Ha'Penny Chance (Ivy Rose Series Book 2)

by Gemma Jackson

  “What are you thinking, Ivy Murphy?” Jem raised his head from his hands and stared. “I know that look.”

  “I want to help that old woman.” Ivy shrugged. “But that’s not all. I think with all the changes taking place around us, there is the chance of a moneymaking opportunity here for us. I haven’t worked out all the details in my mind yet. I need to concentrate on getting ready to sell my dolls for the moment but there is an opportunity here. I’m sure of it.” She laughed. “Even if I don’t know what it is yet!”

  “Ivy,” Jem dropped his head back into his hands and groaned dramatically, “I’m running in place with all of the new business opportunities I’m taking up already.”

  “I’m only saying, Jem. I’ll have to spend more time thinking about everything. Anyway, Nanny has to come first. She hasn’t been told when she has to leave the house. With the grace of God, we should be able to get through Christmas and the New Year before any decisions have to be made about her stuff. I couldn’t take on something else right now meself.”

  “I know you, Ivy.” Jem shook his head ruefully. There was no holding Ivy back when she got a bee in her bonnet about something. “I know I haven’t heard the last of this.”

  He wanted to ask her about them. He wanted to say ‘What about us?’. But he felt too raw right now to bring that subject up. He was still reeling from the close call they’d had on this bloody chair. They needed to get churched. And soon.

  “Being in that room with Nanny Grace made me think about Emmy.” Ivy looked over her shoulder as if expecting to see the child standing behind her.

  “What about her?” He dragged his mind away from where it wanted to wander, forced his eyes away from the big bed standing so close and forced himself to think of the innocent child he’d taken responsibility for. A child, moreover, who could be knocking on the door at any minute. He’d given no thought to Emmy when he’d had Ivy locked in his arms.

  “It occurred to me when I was talking to Nanny . . . when I was sitting in that big room full of toys and wonders . . . I began to think about the house Emmy grew up in. That house probably has a room very like the one I was in today.” She sighed deeply.

  “Ivy, spit it out,” Jem prompted. “Emmy will be coming in here soon. You know what she’s like. She hears everything you don’t want her to.”

  “Jem, we need to see that Emmy gets the education she would have got if her aunt had never tried to throw her away.”

  Emmy’s aunt had been a passenger in Jem’s cab. She’d had a fatal accident along the route but not before letting Jem know that she intended to drop her niece off at Goldenbridge, a home officially known as a trade school but in reality a workhouse for female orphans.

  “I don’t understand your worries, Ivy. Emmy is getting a good education. You of all people know that. Emmy’s teachers say she has the brightest mind they’ve ever come across. The child is able to teach you.”

  “That’s not the kind of education I’m talking about, Jem. That’s book learning and that’s important. It’s the other things she needs to know.”

  “What other things?”

  “Emmy needs the kind of education Ann Marie Gannon got when she was growing up. Things like music and art appreciation. She’ll need to learn to handle her own money or ‘finances’ as the nobs call it. She’ll need to fit into her own society, Jem. We can’t teach her that. We don’t know how. We never learned.”

  “I still don’t know what you mean, Ivy.” Jem was doing the best he could by the child he’d taken into his home.

  “Emmy needs to learn to play the piano or the harp or something.” Ivy was thinking of the musical instruments standing in that room with Nanny. She hadn’t recognised the half of them. “Little girls in her social class learn to paint.” She shrugged. “For all I know they learn foreign languages.” Ivy couldn’t imagine the magic of speaking several languages. She could only make a stab at Irish and English herself. “They learn to ride horses.” Ivy was trying to think of things she herself would love to learn how to do. “They have dance classes. They learn to mingle socially.”

  “Emmy is only seven, Ivy.” Jem shrugged. “She has time to learn anything she needs to learn.”

  “She has to start now, Jem,” Ivy insisted. “I was thinking we might ask Ann Marie for advice.”

  “I thought we were going to keep Emmy and where she comes from a secret between ourselves, Ivy?” It was vital that the accident that killed Emmy’s aunt was kept secret.

  “I don’t want to send her back to her own world unprepared, Jem. They’d snigger at her behind their hands. She’d be an outcast. We can’t allow that to happen.”

  “I don’t know anything about high society, Ivy.” Jem sighed and pushed his hands through his hair. Trust Ivy to think up a list of problems.

  “I know that, Jem. I don’t know anything much myself. I listened to my mother telling tales of her life before she married me da. It was like something from another world. Ann Marie would know what was needed. She knows how to move about in society. She doesn’t have to learn. She never makes a fool of herself.”

  Ivy fell silent, staring ahead, a hopeless expression on her face.

  “Ivy . . .” Jem stared at her. “What’s the matter? What’s going on?”

  “She’s challenged me, Jem,” she said with a shrug.

  “Come again?” Jem stared.

  “Ann Marie Gannon has issued a challenge to me.”

  “I don’t suppose you’re talking about pistols at dawn,” Jem said slowly.

  “It’s me own fault. I was praising her on how well she was beginning to fit in around here.”

  “And?” Jem prompted.

  “She invited me to take tea with her at the Shelbourne Hotel. She dared me, Jem.” Ivy jumped to her feet. She grabbed her cup from the table. She had to do something, move, or she’d be sick.

  “Well, Ivy Murphy, no one can say you’re not coming up in the world.” Jem shook his head in admiration.

  “Jem,” Ivy wailed, “I can’t go into the Shelbourne Hotel! I’d die of fright. You’ve seen those sour auld doormen that guard the place. Can you really imagine me, Ivy Murphy, all fur coat and no knickers, going into a place like that?”

  “You have to go, Ivy.” Jem grinned widely. “You can tell the rest of us what it’s like inside. Ivy Murphy, you owe it to your friends. We’ll never get the chance to put a toe inside that place. You’ve been talking about Emmy learning to be social. B’gob, woman, it looks like you might be the one to teach her.” Jem roared laughing at the look of complete and utter horror on Ivy’s face.

  “Mind yeh don’t choke,” Ivy said sourly. She’d thought Jem would be on her side. She couldn’t do it. She could not, simply could not, step inside that big fancy hotel as if she belonged in the place. She’d drop dead of fright on the spot. “I’m sorry I told yeh now.” Ivy glared. Didn’t he understand? She’d walked past the Shelbourne Hotel so many times in her life. The look of sheer disgust whichever sneering doorman on duty directed at her almost pulled the skin from her bones. Some of the doormen kept a collection of stones to throw at those they considered lowered the tone of the street in front of the hotel. She remembered every bruise she’d ever received that way.

  “You got yourself all dolled up and went into that fancy toy shop in Grafton Street to do business and the sky didn’t fall. That turned out really well for you as I recall.” Jem grinned widely. It was good to know something intimidated Ivy.

  “I’m glad I could amuse yeh, Jem Ryan.” Ivy suddenly realised she was standing here like a fool with a cup and saucer in her hand. She put the dishes on the table then she slapped both hands on her hips and glared down at Jem. “Anyway, we were talking about Emmy, not me. We can’t help Emmy prepare for her place in society, Jem. Ann Marie is the only person I can think of that could help.” Ivy didn’t want the matter of her visiting the Shelbourne raised again. She was sorry she’d ever mentioned it.

  “We would have to tell
her the whole story.” Jem grimaced. “Ann Marie would have to know everything about Miss Emerald O’Connor of Galway. I don’t know if I want to open that can of worms, Ivy.”

  “We can think about it, Jem. We have a bit of time but we do need to start thinking about Emmy’s future.”

  “I suppose.” Jem heard the clatter of small feet on the outside steps. “Here’s Emmy now, Ivy.”

  “I’ll let her in.” Ivy was delighted at the interruption. She hurried into her front room. She had the door open before Emmy could knock.

  “Auntie Ivy, I had the time o’ me life.” Emmy danced in place, delighted with herself. “I made sure to get me balls back, Auntie Ivy.” She held up both hands, a colourful rubber ball clutched firmly in each little gloved fist.

  “I beg your pardon, Miss Ryan?” Ivy said in a posh accent. That’s all they needed, Emmy Ryan with a flat Dublin accent. “I’m afraid I didn’t understand that last sentence.”

  “I do beg your pardon.” Emmy stuck her nose in the air. “I had a wonderful time with my friends, Aunt. And I made sure of the safe return of my rubber balls.” And she giggled with wild delight.

  “Much better.” Ivy opened the door wide and Emmy skipped through.

  “Just for that, Auntie Ivy,” Emmy giggled, “I’m going to be really cross with you if you make any mistakes in your homework.”

  “Oh mercy me!” Ivy cried dramatically. “Not that! Spare me!”

  “Will you two giggling females get in here!” Jem shouted from the back room. He loved to hear Ivy and Emmy twitting each other.

  “Uncle Jem!” Emmy screamed and ran towards the sound of his voice. “I didn’t know you were here. No one told me.” She threw herself at him.

  “You must have missed the news broadcast.” Jem laughed and pulled Emmy up onto his knees.

  “What are we having to eat, Auntie Ivy?” Emmy demanded. “I’m hungry.”

  “Duck under the table,” Ivy said, giving the Dubliner’s standard reply for having nothing to eat in the house.

  “Auntie Ivy!” Emmy giggled. “You always say that. Now, really, what are we having to eat?”

  “We, Miss Ryan, are having a fry-up.” Ivy grinned. “Does that meet with your approval?” She hadn’t had time to make what most would consider a cooked meal. To Dubliners, if the meal didn’t include potatoes it wasn’t a meal. It was a snack. She had brown soda bread from her recent baking – that, with sausage, bacon, egg and tomato would suffice for a filling snack.

  “Am I invited, Ivy?” Jem allowed his lower lip to tremble, sending both females into hysterics.

  “I don’t see why not,” Ivy said. “I bought plenty of food. Are you sure you wouldn’t like to go and announce it to the world that you’re staying for a bite to eat? You could even announce the menu.”

  “I’ll pass on that, thanks.” Jem sat back and watched Emmy jump around, getting the dishes from Ivy’s tall cupboard. Emmy insisted on setting the table whenever she ate with Ivy.

  Jem sat back in the soft chair, crossed his legs and dreamed of a time when this scene would become an everyday part of his life.

  “Oh, Auntie Ivy, I forgot to tell you.” Emmy held her fork frozen between her plate and her lips. “The sad boy gave me a message for you.” She had insisted on calling Liam Connelly ‘the sad boy’, ever since she’d first met him.

  “When did you see Liam?” Jem asked.

  “He and his sister went past when we were playing ball.” Emmy put the piece of sausage on her fork into her mouth and chewed happily.

  “What was the message?” Ivy sat back and waited, expecting Emmy to simply pass along a social greeting.

  “He wrote it down.” Emmy dropped her fork onto her partially consumed plate of food. “’Scuse me,” she muttered before jumping down from the table. She ran to where her coat was lying on the nearby bed and searched in her pockets, then returned to the table, climbed back on her chair and passed a folded piece of white unlined paper across the table to Ivy.

  “Ivy?” Jem watched in almost morbid fascination while every piece of colour seemed to leach out of Ivy’s face, turning it as pale as the paper that trembled in her hand. She dropped the note, shoved her plate of food out of the way and dropped her head down onto her folded arms on the tabletop.

  “I can’t breathe.”

  “Auntie Ivy?” Emmy moved to leave her chair.

  “It’s okay,” Jem assured the child. Ivy could be overly dramatic at times. He prayed to God this was one of them. “What’s the matter, Ivy?”

  “Look!” Ivy raised her head and stabbed a finger at Liam’s copperplate script. “‘An invitation-only gala evening of theatre’!”

  “Is that what’s upset you?”

  “Read it,” Ivy mumbled as she sank her head onto her arms again.

  Jem picked up Liam’s note and began to read. “Ivy, this is marvellous!” He grinned broadly.

  “Have you read all of that thing?” Ivy’s head snapped up again. She reached across the table and grabbed the note from Jem’s loose grip.

  Emmy watched the exchange with delight while she continued to eat the food on her plate. She was hungry – running around after bouncing balls had worked on her appetite. She looked between the two adults and simply sighed. Life was so good.

  “It says here,” Ivy shook the paper in the air, “that they are putting on a special preview of the pantomime starring that fella Conn told us about who stepped in as top of the bill. The one that everyone’s talking about!”

  “My word, Ivy Murphy, you know all the fancy terms now, it seems.” Jem couldn’t resist pulling her leg. She’d given him quite a turn – it was only fair he should get his own back. He grabbed the note back and pointed to one part of it. “Liam says it will be a chance for you to sell your dolls! It’s marvellous.”

  “Oh yeah, marvellous, you bloody . . . man.” Ivy grabbed at her hair and almost shrieked. “Did you look at the date? No, you didn’t! It’s tomorrow!”

  Jem stifled a grin. He exchanged a laughing glance with Emmy who hid her own smile behind her two little hands clapped in front of her face. “Well, Liam does say he only just found out as he and Vera won’t be a part of it.” He spread his hands wide. “Nice of them to make it on a Thursday.” He collapsed laughing at the look of horror on Ivy’s face and Emmy giggled until she hiccupped.

  “A ‘preview’, Liam calls it.” Ivy grabbed the note back – at this rate the thing would be in flitters before they left the table. “He says that the show is for an invited audience of bigwigs.”

  “But, will there be little children there?” Jem wondered.

  “Liam,” Ivy consulted the note again, “says that there will be lots of children attending.” Then she added, a sparkle at last coming into her eyes, “He says only the children of the wealthy – that the theatre bosses are trying to attract people with money to back their shows.”

  “It’s a great opportunity, Ivy,” Jem said. “It’ll give you a chance to sell your dolls before pantomime season. You can learn what will and won’t work for you. See if you’ll have any problems. ”

  “Yes,” Ivy whispered over the lump in her throat. “Great . . . but . . . tomorrow!”

  Chapter 26

  She didn’t think she’d ever been so cold in her life. She gritted her teeth behind her frozen smile and accepted the money being handed to her. Her feet, inside her well-worn steel-capped boys’ work boots felt like blocks of ice. She shivered as the wind found every exposed inch of her flesh.

  “Girls, please remember you are ladies – you have a position in society to uphold,” the sour-faced nanny snapped at her overexcited young charges.

  The two girls dressed in matching red-wool coats with white fur-trimmed collars, fur muffs and hats danced in place. Their little laced black ankle-boots rapped a sound of joy on the cobbles under their feet.

  Ivy stared at the two young girls, wondering what their lives were like. The two were dressed like young princesses but she’d
learned appearances could be deceptive. The nanny looked like a bad-tempered pincher to her. She wouldn’t fancy being under her thumb.

  “Your father was kind enough to allow his driver to return us to the theatre with the coins to buy these dolls. You are fortunate indeed that we live so close. Now, do you ladies think that bouncing around in this very unladylike fashion is any way to repay your father’s great kindness?” Nanny Willis wanted out of this freezing cold. The wind whistling down this street would skin a body. What a palaver over two dolls that cost more than she earned in a month!

  Ivy wished the two young ‘ladies’ would stick their tongues out at the old biddy. Could they not be allowed to enjoy their new toys?

  “The price is outrageous.” Nanny Willis sniffed and turned away from the doll seller in a huff. She grabbed each little girl by the hand and tugged them towards the waiting carriage, then pushed the two girls in front of her through the door being held open by a servant.

  “Do you think the toffs cook up those auld biddies in a mad scientist’s lab somewhere?” a familiar voice drawled over Ivy’s shoulder.

  “Jem, what are you doing here?” Ivy stamped her frozen feet and turned to greet him with a smile. He’d made the effort to come down here to meet her – she would not let him see the terror she was feeling. The whole enterprise had been a disaster. She needed time to think about everything.