Exit the Actress (6 page)

“What?” I asked distractedly. I was trying to stir the beef stew and read Mr. Pink’s column in the
Gazette
at the same time.

“The end of the world, Ellen,” Rose repeated impatiently, “it is
next week
.”

“What?”
I asked, alarmed, dropping the spoon. Eventually, I got the full story. A lunatic in Bedlam Hospital has prophesised this calamity, and he would be discredited but this same fanatic also foresaw the king’s blessed Restoration. How like Rose to deliver such news without preamble. Just in case the end is near, Rose and I and possibly Grandfather are going to church this evening.

It was a good thing that Grandfather did not come, for the pews were overfull and he would have had nowhere to sit. Rose felt uncomfortable up front and preferred to stand near the door. Crowds make her nervous now that her reputation is growing. I squeezed in next to Mrs. Lake, the cheesemonger’s wife, who had obviously been eating garlic. Lots of garlic.

Now at home: Grandfather and I are off to bed. We no longer wait up for them. There is no point. They do not return until dawn. What a quiet little household we have become.

Relief. The lunatic was wrong. Nothing happened.

All of us at home today. Mother baked Christmas pies. The neighbours devoured most of them and then got sticky sugar on all the door latches. I played my guitar—Rose is mystified as to why I do not learn a more fashionable instrument. “A guitar is so
provincial,
” she complained, sounding like the old Rose. I welcomed her criticism, as she has been so unnaturally quiet lately.

This evening I attended a rousing musical lecture at Gresham College with Duncan, Grandfather, and Dr. Genner, an old friend of Grandfather’s who looks just how you want a doctor to look: white beard, kindly expression, and walking stick. Rose did not come along as she is rarely at home now that she has started working for Madame Ross at her large and notorious establishment in equally notorious Lewkenor Lane. It is a step up of a kind, I suppose. Mother is angry that Rose no longer works exclusively for her, but cannot complain about the extra money. She has already found a girl to replace her.

Rose was in the kitchen, hemming the sleeve of her new bluebell blue dress and drinking a bowl of chocolate when we came trilling home—a happy, boisterous quartet. I pulled off my hat and went to stand by the warm fire. Duncan stopped at the door and flushed crimson when he saw Rose. A sad sort of look flashed across Dr. Genner’s face, but he quickly crossed the room and kissed her cheek. “Lovely to see you, my dear. Are you keeping well?”

“Very well, thank you, Dr. Genner. Did you enjoy the concert?”

“It was a lecture, not a concert,” corrected Duncan from the doorway, and then he mumbled his thanks for an educational evening and fairly fled out the door.

“Rose, dear, is there any of that chocolate left to offer our guest?” asked Grandfather, unfazed, “or is that the last of it in your mug?” Rose smiled at the jibe; she has a sweet tooth and always finishes off the chocolate.

“No, there is plenty in the pot. I thought you might be coming back soon.”

“I can’t stop, either, I’m afraid,” said Dr. Genner. “Celia will start to fret.” He gently patted Rose’s cheek. “It was good to see you, my dear. You must stop in and see Celia. She misses you.” He left after shaking Grandfather’s hand and promising to thrash him in a game of backgammon on Sunday.

The three of us were left standing in the kitchen in the wreckage of the lovely night. Grandfather reached up to the high shelf and brought down two more mugs. Rose set down her sewing and poured out the thick chocolate. Once we were all settled at the table, I could no longer hold back, and my giggles erupted. “Forgive me, Rose,” I gasped. “Duncan just looked so uncomfortable and pompous, and then he … he … he
panicked.
”

Grandfather chuckled. “I think, my dear, he did not know quite what to say to you.”

Rose smiled sheepishly. “No. No one seems to know what to say to me these days.”

Even though I wore two pairs of woollen hose and stuffed my boots with paper, I still had to stomp my feet to keep my toes from freezing today. The wintry sun did little to warm me, and by two in the afternoon I could stand no more and ducked into the cook-shop for warmth and a beef pasty. What luxury! If Rose can spend money on absurd hair-combs, then I can surely buy a pasty. Regretfully, I did not have any hot cider as I need the money to buy lip salve tomorrow for my wind-whipped face. These days I am permanently pink—most unattractive.

Rose came home at dawn this morning and, thinking I was asleep, undressed in daylight. I gasped when I saw her bruised collarbone and forearms.

Rose turned, swiftly covering herself with her chemise. “It is not as bad
as it looks, Ellen,” she said tersely, pouring water from the china pitcher into the basin. “Go back to sleep.”

In the morning I found the cloth she had used to wash bundled at the back of the wooden washstand.
Blood.
So it is as bad as it looks.

The news:

Fourteen people froze to death in the village of Highgate, a five-legged cow was born in Chelsea, and the king asked his new queen to accept Barbara Castlemaine as her First Lady of the Bedchamber. She refused! Bravo!

The news:

The farmer in Chelsea is charging fourpence a head to see the five-legged cow. “Less than a penny per leg,” Grandfather said. “That is reasonable.” The Dutch have inflated the price of lace to more than seventeen shillings a yard, and Queen Catherine relented! Mother says a wise woman accepts. Rose says the young gallants are calling it the “Bedchamber Crisis.” Are those her customers—young gallants?

No oysters to sell. Today the whole country kept a solemn fast in remembrance of the late king’s murder. Funny that now that the king is restored, it is called murder: three years ago the punishment for mourning the late king’s execution was imprisonment. Grandfather, a true Cavalier, fasted despite his frail health. Twice I tried to filch some cheese from the sideboard, and twice Grandfather caught me. Unusually stern, he was
not
amused.

Meg, who sells oranges in Covent Garden, Orange Moll, as she is known, stopped to speak to me today. I was wearing a white smocked chemise under my new yellow pointed bodice that laces in the
back,
a present from Rose. Grandfather said I looked like a field of daisies.

“Turn, turn, so I can see!” encouraged Meg. I obliged, twirling in my
new clothes. “Ah, fresh and sweet and always a favourite with the customers. How do you like selling oysters?”

“They are smelly and the walk to the market is tedious and Mr. Morton is overly … forward.” I answered candidly. Will I ever learn to be discreet?

“I’ll bet he is. How would you like to sell oranges instead? I need one more girl for Mr. Killigrew’s new theatre in Bridges Street.” She held out a fat, round orange. “For the birthday girl.”

“Thank you!” I said, pocketing the sweet fruit. China oranges are such a luxury; I would save it to share with Grandfather.

“You’d best understand,” she said, catching my chin in her hand, “I sell fruit, not girls. The minute you sell yourself, you work for someone else.” She looked hard at my face, her expression searching and fierce. Then, breaking into a smile, she patted my cheek. “No, I can see it. You don’t have the vanity to go bad. Not like your sister over in Lewkenor Lane. She was always going to go that way.” I must have shown my surprise, for she laughed a kind, enveloping laugh. “Oh yes, sweeting, I’ve been watching you.”

So it is decided: I will give up the Octopus and become an orange girl.

Note—If Candlemas day be dry and fair
—but it was cloudy, so six more weeks of hard winter.