The Poison Thread

by Laura Purcell

  ‘That was terrible, Dora!’ he rages at me. ‘What in the world would possess you to attend a trial of such an ugly nature?’

  Judging by the drips of sweat falling from his hatband, I believe that he already knows.

  52

  Dorothea

  They keep the wretches condemned to death in the cells beneath the courthouse. These are not bright and clean like the ones in New Oakgate Prison; they are chambers of crumbling brick and rusted iron. A rat scurries past my foot as I walk with David, causing me to flinch and raise the hem of my skirt.

  ‘Don’t worry. He won’t hurt you. It’s the people here you need to be afraid of.’ His voice carries the weight of fatigue. It is not merely the low light that has altered his mien. He stoops his shoulders, shelters his hands inside his pockets. Something has disturbed him.

  I do not believe my heart has accommodation for further sorrow; it throbs so painfully on behalf of Ruth. But then the poor dear does look so very dismal. I must offer him some succour.

  ‘Has something unpleasant occurred, David? You appear out of spirits.’ He regards me quizzically. ‘I do not mean to imply that one should be joyfully animated in our present surroundings, but . . .’

  ‘It’s London,’ he replies heavily. ‘My services have been declined.’

  It is as if he has shifted a load on to my back. I stagger, am forced to take his arm. ‘Oh. Oh, I see.’

  ‘I wasn’t going to say anything until you’d spoken with your friend,’ he apologises. ‘I know you have sorrow enough already.’

  Indeed I do. But there must be a solution, a way forward for us, if I could only think . . . Yet I cannot. These debilitating feelings of giddiness and nausea are getting the better of me. I am losing Ruth. I must forgo all hope of London. Why, that means I shall be at home for the dreaded wedding. A social embarrassment to Papa. Forced to ‘play step-daughter’ after all . . .

  I will not allow myself to consider that at present. The time to shed tears shall come later, in private. For now I must sustain Ruth, sustain poor David . . . ‘I am extremely sorry. It is a blow to us both, my dear.’ I apply pressure to his arm with what I hope is a mixture of sympathy and encouragement. ‘Especially considering how worthy you are for the position. Did they not give you a reason why?’

  He shakes his head. ‘It’s a rum do. Something has felt . . . off kilter. Just this week. The sergeant’s watching me more closely than usual. I can’t think why he should.’

  Is it foolish that I suspect my father of making enquiries, trying to ascertain just what the look that passed between us at the trial concealed?

  To own the truth, I find every act of Papa’s suspicious of late. That maggot in my head . . . Rather than taking the carriage to visit Ruth one last time, I actually waited until Papa was out of the house and walked until I could find a cab.

  Despite my intention not to give any credence to Sir Thomas, I am behaving as if I believe every one of his words. As if I expect, at any moment, to be poisoned.

  ‘At least you cannot run into trouble for this,’ I reassure David. ‘Given my connections to the prison, it is natural that I should visit.’

  But there is nothing truly natural about this underground warren with the damp floors and ingrained sense of despair. One woman, dirty and missing teeth, clangs at the bars. The rest cower or lie supine, drained, waiting for Death to take them. He is hovering, just out of sight. You can smell him.

  Ruth kneels at the corner of her cell, in prayer. I have never seen her in this attitude, or looking so pale.

  ‘I’ll come back for you in fifteen minutes,’ David says, unlocking the door and administering a secret squeeze to my fingers.

  She must hear me come inside, but she waits until she has finished her supplications before opening her eyes and turning her head in my direction. Poor child, she is like a whipped dog.

  ‘Miss! I’m so glad you’ve come.’

  Reserve is at an end between us. For the first time, we approach each other and embrace. Her arms are still strong, around my waist, but already she has taken on the scent of mould and decay.

  ‘You knew, didn’t you?’ she says sheepishly. ‘All along. About the poison?’

  ‘Of course I did. I thought that you knew too! If only I had explained, if only I could have helped you!’

  She blows out her breath. ‘I was a dunderhead. A regular dupe. I just kept telling the police I killed her, and didn’t bother going into the how. I never let them question me properly, or talked to my lawyer the way I should. Because . . .’ She trails off, gazing somewhere over my shoulder. There is a pause. Then, it is as if she is looking at the world through a new pair of eyes. ‘I didn’t do it.’

  ‘They must have planned it for years, the pair of them. They always intended to kill Catherine and take her mother’s money for their own. Each time he visited the shop and made her cocoa . . . You were simply an excuse too good to pass over.’ Pain wedges in my throat. ‘But they need not have blamed you! From the way you spoke of your mistress at the end, she was depressed in her spirits and full of a strange remorse over her part in her mother’s death. Why could they not have claimed suicide?’

  I remember the way Ruth watched Billy at the trial. Nell might be wicked, but she is not a stupid woman, nor blind. Perhaps she has had enough of rivals for Billy’s affection.

  ‘No,’ Ruth says, grasping my hands. ‘You don’t understand. I didn’t do it!’ A smile breaks over her face. I stare at her, confused. ‘The corset was powerless. All that hate and it didn’t touch Kate at all, only the poison did.’

  ‘What are you trying to say, dear?’

  She bursts into tears, but the smile only grows wider. She is almost pretty, with that smile. ‘I never had a power in my sewing, did I? Naomi . . . Pa . . . It wasn’t my fault. None of it was my fault.’

  Had I given her the key to her cell and a hundred pounds, she could scarcely look happier. The strain of the past few days must have made her hysterical.

  ‘And yet they are going to hang you all the same. Poor child. Here.’ Disentangling my hand from her, I reach into my reticule. ‘The constable you just saw is my friend, he did not search me. I have brought you a gift.’ The needle winks gold, a tiny drip of sunlight in this dank place. ‘Forgive any association with your former work; it is the smallest article I could smuggle. This needle belonged to my mother. Her life was also cut tragically short. I hoped it might comfort you. To have it with you . . . at the end.’

  Ruth takes it from me solemnly. The gold warms beneath the grip of her fingers. ‘Thank you, miss. It will help. Not that I’m as afraid now.’ She looks up from the needle, hopeful. ‘I can be saved, can’t I? I’m not a killer. I can go to God, and my ma.’

  Tears prick my eyes. This is all I ever wanted for her: the chance of salvation. I do not understand why there is a bitter taste in my mouth. ‘But are you not angry? I should be furious! Billy and Nell used you; they murdered Kate, and they have got away scot-free!’

  She sobers a little, at this. Then she shrugs. ‘Once, I would have hated them. Not now. Since I’ve been speaking to you and the chaplain, I feel . . . sorry for them.’

  ‘You cannot! Do you not wish for revenge?’

  ‘I must forgive them, mustn’t I? That’s the only way I’ll get to Heaven. I wish there was something I could give Billy, something I could make him, to show I don’t hold a grudge.’

  Pondering for a moment, I produce my pocket handkerchief. ‘It is clean,’ I tell her. ‘Although what you will do for thread I cannot . . .’

  I do not finish my sentence, for she fairly snatches the article from my hand and crosses her legs to sit on the floor of her cell. One by one, she plucks strands of dark hair from her head and slots them through the eye of the needle.

  What a strange girl she is. How I shall miss her.

  ‘What are you goin
g to work?’

  ‘An initial in the corner,’ she says, ‘like Ma’s handkerchief had. I’m going to do an R. R for Ruth, R for Rooker. That’s both of us together, at peace.’

  Billy. So much eagerness to complete this task for him. Not a word of forgiving Nell, being at peace with Nell, who sticks in my mind as the main culprit.

  This claws through me more painfully, I believe, than all the rest: she still loves him. The man who sold her to the gallows to protect Nell. I do not want him to have a handkerchief made with her tenderness.

  ‘Do you wish me to attend?’ I ask quietly. ‘Tomorrow?’

  ‘No, miss. I’d spare you that. It’s a horrible sight for you and it’s ten to one whether I even set eyes upon you in the crowd. I’ll have this needle and I’ll know that you’re praying for me.’

  ‘Indeed I will be.’ These busy, active hands. It does not seem possible that they can hang her. All the spark and wit in Ruth, snuffed out. ‘Try not to be afraid, my dear. I know what you saw at Mrs Metyard’s execution was . . . unpleasant, yet these things often look worse than they truly are. You must take courage. Be brave and know that a far better home awaits you.’ Even to my own ears it sounds trite, but I can furnish nothing better. What does one say at such a pass?

  Her fingers do not cease in their motion, but I can tell from the set of her lips that she is picturing it, that day. ‘Mrs Metyard’s was pretty bad. Especially as she didn’t have the hood. To fight for breath like that, feel it leaving you . . . But it won’t last for long, will it? I’ll be dead fairly quick. Sometimes, if you jump as the door goes, the rope breaks your neck, just like that.’

  She mentioned to me once that her parents used a falsely jovial tone to speak to her, and I think I hear its echo now, in her voice. She may have hope in God, but she is still nervous, pretending a bravery she does not feel.

  The black R takes form beneath my gaze, squeezing through and around the white weave of my handkerchief. It is a skilful hand they will stop tomorrow at noon. Out of mere hair it has made this bold letter. A clever device, although I cannot say I like it. Worked in this material, it reminds me of mourning brooches, dead birds.

  ‘You will give it to Billy?’ she pleads, placing the finished piece into my hand. I am glad to be wearing my gloves, not to have direct contact with the morbid item. ‘Find his house on Water Mews? It’s just by the river, the door’s green.’

  I tuck the little parcel into my reticule, keen to have it out of my grasp. ‘I will certainly deliver it, Ruth.’

  ‘And make sure he knows it’s from me?’

  ‘I will arrange everything.’

  David is coming back. For once, I am not glad to hear his familiar tread. The sound seems to pull Ruth away, each step a bit farther. I stare into her brown eyes with the stubby lashes, set too far apart in her head, for the last time. Her inscrutable skull will take its secrets to the grave with her.

  But what about mine?

  ‘God bless you, Ruth. Do not be afraid.’

  She grips my glove in her sweaty palm. Tight, as if I could save her from the jaws of death. ‘Thank you, miss. For everything.’

  The door whines open.

  ‘It’s time, Dotty.’

  I will not sob. Not until I reach home and may cry, deep into my pillow. I embrace Ruth again, stumble out on to David’s waiting arm.

  The door closes, the shadows of the bars fall into the cell.

  She is so youthful. Dark of complexion, ungainly in stance. Nothing akin to the blonde beauty that was once my mother. Yet as I look back over my shoulder at the figure hunched in her iron cage, I see a similarity between the two.

  Frightened eyes, attempting to brave the stare of death. Lithe bodies, summoned before their time.

  I see two women who trusted in the wrong man.

  Two women, betrayed.

  * * *

  Warily, Wilkie hops to the open door of his cage. He perches on the edge, surveying his surroundings. This is his custom: always check, before taking flight. In this, a mere bird proves himself wiser than the majority of humankind.

  The coast is clear. Wilkie jumps, spreads his wings.

  I find it helpful to have him flutter about my bedroom as I stare at my reticule, sprawled before me on the desk. Although I am stationary, my thoughts are flying with him, exploring every corner, stretching themselves out.

  In the end, it has all come down to this: what do I believe?

  Do I put my faith in phrenology? Accept that I cannot escape the contours of my skull, reflected in the dressing-table mirror? For the bumps are still there, despite all my efforts, and the man who was to be my better half has not redeemed me.

  Or perhaps I should trust the chaplain’s words. The blessed mercy that says all may be forgiven. Ruth, for her part, seems to have embraced them. Yet did not the chaplain also tell me that the wicked must be punished? I cannot puzzle out which is more important: forgiveness, or justice. I cannot have both.

  Two yellow feathers fall from Wilkie’s tail. I watch them drift to the floor. They might be my choice, laid out in allegory.

  Once, I would not have hesitated. But it seems to me that I have absorbed Ruth, along with her tale; I hear her voice, beside my own. Not the pitiful whine from yesterday, in the condemned cells; it is the strong, measured cadence of hate inside my ear.

  There, again: what do I believe? That the circle of death surrounding Ruth was all mere coincidence? Every death has a rational explanation but, strange as it sounds, I cannot dismiss the notion that there is something unearthly about that girl. A power science cannot explain.

  I made her speak of hanging, did I not, while she worked at the handkerchief? Suppose she does not forgive Billy Rooker after all? This creation of cotton and hair does not resemble a gift in my eyes. It is a memento mori.

  I take a sheet of brown paper from inside my desk and tip the handkerchief out of my reticule, into the centre of it. The musk of the condemned cells mingles with bergamot oil, rising in wisps of confused scent. Careful not to sully the fabric with my touch, I wrap the handkerchief up, securing it in a parcel with string. Although it is covered, I can still see that R etched on to the back of my eyelids. Raven black.

  My hands are trembling. White lines mark the pinks of my fingernails. Time has elapsed since the trial, but nausea is still crouched in my stomach, stirring up trouble, waiting to pounce. Perhaps it is the strain of the last few weeks taking its toll upon my body. Or an infection, picked up from my visits to the poor and unfortunate.

  Perhaps I am going the way of my mother.

  With a clatter of claws, Wilkie perches on the desk beside me. His inky eyes are fathomless. ‘And you, sir?’ I ask him. ‘What is your opinion?’

  Of course, he does not answer, but something inside of me does. I am no fool. I have lied to myself for long enough. Deep down, I have always known what I believe. What I must do.

  I must deliver the handkerchief.

  The clock strikes eleven when I arrive, giddy, at his door. Nothing but silence lies within. Nervously, I clutch the package in one hand and raise the other to knock. My strong rap suggests a confidence I do not feel.

  What shall I say? Will the words come to my aid? Maybe I cannot see it through – but I must, I must, for her.

  I wait. It is a few moments before my heart stops pounding in my ears, affording me the opportunity to listen for approaching footsteps or handles being turned. There is nothing.

  Perhaps he did not hear. I knock again, louder this time.

  The hush is so profound, it is almost painful.

  To tell the truth, I am relieved. Everything will be much easier without having to face him. Scribbling a note with his name at the top, I wedge it beneath the string on the package and leave it at the foot of the door. It is quite secure; there is no wind to blow it about or snatch the note away. An
other person may steal it, I suppose, but that is a risk I shall have to take.

  By the time I am back in the safety of my own room, Wilkie has voluntarily re-entered his cage. I shut the door upon him, but I am the one that feels restless, trapped. Time moves by with the speed of a slug.

  These will be Ruth’s last moments upon earth. The seconds that pass so slowly for me shall fly all too quick for her. Or perhaps she does not mind if they race along towards noon. Perhaps she only longs for it all to be over.

  Downstairs, Papa returns to the house. I hear him speak to the footman, hand over his gloves and hat. He has been visiting Mrs Pearce. His steps stride towards his library – once, he would have come straight upstairs to see me, but these days I do not expect it.

  Just fifteen minutes to go.

  Did Billy and Nell venture out to watch poor Ruth die? I should have thought of that possibility. They will not be in the house at Water Mews but in the square, jostling for the best view of the scaffold. Wicked poisoners, the most cowardly of all murderers, watching the punishment that should have been their own.

  The clock chimes. Noon.

  I fall to my knees, clasp my hands and pray. I pray with a ferocity I never felt before, picturing her poor, dying face. Four bells. Five. Ruth on the end of a rope, gagging. Seven bells.

  The image in my mind is achingly clear. Between the chimes I can practically hear her, choking for air.

  No.

  I hear him.

  As I rise to my feet, I catch a glimpse of my reflection in the mirror and it is smiling. At last I have placed my faith in the correct quarter. Ruth.

  Ruth always told me the truth.

  I take the combs from my hair. The bumps above my ears, the centre of Murder, are more pronounced than ever. No need to hide or deny them any longer. My destiny is finally played out.

  I open my door.

  Servants rush through the corridors. Tilda stands at the head of the stairs, wringing her hands.

  ‘What is it?’ I ask. ‘Is Papa unwell?’