human beings. You could only do that by getting this high up, taking this distant perspective. Surveyed from this lofty eyrie, your material calmed, became manageable. Back down on the ground you got lost amid other men, no longer in charge of your vision, the crowd of humanity surged and knocked. Too many shifting points of view.

  The bells chimed the quarter-hour. Joseph corkscrewed down the staircase from the dome. Back to earth, he told himself. Ready to start afresh.

  He hailed an omnibus. What would Mayhew make of this ruffian driver, stove-pipe hat at an angle, pipe clenched in his teeth, hollering and cursing at other conveyances getting in his way as he coaxed his team along? Or that booted and caped inspector, standing there in the mud, watch clasped in one hand, notebook in the other? Whereas to others of Mayhew’s class they were invisible as the souls of the dead, to Mayhew they shone with purpose, with meaning. They formed part of the mighty army of working men who kept London alive. So get on with your own job, Joseph. That meant travelling to Walworth, to Apricot Place.

  Betsy opened the door, peered out, one hand on her swollen belly. Her face dull, her attention inward-turned. Where was her husband? Perhaps he worked away, re-joined her on Sundays. Joseph smiled at the girl, and she jerked, and lea
ned back.

  Mrs Dulcimer’s sitting-room held the scent and heat of a crackling fire. This morning she sported a crimson walking dress. Her black hair was a tied-up mass of curly plaits. An earring of blue turquoise chips bunched onto tiny gold wires clasped one earlobe. On the side table lay a straw bonnet adorned with a curling red feather.

  She said: so you’re back.

  He returned: yes, I’m back.

  She raked the red mass of the fire, settling it. She picked up her gloves, a little red bag that matched her walking-dress. Another badly chosen moment to visit! I’m on my way out to the market, to buy dinner. I must get to the butcher’s in good time.

  But she herself had suggested he call today! How would he ever pin the woman down? Butterfly fluttering hither and thither. His Walworth Beauty with flickering wings. Tantalising him, flying out of his reach. Joseph tightened his grip on his stick. I was hoping for a brief conversation.

  Mrs Dulcimer shook out her crimson skirts. Why not accompany me? We can talk as we go.

  She put up her hands to her hair, patted it, smoothed it behind her ears. Her fingers touched her earring, held it for a moment. Still twiddling an escaping tendril, she looked around for her bonnet. She said: it’s not far. Just along the main road.

  Joseph used to watch Nathalie re-arrange her hair. Slowly, eyeing him eyeing her, one by one she would pluck the combs from her ringlets, unfastening their high twists and loops. She shook out her thick, wavy brown mane. She faced him and preened, lifting her long curls, teasing them around her fingertips.

  Mrs Dulcimer’s spicy scent reached him. Carnations? Roses? Some fancy pomade. Her black velvet eye-shade lay on the side table, next to her bonnet. Nathalie was kissing the back of his neck. He wanted to capture her fingers: let’s see what we can do with this.

  The crisp frilled edges would tickle his face. Nathalie would tie the knot behind his head with a firm hand. He’d have to guess, in the plush darkness, quite what she was up to. She’d sit astride him, her nightdress up round her hips, her thighs, slippery with sweat, gripping him, releasing him. Soft as summer grass her sweet-smelling hair would fall onto his face, sweep across his mouth. Deft fingertips would flick it aside, the hair acting like a brush, swishing to and fro over his skin. He was a canvas and she was painting him. Shivers erupting all over him. Her mouth seizing his, long languorous kisses, she rocked up and down until he could bear no more, shouts of animal joy ripped out of him, she’d flop forwards onto him, her arms around his head, the fingers of one hand threaded into his hair. She’d reach for the knot, untie it, draw the mask away from his face. They would lie together, their legs interwoven, his head on her breast.

  Are you coming or not? Mrs Dulcimer threw a veil over her bonnet, picked up a red shawl with a blue and yellow paisley border. Shall we go?

  He followed her down the stairs. Daylight splashed from the landing window behind them onto the top of her bonnet, her red-draped shoulders. The bloodied boots he’d spotted yesterday had been removed.

  In the hall Mrs Dulcimer took up a large wicker basket, slid its glossy plaited handle over her arm. She said: remind me, won’t you, I must stop at the stationer’s stall. I’ve run short of paper, and of ink.

  The buttercup-yellow front door shut behind them. From over the wall at the end of the cul-de-sac the green breath of the countryside brushed Joseph’s nostrils again. Under the bitter-smelling pall of London smoke crept the scent of warm earth, of blackberries ripening. Wheatfields cut close and golden, stubble heating up in the sunshine. Trees bowed over with reddening apples, with swelling pears. He blinked, returned to the London street. Late October, sun and cool wind touching his cheek.

  Mrs Dulcimer lifted her skirts clear of the muddy ground. And then, if there’s time, I’m going to the library.

  Passing under the archway they turned out of Apricot Place, into Orchard Street, thence into the main road. Two hundred yards further on and the market hubbub beat up at them. Bawling street-sellers thrust forward their wares, purchasers jostled each other to get through. The throng parted a crack, and Mrs Dulcimer dived into the space opened up.

  Her red-feathered bonnet bobbed ahead. He scrambled in her wake. Stalls displayed tin saucepans, glossy blue and yellow crockery, towers of water tumblers, japanned tea-trays, roasting pans. One establishment showed off blue check shirts and red handkerchiefs hung on lines above its door. Another had headless dummies, dressed in fustian jackets, lining both sides of the pavement, with rows of secondhand shoes underneath them. Small boys wriggled through, holding up strings of onions. A confectioner pushed along, hoisting a tray of boiled sweets, striped and whorled like marbles.

  Joseph found his breath, his balance, called to Mrs Dulcimer: my work began with all this!

  A leather-aproned youth thrust a bucket of whelks at her face. She pushed the boy off, turned to study yellow haddock laid out on crushed ice on a marble slab. She sank her voice under the din, sending it out like a low note on a flute: you’re in business? You’re going to open a shop?

  A donkey cart backed, heaped with a slide of green and white turnips. The donkey released a stream of knobbly turds and the greengrocer stallholder summoned Mrs Dulcimer with a high whoop to look at his pickling cabbages, his potatoes.

  Joseph shouted: it’s a collaboration. My colleague’s idea. To record the lives of the labouring poor. I’m concerning myself with those who will not work. The criminal classes. One particular sub-section thereof.

  A gang of urchins took up the cry. The criminal classes! The criminal classes! The children squawked and danced. Mrs Dulcimer forged on. Joseph lurched along behind, banging into a brown-shawled woman proffering bunches of parsley, dodging a chorus line of pastry cooks in white aprons holding out platters of curd tarts.

  Mrs Dulcimer pointed. The butcher’s down there. She turned into a side street, where the crowd lessened a bit. Pheasants hung on hooks; strings of partridges and quails. A grey-haired woman building a pile of wooden crates called a greeting. A couple of overalled girls flogging walnuts stopped shouting long enough to shake hands. Another, sweat-darkened hair escaping from her shabby bonnet, shaking a pierced roasting pan full of chestnuts over a red-glowing brazier, screamed out hello from across the road. Their glances roamed over Joseph and passed on.

  The butcher’s shop counter, opening onto the street, was piled high with slabs of red and white meat, towers of fat cuts reaching almost to the first-floor windowsills. A small boy, flourishing a bunch of yellow feather dusters, shooed away the bluebottles that buzzed about.

  Mrs Dulcimer surveyed a mounded pink coil of sausages, a white enamel dish glistening with kidneys, flanked by another of white squares of tripe. Handkerchief clutched to his nose to keep off the stench of dead flesh, warm blood, Joseph managed to go on speaking. It can be hard work cajoling wrongdoers to accept being interviewed. Money helps. Or drink.

  The butcher’s assistants roared out the prices of saddle and flank. Neighbouring stallholders competed, advertising chickens and rabbits. Mrs Dulcimer ignored the din, pointed to the meat she wanted.

  Mind your backs! Joseph jumped aside as two cows lumbered past, driven by a gaunt crone wearing a man’s overcoat fastened with twine. He shouted: I try not to judge them. I just record what they say.

  Mrs Dulcimer battled forwards again. She paused, began choosing leeks, fat ones with white snub ends. She held out her basket for the vegetable-seller to tip a stream of orange carrots into it. She turned her head, glanced a question.

  He said: prostitutes, I mean. They’re very wary, most of them.

  Mrs Dulcimer said: they have reason to be wary of you, perhaps.

  He took the basket from her: let me carry this. She walked on ahead, but kept stopping, so that each time he bumped into her and had to apologise. She bought a ream of paper from one stall, a bundle of nib-holders from another.

  She said: for them to talk to you freely, they would need to trust that you were a true well-wisher, a true friend. />
  She fingered the silk scarves looped up, fluttering like streamers, in front of a hat shop. She conferred with the stallholder over the price of artificial anemones. Joseph leaned against the wooden post supporting the milliner’s canvas awning. Lengths of lace and ribbon blew in his face, tickled him.

  Was she mocking him? Nathalie would tease him rather than mock him. She’d seize a pillow and pummel him with it. Let go, let go, I need to get dressed. After a few protests, mind the baby, we must be careful of the baby, she would yield, he cried out I love you, he shuddered, he came. She held his shoulders and whispered: I love you too. Five minutes later she’d be up, hunting on the floor for her stockings. Silky black scraps. Sainte Vierge! There’s a great hole in the heel of this one. Oh, curses. They were meant to last until New Year.

  They emerged from the market at the top of the main road, where the common began. Mrs Dulcimer said: there! We’re done! Her red mouth curved. Her teeth shone in her dark face.

  Joseph said: there’s a lodging-house near Newington Causeway I need to visit again. In order to complete an interview. Would you accompany me? I think the inmates might talk to me if you were there too, to reassure them I mean no harm.

  She hesitated. Oh. All right. I suppose so.

  She turned under the massing trees, towards Newington. Joseph plodded along at her side. The invisible sun, burning through the smog floating overhead, pressed heat onto the shoulders of his overcoat. Too many layers of wool. The laden basket, too large to carry easily, bumped his thigh.

  He said: I need your help with something else as well. I’m looking for a maid of all work for my household. I thought you might know someone, given what you’ve explained to me of the nature of your lodging-house, your tenants.

  Mrs Dulcimer paused, stood still. A bee alighted on the edge of her bonnet. A golden-brown stud of fur. Quivering. She raised her hand, brushed it off.

  Joseph said: I’ve decided, by the way, not to press charges against the girl Doll. I accept that there were mitigating factors, which you hinted at, in her case. Some distressing circumstance, which made her behave, let us say, irrationally.