Death of a Fop (Bow Street Consultant series Book 1) (6 page)

“Gawd bless yer, lidy!” said Dolly in deep relief “Gawdstruth, wot’s a fine mort like you doin’ ‘ere? You ain’t an abbess are yer?”

“I am not in Holy Orders” said Jane.

Dolly stared then gave a coarse laugh.

“Nar! An Abbess! A madam! One what runs a bawdy ‘ouse!”

Jane flushed.

“No” she said “I am not. I am Mrs Churchill; Frank Churchill’s wife.”

The laughter was suddenly cut off.

“Then – you done this? As revenge? But lidy I swear, strite up I do, ‘e di’n’t never tell me ‘e was legshackled! Please don’t ‘urt me no more, you can ‘ave the ruddy necklace, if I’d known it was ‘is wife’s……..”

“I have
not
done this!” Jane almost snapped “I ignored his
affaire
; it was a more dignified thing to do than to take issue with him! I have come to see you because my husband has been murdered; in the hopes that you might be able to throw some light on the matter! Ah, Mr Armitage; have you apprehended the villain who has hurt, er, Dolly?” she added as Dolly let out a screech that impacted painfully on Jane’s eardrums.

“No Mrs Churchill; the beggar went between two carriages, it weren’t safe to foller; even if I could of found the, er, feller again once I’d got across the street” said Caleb ruefully. “Here, Dolly; you stubble them whids, you, in front of Mrs Churchill!”

Dolly had been crying and swearing.

“Oh-oh- OOH Frankie’s dead!” she howled.

“And not much loss to the world either” said Caleb. “Nah then Dolly! I’m an officer of the law; and you had better tell me what I need to know.”

“I ain’t sayin’ nothin’ to no ruddy Runner” said Dolly sulkily.

“Nonsense Dolly!” said Jane “If you want to catch whoever killed Frank – who may be something to do with that lewd fellow who was hurting you – then you will tell Mr Armitage and me everything we want to know. Now you gave me to believe that the man who was hurting you asked for the necklace.
That
might be significant; so if you are sufficiently recovered to fetch it, I suggest that you do so.”

Dolly scowled.

“
He
didn’t find it and you won’t neither” she said.

“What, strung danglin’ out of the window is it?” asked Caleb “Or inside the hem of a gown to seem like a weighted hem? Ah, Dolly, better to co-operate with the law you know” as her expression gave her away with his second suggestion.

“You…..” she began

“NOT in front of Mrs Churchill!” Caleb barked in the voice of the parade ground.

Dolly stuck her tongue out at him; but went to her bedroom. Her gowns were hung behind a curtain; and soon she drew out a coruscating band of bijouterie, shimmering in myriad prisms of colour even in the dimness of the shabby room.

Caleb gasped.

“Oh Lord, Mrs Churchill, your husband was into receiving stolen goods!” he declared in horror.

“Stolen goods? Do – is – excuse me I am not sure what questions to ask” said Jane, faintly, sitting down.

Caleb twitched the necklace from Dolly’s reluctant grasp.

“This belongs to the Duchess of Avon; it was stolen last week” he said “There’s a gang of high class jewel thieves who steal from the ‘ote tone and we’ve every belief that the stones are reset to disguise them. Only this is according to description, unchanged.”

“It is a beautiful thing,” said Jane, “and I can understand Dolly’s reluctance to part with it; but my dear girl! Was it worth being so badly hurt for?”

Dolly was holding the wet cloth to her burned face and bosoms alternately.

“It were the way ‘e asked” she said sulkily “Why should I give it up? I s’pose if it’s stolen I don’t get no choice” she added truculently. “Frankie said ‘e was onto a good fing, but nuffink about bein’ a prigger o’ baubles!”

“I don’t think he was actually involved in the stealing of them” said Caleb. “I’ll see you get the reward, my girl, for being co-operative; and at that you can think yourself lucky I don’t believe you to be involved in this business or you might be before the beak for bein’ in possession of stolen goods. Now go and put some clothes on; there’s too much flesh on display and I feel like I’m in a butcher’s shop with it poking out at me.”

Dolly gave him a filthy look and went sulkily into the bedroom.

“Mrs Churchill; I would like to get you away from here” said Caleb anxiously.

“Mr Armitage, if you think I intend to leave that poor girl alone when that monster might come back, you can think again!” said Jane. “I am taking her home with me!”

“Mrs
Jane
!” wailed Ella.

“Ella” said Jane “You are an excellent abigail and I appreciate your services; pray find it in your heart to extend a little charity to this unfortunate fallen creature in her most unhappy hour.”

Ella blew her nose hard.

“If you insists Mrs Jane” she said “But it isn’t what I’m used to. And places like this; my pore mother would turn in her grave!”

“Your mother,” said Jane firmly, “would adjure you to do whatever your lady needed; and to thank your Maker that you were not yourself in the situation that this, er, Dolly is in.”

Ella nodded dubiously, not entirely convinced; but sufficiently shamed to be subdued at least.

Jane nodded her to the bedroom.

“You shall insist that Dolly packs and help her” she said. “We shall place her…..dear me. She is to be my guest but one can scarcely place her in the red room; it is NOT suitable.”

“No indeed Mrs Jane!” said Ella “She ought by rights to have that Juliet’s room once the hussy goes; but…. Mrs Jane, there are rooms suitable for elder children; might she be placed in one of those?”

“Excellent” approved Jane “I leave it in your efficient hands, Ella.”

Caleb watched with a raised eyebrow as Ella stalked into the bedroom.

“You have the management of that one down to a ‘T’” he said.

“Ella is a good woman; and a little too impressed by her concept of my consequence” said Jane. “She is also proud of her own abilities. Doubtless with her skills we shall soon have Dolly speaking acceptable English and dressing in such a way that I may find her a position with a mantua-maker or milliner; for I have every expectation that the trim on her gown is what she has herself added.”

“You really are a most remarkable lady, Mrs Churchill” said Caleb who had not up to that point noticed the competently executed vandyked ruffle on the smouldering gown.

Dolly was reluctant at first to leave her ‘own little nest’ but Ella was firm and Dolly gaped at the fine town house in Pembridge Square with its gleaming white stucco frontage. It might be on the unfashionable side of the square and not so large as those on the North side but to Dolly it was next thing to a palace. She squealed with delight and hugged Jane.

“Dolly dear, you must save such effusions for our private rooms if you want me to teach you how to act in a ladylike manner” said Jane, firmly. “Come now; Ella shall issue orders that a room is prepared for you and we shall drink tea.”

“Cor this beats Pimlico” said Dolly enthusiastically. “Don’t you have no blue ruin instead of tea?”

“Certainly not” said Jane “I am certain that it would be bad for your complexion.”

Dolly was taken firmly on ahead by Ella and Caleb murmured to Jane, “I am amazed that you knew that blue ruin is a name for gin.”

“Mr Armitage, I had no idea” said Jane primly “But I suspected it was some kind of spirituous liquor and made the comment accordingly. That poor girl needs careful handling.”

“You’re a remarkable lady!” Caleb said again. “She’ll find a lot of difference in this fine modern house to from the old timber framed buildings in the West End. Though I fancy the residents there will find themselves evicted when someone realises how big the city is growing and how close it actually is to the centre of London.”

“And remarkable that she has managed to keep as clean as she is in such insanitary places” said Jane. “And she must have a modicum of conversation, albeit rough and untutored. Frank may have kept her for other reasons then conversation but he always likes – liked to show off how erudite he was and how clever and if she did not appreciate that I fancy he would have got rid of her in short order. Dear me, what a charge he has left upon me! And consider if she might also be with child! I wish I had male relatives that I might rely upon; but I will not hang upon the sleeve of Colonel Campbell who has been so good to me; and I certainly do not wish to involve Mr Churchill for he will surely see how much disarray Frank’s affairs are in. And I must sell the horse; but I have written all my worries to dear Emma and I hope that she may advise me.”

“I would do what I could, Mrs Churchill, but I am not a man of affairs and I would not be taken seriously in undertaking any of your business needs” said Caleb, clenching and unclenching his hands in frustration.

“Oh Mr Armitage your very offer of support is heartening” said Jane. “As a governess I should have had to manage all things for myself; and so I shall contrive to do, though I fear being cheated over the horse.”

“I can make enquiries as to that if you will, ma’am” said Caleb. She brightened.

“Would you? How kind you are! Then if you will do so – when your duties permit of course – I should be delighted. Now I know you wish to get that necklace safely away; will you return in time for dinner? I shall have Dolly write out some kind of affidavit if that will help you.”

“Thank you; it will. I think it will not harm you if I say that as yet it is not known how a stolen necklace came into your husband’s possession; I cannot think that he would move in the right circles, either as a guest or as a servant, to be a thief.”

“It must needs come out eventually that he was a criminal, however minor; how thankful I am that a wife cannot be sent to gaol for her husband’s misdeeds as a man might be for his wife’s!” said Jane.

It made her feel quite cold to think that had not the law stated that a woman was too incapable to undertake illegal activities without the participation of her husband or other protector she might have been held liable for her husband’s misdeeds. Going to gaol for a crime she had no knowledge of – indeed was not even sure of the nature of – was a terrifying thought!

Caleb left to relieve himself of the responsibility of the Avon necklace; and Jane went in to drink tea with Dolly under the disapproving eye of Fowler after Ella had looked over the girl’s wounds in a more detailed way than the perfunctory treatment at her rooms. .

“Fowler, you will share the responsibility of helping Miss….” she looked a question at Dolly “Baxter, lidy” said Dolly.

“Quite so, Miss Baxter, to feel at home and to adapt to living here,” said Jane firmly, “since it may be that she is to be the mother of a sister or brother of Miss Frances. I will not neglect the wellbeing of a half sibling of my daughter.”

“Ow, you have a babby girl?” said Dolly “I love babbies! Frankie never telled me nuffink about her neether.”

“Perhaps, Fowler” said Jane smiling at him “You will ask Annie to bring Miss Frances down to the parlour.”

“Yes Mrs Churchill” said Fowler. “You want, er, Miss Baxter to be taught to be a lady? Have I those orders clear?”

“I believe that Miss Baxter is perfectly capable of learning a ladylike manner that we might support each other in what is, after all, a mutual bereavement” said Jane firmly. “Please also send out for a doctor to attend to her at his convenience; she has been hurt by the villains who killed Mr Churchill and needs appropriate ointments for burns.”

Fowler glanced involuntarily at the burn on Dolly’s cheek and shuddered.

“Yes Ma’am” he said.

Jane induced Dolly to write in her own words how she had been given the necklace as a love token from her protector and to make a brief description of it. Dolly sighed as she regretted the necklace but wrote obediently.

Jane stiffened as she read ‘’undreds and ‘undreds of loverly shinin dyemons’.

Hundreds. An hundred.

That might be significant.

She permitted Dolly to cuddle little Frances and play with her – Frances was at an age where she could sit firmly and was starting to crawl and wanted to investigate everything – and smiled to see the buxom girl dandle Frances on her knee and play ‘this is the way the farmer rides’ with her, a rhyme that must be universal. Jane took her own daughter for a while and showed Dolly how to play ‘Pat-a-cake’ which Dolly laughed over.

“I fink I have played that when I were small, but not wiv my little bruvvers and sisters” she said. “Cuh, Mrs Churchill, I ‘opes you can get me a good position, ‘cos I were sending back a lot of what Frankie – er, Mr Churchill – gived me. And lucky I fort meself to be the peculiar of a classy gent like him after me bad luck!”

“What bad luck is that?” asked Jane.

“Well, see, I worked as a barmaid in an inn at Sadler’s Wells – the resort just outside town y’know – and gent took my good name away by force, and I was turned orf account I had the babby in me, Well I ‘ad it dealt wiv…… only I were right ill of it and landlord, he found out.”

“You were lucky not to die from the ministrations of the awful old women who do that!” said Jane, scandalised. Such things too she had heard of in whispers when she had been finding out all the pitfalls that might befall a governess.

“Yerse, I fort I were going to fer a while” said Dolly. “And me away from ‘ome and fambly; Bethnal Green we comes from, a long way away. But I di’n’t turn up me toes, and so I come into the city and found I could work on me back standin’ up as you might say round the back o’ Covent Garden theatre, and that’s where Fr – Mr Churchill picked me up and offered me lodgin’s and well, I been his peculiar ever since. ‘E said I weren’t ‘ardened and ‘e liked a girl what was quiet and com- comp – I forget the word.”

“Compliant” said Jane. “Yes, his aunt was domineering; he picked me for my compliance.”

Dolly regarded Jane and wondered whether a stiff necked lady had actually been compliant enough in the way Frankie had liked and decided not to ask. Swell morts probably did not know that gentlemen sometimes liked playacting. And she had heard stories of some flash coves who liked their playacting to include hurting so she had been well off with Frankie It had been a kind of freedom not to be bound by the conventions, but she had been so happy as a barmaid, flirting without meaning anything with the coves who came in to drink, out in the countryside of Sadler’s Wells which was right pretty, but with enough amenities not to be as inconvenient as she had heard the real countryside could be. Being respectable might be nice; and seemingly as she did not have much choice with the gentle forcefulness of Mrs Churchill she might as well do as she was told. Poor Frankie dead!