by Val Wood
‘No!’ Her lips curled pettishly. ‘I don’t believe in owt but getting from one day to ’next.’ She gave a discontented grunt. ‘I wonder sometimes what I’ve been put on this earth for.’
‘To give pleasure to men.’ Alice yawned. ‘Nowt else.’ Her eyes looked huge in her pallid face. ‘Leo says he’s glad he met me.’ She shrugged and smiled. ‘Sometimes we onny talk, you know, but I’m happy wi’ that.’
‘What!’ Lizzie’s face was a picture of disbelief. ‘He pays you just to talk? I wish I’d tekken him upstairs instead of that serpent Kendall!’
‘Lizzie, I can tell Kendall you’re not available,’ Lily told her. ‘He can go with Mary or—’
Lizzie shook her head. ‘No. I know what to expect from him now.’ She gave a little shudder. ‘And he gives me extra,’ she glanced at Lily, ‘that I don’t hand over.’
Poor Lizzie, Lily thought. Is it too late for her? Is she so embittered that her life will never be satisfactory? God knows I feel downhearted most of the time, yet there’s still a spark of hope within me that makes me think that life will get better. That I won’t be in this pit for ever.
Henry rang the door bell one afternoon a few days later. ‘I’m back.’ He beamed at Lily. ‘My business affairs didn’t take as long as I’d thought.’ He came inside and vigorously rubbed his hands together. ‘Betty?’ he enquired.
‘She’s not here at present,’ Lily told him, and watched his disappointment show and his ready smile disappear.
‘Oh! Of course she won’t be expecting me just yet, and I usually come in the evening.’ He heaved a breath. ‘Mmm. She’ll be here tonight though?’
‘No. She won’t be back for a day or two.’
He looked puzzled. ‘But – where has she gone?’
‘I’m not at liberty to say. It’s something private. If she wishes to tell you on her return, that’s up to her.’
‘I see!’ His eyes clouded. ‘Oh. Well. I suppose I’ll just have to wait.’
Lily lowered her voice. ‘Would you – would you like to talk to one of ’other young ladies? Or perhaps stay for tea,’ she added brightly.
He looked bewildered. ‘Why would I want to talk to any of the others? Betty’s my friend, and I’ve something to discuss with her.’
Lily felt a flutter of excitement. ‘Will it keep?’ she asked. ‘I could get a message to her.’
‘You know where she is? So can’t you tell me?’
‘I’m sorry,’ Lily apologized. ‘I can’t.’
‘She’s not in trouble?’ Henry said anxiously. ‘Or it’s not that she doesn’t want to see me?’
Lily smiled. ‘No. She only ever says how much she enjoys your company.’
‘Ah!’ His eyes brightened a little. ‘She’s a grand girl, you know. I’m very fond of her. I’ll come back tomorrow,’ he said decisively. ‘Tell her to wait for me, won’t you?’
‘I’ll ask her, certainly,’ she said.
‘Yes. Yes, I meant ask, of course. I shouldn’t presume.’ He frowned. ‘Does she – erm, well, I suppose she sees other gentlemen when I’m not here?’
Lily didn’t answer, but quizzically raised her eyebrows.
‘Sorry.’ He patted his hands together, making a hollow clapping sound. ‘Of course. Shouldn’t ask! Right. I’ll come back tomorrow. Thank you so much, Miss Lily. Goodbye.’
Lily shook her fists joyously after she had closed the door behind him. Was her plan going to work? What was he going to discuss with Betty? She’d half a mind to send a message to Betty to ask her to come back, but she refrained. No, she thought. Henry can wait a little longer.
He came back early the following evening and sat despondently drinking a glass of wine and ignoring or not noticing Lizzie’s blandishments or flirtatious behaviour. Lily sat down beside him. ‘I did say she wouldn’t be back for a few days,’ she said gently.
‘Yes. Yes, you did. But I just hoped that perhaps she’d come back early. Tomorrow, do you think?’
‘Perhaps. More likely ’following day.’
‘But you still won’t say where she’s gone?’ Henry gazed at her appealingly.
What a nice man he is, Lily thought. So guileless. You’d really want to please him.
‘You see, Miss Lily,’ he dropped his voice, ‘I’d never been with a woman until I met Betty. And it’s – it’s just wonderful. I had no idea!’
‘How is it that you hadn’t – hadn’t been to an establishment like this before?’ she asked. ‘Young men do.’
He nodded gloomily. ‘When I was very young, my aunt gave me books which cautioned of sinful practices before marriage. Of course, what she really wanted was for me to stay with her and never get married. I was working as a clerk in a bank and didn’t get the opportunity to meet very many young ladies, and those I did take home she warned off. I was constantly at her beck and call and made to feel grateful that she had given me a home after my parents died. I wasn’t allowed to go away to school where I might have found out about, erm’ – he glanced sheepishly at her – ‘sexual activities, but had to attend a local school. I could have left her when I was twenty-one, but by then she was hinting that I would receive all of her estate, providing I didn’t do anything to forfeit it.
‘I suppose that might be considered acquisitive, but I wasn’t earning much money, not enough to set up a home, and I decided that I could hang on a bit longer and then do as I wished when she had gone.’ He put his chin in his hand. ‘Didn’t think she would live so long, though,’ he said dejectedly. ‘She was nearly eighty when she died.’
Lily hid a smile. ‘Well, you can kick over ’traces now,’ she said. ‘If she left you all her possessions.’
‘I suppose I can.’ His spirits didn’t seem to lift. ‘But I’m an ordinary kind of man, Miss Lily; never been very ambitious, and I don’t really know what to do next.’
The door bell pealed. Henry drained his glass and got to his feet. ‘I’ll be off,’ he said. ‘You don’t want to hear about me. That’s the thing about Betty, you see. She always listens to me.’
He didn’t say if he’d come back tomorrow, Lily worried as she let him out and another gentleman in. Perhaps I’d better fetch Betty back.
There were a lot of customers that night. Some were regulars, others were strangers. One man in particular seemed familiar, but Lily couldn’t place him. She sent him upstairs with Mary but he didn’t stay long; nor did he leave Mary anything extra, which most of them did.
‘He was an odd sort of cove,’ Mary told Lily. ‘Real jumpy he was, as if he thought his wife might come in and catch him. Didn’t tek his coat off neither, and kept asking me questions about how long I’d been working here and was I on ’streets; and he asked about you, did you have any favourite customers ’n’ that.’
‘I hope you told him I didn’t.’ She was alarmed and wondered why he wanted to know.
‘I told him he’d have to ask you.’ Mary sniffed. ‘Said it was nowt to do wi’ me what you did.’
Lily felt unsettled. There wasn’t the usual jolly mood tonight: no Henry to play the piano, and neither Leo nor Kendall had come. They generally lightened the atmosphere, giving the feeling of a social occasion with their witty banter and repartee.
I’m fooling myself, she censured herself as she let a customer in. Pretending it’s a party of friends getting together when it isn’t at all. The men are here for one thing only and I’m degrading myself and the girls by tolerating it.
The next morning Jamie arrived with two young girls. ‘Look after these two, will you, Lily? They’ve just got off a ship and don’t speak English.’
‘What am I supposed to do with them?’ Lily gazed at them. One was dark-skinned; the other had high cheekbones and an oriental look about her. They were about sixteen, she thought, and both seemed very frightened.
‘Get ’em cleaned up and put ’em to work, what else?’ he said sharply. ‘That’s why they’re here.’
‘But where have they come from? Have they
worked before? They’re very young.’ She was suspicious that something was not quite right.
‘Yeh, course they have. They came looking for work. A fellow I know brought them over from Holland. He picked ’em up in Rotterdam. He says there’s loads o’ women over there wanting to come over.’
‘All right, leave them wi’ me,’ she said, anxious to be rid of him. ‘They can have a bath and I’ll find them some clean clothes for a start.’
The two girls were filthy and their clothing was torn. They huddled together and clutched their arms across their chests. Their hair was matted and unkempt. As soon as Jamie had gone they both started talking; their incomprehensible speech was racked with sobs and shouts, and the dark girl pushed at Lily with her fists.
‘It’s all right, it’s all right,’ she soothed them, and beckoned with her hand to lead them into the kitchen. They both turned and headed for the door which Lily had locked after Jamie, putting the key in her pocket. They screamed and shouted and rattled at the lock, banging with their fists against the wood.
‘What’s happening?’ Cherie came out of the kitchen with a cup of coffee in her hand. She looked very sweet and innocent and had a sleepy glaze in her eyes, for she had only just got up. ‘Who’s this?’
The two girls dashed towards her, gabbling furiously and pointing towards the door. The oriental girl licked her lips as she smelt the coffee. Cherie held it out to her. ‘Want some?’ she said. ‘It’s onny just been made.’
The girl took it and at first sipped it slowly, as if she thought it might poison her, and then as she tasted the sweetness, for Cherie always added sugar, she drank it eagerly.
Mrs Flitt came out of the kitchen. ‘Who’s mekking all that row?’ Lily smiled. Mrs Flitt was wearing a voluminous apron and a cotton cap on her head and looked a picture of domesticity. ‘Who’s this then?’
‘Jamie brought them. But they obviously don’t want to be here. Have you got more coffee, Mrs Flitt? I think they’re in need of it.’
‘A jug full,’ she said, turning back into the kitchen. ‘And some bread just out of ’oven.’
The two young women tore into the bread that was offered and drank the coffee jug dry. The dark girl kept clutching Cherie’s arm and telling her something.
‘I don’t know what she’s on about!’ Cherie said. ‘It’s double Dutch!’
‘Dutch anyway,’ Mrs Flitt remarked. ‘That’s what it sounds like to me.’
‘Jamie said they’d come over on a ship from Holland,’ Lily told them. ‘He said they’d come looking for work.’
‘Not our kind o’ work, I bet.’ Lizzie spoke from the doorway where she was lazily leaning, still in her nightshift. ‘Reckon they thought they were coming for some other kind o’ work, domestic or summat like that.’
The two girls looked at Lizzie and then at Cherie, and back to Lizzie again. ‘No! No!’ the dark girl said, shaking both hands in front of her.
‘You see!’ Lizzie was quite unperturbed, though her mouth turned down. ‘They can tell what I am just by looking at me.’
‘What nonsense, Lizzie,’ Lily said, though she was inclined to agree. Lizzie looked as if she had been up all night, which was almost true. It was four o’clock before the last customer had gone. ‘They’re frightened. They don’t understand ’language.’
Lizzie came into the kitchen, looked into the empty jug and sighed. ‘Mek us a cup o’ coffee, Mrs F, will you? No, ’fact of ’matter is, Lily, that our dear Jamie is up to summat. Word is out on ’street that foreign girls are being brought in from Germany and Holland, and women from Hull are being tekken over there. There’s a ton o’ money to be made. For ’men that trade ’em, that is,’ she added cynically. ‘Don’t suppose lasses’ll mek much and they’ll probably finish up in one of ’canals if they don’t do as they’re told.’
‘Lizzie!’ Lily breathed. ‘Is that true?’
‘As true as I’m waiting here gasping for a cup o’ coffee.’ Lizzie sat down and put her feet up on a vacant chair. She looked at the strangers. ‘They’re scared all right. They probably thought it’d be a lark to work abroad and didn’t know what they were getting into. They’ve got innocence written all over ’em; and they look different, don’t they? Men’ll pay a load o’ money to bed girls like them.’
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
By midday the two girls had been bathed and fed and put into clean clothes which had belonged to Alice and Lizzie but which had been washed and mended and were fairly presentable. By means of sign language and gestures Lily told them that they should go with her. She pointed to both of them, at herself and then at the door, and Cherie nodded and grimaced to show it was all right.
‘Where do you intend to take them?’ Lizzie asked. ‘Jamie’s going to be right mad if they’re not working for him.’
‘Jamie can go jump in ’river,’ Lily said vehemently. ‘These girls are far from home and I’ve no means of getting them back, but I know somebody who might. I just hope they don’t run off when we get outside. We’ll never find them if they do.’
‘I’ll come with you, Lily,’ Cherie said. ‘They seem to trust me. I’ll get my shawl and I’m ready.’
‘If Jamie comes you don’t know where I’ve gone or where the girls are either,’ Lily told Alice and Lizzie. ‘Are you listening, Mrs Flitt?’
‘What, m’dear? Didn’t hear a word you said. What girls? I ain’t seen no girls.’
Lily nodded. She could trust them, she knew, but she was furious with Jamie.
The girls didn’t attempt to escape as they went out but walked at Cherie’s side, holding her hands and looking nervously at the adjoining houses where the prostitutes sat on the doorsteps in the sunshine and shouted abuse at them as they walked by.
‘Don’t look at them, Cherie,’ Lily said firmly. ‘Keep your eyes in front. We don’t want any trouble.’
But one of the women got up from her place and strolled towards them. ‘Hey,’ she said. ‘What ’you up to then?’ she asked Lily. ‘You’re running that brothel over yonder. Got some foreign lasses now, have you, tekking our jobs?’ Her mouth and teeth were stained and flecked with brown strands as she chewed on a wad of tobacco. ‘You should send ’em back where they’ve come from!’
‘You’re mistaken,’ Lily said politely. ‘They’re not in your line o’ work and neither am I.’
‘What about her then?’ The woman pointed with her thumb at Cherie, who shrank behind Lily.
‘No. Her neither. Sorry.’ She gave a thin apologetic smile. ‘Can’t stop to talk. Got an appointment.’
‘Oh, aye! Wi’ ’magistrate, I bet.’
Lily shook her head and they moved away. The dark girl grabbed her arm and urged her on, muttering anxiously. Lily patted her hand. ‘It’s all right,’ she murmured. ‘At least I hope it will be.’
They climbed into a hansom and Lily mused that she would soon have no money at all if she had to keep paying out fares. Jamie paid her a small percentage of the takings, and the customers usually gave her something as they took their leave; but after buying food she had little left. Still, she thought, I’ve never had money, so there’s nothing different.
As the vehicle drew to a halt outside Hope House the foreign girls jabbered vigorously to each other, their eyes fearful. ‘They’re frightened,’ Cherie said. ‘They won’t know where they’re coming to.’
A maid opened the door and took them through to Mrs Thompson. ‘Mrs Maddeson! I didn’t expect to see you again quite so soon, though I think Betty is anxious to talk to you. She’s come to a decision.’
‘I didn’t come to see Betty,’ Lily said. ‘I came about these two young women.’ She turned to the two girls who were cowering behind Cherie.
‘Cherie!’ Mrs Thompson beamed. ‘You’ve come back!’
‘No, not me,’ Cherie said hastily. ‘It’s these two.’
Lily explained the situation and Mrs Thompson frowned. ‘It’s not the first time this has happened,’ she said. ‘Just a moment.�
� She rang a hand bell and the maid returned. ‘Ask Lottie to come through, will you?
‘I have two other young women here at present,’ she told Lily. ‘They were induced to come to England from Holland. They were promised housekeeping situations, but on arrival were told that they were to work in brothels. One of the other prostitutes told them about us, and as soon as they could they made their escape. Unfortunately they spent some time within those establishments and one of them is extremely distressed after her experiences.’
A blonde woman of about twenty knocked and came into the room. ‘You want to see me, yah?’
‘We have two of your fellow countrywomen here, Lottie. Could you explain to them that they are safe and will be able to go home?’
Lottie turned to the girls and spoke quickly to them, whereupon they both burst out weeping and clung to her. She nodded and said something else and finally put her arms about them both. ‘Come,’ she said, and to Mrs Thompson said, ‘I’ll take them to see Ellie. They will know then that they have lucky escape. They are not hurt.’
They all went out of the room, but then the oriental girl came back. ‘Sank you,’ she said to Lily. ‘Sank you.’
‘I’m trying to arrange a passage back,’ Mrs Thompson told Lily. ‘The police have been informed and it’s to be hoped they can catch the people who take such advantage of vulnerable young women.’ She sighed. ‘It’s a very big problem. There are moves afoot to organize a society for the protection of foreigners who are stranded here, and to send them back home. Perhaps it’s something that you might care to become involved in, Mrs Maddeson?’
Lily shook her head. ‘I’m more concerned over local young women,’ she said. ‘Those that I know, anyway.’
‘Like Betty, you mean?’
‘Yes, like Betty. Girls who come into this kind of life through no fault of their own and are caught up in it with no means of getting out.’
‘Like yourself, in fact?’ Mrs Thompson said quietly.
‘Yes,’ she answered, her voice faltering. ‘Just like me.’
When Betty appeared, she said that she would like to return to Leadenhall Square with Lily, and asked if Henry had been to the house. ‘I’m going to change my life,’ she told her. ‘Mrs Thompson has shown me how to go about things and how to conduct myself and she says I can work here until I find something else.’
