by Quenby Olson
"But I’ve no worries about business picking up soon enough," she crows, a discreet look in my direction. A flick of her hand, brushing a feather off her forehead, and she’s fully composed, the stream of pedestrians breaking around her as she halts in the middle of the pavement. "I’ve received more than a few inquiries about you, you know. People asking about your…" A small gesture, indicating my person from the waist upward. "Your gifts, and all. Now, not as many as I’d like, but after that business in Chelsea, well I’ll say I’ve heard a distinct rise in interest about you. Just the other day in fact, there was a young man, quite determined to secure your services."
I can feel the frown on my face, pulling down the corners of my mouth until I think that left unchecked, the expression could drag me all the way down to the ground. "I am not going back," I say, and watch my words strike against her intentions with all the firepower of flower petals. "I won’t return to the stage, and I won’t have you hawking me off like a shopkeeper’s wares."
She shrugs at this, but there is a glint in her eye, a thrill now that she realises I’m still as easy to goad as I ever was.
"So, shall I look forward to your presence at Lady Franny’s next demonstration?"
A wonder, is our Marta Summerson. Never retiring a question until she’s gifted with the reply she desires.
"I am sorry, Marta."
"Oh, I’m not asking you to put a single ounce of effort! Stand in the corner of the bloody room and glower at us, if that suits your fancy!" She wipes the back of her hand across her brow, the first display of irritation I’ve witnessed from her all afternoon. And now, I notice even her feathers have begun to lose some of their former buoyancy. "I won’t have it, you know. I’ll not leave you to waste away under old Selwyn’s roof."
I blink rapidly, and the reaction is enough to award her this small triumph. For I know the lengths to which she’ll reach in order to achieve a desired object.
"You’ll do something to earn your keep," she says, her voice lower, the powdered lines of her face several inches closer to mine. "Even if it means I’ve got to haul you out by your stockings."
Such a rare occurrence, to hear her voice a threat, even one so mild as this. In the end, I’m forced to meet her halfway. I tell her, in words labouring under the strain of having been dragged out of me, that I will "think about it”. And there, as simple as that, she’s mollified. The eyes resume some of their previous sparkle, and the feathers—oh! The feathers!—begin to dance on an imaginary breeze.
"Very well," she says, as if I’ve still managed to disappoint her. Yet the shine doesn’t depart from her gaze. And even more surprising, the folded bank-note finds its way into my hand, followed with the promise of two more once I’ve fulfilled my part of the agreement.
"I’ll make no promise to you, Marta. You know how much I despise a séance."
But Marta will not allow her present happiness to be thwarted. "Oh, you’ll come round." She beams, so brimming with confidence I’m almost inclined to believe her. "After all," she adds, and her smile broadens while her eyes retreat behind crinkled lids. "You have your price, just the same as all the rest of us."
Chapter Three
* * *
* * *
Mrs. Selwyn knocks on my bedroom door, three sharp raps followed by a pause the length of a breath before my privacy is snatched away from me.
"There’s a man to see you, Miss Hawes." Her thin voice never fails to create an image of her larynx pinched between finger and thumb as she fills out her consonants. "Is this going to become a regular occurrence? I’ll not have men running up and down these stairs all day and all night. Wear out all my carpets before the end of the year."
She blinks, tilts her head to one side until I think her cap might finally succumb to the pull of gravity, but the shapeless lump of fabric clings fast to her greasy curls, and ultimately, my eyes are drawn downward to the scrawny grey feline arching its back against Mrs. Selwyn’s heels.
"Did he give his name?" I ask, and return this morning’s bit of sewing to my lap. Only the edge of a handkerchief today—my last handkerchief—a repair to a small tear before the whole thing unravels to a mass of tangled thread in my hands.
Her dusty eyebrows pinch together. If the man gave a name, the information has already dribbled out of her ear during the arduous trip up the stairs. Nothing less than the flash of a coin would be capable of retrieving it at this point.
"He…" And here, her eyes narrow, suspicion deepening the wrinkles in her brow. "He says he knows you."
"Knows me?" I keep my breathing steady, even counting the seconds between one inhalation and the next.
"That’s what he said, Miss. But, no." She catches herself, her gaze far away as she relives the conversation that must have transpired only moments before. "He said he knows of you."
And with the simple addition of a preposition, I’m back to grasping for needle and thread, tilting my work towards the light that filters through the window, my nose held in the air as if I’ve a pair of wire-rimmed spectacles perched on top of it.
"Is it away with him then? Because I’ll be charging an extra shilling to your rent if you’re going to start with bringing in visitors." The way she pronounces the last word, tainting it with enough revulsion to make me question the level of debate that even now must be underway inside her head. For which sort of immorality is worse in her estimation? Dabbling in the black arts, or welcoming gentlemen callers in the brash light of a Tuesday morning?
I glance up at her, but as my eyes leave my work, the needle pricks my skin, causing my next words to come out with more of an edge than I’d originally intended.
"No visitors, Mrs. Selwyn. From here on out, if someone calls for me, I would be much obliged if you could tell them I no longer reside here."
She sniffs, one corner of her mouth curling upward with the movement. Quickly, she wipes her hand across her nose before drying her moistened fingers on the back of her skirt. "Oh, of course, Miss. How silly of me to think you’d wish to be bothered, sittin’ up here all day, every day." Her head lowers deferentially. "I’ll be sending him on his way." One side of her mouth still quirked, she turns and walks out of the room, shutting the door behind her.
I must admit, I feel ashamed for having spoken so sharply. And when I hear her renewed tread on the stairs less than a minute later, I’m already rehearsing the beginnings of an apology under my breath. Better not to forget I paid her only yesterday for two weeks’ rent, long overdue. And, what is even more important, that my tenure here depends entirely on keeping myself in her favour. However much of it there is to go around.
I look up, prepared for Mrs. Selwyn’s knock. One, two, three, raps in all before I call out to her, my voice carrying a heavy enough note of contrition to be heard through the door and into the hall.
"Yes, Mrs. Selwyn? Is there something else?"
The door opens again, and the old woman’s reedy voice pipes up from behind the great slab of warped wood.
"A Mister Chissick to see you," she announces, her watery eyes practically glistening in triumph, her fingers still toying with the coin that must have purchased Mister Chissick’s passage to the upper storeys of the house.
And here I sit, not in any way prepared to welcome a visitor. Yesterday’s stockings still lie on the floor, curled and crinkled like two intertwined snake skins. The uneaten end of a pasty sits in the midst of a ring of crumbs, more sustenance for the next mouse daring enough to venture into the room.
And there are other things. More than enough to showcase my lamentable housekeeping skills. An unmade bed, a stack of newspapers about to topple over, a floor in dire need of sweeping. But there’s no time to put everything to rights, or to manage at least some semblance of tidiness, before there’s a blur of skirts and dust as Mrs. Selwyn disappears, the grey cat letting out a shriek of irritation as she nearly tramps on his tail in her haste to remove herself from my line of sight.
Mister Chissick, however,
does not disappear. Very near to the door he remains, hat in hand. A hat with a short brim that appears to have borne the worrying of his fingers on more than one occasion. Perhaps a bowler, in one of its finer days. The absence of a covering on his head allows me to study the man’s features. Years of standing onstage, gazing out across a sea of darkened faces no doubt have trained me. Another blink, and I can even begin to count the individual lashes that frame his eyes.
He takes a single step forward and pauses. The light from the window crosses his face, setting fire to the tinge of red in his hair. A few strands cling to his forehead, darkened with sweat, and I’m reminded of the heat that adheres stubbornly to every corner of the room.
"Miss Hawes," he says, such a strength of certainty in those two syllables, and I’m nearly convinced the two of us are old acquaintances, the use of my surname a mere formality to be done away with once the offer of a chair is made.
"Mister Chissick?" I try out the name for the first time, pushing it towards the tip of my tongue, my jaw jutting forward with the exaggerated pronouncement.
"That’s correct." A movement of his arm, and I suspect he stopped himself from offering his right hand in greeting. He glances around the room. I’m seated in the only chair, but despite the lack of furnishings, all of my forgotten manners come flooding back.
"Will you sit down?"
A slight hesitation before he commandeers the portmanteau with no small amount of grace, easing himself down in an attempt to mesh his own form with the hard lines of the makeshift seat. His hands find a resting place on his knees, his fingers drumming upon the hat now perched on his thigh. He clears his throat, or begins to, before he gives up on the endeavour halfway through.
A noise such as this fills me with an expectancy of a greater speech to come. But instead, long, tapered fingers reach into a coat pocket in order to retrieve a wallet, only to remove a folded slip of paper, yellowed with age. He unfolds it with such care that I half expect this mysterious note to bear the answer to some ancient riddle. And then he reaches out to slip the paper between my own fingertips, the battered page leaving a light layer of powdery residue on my skin, the evidence of its slow decay.
Mister Chissick nods to the document. "This is you?"
Even after all these years, the act of seeing my name in print still produces a twinge of surprise, centering itself in my abdomen before it spreads upwards—upwards and outwards—freezing my rib cage in place so my next breath will take some effort. It’s a newspaper clipping I hold in my hands, the creases so worn that I wonder it didn’t fall to pieces during the course of its journey from his hand to mine. It’s impossible to locate any sign of a date, or even the identity of the paper in which this article must have appeared, but judging from the author’s flattering tone, it cannot be less than seven or eight years old.
But it’s the drawing at the top of the column that catches my eye, the black ink now faded to a dull grey. The young girl in the picture is so removed from my current self I’m ashamed to admit it takes a full minute to recognise my own portrait.
It’s not a bad likeness, all told. Much younger, of course. See the softness in the lines of my jaw, my cheekbones barely visible? The hair is the same though: still pale, still thin. And the sharp point of my chin, forcing my face into the top-heavy shape of an inverted teardrop. In a fleeting moment of vanity, I consider folding up the paper and keeping it for myself.
"Miss Hawes?"
He reaches out for the fragile clipping, the sleeve of his coat climbing high on his wrist, revealing several inches of sun-deprived skin and light brown hair. With even more care than previously shown, he folds the paper in half, once more, and again. As it disappears into the recesses of his wallet, I can’t help but wonder for how long my illustrated face has slumbered there.
"I had the pleasure of witnessing one of your demonstrations," he says, eyes down and fingers re-adjusting the folds of his coat. "Nine years ago."
"As did many others, I am sure." My gaze lingers round and about the area of his right breast pocket, but there’s no outward sign of the portrait that resides inside. No doubt I should consider myself fortunate if I ever see it again.
"The papers always wrote very warmly of your particular talents, Miss Hawes. Some even heralded you as one of the leaders of the Spiritualist rebirth." His blue eyes widen slightly as he speaks, and when he leans forward the portmanteau creaks in sudden protest of his shift in weight.
And now, I find, a minute must pass before I'm able to locate my voice.
"Some papers did." One corner of my mouth twitches upward. "But not many. I was never theatrical enough to satisfy the tastes of most critics. And besides all that, Spiritualism is dead, Mister Chissick. Our countrymen have firmly embraced this new era of reason and logic. My time has passed, or weren’t you aware?"
He says nothing to this. Only the same curious gaze that does little to lend my speech any strength.
"If that same paper were to write of me today, if they wouldn’t consider it an utter waste of ink, I’d be painted as one of the greatest charlatans to have ever set foot in London. And that drawing wouldn’t be half so flattering."
A hint of a smile from him, and I gain confidence he’s listening. But whether or not he’s bothered to truly absorb a single word I’ve said is a feat yet to be seen.
"I am no longer the same girl you saw—nine years ago, was it? People are too worldly to be moved by a few amateur parlour tricks performed by a slip of a girl in a white shift and bare feet. Unfortunately, perhaps, I am what the public makes me, and they’ve moved on."
The sun is moving steadily across the room, and my feet begin to feel the warmth from the shaft of light pouring in through the window. A soft rustle of fabric, and I’ve shifted several inches closer to the edge of my chair, this new angle casting young Mister Chissick’s face in a warm-toned shadow.
Ah, I said "young”, didn’t I? And here’s where a touch of my old superiority shines through. Any gambling man with a spare shilling would bet that Mister Chissick is my elder by no less than ten years. But still, I prefer to fancy myself as the most mature person in the room, the one most experienced in the ways of the world. Give me that satisfaction, will you? As slight a one as it is.
"And what about the spirits, Miss Hawes?"
I’m flustered momentarily by the realisation that the conversation seems to have progressed without my knowledge. "I beg your pardon?"
"Have they moved on? The spirits?"
When I still hesitate, he leans back, or rather shifts into a more rigid position that vaguely mimics my own.
"Mister Chissick." Strange how much I enjoy pronouncing his name, the feel of it on my tongue. "If you are even to trust in the existence of such phantoms, then yes, I believe they have moved on."
For me, it is no difficult thing to lie, but this one tests my limits. For another minute, I ramble on, speaking absolute nonsense, one word falling over the next as quickly as they enter my head. My guest listens with all the attention of an eager pupil, struggling to become the favourite of his teacher. But something else passes over his eyes, a hardening of sorts, and the brightness he carried into the room with his entrance fades as fast as he can blink.
"I see."
Two words are all he offers in the wake of my wandering speech. Without another sound, his hands return to his knees and he stands, the erstwhile bowler dangling from two crooked fingers as if he’s forgotten about its presence. No farewell from him, no apology for this hasty departure, and he walks towards the door, one arm already extended, his hand curving around the smudged doorknob. When he turns around, I feel the oxygen pull into my lungs, and my chin rises. I use the movement as a distraction, so he won’t notice the shudder that invades my chest under the weight of his gaze.
"Whatever you are, Miss Hawes," and he pauses, eyes narrowing. "Whether it was simply a few well-executed tricks performed for the entertainment of a gullible audience, or something else entirely, you do
have a talent, and I’m sure it’s one of which I’m in desperate need."
A long span of silence follows. For all of my skill at seeing what others do not, I stare up at him, my mind caught in the laborious chore of deciphering basic English into something I can understand.
"Desperate?"
He moves away from the door, his hat tapping out an irregular rhythm on his thigh. "I’m sorry, I didn’t want to give you any cause for alarm." He sighs, and his pause serves to alarm me more effectively than anything else he’s said until now. "I beg your pardon, but I was directed to a former associate of yours, and she informed me of your current whereabouts."
I nod my head once. "Marta Summerson."
"She said you wouldn’t mind—"
"She says a great many things, I assure you."
He takes another step forward, the hat once more clenched between both hands, and the introductions have gone back to the beginning. "I feel a compulsion to be honest with you, Miss Hawes. I’m a man of God. Or it was once my intention, not so very long ago. I was to lead only a small congregation, but…" He spreads his hands, his arms, and I’m left to fill in the blank with whatever I can conjure.
"And you’re compelled to tell me this because…?"
"Well, I think it would do much towards building a measure of… well, something of a trust, or a confidence between us, don’t you agree?"
If I could make heads or tails of what he is trying to tell me, perhaps I could provide him with a more satisfactory reply. As it is, I can merely blink up at him for several seconds, while I wonder if his arrival here is nothing more than one of Marta’s less successful attempts at a joke.
"Mister Chissick, I am afraid I don’t quite understand your line of reasoning."
He takes this as an invitation to continue, and begins to pace from one end of the room to the other, seemingly oblivious to the mess that surrounds him on all sides. The moment he speaks, however, the pacing stops and his probing gaze finds its way back to my face.
