The Gilded Lily

by Deborah Swift

  She uncorked a jar and applied a little more madder to her lips, brushed down her skirts and waited behind the counter, pretending to arrange a display of pots of marigold cream. Jay’s silhouette approached behind the single pane of glass in the door. She felt slightly sick, and swallowed; the taste of wine still lingered on her palate.

  The door opened and he strode towards her. He carried a rolled-up paper in his hand, probably a stock list or a roster of orders. She forced a smile to her lips, pushed away the image of his hand tracing the shape of Wycliffe’s buttocks. She hoped he would not notice her hastily applied face. Jay stopped directly before her and glowered under his thin eyebrows. It crossed her mind that perhaps he also was feeling under the weather after the evening at Wycliffe’s. But something in his demeanour made the back of her neck prickle.

  Wordlessly he unrolled the paper and spread it out on the table to face her. She took a sharp breath. He smoothed the paper flat and picked up four pots of salve to hold it open and weight it down, standing them with mathematical precision on the corners. Ella could not read the paper, but it didn’t matter. She had recognized it as soon as he unrolled it. It was one of the ‘reward’ notices. She stared at it, her mouth dry. She could not speak so she just waited.

  ‘Tell me why I should not claim this reward,’ he said.

  She decided to try to bluff it out. ‘Beg pardon, sir, I can’t read.’

  Jay laughed, but it was a laugh without merriment. ‘You know well enough what it is. Someone at the Corn Exchange was telling me that there was a reward out for two maids. As soon as he said one of them had a piebald face, I thought to myself, now then, I’ve seen someone with a face like that, now where was it?’

  Ella was watching him warily. He did not seem angry, just puffed up and full of himself.

  ‘Of course!’ he said, hitting his forehead in mock frustration, ‘it was at the perruquier’s. Your sister. I was about to dismiss it as a coincidence, but then I got to thinking – how Madame Lefevre was so keen to find you. And you spun me that yarn about pinching from the till. I thought it mighty odd then that you wanted your whereabouts kept secret.’ He leaned towards her, resting his forearm on the table. ‘No wonder – you’re wanted for murder.’

  She clutched at the front of her bodice. The game was up. There was no point in denying it.

  ‘I didn’t do it, sir.’

  ‘It matters not an ounce to me whether you did or no. But you have to understand, it’s a risk to me you working here. Either they’ll think I’m stupid, or they’ll think I’m protecting you. Neither is an option. So I’ll have to hand you over, you know that.’

  ‘Please, sir, don’t do that. They’ll hang us.’

  Jay moved away, tapping his hat against his thigh, as if weighing it up.

  He’s enjoying this, she thought, with a sudden realization.

  ‘You thought to take me for a simpleton, Miss Appleby. That was foolish. Now tell me, where is your sister?’

  Ella shrivelled inside. ‘Don’t know, sir.’

  ‘What do you mean, you don’t know?’

  Ella thought quickly. ‘When I moved in here she couldn’t pay the rent. She was angry with me and moved out of our lodgings.’

  ‘Where is she now?’

  ‘I’ve told you. I don’t know.’

  Ella glanced at the door. Even if she got past Jay, there was not a cat’s chance of escaping through the throng of carriages. Jay saw her look.

  ‘Oh, my man Lutch has instructions not to let you leave the premises.’

  She looked again and saw the dark silhouette of a man just outside the door.

  ‘Wycliffe was very keen for you to provide a suitable – how shall I say – divertissement for Allsop, and I see no reason for that to change.’ Jay laughed at some joke of his own. ‘A day here or there will not matter. Ibbetson will wait.’ He turned back to face her, smiling his wolfish smile. ‘Perhaps I may reconsider if you please my friends. But if you wish to be of value you must look attractive,’ he went on. ‘There is white powder sprinkled on your bodice, and your lips need repainting.’ He looked at her with distaste as though she were a dog with fleas. The door tinkled and Polly hurried brightly in. She stopped short of the counter, evidently taking in the odd atmosphere in the room.

  ‘As we discussed, Miss Johnson is not to go out of the Lily without my say-so. She will stay indoors and you will not mention her name to anyone. Do you understand? Get your warm cloak and bonnet on, Miss Bennett. You will be on duty at the Frost Fair to assist Mrs Horsefeather. The boy will come for you in the gig at the quarter bell.’

  ‘Yes, Mr Whitgift.’ Polly simpered and tossed her brown curls at him, before giving Ella a triumphant look.

  Jay went to the door. ‘Chaperone Miss Johnson until I get back,’ he said shortly. ‘Don’t let her go anywhere on her own.’ He disappeared into the yard.

  ‘What’s going on?’ said Polly.

  Ella shook her head. ‘Mind your own. I just need a few minutes to fix my face. You can give me a few minutes for that, can’t you?’

  ‘He said I’ve not to let you out of my sight, or I lose my place.’

  ‘Oh, for God’s sake. Come to the top of the stairs with me then.’

  Polly looked doubtful, but she followed Ella. Ella walked up the stairs like a doll, as if her legs were not her own. Her mind was racing. She just needed some time to think. At the door to the room Ella said, ‘Look. I just want a few minutes alone to fix my face, all right?’

  ‘What’s up?’ Polly said, trying again.

  ‘Nothing.’

  ‘I’ll be listening at the door. If I hear anything funny, I’ll bring Mr Whitgift.’

  ‘Do I look like I’m going to turn bedlam? I’ve told you, I’m only going to fix my face.’

  She closed the door on Polly’s curiosity. She had to try to think, make a plan. She looked directly below and saw the bulky head and shoulders of a man standing just outside the door. She hurried to the windows, ran her fingers over them, but they were sealed with layers of caulk and had no handles. Damn, they didn’t open. And they faced the yard, where everybody came and went. So there was no way out from up there. She knew there was a tiny window in the back downstairs, but it wasn’t even big enough for a cat. The rest of the windows faced the front where Jay’s man was on guard.

  She went over to the mirror, and her reflection stared back at her, impassive, as if nothing was amiss. A wave of anger came over her at her naivety. She had thought herself and Jay to be alike. She wondered how she could ever have thought him attractive. She loathed him. She hated his sloe-black eyes, his pointed nose, his almost fleshless fingers. She hated the immaculate cut of his clothes, his too-clean cuffs, the way he swaggered from place to place, ignoring all the customers queuing in the yard as if they were invisible.

  And she had caught the look between Wycliffe and him. The intimacy of that look had made her wince with shame at her own stupidity. Whatever she looked like on the outside, she was still just so much chaff to him.

  A great rage filled her. She grabbed a wet muslin cloth from the ewer and scrubbed at her face. The white lead came off in big streaks, the cochineal from her lips stained the cloth red.

  The door opened with a creak and Polly’s curious head came round the corner.

  ‘Get out!’ yelled Ella with venom, turning her dripping face towards her.

  Polly’s eyebrows shot up and she retreated back behind the door. A few moments later Ella heard the noise of the gig outside and Jay Whitgift’s voice. Then the sound of the door banging to, as Polly left. Ella went over to the window again and was disconcerted to see the big-shouldered man still stationed outside.

  She sat back down and scrubbed at her face until it was red. When she looked up again she saw the wide-eyed country girl that had first come to London, breathless with hopes and dreams of a better life. The face reminded her of someone. She paused in her rubbing and stared. And then she saw it. The wide mouth, the snub up
turned nose. It was Sadie.

  It was the first time she had ever caught a family resemblance between herself and her sister. And more, it reminded her of her ma. Her eyes turned glassy, but she wiped them roughly with the muslin. Ella remembered how Sadie had tried to hug her the last time she had gone to see her, and the ache in her chest grew stronger. With awful clarity she remembered seeing Sadie holding out her arms, and then her face fall, as Ella ignored her and stepped away. The vision transformed, was replaced by a picture of her hand in its fine lace glove, turning the key in the padlock. Her eyes were streaming now, and she wiped them roughly not caring that it stung, to punish herself.

  Sadie would be waiting for her, would need her to fetch food and water. The thought of Sadie waiting patiently by the locked door, her stomach hollow with hunger, made a small moan escape from the back of Ella’s throat. She would wait, and nobody would come. In a panic, Ella groped for the solid metal shape of the key to the padlock, hung beneath her skirts. She let out a sigh of relief. It was still there. She must get out of here. She was suddenly hot, on fire with hatred for herself. Sweat broke out on her forehead and she scraped it away with the cloth. She felt for the key again and stood up.

  The room was stifling, airless. Meg had banked up the fire and it crackled now. It had blazed away even when she was out of the room. It had seemed like luxury, but now it seemed wasteful and needless. She thought of Sadie scavenging her few sticks for a fire for cooking and remembered her promise, made all those years ago in the big bed in Netherbarrow, that she should dine on sweetmeats and sleep on silk. She knew where Sadie was now – sitting silently in her old petticoats, her feet wrapped in rags, looking at the empty shelf. Ella moaned. She had tried to leave Netherbarrow behind, but it was as if the river Nether flowed in her veins instead of blood.

  Slowly and deliberately she pasted on a new layer of white ceruse. This time it was to hide herself, hide the old Ella, so that she might appear to be still Miss Johnson, when she knew as sure as the sun rose each morning that she could never be anyone but Ella Appleby of Westmorland. She plastered the white paste over her neck and bosom. Deliberately she drew in blue veins with a crayon, and rubbed the blue over her eyelids. She made her lips even redder, and her eyelashes black with soot powder. Her emotion manifested as a sort of deliberateness, an icy control. She would not be beaten. She would find a way to get out of the Lily, for she must go to her sister.

  She whisked away the powder at her neckline with a hogshair brush, and smoothed her skirts. The process made her calm. She picked up her fan and sat down to fathom a plan.

  Sadie had been two days without food or water. The air was sharp. The night had been remorselessly cold and Sadie had hung a small jug out of the window, hoping to catch a little moisture or dew inside it by the morning, but when she hauled it back in by its string, it was still empty but rimed with frost. The skin of her fingers stuck to it. She breathed onto her fingers to warm them, frightened she might tear them without, then saw as she did so that her breath clouded on the outside of the jug forming little beads of moisture. She breathed onto it again and a trickle of water ran down the green glazed surface. Sadie licked at it eagerly, and spent some time repeating this, before tiring of it and hanging the jug back outside.

  On the third day she woke parched, her lips chapped and sore. She dragged herself out of bed and checked the jug. Still empty. She prowled the room looking for anything that might hold a little moisture, but the room was dry. She had made it so by burning anything small that would catch – fearful she might freeze in her sleep and never wake. Now she had no wooden bowls, no stool, no box for the rushlights, no shelf on which to put her last glazed pots. There were dry oats in the food press – too heavy for her to lift; her cloak on the back of the door was rough as sand to the touch.

  Sadie saw that her hands looked wrinkled, her tongue felt too large for her mouth. Good Lord above, she would die if she were left here without water another day. Where on earth was Ella? Please God she was safe.

  Desperate, she took up a metal skillet and banged with all her might on the floor, listening for a reply from downstairs. She kept this up for an hour, but no one came. The clattering was hollow through the empty house, as if she were the only person left in the entire world.

  There was nobody on the bank today, no mudlarks or other scavengers. The river stood still, stopped in its tracks. Sadie shouted to try and attract attention, but her voice was hoarse and the bitter wind carried it away. Her stomach clenched at the sight of the ledge she had stood on when the constable came. She quailed at the idea of venturing onto it again. The wind would blow her away, and beneath her the ground was set into jagged black furrows by the frost. But it was her only option. That, or die here in this desiccated room. What had become of Ella? Three days, and not a sign of her. But if she was safe, why had she not come? A tear trickled down her cheek. She let it fall. Did not even stretch out her tongue. Perhaps Ella really had tired of looking after her and was never coming back. Out of the window the sky darkened, a squall of snow and wind flapped the curtain. Angrily, she stuffed a blanket into the gap so the room fell dark.

  Sadie shivered and came away. The dress Ella had bought was still on the table. She had burnt the box last night, to give a few moments’ heat and cheer. She held it in front of her. It was no use to her, trapped in here. She would burn it; God help her, it would warm her one way or the other. She went to fetch the one good knife to cut it to shreds. The desire to rip it to pieces warred with her fear of wasting anything. She picked up the yellow fabric and shook it out. A faint smell of dust and stale perfume tickled her nostrils. She laid it down.

  It was no use waiting. Ella was not going to come. There was nobody in the house, only her. She had to get out. Why waste her strength on the dress? She grabbed the knife and approached the door. She began to dig the point into the wood over and over with grim determination. Perhaps if she could gouge a hole she might be able to pick the lock from the outside. Heaven only knows what the Gowpers would make of her ruining their door. But there had been no sign of Dennis or his mother and there was no telling when they might be back. Sadie dug patiently at the door as the wind whistled, the splinters sticking to her sleeves, not noticing that outside the snow had begun to fall heavy and deep.

  All day she scraped at the wood until her hand was blistered from the knife. It was a small triumph when the knife finally burst through the door, but then the hole was too small for her hand to go through and she had to gouge at the wood for another hour to make the hole large enough. Once through she felt for the padlock and manoeuvred various kitchen knives to try to get the lock to open, but it was no use, it would not budge. She wept with frustration, hurled the knife to the ground.

  It would have to be the window after all. She looked out and was amazed to see how much snow had fallen, and that it was still falling, more quietly now, in big lacy flakes. Below, the snow had formed into drifts along the riverbank. Directly beneath her the wind had shaped it into a soft mattress of white. She picked up the knife again and dropped it out of the window. It disappeared into the mound of snow, leaving a deep hole behind it.

  Sadie put on her grey woollen cloak, tied her Westmorland shawl tightly round her head and shoulders, gathered up her purse and tucked it into her bodice. She dragged the blanket clear, hitched her skirts and clawed her way up onto the windowsill, her clogs kicking against the lath walls. Teeth chattering with cold, she edged out onto the ledge. The flakes floated icy on her eyelids, dissolving into a blur of rain. She gauged where the thickest drift of snow lay. Please God, she could jump that far. Her heart hammered in her chest.

  Sadie took a deep breath and leapt.

  When she looked up she seemed to see stars, but then realized it was only the patterns of snowflakes eddying above her. There was a weight of snow over her face. She struggled to sit up and was relieved to find that everything was working. She scrubbed the snow from her face. A wave of euphoria hit her. She co
uld scarce believe it, she had done it. The snow was deep around her, she was lying in a well of white. She scrambled to her feet, staggering up to her knees in the compressed snow. She sucked the moisture from a handful of the stuff before brushing herself down. She did not look up to the ledge from where she had jumped but pulled her shawl closer round her face and dived for the dark shadows of the alleyway.

  Chapter 33

  Mercy Fletcher waited out of sight behind the cobbler’s on the corner, her eyes fixed on the entrance to the alley where Madame Lefevre’s wig-shop sign hung, topped with a thick layer of snow. She was waiting for Corey Johnson. Corey and the other girls jostled out of Madame Lefevre’s wig shop in high spirits, pulling on their gloves and marvelling at the new fall of snow. The girls scrunched it into balls and pelted Betsy with handfuls of it. Betsy had just told them she was to be wed to Willie Carpenter, the apprentice turner at the wheelwright’s.

  ‘Leave off, you fools,’ she cried, ducking her head to avoid the onslaught.

  ‘Better than rice, this!’ yelled Pegeen.

  ‘Is it to be a spring wedding, Betsy?’ Corey took Betsy’s arm, and slapped at her shoulders to dislodge the snow.

  ‘It’ll be as soon as Willie’s papers are signed and he’s his own man.’

  ‘What you going to wear, Betsy?’ said Alyson. ‘Let’s hope it’s sunny. We’ve not seen the sun for months.’

  ‘This snow and ice is getting to me. My hands are numb it’s that cold.’

  ‘I know, it’s frore,’ said Corey. ‘Still, there’s snow, so it must be getting warmer.’

  ‘You can never count on the weather, so I’m not having a spring gown,’ Betsy said. ‘My mother’s making me something that’ll do after for church and for high days. They’re busting their buttons to give me a good dower box.’