The Luminaries (31 page)

‘You keep a clean house,’ was all she said.

‘I live alone.’ Gascoigne pointed with a stick to the trunk at the base of his bed. ‘Open that.’

She loosed the clasps, and heaved open the top. He directed her
to a swatch of dark linen, which she lifted up, and Agathe’s dress slithered out over her knees—the black one, with the tatted collar, that he had so despised.

(‘People will think me an ascetic,’ she had said cheerfully, ‘but black is a sober colour; one ought to have a sober dress.’

It was to hide the bloodstains, the fine spray that peppered her cuffs; he knew it, but did not say so. He agreed, aloud, that one ought to have a sober dress.)

‘Put it on,’ Gascoigne said, watching as Anna smoothed the fabric over her knee. Agathe had been shorter; the hem would have to be let down. Even then, the whore would show three inches of her ankle, and maybe even the last hoop of her crinoline. It would be awful—but beggars could not be choosers, Gascoigne thought, and Anna was a beggar tonight. He turned back to the fire and shovelled ash.

It was the only dress of Agathe’s that Gascoigne still possessed. The others, packed in their camphor-smelling cedar case, had been lost when the steamer ran aground—the berths first looted, then flooded, when the steamer fell at last upon her side, and the surf closed in. For Gascoigne the loss was a blessing. He had Agathe’s miniature: that was all he wished to keep. He would pay her memory due respect, but he was a young man, and still
hot-blooded,
and he meant to begin again.

By the time Anna had changed, the fire was lit. Gascoigne glanced sideways at the dress. It looked just as ill upon her as it had upon his late wife. Anna saw him looking.

‘Now I will be able to mourn,’ she said. ‘I never had a black dress before.’

Gascoigne did not ask her whom she was mourning, or how recent the death. He filled the kettle, and put it on the range.

Aubert Gascoigne preferred to initiate conversation, rather than fall in with another person’s theme and tempo; he was content to be silent in company until he felt moved to speak. Anna Wetherell, with her whore’s intuition, seemed to recognise this aspect of Gascoigne’s character. She did not press him to converse, and she did not watch or shadow him as he went about the ordinary business of the
evening: lighting candles, refilling his cigarette case, exchanging his muddy boots for indoor shoes. She gathered up the gold-lined dress and conveyed it across the room to spread on Gascoigne’s table. It was heavy. The gold had added perhaps five pounds to the weight of the fabric, Anna guessed: she tried to calculate the value. The Crown would buy pure colour at a rate of around three sovereigns per ounce—and there were sixteen ounces in a pound of weight—and this was five pounds of weight, at least. How much did that total? She tried to imagine a column of sums in her mind, but the figures swam.

While Gascoigne banked the fire for the evening, and spooned tea leaves into a strainer, ready to steep, Anna examined her dress. Whoever had hidden the gold there evidently had experience with a needle and thread—either a woman or a sailor, she thought. They had sewn with care. The gold had been fitted up and down the bones of the corset, sewn into the flounces, and parcelled evenly around the hem—an extra weight she had not noticed
earlier
, for she often carried lead pellets around the bottom of her crinoline, to prevent the garment from blowing upward in the wind.

Gascoigne had come up behind her. He took out his bowie knife, to cut the corset free—but he began too like a butcher, and Anna made a noise of distress.

‘Please,’ she said. ‘You don’t know how—please let me.’

He hesitated, and then passed her the knife, and stood back to watch. She worked slowly, wanting to preserve the form and shape of the dress: first she took out the hem, then worked her way upward, along each flounce, snicking the threads with the point of the knife, and shaking the gold out of the seams. When she reached the corset, she made a little slice beneath each stay, and then reached up with her fingers to loose the gold from where it had been stuffed, in panels, between the bones. It was these lumpy parcels that had so reminded Gascoigne of chainmail, in the
gaol-house.

The gold, shaken out of the folds, shone gloriously. Anna
collected
it in the centre of the table. She was careful not to let the
dust scatter in the draught. Each time she added another handful of dust, or another nugget, she cupped her hands over the pile, as if to warm herself upon the shine. Gascoigne watched her. He was frowning.

At last she was done, and the dress was emptied.

‘Here,’ she said, taking up a nugget roughly the size of the last joint of Gascoigne’s thumb. She pushed it across the table towards him. ‘One pound one shilling: I haven’t forgotten.’

‘I will not touch this gold,’ said Gascoigne.

‘Plus payment for the mourning dress,’ Anna said, flushing. ‘I don’t need charity.’

‘You might,’ said Gascoigne. He sat down on the edge of the bed and reached into his breast pocket for his cigarettes. He flipped open the silver case, plucked out a cigarette, and lit it with care; only after it was lit, and he had taken several lungfuls, did he turn to her, and say,

‘Who do you work for, Miss Wetherell?’

‘You mean—who runs the girls? Mannering.’

‘I do not know him.’

‘You would if you saw him. He’s very fat. He owns the Prince of Wales.’

‘I have seen a fat man.’ Gascoigne sucked on his cigarette. ‘Is he a fair employer?’

‘He has a temper,’ Anna said, ‘but his terms are mostly fair.’

‘Does he give you opium?’

‘No.’

‘Does he know you take it?’

‘Yes.’

‘Who sells you the stuff?’

‘Ah Sook,’ said Anna.

‘Who is that?’

‘He’s just a chink. A hatter. He keeps the den at Kaniere.’

‘A Chinese man who makes hats?’

‘No,’ Anna said. ‘I was using local talk. A hatter is a man who digs alone.’

Gascoigne paused in his line of questioning to smoke.

‘This hatter,’ he said next. ‘He keeps an opium den—at Kaniere.’

‘Yes.’

‘And you go to him.’

She narrowed her eyes. ‘Yes.’

‘Alone.’ He spoke the word accusingly.

‘Most often,’ Anna said, squinting at him. ‘Sometimes I buy a little extra, to take at home.’

‘Where does
he
get it from? China, I suppose.’

She shook her head. ‘Jo Pritchard sells it to him. He’s the chemist. Has a drug hall on Collingwood-street.’

Gascoigne nodded. ‘I know Mr. Pritchard,’ he said. ‘Well then, I am curious: why should you bother with Chinamen, if you could buy the stuff from Mr. Pritchard direct?’

Anna lifted her chin a little—or perhaps she merely shivered; Gascoigne could not tell. ‘I don’t know,’ she said.

‘You don’t know,’ said Gascoigne.

‘No.’

‘Kaniere is a long way to walk for a mouthful of smoke, I think.’

‘I suppose.’

‘And Mr. Pritchard’s emporium is—what—not ten minutes’ walk from the Gridiron. Still less if one walked at a pace.’

She shrugged.

‘Why do you go to Kaniere Chinatown, Miss Wetherell?’

Gascoigne spoke acidly; he felt that he knew the probable answer to the question, and wanted her to say the words aloud.

Her face was stony. ‘Maybe I like it there.’

‘Ah,’ he said. ‘Maybe you like it there.’

(For goodness’ sake! What had come over him? What did he care if the whore plied her trade with Chinamen or not? What did he care if she made the trip to Kaniere alone, or with an escort? She was a whore! He had met her for the first time that very evening! Gascoigne felt a rush of bewilderment, and then immediately, a stab of anger. He took refuge in his cigarette.)

‘Mannering,’ he said, when he had exhaled. ‘The fat man. Could you leave him?’

‘Once I clear my debt.’

‘How much do you owe?’

‘A hundred pounds,’ said Anna. ‘Maybe a little over.’

The empty dress lay between them, like a flayed corpse. Gascoigne looked at the pile, at its glimmer; Anna, following his line of sight, looked too.

‘You will be tried at the courts, of course,’ Gascoigne said, gazing at the gold.

‘I was only tight in public,’ said Anna. ‘They’ll fine me, that’s all.’

‘You will be tried,’ Gascoigne said. ‘For attempted suicide. The gaoler has confirmed it.’

She stared at him. ‘Attempted
suicide
?’

‘Did you not try and take your life?’

‘No!’ She leaped up. ‘Who’s saying that?’

‘The duty sergeant who picked you up last night,’ said Gascoigne.

‘That’s absurd.’

‘I’m afraid it has been recorded,’ said Gascoigne. ‘You will have to plead, one way or another.’

Anna said nothing for a moment. Then she burst out, ‘Every man wants his whore to be unhappy—every man!’

Gascoigne blew out a narrow jet of smoke. ‘Most whores
are
unhappy,’ he said. ‘Forgive me: I only state a simple truth.’

‘How could they charge me for attempted suicide, without first asking me whether I—? How could they? Where’s the—’

‘—Proof?’

Gascoigne studied her with pity. Anna’s recent brush with death showed plainly in her face and body. Her complexion was waxy, her hair limp and heavy with grease. She was snatching
compulsively
at the sleeves of her dress with her fingers; as the clerk appraised her, she gave a shiver that racked her body like a wave.

‘The gaoler fears that you are insane,’ he said.

‘I have never spoken one word to Gov. Shepard in all my months in Hokitika,’ said Anna. ‘We are perfect strangers.’

‘He mentioned that you had recently lost a child.’

‘
Lost
!’ said Anna, in a voice full of disgust. ‘
Lost
! That’s a sanitary word.’

‘You would use a different one?’

‘Yes.’

‘Your child was taken from you?’

A hard look came across Anna’s face. ‘Kicked from my womb,’ she said. ‘And by—by the child’s own father! But I suppose Gov. Shepard didn’t tell you that.’

Gascoigne was silent. He had not yet finished his cigarette, but he dropped it, crushed the ember with the heel of his shoe, and lit another. Anna sat down again. She placed her hands upon the fabric of her dress, laid out upon the table. She began to stroke it. Gascoigne looked at the rafters, and Anna at the gold.

It was very unlike her to burst out in such a way. Anna’s nature was watchful and receptive rather than declamatory, and she rarely spoke about herself. Her profession demanded modesty of the strictest sort, paradoxical though that sounded. She was obliged to behave sweetly, and with sympathy, even when sympathy was not owing, and sweetness was not deserved. The men with whom she plied her trade were rarely curious about her. If they spoke at all, they spoke about other women—the sweethearts they had lost, the wives they had abandoned, their mothers, their sisters, their
daughters
, their wards. They sought these women when they looked at Anna, but only partly, for they also sought themselves: she was a reflected darkness, just as she was a borrowed light. Her
wretchedness
was, she knew, extremely reassuring.

Anna reached out a finger to stroke one of the golden nuggets in the pile. She knew that she ought to thank Gascoigne in the conventional way, for paying her bail: he had taken a risk, in telling a falsehood to the gaoler, keeping her secret, and inviting her back to his home. She sensed that Gascoigne was expecting something. He was fidgeting strangely. His questions were abrupt and even rude—a sure sign that he was distracted by the hope of a reward—and when she spoke he glared at her, quickly, and then glanced away, as if her answers annoyed him very much. Anna picked up the nugget and rolled it around in her palm. Its surface was bubbled, even knot-holed, as if the metal had been partly melted in a forge.

‘It appears to me,’ Gascoigne said presently, ‘that someone was
waiting for you to smoke that pipe last night. They waited until you were unconscious, and then sewed this gold into your dress.’

She frowned—not at Gascoigne, but at the lump in her hand. ‘Why?’

‘I have no idea,’ the Frenchman said. ‘Who were you with last night, Miss Wetherell? And just how much was he willing to pay?’

‘Listen, though,’ Anna said, ignoring the question. ‘You’re saying that someone took this dress off me, sewed in all this dust so
carefully
, and then laced me back up—filled with gold—only to leave me in the middle of the road?’

‘It does sound improbable,’ Gascoigne agreed. He changed his tack. ‘Well then: answer me this. How long have you had that garment?’

‘Since the spring,’ Anna said. ‘I bought it salvage, from a vendor on Tancred-street.’

‘How many others do you own?’

‘Five—no; four,’ said Anna. ‘But the others aren’t for whoring. This is my whoring gown—on account of its colour, you see. I had a separate frock for lying-in—but that was ruined, when—when the baby died.’

There was a moment of quiet between them.

‘Was it sewed in all at once?’ Gascoigne said presently. ‘Or over a period? I suppose there’s no way to tell.’

Anna did not respond. After a moment Gascoigne glanced up, and met her gaze.

‘Who were you with last night, Miss Wetherell?’ he asked again—and this time Anna could not ignore the question.

‘I was with a man named Staines,’ she said quietly.

‘I do not know this man,’ Gascoigne said. ‘He was with you at the opium den?’

‘No!’ Anna said, sounding shocked. ‘I wasn’t at the den. I was at his house. In his—bed. I left in the night to take a pipe. That’s the last thing I remember.’

‘You left his house?’

‘Yes—and came back to the Gridiron, where I have my lodging,’ Anna said. ‘It was a strange night, and I was feeling odd. I wanted
a pipe. I remember lighting it. The next thing I remember, I was in gaol, and there was daylight.’

She gave a shiver, and suddenly clutched her arms across her body. She spoke, Gascoigne thought, with an exhilarated fatigue, the kind that comes after the first blush of love, when the self has lost its mooring, and, half-drowning, succumbs to a fearful tide. But addiction was not love; it could not be love. Gascoigne could not romanticise the purple shadows underneath her eyes, her wasted limbs, the dreamy disorientation with which she spoke; but even so, he thought, it was uncanny that the opium’s ruin could mirror love’s raptures with such fidelity.