The Lost Sisters: A gritty saga about friendships, family and finding a place to call home

by Lindsey Hutchinson

  Once more dressed in trousers, jacket and cap, Hortense picked her way to the meeting place. The moon shone brightly and she could see a man pacing back and forth. Hiding herself behind a crumbling wall, she watched for signs of any other movement. Just then, a small light came from the shell of the building on the opposite expanse of ground. Someone was there! Abel had brought someone with him, and they had been stupid enough to alert her to their presence by lighting a cigarette!

  Hortense shrank back into the shadows and left Abel waiting for a meeting that would never take place.

  *

  The morning after the botched rendezvous, having had no sleep and with a headache from hell, Abel sipped hot tea as he sat in the shop. He telephoned Zachariah and said, ‘I will be staying in the shop until Orpha is found.’ Replacing the receiver, the telephone immediately began to ring.

  Peg answered it and heard someone say they wanted to speak to Abel Buchanan.

  ‘I thought I told you no police!’ the voice rasped. ‘Now I suggest we try this again, same place, same time, drop the bag and leave. When the emeralds are in my possession, you will get your daughter back! Get it right this time or I will kill the girl!’

  ‘Hortense! Is that you? I swear I will…’ Abel yelled into the telephone but the caller had already rung off.

  Immediately ringing Zachariah again, Abel said, ‘I need you as fast as you can get here… and bring the two stable lads from Buchanan House with you.’ He had no intention of informing the police this time. Somehow the person who had his daughter knew the police were there. Running his fingers over the leather case holding the pebbles, Abel rocked his head back and forth. This time he was taking charge.

  A few hours later, Zachariah dashed into the shop, followed closely by the two stable boys. ‘Father!’ he gasped. ‘Are you all right?’

  Abel, seeing the concern on his son’s face, shook his head. Suddenly he bent double and Zachariah ran to him.

  ‘Father! Are you ill?’

  Abel shook his head and grasped the front of his son’s clothes with one hand, the other leaning on his own bent knee. Abel Buchanan gasped short breaths before letting loose his despair. His shoulders shook as he wept openly. Dragging in a deep breath, it escaped his lips like a howl from a wounded animal. Peg’s hands shot to her mouth as she saw her father’s distress.

  Zachariah held Abel until his father was spent. Then, slowly, Abel raised himself up. Wiping his eyes on the handkerchief his son produced, he nodded. With a sniff, he said, ‘Now then…’ His words broke the spell the others appeared to be under. ‘This is my plan. Seth, I want you to hide on one side of the coal shaft and Jago on the other. I will take the case along with two oil lanterns already lit. I will place the case on the ground and leave one lamp beside it to show its position; the other lamp will lead me away from the area. When you see the bag being retrieved, I want you to silently follow the person. Do not be seen! Hopefully you will be led to Orpha. Should the kidnapper not lead you to my daughter, you are to bring that person back to the shop unharmed. Then I will discover where Orpha is being held!’

  Chapter 35

  Orpha’s senses slowly returned and she realised she had a rag round her mouth and another round her eyes. Her hands and feet were tied and she was lying on a cold stone floor. Her head ached and the smell of damp around her said she was in an old building. Then she remembered; she had gone to meet someone but the area she went to had seen no trading life for many years. Is that where she was now? Was she still in Major Street or had she been moved elsewhere?

  Listening keenly, she heard nothing, not even a bird was singing. Who had taken her? Why had they taken her? The fear she felt at first waking was slowly being replaced by anger. Wriggling her feet, she tried to break her bonds, but to no avail. She tried feeling around with her fingers, endeavouring to untie the ropes that bound her hands behind her back. Persevering made her fingers ache and she had to rest them; all the time, she listened for any sounds of her kidnapper.

  Thinking about her predicament, she realised if she straightened her body she could bring her hands down past her backside and then, bending double, she could bring her feet through her arms. It would be awkward, but she had nothing to lose in trying. Dragging a breath through her nose, she let it out slowly before she leaned her upper body backwards. Pushing her arms down, her shoulders strained until her muscles screamed their protest. She tried pushing her bottom out through her arms, but the pain caused her to drag in a breath and she lessened the pressure on her arms. Resting a moment she thought the process through again. She had to keep trying! She had to escape before her abductor returned. Making another attempt she pushed her arms down ignoring the agonising strain on her muscles then she leaned her upper body forward and slid her arms down the back of her legs. Bending her knees, she pulled her hands over her feet and skirts and, with her hands now in front of her, Orpha fought to control her erratic breathing. Dragging the rag first from her mouth, she drew in large breaths. Then snatching the blindfold from her eyes, she squinted around her. She was alone and she breathed a sigh of relief. Taking a moment to take a few deep breaths and steady her beating heart, she then freed her feet. Dragging the ropes from her hands with her teeth, and keeping a keen eye out for anyone approaching, she moved quietly to the edge of the building and peered out into the fading light. There was no-one to be seen and gathering the last vestiges of strength left to her she took a step forward.

  Slipping silently out of the ruin, she had been held captive in; Orpha’s eyes swept the area for any signs of her assailant. Seeing no one, she picked up her skirts and ran. Direction didn’t feature in her thoughts; she just needed to get away from that awful place. Suddenly seeing the allotment gardens on her left, she knew where she was and ran like the wind for the shop in Oxford Street.

  Dashing in through the door, she fled into the living room where Abel and the stable boys were finalising their plans.

  Rushing to throw his arms around her, Orpha explained to her father amid sobs and snatched breath what had happened to her in Major Street.

  ‘I didn’t see who it was, Father! I was looking for the woman who had telephoned me and then I was hit on the head. When I came to I found myself tied and gagged!’

  Peg provided hot sweet tea as Abel related what he knew of the incident then said, ‘We will go ahead with our plan as if Orpha was still missing. We have to catch the perpetrator red-handed.’

  They all agreed to inform the police after the event this time; after all if it had been Hortense, wouldn’t she have been apprehended already had it not been for their bungling of the situation in the first place?

  Darkness fell and the three men set off for the old coal shaft. A lit oil lantern in each hand and the leather case tucked beneath his arm, Abel strode out with determination. With Jago and Seth safely in their hiding places amongst the ruins, Abel set the bag and one lantern down as a marker. Looking around, he could see nothing but the silhouette of the old abandoned buildings. All was silent; he could not see the stable boys, but he knew they were watching him. Abel began to walk away from the lone lantern on the patch of waste ground.

  Hortense arrived just as Abel had placed the lantern on the ground. She watched him look around before leaving. Waiting until she could see him no longer, she waited just a few more moments. Seeing nothing move, she stole from her hiding place and retrieved the leather case and lantern. Almost at a run, she fled the scene. Abel, the fool, had complied with her orders. Walking quickly, she smiled into the darkness; he had even been kind enough to leave the lantern to light her way home. Being so occupied with her thoughts, Hortense didn’t see the two young men who followed some distance behind as they crept from one shadow to the next. With rags tied around their boots their footsteps were silent as they watched Hortense disappear into a hotel.

  *

  Hortense placed the lantern on the small table in her room and, opening the leather case, she tipped out its contents. Seeing the
gravel stones, she let out a hiss of utter frustration.

  ‘Bastard!’ she growled through clenched teeth, then threw the bag across the room before dropping into the solitary chair. Tears of complete misery formed in her eyes as she looked at the gravel on the table again. How was it that girl and her family seemed to beat her at every turn? She should have killed Orpha when she had a chance, she knew that now. Scraping the gravel from the table, she threw it into the fireplace. The girl was going nowhere and no one knew where she was. That settled it, tomorrow would see Orpha Buchanan take her last breath!

  *

  Jago Morton took shelter in a doorway opposite the hotel in Hospital Street while Seth Walker, taking the rags from his boots, hotfooted it to the shop to report back to Abel.

  Undecided whether to pass this onto the police immediately or wait until the following day, Abel watched Peg bathe the cut on the back of Orpha’s head with saltwater and deliberated. Voicing his thoughts, he began, ‘We cannot prove the voice on the telephone was Hortense. The boys watched the person they assumed to be Hortense, but in the darkness it was difficult to tell, take the bag and lantern back to the hotel opposite the Wolverhampton & Staffordshire General Hospital, but that person could say they had found the items. With my daughter now safely back in the fold of our family, there is nothing to say it had been Hortense who had carried out the assault on Orpha. I am at a loss. There is no evidence for the police to arrest my wife therefore, Seth, if you would be kind enough to bring Jago back to the shop, there is nothing more we can do.’

  ‘Beggin’ your pardon, Mr Abel, but I think we should tell the police. They could go to the hotel and arrest her.’ Seth said tentatively.

  ‘I suppose it would make sense, lad. Right, off you go and I’ll get down to the police station,’ Abel agreed.

  *

  Hortense had spent the night in yet another hotel thinking of ways to dispose of her daughter without suspicion falling on her, then she had left the next morning leaving her things in her room. Stomping over the cobblestones, Hortense was belligerent - she was going to kill Orpha Buchanan! On her way back to Major Street, she had stopped and bought a ‘gulley’, a bread knife with a serrated edge. Anger at being duped by Abel was mounting in her and she stamped her ire into the cobblestones of the street to the last building. Casting a quick glance around and seeing no one, she stepped inside. The girl was nowhere to be seen but the rags and ropes lay on the floor where she had been left.

  ‘God damn the bloody blinding girl!’ she growled as she kicked the ropes across the floor. With a huge sigh, Hortense left the building and marched back up Major Street. Now what? With the girl gone, she had no leverage. Obviously concentrating solely on acquiring the emeralds had been a mistake on her part. With the money gained from the stolen gems which she’d sold to the same jeweller almost immediately after acquiring them, Hortense knew it would dwindle fast. Having to move from one hotel to another was costing her, but she daren’t stay in one place too long lest the police catch up with her. She had to get her hands on either Abel’s money or his jewels, otherwise she would end up in the workhouse!

  *

  The police telephoned Abel at the shop and said that after going to the hotel in search of Hortense they were told the woman in question had already left. However, should she be found, they would question, and possibly arrest her regarding both the arson and the kidnapping. They would keep him informed.

  Orpha insisted, ‘Father and Zachariah, you must go back to your work in Birmingham; we will be safe enough as Ezzie and Edna are due back with supplies for the shop’ Father and son acquiesced albeit begrudgingly.

  *

  It was a few days later when once more in the shop, Orpha sighed as the telephone rang.

  ‘Is that “The Choc’s Box”?’ a snooty voice said and Orpha confirmed it was, saying she was the owner and giving her name. The voice went on, ‘Miss Buchanan, my name is Travers and I am in Her Majesty’s employ.’

  ‘Oh,’ muttered Orpha, not believing a word of it.

  The voice said, ‘I am to inform you that Her Majesty has heard of your little shop…’ Travers paused and Orpha felt the heat of disdain creep into her cheeks… little shop indeed!

  ‘Mr Travers, I’m having difficulty believing this. How would the Queen have heard of my shop, may I ask?’ Orpha said.

  ‘It would appear she has read of it in the newspapers,’ the man said, his voice holding a sharp frustrated edge. ‘Her Majesty likes to keep abreast of the news, as I’m sure you are aware.’

  Still unsure whether someone was playing a joke on her, Orpha snapped. ‘Mr Travers, what exactly can I help you with?’

  ‘Ahem,’ the man went on, ‘Her Majesty Queen Victoria…’ Orpha sighed audibly into the telephone – she knew who the Queen was ‘…would like you to make available some of your confectionery.’ The sound of the man’s sniff ended the sentence.

  ‘Oh my goodness!’ Orpha said with the utmost surprise.

  ‘Indeed. In which case, her servant will be at your shop at four o’clock prompt tomorrow afternoon.’ The line went dead as soon as he finished speaking.

  Orpha wandered into the shop area in a daze. ‘Lottie,’ she said, ‘it would appear the Queen has requested some of our chocolates. Her servant will be here at four tomorrow afternoon.’

  Lottie squealed with delight as she scrambled around stacking boxes of everything they produced in readiness for collection.

  Orpha sighed at the activity not at all sure the telephone call was genuine and not someone playing a hoax. However, she left Lottie to her task. After all, if it proved to be true, then they needed to have the confectionary ready for collection. Now she needed to await the outcome of the telephone call and pray it was authentic.

  The following day at four on the dot a cabbie reined the horse to a halt and a young man stepped into the shop. Orpha was there to greet him. The young man nodded his greeting and placed a small card on the counter, the Queen’s coat of arms emblazoned upon it. Orpha’s eyes widened as the boy turned over the card to reveal the Queen’s signature. So the call the previous day had been honest and sincere.

  The boy picked up the boxes which had been strung together and walked from the shop, leaving the card on the counter. Lottie and Orpha exchanged a glance before bursting out laughing when Lottie said, ‘He never even paid for them!’

  Peg and Ezzie arrived back to the excitement of the tale of the Queen’s envoy.

  Orpha rang Abel. ‘Father, you’ll never guess! The Queen sent an envoy for some of our chocolates!’

  Her father’s voice filtered into her ear. ‘Oh sweetheart, I’m so pleased for you! Well done, I’m so very proud of you!’

  Some days later, Orpha was busy in the kitchen, dipping small home-made biscuits into creamy chocolate and setting them to cool. This was a new line she was trying out and so far it was proving very popular. She was also in the process of testing new flavours with the chocolate; some she was pleased with, others she disregarded.

  Lottie yelled through from the shop that the postman had a letter for her. Looking at the envelope, Orpha took it through to the living room to open it. Reading the letter, her excitement began to mount.

  ‘By Appointment to Her Majesty Queen Victoria…’

  She had received a Royal Warrant from the Queen for her chocolates! Letting out a whoop, she rushed to tell Peg in the kitchen. ‘We have received the highest accolade; a mark of recognition from Her Majesty!’ Orpha gushed.

  ‘Bloody hell!’ Peg said as she dropped onto a kitchen chair.

  ‘Peg, I have to go to the signwriter straight away and to the box factory…’ Orpha said in a panic.

  ‘Telephone, Orpha… you can telephone them now,’ Peg said with kind sarcasm. Both girls laughed as Orpha went to order their new sign for the shop and new boxes from the cardboard factory. The Royal Warrant needed to be displayed for all to see.

  The following week the new sign was hung above the shop and a r
eporter from the local newspaper came to see Orpha wanting to write an article on her shop and the Royal Warrant awarded to her. He said, ‘You will be able to read the article in the next edition which is out tomorrow.’

  Orpha guessed she would have to hire more staff very soon as she tucked the letter and card into a box in the drawer until she could get them framed and mounted on the wall. It seemed at last that things were getting back to normal. Abel and Zach were keeping in touch regularly via the telephone and there’d been no more sign of Hortense. Orpha prayed they had seen the last of her mother.

  *

  In her room at the hotel, Hortense thought long and hard about what to do next. Anger, disappointment and frustration fused together, leaving her feeling wretched. She felt weary to the bone and lying on the bed she closed her eyes. The last picture she saw in her mind before falling asleep was the face of Orpha Buchanan – smiling defiantly. Hortense was determined she would wipe that smile off the girl’s face eventually.

  *

  Orpha and Peg decided to see if Mr Belcher had found a suitable house for them. It turned out he had indeed discovered a massive house for sale which stood in acres of its own ground between the towing path at Shrubbery Basins and the Stour Valley Railway Line. The house had only recently been vacated and the girls were eager to take a look.

  Having had a good look around and standing in the hall once more, Peg said, ‘Orpha, this will cost an arm and leg!’

  ‘I know… but I want it!’ Orpha replied, her green eyes sparkling.

  ‘We can’t possibly afford it!’ Peg retorted.

  Looking at her sister now, Orpha related her plan excitedly. ‘If we persuade Father to sell Buchanan House we can borrow the money from that sale to buy this!’ Orpha twirled on the spot with her arms out.