Tattycoram (16 page)

More than once Jonnie offered to take me with him again when he went bird-catching, but I couldn't do it; my hands still tingled from those frantic, beating hearts. I did not try to explain this to him but I think he understood. Nevertheless, I always awoke on a night when he was going to seek out birds. He usually started around two in the morning in order to get to his place before daylight and have time to set the net. However
quietly he slipped from his bed or however carefully he gathered his traps together, I always arose, put a shawl around myself and saw him off. Perhaps I had a fear that something might happen to him and I would never see him again, I don't know. Sometimes I stood at the door and waited until he had disappeared around the corner. London was very still at that hour, in the district where we lived; it was hard to believe that in just a few hours the streets would be full of noise. In those hours before dawn I often lit a candle and went back to my bed with a book, for although, in the end I had stored most of my belongings in the box room at Urania Cottage, I had carried my precious books with me. It did not matter to me that I had read them before, many times before; just the act of reading soothed me, the sound of the words in my head. After a while I snuffed the candle and settled down again to sleep.

Once a year, I travelled home to visit Mother and Father's graves and spend some quiet hours in the churchyard. Now I asked Jonnie if he would go with me. I could see, from the moment the sentence was out of my mouth, that the very idea of going back in broad daylight frightened him.

“It's been years,” I said. “Surely no one would ever arrest you now?”

“I can't chance it, Hat, I couldn't bear to be locked up. Just the thought of it . . .”

And so I went alone, stood in the pale winter sunshine saying my prayers for the souls of my family. Then I went into the church and sat for a while, not praying, not thinking, just glad to be there, glad, I suppose, that nothing had changed. In a little while I would visit the school, take a walk on the Downs and gather some holly for Mother's grave. Although the church smelled a bit musty — it was very old — the air was much better than the fug of London. I was almost asleep when hurrying footsteps came up behind me. It was the curate, wringing his pale hands in his usual nervous manner.

“Miss Harriet, thank heavens! I thought I had missed you.”

I was dismayed that my quiet time had been interrupted,
and I suppose it showed, for he said, “I would not normally bother someone so deep in contemplation, but my wife said she saw you in the churchyard and then you disappeared.”

He's going to invite me to tea, I thought, and I don't want to go to tea, I want to walk on the Downs. I wished he hadn't come looking for me; there would be no way to get out of tea and small talk without hurting his feelings — or his wife's feelings. No doubt she was already putting the kettle on, getting out a nice tea cloth and wondering if she should slice some bread and butter or if the fruitcake would be enough. What would she say if I told her I now live in a dwelling with half a hundred birds and a dirt floor?

“. . . message for you.” He had obviously been speaking to me and was waiting for some response.

“I'm so sorry. What did you say?”

“I have a message for you. The Misses Bray are away until the new year or I should have left it with them. I know you write to them.”

“A message?” It had to be Mr. Dickens, but he knew I was in London.

“A stranger. I think he was a foreigner, although he spoke English perfectly well. From the colonies, perhaps.”

My heart began to pound.

“What was the message? What did he want?”

“He wanted to find you.”

“Did he leave his name? Where I could find him?” I practically grabbed the poor man by the arm.

“He left a letter, in case you came here. And another for the Misses Bray. If you just step over to the house I'll get it for you.”

I nearly pushed him out of the church door, I was so eager to
get my hands on that letter. Nearly tore it out of his hands. And it was as I had hoped. Sam had come home and was looking for Jonnie and me!

Perhaps Jonnie was right — that all God does is watch — for the next few weeks were among the happiest and saddest in my life thus far. I hurried back to London, refusing even a cup of tea with the curate and his wife, and went to find Sam. He had told me to write him at a lodging house not far from the India Docks. Night had fallen by the time I reached London, along with one of our dreadful fogs, a thick yellow blanket that would have made it hard to negotiate even familiar streets. I was sorry I hadn't stopped to get Jonnie first, for this was a rough district, and to the men who frequented the area — sailors mostly or longshoremen as well as thieves and those who dragged for the drowned — a woman walking alone at night, even if she were hurrying and not loitering, could want only one thing.

“Hello, darlin', lookin' for comp'ny?”

A foot without a body would suddenly appear and disappear, a hand reaching out of a filthy coat, voices, the sound of water slapping against wood. Twice I was sure I was being followed — weren't those heavy footsteps I heard behind me? — and l walked faster, terrified of the hands that would grab me, of the rag thrust into my mouth. The whole world seemed to have turned evil. Men's laughter behind the dull glow of a public house window, the sudden cackle of a woman's voice — these increased my pace until I was almost running.

With some difficulty, for I did not want to stop and ask directions, I found the address and pounded on the door. No
one came for what seemed a very long time, and I was about to turn away in despair when a slatternly girl of about fifteen opened the door halfway, peered out and demanded to know what I wanted. She held up a battered tin candlestick, and the light from it made her face look old and evil.

“Do you have a lodger here? Mr. Samuel Allen? I've come to see him. I'm his sister.”

“I dunno.”

“Well, could you go and fetch someone who would know?”

“The mistress is busy.”

I held out a sixpence.

“Please, it's important.”

She took the money and shut the door in my face. I stood on the step, shivering. The fog wrapped around me, thick and greasy, and the cold made my bones ache.

I don't know how long I stood there, but I was determined to wait all night if necessary, in spite of the fog and the chill. Eventually the door opened and the girl beckoned me into a dingy hall.

“'E's in the parlour.”

“Did you tell him his sister was here?”

“I didn't tell 'im nuffink. I just got 'im for you.”

“He doesn't know I'm here?”

She shrugged. “You can go tell 'im yerself.”

My hand trembled on the knob. What would I find when I opened the door? I could hear men's voices, so more than one man awaited me. The letter had been brief but well-written, yet this seemed such a low place. Perhaps he had gone to a scrivener and could not write himself.

“Well,” said the girl, “are yer going in or not?”

I knocked and went in.

Four men played cards by lamplight. The three who could see the door looked up in surprise.

“Hello, hello,” said one, “who's this?”

They were big men, rough-looking men, stevedores or bargemen.

“Whatever 'tis you're offerin',” said another, “I'm buyin',” and he laughed heartily at this witticism.

“I am looking for my brother,” I said, my voice trembling. “I believe he is stopping here.”

The man with his back to me whirled around and stood up, knocking over his chair.

“Hattie?” he said. “Hattie?”

I would not have recognized him, this tall, muscled giant, had he not spoken my name. Then he moved towards me, and I could see that he walked with a limp.

“Sam, is it you?”

The giant began to sob, great tears rolling down his cheeks, his hands outstretched, palms upward. I, who had never fainted in my life, felt the room spin and fell to the floor.

When I regained consciousness, I was lying on an old sofa, with Sam beside me and a cool cloth on my forehead. The other men were gone. I struggled to sit up, but Sam gently pressed me down.

“Lie still for a while, Hattie, you've had a shock. We'll talk in a minute.”

Still trembling and disoriented I was content to do his bidding.

“My dear, you should not have come here alone. This is not the neighbourhood for a woman like you.”

“I was in Shere,” I said, “visiting our parents' grave when the
curate gave me your letter. I had to come. I knew I could not rest until I had seen you.”

“I shall go back with you as soon as it is light.”

“No, no. I do not live in the country. Did the curate not explain that to you?”

“He said very little. I think he was suspicious of me.”

“Did you see their graves, Sam? Mother, Father, Grandfather?”

He bowed his head and nodded.

“I did.”

I took a breath.

“Now, Sam, take my hand and hold it tight.” When he had done this, I began my story. “Sam, I am living with Jonnie. He is here in London as well.”

“Oh God oh God. My brother and sister found on the same day! I did not dare to inquire in the village, and Mother told me, before I was transported, that she feared he was gone forever. That has lain like a stone on my heart for all these years.”

“I only discovered him quite recently, and that by accident.”

I told him how I had stopped in Neal's Yard, with the idea of buying a canary, and how I had seen Jonnie in the crowd of hawkers. How he had nearly run away when I called him by his old name, for he did not recognize me.

“No more did I. You are a woman now, Hattie, and much changed. It is only your hair that is the same, and when you came in that was covered by your shawl.” He twisted one of my curls around his big, work-scarred fingers.

“Oh Hattie,” he said, “I have been so lonely for all of you. I thought I would never see you again.”

For a while we remained silent, hands clasped.

“I want you to take me to Jonnie,” he said, “but first you must eat something. I think your faint was partly from hunger. I shall leave you for a minute while I send that girl for something hot. After our breakfast, and as soon as it is light, we will be away from this place.”

“There is money in the side of my shoe, if I can just unlace it.”

“In the side of your shoe!”

“I feared I might be robbed.”

“And so you might have been — or worse. But don't worry about money, Hattie. In spite of the surroundings in which you find me, I am well set up for money, truly I am. Australia, in the end, was kind to me. I came to stay in this low place because I had a letter to deliver to the woman who runs it, a letter from her son. Then I decided to stay a few days in case I heard from you.”

“And after that?”

He limped to the door and went in search of the girl.

I lay back on the sofa — he had taken away my damp shawl and covered me with a heavy coat — and I must have fallen asleep for a while, worn out by emotion and the fatigue of my rushed journey. The next thing I knew he was back, had drawn up by my side a small table with a tray of food set upon it and a steaming jug of something that smelled of lemons and spice.

“Now you must eat — we'll both eat — and then in a few hours we'll be off. I think we have a great deal to tell one another, stories of a whole lifetime, nearly, but for the present let us just break bread together, Hattie, and try not to tell every-thing all at once. I'm still finding it hard to believe I'm not asleep and you nothing more than a cruel trick of my imagination.”

I leaned over and pinched him. “Was that an imaginary pinch?” I said.

We bowed our heads and gave thanks to the Creator for bringing us together after all those years, and then we ate, and then I slept a little more with my brother's hand in mine.

Shortly after dawn he awakened me and settled his bill (“Yer sister!” said the girl, and gave a nasty laugh), and we set off.

“Are you feeling strong enough to walk a while, Hattie? We won't find transportation around here, not at this time of day.”

I laughed. “I am a champion walker, Sam. Walking is something I'm very fond of.”

The neighbourhood was perhaps less fearsome now that day had come and the fog had dissipated somewhat, but it was terribly run down, and the gutters overflowed with filth. Several times we saw rough men sleeping off the effects of the night's debauch in doorways, and once or twice a shawled figure wandering home with uneven steps from God knows where. When we reached Tower Hill we took a cab.

“Sam,” I said, as we rattled along, “Jonnie bears no animosity towards you, I want you to understand that. On the contrary, he feels that if he hadn't insisted upon going along that night, you would have paid more attention to where you were walking. You would have seen the trap before you stepped in it.”

“Not true, not true. And I never should have been there at all. You see, Hattie, we weren't really like the men who poached from hunger. Times were hard, but Father was never out of work and Grandfather brought in money with his carving. No, I did it chiefly for the excitement, I did it just to do it and not get caught. It didn't matter how many times Father punished me for it or Grandfather warned or Mother wept, I wanted excitement,
the thrill of being on forbidden ground, of outwitting the gamekeepers. I never thought of prison, even though I knew what I was doing could lead me there, for I was far too clever to get caught. I paid dearly for my arrogance — we all did.” He brushed his hand across his eyes.

“Tell the man to turn here,” I said, “and then take the small street to the right.”

Jonnie was just fitting the day's birds into a big cage before he left for the market. He turned in surprise as I appeared in the doorway with a stranger.