Belle

by Lesley Pearse

  *

  ‘Well, Jack, if you’ll just take your pants off, I can wash you,’ Belle said, trying hard to sound as if she’d said that a hundred times before. He’d given her the money as they got into the room, and she’d opened the door again and handed it to Cissie who was waiting outside. As she poured the water from the jug into the basin on the washstand, her hand was shaking so hard she thought she might drop it.

  ‘You sure are lovely,’ he said as he unbuttoned his trousers. ‘Why, I can’t believe I’ve found an angel like you.’

  ‘That’s very kind of you, sir,’ Belle said, suppressing a giggle. ‘Is that because you haven’t been to a sporting house before?’

  His pants were on the floor, along with his underpants. He was very pale-skinned and his legs were very thin. ‘This is my third time,’ he said with some pride. ‘I come to New Orleans on business with my uncle once every three months. He’s in tableware.’

  Belle knew she had to hurry him along, so she parted his long shirt, took hold of his penis and went to wash it with the cloth. His penis instantly reared up, and thankfully it looked very healthy, with no sign of any discharge.

  ‘He’s pleased to see me,’ she said, copying what she’d heard Hatty say to one of her gentlemen.

  ‘He sure is,’ Jack gasped.

  ‘Well, you’d better unfasten my dress for me,’ Belle said.

  His breath was hot on the back of her neck, and she could feel his fingers trembling. That he wanted her so badly made her feel a faint stirring of desire for him too. She didn’t think it was going to be too bad.

  Once she had stepped out of her dress and thrown it on a chair, she stood there in her short chemise, stockings and shoes and, smiling at him, reached out and took his hand, placing it on one of her breasts.

  She was just going to ask him how he wanted her, when he lunged forward, pulling her chemise down to expose her breasts, and took one nipple in his mouth to suck. His hand slid between her legs, and holding her that way he nudged her towards the bed and bent her back down on to it. He wasn’t rough, just passionate, and again Belle felt that stab of desire, so she moved under him, telling him she liked it. All at once he was on her, pushing into her, while his mouth was still glued to her breast. She was only half on the bed, and he was standing on the floor fucking her.

  He came after just four or five thrusts, then collapsed on top of her with a sob. She looked at the little clock on her mantelpiece and saw he’d been with her less than ten minutes. It was almost a comic situation; he’d spent more than most people earned in months on her, and it didn’t even last as long as a glass of beer. But she saw the sad side of it: a nice but lonely young man who probably thought coming to a whorehouse made him a real man.

  She cuddled him for a couple of minutes, telling him he was marvellous, then eased him up from her and said he must get dressed. She half expected him to say he hadn’t had long enough, but he looked stunned and happy, not a bit disgruntled.

  ‘Could I call on you next time I get to New Orleans?’ he asked.

  ‘Of course, I’ll be waiting for you,’ Belle replied.

  He was gone in a trice. She shut the door behind him and leaned back on it, closing her eyes. She didn’t feel bad at all, for Jack had seemed really delighted with both her and himself. If they were all like Jack, she might even find herself begging one of them to stay a while longer so she could teach him a thing or two about pleasure.

  She laughed to herself then. She was officially a whore now. A fifty-dollar-a-time one at that. She wondered what her mother and Mog would think of that.

  *

  ‘You’ve made a mistake, Martha,’ Belle said at the end of the evening. All the girls had received their pay, and Belle had hung back till everyone else had gone. She wanted to query why she’d only been given two dollars. ‘I went with twelve men. I should be getting three hundred dollars.’

  ‘No, honey. New girls under contract to me get just two dollars a day until their fee has been repaid and the cost of any gowns, shoes or underwear recovered.’

  Belle didn’t know what to say. Two dollars for a night’s work would be as much as she could expect in most other lines of work. But Etienne had said she’d get half of what was taken, and she didn’t like being cheated.

  ‘Well, I’m sure you won’t mind showing me the books you’re keeping?’ she said after a second’s thought. ‘Show me what you paid for me, what you’ve spent on me so far. That way I’ll know how long I have to go until the debt is paid off.’

  She saw Martha’s face tighten, and knew being smart probably wasn’t such a good idea. But she had no intention of retracting anything.

  ‘Go to bed,’ Martha said in a voice like ice. ‘I’ll talk to you in the morning.’

  Belle lay awake for a long time that night, listening to the sounds of Basin Street. A jazz band was playing just along the street and she could hear dancing feet pounding on a wooden floor somewhere close by, shouts, laughter, muffled conversations, drunks calling out and bottles being thrown into a bin. It was much the same kind of noise she’d grown up with in Seven Dials, and that made her consider what her mother’s response would have been if any of her girls had questioned what they were paid.

  She suspected Annie would have told them they could sling their hook if they didn’t like it and there were plenty more girls to take their place. But then, Belle had no idea how many men each of her mother’s girls serviced in an evening. Nor did she know the price they charged. But she doubted that they went for more than five pounds a time, top whack. She also had no doubt that if the girls had only got one pound a night all found, they’d have been ecstatic.

  But knowing that didn’t make Belle feel any better. It was she who had to put up with men groping her, gawping at her, saying crude things, pawing her, fucking her and finally maybe even giving her the pox or making her pregnant. All Martha did was sit on her fat backside and watch the money flow in.

  Belle was sore too, not so much from the sex, as none of the men lasted long enough to hurt or bruise her, but from the disinfectant Martha made them use. It smelled strong enough to kill a grown man, let alone a sperm or a germ.

  It was clear there was big money to be made from whoring, but now Belle had a sick feeling that she wasn’t going to make it here working for Martha. The woman was unlikely to ever admit how much she paid for her, and that meant the time would never come when Belle didn’t owe her.

  But Belle wasn’t finished yet. These Southern Americans thought they were all so smart, but they couldn’t beat the cunning of a girl from Seven Dials. She’d go along with everything for now, but she’d be watching, listening and learning, then when the right opportunity came along, she’d grab it with both hands.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Mog looked at Mrs Stewart in astonishment. ‘You say your Amy’s gone missing?’ she gasped.

  ‘Yes, that’s right. It were two years ago now. I nearly lost my mind with grief and worry.’

  ‘I’m so sorry,’ Mog said with utter sincerity. ‘We lost our Belle the same way so I can understand what you’ve been through. Could I come in for a moment and talk to you?’

  ‘You know something?’ Hope sprang up in Mrs Stewart’s face and for a brief second she looked ten years younger.

  ‘Not exactly, but if we put our heads together …’ Mog said.

  Mrs Stewart opened her door wider. ‘Come in, Mrs …’ She paused, realizing she didn’t know the name.

  ‘Miss Davis,’ Mog said as she stepped over the threshold. ‘But everyone calls me Mog. Belle is my friend’s daughter, I don’t have any children of my own, but I helped bring Belle up from a baby.’

  ‘I’m Lizzie.’ Mrs Stewart led the way down a narrow passage into a large, warm kitchen. ‘I’d take you in the parlour but it’s so cold in there. I always lit the fire in there until Amy disappeared, but there doesn’t seem any point now.’

  ‘I live in the kitchen too,’ Mog said. She glanced round the
room, noting that it was spotlessly clean, and the table and floor well scrubbed. Two easy chairs by the stove made it very homely. ‘No point in wasting good coal on a fire you can’t sit in front of. You say your Amy was thirteen when she went. Did the police have any suspects?’

  Lizzie shook her head sadly. ‘They were worse than useless, kept telling me she’d come home in her own good time. I knew my girl, she wouldn’t go off like that and frighten me.’

  ‘What do you think has happened to her?’ Mog asked.

  ‘It’s my belief she’s gone to the white slave trade,’ Lizzie said.

  In the more sensational newspapers there were always stories about young women being captured for this trade. In the past Mog had thought it was scaremongering, lurid stories made up to sell more newspapers. Yet however much she had once laughed at fanciful tales about young English girls being sold to become concubines in the harems of Persian princes, now that Belle was gone, she no longer found it amusing.

  ‘I don’t think the white slave trade exists, at least not in the way it has been portrayed in the press,’ Mog said gently. ‘But I do think your Amy may have been taken by the same people that took our Belle.’

  She didn’t want to say too much. ‘You see, a friend of mine has been doing some snooping to try and find Belle, and he came across a list of names and addresses. Your Amy’s was on it, that’s why I called on you.’

  ‘We must take it to the police then,’ Lizzie said.

  Mog became a little frightened then; she didn’t know if she could trust Lizzie Stewart. She was a respectable woman, and if Mog began telling her about a girl being murdered in a brothel she’d probably run down the street squealing like a stuck pig.

  ‘We think the man behind this has the police in his pocket,’ she said. ‘So I daren’t go to them until I’ve got real proof that he’s snatching young girls. But I’m going to call on the other addresses on the list, and if all the girls have disappeared then we’ll have a case that the police won’t be able to ignore.’

  ‘Are you saying the police are corrupt?’ Lizzie’s pale blue eyes opened wide with childlike innocence.

  ‘Let’s just say they look the other way sometimes, especially if villains are strong, powerful men,’ Mog said, not wishing to disillusion the woman entirely. Lizzie was comfortably off, and although she lived close to Seven Dials she was probably blissfully unaware of what went on there. ‘Do you have a picture of Amy you can show me?’

  Lizzie went straight over to the dresser and brought over a framed family group picture taken in a studio. She was sitting on a couch with her husband, a tall, slender man with a large moustache, and Amy was sitting on a low stool by their knees.

  ‘Amy was twelve then.’ Lizzie’s voice trembled. ‘Isn’t she pretty?’

  ‘She is indeed,’ Mog agreed. The girl was slender like her father, her fair hair plaited and wound round her head like a crown.

  ‘When I took her hair down it reached her waist.’ Lizzie’s eyes filled with tears and her lip trembled. ‘The day she disappeared she was wearing a cornflower-blue coat, the same colour as her eyes, I made it for her myself. Larry, my husband, he said it was a daft colour for a coat because it would show the dirt. But I didn’t care, she looked so pretty in it …’ She stopped short, overcome by emotion.

  Mog put her hand on the other woman’s arm in silent sympathy.

  ‘She’s my only child. The pain of losing her was so bad I thought I’d die,’ Lizzie sobbed. ‘Sometimes I wish I had died because there’s nothing else left in this life for me.’

  ‘I’ve felt the same way about Belle,’ Mog admitted. ‘It’s the not knowing if they are alive or dead which makes it even worse. But I’m staying strong because I don’t believe Belle is dead, not in my heart. And I’m going to find her. How about you? Do you think Amy has been killed?’

  Lizzie shook her head. ‘No, I’m sure I’d sense it if she was. Larry doesn’t trust my intuition, he says it’s just wishful thinking, but I think he’s wrong.’

  ‘Then there’s hope,’ Mog said, and put her arms around the other woman and hugged her. Lizzie hugged her back and they stood that way for some little while, two strangers united because of fear for their girls.

  Mog broke away first, her eyes damp with tears now. ‘I can’t promise you anything, but I will come and tell you if I find out anything at all. If you think of something that might help us, or you just want to talk to me, you can find me in the Ram’s Head in Monmouth Street.’

  The second name on the list was Nora Toff of James Court. Mog knew that it was over by Drury Lane, and she remembered people often called it Gin Court for it was said to be home to hard drinkers. But, unconcerned whether this was true or not, she hurried off there, anxious to have some kind of case to put before Garth and Noah.

  James Court was very squalid. Mog picked her way carefully through refuse, ignoring the stares from snotty-nosed urchins wearing only rags and found her way to number two, which had a door that appeared to have been kicked in many times. She rapped firmly on it.

  ‘Bugger off, you little bastards,’ a male voice bellowed from within, and Mog stepped back from the door in fright.

  It was flung open by a man wearing only trousers and a dirty vest. His feet were bare and he smelled of drink. ‘If you’re from the church you can bugger off too,’ he snarled at her.

  ‘I’m not from the church,’ Mog said, indignation at being spoken to so rudely making her bolder. ‘I came to ask you about Nora Toff. Is she your daughter?’

  ‘And what’s it to you?’ he said.

  Mog took that to be confirmation that he at least knew Nora, even if he was not her father.

  ‘I hope she has nothing to do with me, but my friend’s daughter has disappeared, and also another girl under very similar circumstances. I’d just like to know if Nora is safe at home.’

  ‘She went off six months ago,’ the man said. ‘What are you saying? What’s happened to those other girls?’

  ‘We don’t know, they just disappeared,’ Mog said. ‘Both of their mothers know they wouldn’t run off of their own accord, they were good girls.’

  ‘You’d better come in,’ the man growled. ‘Our Nora weren’t flighty neither, she never done nothing like that afore.’

  Mog did not want to go into the man’s home alone; the dank, festering smell wafting out was enough to know it would be even worse inside. He looked a desperate character too; it really wasn’t safe. ‘I’d like to talk about it to you,’ she said carefully, ‘but not here. Could you come to the Ram’s Head in Monmouth Street early this evening? Ask for Mog.’

  She slipped away quickly, even as he was calling after her. Once around the corner in Drury Lane she looked at the list of names and addresses and decided that she’d done enough for one day.

  When Mog walked into the pub, she found Noah there talking to Jimmy and Garth. They all looked round expectantly as she came in and obviously had been discussing the list of names.

  ‘Amy Stewart disappeared two years ago,’ Mog said quietly, aware some of the drinkers might be listening. ‘Only thirteen and she’s got very respectable parents.’ She went on then to tell them what had happened when she asked about Nora Toff.

  ‘I’m not sure if the man was her father,’ she explained. ‘He was a rough sort, and he’d been drinking, but I suggested he came here in the early evening. I don’t feel inclined to try any more today – Lizzie Stewart drained me.’

  ‘I’ll go and ask about some of the others,’ Noah offered, taking the list from her and looking at it. ‘There’s two from near Ludgate Circus, I’ll check them as I’ve got to go to Fleet Street this afternoon anyway.’

  ‘What about going to Paris? To check out that Madame Sondheim,’ Jimmy said, his eyes sparkling with excitement. ‘If you go, Noah, can I go with you?’

  ‘You aren’t going anywhere, son,’ Garth said firmly.

  Jimmy stuck out his lip.

  ‘Your place is here,’ Noah sa
id, reaching out to ruffle the lad’s hair. ‘You’ve done a fine job getting this list, and the address in Paris, but if I take anyone there with me, it will have to be someone who speaks French.’

  ‘Seems to me,’ Garth said ponderously, ‘that we should double our efforts to find that man called Sly and kick some information out of him.’

  ‘Oh, Garth!’ Mog exclaimed.

  Garth folded his arms defiantly. ‘Look, Jimmy heard him mentioned again, they said he’d turned yellow-bellied, so ask yourself why that is.’

  ‘Disgusted with what the others were doing?’ Noah suggested.

  ‘Possibly,’ Garth said. ‘But it’s more likely he found himself in deep water and got scared.’

  ‘You said no one round here had seen him in ages,’ Jimmy said.

  Garth nodded. ‘That’s right, but I know a man I could lean on who might tell me where he hangs out.’

  Mog didn’t like it when men spoke of giving people a kicking or leaning on them, and said so. Garth merely grinned. ‘Some folk just don’t respond to being asked nicely,’ he retorted.

  Two weeks later Mog, Garth, Noah and Jimmy gathered round the table in the kitchen behind the saloon. It was wet and very windy outside, and at six in the evening the bar was still quiet.

  Noah had a sheet of paper in front of him on which he’d written out the names and addresses from the list found in Colm’s office and next to each he’d made notes of what he’d found out.

  ‘Amy Stewart,’ Noah read. ‘Disappeared two years ago, age thirteen. Nora Toff, fourteen, disappeared six months ago. Flora Readon, sixteen, disappeared eleven months ago. May Jenkins, disappeared fourteen months ago.’

  Noah paused and looked around the table. ‘There’s no need to go right through all the twenty names on this list. All but three of them have gone missing in the last four years. They were mostly between fourteen and sixteen. Amy Stewart was the youngest of all at thirteen. Every one of them was said to be pretty; in most cases I was shown a photograph which confirmed this. As for the remaining three names I can’t be sure what happened to them as their families no longer live at the addresses on the list. But a neighbour of Helen Arboury said the girl had “gone off”. She couldn’t or wouldn’t say if she thought there was anything suspicious about this, but she did say that Helen’s mother was a widow and she took her other two children and went to stay with relatives.’