‘Yes, Mrs Leander,’ Tilly said. ‘I am indeed accusing you of stealing from us.’
Mrs Leander stared back nonplussed. She had put the direct question to Tilly, expecting her to climb down, to find some way to crawl around the matter, but she had responded so strongly that Mrs Leander was clearly put about. She stared at Tilly with her black eyes almost invisible behind narrowed lids, clearly thinking hard.
‘Well,’ she said at length. ‘If I am, I have fair cause to.’
‘No one ever has any cause to steal,’ Tilly said flatly.
‘Oh, piffle!’ Mrs Leander said and she moved towards a chair as though about to sit down, caught Tilly’s eye and clearly thought better of it. ‘In a word, Missy, you have to make the best shift for yourself you can.’
‘I am Mrs Quentin,’ Tilly said steadily, never taking her eyes from Mrs Leander’s face. ‘Address me so. Or as Madam.’ It really was much less difficult than she had thought it would be to face Mrs Leander. When she had first rung the bell in the morning room and sat waiting for it to be answered, she had been shaking. Her hands had been slippery with sweat and she felt it trickling down between her breasts, too, chilly though the room was, for the fire had burned down and no one had come to tend it. It was that which had helped, in fact. She had told Mrs Leander sharply to see to it when she came in response to the bell, and had stared her down when the woman looked as though she intended to refuse and to send for a lesser servant to do it. But Tilly had won and Mrs Leander had put some coals on, and stood beside the fireplace and waited for more.
She had got it in greater measure than she might have expected from the hitherto quiet Tilly. She sat with her back very straight, reminding herself she was not Miss Kingsley but Mrs Quentin, an altogether more important person, and said it all baldly.
‘You took money from the girl Eliza’s family to train her in an apprenticeship when there is no such possibility here, as well you know. The parson in the village where the mother lives has discovered it and complained to me.’ She lied unblushingly, putting Eliza’s pleas for protection in place of honesty and finding no difficulty in doing so. ‘That is quite wicked. What happens to the girl’s wages? Do you keep those as well?’
When Mrs Leander did not answer but stared insolently back at her, Tilly took a deep breath. ‘In that case you had better leave at once,’ she said clearly. ‘There can be no room in this house for a self-confessed thief. You may pack your bags and be gone. At once, do you hear me?’
She caught her breath at her own audacity; what would her father say if he came home and found Mrs Leander gone? What would Mrs Leander herself say? Tilly’s heart quickened as she readied herself for Mrs Leander’s reaction. When it came, it was a surprising one. She laughed and, when she saw Tilly’s expression of amazement, laughed even louder.
‘Oh dear, oh deary me! And what am I supposed to do now? Run away with my tail between my legs? There’s been no money coming into this house for servants’ pay since – well, Christmas. He keeps saying he’ll find the necessary and never does. Why else do you think we have such disgusting cookery? Why else is this house so cold? I do all I can to scrimp and save and what do I get from you but high and mighty sermonizing? It’s stolen food you’ve been eating this past two months, if not paying your grocer’s bills is stealing and I imagine you’ll say it is.’
Tilly caught her breath and tried to understand. Her anger had melted away in the flood of Mrs Leander’s words. ‘But Papa –’ she managed. And again Mrs Leander laughed.
‘Your father is in debt, Missy – oh, I’m so sorry! Missus Quentin.’ And she dropped an insultingly deep curtsey. ‘He don’t know where his next sov’s coming from. He’s got plans all right – talks about them all the time. But as for money – well, I have to make what shift I can. Including your precious Eliza’s apprenticeship. I thought it an excellent scheme and so it’s proved, for we’ve lived on it these many weeks past. So, do as you wish about your country parson and his complaints. You’ve had as much of the woman’s money in your belly as I have. Much good may it do you.’
She turned to go and Tilly said quickly, ‘You are not to beat Eliza over this. I won’t have it –’
Mrs Leander shrugged. ‘I care not what she does. I am past caring. You no longer want me to work here? That is a decision that suits me well, and glad I am to tell you so. But if you want me out, you must think again, for only your father can send me away. But for my part I’ll deal no longer. I shall take to my room and give up all efforts on your behalf or your misery of a mother, who’d be better off dead. I shall tell your father you want no more of me about the house and you can manage as best you can. And good luck to you.’
She stopped at the door and looked back. ‘And the same goes for my girl, too. Not another hand’s turn will she do for you and yours. I’ll see to that – she’s got better things to do than act the scullion for you lot –’
‘Is she back?’ Tilly said quickly and for the first time Mrs Leander looked startled by Tilly’s words.
‘What do you mean? Back? She’s gone nowhere.’
‘Hasn’t she?’ Tilly smiled sweetly, caring nothing for any promise she might have made to Dorcas, caring only for the chance to strip the self-satisfaction from this hateful woman. ‘As I understand it, she went off yesterday evening to get herself wed. To a soldier. She wants no part of your Mr Hearne, whoever he may be. I thought she might be back and showing off her wedding ring by now. But there, maybe she’s no intention of ever seeing you again! I certainly wouldn’t wish to were I in her shoes. Whatever else my mother may be, she is not a liar and a thief and a bawd. So, there!’
With which childish expletive she at last lost control and burst into tears. But it didn’t matter. Mrs Leander had already slammed out of the room and rushed upstairs.
Chapter Six
IT WAS AMAZING to Tilly that her life could change so much in just one week. As April burgeoned in the new gardens in the streets beyond Brompton Grove, and the young plane trees lifted their heads to softer blue skies, she had set about putting her house in order.
Mrs Leander, true to her word, vanished to her room on the top floor of the house and was seen only rarely, as she made her way down the stairs to go out – using always the front staircase and never the back one, a piece of insolence Tilly found wiser to ignore than to comment upon – dressed in all her finery and looking very scornful. Mrs Cashman, the cook, departed in a flurry of anger when Tilly told her bluntly that she had to improve her efforts. Much to Tilly’s relief, she relinquished any claim for wages by dint of marching akimbo into the dining-room and being thoroughly rude to Austen Kingsley, who almost attacked her physically as a result of her words. Tilly had to hold him back, but it was worth the hateful fuss for, without Mrs Cashman, and the tweeny and the housemaids who took deep umbrage at being told by Tilly that they would have to work much harder from now on, she felt she had a better chance of making the house run smoothly, even though she had only Eliza to help her do it.
Not that it would be easy. She spent a long morning in Mrs Leander’s old sitting room beside the kitchen poring over the ill-kept household books and saw that the housekeeper had spoken the truth. They were in deep debt to every tradesman around: the grocer’s bill alone had been running high for almost two years, and only the butcher, Mr Spurgeon, seemed to be paid regularly. Probably, Tilly thought shrewdly, because he made more fuss than the others. But everyone else was owed a lot of money – an aggregate of over six pounds, she discovered, when she totalled it, and her heart sank. She would have to deal with it all, somehow, and she sat thinking and gnawing the end of her pen until, eventually, she came to a decision.
If it had been good enough for Dorcas, it would be good enough for Tilly herself, she decided. It was clear that Dorcas had no intention of returning to Brompton Grove. She had vanished as surely as if she had jumped into the River Thames, without, as far as Tilly could tell, sending so much as a note to anyone in the house
. On the occasions when she did get a glimpse of Mrs Leander it was obvious, from her tight lips and hard face, that she was less than happy, and it could not have been the change in her social situation that made her so – far from it; for Mrs Leander, Tilly decided, the changes were all to the good. She no longer had to rise early, or make any move about the house. She lived the life of a lady in many ways, for Tilly, brave though she had now become, still did not have the courage to forbid Eliza to keep Mrs Leander’s room clean and cared for and her fire fed. In spite of all the extra work Eliza had to do, both in the house and in assisting Tilly to care for her mother, changing Henrietta’s bedding whenever necessary (which was sometimes two or three times a day) and feeding and washing her, the girl also had to wait on Mrs Leander. She would scurry up and down stairs with trays of tea and assorted little dishes and scuttles of coal in a way that made Tilly furious, but she could do nothing about the situation, for she was only too well aware of what her father would do if his comfort was obstructed in any way. And obstructing Mrs Leander would definitely obstruct him, for he had now thrown any hint of caution to the wind and had moved his accoutrements into Mrs Leander’s room, and spent what free time he had in the house in there with her. Yet still Mrs Leander looked angry and abstracted and Tilly was certain it was Dorcas’s disappearance and subsequent silence which had that effect on her. She felt very warm towards Dorcas in consequence. She even forgave her for the loss of her spoons.
It was down the same road she went to relieve her own present financial difficulties. Dressed in her green pelisse with the coney trimming and her good black straw bonnet, she went to the dining-room and chose her items judiciously. Nothing that was too big or showy, for her father might notice the gaps; he could hardly complain too much at what she was doing, not if he wanted to eat, but all the same there was no need to draw his attention to what was happening. So she collected just half a dozen small items, vases and bon-bon dishes and a handsome set of little jugs made in the reign of Queen Anne, and put them into the capacious carpet bag she had with her. It threatened to be a most embarrassing experience, but she steeled herself to it, pretending it was not she who was doing it at all. She was someone quite other, a girl who wanted to be married, perhaps, and needed money to pay for the wedding breakfast.
She had thought carefully about where she would take her silver for sale and decided against the immediate neighbourhood. To go to insalubrious Knightsbridge would not be agreeable. It was true that with all the massive rebuilding going on the district was changing and a nicer class of person was moving in, but there were still streets that no respectable woman would risk entering and, anyway, she did not wish to be seen selling items in places where she might owe money. She could not, for example, go to the small jeweller and pawnbroker in Middle Queen’s Buildings, the nearest group of shops to the Brompton Grove house, for fear of being seen by Mr Burdon of the grocery shop where the household owed a large sum of money for tea, soap and candles. She decided to go to Kensington High Street. She would walk there through the newly cut Montpelier Square and Rutland Gate, and thence past the big houses along Kensington Gore. It would take her but twenty or thirty minutes if she stepped out briskly and would be agreeable on a bright morning like this. And, if she had no success in Kensington she could take Mr Chancellor’s omnibus, which ran from Chelsea to Mile End, as far as Bond Street or Piccadilly. So she told herself as she stepped bravely out of the house and on to the street.
There was mud everywhere and Tilly thought wryly of her good Balmoral boots and wished she had worn pattens, unfashionable and clumsy though they were considered to be for town life. She nearly went back for them, but then changed her mind. It had taken all her courage to get this far; if she returned to the haven of the house there was every likelihood she would not leave it again. So she steeled herself to the fact that her boots and indeed the skirts of her gown would need a good deal of attention after her return, and went purposefully on her way.
The noise of hammers and saws and shouting was everywhere, and she marvelled at how the district was changing. Before the Exhibition, just four years ago, these had been largely quiet lanes, with just a few houses and many trees and bushes; now everywhere she looked there was activity and bustle and people, people, people. It was as though a city was growing around her like an organic thing, and she felt a sudden lift of exhilaration. This was an exciting time in an exciting world; things might be difficult in her own home, but she could set them to rights there and after that, why, anything was possible. She felt uplifted and full of hope for the future.
She did not have to take Mr Chancellor’s omnibus into town, after all, for the second shop she went to welcomed her cheerfully. It was a small but neat establishment, with several handsome pieces of silver displayed behind a careful latticework of small panes and woodwork in a shop window which was set well back to frustrate the hopes of any would-be thief.
‘My wedding presents were so numerous and so generous,’ she lied shamelessly, ‘that I find myself with an excess of silver. There are other items I wish to purchase but cannot in all conscience do so until I have made space by disposing of these.’
She couldn’t be sure whether or not the proprietor, a brisk and businesslike young man with his hair parted in the middle in the fashionable style and with most elegant bushy side whiskers, believed her, but did not really care for she was carried along by the novelty of what she was doing, and reckless about others’ opinions in a way that was really quite remarkable for one who was usually so shy. She watched breathlessly as he took her items and turned them in his hands, and peered at the hallmarks and chewed his lower lip. When he shook his head and said dubiously, ‘Well, I’m not sure I’ve much of a call for such as these –’ Tilly, emboldened by his readiness to look, was ready with her protests.
‘Oh, come Sir. Business must be good with so many new people coming to live in the neighbourhood and they will need new items for their dining-rooms, I am sure.’
‘Well, that’s as may be, Madam. But they’re nice enough pieces and it’s a pleasure to oblige a lady as might be a customer herself in due course.’
‘Indeed. And my friends.’ Tilly smiled up at him sweetly. ‘I will tell them all of how well you treat me. I dare say they too will have needs they must bring to you.’
‘No doubt,’ he said a little drily. ‘Now, as to a price –’
They settled down to haggle, a protracted business at which Tilly was amazed to find she was rather good, insisting on dealing with the goods piece by piece when the shopkeeper tried to suggest a price for the lot, and ending up well satisfied. She walked out of the shop into the bustle of Kensington High Street with nine sovereigns and seventeen shillings and sixpence tucked into her skirt pocket, highly pleased with herself.
She felt so good about it all that she decided to indulge herself in a ride back to Brompton and duly waited by Breeze and James’ at Number thirty-two (stifling a longing to go into that elegant emporium for ribbons) for one of Mr Chancellor’s two-horse omnibuses. She squeezed herself in between a large lady in a fur pelisse, who was sweating heavily in consequence, and a small child who looked decidedly queasy as it bounced on its mother’s lap, so that she feared for a while he would be sick on her; but arrived without mishap fifteen minutes later and a half-penny poorer at the corner of Brompton Grove. And set about what she expected to be the more agreeable side of her morning’s plan.
It had been some time since she had come to Middle Queen’s Buildings to do any shopping; Mrs Leander did not need anyone apart from herself to buy for the household and there were few linen drapers’ or haberdashery shops there to attract a young girl, but she knew the shops well enough. They had supplied the household for as long as she could remember, and now she moved along the small row, peering at the windows with great interest. They were very small shops, since they had been built as single storey edifices over the front gardens of the row of two storey houses that gave the street its name, an
d each had clear indications of its wares displayed, though the shop owners were not content with that advertisement. Each of them had a man who stood at the door of his business and shouted its wares, so the din was considerable.
‘Best candles, fourpence a package, light your ’ouse for a week. Best candles,’ bawled a thin young man with drooping moustaches outside Perkins the chandlers, while further along John Barnes, the grocer, shouted lustily of the ‘best Ceylon tips tea and coffee from Brazil’ in an effort to outdo his neighbour. The brush shop contented itself with having great tangles of brooms and feather dusters in its portals which a diminutive shop-boy waved under the noses of passers-by, while Jobbins the second grocer had a boy at his door offering small portions of cheese to be tasted by any passers-by who wished to avail themselves. Tilly was enchanted with it all, and wished that it was Mr Jobbins who was the grocer to whom she owed money. He looked a jollier man altogether than his neighbour across the passage, Mr Burdon. And then she stopped and looked again, for the name had been painted out over Burdon’s shop front and a new one put in its place.
She thought for a moment and then went in to stand beside the high central counter on the sawdust strewn floor, looking about her in the dimness. There were big japanned tins with black and orange and red dragons painted on them lining the shelves. They produced the rich smell of tea that overlay every other smell in the shop, though she could identify carbolic soap and candles as well and the hint of dried coconut and prunes and, oddly, boot blacking, and she took a deep breath as the lady at the counter who was being served tucked her hands into her pelisse and turned to go, leaving the boy behind the counter to look at Tilly and say, ‘Yes, Miss?’
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