The Reckoning (56 page)

Héloïse
shrugged. 'I suppose his means are not enough to
take a wife wherever he will. He is a younger son, after all.'

‘
Well I think he's behaved most shocking,' Agnes said
stoutly, 'and I shall tell everyone who asks that I think
nothing to him.'

‘
He has to return to Manchester sooner or later,' Miss
Pendlebury said thoughtfully. 'I wonder that he should risk
his reputation like this.'

‘
Perhaps his mother insisted,' Héloïse said. 'Or perhaps he
felt it was the kindest thing by Sophie, as he had raised so
many expectations, to remove himself entirely and at once –
the clean cut. Yes, on the whole, I think that is the most likely explanation. We should think well of people as long as we can.'

‘
Even of that horrid Lady Grey?' Agnes demanded.

Héloïse's expression hardened. 'She did not, after all, tell
anything but the truth,' she said quietly. 'And now, let us
dismiss this whole foolish matter from our minds. Sophie, my
love, ring the bell, and let us have a nuncheon. What do you
all do this afternoon?'

‘
Agnes and I mean to take Sophie with us on a benevolent
mission, if you please, Lady Morland,' said Miss Pendlebury.

Héloïse smiled. 'Yes, of course – there is nothing better
suited to restoring one's peace of mind than to see how much
worse other people's problems are.'

‘
And as I shall be there to chaperone them,' Agnes said
importantly, 'you need not worry about them, ma'am.’

Héloïse managed not to laugh, but she could not quite
suppress a smile. 'I'm sure both will be safe in your hands,'
she said. 'Young ladies, you must be sure to do just as Mrs
Droylsden says.’

*

If the benevolent visiting were meant to be healing to Sophie,
it was by way of a cauterisation, she thought, for this time she
was taken to what surely must be the worst part of
Manchester. Her respect for Miss Pendlebury increased enor
mously when she saw how unflinchingly she faced sights and
smells which would make most women faint away. Agnes
turned pale and grew very quiet, and anything that could
silence her chatter must be very bad indeed. Prudence tried to
prevent her companions from going in to some of the dwellings, but they were both determined to be resolute – Sophie
because she wanted to be useful, and Agnes because she felt
she must look after Sophie.

Water Street ran parallel with the River Irwell all the way
from the new Salford bridge to St Mary's Gate, giving access to the mills and manufactories which lined the river. Leading
off Water Street to both sides, crammed into the spaces
between the tall, black mills and the belching chimneys, were the lanes and courts and entries where the mill-hands lived in
the worst of squalor.

The tenements were old buildings, built of bug-infested
lath and crumbling plaster, and divided and subdivided
into ever smaller rooms and ever more teeming tenancies.
The proximity to the mills meant that they were in per
petual half-darkness. A constant fog of smoke shut out the
sun and choked the lungs, while a drizzle of soot blackened
the buildings and further obscured the small, dim window
panes.

In some courts it would have been possible for tenants of
houses on either side to have joined hands by leaning out of
their windows, had the windows been capable of being
opened. In most there was an open kennel running down the
centre, which was frequently so choked with offal and rubbish
that the other effluvia overflowed and trickled into the base
ments. A common dunghill was the playground to such
children as were not yet in employment; dogs truffled in the kennels for the tastier morsels, occasionally breaking off to
bark at the rats, which were large enough and bold enough to
challenge them for the rubbish in daylight. Sophie wondered
where the residents got their water from, and supposed it
must be a long way off. She hoped they did not draw it from
the river: she never saw a single pump.

Even Miss Pendlebury would not venture into the base
ments, though she had heard of them from Father Rathbone
and told her companions in a few terse words of the condi
tions there. The basement areas of most of the old houses
were divided into several rooms, the inner ones opening off
the outer ones and having no window or ventilation. In pitch
darkness, therefore, the poorest or unluckiest lived eight or
more to a room whose floor was always wet, and frequently
flooded with the seepage from the kennels. Mattresses had to
be raised off the floor oh wooden pallets. There was no means
of washing or cooking, and those who lived there rarely had any possessions beyond the mattress and perhaps a blanket.
When they laid down and died — which many of them did — it
was sometimes days in that Stygian darkness before their
death was discovered. Yet such was the demand for accom
modation, that almost as soon as a corpse was removed from
a bed, its place was taken by a living body.

These things Sophie did not see, but what she saw was hard
enough to bear. They visited Brooke's Entry, and went from
room to room, advising, comforting where they could, and
treating such ailments as were within their capability. Infec
tions were frequent in those filthy conditions — indeed, Sophie
wondered how any wound ever healed, when the people were
so poorly nourished. Most of the children and many of the old
people had rat-bites about them; lung infections, sore eyes,
dysentery and scurvy were present everywhere; deformities of
all sorts, missing limbs and ugly scars.

Sophie admired the spirit with which Miss Pendlebury,
even when faced with the most pitiful and hopeless victims of
sickness and misfortune, continued to recommend prayer,
regular devotions, and church attendance along with what
ever physical remedies she advocated. Sophie's own faith was
strong, but she found it hard to speak of God's benevolence to
those whose lives seemed rather a curse on them than any
kind of divine gift.

‘
You must guard against despair, Sophie,' Prudence said to
her briskly when they left these scenes of misery at last, and
drove back to the mission to report to Father Rathbone and
refresh their spirits after their labours. 'It is the easiest thing
in the world when faced with such sights to lose one's own
inner convictions; but we owe it to these people to fight
against such feelings. God is good; there is hope for every
creature, and redemption is sure for those who bear their
sufferings patiently, and continue to love Him in their hearts. That is what we can give these people, more surely than food
or clothes or medicine, and it is what is most important.
Many of them will die untimely; most, perhaps all, of them
will suffer; and without Faith, it is all in vain.'

‘
Yes, you're right, of course,' Sophie said. 'I do see that;
and I will do my best.'

‘I know you will,' Miss Pendlebury said with a rare smile.
‘Remember that if we do not believe in God's goodness, there
is no reason for us to try to help these people at all. Annie, are
you all right? You're very quiet.'

‘
Oh, I shall be well enough,' Agnes said queasily, 'when I've
got the stink of those places out of my head. Sophie dear,
have you any lavender-water about you? I sprinkled all of
mine in that first place we went to. Ah, thank you, that's
better. I feel as if I shall never be free of the smell! I wonder
you can bear it, Pru, and go back as often as you do.'

‘
Someone must do it,' Prudence said simply.

‘
Well, but why you, at all events? It's no task for a woman
— or at least, not for a gentlewoman.'

‘
God takes no account of rank or sex,' Prudence said. 'He
sees only our Christian hearts.'

‘
I don't see how you can always be so sure what God's
thinking,' Agnes complained, her spirits reviving now they
had left the black places behind. 'You always say He thinks
this and thinks that, but who tells you so? In any case, it
seems to me that if God wants these people to be helped, He
might just as well not strike them down with disease and
poverty in the first place. That would save everyone a great
deal of unpleasantness.'

‘
Oh Annie!' Prudence exclaimed in exasperation, but a
smile tugged at her lips all the same. It was impossible ever to
be really angry with such a simple cheerful creature as her
sister.

The mission seemed a haven of cleanliness and comfort
after the tenements, and two or three cups of hot, fragrant tea
were enough to restore Sophie to her normal spirits. The
arrival of Father Rathbone took Prudence away from them
for a long, private consultation, presumably about the afternoon's activities. Sophie and Agnes remained on their sofa, chatting in a comfortable way, and by unspoken agreement
avoiding the subjects of poverty and disease.

Some time later, while Prudence was still in conference
with the priest, the door to the street opened and Jasper
Hobsbawn came in. Sophie started and blushed, and
wondered at the strange coincidence by which she met him
here every time she came. His eyes came straight to her, as if
he had known she would be there, and he acknowledged her
across the room with a bow of the head, but then turned aside
to speak to Rathbone. Sophie ceased to hear anything Agnes
said. Her eyes were fixed on the group on the other side of the
room. She saw Rathbone speak, and then Prudence, and the
eyes of all three turn towards her and Agnes. Mr Hobsbawn
said something, and Prudence spoke again.

And then he was coming across the room towards her.
Sophie lifted her eyes to his face cautiously, wondering what
sort of greeting she would get from him, whether friendly or
distant, approving or disapproving. His mood in her company
had been so unpredictable in the past.

‘
How do you do, Mr Hobsbawn,' she said when he was still
a pace or two off, to get it over with.

He didn't smile, but his expression was kindly, at least, and
not disapproving.

‘
Miss Morland. I'm glad to see you. And Mrs Droylsden –
how do you do, ma'am?'

‘
Good day to you, Mr Hobsbawn! We're feeling much
better now, thank you, after some reviving tea. For really, you
know, we've been through the mill today, haven't we, Sophie?’