Endure My Heart (16 page)

At home a hired hand on a fishing boat worked a long day for that sum, and counted himself fortunate to have got the work. The dining room as well at Stephen’s was very dear, and the food no better than elsewhere, though a little more daintily served, with more footmen than was quite comfortable hovering about the table like vultures. Another time, I think we shall go back to the Reddelstone, where you are made to feel welcome, and not as though you had gotten out of your depth.

To return to my story—I was directed to a municipal office, where I learned the “Simon estate,” as it was grandly labeled, was in the hands of a firm of solicitors
miles
away, but still within the precincts of London. Away on the east side it was, on Cornhill not far from the Tower. The reason for this was that Mr. Simon was attached to the East India Company, and stationed off in India. When he was in the country, the firm of Milne and Linus was convenient for him, no doubt, but it was extremely inconvenient for anyone else.

And expensive too. The round trip in a hired cab cost us a guinea flat (plus that ever-menacing gratuity). I had the notion everything in the city was more expensive than formerly, and soon had the added idea that the price of brandy as well was due for an increase. All the wicked expense was worth it. I hired the Eyrie for a year at a hundred pounds. Mr. Linus suggested a sum of two hundred, mentioning the salubrious location by the sea, but neglecting to mention those sea breezes would not stop at the door, but sail right into one’s saloon due to the poor condition of the building. He had the audacity to describe the place as “furnished”! I could hardly tell him I had seen those furnishings, but implied that I understood the place had been empty for some time and was not apt to be worth two hundred pounds a year to anyone, least of all me.

He settled for one hundred without too much trouble. I signed myself as Miss James, and left with the lease in my reticule.

With the minarets of the Tower beckoning us in the distance, we took the opportunity to have a look at it while we were within a shilling of the place. It cost us a good deal more than that before we were let in. The rate was two shillings and ten pence each, and that a special reduced rate for a party of more than one. Edna felt a sight of the crown and regalia was well worth the price (perhaps because it was not herself who was paying).

The King’s Menagerie was certainly interesting. It is not every day one has a chance to see live wild beasts. The monkeys in particular were very amusing. They reminded me of the girls at Salford, all hanging round in a bunch chattering, pointing and generally making a spectacle of themselves with no concern for what anyone thought. The elephant made quite a determined effort to relieve me of my reticule. It took the hat right from one gentleman’s hand and returned it, slightly the worse for wear. I thought this a sufficiently amusing trick that I spoke to the gentleman in a bantering way, congratulating him on getting his headgear back. It set Edna into such a pucker that she dragged me off, chewing my ear for being a “forward creature, making up to every pair of trousers” we met.

I had to remind her I was no longer her charge, and with one thing and another we were hardly speaking by the time we got back to the hotel. There were no messages for us. Of course we had not told anyone we were putting up at a hotel, so this was hardly surprising. Still, I think if anyone had been very eager to see us, he might have tried a few hotels right on the main street.

Chapter Twelve

It was my intention
to get not only a lease on the Eyrie, but a tenant for it. My next step was a trifle odd, no doubt. I cannot think it warranted the “insane” or “criminal” Edna took upon herself to bestow on it. Certainly it was unnecessary for her to state so repeatedly it had anything at all to do with Mr. Williams, except that he was the revenueman I had to fool. She would have it it was all spite because of his marrying Lady Lucy, while assuring me between bouts of ill humor that he had no intention of marrying anyone but myself. I had finally to forbid her from mentioning that man’s name to me again till we were home.

To avoid making a short story long as I seem to be doing, I shall outline at once what I did. I hired an actress, who was
not
a prostitute, no matter how many times nor in how many euphemistic phrases Edna called her one. She was amazingly uncivil to me throughout the entire trip, Edna. The newspapers were advertising for actresses for a new play opening, and I went along to look them over, which unfortunately had to be done from outside the building. I’m sure no one took the notion I was a lightskirt, standing there with a perfectly respectable middle-aged chaperone with a face like sour vinegar.

The gentleman who asked me if I was lost was as elegant as may be, and did not persist in the least when I told him I was waiting for a friend. I thought it rather sweet of him to inquire whether he could not be of help to me if my friend did not turn up, but Edna would have it he was trying to scrape an acquaintance with me for his own vile reasons. Never mind.

Several painted women came complaining out of the theater, refused any role in the forthcoming production. It was this batch of rejects I was interested in. I chose one who was all alone, looking somehow
desperate.
I cannot imagine what role she had applied for. She was no ingenue—had not been for a quarter of a century, and they continue playing ingenue roles well into their thirties, you know. The ancient playing such a part at the Christmas comedy had to caulk her wrinkles before every performance. All painted up and from a distance, the wrinkles don’t show, but when she made her bows at the end of the show, she looked a perfect hag, with the light striking her face at just the wrong angle.

My actress wore a garish blue outfit, once elegant, now shabby. Her poor hair was tinted a horrid reddish color, with the dye job not lately repeated, so that half an inch of white showed at the roots. She was pitiful. She had a lost look about her, strolling slowly as though she had nowhere to go.

I felt she was destitute enough to accept any sort of a job, but was slow to approach her, as I did not know quite how to put my proposition to her. I followed her for half a block, while she looked in at windows, then pulled out a handkerchief to apply it to her nose. When I saw the finger out of her glove, I had hopes she would not demur too much at my offer. I stepped up, trying not to look either brazen or condescending, and asked in a friendly way if she was one of the actresses I had seen coming out of Covent Garden.

“I didn’t see you there, did I, dearie?” was her answer, given in a mock-duchess sort of a voice. She looked me over pretty closely, frowning at my clothing, and more so at Edna, who stood by like a disapproving statue that wished itself elsewhere. “What if I was then? Ain’t against the law, is it?” she continued, abandoning all attempts at a noble accent.

“No indeed, I should hope not. Ah—positions are hard to come by, I suppose?”

She sniffed, pulling out her handkerchief again. The less said about that article the better. “What sort of parts do you do?” she asked me. I dislike to say her eyes alit on my reticule, but I’m afraid they did. She intended hitting me up for money, which was excellent. I would hit her up in turn to perform for me.

“I’m not an actress actually,” I answered, sadly, as though I would like it of all things to be one.

“You’re not one of them Methodists?” she asked suspiciously.

“No. No, I am just visiting in the city. I think it so very exciting, your being an actress. I never met one before.”

“So it is, a very exciting profession. I have played with the best—Edmund and Sarah. Mrs. Siddons, you know, and Edmund Kean. So charming. But that was a few years ago.”

Some several years ago, before these personages had become stars no doubt, but I did not say so. She was being the duchess again. “Rather chilly today, is it not?” she continued, but made no move to hasten on.

“It certainly is. I wonder if there is somewhere we could have a cup of tea and chat a while. I am Miss Hadley, and this is my aunt, Miss Williams,” I told her, grasping the first names that came to mind.

“There’s spot around the corner don’t charge you an arm and a leg,” she offered. We followed her, Edna hanging a step behind to show her disapproval. If they charged a fingernail it was more than the tea was worth, but it forwarded the acquaintance, and that was the thing. She started off by being one of the brightest names in the theatrical world of London. Edmund and Sarah her constant companions, but by subtle degrees I got her to realize I was good for more than a cup of tea if she were in need, and before long we got away from theatrics.

Over the second cup she was already lamenting, “I’m down to my last shilling, and that’s a fact, dearie. I don’t know what I am to do. They all forget, once your looks begin to go, they’ve no use for you. Living in a room so small there’s not a spot to hang my clippings. I have clippings. I’ll show you,” she offered.

“What will you do if you don’t get a role soon?” I asked.

“Starve,” was her forthright answer. “You wouldn’t care to try the sausages, dearie? An excellent sausage they give you here. Only a shilling, and you get potatoes with it.”

Over sausages I casually mentioned having an old abandoned house belonging to me that she could use free, but then it was a wreck. She would not be interested. Away from London too.

“There’d be no work,” she said frowning, but disliking to pass up something for nothing.

“No, I could not pay you much, and besides…” I don’t know whether it was the mention of pay or the hesitant “besides” that set her eyes alight.

“Besides what?” was her question.

“The house is a mess. A total wreck. If you wanted to undertake to fix it up, I could pay you a little something.”

“I’ve never played a housekeeper,” she answered, considering this new role.

“I should not have mentioned it. It is beneath Kean’s acting partner.”

“I haven’t played with Kean for a while,” she allowed. “Maybe I’ll give the role a try. What have I got to lose?”

“There's something else I ought to tell you really. It is said in town—just a rumor, you know, but I shan’t keep it from you—well, the fact is, Rose Marie [we were now Mabel and Rose Marie but still Edna was Miss Williams], some people say that smugglers use the place. Not that they’d
harm
you, of course, but...”

“It wouldn’t bother me in the least. I’d give them a hand. There’s my salary!” she said on a bark of laughter, then reaching out she gave my arm a cuff. “My own pa used to work for them when we were living at Dover. Many’s the night I’ve hauled the poor old soul out of his warm bed when the tap came at the door. Oh dear—I daresay a proper lady like yourself wouldn’t approve of that.”

My plan had been no more than to get her into the house to keep Williams out. My men would be provided with a key to come and go in the cellar without her knowledge, for it was a huge old house, and past midnight she would not be likely to be in the kitchen or cellar. They moved like mice, noiselessly. Eventually, if she proved trustworthy, I would tell her more.

“I do not disapprove of smuggling,” I allowed, and went on to explain my reasons. “No, actually I approve,” I ended up.

“Clap hands and it’s a bargain then,” she said, giving me her hand to shake, like a gentleman. We went around to her room—what a pitiful sight it was—dark and small, with her yellowing clippings piled in a heap on her bed. They had been read and thumbed till they were as soft as muslin. I took her back to the hotel with us, her worldly possessions in a straw suitcase—weird, garish gowns and ostrich feathers for the most part.

I judge people quickly. Edna had a dozen warnings to issue me, but I had taken a liking to Rose Marie. The fact of her having puffed her career up a little did not qualify her for “a constitutional liar” in my view, as it did in my companion’s. I thought the time would not be long till Rose Marie was a full-fledged member of my gang. If you can’t trust a smuggler’s daughter to be close, whom can you trust?

We finished out the remainder of our visit in Rose Marie’s company. The woman’s eyes bulged from her head when she learned where we were putting up. “Stephen’s Hotel?” she asked, her mouth open. “My dear, it’s for Johnnie Trots. A regular fleecing you get there. If it is a touch of class you’re after, try Grillons. And if it’s only a clean bed and a decent meal, go to Storms around the corner and stay in comfort for half the price.”

Rose Marie was so startlingly at variance with the other patrons of Stephen’s that Edna and I checked out and removed to Storms. Another time we would go to Grillons, but with our new friend in tow, we settled for Storms. The rest of that visit was a very different and livelier one than I had ever spent in London before. She dragged us from theater to theater, from shop to shop, and from café to café, often introducing us to persons we would as lief not have met, but doing the whole with such good humor and verve that it was impossible to object.

We became quite the bosomest of bows, Rose Marie and myself. Edna remained stiff-faced throughout it all. The closest she came to accepting it was to comment, “Well, at least the actress seems to have got your thoughts off Sir Stamford for two minutes in a row. That is more than the play at Drury Lane accomplished.”

On the last evening of our visit, Edna proclaimed herself too beat to go out again. She would have dinner in her room and go to bed early. I took the opportunity to open my budget in full to Rose Marie—true identity, Miss Sage identity, the whole thing.

“I know it, dearie,” she told me, patting my knee and nodding her head wisely. “I’m glad you confided in me. I daresay you’d have done it sooner but for the old dragon you have guarding you. Very proper you should have a chaperone, of course, being a lady, but I have often pitied the young ladies who can’t budge without some old malkin at their elbow, spoiling their fun. Truth to tell, I didn’t quite twig to it you were this Miss Sage you speak of. I figured him for your beau, but I knew you were in on it somehow. Takes one to know one, eh?” she asked, giving my elbow a nudge with her own in the commonest way imaginable.