Victorian Maiden

by Gary Dolman

  It was very curious feeling, to walk with Old Rachel back up the long road to Harrogate – almost as if she were entering a strange town for the first time; a town that she had previously known only in picture books. Everything looked the same; the great beech trees that lined the road, the cottages and the farmsteads, the Stray itself… But it was also all strangely different. True, she was dressed as a pauper girl now in her stiff grogram gown and day cap, and the bright yellow jacket she wore seemed to attract all manner of attention, from disdainful stares to outright hostility.

  It had taken quite a long time for her to realise that it was the jacket that was the cause of the attention, and not just the sheer fact that she was a wicked pauper girl with a precious bastard baby in her belly. Women hustled their children into their houses or hid them behind their skirts and they would call, ‘slut,’ or, ‘harlot,’ or ‘whore’ as she passed. Men would shout from passing wagons, asking how much for a kiss, and would she meet them in the tavern after dark. One man even broke away from a whistling, jeering group of farm labourers to run across the road and grab at her. She let her body fall limp and her mind flee as his rough stubble raked across her face until Old Rachel beat him off with the thick handle of her slasher. But even as her mind took off and fled to her special, secret place, Elizabeth realised that her uncle and Mrs Eire had been right all along; everyone knew, everyone could see even without the yellow jacket she was wearing that she was a nasty, sinful little harlot who needed to be punished and punished and punished.

  “No ye aren’, child,” Rachel had said, just as Mary had said before her. “Ye’ve jus’ been terrible unfortunate, that’s all. Take that there jacket off an’ I’ll hide it in a tree for ye ’til we come back. No-one need be any t’ wiser. Mr Wright can’t see us when we’re away from t’ poor-law an’ what he can’t see winnet hurt ’im.”

  Elizabeth took it off, but she knew that it would change nothing. She knew for certain that she was wicked – that she was a wicked, wicked creature who would surely go to Hell, and who deserved no mercy. She deserved the shouts and the insults, and she deserved for the men to attack her. As she watched Rachel wind her jacket into a tight roll and push it snugly into a fork of a roadside tree, she hoped with all her heart that the spines of the whin bushes would scratch her and scratch her, and scratch her to death.

  It had taken quite a long time for her to realise that it was the jacket after all that had been the cause of the attention. But she walked now with no heavy jacket, listening to Rachel’s chattering and her stories of the workhouse, and even her heart seemed to grow lighter. She had just the weight of her perfect, unborn baby in her belly, and the slasher in her arms. People still stared at them to be sure, but now no-one shouted, no-one jeered, and no-one came to hurt her.

  Not long after her poor mama had left her to go to Heaven, and she had been taken away to live in the Annexe, Mr Otter, the steward of the Friday Club, had suddenly burst into her room where she had been sitting in a chair reading to John.

  John was a full three years younger than she, but she remembered how brave he had been that day. He had picked up the wooden sword he had recently taken to carrying with him everywhere and he had brandished it at Otter like a gallant knight to an ogre.

  Mr Otter had laughed as he had plucked the sword from John’s grasp, and he had laughed again as he had smashed it to pieces over his knee. But he had seemed deadly serious when he had said, more to Lizzie than to John: “You want to be very careful with me, you do.”

  “You aren’t allowed to touch us, Otter. I heard Papa tell you. We’re gentlemen’s children and we’re not to be interfered with.”

  John’s scream was a scream of rage.

  “You’re only allowed your pick of the downstairs children, and even then, only after the Friday Club has finished with them.”

  “You’re both to come with me right now,” Mr Otter had growled in reply. “Mr Roberts wants to show something to you on the Stray.”

  Curious, but still wary enough to leave a respectful distance, they had followed him obediently through the Annexe’s smoking room and down the stairway beyond. But when he reached the big door at the bottom, he had turned on them with a suddenness that had both frightened and surprised them for such a big man.

  “If I were ever to touch you, Miss Elizabeth,” he growled, “If I were ever to come to your room and drag you from your bed and take my fill of you, you can be certain that neither of you would live to tell the tale of it.”

  His laughter had echoed horribly in the empty void of the stairwell and, when he turned and pulled open the door, neither Lizzie nor John doubted the truth of his words for a moment.

  They were almost relieved to find Uncle Alfie waiting impatiently for them by the columns of the portico.

  “John, Lizzie, come with me; I want to show you both what happens to disobedient children and to those who run away.”

  He led them along the carriage drive to the big, stone gateposts marking its end. There he pointed.

  They looked. A little way across the Stray one of the great, old trees by the roadside had fallen in the night. A large group of people, men, women and children, were crawling over it like the colony of ants John kept in a jam jar under his bed.

  “Those creatures are paupers,” Uncle Alfie announced, “From the poor-law workhouse at Starbeck. They have come to clear that tree for firewood.

  I want you to look hard and pay heed to their misfortune. Workhouse paupers are the most miserable wretches in Christendom. They are naturally idle, indolent and feckless. That is why, in an attempt to drive the more godlike qualities of industriousness, abstinence and humility into them, they are starved, beaten and worked as hard as they can bear.

  Now if you should wish to avoid the fate that has overtaken those poor unfortunates, you must always, always do as your betters instruct you, and you must never run away. If you are being hard punished, I remind you that it is for the sake of your immortal soul. Do you hear me, Lizzie?”

  She nodded. She had heard the words her uncle had spoken, certainly, but as she watched the paupers laughing and chattering and calling to each other as they worked, she barely believed the truth of them.

  The pauper women and girls – for they looked to have women and girls just like ordinary folk – were all dressed identically in heavy grey dresses. She was reminded suddenly of Halcyon, the house where she had lived with her mama before she went away to Heaven, and of the family who lived next door. They had three children, all girls, and they were always dressed exactly the same – just like a row of little ducklings, as her mama used to say. They had always seemed happy too; they were always laughing and chattering just like the paupers. How she wished and wished that she could be a little duckling, following her mama wherever she went. How she wished she could be a pauper and laugh and chatter like them. They were like a family; one great, big, happy family, with brothers and duckling sisters and even, dear Lord even, warm, living mamas.

  Chapter 22

  “I can’t believe it. I just can’t believe it. How utterly stupid must the man be, Atticus? Shouldn’t a magistrate be blessed with at least a spark of intelligence?”

  Dr Roberts was utterly distraught as he paced back and forth in front of Sessrum House.

  “Doctor, we only came over to tell you that your aunt’s lawyers are preparing the papers regarding her inheritance, but we seem to have walked into a veritable brouhaha. Whatever is the matter? You look fit to explode.”

  “The matter is, I’ve had a letter from that fool magistrate. Here, read it for yourselves.”

  He thrust a ball of crumpled paper across at Atticus, who caught it, and with a deeply apprehensive glance to Lucie, opened it out and smoothed it against one of the big stone columns.

  “She’s failed the McNaughton test,” he said after a moment, “Due to the absence of any evidence of madness and the sworn testimony of the police. She’s to stand trial at the next assizes.”

&nb
sp; “Surely not,” breathed Lucie, “But how could she?”

  “That imbecile of a police superintendant swore an oath that she could understand perfectly well what was being said to her whilst she was in their custody. It’s utter poppycock, of course; she’s senile. She hadn’t the first idea what was happening to her in there.”

  “Absence of evidence is not the same as evidence of absence,” Atticus added.

  “But you’re an eminent psychiatrist,” Lucie said, “Won’t they take your sworn word as evidence too? Your oath is as good as his.”

  “They’ve an idea I’m in on it!”

  Roberts’ eyes seemed to bulge from their sockets.

  “Can you believe it? They spoke to that fool Liddle at the workhouse and he told them that I’d been there many times to see their Medical Officer. So now they think I might have conspired with Aunt Elizabeth to kill my grandfather. They think I might have coached her in how to behave like an imbecile, so she could get away with it scot-free!”

  “So when are the next assize sessions?” Lucie asked hurriedly, to forestall the question she could sense was already forming on Atticus’ lips.

  Roberts looked at her grimly.

  “Next week,” he said.

  “Then, Quo Fata Vocant,” said Atticus, neatly folding the letter and handing it back to Roberts, “Whither the Fates Call. We need a plan of action.”

  “Very well,” said Roberts, “I’ll have Petty send up some tea. We’ll meet Mary in the Annexe for a council of war. It’ll be private there, and Aunt Elizabeth will be having her mid-morning nap.”

  A few minutes later, they were back in the smoking room of the Annexe under the malevolently watchful gaze of Freya and the ghosts of the Friday Club.

  “I’d forgotten quite how oppressive this place is,” Lucie whispered after the doctor had excused himself to summon Mary.

  Atticus nodded.

  And then Mary Lovell duly appeared, and when she did, they were appalled at the sight of her. It might have been Elizabeth Wilson herself shuffling after Dr Roberts through the door, so stooped and broken did she look. Her face was crumpled and worn, and the gloom of the Annexe accentuated the deep black semi-circles beneath her eyes. It seemed as if she hadn’t slept a moment in the days and nights since they had last seen her, and that those sleepless days and nights must have worn her down like so many years.

  “You’ve heard the news I take it?” she whispered, as she collapsed onto a seat opposite them and fell against its arm.

  “We have,” Lucie confirmed.

  “And they’re here to help us plan a course of action if this travesty of natural justice is to be avoided,” Roberts added.

  “There is no way to avoid a trial, then?” Atticus asked.

  Roberts glanced at Mary, and Mary shook her head.

  He said: “I’ll engage a lawyer, the very best lawyer I can find to fight for it – of course I will – but the magistrate says not, especially when the sessions are so close.”

  “Then we must think about a defence for her,” Atticus replied.

  He tapped his chin with a forefinger.

  “I’ve been giving all of this a lot of thought, and it seems to me that although it is conceivable by the letter of the law that Miss Elizabeth might hang, in reality it’s most unlikely, most unlikely indeed. Very few women are executed for murder these days, and those that are, are either the ones who have shown clear and wicked malice aforethought, or the ones who have gone completely against their natural, maternal instincts; child killers for example.

  Miss Elizabeth had only been here for a matter of hours that day, and she had no prior notion that she was going to be fetched here at all, no matter what the police might suspect. Also, remember that it was your grandfather who paid the visit to her bedroom, and not the other way about. No, I could quite imagine her being sent to an asylum or even perhaps, to a prison, but I certainly can’t see her being executed.”

  “Mr Fox,” Mary said, her voice no more than a whisper, “Incarceration would be a thousand times worse for Lizzie than execution.”

  “Worse? But how could it possibly be worse, Miss Lovell?”

  Atticus was astonished.

  “Her mind is gone as you all agree. So as long as she was warm and adequately fed, surely she wouldn’t know the difference?”

  “In short, as long as she was kept caged, like the meanest animal, that would be fine, Mr Fox? Is that what you’re saying?”

  Mary Lovell’s words dripped with venom.

  “No, no of course I didn’t mean it like that, Miss Lovell,” Atticus replied hastily, “It’s just…”

  He paused to select his words carefully.

  “It’s just that she surely wouldn’t feel the pain of imprisonment as keenly as an ordinary person would, someone who had a full command of their faculties.”

  “You’re quite wrong, Mr Fox.”

  “Excuse me, but how so?”

  “Because her thoughts and memories torment her far more than you could possibly imagine. She’s in purgatory every single, waking hour. I believe Dr Roberts has already told you how she takes a knife to her arms and breasts so that the pain of her wounds can distract her from the pain of her soul. Before her dementia, she used to tell me continually how she could never quite drive the demons from her mind. Every day for nearly fifty years she has wished herself dead, Mr Fox. She has spent every single day yearning to die, and the only things that have stopped her from taking her own life have been sheer good fortune, and a fear of going to Hell. You see, she believed that she was so wicked, so utterly loathsome, that if she died, she would surely go straight to Hell and be tormented for eternity.”

  She hesitated.

  “And there was one other thing.”

  “Which is what?”

  She hesitated again, her eyes pained with fear and doubt.

  “You must tell us everything, Miss Lovell, if we are to help her,” Lucie urged. But instead of Mary Lovell, it was Dr Roberts who answered. His rage had all but subsided, and instead had given way to exhaustion and resignation.

  “May I tell you both something in the strictest confidence, something you must never divulge to another, living soul?”

  “I can’t guarantee anything, Dr Roberts,” Atticus answered cautiously, “But we pride ourselves on our discretion.”

  “Very well, I can’t ask for anything more, I suppose.”

  Roberts took a long breath and raised up his head, as if it were he that was about to face the gallows and not his aunt and said: “In plain terms, Atticus and Mrs Fox, my grandfather was nothing less than a monster.”

  “A monster,” Atticus exclaimed, “But how can you call him that? He may have been a little overbearing perhaps, bombastic even, but in spite of that, he was still a great philanthropist. Or like Miss Lovell, are you saying now that he wasn’t even that?”

  Roberts shook his head and Mary stared stoically at the tea tray.

  “That’s what he would have had the world believe.”

  He took another long, deep breath.

  “It was Lord Acton I think who wrote that: ‘Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Great men are almost always bad men.’ Alas, how true those words prove to be. We British are undoubtedly a great and powerful nation, Atticus. It’s just unfortunate that, as a consequence, we have produced a disproportionate number of great, but corrupt and ultimately bad men. We think that with the genius of our engineers, the wealth of our industry, and our sheer military might, we can do almost anything we choose. Tragically, too many of those same corrupt men believe that they can indeed do anything they choose, and get away with it. Tell me: Have either of you ever heard of something called the ‘Defloration Mania’?”

  Atticus shook his head. He glanced at his wife, who was staring at Roberts in what might have been horror.

  “It’s also been called, ‘The Maiden Tribute of Modern Babylon,’ I believe.” Roberts added.

  At that, a gr
eat wave of comprehension swept over Atticus Fox. It left him cold, dazed and wet with sweat.

  “Stead,” he hissed at last; “W. T. Stead, the editor of the Pall Mall Gazette. I read about his articles a few years ago – the ‘Maiden Tribute’ articles – if that’s what you mean. I thought that Stead was just a sensationalist, just someone trying to sell copies of a newspaper. I mean to say, thousands of young, innocent girls entrapped or bought like slaves on the streets of Britain for the perverted pleasure of the wealthy classes. I can’t see how all of that could have been going on under our very noses. Surely it would have raised Hell itself?”

  “I do indeed mean Mr Stead’s articles, Atticus, and yes, I do mean the procurement of vast numbers of very young girls – virgin girls – in order to forcibly deflower them. Mr Stead’s claims were, and still are, entirely accurate. I will concede that you’re right when you say it should have raised Hell. But it happened here, in this Annexe, for years and it didn’t even raise the servants.

  I’m deeply ashamed to admit to you both that my grandfather and his select circle of friends in the Friday Club rejoiced in the vanguard of Harrogate’s very own defloration mania.”

  They glanced as one at the picture high on the wall, and the smirks and leers of the faces there betrayed the stark truth of his words.

  “Then thank Providence that’s all the Friday Club is now,” Lucie said, “Just awful memories and an old photograph on a wall.”

  “We’re all very glad too, Mrs Fox,” Roberts agreed. “Those men are all either dead now or at least are very old and frail. But remember this: Mr Stead wrote those articles – his ‘infernal narrative,’ as he called it – not fifty, not twenty, not even ten, but just five short years ago. There have been some reforms to be sure; the age of consent for girls has been raised from thirteen to sixteen years for example, but you can be certain of this: The Maiden Tribute is still being paid to this day, in the dark places of every town and city in the realm.”