Rushed to the Altar (17 page)

She looked around the chamber, then her eye fell on one of the small, round cushions on the daybed. She picked it up and went to the mirror, experimentally tucking the cushion against her stomach beneath her cloak. It produced quite a convincing little bump, not enough for an instant recognition of pregnancy, but sufficient proof if someone knew she was carrying a child. She hauled up the skirt of her gown and pushed the cushion into the waistband of her petticoat, tying the drawstring tightly over it, then dropped her skirt down. She threw her cloak around her shoulders, drawing it tightly around her, then examined her reflection again in the mirror. She really didn’t look in the least like herself. She drew her hood up, hiding as much of her face as she could, and hunched her shoulders a little, as if she was trying to hide the shameful evidence of her pregnancy. The transformation was complete; she barely recognized herself.

She let herself out of the house without encountering another soul. The streets were cold, empty, and piled with the debris of the previous night’s entertainments. She stepped gingerly over a pile of vomit, holding her skirts high, and made her way around the colonnades of the Great Piazza, heading for the river. She threaded her way through the streets leading to the Strand and from there down Savoy Street to the water steps on the embankment at the end of the street.

There were more people around here and the river was already busy with skiffs darting between the larger barges laden with goods. The watermen kept up a constant whistle as they touted for custom on both banks, poling their craft up and down along the embankment.

Clarissa descended the stairs to the small platform that jutted out over the water. A skiff with two oarsmen came up immediately. They shipped their oars and one of them leaned out to seize a rope hanging from the platform. He hauled on it, bringing the little boat tight into the platform. He held it steady as Clarissa stepped in.

“Wappin’ Stairs.” Her voice was a little muffled, her accent that of the Kentish countryside. It was an accent she had heard all her life and she felt reasonably confident she could keep it up as long as she didn’t say too much.

The waterman nodded, finding nothing remarkable in either his passenger or her destination, and as soon as she was seated on the narrow thwart pushed off from the bank with his oar and he and his partner took the skiff into the mainstream. It was cold on the river and Clarissa huddled closer into her cloak. Her nervousness grew as the skiff moved swiftly towards her destination. She rehearsed over and over in her head what she would say to the baby farmer, concentrating on getting the vowel sounds authentic, remembering to drop the final
g
at the end of certain words. If she was word-perfect the disguise would be easier to maintain.

The hulking bulk of the Tower of London loomed
up ahead of them after almost an hour. Clarissa was frozen by this time. She’d had no idea it would take so long and guessed now that it would have been quicker by land under horsepower. But it was too late for second thoughts. The watermen brought the boat close to the forbidding Traitor’s Gate, a grilled gate giving onto a dark hole leading into the gray stone of the edifice. She shuddered, thinking of all those who had disappeared into that darkness never to reappear.

They went beneath Tower Bridge, the rowers carefully steering between the great stone pillars that were sunk deep into the riverbed. The river eddied swiftly at their bases and many a boat had come to grief caught in the swirling currents. They passed Alderman’s Stairs and Tower Bridge wharf, and finally Wapping Stairs came up on the north bank of the river.

The jumble of buildings along the embankment looked like warehouses. The watermen brought the skiff against a long pier jutting into the water. Steps led from there up to the embankment. Clarissa paid them the shilling fare and stepped out onto the pier.

The landscape was alien, threatening in its strangeness. Porters darted hither and thither along the pier with great baskets balanced on their heads, raucous shouts filled the air, children struggling bent double under the weight of heavy sacks staggered past her to the barges waiting to be loaded at the end of the pier, and above her loomed the great stone warehouses on either side of the steps. Her only comfort lay in the fact that
everyone was too occupied with their own affairs to cast so much as a glance in her direction.

She climbed the steps, which were wet and slimy with green weed at the lower level where the river at high tide covered them. Once she reached the top she breathed a sigh of relief. The air felt lighter, fresher, although it was still redolent of fish and tar, and the crowded buildings blocked the daylight. She looked around, searching for the Eagle and Dove tavern. It was supposed to be hard by the stairs.

Tentatively she approached a woman, carrying a basket of laundry on her head. “ ’Scuse me, mistress, I’m lookin’ fer the Eagle and Dove?”

The woman barely glanced at her and hardly broke stride. “Corner o’ Scandrett.”

And where or what was Scandrett? Clarissa looked around again helplessly. It must be a street close by. She set off along the muddy lane that stretched behind the warehouses, picking her way through evil-smelling puddles. The powerful, vile reek of a tannery made her catch her breath as she passed one building, and then there was the more familiar and certainly pleasanter smell of a livery stable a little further on with a narrow alleyway running alongside it.

A stable lad came out of the livery stable leading a brown cob and Clarissa accosted him. “I’m lookin’ fer Scandrett Street.”

He looked at her as if she’d walked out of Bedlam. “Y’are standin’ on it.”

Clarissa looked behind her up the alleyway. “This is it?”

“Aye, where you from, then?”

“Not around ’ere,” she said shortly. “I’m wantin’ the Eagle and Dove.”

“Up top.” He jerked his thumb at the alley and continued on his way.

Clarissa followed direction and ventured into the alley. There were houses on either side, the street so narrow that their rooftops almost touched across the lane. It was dark and dank and strewn with rubbish. How could Francis possibly survive in one of these filthy hovels? Anger burned deep within her, giving her strength. Luke would pay, and he would pay dearly.

The Eagle and Dove was at the far end of the alley as the boy had promised, and to Clarissa’s pleasant surprise the alley opened onto an expanse of green, with the tavern sitting on the edge of it. It was as if suddenly she found herself on a village green in the countryside, and her spirit lifted a little. Maybe Francis wasn’t buried in those reeking alleys. Maybe he was in one of the cottages scattered along the sides of the green.

Emboldened, she pushed open the door of the tavern below the creaking sign depicting an eagle with a dove in its talons and found herself immediately in a small taproom, heavy with the odor of spilled beer and the sea coal that burned sullenly in the fireplace.

The taproom was deserted and she went to the counter. “Landlord?”

An elderly man shuffled through a door in the rear wall and peered myopically at her. “Who wants ’im?”

“Me. I’m lookin’ fer a woman what takes in babies around ’ere. Is there one?”

His eyes became mere slits as he took in the slight swell beneath her cloak. He began to rub the stained countertop with a filthy rag. “Depends on who wants ’er.”

“I does, sir.” Clarissa decided she would get what she wanted more quickly if she went straight to the point. “I’ve coin t’ pay for the information.” She huddled closer into her cloak, turning slightly sideways, laying a hand on her belly.

The old man’s eyes took on a calculating gleam. “Let’s see yer money then.”

Clarissa slipped her hand into the pocket of her cloak and felt in her coin purse. She didn’t dare bring it out into the open in what was inevitably a den of thieves, and she didn’t dare give the impression that she had more than a few meager coins. She identified a sixpence with her fingertips and laid it on the counter, letting him see it before covering it with her hand. “Where will I find her?”

“Dundee, next street along the green.” He reached for the coin but she kept her hand over it.

“ ’Ow will I know the ’ouse?”

He grunted and blew his nose copiously on the filthy rag he’d been using on the countertop. Clarissa controlled her revulsion and waited. Finally he said, “Third ’ouse down on the right.”

Clarissa lifted her hand off the sixpence and it disappeared in an instant. “Is she the only one ’ereabouts?” She gave him a pleading look, her hand stroking over her belly. “Please, sir. I need ’er real bad.”

He grunted again, and seemed to consider his answer, before he said grudgingly, “Nobbut our Bertha on Dundee.”

“Thankee, sir.” She gave him what she hoped was a pathetic smile of gratitude and left the taproom, heaving a sigh of relief once she was out in the fresh air again. The stench of stale beer and tobacco smoke seemed to be stuck in her nostrils. But she had the information she needed.

She found Dundee Street easily enough; the name on a wooden plaque was actually screwed into the wall of the first house. At the third house, she stopped, her heart racing. It was a house like any other on the mean street, its crooked tiled rooftop almost touching the one opposite. There was no knocker on an unpainted door opening directly off the street, and the tiny windows were ill fitting, their frames slightly askew.

She touched the shape of the cushion, making sure it was firmly in place. It would be a disaster if it drifted loose during the coming interview. Then she raised her hand and banged vigorously on the door.

It seemed to take a long while before the sound of bolts being drawn on the far side of the door told her someone had heard her knock. The door opened a crack and a small girl peeped out at her. “Yeah?”

“Is Bertha ’ome?”

“Who wants ’er?”

It seemed to be the first question anyone asked around her. Clarissa said firmly, “Me. Is she ’ome?”

The child leaned back and yelled with surprising power into the gloom behind her, “Mam, someone’s ’ere.”

“I know that, yer daft biddy. Who is it?” The yell was loud enough to bring down the rafters and Clarissa winced. Francis hated loud noises. A woman appeared behind the child before the echo had died. She cuffed the child across the head. “Get back inside, yer lazy good-fer-nuthin’. See to that babby what’s cryin’.”

Clarissa could hear a baby’s thin cry now coming from somewhere above. The woman stood in the doorway drying her hands on a dirty apron, treating her visitor to a thorough scrutiny. Her eyes lingered on the swell of her belly. “Best come along in, then,” she said eventually, turning away from the door, leaving Clarissa to follow her. “Shut the door, we don’t live in a barn.”

Hastily Clarissa did so and found herself in a narrow dim passage. She could hear sounds of children now, cries, whimpers, murmurings, all coming from above her head. She could hear them through the ceiling, where cracks of light showed through the gaps in the floorboards of the room above. It was cold, drafty, and damp in the passage, but the woman was heading for the rear and Clarissa followed, wondering how she would discover if Francis was among the children upstairs.

The kitchen was warmer at least, although it smelled of boiling clothes and fried onions. A man in his shirtsleeves sat in a rocker by the range, a tankard in his hand, his stockinged feet propped on the andiron. He glanced incuriously at the visitor and growled, “Fetch me another jug o’ gin, Nancy.”

“Jem says as ’ow ’e’ll not give you ’nother without threepence.” A girl, older than the one who’d answered the door, materialized from a shadowy corner. She carried a baby against her shoulder.

“Eh, mother, give the girl threepence,” the man demanded of Bertha.

“Give it to ’er yerself,” she retorted. “I’m sick o’ keepin’ you in gin with me own ’ard labor.”

The man was out of his rocking chair in a trice and came at her, fists clenched. She backed away. “All right, all right. Just one, mind. An’ ’tis only to keep you away from the babbys’ bottle. Nancy, take threepence from the jar, an’ hurry back. ’Tis time to give that lot upstairs their dosin’ or they’ll be screamin’ all afternoon.”

The girl handed over the baby, picked up a jug from the dresser, and disappeared through a back scullery and out of a back door, presumably heading for the Eagle and Dove.

Bertha sat down at a deal table, the baby propped against her shoulder. “So, what can I do fer you? In trouble are you?” The baby began to whimper and she rocked it.

Clarissa nodded, keeping her shoulders hunched, her
face slightly averted. “Aye, someone said you’d ’elp. I can’t keep the babe, someone’ll ’ave to to care for it after.” She kept her hand on the cushion beneath her cloak.

Bertha nodded. “Aye, thought as much. When’re you due?” The baby’s whimper turned into a shrill cry and with a muttered execration she got up and went to the dresser. She took a brown bottle and a spoon off the shelf and sat down again with the baby held against her arm. She poured clear liquid into the spoon and pushed it between the child’s lips.

Clarissa smelled the powerful aroma of gin and a wave of nausea swept over her. She pressed the back of her hand to her mouth. She had heard of poor mothers feeding their babies gin because they couldn’t afford milk, but this woman was paid to care for these babies. Dear God, was she giving gin to Francis?

“So, when’re you due?” the woman demanded again as the baby went quiet and limp against her arm.

“Dunno, really. About five months give or take.” Clarissa tried to inject a note of desperation into her voice even as she fought her horror. There was no child, but how did all those women feel who had no choice but to give up their own children to this woman’s gin-soaked mercies? “I can’t lose me position, ’tis a good one. I’ve a good mistress but she’ll not keep me if she finds out about the child.”

“You’ll be showin’ good an’ proper soon enough,” Bertha said matter-of-factly. “ ’Ow d’you expect to ’ide that?”

“I won’t ’ave to. Me mistress is going abroad fer six months and she don’t need me to go with ’er. I’m to be sent to the country ’ouse, where me mam’s ’ousekeeper. I’ll ’ave the child there and bring it to you when we gets back to London. That way I’ll be able to visit it sometimes.” She managed a pathetically hopeful smile.