A Substitute Wife for the Prizefighter: A Victorian Romance

by Alice Coldbreath

  Rinsing the soap from her wrists and arms, for it was harsh stuff, Lizzie dried her hands and set about refilling the kettle and hanging it above the fire. “You’ll have to excuse me while I collect some more firewood,” she commented. Ma Toomes shrugged and, removing her pipe from her wrinkled mouth, she set about repacking it with fresh tobacco as Lizzie foraged for branches.

  “I’ve still got your cloak and headscarf,” Lizzie commented as she returned with an armful of sticks. “I keep meaning to return them to you but have been getting distracted.”

  Ma grunted and puffed furiously on her pipe until the bowl smoked. “A nice granddaughter you’ve turned out to be!” she muttered, sounding aggrieved. “If it wasn’t for that doxy of Frank’s, I’d starve in a hedge before you did your duty by me!”

  Lizzie set out the teapot and cups. “Is Daphne Frank’s doxy?” she asked calmly, letting her skepticism show. “He doesn’t talk about her that way. When he first mentioned her to us, he called her a sort of stepsister.”

  “She don’t see it that way!” Ma Toomes retorted.

  “Yet she sleeps in your wagon.”

  Ma’s eyes glinted. “Stop trying to change the subject, girl.”

  “Maybe I have not been terribly dutiful,” Lizzie acknowledged.

  “You haven’t lifted a finger! Not so much as a stocking of mine have you darned!”

  “As I understand it, Frank’s wife was exceedingly dutiful, yet you did not appreciate her in the slightest.” The words flew from Lizzie’s lips before she had the chance to check them.

  Ma clamped her pipe between her teeth and tilted her chin up aggressively. “I’ll own Maggie were a good girl,” she muttered, narrowing her eyes. “Not like you, my fine lady.”

  “Yet you did not appreciate her efforts until she had flown.”

  “There’s a pecking order to be followed. I did my fair share when I was a girl, now’s my time to be waited on a bit,” she bridled.

  “That may well be,” Lizzie answered lightly. “But my husband has made it plain that I am not the one to do the waiting.”

  “Pah!” Ma Toomes burst out. “Let’s see if he’s still singing that tune in a twelvemonth when the shine’s worn off you!”

  “Maybe he thinks if I’m not worn to a frazzle, I’ll keep my shine longer?” Lizzie suggested mildly.

  The old woman contemplated her a moment in moody silence. “Properly got him on leading strings, haven’t you? You must be feeling mighty proud of that fact, for Lord knows, you’re no beauty.”

  Lizzie poured some of the hot water into the pot and swirled it about before emptying it out. “Perhaps his attraction to me runs deeper than my superficial appearance?” she suggested.

  The old woman snorted. “Don’t be naïve, girl!” Lizzie shrugged and measured out three teaspoons of tea leaves from the tin and into the pot. “I know exactly how you snared him, as it happens,” the old woman said smugly. When Lizzie poured the hot water into the pot without comment, she continued malevolently. “It’s that hankering for respectability that the workhouse gave him,” she pronounced with disgust. “Those places install it in you if they catch hold of you young enough. It’s not really the lad’s fault.”

  Lizzie looked up at that. “The workhouse?”

  “Didn’t know about that, did you?” answered Ma with satisfaction. “Well, you don’t know everything about Benedict Francis Toomes, do you? For all, you’re his sweetheart.” She spat this last word with the utmost contempt.

  “I don’t understand,” Lizzie admitted. “Benedict told me his great-grandfather ran away to join the fair, and his family had followed in that trade ever since.”

  Ma Toomes blinked. “Well, that’s right enough,” she admitted grudgingly.

  “Then how is it that Benedict wound up in a workhouse when he was young? Did you fall on hard times?”

  The old woman looked cagey. “Don’t you get mentioning it to him!” she cautioned. “For it’s not spoken of in general, and he won’t thank you for it.” She hesitated a moment, her thin lips working as she seemed to undergo some inward struggle. “I blame that time for the rift between Ben and the rest of us,” she said at last bitterly. “The time he spent there drove a wedge between us all. He resented us and never forgave his father for it.”

  “Do you mean ...?” Lizzie broke off uncomprehendingly. “Can you be saying that it was only Benedict that was admitted to the workhouse? No, that cannot be.”

  The old woman looked away. “As it happens, it was.”

  “How?” Lizzie demanded. Benedict was the middle son, so she could imagine no easy circumstance in which he could have been separated from his family.

  “It’s not for me to tell you,” the old woman clammed up suddenly.

  “When he was a child you said,” Lizzie said slowly, and suddenly she remembered the heated exchange in the beer tent. “He said you never raised him,” she remembered. “He said – ”

  “That’s not true!” the old woman burst out hotly. “He was all of eight years when he went in and no more’n ten and a half when he came back out again.”

  Lizzie stared at her. Two and a half years. “And he was the only one of the three brothers?” she asked, feeling stunned. “How could that happen?”

  “It ain’t my story to tell!” the old woman grouched. “Where’s that tea, girl?”

  Lizzie clutched her skirts between her fingers as she strove to remain calm. “I shall ask him, you can be sure of that,” she warned as she poured tea unsteadily into a cup. “And your tea will be weak as you have not given it time to brew.” She passed the cup across at the glaring old woman.

  “Huh!” Ma Toomes muttered darkly. She considered Lizzie over the rim of her cup as she sipped it and grimaced. “I’ve a sister and a niece in Shropshire,” she said in an abrupt change of subject that made Lizzie’s head spin.

  “Oh?”

  “Benedict ain’t the only one who craved a respectable life,” she sniffed. “So did Mabel. Married a farmer, she did. Dull fellow, dull but steady.”

  “I see. You think Benedict takes after your sister? By marrying into staid respectability.”

  Ma Toomes gave a shout of laughter. “You’ve plenty of faults, but dullness ain’t one of ’em. No, I seen the way he looks at you,” she said screwing up her mouth. “I’ve eyes in me head, don’t I?” She shook head. “But I do say as that’s how you got your clutches into him in the first place. Hankering for respectability,” she nodded. “That’s what the workhouse does for you.”

  Involuntarily, Lizzie thought of Betsy. Was that why Benedict had become engaged to her cousin? The solid respectability of Sitwell Place was beyond question. “You’re quite wrong,” she heard herself say aloud. “When Benedict married me, I was engaged in slopwork and living hand to mouth with eight other females in two rooms in the east end of London.” She saw Ma Toomes’ eyes widen and felt a momentary satisfaction in scoring the old woman off.

  Ma soon recovered however. “Well, madam, you may have been brought low,” she answered dismissively. “But it’s plain enough what stock you come from.” She fell into a brooding silence for a moment before adding bitterly, “The Toomes men never have much luck with marriage.” She fell silent a moment, and Lizzie remembered her railing on this subject before. Something about Benedict’s mother and Maggie both running off and leaving their husbands.

  “His father’s always been a fool where women are concerned,” Ma started up again abruptly. “Always thought more of whatever bit of petticoat had his attention than he ever did of his own kin. It was a dark day that he allowed Ben to go through the gates of that place. Wrought all manner of damage on our family, it did. Short-sighted, that’s what Jedidiah Toomes was and always shall be. He thought it would learn Ben a lesson, but all it taught him was to nurse a grudge and see himself as separate from us all.”

  “Shall I ever meet him, do you think?” Lizzie asked, gathering Jedidiah was her father-in-law.

  “N
ot if Ben can help it. He loathes his pa like poison. Always did, even when he was a boy.” Ma Toomes paused. “I don’t say his father was a saint. He never had much work in him, my Jed. Too fond of the bottle too. He’s not the one to keep his old mother in comfort in her old age.”

  “Where is he now?” Lizzie asked curiously. “Does he still work the fairs?” If so, surely their paths would cross at some point.

  Ma Toomes gazed out across the field opposite her. “He’d taken up with some slut last time I saw him,” she said disparagingly. “Daphne’s mother, as it happens. They were running a pickled whelk stall and talking about moving to the coast.” Dimly, Lizzie remembered Frank telling them this before about Daphne’s mother being Pa Toomes’ latest woman.

  “He was the one as introduced Daphne into the family,” Ma said dryly. “Jed had some notion she would suit Frank better than Maggie. He’s the one told lied to Frank about her taking up with another man.” Lizzie stared at Ma as the old woman steadily returned her gaze. Did she know what she was admitting? Lizzie wondered. That they had sabotaged Frank’s marriage and conspired to get rid of his wife behind his back? “Mebbe I should have stood firm against the scheme,” Ma said mutinously. “But, truth to tell, Maggie’s martyred act was getting on my nerves!” She hitched her shoulder irritably. “She didn’t have your spirit, girl. Never argued back, did Maggie, just fell into her mopes. And she had no cause to be so timid, for Frank never raised a hand to her, that I’ll swear.”

  Lizzie gazed at the old woman aghast. “Frank is torn up about her leaving,” she managed to gasp out. “Benedict says he’s started to take to drink.”

  Ma Toomes took a deep breath in and out. “I know that, you little fool! Why else do you think I’m tellin’ you all this? First Jed messed up Ben, and now he’s done the same to Frank!” She gnashed her teeth together angrily. “I thought I’d run you off and rely on Daphne to hold things together, but all things considered, you’re the better bet.” She gave Lizzie a level look. “Daphne hasn’t managed to snare Frank, and hell would freeze over before Ben let you go, so I’m retiring from the ring.” She cast her eyes up and down Lizzie impartially. “You’ll carry it off, I have no doubt.”

  “What do you mean?” Lizzie asked, feeling alarmed.

  Ma Toomes threw her scrawny arms in the air. “I’m too old to sort out this mess! So, I’m leaving it to you to sort this family out.”

  Lizzie stared as Ma rose to her feet and cast the remains of her teacup away. “I’m leavin’,” she said abruptly, “before the boys get back. You can keep that cloak, if you’ve a use for it. My gift to you.”

  “Where will you go?” Lizzie stammered. What would she even tell the brothers? “Into Shropshire?”

  Ma gave a mirthless chuckle. “Aye, and it’ll give Mabel the shock of her life. Always said she has a place for me at her farmhouse table, has Mabel. She never really thought I’d take her up on it, though,” she said with satisfaction. “That’s the thing about respectable folks,” she remarked caustically. “Always a slave to their duty. Oftentimes, it comes back to bite ’em in the backside!”

  “Well, at least you won’t wind up in the workhouse,” Lizzie pointed out and received a vicious glare in response.

  “Well!” Ma Toomes expostulated. “Good luck to you! You’ll need it. And if that no good son of mine ever does turn up like a bad penny, you’ll send him away with a flea in his ear, if you’ve got any sense.” She looked Lizzie up and down again and nodded, stomping off in the direction from which she’d come.

  “Wait!” Lizzie half rose off her wooden stool, but what could she do except call a feeble ‘goodbye’ after her? Sebastian barked, but did not move from his spot next to the fire, so it was clearly a half-hearted gesture even from him.

  Had Ma even told Frank and Daphne she was leaving? Lizzie sank back down onto her seat and gulped the last of her tea down in hopes of fortification. Her head felt in a whirl that Benedict’s grandmother could think she was the one to sort things out. She bit her thumbnail a moment, lost in thought. Only the lingering taste of the soap reminded her she was but halfway through her washing. With a frustrated sigh, Lizzie returned to the washtub and plunged herself back into her work.

  20

  They did not reach Putney until long past four o’clock, and Benedict was restless by the time they turned their wagon down the lane that led to the heath.

  “For the love of God, would you settle down, Ben?” his brother sighed in exasperation. “It’s your fault we’re so late, after all! You’re the one who insisted we went shopping.”

  Jack spoke nothing but the truth, and the number of parcels bundled up in the back of the wagon bore testament to his words. Still, Benedict was itching with impatience by the time his brother set him down next to his own wagon.

  “Will you come over to ours later to catch Frank up with how things went?” Jack asked as Benedict unloaded his parcels from the back.

  “Will I be damned,” he muttered, jumping down. “I’ve better things to do. You can brag to him of your triumph all by yourself.”

  “What of your win?” Jack asked with a grin.

  “Jesus, Jack, he was nothing but an untried boy. That win was hardly something for me to brag about.”

  “I don’t know about that,” Jack said slowly. “Nat seemed well pleased with how you handled it.”

  Benedict shrugged. “I kept it clean and I didn’t humiliate the boy. Nothing more, nothing less.”

  “I still say you acted handsomely,” his brother insisted. “And I wasn’t the only one.”

  “Well, be that as it may,” Benedict glanced over his shoulder, but no one was stirring from the direction of the wagon. Not even the dog. “I’ll bid you farewell now.”

  Jack nodded. “I bet you do go and brag to Lizzie, all the same,” he grinned, and gee upped the horses before Benedict could respond.

  Shaking his head at Jack’s nonsense, Benedict carried his packages over to the wagon and deposited them inside. A pile of crisp laundered washing was neatly folded on top of the nearest trunk, and if he wasn’t mistaken, the items strewn over the nearby bushes were also theirs.

  Ben made his way toward them and found them mostly dry. To his surprise, most of the items there were his own. Gathering them up, he carried them inside and then started setting up the campfire. He would get things sorted here and then walk over to meet Lizzie at the end of her shift.

  He soon had a pile of firewood ready. After collecting the water, he unwrapped the new set of steps he had bought, and he set them down next to the wagon. Having run through the list of tasks, he made his way toward the fairground where things appeared to be in full swing.

  Glancing at his pocket watch, he thought it must be about time Lizzie was done for the day and made his way toward Connie’s tent. To his surprise, he found Lizzie already stood outside and in deep conversation with the redhead she had introduced him to previously.

  Only Sebastian seemed to notice his approach, his tail thumping against the ground in a lazy wag. Quickening his pace, Benedict called out her name and saw his wife start guiltily at his approach.

  “Oh, Benedict,” she said turning toward him with an outstretched hand. He grabbed it firmly and pulled her into his embrace.

  “Has something happened?”

  “Hmmm?” she gazed up at him.

  He cast a glance over his shoulder toward the tent and found the redhead watching them with amusement. “You in Connie’s bad books again?”

  “What?” she looked aghast. “No! How about you?” Her expression grew suddenly anxious. “It went off alright, didn’t it? The fight, I mean.”

  He nodded. Had she been worried about him? And why did that make him feel warm all through? A smile tugged at his lips. “Couldn’t have gone better, actually.”

  She sighed and gave him an answering smile. “That’s alright, then.”

  He lowered his face to hers, couldn’t help himself. The kiss was tender and lingering. It
didn’t belong in an open field, surrounded by crowds, but there was little he could do about that. When he drew back, Lizzie’s eyes were closed, and she swayed slightly in his arms. “You finished here?”

  Lizzie blinked, nodded, and turned to wave at Niamh, who laughed and called something about a pair of lovebirds before pulling her shawl about her shoulders and setting off in the opposite direction.

  “What were you two talking about that you looked so serious?” Benedict asked, pulling her arm through his. Sebastian trotted at their heels.

  Lizzie’s color heightened. “I was asking her about Maggie,” she admitted in hushed tones.

  “Maggie?” Whatever he had expected her answer to be, it wasn’t that.

  “Yes, and Benedict, you will never guess,” her voice shook with excitement and she went up on her tiptoes, angling her mouth toward his ear. “I’ve found out where she is!” Her eyes gleamed. “Shall we go for some refreshment so I can tell you all about it?”

  It was a struggle, but somehow, he managed to murmur the affirmative. Fuck Maggie and Frank, he thought sourly as he towed Lizzie off to feed her. He didn’t want to talk about either of them. Fuck the tea tent too, he thought. He needed a real drink.

  The good thing about receiving Lizzie’s confidences was as soon as they were seated in the beer tent, she brought her chair flush against his and leaned right into him. The bad thing he thought, slipping his arm around her back, was that her excited chatter was about his bloody family.

  “ – and Niamh says that Maggie definitely had the impression that Frank was untrue to her,” Lizzie said breathlessly. “For Aggie told Niamh. So, that you see, is why Maggie went with her to Southend!” She leaned back to gauge his reaction to this piece of news.

  Who the fuck was Aggie? Luckily at this point, the server approached with their pitcher of beer which stemmed the excited flow. Benedict poured their drinks, and Lizzie accepted hers with thanks, taking a sip and looking at him expectantly.