The Gilded Lily (31 page)

Sadie paused just inside the door, her teeth chattering, hearing the sound of crying and coughing from the Gowpers’ chambers, and the murmur of Dennis’s voice
soothing her.

He’s a good son, she thought to herself.

She took off her clogs and tiptoed upstairs, where she was surprised to find the door was ajar but Ella’s cloak gone from the peg. She checked all round the room, but there was no sign of
it, so Ella must have gone out. But the door was unlocked. It was unlike her to leave it open; she hoped it did not mean the worst. What if Ibbetson had tracked them down? She closed the door but
left it open a crack to listen out for Ella, and took off her sodden skirt and boots and put on some old petticoats. She rubbed her feet hard until they began to tingle and the toes lost their
pallor and turned red. The smell of the Thames seemed to fill the room. With a pang of guilt, Sadie reasoned that perhaps Ella was still out searching for her, and by now she must be worried to
death.

A rap at the door. Sadie jumped, and turned round.

‘Can I come in?’ said Dennis’s voice.

Oh no, not now. ‘Wait on.’ Sadie hastened to the trunk and wrapped an old apron around her waist to hide her petticoat, though she knew she looked dishevelled and her hands were
still muddy. She swirled them in the pail and dried them on her sides. She hoped her eyes were not too red – she did not want him to know she’d been crying.

Dennis sidled in, looking uncomfortable. He held his cap in one hand, and the other plucked nervously at the seam of his brown tweed breeches. He gazed down at the space in front of her feet, as
if addressing the floorboards,

‘I got home and found my ma in a right old state. She’s that upset it’s taken me near on an hour to quieten her. Someone’s been a-hammering at our door and shouting at
her.’ He looked into her face in appeal. ‘I told you, she can’t stand trouble. She says it was Miss Johnson from up the stairs. Is that right? Was it your sister?’ He
paused. ‘Or was it you?’ His eyes rested on her face briefly but then flicked downwards again.

‘It wasn’t me. I’m sorry. It must have been Ella. She’s upset. We had a disagreement.’ She avoided his eyes, aware that this hardly described what had passed
between them.

The pair of them paused, both staring ridiculously at the floor. Eventually Dennis looked up and said, ‘Sorry, Sadie, but I can’t be having it. I said – if there’s
trouble, then you’ll have to find somewhere else.’

‘Oh, please, no . . . don’t say that. It won’t happen again, I promise. I’ll talk to her, honest.’

He looked doubtful. ‘No. When I first said you could have the room you looked like nice country girls, and I was sorry for you because them lads were after you. Then I finds out
you’re on the run. I should have turfed you out there and then. But I didn’t. God knows why not. Now this. Sorry, but Ma says the girl’s got to pack her things and go.’

‘We can’t. You know we can’t,’ Sadie said, tears starting to prick in her eyes again. ‘There’s notices out all over London. If I’m seen, then
we’ll both hang. Have a heart, don’t put us out, Dennis.’

Dennis squeezed his cap between his hands and shifted from foot to foot. He cleared his throat. ‘Ma’s already suspicious. She says she can hear noises and shouting from up here. She
thinks your sister’s entertaining menfolk and she’ll not stand for it. I didn’t think you were like that.’

‘I’m not. You know it’s not that. I try to be quiet as I can, but it’s hard, cooped up here every day. I’ll talk to Ella, we won’t be no more trouble, I
swear. Just give us a bit more time, till the hue and cry has gone. Then we’ll move on, if you like, I promise.’

‘I don’t know. She was right upset, thought it were some beggar breaking in again, till she heard a girl’s voice shouting through the door.’

‘Sorry if we upset your ma, Dennis. We’ll be quiet as the grave. But please don’t put us out. Where could we go?’

‘Sorry, Sadie.’ Dennis twisted his cap in his hands and hurried to go out of the door.

‘I’ll do anything.’ Her voice broke as she called after him. ‘I’ll do all your mending, or anything. Just let us stay.’

‘No,’ he said, turning, anger flaring in his eyes. He softened. ‘You don’t need to do that, I mean . . . if you stay, there’s to be no more fuss, and no more
bothering Ma.’

‘There won’t be, I promise. Please, Dennis?’

‘Well, I . . .’

‘You’ll let us stay?’

He inclined his head with a barely perceptible nod. ‘Don’t know what I’ll tell Ma.’

She rushed towards him as if to hug him, but stopped short and mumbled instead, ‘Beg pardon, I mean . . .’

‘I must be mad,’ he said. ‘But if you went, I couldn’t stand to hear you’d been caught and hanged and be thinking it were all my fault.’ He turned to leave,
but she followed him to the door.

‘Thank you, Dennis. You won’t hear another sound, promise.’

‘It’s a big favour I’m doing you, so I hope you’re mindful of it.’ His face creased into a smile. ‘Keep safe now, and tell that sister of yourn I expect her
to come apologize to Ma.’

‘I’ll tell her,’ Sadie said, knowing there wasn’t a hare’s chance. ‘Sorry’ wasn’t a word generally in Ella’s vocabulary.

When he had gone Sadie tiptoed down to look out of the door to see if there was any sign of Ella. But the street was empty, the night was frosty and most sensible folks were inside by a warm
fire. She came back up the stairs shaky from the strain of it all. She put her hand to her chest, felt the scrap of lavender ribbon there and the reassuring thump of her heart. She was ashamed that
Dennis had had to come up, uncomfortable that he should think ill of her. She could still see his rueful expression in her mind’s eye, and it pained her, a sharp ache in the pit of her
stomach.

She roused herself to make a tin cup of watered ale, added a pinch of allspice and heated it over two candle flames until it bubbled. Then she sat with it cradled on her lap, keeping the
scalding metal moving in her hands, waiting for Ella’s return.

At length Sadie found her head nodding. She sat up with a start. Still no Ella. Befuddled with sleep, she closed the gaping door. She pushed away the thoughts that Ella might have been
recognized, or something untoward might have happened to her. She was just too tired to worry about her any more. Her legs were leaden, her eyes smarted and her head ached. She took herself to
their shared bed and pulled the covers up to her chin. She stroked the lint of her shawl between her finger and thumb, the way she had when she was a child, and when she fell asleep, she slept for
a long time.

Some time in the night Ella must have returned, because in the morning Sadie awoke to find that there was a bowl on the table, with the remains of some millet gruel, and a bone comb lying there.
Sadie let out a great breath of relief. Ella must have been back and gone out again to work as usual. By the fire stone was a tiny poundweight bundle of kindling such as you might buy from a shop.
These signs of normality lifted her spirits and she happily washed Ella’s platter, as she was wont to do, and when she found Ella’s dirty chemise cast onto the floor, she picked it up
and put it in the buck tub along with her wet things from the night before. She moved slowly, so as not to make a noise, and she was leisurely with these tasks, for she knew time would hang heavy
on her hands through the daylight hours, and she could not risk going out until after dark.

That day she lit a fire, taking cheer from the crackle and spit of the wood. Widow Gowper would never know, she never went out. The wind whistled its hollow song through the chimneys and spires
of the city, and the water began to melt in the jug. She trimmed the wicks on the rushlights, boiled down the saved candle-ends to make soap and gazed out of the window at her friend, the river.
There were plates of ice now stretched out from the bank, like ragged shelves. The sea birds were standing on them squawking their hunger to each other. She could not wait for nightfall – to
go out, feel the fresh air nip her nose and go back to the water’s edge to watch for tall ships from the jetty. She might find more fuel too; the fire was like a beast, always needing to be
fed.

She knew the hours between four of the clock and dusk always felt the longest; it was at this time she began to get restless. She put on her cap and shawl and her hooded cloak, long before the
dark. Standing by the window, impatient, she watched the setting sun bleed into the sky, saw the few buildings on the opposite bank flame and then fade to featureless shapes, becoming blank holes
in the landscape.

She watched the night ferries go by, rejoicing at each passing lantern. When she could see a dozen lanterns, surely then it was dark enough for her to venture outside, though she worried about
the reflected light from the snow. When night finally fell and she turned back into the room it was darker than she anticipated, but she did not bother with a taper as she knew every inch of the
space. She wrapped her shawl tight about her head and face, cowled the hood of her cloak into a deep cave.

She felt for the door and found the thin metal latch that served as a handle. She pressed it down and pulled the door.

It wouldn’t shift.

She fiddled with the latch, thinking it must not be fully disengaged. Another hard pull. It was stuck.

Perhaps it was frozen. She knew this was unlikely. She tugged even harder, but it still didn’t open. She could hear the hasp rattling on the other side. Frustrated, she went to light a
stub of candle. She held it up to the door to see where it might be jammed. But she could not see anything, just a thin sliver of darkness. She leaned back on the latch with all her might but it
did not give an inch. She dare not rattle it too hard, and she could not shout to anyone for help.

She paced the room, hoping that when Ella came home from Whitgift’s she would be able to get it open from the other side somehow. But as the night grew on, there was still no sign of Ella.
She went to the window again, drawn as always by the view of the life from which she was excluded. The odd flake of snow drifted past on its leisurely journey to extinction in the river. Shortly
after the bells struck eleven of the clock, she heard a noise outside.

It was the sound of clinking metal as if someone was fiddling with the lock. Sadie went over to the door and, half fearful, put her ear to it. She could hear someone shuffling outside.

‘Ell, is that you?’ she whispered.

‘Course it’s me,’ came the short reply.

‘Is the door still stuck? What’s the matter with it? I can’t open it.’

Just then the door swung open and Ella came in.

‘It’s not stuck,’ she said. ‘I locked it.’

Sadie was dumbfounded. ‘With this,’ continued Ella in the low voice they always used at home. She held up a new iron padlock, from which a large key protruded. Sadie stood aside to
let her pass, still a little confused.

‘Where did you get that from?’

‘The ironmongery. Last night.’ She lifted it up and held it out. ‘Four shilling, it cost me.’

Ella kicked off her snow-crusted clogs onto the floor where the snow began to pool in a dark stain. Sadie noticed her lips had been smeared with a red paint. ‘You mean . . . you mean you
locked me in on purpose?’

‘Well, I couldn’t have you roving all over London.’

Sadie looked at the lock in disgust. ‘Four shilling for that? You’re mad. Fancy locking me in. What if there was a fire? I wouldn’t have been able to get out.’

‘Then you’d have been warm for a change!’ Ella giggled at her own joke. ‘There won’t be a fire. I reckoned someone might recognize you and follow you home. And then
they’d have us both by the necks. So I took precautions.’

‘Well, I won’t be locked in again, d’you hear?’

‘Stop bellyaching. It was only a few hours. Look what I’ve brought us.’ She held up a basket. ‘Peace offering,’ she said, pulling back the cover to reveal some cold
pasties.

‘I don’t want any. Where were you last night?’

‘I went back to the night market by the bridge. Stayed awhile to listen to the ballad singers. You were snoring like a horse when I got home.’

‘I was not.’

‘Please yourself. I’m going to bed. I’m that tired I could sleep for a hundred years.’

Neither of them mentioned their falling out. Ella washed her face then made a great fuss of getting undressed, struggling with the lacing of her bodice, unable to twist to undo the points in her
stiff busk. Sadie did not offer to help as she usually did, but let her curse and strive. In her shift Ella looked like the little girl Sadie used to know, with her calves and ankles showing like
they did at haymaking when the weather was hot and they cooled off their feet in the trough. Sadie watched her gather up the folds of the shiny gown from round her feet before hanging the whole rig
from the back of the door. Ella wrapped herself in a blanket and climbed into bed without a word.

‘Night,’ Sadie said.

Ella ignored her, pulled all the blankets and the knitted coverlet up to her chin and shut her eyes, leaving the bare palliasse at the other end. Sadie wondered how her sister could sleep like
that – she slept upright now, stiff as a scarecrow, lest her hair spoil.