Never Look Back (12 page)

Last August with its stifling hot weather had been a kind of watershed in both their lives. In that month she had heard about the Reverend Milson’s intention to move to America, her father had met Dolly, and her brothers had run away from home. Matilda had been deeply troubled by all three events, but now six months later it seemed as if everything had turned out for the best and luck was smiling on the Jennings family at last.

Luke and George had run off after being given a beating by their father for picking pockets. He guessed they were hiding in
one of the hundreds of rookeries in Seven Dials but all his attempts to find them came to nothing. Countless old hags and their bully boys made a business of luring children into their lairs by offering them food and shelter. Once they had got them firmly in their clutches they trained them as thieves, taking most of the proceeds.

Around the same time Lucas met Dolly Jacobs. He had been rowing a party down the river towards the village of Barnes one hot afternoon, and one of their number suggested stopping off for refreshments at Willow Cottage tea garden.

Lucas stayed in his boat while the group sat at tables in the pleasant riverside garden with their tea and cakes, but a little later, the woman who owned it brought him down a jug of ginger beer. Lucas related later to Matilda what a nice, jolly woman she was, and how he had offered to drop in again before long and repair an old rowing boat she had moored on her landing stage.

The friendship between her father and Dolly grew as he repaired the boat, and before long he was calling on her regularly to do more odd jobs. Dolly and her late husband had owned a very successful cake shop in Cheapside. Around five years ago they had sold their shop and retired to Willow Cottage because of Mr Jacobs’s ill health. Sadly he had died a year after moving there. Dolly had been left well provided for but she was lonely, so she opened up her garden and parlour as a tea garden.

Matilda was concerned at first that this little widow might be using her father, for she couldn’t imagine why else a woman in her position would befriend a humble waterman. But she knew her father was very lonely, and as it seemed to be taking his mind off fretting about the boys, she kept her fears to herself.

It was at the end of October that they got news of George, through a carter named Mr Albert Gore out in Deptford. Gore had caught both brothers stealing from his wagon, and though Luke had managed to give him the slip, he had felt sorry enough for George to take him home with him for a meal and a bath. From what George told the carter about his older brother and his family situation, he realized that the easily led boy had been forced into thieving by Luke.

As Mrs Gore was very taken with George, they kept him with them, and eventually got a note to Lucas saying they were prepared to give him a permanent home in return for helping
on their cart. Lucas went straight over to Deptford, determined to take George home, but when he found they were respectable, kind people and his youngest son was very happy with them, he agreed that George would be safer with them, well away from Luke’s bad influence.

It transpired that Luke was beyond rescue. Although only just eleven years old, since running away from home he had embraced all the nastiest aspects of London’s underworld, revelling in drinking and dog fights and showing great admiration for all crime. He boasted he was going to become a ‘cracksman’, and as he had already served his apprenticeship at pickpocketing and was working at night with two older burglars as their ‘boy’ – his role being to wriggle through small windows and let the others in through the front door to plunder the house – Lucas knew that within a short time Luke probably would indeed progress to far more serious crime, if not blowing safes. Sadly he knew then it was futile to spend any further time or energy pursuing him.

Later, in November, Lucas said he was going to live with Dolly and in future would work that stretch of the river. Although it was common enough for the working classes to live together without marrying, Matilda was surprised and a little shocked that a seemingly respectable widow would do such a thing, she just hoped that Dolly wouldn’t turn out to be another Peggie, and give her father more grief. Yet he did seem so very happy and excited, and even if it meant she wouldn’t be able to see him so often, she was very glad he had found someone to love and was finally leaving Finders Court.

‘Now, isn’t she a fine-looking woman?’ Lucas said as they approached the landing stage, his croaky voice softer with affection. ‘I calls ’er me apple dumpling.’

Matilda looked up at the woman waiting for them and thought his pet name for her was appropriate. She was small and round with a sweet, unlined face wreathed in a beaming smile. Although her hair was grey and Matilda knew her to be as old as her father, she had a youthful gaiety about her which even the oversized men’s boots and coat she was wearing couldn’t conceal.

‘Looks like you’ve fallen on your feet, Father,’ she whispered.

‘Oi! I pays me way,’ he said with some indignation.

As soon as the boat was secured, Dolly rushed them straight towards the cottage, clucking over how cold they both looked and how she’d made a beef and oyster pie for their dinner. As they went up through the garden Matilda saw hens, geese and ducks, and a pen of rabbits. She wondered if they were just pets, she couldn’t imagine Dolly killing them.

Dolly ushered Matilda straight into a large, warm kitchen which smelled deliciously of meat pie. She had a stove just like the one at the parsonage and on the table was a newly baked cake. From the beams on the ceiling hung bunches of dried herbs and flowers, there were dozens of jars of preserves on a shelf and even more china than Matilda had seen at the Milsons’ sitting on the dresser. It was bright, clean and very homely. Clearly she wasn’t another Peggie.

‘Sit yerself down,’ Dolly ordered, taking Matilda’s shawl from her shoulders and pointing to a chair by the stove. ‘And you should be wearing something warmer than that in this cold weather. I’ve got a coat upstairs that will fit you. I’ll get it later when we’ve had a cup of tea and a chat. But bless me, I haven’t even said how nice it is to meet you at last, or happy New Year.’

Matilda smiled as the woman smacked a hearty kiss on her cheek. She wondered if she always talked as much. ‘It’s nice to meet you too,’ she said. ‘And I’m sure it’s going to be a happy New Year for all of us.’

Dolly shed her man’s coat and boots, making a complaint about how muddy the garden was and how she longed for spring to arrive. Her dress was a sober dark blue with a small lace collar, but the material and cut of it wouldn’t have looked out of place on one of the richer women at the church. She was curvaceous rather than fat, and as she lifted her dress to slip into a pair of dainty indoor shoes, Matilda noted her shapely ankles.

Lucas pulled up the Bosun’s chair that had been in their old room and sat down beside his daughter. ‘I told Dolly this was me dowry,’ he joked. ‘Looks well in ’ere though, don’t it?’

‘As if it was made for here,’ Matilda agreed. She sensed her father was embarrassed that it was the only thing he had to offer Dolly.

‘Lucas is made for here too,’ Dolly said as she made a pot of tea. Her eyes were dark brown and twinkled merrily as she
smiled. ‘Heaven knows, I don’t know how I managed without him. He’s a real wonder, he can fix anything. And I want to say before we go any further that you must think of here as home now, Matty. Lucas and me might not be wed, but me heart’s set on him and so his children are my children too.’

‘We’re gonna get wed though,’ Lucas said, and reached out to squeeze his daughter’s hand. ‘We thought in the spring, when the blossom’s out. How d’you feel about that?’

Dolly put the tea pot down on the stove and looked anxiously at Matilda as if expecting disapproval.

‘I think that’s the best news I’ve ever heard,’ Matilda said. Her eyes were prickling and she hoped she wasn’t going to disgrace herself by crying. She might not have known the woman for longer than ten minutes, but just the warmth flowing between the couple, Dolly’s kind words about his children and the security her father would gain by marrying her were enough to dispel any doubts in her mind. ‘I just hope you make it before I leave London. You see, the Milsons have asked me to go to America with them.’

She wished she hadn’t blurted it out like that when her father’s ruddy colour suddenly drained away. ‘America!’ he exclaimed. ‘Oh no, Matty!’

Because of the boys’ disappearance last August, she hadn’t told him anything about her employer’s intention of going to New York, besides, it wasn’t mentioned again after that night, not in her hearing anyway, so she’d begun to think Giles had abandoned the idea.

‘Take this tea, afore you go on,’ Dolly said, pushing a mug into her hands. ‘And don’t you look so sour-faced, Lucas. It’s a great chance for Matty. Now, just let me cut a slice of cake for you both and we’ll have the whole story if you please.’

The cake was still warm, and rich with raisins and spices. Matilda thought it was the best she’d ever eaten, it put Aggie’s and her own efforts to shame.

‘It was only on Christmas Day they asked me to go with them,’ Matilda began. ‘They asked me into the parlour to give me my present, that lovely brown shawl. I nearly burst into tears at that, but then blowed if they didn’t make me sit down because they said they had another surprise for me.’

She paused for a moment to get her breath back. ‘Well, then
Sir just came out with it. Said they’d decided to go to America in April and would I like to go with them. Oh, Father!’ she exclaimed, reaching out to touch his knee. ‘Sir was so lovely. He said, “We think of you as one of our family now, Matty. None of us wants to go without you.” Well, I did cry then, and Madam, she gave me one of those soft looks she gives Tabby. She said she hoped it wouldn’t make you unhappy, but if I didn’t like it I could always come home again. Sir’s so excited, Father, he keeps saying what a big adventure it will be, and showing me maps and things about America.’

She paused again, suddenly aware that her father looked stunned and so very sad. ‘I don’t like to leave you, Father,’ she went on, taking his hand and rubbing it between her two. ‘But if I don’t go, what are the choices for me? Another nursemaid’s job perhaps with a family that won’t be so good to me, or being a maid or a shop girl.’

‘She’s right,’ Dolly said stoutly, giving Lucas no time to chip in with his opinion. ‘A slave to someone who will never appreciate her! If I’d been offered such a chance when I was Matty’s age I’d have been off without thinking twice. We keep hearing that things is going to improve soon, but I’ve been hearing that all me life and so have you, Lucas. The truth of the matter is that the rich get richer and the poor get poorer. America’s got to be a whole lot better.’

Lucas looked at his daughter. Apart from her hands moving on his, she was sitting as stiff as a plank, her eyes pleading with him to agree she should go. He looked at Dolly who gave him an encouraging smile. ‘You go with my blessing if it’s what you really want,’ he said slowly and thoughtfully. ‘I told you once before, Matty, to never look back, and I meant it. If I can’t be ‘ollering with ‘appiness right now for you, well, it’s just that it will be ‘ard not to see you grow into a woman, see you get married to some fine fella and a brood of little ‘uns around yer skirts.’

‘I’m not going for ever,’ she said, shocked that he thought he was never going to see her again. ‘I’ll come back when the Milsons do.’

‘You won’t, me darlin’,’ he said softly. ‘You’ll get stuck in over there, I knows that. From what I’ve ’eard it’s a big brave country, a fitting place for a brave girl like you. Just you write to us and
tell us all about it. Dolly can read as good as you and she’ll write back for both of us.’

‘Now, afore you get settled in that chair, let me show you round,’ Dolly said, anxious to lighten the atmosphere. She held out a hand to Matilda. ‘I’ve got the bed all aired for you.’

After the parsonage the cottage seemed very small. Just the kitchen with a little scullery leading off it, and the parlour which Dolly used as the tea room when it was too cold or wet for people to sit in the garden. It looked very bare and cold after the warm kitchen, with only half a dozen small tables and chairs in it and a glass-domed stand in which, she explained, she put her cakes on display.

‘I won’t open it up again till Easter,’ she said. ‘Lucas has just given it a new coat of whitewash, and I’ve taken the curtains down for a washing. But it looks real pretty with the tables laid nice and a few flowers.’

Dolly’s bedroom went right across the front of the cottage and Matilda had to stoop down to see the river out of the windows set in the sloping ceiling. It too was very bare, just a brass bed covered in a gaily coloured patchwork quilt and a chest of drawers, but spotlessly clean and smelling of lavender.

‘You like the smell?’ Dolly asked as Matilda bent to sniff a bowl of it on the chest. ‘That’s yer father’s doing. He brought back great clumps of it in the summer, he said he thought it was the best perfume in the world.’

The room Matilda was to sleep in had clearly been specially prepared for her. It was smaller than the front room, and much less austere. Frilly print curtains hung at the small window, the patchwork quilt on the iron bed was all worked in pinks and blues, and a rag rug softened the waxed floorboards.

‘I rushed to finish that quilt when I knew you were coming,’ Dolly said. ‘You might be going to America, lovey, but this is your room anyway. Lucas told me so much about you, right from when we first met. But you are even nicer and prettier than he said. No wonder he’s so proud of you.’

Matilda wished she felt able to hug Dolly. Somehow her home encapsulated all those dreams and hopes she knew from her father that he’d once shared with Nell before she was even born. Tragic as it was that her mother hadn’t survived to realize any
of them, it was good to know Lucas would live out his days in peace and comfort with a loving woman worthy of him.

‘I’m so glad Father found you,’ she stammered out. ‘I won’t feel so bad about going away knowing he’s got you.’