Jack the Ripper Victims Series: The Double Event (30 page)

He saw her and stopped dead in his tracks, a smile beginning to frame his lips. But it didn’t spread. 

Paralyzed with astonishment, Katie still held the drink to her mouth. The fumes stung her nose.

Conway’s eyes narrowed as he took in the scene.

I haven’t yet taken the drink! I’ll tell him what happened.

But she didn’t move. She
wanted
the whiskey.

Conway’s expression made it clear that he knew what she was drinking, and that it was too late.

No! I’ll explain everything...and…

His mouth tightened in disgust.

…and…he’ll never believe me!

Without a word, Conway turned on his heels and walked out of The Black Anchor.

The door to her old life closed forever.

Fresh tears rolled down her cheeks and tumbled from her upper lip into the drink. Still, she didn’t move, breathing in the fumes. The liquor’s smell of death and decay suggested the swift passage of time and the healing of wounds.

Finally, she tipped her head back and swallowed her tears with the whiskey.

Since the night Conway turned his back on her at The Black Anchor, she’d been unable to live without alcohol to dull the sharp edges of life. After that first drink, the desire for more had not left her, and there was never enough. While there had been much hunger and privation in her life, never had she experienced such nagging urgency to earn
the price of more
. 

She had not gone back to The Black Anchor. Her drinking was the excuse Mr. Matthews needed to justify her expulsion from his home. Emma unhappily accepted his decision.

Her first drunken binge lasted nearly a month, during which she stayed in the casual ward of the Bermondsey workhouse. The task-mistress was a hard woman who had Katie scrubbing cells day and night. The labour and conditions were so harsh, Katie was compelled to make a change. She cleaned herself up and took the long walk to her daughter’s home, carrying everything she owned with her, rolled into a blanket.

on the door, and as she waited, she thought of how best to present herself. She straightened her clothing and knocked the soil off her boots. Despite the back pain she suffered from the hard labor, she struggled to stand straight and tall. She tried out several types of smiles and finally abandoned them all.  When the door open abruptly, she let out a startled cry.

“Mum, you look terrible,” Annie said.

Katie knew it was the truth and she couldn’t pretend otherwise. She broke down in tears and hugged Annie. “Please take me in.” she said.

“Yes, of course, do come in.” Annie led Katie into the house to a small parlor.

They were seated and Katie gathered herself together. “No,” she said, “I mean
please take me in.
I have nowhere to go. I’ve come from the workhouse.”

Annie’s face expressed horror and she said nothing for a time.

She’s reacting to me the way I did to my sisters when they came from the workhouse. She won’t want to have anything to do with me.

Annie’s look of disbelief changed to one of understanding and sympathy.
“Yes,” she said finally.

Excitement sent Katie into a coughing fit, but she suppressed it to hear what her daughter was saying.

“Mr. Phillips will accept it if you’re here to take care of me. I never fully recovered from the illness I had when you were last here. There’s much I still can’t do around the house. Don’t you worry. Let’s get you settled.”

Katie had dreamed long ago that in her declining years, Annie would embrace her and keep her, making her old age tolerable. She would be eased gently from life to join Catherine in peace. A wave of relief washed over Katie and engulfed her. Then she was rising back up out of darkness.

Annie stood over her, fanning her with a newspaper. “Mum, are you all right?”

“Yes, I…I haven’t eaten well for some time.”

Annie fed her mother and prepared a bath for her. When Katie was finished, Annie settled her in an upstairs room with a bed, wash basin, a flannel, hand towel and a tooth comb.

Mr. Phillips was clearly not pleased that evening when he got home and heard Annie’s plan. Katie remained in her room, listening to their argument downstairs. With time, their raised voices became quieter as if an agreement had been reached. Katie didn’t suffer the suspense long before Annie came up to see her.

“It’s settled,” she said. “You’ll stay and attend to my needs.”

Katie smiled and clutched Annie’s hands. “Thank you.” She shook and Annie held her.

When Katie was calmer, Annie leaned back and produced a tight smile. “Mr. Phillips is most concerned about drinking. We heard about what happened in Bermondsey.”

“I will not—” Katie started, but Annie cut her off.

“I told him I’d never known you to take a drink, that the circumstances had been extraordinary, and that if you did it in the future, just as he does, it would be in moderation and for good health.”

Katie nodded her head, but remained silent. She craved a drink, but had decided that she must give it up. With the new opportunity, the comfort of a fine home, a warm bed and the love of family, it shouldn’t be difficult.

~~~

Before the week was out, Katie had found a bottle of Mr. Phillip’s sherry while she was getting the dishes out of a cabinet to serve dinner. She returned to the cabinet the next day while cleaning house.

Any reasonable person could take just one swallow to relax
, she told herself firmly.
I’ll have that and no more
.

In the afternoon of the next day, after sweeping out the downstairs, she came back to the bottle and had another, larger swallow. The warm feeling spreading out from her belly provided a deep feeling of wellbeing.

An hour later, Annie decided to lie down for a nap until Mr. Phillips arrived home at supper time. Katie went back for more sherry, and then still more. With each drink, it became easier to justify the next.

Then she was being awakened by Mr. Phillips. “Where’s Annie?”

Katie almost fell out of her chair. The bottle of sherry, nearly empty, slipped from her grasp, hit the floor and rolled until it struck Mr. Phillip’s shoe and stopped.

“I’m here,” came Annie’s sleepy voice from the stairs.

“There’s no supper,” he said, stooping to pick up the bottle.

At the bottom of the stairs, Annie paused, taking in the scene. “Oh, Mum,” she said.

“Tomorrow,” Mr. Phillips said, “your mother will go home to Mr. Conway.”

The dream has come and gone so quickly.
Katie was numb, and then she was afraid of the street, the workhouse, herself.

~~~

She didn’t understand how it could have happened. She stood outside the front door of her daughter’s house the next morning, saying goodbye.

Mr. Phillips had little to say and had gone back in. Annie kept talking about Conway, but Katie wasn’t listening.

Why can’t I drink only a little, like the countless people in the world who take just enough and no more?
How had she failed to control herself when the dream of her declining years was at stake? She could hardly blame Mr. Phillips and Annie for their reaction. Still, it hurt, for Annie didn’t stand up for her.

Shouldering her blanket full of possessions, Katie wept. 

“I’m sorry, Mum,” Annie said. “Please go home to Papa.” She pressed a white handkerchief into her mother’s hand as she sent her away. Walking toward the East, Katie began to cough. As she wiped her mouth and nose with the handkerchief, she discovered the coins that were hidden in its folds, a crown, and a florin.

~~~

The money allowed her to stay in a common lodging for a few days and buy food and drink. While there, Katie met a man named Jon Kelly. He was a sometime market porter and full time drunkard in need of a partner. And she was desperate. Katie knew she would never have tender feelings for him, but he was a decent sort and would provide her with some protection. She would need it if she was going to drink.

In April of 1888, Katie was 46 years old. She had been with Jon Kelly six years. They lived together in common lodgings in London’s East End when they could afford it, in the casual wards when times were tough. Because Katie had to keep everything she owned on her person while she slept to protect it, she sewed two bed ticking bags to add to all the pockets she wore under her skirts.

Her health suffered, but she sought no remedies. Katie had lost most of her back teeth and had to be careful what she ate. She had increasing occurrence of severe back pain in the area of her kidneys and had endured the excruciating pain of passing multiple stones with her urine. The condition of being unable to catch her breath came more frequently, but was at its worse on the numerous occasions when her tissues held onto fluid, making her whole body feel bloated and tight.

Katie earned money in a variety of ways, such as running errands or scouring for a shopkeeper, but these jobs could be found only when she was washed and carrying herself well, a set of conditions becoming increasingly rare. As a beggar, she sang on the streets, when her cough allowed, with a ticket telling a sad tale pinned to her breast and an imploring look on her face. When all else failed, she took to prostitution.

Since the autumn of 1887 several single women, about Katie’s age, had been stabbed to death and left on the streets in the East End. No doubt they were victims of the High Rip gangs that took protection money from prostitutes. Mr. Kelly’s presence in Katie’s life had protected her from them so far. He wasn’t good for much, but he had a way with a knife.

Katie frequently spent what little she earned on drink instead of food. She had been in the habit of selfishly consuming her food and drink before reuniting in the evenings with Mr. Kelly, but since the recent spate of murders, she shared everything she could with him. More than ever, Katie was afraid of being on her own, and did her best to keep Mr. Kelly’s interest.

In early September, 1888, with a terrible ache in her head and cramps in her belly that could only be soothed by more drink, Katie stalked her daughter in Holborn, looking for an opportunity to ask for money. The pursuit had become a habit, something she did every month or two. Each time, Annie showed a little more disgust and contempt. When Annie was younger, Katie was delighted by the idea that she knew her daughter’s mind, shared her thoughts and experienced her emotional states. Now she tried to deny what she knew full well; Annie’s thoughts and feelings were plain to see on her face. Katie was compelled to endure the shame of it out of hunger and thirst.

Lingering within sight of the front door to Annie’s house, she peeked around the corner from the nearest street crossing two houses away. She endured cold looks from those of the neighborhood who passed by on the street. What they saw in her was unmistakably clear in their mute expressions; with her many layers of clothing, unkempt appearance and the odor of her unwashed body and clothing, she was the embodiment of weakness and failure, of arrogant and insufferable shame.

With more drink in her belly, she would not care what they thought. Although it didn’t work as well as it once had, alcohol could be depended on as a buffer against all her woes, her aches and pains, her fear of each day and the coming night, her dread of the future and her progressive infirmity.

When deep in her cups, she could be who she wanted to be, for it set her imagination free. She became a person who stayed with Jon Kelly because he was aging and a drunkard who needed help getting along in the world. She ate little and had no real home because she was past the time in life when the consistency of such things was necessary for raising a family. If she fell asleep in an alley between crates, it was because it was comfortable enough and the weather had permitted it, and had nothing to do with the fact that she had passed out while playing Grandmother’s Trunk with the ghost of her dead mother.

Her imagination had worked over her past as well. One day, she decided she’d indeed touched Catherine through the silver inside her thimble that last night at The Black Anchor. Once that was the truth, it was an easy matter to blame her mother for thwarting her efforts to work for Frank Carver. Catherine had taken over her voice and facial features to express defiance.

She was protecting me from a terrible temptation.

During their occasional visits, Katie never brought it up with her mother because she didn’t want to spoil their time together. Her mother disapproved of the life Katie led, but out of love, held her tongue. Several times lately, Catherine had cradled Katie’s face in her hands and said, “Your suffering will be over soon.” She was afraid to ask her mother what she meant.

When Katie was not drunk, she didn’t believe such fantasies were real. Catherine was dead and gone, her thimble was merely a thimble. Her life was a deep and overflowing cesspit that could never be cleaned.  With no hope, no love, Katie’s only refuge was drink, and she would always return to it as quickly as she could.

Annie emerged from her house and walked east along the street toward Katie. When she was close Katie stepped up to the corner and smiled for her. Annie stopped and clearly struggled to smile. “Mum, I cannot help you this time.”

At least she didn’t tell me again how bad I look
.

“But you always have a little something for me.”

“I do, and then I suffer for it when Mr. Phillips finds out. I can’t pretend it’s good to see you.”

How can she stand so close, in her clean blue and white cotton skirt and warm shawl, and deny my need?

“I
am
your
mother
,” Katie said miserably.

Outrage hardened Annie’s features. “Oh...but what you’ve
done
to my mother!” she said, tears in her eyes. “You’ve shattered my memories of the mother who loved and cared for me, who sacrificed to protect me. Every month you come to give me a glimpse of hatred, madness and death.” Tears streamed down her cheeks. “You come to me from the bowels of the city,” Annie cried, “smeared with filth…reeking of disease...to ask for money.”

Katie could only stare in horror, knowing exactly how Annie saw her, for a mirror had shown the same only recently. The memory was vague because she had been deep in her cups. Perhaps it had been a late afternoon—she couldn’t quite recall—when her reflection appeared in a shard of a broken mirror propped up in an abandoned shop window as she passed by on the street. She stared at her image, unbelieving. Who was the impostor wearing the aspect of filth and madness her sisters had worn like a costume when they lived in the workhouse? She knew it was her own image, but it was not the way she saw herself.  She shook her arms, expecting the costume to fall away in tatters. When it did not, she panicked and flailed her arms and legs. She screamed and turned away from the mirror and fled.

Yes, there is a madness about me. I’m not just wearing it. I’m not playing a role. I am a filthy, drunken, muck-snipe whore.

Annie had fixed her gaze on the pavement at her feet. “You frighten me,” she said, quietly, pitifully. “What vermin do you bring to my doorstep? What illness might you leave with me?” 

Katie touched the piece of blue and white shirting on her head. She’d picked it up at the common lodging that morning to bind up her hair because she had lice again and didn’t want to give them to Annie.

“I would never intentionally harm you,” Katie said. How good it would be to become angry, but there was nothing but a sense of helplessness.  She was a sneaking, bloodsucking spider slowly crushed beneath her sweet daughter’s heel.

And rightly so, for I
have
harmed her. I am a miserable burden for Annie to bear. How embarrassed she must be.

Katie wept into her ragged sleeve.

“Take this and go.” Annie held out a double florin.

Katie gazed at her daughter for a time, but the young woman would not look at her.  “I’m sorry,” Katie said as she took the coin and turned to walked away.

“So am I,” Annie said.

Sobbing, Katie kept walking. 
She
has the life I wanted to her to have, and such as I am, I can’t be a part of it.