‘Phineas.’ Michael’s fingers twiddled the crisp damask napkin lifted from his knee. ‘This girl… I agree it sounds as though she has been given some degree of education, and if her account of her parents’ death is the truth then she has my sympathy but… well, what I mean is…’
‘What you mean, Michael, is can it all be fiction? Is the girl spinning a web of lies in which to catch an old fly?’
‘There’s no hiding anything from you, is there?’ Michael’s smile was rueful. ‘I learned that long ago yet I still give myself headaches bashing my skull against a brick wall; but in all honesty, Phineas, you know precious little of the girl apart from a name which you yourself must admit is one thing designed to catch your attention: and was it? Is the name Callista her true given name or one specifically chosen as a starting point for that web you spoke of?’
Above the neat silver flecked goatee beard Phineas Westley’s grey eyes reflected the smile his mouth did not reveal. Michael Farron’s veiled accusation was not one of jealousy for his own standing in this house or his place in an old man’s affections; it was a reflection of the love and concern the lad had always shown for the uncle he loved. Looking directly into the vivid blue eyes Phineas thought again of the mother of this man he loved as his own child, of the sister who had been half of his world, a sister who had the same fierce protective love for him as had her son, and with the thought his mouth received that inner smile, displaying it gently with his answer.
‘Birth name or contrivance? That, my anxious nephew, I will make no effort to determine.’
‘But why!’ Perplexity and doubt creasing his forehead, Michael flung the napkin aside. ‘You investigate the authenticity of the smallest of objects you buy, you scrutinise the credentials of every purchase you make with all the care and precision of a coroner, you cross-examine the claims made for everything you acquire with the ferocity of the Spanish Inquisition yet you apply none of these precautions to that girl… you ask her to come into your life, to share your home, while all you know of her could be written on the back of a postage stamp! Why, Phineas? Why?’
In the gleam of crystal shed candlelight Phineas Westley read the concern registered on his nephew’s handsome face. He spoke as he did because of that concern; one certainty in all of this was that Michael Farron did not hold any selfish motive.
His voice quiet and even, contrasting with the sharp tone of his nephew, Phineas answered. ‘Firstly, Michael, I do not consider Callista Sanford an object, I do not look upon her as a thing and I most certainly do not see her as a purchase. As to my reason for not investigating her background that is simple to understand. I like Callista Sanford, I like talking with her, I like her company. Being with her gives me pleasure… and most of all I trust her.’
As men of his famous chronicles trusted the enchantress Circe, who rewarded that trust by turning them into swine! Or did his uncle see himself as Odysseus, who was impervious to the charms of the sorceress? But there was no Hermes to aid this man, no watchful god to protect him from a woman’s poison; there was only his nephew. Watching the face which resembled his own so closely Michael Farron knew his warnings would be mist in the wind; fleeting and easily forgotten they would count for nothing against the pretty face and soft words of Callista Sanford.
*
No, this was not the way he had thought to meet with Sally Baker. Oswin slid a hand over the mouth of the squirming woman. To speak with her inside the tavern had been his plan but then caution had made its voice heard. The Turk’s Head was much frequented; not all of its customers were there solely for ale and those that came for the use of a woman could be choosy. They would look around, notice which woman was with which man and Sally Baker might be popular with a number which could mean Oswin Slade being noted. That he did not want; being associated with a common prostitute would not sit well with the life he had set out for himself.
A boot catching a second time against his shin, he caught his breath. This slut was stronger than he thought, if she broke free… ran into the tavern… then it would be all up with him. There was like to be many a man in that place would be only too happy to help cripple Oswin Slade. But he could not question her here. Uncover her mouth so she could answer and the bitch would scream; even now the sounds of her struggling might be overheard.
Thoughts turning rapidly detracted for a moment from his concentration, but a moment was all the struggling Sally needed. Feeling the hand clamping her mouth relax she twisted loose, then bit hard on the grasping fingers.
His reaction one with the yell he buried in his throat, Oswin’s hand withdrew from the woman’s face. Snarling with rage and pain he twisted his fingers savagely in the hair at the back of her head then smashed her forehead hard into the brick wall.
Christ, what had the whore done! The figure slumped in his arms; Oswin listened, weighing every sound against the thumping of his own heart. Had they been heard? Had his own strangled cry been detected? Blood pounding, veins racing, he stood poised. He could drop her and run… at the first sound of a voice he could run; this alley gave onto unused ground, he could be across it and lost among a warren of houses bordering it before anyone realised he was here.
The beat of his heart boomed like a drum in his ears as he waited. What if the trollop were dead? Should he leave her? His grip slackening, the inert figure slid lower against his body. But if the blow had merely stunned her, so that when found she wasn’t dead but alive… alive and able to tell who it was had attacked her… God Almighty, the bloody whore could see him sent to the gallows!
Beyond the narrow opening the sound of a carter’s wagon rumbled in the night. In a few minutes it would have pulled into the yard, there would be ostlers and stable lads buzzing about like bees around a hive and that yard looked out over the derelict ground. Weight pulled on his arms as the senseless figure slid a little closer to the ground. Beads of perspiration trickling into his eyes blurred the buildings opposite the narrow alleyway into an unrecognisable whole. Christ, what did he do! Blinking his sight clear he stared at the opening which gave onto the street. This alley, no more than a three feet wide space separating the tavern from an adjacent poulterer’s shop, was, he knew, regularly used as a short cut across the empty space to Camp Street, and any minute now somebody might take that shorter route and find him with Sally Baker… a dead Sally Baker?
Liquid beads gathering together trickled wetly over his cheeks and down the sides of his neck, burying themselves damply into a stiffly starched wing collar.
Dead! Not now… not yet… the trollop couldn’t be dead, he hadn’t asked… she hadn’t told him…
Unreasoning anger blinding him to the risk any noise would elicit, his hands clamped on the slumped shoulders; the woman’s boots scraping the hard earth, he dragged her towards the open ground.
*
Luck had been on his side, luck or the devil and he didn’t care which. At home in Loxdale Street, doors locked and curtains drawn against the night, Oswin Slade listened nervously for any sound other than the thumping of his own heart. That slut of a prostitute hadn’t died… well, not from that strike of her head against the wall.
Fingers still shaking fumbled with the single row of buttons fastening his chequered coat.
He had hauled her to the open ground intending to ask his questions there but a full moon had it lit up like a circus ring; a bloody field mouse couldn’t have stood there unseen! He had thought of bringing her here to this house then had ruled out the idea. Spotted bringing a woman home, one seemingly so drunk that he needed to almost carry her, would arouse talk among neighbours. ‘Oswin Slade never entertained a body in his ’ouse, now ’ere he were wi’ a wumman, a drunken wumman, an’ ’twere none but whores drunk theirselves stoopid… so Oswin Slade had fetched ’isself a trollop ’ome.’
Oswin flinched as if hearing aloud the words sounding only in his mind. How the tenants whose rents he rarely failed to prise out of them would relish that bit of gossip! But that was a
pleasure they would never taste. Buttons freed, he laid the jacket across his bed then slipped from his trousers. He must make sure no sign of that struggle showed on his clothes. There was nothing to link him with that accident but it would do no harm to be careful. Reaching for a clothes brush from the marble topped washstand confiscated from an evicted tenant he brushed coat and trousers thoroughly before hanging them in a tall cupboard.
Sally Baker had told him all he needed to know. More than he needed. Hands and face rinsed, he smiled at himself in the cheap mirror hung above the washstand.
It had been a heart stopping exercise half carrying, half dragging her to that empty ground but once there he had realised the impracticality of it. Not only brightly lit as if by a beacon, it was edged around by buildings, the rear of shops with living quarters upstairs, houses knitted together tight as stitches in a jumper, and all had windows any one of which could have someone watching him. He had been as badly burned as scalded dragging the slut there.
Slipping his nightshirt over his head he climbed into bed. He had contemplated abandoning the whole thing, of simply leaving her there, but again the thought of her regaining her senses, of naming him her attacker, had that idea nipped smartly in the bud. So he had hauled her to her feet, his own head lolling on his chest, pretending they were both well under the influence of alcohol, had proceeded to stagger through the maze of constricted streets strangled with condensed rabbit hutch houses. Several people had passed, women muttering about drunken louts while men grinned and referred to the hangover that would be his the next morning. But none had interrupted his journey or the thoughts racing in his head. He couldn’t haul the woman far, which ruled out the open heath, nor could he risk standing about where they were easily seen. It had been a problem but he had solved it on coming to the Holyhead Road. Opposite him the municipal buildings reared black and heavy against the shadows. That place was no delight to the folk of Wednesbury during the day; at night it was as welcome a place to be as was a graveyard.
Lying in the darkness of his bedroom Oswin smiled again. The rear of the Town Hall had proved the perfect place.
Sally Baker was already moaning by the time he had hauled her there and a few stinging slaps and a threat of strangulation should she utter so much as a whimper had her fully conscious and listening.
Yes, she visited Acacia Villa, yes, she knew the acquaintances of Emma Ramsey. Sally Baker was a strumpet but she was no fool. She had replied to every question he had put and those replies… the smile widened… they had been all he could pray for. She had given him what he wanted, offering more besides if he let her go, but the thought of tumbling her even for free no longer held any appeal. But yes, she could leave.
Watching moon chased shadows play over the wall of the bedroom Oswin gave himself to the pleasure of remembering.
‘I aint a blabberer.’ Sally Baker had peered at him in the darkness. ‘I won’t go tellin’ nobody about you, I won’t go tellin’ nuthin’.’
‘No, you won’t, you won’t be telling anything.’ Softly spoken, the words were almost lost beneath the clatter of a steam tram coming along from the junction of the White Horse.
‘G’night then.’
She had wished him goodnight! The smile locked to his mouth, Oswin stared at the dancing shadows. The stupid slut had wished him goodnight! And he had answered in like vein as his hands had closed about her throat.
It had taken only minutes for the body to slump against him, for his fingers to tell him no pulse beat in that throat, but the minutes had been long enough for the sound of the tram to say it was not many yards from where he stood. It had been a case of move or lose the chance. And he had not lost it. Hauling the lifeless figure upright, holding it so it shielded him, he marched it to the front of the building and as the tram drew almost abreast, flung it beneath the wheels.
There was no danger of her saying anything… ever. Oswin’s satisfaction sat like a warming poultice. Clothes tom, a face marked by the blows of a fist… the woman was obviously a prostitute strangled by a client. The constables would be right on two counts; two out of three wasn’t bad.
But Oswin Slade had been right on all counts. What he had only surmised, Sally Baker’s terrified answers had proved correct; and tomorrow… tomorrow he would begin to count the profits of the night’s labour.
14
She could still end her hunger, buy a beef pasty… would that be so wrong?
Callista left the waters of the brook behind and sank to the heath, resting her back against an outcrop of rock which helped shield her from the freshening breeze.
It did not have to be a pasty. She swallowed the saliva the thought of hot meat and crusty pastry gathered in her mouth. A stale loaf, bread a few days from the baking, could be had for a halfpenny; she could buy one of those and still have twopence halfpenny.
But what if twopence and a halfpenny were not enough? What if the least it would take was threepence?
Taking the silver coin from her pocket Callista stared at it. It was so small lying there in her palm… so small to buy so much. But would it buy that which she had promised or would the pangs twisting her stomach be no more than a useless gesture? Maybe. Pushing to her feet she returned the tiny coin to her pocket.
She need not go on. The thought echoed with every movement. She could go back, live in a home filled with warmth and comfort, know the pleasure of seeing so many of the beautiful antiques, of reading those same books her father had loved.
Phineas Westley had smiled when making that proposal, a smile in which she had seen more than friendship.
A home, no more worries of finding work in order to pay rent or buy food, no more Oswin Slade! But all of those things were her gain, they were to her advantage; what would be Phineas Westley’s gain, what advantage would that man get? Pulling her shawl close against the gathering wind she thought again of that smile and what she had seen behind it. He was a kind man, the episode of the Artemis had shown that. He could easily have claimed it had been damaged due to her carelessness, could have taken her before the magistrate and pressed for a long custodial sentence on finding she could not reimburse him the cost of the statue; instead he had dismissed the whole thing and now in addition to all of that he was offering her a home.
Head bent against the sudden flurry of raindrops, Callista heard the words play in her mind.
‘… with your parents gone you have no other call upon you, you are alone in the world and believe me, my dear, that world can be a heartless place…’
She did not need to live another day to find that out; hadn’t she already had very long and first hand proof of that?
‘… I promise you there will be no sorrow for you at The Limes… make my home yours and give us both happiness. Make the choice, my dear, come with me now…’
A shake of her head had halted him and the look which had come to his eyes, the veil through which she had seen disappointment peep, had a sharp prick of guilt tightening her chest. She had not wanted to appear ungrateful, to seem to be throwing such a wonderful offer back at him, but the promise she had made in her heart must come before anything.
He had listened as she told him, disappointment fading from his eyes as she held the threepenny piece for him to see, and once more the kindly smile had found his lips as he offered his help, showing his understanding when that help was refused.
‘Do what you must, Callista…’
He had taken both hands, holding them between his own as he spoke.
‘… do what you have set your heart upon, and when it is done come back… my home will be waiting.’
What was it had urged Phineas Westley to ask what he had? Callista drew the shawl across the lower half of her face, protecting it from wind lashed rain. They barely knew each other; two meetings, a few minutes’ conversation in each, could hardly constitute being called friends, passing acquaintances maybe but not friends in the true sense of the word… yet he had asked her that… had asked her to…
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‘Won’t you bide a while from the rain… it seems fair set to give a body a soaking.’
The call had come from a woman standing at the open doorway of a low built cottage, the honey pot shape of a pottery kiln rising in the background.
‘There be tea on the hob should you care to share it.’
A cup of hot tea! Callista’s heart seemed to expand, to widen at the thought. A cup of tea! At this moment it seemed to outdo all the promised luxury of The Limes.
‘Standing there be doin’ no more than adding to the water soakin’ through that there shawl; wherever it is you be ’eading for won’t go no further away should you bide for a sup of tea.’
Beneath a frilled cotton bonnet a rosy cheeked face smiled and Callista’s hesitation melted.
‘Be a real April shower and no mistake.’
Taking Callista’s shawl the woman shook it, scattering droplets of water in a silver shower over her doorstep, then draping it over a chair set close to the hearth, proceeded to pour tea into cups decorated with scarlet poppies.
‘How pretty.’ Callista could not keep from admiring the cup passed to her, the scarlet vibrant against the pale cream body.
‘’Tain’t nothin’ special, it finds work for the hands once the day be done; my Daniel says it be a frippery but I enjoys the doin’ of it.’
‘You painted these flowers? These cups are your work?’
Bonnet frill bobbing as she shook her head, the woman offered a lace covered jug, pretty green glass beads tinkling against its sides. ‘Not altogether they don’t be, the flowers they be done by me but the cups theirselves they be the work o’ Daniel.’
‘They are beautiful.’ Callista balanced the delicately fluted jug in her hand, admiring the same decoration of scarlet poppies. The man’s work must be in great demand.
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