*
Leather money bag fastened about his waist, ledger in the crook of his arm, Oswin Slade reached the end of Foster Street, his nose wrinkling with distaste as he took the right hand turn which led into Portway Road. Each of the houses he had called at collecting rent had been a twin of its neighbour, reeking of poverty and filled with kids packed in like berries in a jam pot. That was not going to be the life of Oswin Slade; he was not about to let poverty grind him into the dust or work himself to an early grave feeding a bevy of children. One… a son, yes, a son he could train, teach to be like himself, a man to make life do as he said, to become a figure this town would take note of.
‘Me mother said to tell you ’er ain’t in.’
Oswin looked down his nose at the barefoot child who had opened the door of the first in the line of soot grimed houses. The pattern was beginning! Week after week there were one or two thought to get away with not paying their rent. ‘Me mother says to say ’er’ll pay double next week… my ’usband don’t yet be ’ome with his tin… will you tek ’alf this week and a week and a ’alf next…’ They ran like lines in a play, well rehearsed but forgotten the moment it finished – and he had heard them all.
A tousled head tilted upwards, the child’s large brown eyes stared blandly from a face showing no sign that the words he had spoken were a lie. They learned at an early age! Letting his glance rest momentarily on the open ledger Oswin snapped it shut then met those so innocent brown eyes with a thin smile.
‘Your mother is out, you say?’
‘No, mister,’ the lad met Oswin’s smile with a grin, ‘I d’ain’t say that, I said as ’er ain’t in.’
The boy was young, no more than seven or eight, but brains sharpened early in Portway Road and this little toe-rag was as sharp as they come. Fingers tightening on the pencil held between them Oswin controlled the anger biting keenly at his tongue.
The fading smile denoted his only admittance to the annoyance that had him wanting to slap the grin from the boy’s face and he appeared to think a few seconds before answering.
‘It is unfortunate your mother not being at home because I have a message for her. But then you and I both know how smart a lad you are so perhaps you could give the message for me.’
Stepping a few paces back from the doorway Oswin looked up at the window of the bedroom where he knew well the mother stood listening.
‘Tell your mother.’ He raised his voice, letting it bounce from one smoke blackened building to the next. ‘Tell your mother she’s been given notice to quit the premises… the bailiffs will be here first thing in the morning!’
His words had carried like smoke on the wind running before him from house to house and in each women had stood with coins in their hands. They realised Oswin Slade made no empty threat. But those women, lips trembling as they watched their children’s keep disappear into the leather bag, would not be long alone in knowing that; soon they would be joined by others, joined by Samuel Ramsey and Edwin Derry.
Emma Ramsey has a lover…
The words he had heard in the Turk’s Head Inn, the words spoken behind that glass screen, rang in Oswin’s brain as he continued his round of rent collecting. They had rung there ever since his first catching them, had taunted him with their promise. He could use them to advantage, they were the stepping stones to the life he promised himself, the foundation stone of the fortune he intended would be his. But how to go about it? Blackmail was not something you shouted like he had just shouted that eviction order, it was a private matter, one best kept between himself and the men he would bleed dry! Samuel Ramsey would find no pleasure in parting with his money and no satisfaction in hiding his wife’s infidelity from his friends. And what of Edwin Derry? But it would afford Oswin Slade a great deal of pleasure to see that conceited, self-important poetaster, that wife of Derry grovel… and even more pleasure to laugh in that haughty disparaging face!
He would pay her back a thousandfold for the insults she had thrown at him, for all the times she had threatened to end his employment and watch him slide into the gutter along with the rest. But it would not be him felt the slime of the gutter, not his arse would hit the slippery slope; Oswin Slade would climb and if fortune was with him then the shoulders of Ramsey and Derry would not be the only ones he would use as steps.
*
‘The rent man be ’ere, he said to tell you he don’t ’ave all night to wait on you.’
Callista’s face still pressed close to her middle, Ada looked at her youngest wiping his nose on an already crusted sleeve. It was a losing battle trying to keep the six of them clean while working every hour God sent at the nailmaking, a trade which brought home less every week.
When Callista pulled away, Ada reached a hand to the string tied across a grate which had seen no fire since the night of Ruth Sanford’s passing. Taking down a strip of cloth, she pressed it into the girl’s hand.
‘You ’eard what the lad said, I ’ave to go pay afore Slade busts a gut and he’ll be to this house next so you best give your face a swill. Eh wench, ’tis a pity…’ Breaking off, Ada caught the scruff of her son’s neck, marching him from the house; the rest of the sentence silent in her mind. A pity you’ve promised your self to that man.
Oswin would be here in a few minutes; it took little time to mark an entry in his ledger and then he would come to this house. Callista rinsed her face in the bowl of water Ada had drawn earlier from the pump in the yard. Using the cloth to dry her skin she held its dampness to her eyes. If only she did not have to see him again, if only she could just close her eyes and fade out of existence, be free of cold and misery, be free of Oswin Slade. But the world rarely gave what was wished for.
She was to be his wife. Her movements automatic, her fingers numb with cold, Callista draped the cloth back over the string. She was promised to Oswin Slade, to a man who had not spared the time to attend her mother’s funeral. She had told herself the news might not have reached him, that he had not known of Ruth Sanford’s death, yet all the time she had recognised she was duping only herself; Wednesbury was a small town, a warren of narrow streets and close packed houses; very little happened in one that was not known in almost every other within hours and Ruth Sanford’s passing would have been seen as no secret to be kept. No, it would have been no secret; Oswin would have heard but had chosen not to call. He was prepared to stoop to marry her daughter but to acknowledge the mother, even to pay respect to the dead? Oswin Slade’s back did not bend that far.
‘Callista, I did not know…’
Movements awkward and wooden Callista turned towards the figure entering the house. Already he saw his coming into this house as a right, entering without a knock, not waiting to be bidden, already the master.
‘Why was I not informed?’
Where were the words of condolence? Where the softly spoken comfort of a man for a stricken fiancée? Where the feelings of a man in love? Inside the frozen barrier circling her mind the questions hung like spiked icicles.
‘You should have sent word to me… imagine how my not being present at your mother’s funeral must look, the picture it presents! Really, Callista, you should have more thought.’
‘My senses were not all they might have been, my mother’s dying—’
‘Was not unexpected!’
Sharp, and reprimanding, edged with the usual self-righteousness, the words pricked at the shell of ice which through the past days had held her together.
‘Your mother’s dying cannot have been so much of a shock as to make you forget your duty, you should have…’
Duty! It pierced the barrier like a spear. That was all Oswin Slade could think of, her duty. But it was not duty to her mother he had meant, it was Callista Sanford’s duty to him, the submissive unquestioned duty she must always pay once she became his wife.
‘I should have…?’
Meeting a look he had not seen in her before, Oswin hesitated at the coldness of it. Was she challenging him,
questioning his superiority of thought? Maybe not but any hint of such must be nipped at the bud, removed before it had any chance of growth. He wanted a wife who not only knew her place but kept it and with it a quiet tongue.
‘Yes, Callista,’ he forged on, ‘you should have sent word to me.’
‘Why?’
‘Why?’ Disconcerted by the flat monosyllabic question Oswin repeated it while his own mind juggled an answer. ‘How can a woman as intelligent as yourself voice such an inane question? You should have gotten word to me so I could—’
‘Have sent some excuse not to attend? You were aware of my mother’s passing though you pretend otherwise.’ Apathy suddenly falling away Callista saw the nuance of expression flick across the pale eyes now watching her with new acuteness and she went on. ‘You did not come here nor yet to the churchyard not because of my failings, Oswin, but because of your own.’
‘My failings?’
Drawing a deep breath Callista watched the face with its already deepening jowls, the pompous line of the mouth thinned now to mark his offence. How could she ever have thought of joining her life to his!
‘Perhaps not the best description but as true as any other.’ Frigid as hailstones, Callista’s words drummed one after another, rapping into the room. ‘You failed to suppose I knew the honest reason you did not come, that reason being you might be seen. You did not want the taint of a pauper’s burial touching the name Oswin Slade.’
‘There is no need to speak of that!’
It was curt, peremptory, cutting in its sharpness. A week ago, perhaps even yesterday, she would have obeyed the latent command underlying the brisk remark – but yesterday was gone! Holding that pale wintry glance with one she did not realise held all of her own distaste, all her repugnance at this pedantic man, his heavy features drawn into a frown, she let the storm which was building inside her hurl its defiance.
‘There is every need!’
Violet glaciers stared undaunted, holding his own answering gaze with a resolution he had never expected to see in the docile, acquiescing girl he had chosen to make his wife, and Oswin felt the first stirring of doubt. But quickly as it had come he dismissed it. He did not make mistakes, her words were no more than the after effects of that funeral. Tomorrow it would be gone and she would be her normal self again.
The confidence from the thought lending a spark of leniency, he smiled over the ledger he had flipped open. ‘The trials of the day have upset your mind.’ His look dropped to the column of pencilled numbers. ‘We will say no more of it.’
For once he had said something which found an echo of agreement in her heart. The light of a solitary candle glinting on the raven darkness of her hair, Callista nodded.
‘Yes, Oswin, the trials of the day have upset my mind, a day which you did not offer to share. But I am glad you did not come to be with me for had you done so my mind might still be in the state of torpor, having me believe marriage to you would be best. I would still be telling myself you were acting only out of love. Yes, my mind was upset but not in the way you think. The pain of today has burnt it clear and now I can tell you what I have known yet kept hidden in the hope of providing my mother with a few physical comforts. But my mother is dead, Oswin, and so is that hope. In that loss I no longer need to lie, to pretend marrying you would be anything other than anathema, a living nightmare. So you need have no more fears people of quality may see you with a pauper’s child for there will be no marriage between us.’
Momentarily stunned, Oswin stared at the small heart shaped face, glowing violet eyes gleaming defiance. Callista Sanford would be an asset to his plans and nothing, especially not her, could be allowed to stand in the way of those. It drew his senses together like a magnet. Returning his glance to the page of the open book he forced a nonchalance to his voice.
‘That is nonsense, Callista, but I shall overlook it this time. Now if I might have your rent…’
‘You may overlook whatever you wish but I shall not!’
The definite snap of it tweaked the doubt Oswin thought he had overridden. The pencil hovering, he glanced again at the thin figure staring obstinately across the margin of space the tiny room allowed between them. She was daring to defy him! Well, in three weeks time he would be her husband… and he would take great delight in proving to her he was not a man to be defied.
The thought a morsel to be savoured later, to be rehearsed and lived through again and again while lying in his bed, he smiled. ‘Callista, you don’t know what you are saying, you are not in your right mind.’
‘Oh, but I am.’ Callista returned the smile but in hers there glowed the certainty of deep seated truth. ‘I have never been more in my right mind. My agreeing to become your wife was simply a means to an end, one for which there is no longer the necessity. The need no longer exists for me to force myself to suffer your touch; I did not and will not ever feel less than revulsion at the thought of sharing my life with you…’
Watching her, Oswin’s smile faded, but the weak light of the candle burning on the shelf above the empty grate reflected the glint of anger in washed out almost colourless eyes, and teeth clenched behind lips whitened by seething fury.
‘Take care!’ The attempt to mask the threat encased in those first words was not entirely successful so he forced himself to pause, to breathe evenly before continuing. ‘You wouldn’t want to say something you may come to regret.’
‘No, Oswin, I would not. But then you see I shall not regret saying what has been in my heart to say for so long. I will not marry you, nothing you could say would induce me to change my mind.’
‘Nothing?’ The threat did not fade as Oswin glanced again at the book balanced in his hand. ‘But what of the rent for this house… how else can you keep a roof over your head unless it is by marriage to me? And what of the money owed? You know tenancy operates on the basis of payment at the end of any week, payment which is now due, Callista, a debt you must pay. Do you have that money? No, I see you don’t. I could mark it as paid, put the amount in for you… but you don’t really expect that of a man you no longer intend to marry.’
He was right of course. Callista’s fingers twisted the thin cloth of her patched skirts. A week’s rent was due on this house, a debt she had no means of paying. Watching the jowled face, the innate menace in the thin twist of the mouth, the sneer in those pale eyes, she felt a cold trickle along her spine. He was playing her as he had often done, using her poverty as a weapon against her, a tool with which to gain what he wanted. It was blackmail, sheer psychological blackmail, a cold hearted act of the worst sort… but then when had Oswin Slade had consideration of any other kind, when had he held feelings of tenderness or benevolence, an interest in anyone’s welfare other than that of Oswin Slade? But all of her thinking of him could not deny the truth.
… how else can you keep a roof over your head?
The words seemed to taunt, to sneer their derision. It was a challenge he had flung at her, a blow which depleted the joy refusal of him had brought. Debts could not go unpaid. Oswin knew her pride and now he waited like a vulture for her to apologise, to beg as he would make her beg… then to suffer those hands, that mouth… she couldn’t… she couldn’t! She could go to the Parish, ask their help as she had a few days ago. But that was as much a humiliation as pleading Oswin’s forgiveness and their answer would still be no.
The thought of life with him sickened her now as it had always done. To be chained to him by marriage vows would be a lifetime sentence of unrelenting misery. But a life of going from place to place, homeless and spending nights sleeping in barns or under hedges, begging every day for work to earn a penny to buy bread… was that preferable? Could she live that life any easier than the one Oswin held out to her?
The choice heavy in her stomach, Callista looked again into the pale triumphant eyes.
10
‘The chap said ’e knocked a few times but there were no answer but I knowed you was here so I fetched ’
im in.’
Light struggling between still partly closed curtains played over the figure sitting beside the empty fire grate.
‘Eh lad! Best say the reason of you callin’ to this house.’ Ada Povey turned to the young man who had followed her into the room.
‘Mrs Sabine Derry sent me.’ Quick eyes darted in the half light, a shiver rippling as the cold caught him. ‘Her said to give you this and to tell you should you be in need of assistance then you may call on ’er.’
Thrusting an envelope towards Callista he glanced at Ada when the girl made no move to take it.
‘’Er, Mrs Derry, ’er said to give it to nobody savin’ a Miss Sanford. This do be ’er, don’t it?’
‘Ar, lad, this be Miss Sanford.’
‘Then why don’t ’er take it?’
‘You ’eard what he said, wench, nobody but yourself be given leave to tek charge o’ what he brings and like as not he were told it must be delivered so best tek it an’ let the lad go about his business.’
‘I do ’ave other messages to run.’
Twitching the envelope hopefully between his fingers the young man turned as Callista took it from him then was halted by Ada’s firm ‘Don’t you be swannin’ off ’til you knows whether or not there be an answer.’
‘Mrs Derry d’ain’t—’
‘Mebbe’s ’er d’ain’t tell you to wait,’ Ada interrupted, ‘but Ada Povey be tellin’ it so you just stand you there ’til Callista be seein’ what it is that woman be sendin’.’
Opening the envelope Callista withdrew the contents, Ada’s sharp intake of breath accompanying the young man’s soft surprised whistle as they saw the white five pound note.
‘Eh, Callista wench,’ Ada breathed, ‘it be a gift from ’eaven!’
No, not heaven! Callista too, stared at the crisp note. It was a gift from the woman she had seen at Emma Ramsey’s house. But why would the woman send her money? Why make her the object of her charity?
Pauper's Child Page 10
