Sixpenny Stalls

by Beryl Kingston

  The sight of her put him into such a muddle of emotions that he didn’t know what to say to her – fury that she’d disobeyed him so blatantly; confusion because he hadn’t expected to see her; desire because triumph was making her glow with the most beautiful boldness.

  ‘I’ve had a marvellous afternoon,’ she said, tucking her hand in the crook of his arm. ‘Are you going home?’

  ‘I was,’ he said, annoyed with himself that he should want her so much when she’d behaved so badly.

  ‘Good,’ she said, smiling straight into his eyes. ‘Then I will tell you all about it as we go. Is the carriage ordered?’

  He was amazed at her. Had she forgotten their dreadful row? She showed no signs of remembering it.

  She sat beside him all the way to Nine Elms, snuggled affectionately against his side, and told him all about her meeting with Mr Chaplin and his associates, plainly expecting him to approve of it. Which he had to do when he’d heard about it, because it was an excellent deal, and the businessman in him knew it. But even so, even so …

  ‘How did you know about it?’ he asked, feeling quite cross.

  ‘Why, from the letter you circulated, of course. Had you forgotten? Mr Jolliffe brought it to me.’

  Damn Mr Jolliffe, he thought. He should have had more sense. Or I should have told him to avoid her. But how could I have done that, when I had no idea she was in the building? She was attracting him so strongly he couldn’t think logically. It would have been easier if her eyes weren’t quite so large or quite so loving. ‘Caroline,’ he said, and the word was a caress.

  She turned her face towards him and kissed his cheek. ‘Wait till you hear what I found out about Mr Chaplin,’ she said. ‘He means to go into parliament, did you know that?’

  ‘A sensible move,’ he said, trying to concentrate on what she was saying.

  They talked business all the way back to Richmond, where he was surprised to find their dog cart waiting for them as if they were expected, and when they reached Richmond Hill, he discovered to his further amazement that she’d ordered dinner for them before she left home that morning and seemed to have known that they would be returning together, for there was a most appetizing smell of roast duckling rising from the kitchens and Mrs Benotti was there to greet them in the hall.

  ‘Just enough time to dress for dinner,’ she said.

  He stood in the hall watching her as she climbed the stairs, trailing her hand along the banister as if she were caressing it. ‘Have you forgotten how we parted this morning?’ he asked, and although he’d intended the question to be a rebuke, all he could hear in it was surprise.

  ‘Oh yes,’ she said easily. ‘That’s all forgotten. We’re bound to fight now and then, ain’t we, seeing who we are?’

  He followed her up the stairs shaking his head at her sang froid. But it had been a terrible row, he thought. Terrible. He remembered it very clearly. And what was worse, he’d thought he’d won it.

  But as he was to learn in the weeks that followed, winning and losing were not words that figured in his wife’s vocabulary. And neither was obedience. She simply side-stepped all three, and did whatever she wanted to, answering for it afterwards if he queried it. The next morning she was up and dressed before he was and travelled to the Strand with him as though that was what they’d both intended, explaining that she had an appointment with Mr Longman the publisher. And it was all said and done with such ease that he couldn’t find a way to oppose her.

  She had such style, that was the trouble. The bull-headedness that troubled him as a husband was an advantage when it came to business. And so was her outspokenness. ‘That’s not very good,’ she would say when a negotiation didn’t go quite the way she wanted. ‘I shall have to look into that and see if I can improve it a little.’ And the amazing thing was that the men she dealt with allowed her to do it.

  By the time Nan came back to London at the end of August, the new deal was completed and a second, for the branch line to Margate, had been begun. It was infuriating but impressive.

  ‘We will hold a family supper to celebrate,’ she said as they dressed to attend Nan’s dinner party at Bedford Square. ‘It’s high time we began to entertain. I haven’t seen Will and Euphemia for ages.’

  ‘And after that perhaps you’ll stay at home for a little while and take a rest?’ he suggested.

  ‘I might,’ she said, grinning at him. ‘And then again I might not. You ain’t going to start all that again, surely to goodness?’

  ‘I don’t think people approve of you working,’ he said.

  ‘Who doesn’t?’

  ‘Well, Mr Maycock and Mr Jernegan for a start.’ They’d both made several caustic comments about it, more or less in his hearing.

  ‘Old fuddy-duddies,’ she said, swooping across the room to kiss him. ‘We don’t need to worry about them.’

  But he did worry. What she was doing was unnatural and he wished she wouldn’t do it. But for the life of him he couldn’t think how to stop her, now.

  Nan made everything worse by praising her. ‘I saw Mr Chaplin this afternoon,’ she said, ‘and I hear you’ve done wonders. You must show me the plans tomorrow.’

  It was a lively evening. Mirabelle was full of information. Three new writers were about to burst upon the London scene. ‘They are called Currer, Ellis and Acton Bell,’ she said, ‘and Mr Newby tells me they’ve written the most extraordinary novels. I shall invite them to my very next soirée.’

  ‘I trust I shall be invited too,’ Mr Brougham said courteously.

  ‘Indeed sir,’ Mirabelle said. ‘You shall head my list. And perhaps you will persuade cousin Will to join us.’

  ‘If he ever stops long enough to join anybody,’ Nan said. Will was the one member of her family who wasn’t present at her dinner. ‘I en’t seen hide nor hair of him since the wedding, he’s been so busy gadding.’

  ‘We read his articles, of course,’ Mirabelle said. ‘He seems to be following this new National Petition very closely.’

  ‘I wonder he bothers,’ Edward said, disparagingly, ‘since it won’t amount to anything.’

  ‘What news do you have of Miss Nightingale, Euphemia?’ Mirabelle said, deftly ignoring him.

  Euphemia looked pale but she too was full of information. ‘We have been corresponding,’ she said with shy pride.

  Caroline was delighted. ‘Miss Nightingale, the nursing lady?’ she asked.

  ‘The same.’

  ‘But my darling Pheemy, how marvellous!’ Caroline said. ‘Shall you meet her, do you think?’

  ‘We have met already,’ Euphemia said, exchanging smiles with Matty and Jimmy. ‘In fact, she has agreed to accept me as one of her nurses as soon as she can find suitable premises for a school.’

  ‘How marvellous!’ Caroline said again. ‘When will that be?’

  ‘Not just yet, I fear,’ Euphemia said. ‘She has been rather ill, you see, and her family have sent her abroad for a year or so to recover. I believe she is in Italy at present. But she told me what books I am to read and I’ve been studying them most closely.’

  ‘Every night, according to Bessie,’ Nan said, grinning at her, ‘as soon as she gets back from Clerkenwell, as if she don’t work hard enough there, in all conscience.’

  ‘We don’t know what we’d do without her, do we Matty?’ Jimmy said.

  ‘No,’ Matty said. ‘I certainly don’t.’ Her pregnancy was too far advanced to hide, but she’d come to Nan’s dinner party notwithstanding.

  ‘Are you well, my dear?’ Nan wanted to know.

  ‘A little fatigued sometimes,’ Matty admitted. ‘She works too hard,’ Jimmy said. ‘That’s the trouble. She’s too conscientious.’

  ‘It’s a family failing,’ Nan said. ‘But a good one.’

  After the meal while Mr Brougham, Henry, Edward and Jimmy were still at table and Nan and Mirabelle were keeping Matty company in the drawing room, Caroline and Euphemia went for a stroll in the garden, following the fam
iliar paths, arm in arm as they’d done on so many evenings.

  ‘Oh, I am so glad to see you again, my dearest,’ Euphemia said. ‘And looking so well and happy. You are happy, are you not?’

  ‘Ecstatic,’ Caroline said. ‘Being married is …’ But then she hesitated, for these were private pleasures that Euphemia couldn’t possibly know about.

  ‘Full of holy joys,’ Euphemia said.

  What a curious thing to say, Caroline thought, but she didn’t pursue it because she had something rather more important that she wanted to ask Euphemia about.

  ‘If Miss Nightingale is to be abroad for a year or so,’ she said, ‘she ain’t likely to start her school much before next April, is she?’

  ‘No,’ Euphemia said, smiling as if she already knew what was going to be said next.

  ‘Have you studied midwifery in these books of yours?’ Caroline said.

  ‘Oh, my dearest girl!’ Euphemia said, throwing her arms about her cousin’s neck. ‘When is it to be? Is it in April?’

  ‘Would you nurse me, Pheemy? I’d rather it were you than anyone.’

  ‘Oh yes, yes, my dearest. Does Henry know?’

  ‘Well, not yet. I’m only just getting accustomed to the idea myself.’

  ‘How happy he will be!’

  He probably will, Caroline thought. But she knew it was equally probable that he would tell her to stay at home.

  Chapter 21

  Matty’s baby was born two weeks later on 17 September, a daughter, and just what her parents had secretly wanted. She was christened Mary Matilda, with Caroline, Henry, and Euphemia standing as her godparents, and she was doted on from the first tentative hour of her life, because she was such a good little thing and so frail.

  Euphemia now spent nearly all her time in Clerkenwell Green, teaching in the afternoons and helping to care for the baby and her two brothers during the mornings and early evenings. But every Wednesday she took time off from her charges and caught a train to Richmond to visit Caroline.

  Wednesday was the one day of the week that Caroline spent at home. It gave her a chance to ensure that her household was being run according to her wishes, and was a small compromise to Henry’s continuing opposition to her work with the firm. He was really being ridiculously difficult about it, insisting that she stop work ‘now’ every time a new deal was completed, and roaring off into a row when she didn’t agree with him. Of course making up again afterwards in their accommodating pleasure palace was always delightful but it made telling him about the baby absolutely impossible. September came and went, October blazed red and gold, November breathed white fog from the river, and according to Euphemia she was ‘half way there’, and she was certainly beginning to change shape, but she still hadn’t said anything.

  Nan and Mr Brougham made plans to leave London for Westmoreland as soon as the first fog choked the City. On the Wednesday before they travelled, Nan came over to Richmond for the afternoon with Euphemia, because Caroline had made such a point of inviting her that it was obvious there was something afoot. The reason became clear as soon as the three of them were settled before the fire in the drawing room and were taking tea.

  ‘I’ve been thinking of ways to increase trade,’ Caroline said just a little too casually as she poured the first cup. ‘I can’t see any reason why we shouldn’t sell other travelling necessities on our stalls as well as books.’

  ‘Have ‘ee now?’ Nan grinned at her. ‘And what might they be, pray?’

  ‘We could start with foot warmers and mufflers,’ Caroline said, ‘now that the weather is getting colder. And if they succeed we could try reading lamps and matches.’

  ‘You have it all planned, I see,’ Nan laughed at her.

  ‘I have thought about it, yes,’ Caroline admitted. Which was true enough. She’d planned it thoroughly, considering all the most likely articles that could be sold and listing the wholesalers she would contact. ‘But I’ve gone no further, naturally. Not until I had the chance to discuss it with you.’

  ‘Which is why I was invited here this afternoon, I daresay,’ Nan said, grinning again.

  ‘It was one reason,’ Caroline admitted. ‘But only one. I miss you sorely when you leave us, you know.’

  ‘Aye,’ Nan said, for that was true too, and they both knew it. ‘Well then, you’d best start work on your new plan, I suppose. At the least it’ll keep ‘ee occupied.’

  ‘You will have a baby to keep you occupied soon,’ Euphemia said, feeling she really ought to remind them both.

  ‘Oh, not for ages and ages,’ Caroline said. Time enough to think about the baby when it was born. ‘I’ve a deal to do before that.’

  ‘Have you told Henry yet?’ Nan wanted to know.

  ‘No, not yet,’ Caroline admitted easily. And then she changed the subject quickly, in case Nan understood her motives just a little too well. ‘You see how natural it is for women to work. I declare we’ve been talking all afternoon about the work we do, exactly as three men would have done, now ain’t we, Nan? I don’t believe there’s a ha’porth of difference between us in this respect.’

  ‘Except that we breed,’ Nan said.

  ‘Yes, so we do,’ Caroline admitted, ‘but that don’t stop us thinking.’ And any woman who means to live peaceably with her husband and still keep working has to think very hard.

  Fortunately on this occasion her forethought was paying handsome dividends. With Nan’s permission she could start work on those new goods tomorrow, then as soon as two or three negotiations were well and truly under way and couldn’t possibly be left to anybody else, she could break her news to Henry.

  In the event it was Henry who broke the news to her.

  They had been making love most pleasurably and were drowsing side by side in the restfulness that always followed the sharpest pleasures.

  ‘Do you breed, sweetheart?’ he asked, stroking her rounded belly with gentle finger tips.

  ‘Yes,’ she said, too well satisfied to lie or defer. ‘Does that please you?’

  ‘Does it please you?’ he said, opening his eyes to look down at her.

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘Then it pleases me,’ he said, kissed her forehead and was asleep before she could say another word.

  When she woke the next morning it surprised her that it had been so easy. And she was even more surprised when he made no objection as she began to dress for her working day. It was almost as if he’d accepted at last, as if he didn’t mind.

  Actually he was being as cunning as she was. He’d been wondering for several days now, hoping that her thickening waistline would prove to be the sign of a pregnancy, and planning how to act if it were. He gave little thought to the child, beyond a vague assumption that it would be pleasant and proper to have an heir. It was the pregnancy that was his hope, because a pregnancy could be his salvation too. And not a minute before time.

  Now that Caroline had embarked on her scheme to sell foot-warmers and such, and with Nan’s connivance too, which was annoying, he knew it would be useless to argue with her to stay at home. He would wait until she’d secured supplies of all these unnecessary goods, which shouldn’t take long, and then he would urge the need for rest.

  It took until Christmas for the goods to be ordered, and she only stopped then because the wholesalers had closed down, and the two of them had promised to spend the holiday at Ippark with Joseph and Emmeline.

  Fortunately it turned out to be a long, leisurely holiday, extending well into the new year of 1847, and taking Caroline to within three months of her confinement.

  Now, Henry thought, as they travelled home to Richmond through the darkened countryside, now is the right time for her to stay at home. I shall speak of it tomorrow morning over breakfast.

  It was a waste of breath.

  ‘Rest?’ she said. ‘What do I need with rest? I’m as fit as a flea.’

  ‘In your condition …’ he began.

  But she already had her bonnet on. ‘Time en
ough for rest when I feel fatigued,’ she said. ‘I’m off to the Mile End today to see about some shawls. With the spring coming ladies are bound to need shawls, don’t you think?’

  ‘But it’s January,’ he protested.

  ‘Quite,’ she said briskly. ‘So you see there ain’t a minute to lose. Have you ordered the carriage for half-past?’

  She was impossible. There was no arguing with her, no living with her. As the weeks progressed and the child grew to very obvious proportions he began to worry that it would be born in the Easter headquarters. To say nothing of the fact that she was upsetting the tender susceptibilities of the regional managers.

  ‘I can’t tell her anything,’ he complained to Joseph, when they met in his brother’s club in Piccadilly. ‘She was bad enough before the child, but I tell ‘ee she’s a deal worse now.’

  ‘She’ll settle,’ Joseph promised, enjoying his brandy. ‘They always do. A sort of nesting spirit comes on ‘em all of a sudden. Always does. You’ll see.’

  But Henry couldn’t imagine Caroline nesting. She was far too brisk and energetic.

  ‘Well, of course she is,’ his brother agreed. ‘She’s an Easter, dammit. Cheer up, little brother. Things’ll improve when her cousin moves in. Pheemy, ain’t it? A woman of sense, your Pheemy.’

  The woman of sense took up residence in the middle of April, when Nan and Mr Brougham had returned to London, there was less sickness in Clerkenwell, and the lamps and shawls were selling particularly well.

  For a few days Caroline was quite cheerful to superintend the hiring of nursemaids, the furnshing of the nursery and the arrangement of the lying-in room that adjoined it, for, as she confessed to her nurse, she would be jolly glad when her pregnancy was over and done with. The child was packed so tightly inside her belly that she was often very uncomfortable, even in the shapeless gowns and boxy jackets she’d had made to cover her awkwardness, but she was too restless to settle, and after a week at home, she began to prowl through the house grumbling that she felt imprisoned.

  ‘Yes,’ Euphemia sympathised, ‘but it will soon be over now, my darling. How if we were to take a ride in the countryside?’