The Journal of Dora Damage

by Belinda Starling

  Lady Knightley was staring around her in a vague daze. ‘How peculiar,’ she mused. ‘You have your store-room as one with your larder, your scullery as one with your pantry, and just one sink for all four functions.’ After further bemused perusal of the kitchen, she stood up and paced into the parlour. ‘And your parlour is also your drawing-room, and your dining-room!’ I heard her say between the rooms. ‘Ah, you have a cottage-piano.’ She started to play the opening bars of Schubert’s ‘Adagio in E major’. ‘Eugh, it needs tuning.’

  I made up my mind what I had to do next, difficult though it would be.

  ‘Pansy,’ I said, as she walked past with a pile of sheets in her arms.

  ‘Yes, mum?’

  ‘Would you hold the baby for just a short while?’

  She placed the sheets in the corner of the kitchen, and came back to take Nathaniel from me. We exchanged a lingering glance, as if to ask, what is going on here and what can we possibly do about it? ‘I won’t be long, love.’

  I placed a few griddle-cakes in a clean tea-towel, and gave another couple to Lucinda, then I wrapped my shawl around me, and left the sounds of Schubert behind to face the freezing night air. I crossed the road, and knocked on the opposite door. Nora Negley shouted from within, ‘I’ll be there,’ and the goat maa-ed from the kitchen, then the bolt was pulled back, and the door was opened a crack.

  ‘Oh,’ she said in surprise. Then her mouth wrinkled with distaste, as she asked, ‘What you want?’

  ‘Sorry for the bother, Nora. Only I have an unexpected guest, with a newborn baby, in need of some milk, and I was wondering . . .’ and, as I proffered the griddle-cakes up to her, steaming in the cold air, the door was slammed in my face and I dropped the cakes in the street. I returned to the house, and to Pansy in the kitchen, who was cooing at the waking baby.

  ‘Nora won’t give us any milk.’

  ‘Pity.’

  ‘What else can we do, Pansy?’ We shared another look. ‘Do you know a wet-nurse nearby?’

  She looked doubtful. ‘There’s one I can think of, not far, but she got a lotta little ’uns and I can’t see she’d want one more. I’ll ask her though. Now?’

  ‘Please.’ I took Nathaniel from her, and rocked him back to sleep as best I could. ‘Take my shawl, Pansy. It’s very cold out.’ She took it off from round my shoulders, and gave me a little squeeze of reassurance, before wrapping it round her and disappearing into the Lambeth night.

  Lady Knightley came back into the kitchen, oblivious to her child in my arms. ‘Goodness, but it’s cold in here. How can you live in such draughts?’ She lowered herself carefully back into the Windsor chair, and we waited for something else to say to each other.

  Then suddenly, the composure on which she had such a precarious hold left her altogether; her head and shoulders fell forwards onto her lap as she set about weeping, as if she was going to tip onto the floor and lie there. Thank heavens, I thought, for Pansy, and a clean floor. Only a few weeks ago she would have tipped herself into dust, grease and beetles. I sat and watched as she cried herself out like her own baby; I knew his stirring would increase to full-blown rage and hunger soon enough, and I hoped his mother’s tears would not hasten the process. She cried and cried, and the tears dripped onto the silk of her skirts, and spread there.

  ‘There’s a sorry thing, Lady Knightley,’ I said, quietly. ‘Don’t take on so.’

  She cried a bit further, then sniffed loudly, then set to crying again, and then the sobs died down, and she sighed, and stood up and wandered around a bit, then sighed some more, and sat down again, and looked at me with eyes that had spent a lifetime being untroubled, and I found myself pitying the weak woman, for not knowing how to live with pain.

  ‘The injustice of it, oh, the injustice!’ she wailed. ‘He – Jocelyn – he said . . . oh, I cannot bring myself to say it!’

  ‘You don’t have to.’

  She shuddered further, then sniffed, ‘He sent me word this morning that I was to leave, and not to come back! Ever! The child is a week old. My lying-in should have lasted a month, with no leaving the house, no exercise, and a feeding-cup for meals! And now I am on the street, with nowhere to go!’

  ‘You’re here,’ I said gently, only I doubted whether this was the best place for her.

  ‘Yes,’ she said gloomily. ‘Oh Dora, it is all too much for me.’

  And, frankly, it was all too much for me, too, to fathom this world where blood was thinner than the old school tie, and where those who opened their hearts to slaves from overseas had little time for the needs of one closer to them, even to a mother and newborn baby. Surely she was exaggerating? Maybe she was playing a game with Jocelyn, and had not gone to her Ladies at all, but at the first whiff of his malice had taken herself to the lowest place she could imagine – here, in Lambeth – to see how quickly he would come running for her. She was using me, I was sure of it. I could not help but be sceptical.

  We heard the front door open and shut, and two sets of footsteps coming into the house. Pansy had brought a woman with her. She was not a coarse-mouthed fishwife, nor a longsuffering kitchen-servant type, nor doughy and nurturing like a baker woman. She did not have voluminous breasts. She looked composed and efficient, like a nurse, and had a slightly furrowed brow and expression of concern, like one of those ladies who visit the missions, the really squalid ones in the east, not just the ones near Chelsea.

  ‘It’s late, you know,’ was the first thing she said.

  ‘I do apologise,’ I said.

  ‘I’m halfway through the nippers, and I must be back within the half-hour if I’m to get any rest tonight.’

  ‘Thank you for coming out, Mrs . . .’

  ‘Masters. Bess Masters,’ she said, looking between Lady Knightley and me as if wondering who it was who needed her assistance. I started to explain the situation, and gestured towards Lady Knightley, and the little baby in my arms. Mrs Masters had a permanent expression of doubt on her face, which I hoped would lift the more I talked, but it didn’t.

  ‘I’m awful busy. Got so many babies this time of year, got to get back to them soon too. Not sure I can take another one on.’

  ‘It’s only for tonight.’

  ‘Actually, Dora, we cannot be so sure.’ Lady Knightley’s voice had returned to its usual authority, poised halfway between tedium and wrath. I looked at her in surprise. ‘I’m here until he comes for me,’ she said simply, as if that explained everything.

  ‘And you will, of course, pay Mrs Masters well,’ I said, but she dropped her gaze into her hands.

  ‘I have no money with me. Jocelyn can pay you, but it will be in time. It will be handsome, but in time.’

  ‘Nope. Just too busy,’ Mrs Masters said.

  ‘Please.’ Lady Knightley’s voice was weak.

  ‘She will have money soon,’ I said, but Lady Knightley’s eyes were still lowered. ‘Won’t you, Lady Knightley? Won’t you?’ I was willing it now, more than ever, for in that moment I realised that it was possible that Jocelyn might never have her back, no matter how innocent she was. ‘I can pay you,’ I said finally to Mrs Masters.

  ‘D’ya not hear me? Too many mouths.’

  ‘So what can we do?’ I asked.

  ‘How old’s the baby?’

  ‘Seven days.’

  ‘And you gave it any of your own milk?’ she said to Lady Knightley.

  Lady Knightley shook her head.

  ‘You bound?’

  She nodded.

  ‘It might not be impossible to get you going.’ I don’t think any of us understood straight away, even when Mrs Masters went on to say, ‘Let me have a look at you.’ And with that, she stood up, and gestured to Lady Knightley to do the same.

  ‘I do not understand,’ Lady Knightley said.

  ‘I need you to cast your skin, luvvie. To see if there’s any hope in those breasts of yours.’

  ‘I will not do it! What an extraordinary suggestion!’

  ‘Well,
you’ve got to do it. Or the little bugger’ll starve to death.’

  Bess Masters, Pansy, Lucinda and I all stared at Lady Knightley, and she looked back at us in dismay and affront. We all knew her decision would clarify everything.

  So when she stood up and beckoned to Pansy to undo all those buttons and ribbons and stays which Buncie had fastened only this morning, I knew that she had lied when she had said Jocelyn would find her soon, and she had been right when she had said she had nowhere else to go. My confusion and suspicions about her disappeared in an instant; we were well and truly lumbered with her.

  She was as good as gold about it when we peeled the binding off her, though she screamed when Mrs Masters rolled her nipples in her fingers and pinched them together. If it had been six months ago I wouldn’t have looked; I would have stared at the floor, or into the ceiling, along with her. But I had seen so many pairs of breasts now that I didn’t feel the lack of decorum, or the burning curiosity, that would have forced my eyes away from them. I could see it was hard for her, and I was quick with her clothes once the ordeal was over. She was shivering, and had goose pimples all over her ivory skin, and was chastened with the indignity of it.

  ‘Perfect. Got lovely milk in there. Pity about the binding, but do as I say and you’ll have fountains of milk. Rub them every hour. Rub them, pinch them, brush them with a soft-bristled brush, ten minutes each side. Give them to the baby to suck, and let him suck and suck even if he’s a hungry bugger, and if he screams cos he ain’t getting nothing, then pull him off, and feed him milk with a teaspoon, only a bit mind, then put him back on, then feed him a bit more by hand, and then on again.’ Lady Knightley nodded, but I knew she needed me to be following it too. ‘I’ve got some herbs here,’ Mrs Masters continued, pulling out a bag of dried leaves. She spread them on the lid of the range. ‘There’s fennel, blessed thistle, borage. And here, here’s fenugreek.’ I fingered the pyramid-shaped seeds; they smelt of syrup.

  ‘Ugh. Jocelyn brought some back from India. He loves the stuff.’

  ‘I got mine from an Indian family up the road an’ all. And beer. Drink lots of lovely beer. It’s the hops what does it. But whatever you do, don’t eat anything cooked with sage. And avoid onions for a week or two. Give it ten days, you should be on your own.’ Then she turned to me and added, ‘Let her cry as much as she needs to. Tears help the milk flow. She’s gonna be cryin’ buckets, an’ all.’

  The crying started right then, only it was Nathaniel. I handed him to Mrs Masters, and she said, ‘Let’s give it a go right now.’ She put her finger inside his mouth to get him sucking, then she brought him over to Lady Knightley’s dress and tugged it down. She got Lady Knightley to hold the baby while her finger was still in his mouth, then, using her other hand, pinched and tugged her nipple until it stood out like a cigar butt, grabbed it between the knuckles of the hand that was in the baby’s mouth, whipped out her index finger, and shoved the nipple in. Nathaniel’s eyes opened wide in shock, and he pulled back a bit, so she guided his head back to the nipple and he gave it a lick, then clamped his mouth firmly on and started sucking.

  ‘When did he last feed?’

  ‘About two hours ago. Bread and milk.’

  ‘Good. He’s in the right state then. Look at him, he’s doing well already.’

  ‘It hurts,’ protested Lady Knightley.

  ‘It’s gonna,’ said Mrs Masters. ‘But not half so much as a hungry baby who’s sick with the wrong kind of milk. Cry all you like; crying helps the milk to come.’

  Lacrimosa, I thought. Tears. And milk.

  ‘I’d better be going soon. Me milk’s comin’ in again and I’ve got four mouths waiting for me. But I’ll give you something before I go to get you through the night. Pansy, be a love and get me some hot water and a glass.’ Then, when she had them, she warmed the glass in the water, quickly undid the buttons of her blouse, pressed the rim of the glass over her nipple, and the milk poured into it as if she had turned on a tap. The glass went cloudy with milk and steam, and when it was almost full, and the flow had slowed, she pulled it away, and fastened up the buttons of her shirt with one hand, using the cloth of the shirt itself to mop up the drops. ‘Look at that,’ she said with pride, and I thought she was going to drink it, she was salivating so. ‘Ain’t no better substance on earth. She can use goat after this if she likes, shouldn’t need it for more than a week. Make sure she uses it up by midnight, or it’ll go bad. That, and the herbs, makes a nice round two and sixpence, don’t you think?’

  No sooner had I given her the money than she was gone, back to her waiting hungry mouths. I could almost hear the crying that would greet her as she turned into her street.

  It was getting late, and I still had things to tidy up. I pressed some small coins into Pansy’s hand, even though she wouldn’t get paid properly until the end of January, and sent her on her way, and then I went back into the kitchen to relieve Lady Knightley of her now screaming child.

  Nathaniel seemed bitterly disappointed with his mother’s provisions, and there were tiny spots of blood around the top of her dress. I took him into the parlour and jiggled him up and down for a bit, before laying him out on a blanket in front of the fire, which quietened him somewhat, and he gazed at the flickering shadows it cast, while Lucinda sat by his side and stroked him. Then I went back into the kitchen, where Lady Knightley was still sitting in a droop where I had left her.

  ‘Come with me, upstairs, now.’ She followed me and my single candle meekly, and I took her into the bedroom, which Pansy had aired. ‘You will sleep here. I will clear all this –’ I dismissed the impedimenta of the sick-room with my other hand, ‘– tomorrow.’

  Lady Knightley was looking strangely around the room. ‘What curious taste you have!’ she said quietly. ‘And my, you have so few wardrobes! Oh look, how clever!’ She pulled back the drape I had pinned across the alcove between the wall and the chimney breast, to reveal the pegs and hooks and their meagre hangings in darkness behind. In her surprise she seemed quite to forget her misfortune. ‘How ingenious! But where do you fit your dresses?’ Had she not noticed that my dresses did not trail with the yards of fabric of her own? I did not mention the brown silk one in the ottoman at the foot of the bed. ‘And look! No hangings on the bed! But what do you do about draughts? Why, this house is considerably draughtier than Berkeley-square, but still you have no curtains!’

  I went over to the chest of drawers and opened the bottom one. It still contained a few of Peter’s shirts; I lifted them out and placed them in the drawer above, then pulled the bottom drawer out completely, and placed it on top of the chest. ‘And Nathaniel will sleep here.’

  She looked down at the drawer, without comprehending at first. Then, as my proposal dawned on her, she protested, ‘But what about soot? What about dust? Have you no cot, with draperies? And a cover you can wash? Why, this is disgusting.’ Her eyes started to fill with tears, and she looked as if she was going to fall over. ‘I had such a beautiful berceaunette for Nathaniel! It had yellow flowers, and cream lace. And my perambulator! It came from France!’

  But this is Lambeth, love, I wanted to say to her, where we carry our babies, and put them in a drawer to sleep, but if they’re lucky they get a bit more love than in some other places. Not always, but sometimes.

  I watched her for a while as she dried her tears on the lace edges of her sleeves, then I helped her out of her dress and into one of my nightgowns.

  ‘You must do something about this,’ she said, as she took her petticoats off, and pulled a bloody towel from between her legs. ‘Take it, please, and get me another one.’

  I folded the towel in on itself, and put it in the chamber-pot to take downstairs. Then I pulled a flannel from the press, folded it, and handed it back to her ladyship. When she was ready, I wrapped her in a blanket, and took her out on to the landing.

  ‘And where is the bathroom?’

  I must have looked at her blankly, for she repeated the question.
>
  ‘There’s a tap in the coal cellar,’ I said eventually, ‘and a hip-bath under the bed. If you want hot water for it, ask Pansy, but please, not on a Monday, which is wash-day.’

  We went downstairs again, and I brought Lady Knightley and Lucinda a bowl of soup and some griddle-cakes, and we sat and ate in silence, watching the flames flicker, and listening to the sweet babble of Lucinda to Nathaniel. But soon the baby was crying again, and I picked him up and leant him against my shoulder to rub his back. Lucinda came over and caressed his meagre hair.

  ‘Maybe it’s time to feed him some more,’ I said gently.

  ‘I can’t bear to do it, Dora,’ Lady Knightley snapped, ‘whatever that awful woman said. Go be a love, get me a teat and a bottle from the pharmacist, and we’ll make do with that.’ I simply sat and stared at her; her child raged against my shoulder and tried to suckle first the skin on my neck, and then its own fists. It was all too much to take in. ‘Get me one, now, or I shall strike you!’

  I rose to standing and felt the words come out as a shout, despite myself. ‘Strike me all you like, you’re using your own tit to feed that child!’

  I handed Nathaniel to her, went to the kitchen, took the glass of breast milk off the windowsill, and found a clean tea-spoon. I wondered at myself and what had brought me to shouting at someone of her station, but my anger was still hot. And when I returned, her head was bowed and tears were dripping off the end of her nose, but her chemise was slipped down, and for a while, Nathaniel was sucking her breast with relative satisfaction and quiet. I waited until he started to cry again, and then I pulled up a chair and spooned the the milk into his mouth as his mother held him, then I made her some tea with the fenugreek, which she took obediently despite its awful taste, and we both knew the balance of power had shifted in my favour, and would stay there as long as she was under my roof.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Blackamoor, Taunymoor,

  Suck a bubby,

  Your Father’s

  A Cuckold,

  Your Mother Told Me.