From Whitechapel

by Clegg, Melanie

  I nodded and then, suddenly afraid that I might lose her in the midst of the crowds that pressed in around us, followed her as she turned to go to the bar that had been set up at the back of the hall and where a huge throng had gathered to wave their money in the air and loudly clamour for service. ‘Gin?’ Emma mouthed to me over her shoulder before disappearing into the crowd then emerging again clutching two full glasses a few moments later.

  ‘The barman here is another old friend of mine,’ she explained as she handed over my glass. ‘These beauties were on the house.’

  ‘Beauties?’ I took a wary sip of the gin then started coughing as the fiery liquid seared my mouth and throat. ‘Are you sure about that, Em?’

  She grinned. ‘Oh, you’ll get used to it in time. They don’t call it mother’s ruin for nothing, you know.’

  ‘I’ve never quite understood that name,’ I said, chancing another sip then wincing as it burned its way down to my stomach.

  Emma laughed and raised her glass to me. ‘You will, my dear.’ She took a generous swig, clearly well used to the drink’s throat burning qualities. ‘You will.’

  We pushed through to the front of the stalls and spent the next few hours staring enraptured at a series of acts that ranged from a few plump lady singers, a sweet couple called, rather improbably, Lucian and Delilah, who duetted several love songs (‘I bet they hate each other in real life,’ Emma whispered to me during their act. ‘Just look at the way she’s glaring at him when he isn’t looking and if her name is really Delilah then I’m the bloody Queen’), Mademoiselle Zara who claimed to have spirit messages for various members of the audience, a magician who seemed to saw one young woman in half and then make another disappear entirely and then, most thrillingly of all, a team of acrobats from Italy who bounded, twirled and leaped across the stage in their spangled brightly coloured costumes until I felt quite dizzy watching them.

  ‘Oh, it’s marvellous,’ I exclaimed to Emma, clutching her arm when it was all over and it was time to go. I couldn’t stop grinning at the people around us. ‘Thank you for bringing me here.’

  She smiled. ‘Still fancy a career on the stage, do you?’ she asked, throwing her arm around my shoulders. ‘I can just imagine you up there singing your heart out.’ She’d had several gins by this point and was beginning to slur her words, stagger against me and make expansive arm gestures when she spoke.

  ‘Can you?’ I felt myself blush. ‘Ever since I was a little girl, I’ve wanted to go on the stage and sing. Everyone says that I have a nice voice but I don’t think I’m as pretty as those girls up there.’ I’d had one too many gins too but while it made Emma more voluble than ever, it made me feel despondent and a little tearful. ‘They’re ever so beautiful, aren’t they?’

  ‘Nonsense,’ Emma cried, pinching my cheek until it hurt. ‘You’re prettier than all of those fat frumps put together. Don’t they have mirrors in that police station of yours?’ She linked her arm through mine and together we staggered through the crowd, which was slowly drifting out of the stalls and on to the street. ‘Fancy another drink? I know a place on Houndsditch that stays open all night long and is always packed to the rafters with nice looking young soldiers. You’ll love it.’

  I was just shaking my head in despair when a young man in a shabby tweed suit appeared out of the throng and planted himself in front of us. ‘Alright Em?’ he said. He was very tall with short clipped dark hair, sad pale blue eyes and a quick shy smile that made his long face light up and dimples appear in his cheeks. ‘Long time, no see.’

  She paused, frowned then rubbed her eyes, a childlike gesture as if she didn’t quite believe what she was seeing. ‘Albert?’ She smiled then with genuine pleasure. ‘Albert Sinclair! It’s been far too long.’

  ‘You can say that again.’ He pulled her into a fierce bone breaking hug. ‘What’ve you been up to then? I haven’t seen you for years! Last I heard you were working as a model in Paris.’

  She shook her head. ‘I left France months ago,’ she said smoothly, shooting me a look that warned me to hold my tongue about what she had really been up to in France. ‘I’m here in Whitechapel now, working in the Britannia on Commercial Street. It’s not much but it keeps me going. How about you?’

  ‘Same as always,’ he said cheerfully. ‘Working for my Pa’s firm back home in Coggeshall. He’s about ready to retire now so I’ll be taking over soon. It’s hard work but, well, the prospects are good and it’ll all belong to me one day.’ he shrugged as if he didn’t care but it was clear from his expression that he was pleased as punch with how his life was turning out.

  ‘How do you two know each other then?’ I asked, curious despite myself and wondering how such an apparently ill matched couple had got acquainted. For a couple they had once clearly been judging by the awkward way they were looking at each other and that hug that had gone on for just a fraction too long before Emma gently prised herself out of it.

  There was a pause before both Emma and Albert started talking together at the same time then laughed and had a squabble, which Albert won, about who should carry on. ‘We knew each other back home in Essex,’ he said with a shy grin. ‘Only Emma here was a cut above me in those days and had all the boys running about after her. I never stood a chance really.’

  ‘That’s not true,’ my friend said flatly as if she had suddenly sobered up. ‘I was never a cut above you, Albert. You could have had me for the asking if you’d only had a mind to it.’

  An awkward silence fell as they stared at each other, the smile draining from Albert’s face as he looked at my friend. ‘Don’t say that, Em,’ he said at last, just as a small dark haired girl appeared beside him and put one tiny lace mittened hand on his arm in a gesture that clearly denoted a claim of ownership. He looked down at her with a frown as if trying to remember who she was then smiled apologetically. ‘Oh, I forgot, this is Sarah.’

  ‘Sarah?’ The two girls stared at each other and I felt Emma’s arm tighten around my waist. ‘Are you..?’ She looked at Albert and he nodded then looked away as if embarrassed. ‘Oh, that’s nice.’ She started to laugh just a little too shrilly and I looked at her in concern. ‘No, it is. Really nice and so lovely to see you both.’ She was too drunk to hide her dismay and I realised that it was up to me to rescue her from this.

  ‘I think we should be going now,’ I said, tightening my hold on her arm as Albert gave me a brisk and rather relieved nod. ‘Let’s be off now, Em,’ I whispered to her as she sagged against me, suddenly drunk and helpless again. ‘Let’s go and get that drink, shall we?’

  She nodded, not laughing any more. ‘Bye then,’ she called to Albert and Sarah over her shoulder as I led her away. ‘See you again some time.’ She let me take her out of the stalls then stopped suddenly and leaned against the smoke and mildew stained wall. ‘I didn’t do very well back there, did I?’ she said with a rueful smile as she wiped away a stray tear. ‘I hate how these things always take me by surprise. It’s always the way, isn’t it? You think you’re over the bugger and then suddenly he pops up large as life and it just hits you, right here.’ She thumped her chest hard enough to hurt then looked away as more tears trickled down her flushed cheeks.

  I didn’t have much of a clue what it was like, never having had a lover, but I nodded sympathetically, remembering the pang I felt whenever I saw Mr Mercier looking after Miss Redmayne with that sickly doe eyed expression. ‘You didn’t do too badly,’ I said soothingly as I rubbed her back and shoulders, feeling close to tears myself. ‘I don’t think they know how upset you are.’

  ‘Upset?’ She angrily scrubbed at her eyes and pushed herself away from the wall. ‘I’m not upset. Bloody man. She’s welcome to him.’ She hurried out of the music hall and for a while I lost her in the crowd before finding her again sitting on the edge of the pavement, her arms folded across her chest as she sulkily gazed across Whitechapel Road. The pubs were closing up for the night now and the road was packed with people, mostly drun
k, milling about and getting in the way of the horses and carts that still plodded up and down the road.

  ‘Are you sure that you aren’t bothered?’ I asked as I bunched up my skirts and gingerly sat down next to her making sure to avoid a huge steaming plop of horse excrement on the road.

  Emma grinned. ‘Alright then, yes, I’m not too happy but what can I do?’

  I sighed and put my head on her shoulder. ‘What happened?’ I asked quietly.

  She gave a short laugh. ‘What do you think always happens?’ she said with a shrug. ‘We saw each other, he liked the look of me and I lost my heart to the big useless lump.’ She pulled a crudely rolled cigarette, cadged earlier on from a man at the bar, from where she had tucked it behind her ear then took an almost empty box of matches out of her bosom before striking one on the pavement beside her.

  ‘That’s not all is it?’ I said, prodding her on.

  She shook her head and took a drag on the cigarette before coughing into her hand. ‘No, that’s not all,’ she said miserably. ‘I thought I was too good for where we came from.’ She gave a hoarse mirthless laugh and frowningly examined the burning end of the cigarette, which glowed in the darkness. ‘I thought I was too bloody good to be stuck there for the rest of my life, seeing the same faces every day and everyone knowing everyone else’s business. He wanted to marry me but I turned him down and ran away.’

  ‘You wanted to marry him though,’ I said as she took another shaky drag on the cigarette.

  She blew out a grey coil of smoke. ‘Course I wanted to,’ she said. ‘I couldn’t though. I just couldn’t bring myself to do it so I told him that I didn’t love him, that I didn’t even like him in that way and that was that.’ She took one last drag on the cigarette then threw it angrily away. ‘You should have seen his face when I said it,’ she said. ‘I’ll never forget how he looked, the poor bastard.’ She got up from the pavement and gave a careless shrug. ‘Anyway, it’s all ancient history now, especially as he’s with this Sarah now and all that.’ She held out her hand and pulled me to my feet.

  ‘Do you think they’re married?’ I mused. ‘Or just stepping out together?’

  She shook her head. ‘Who knows,’ she said furiously. ‘And who cares? I don’t. They’re welcome to each other.’

  I opened my mouth to reply then shut it with a snap. What was the use after all? She’d clearly made up her mind and that was that. We went past the entrance to the Pavilion, heading in silent agreement up towards Houndsditch and that final drink of the night. ‘Alright there girls?’ Another young man, this one short with sandy hair and looking much less pleasant than Albert Sinclair, stepped out of the dusk, grinning and leering at us both from beneath his tattered bowler hat. ‘Fancy a night on the town?’

  Emma pulled herself upright. ‘No, thank you,’ she said with enormous hauteur, pulling me past him.

  ‘Now then, Miss, no need to take on like that,’ he said, adroitly stepping in front of her and snatching at my arm. ‘No need to look down your nose at me when I’m just being friendly.’ He tugged me closer to him as I gave a yelp of pain and fear. ‘See.’ He put his arm around my waist and pressed a very damp slobbering kiss on my cheek as I recoiled away from him.

  Emma whirled around, her eyes narrowing. ‘Let go of my friend,’ she whispered from between clenched teeth and then when he just laughed and tugged me closer: ‘I said, let go of my friend.’

  ‘Make me,’ he snarled, pulling me even closer into his sweaty embrace then clumsily kissing me as I tried to push him away, almost sobbing with panic about what he was going to do next, which in the event turned out to be rolling about on the pavement, clutching his face in agony as blood spurted from his nose and Emma nursed her bruised knuckles while a small crowd gathered to point and laugh at his much deserved comeuppance.

  ‘You were warned,’ my friend said coldly before taking hold of my hand and stepping over him as he lay, groaning and cursing on the blood splattered ground. ‘Come on, Cora, I think we both need a drink after that.’

  Chapter Twenty One

  We hadn’t gone far down Whitechapel Road, skirting around the buskers and gaggles of drunk men and women that hovered about the edges of the filthy pavements, when we heard the first distant blast of a policeman’s whistle coming from the direction of Commercial Road. There was nothing unusual about that sound in the middle of Whitechapel of course but there was something about that mournful wail echoing over the dark rooftops that made us both stop dead and stare at each other.

  ‘Has he done it again?’ I said.

  Emma shrugged as if she didn’t care but her face was grim. ‘Who knows?’ she said. ‘I’m not hanging about here to find out though.’

  ‘Do you think it’s one of your friends?’ I persisted as she hurried along the street and I tried to keep up with her.

  ‘I hope not,’ she said. ‘I really bloody hope not.’

  We weren’t the only ones disturbed by the sound of the policeman’s whistle and as we almost ran along Whitechapel Road, I could see people turning their heads from side to side as they wondered where it had come from and what had happened, their faces pale and panic stricken. ‘It can’t be another murder,’ I heard one woman say to another. ‘He’s gone up north, ain’t he? There’s been nothing doing here for almost a month since poor Annie got ripped up.’

  ‘Just keep going,’ Emma urged me, taking my hand and pulling me along the street. ‘It’s bound to be nothing but let’s get out of here just in case.’

  By the time we reached the end of Whitechapel Road, the news that another woman been found killed in a yard off Berner Street had travelled ahead of us. ‘Just had her throat cut this one,’ the spotty adolescent tart who told us at her pitch outside St Botolph’s church at Aldgate said with a peculiar touch of regret. ‘There was no ripping up this time. The bobbies reckon he got interrupted before he could finish the job.’

  I felt Emma shudder beside me. ‘Poor bitch,’ she said. ‘It doesn’t matter what he did or didn’t do, the fact is that there’s some poor woman lying there dead and the ruddy coppers aren’t any closer to catching whoever is responsible.’ She tugged me away from the girl who was already staring past us with a hopeful smile at a likely looking group of drunk and very noisy City men staggering across from Minories.

  ‘I expect we’ll find out who it is soon,’ I said as we hurried up towards Houndsditch.

  ‘I don’t want to know,’ Emma said gruffly.

  ‘What about that friend of yours from France?’ I said as we continued up the street. The area wasn’t particularly well lit and there was something creepy and distinctly forbidding about the gloomy old City streets which were practically deserted at that time of night. There was still no way that I would rather be anywhere else though - this was the first time that I’d ever gone out so late at night and I was determined to make the most of it as who knew when it would happen again?

  Emma turned on me. ‘What about her?’ she said.

  I faltered and fell back from the expression on her face. ‘Aren’t you worried about her? She was there too, wasn’t she? She saw him as well and he saw her.’

  Emma shrugged. ‘Marie can look after herself,’ she said but she couldn’t hide the look of worry that flashed across her face. ‘Maybe I should go and see her later on,’ she grumbled. ‘Just to make sure that she’s still in one piece.’

  ‘Where does she live?’ I asked, gasping as I tried to keep up with her swift pace.

  ‘Never you mind,’ Emma replied sharply before swiftly relenting. ‘Sorry, old habits and all that. She’s got a place on Miller’s Court that she shares with her bloke. He’s a nice sort, probably a bit too nice for Marie in fact, if you know what I mean.’

  I didn’t know but nodded anyway. ‘You said that she’s got her own worries.’

  Emma nodded, unsmiling. ‘Oh nothing like this but little things, you know how it is. She owes rent to her landlord and he’s started asking for it in kind only her boy
friend, well, he doesn’t…’ she broke off and grinned as a bedraggled looking woman with messy auburn hair that straggled from beneath a wonky black bonnet came staggering towards us down the street. ‘Cathy! Where the bloody hell have you been?’ she exclaimed. ‘I haven’t seen you for ages.’

  Cathy grinned back at her. ‘Down in Kent picking hops, old cock,’ she said cheerfully. ‘You should try it sometime, Em, you make a bit of cash and get ever so brown. Just look at my arms!’ she held out her hands in front of her so that we could admire her tan. ‘Not very ladylike but who cares about that?’ She was clearly the worse for wear and reeked of gin, most of which seemed to have gone down the front of her brown linsey bodice and threadbare black short jacket which was trimmed with bedraggled dark fur at the collar and cuffs.

  ‘Ooh, lovely hair your friend has got,’ she said with a grin, reaching over to touch my hair which was starting to straggle in annoying ringlets around my neck. ‘What a nice shade of red. I bet you have all the boys after you, don’t you, sweetheart.’

  ‘So what have you been up to tonight?’ Em said, smiling. ‘I didn’t see you in the Princess Alice earlier, which makes a change.’

  ‘I got chucked in the old nick, didn’t I?’ Cathy said with a grin that showed off the gaps between her remaining teeth. ‘The coppers picked me up on Bishopsgate earlier on and put me in the cells until I’d sobered up enough to be let go.’ She laughed. ‘Apparently I was doing an impression of a fire engine, bells and everything. Can you believe that? I’m damned if I can remember any of it though. Drunk as a lord I was.’

  Emma burst out laughing. ‘Bloody hell, Chick, how much did you have to drink?’

  ‘More enough, Em, my old mate. More than enough,’ Cathy said with a wink, straightening the length of gaudy red gauze that she had tied around her neck as a rather jaunty makeshift scarf. ‘Only I spent all my pennies and now I don’t have enough for a bed for the night.’ She laughed. ‘Always the bleeding way, isn’t it? I’ll have to go and earn it all again now although I don’t know how, I’m sure, as it’s the middle of the bloody night and I can barely stand up as it is.’