Hall of Infamy (2 page)

Jamie chuckled. ‘Never is a long time, my pet. Betsy, go to the stables and ask Mr Blackstock to come and bring a couple of stable-lads. We may need a bit of muscle, and they will enjoy the show.'

The blood drained from Amelia's cheeks. She maintained her glare a little longer. Surely he was bluffing? He would not, could not dare… But she saw no hesitation in his hazel eyes and suddenly she realised that he was perfectly capable of carrying out the threat. Her shoulders drooped and she hung her head, defeated. ‘No. Please don't,' she mumbled as a tear rolled down her cheek. ‘I'll do what you say.'

‘What a pretty arse your cousin has, Clara. Kneel down there – closer, I want you to watch this. You will take her place if you look away. Betsy, hold Amelia's hands; she seems a little skittish. Now, Amelia, I'm going to give you six for cheek and six for disobedience.'

Amelia gave a little gasp as the cane was laid across her bottom-cheeks.

‘You don't know how long I've waited for this moment, Amelia, or frigged myself off imagining this scene.' Jamie chuckled, and the cane was lifted. Amelia gave a little whimper of pure terror as the tension mounted. Everybody in the room held their breath but the mantel clock ticked inexorably on.

Whoosh… Thwack
!

Amelia tried to fight the shriek but the pain was just too great. It seared across her bottom, forcing a cry from between her gritted teeth. Oh, God, it was worse – much worse – than she had imagined. She could not stand another eleven strokes like that!

Whoosh… Thwack
!

Again the blaze of pain.

‘Stop wriggling, girl, and keep your legs straight.'

‘Ooh! Ooh! Aah!' Amelia sobbed as the pain coursed through her in waves. Blinking away tears, she looked back through her own legs to see Clara kneeling to face her bottom, so close that the cane must have only just missed her face. Clara had a glazed expression, part terror and perhaps part something else, and her eyes were brimming with tears.

Jamie grabbed Amelia's hair, and wrenched her head back until she had to look into his eyes. ‘Welcome back, my dear Amelia. Welcome to Hope Hall.'

‘Rather thin pickings today, Mrs Fraser.' Lady Alicia peered through her lorgnette at the line of girls who stood trembling and barefoot on the stone flags, wearing nothing but thin cotton shifts. The glasses made her look formidable, but they could not disguise her striking beauty. Lady Alicia Feversham, the Marchioness of Hatherby, wore a long bustled skirt of purple velvet and a matching tightly tailored tunic, adorned with military-style piping. A miniature top hat in purple satin with a ribbon and bow completed the outfit. Emma Swift would have felt abashed in so splendid a presence, even had she been allowed her clothes.

‘Well, Alex,' the grand lady continued, lowering her lorgnette again, ‘what do you think?'

Her husband lit his cigar, leant back in his chair and swept his gaze along the file of candidates. The Marquis was a big man, handsome and possessed of a splendid set of whiskers. Emma had never seen a man so immaculately dressed before. His Lordship wore a dove-grey morning suit with a silk top hat and matching gloves. His waistcoat was gold and richly embroidered, his cravat a similar hue. Even the yellow horn handle of the riding-whip he toyed with seemed to match. If she had not been too timid and fearful of the consequences, she would have probably just stood and stared.

Seats had been brought and set out for the grand couple in the exercise yard, a cheerless square surrounded on four sides by the grey stone buildings of the reformatory. Furtively, Emma glanced up at the little windows in the wall she was facing, above the visitors' heads. She could just make out the faces pressed against the bars of every dormitory and cell. For the girls incarcerated in the Hatherby and District Reformatory for Females, this was a rare diversion from the usual grim regime.

‘They're all good workers, ma'am.' The directress of the reformatory glared fiercely at the dozen young women, and Emma dropped her gaze back to the ground. ‘Stand up straight, girls!' She pinched the plump upper arm of a buxom girl with sandy hair. ‘Maisie is as strong as an ox, ideal for kitchen work. I understand that that is what you're wanting.'

Lady Alicia gave the woman a slightly disdainful glance. ‘Indeed, we do need a kitchen-maid, but I like to give my staff the opportunity for elevation. I want a girl who might be trained as a lady's-maid, eventually.' She raised her lorgnette again to peer at Emma, who stood blushing furiously and kneading her shift in nervous hands. She dropped her eyes, but could feel Lady Alicia's gaze on her breasts, the shape of which the thin shift could not quite conceal, and sense the woman's predatory interest. ‘What is that one called?'

‘Emma Swift. A pretty little chit, but not the sturdiest we have.'

‘How old is she?'

Emma tried to swallow but found her mouth had gone quite dry.

‘Just eighteen, ma'am. We've had her about two months.'

‘Have you thrashed her much?' The relish in the Lady Alicia's voice made a cold shiver run down Emma's spine.

‘Not particularly, ma'am. She gets the birch now and then, as they all do. But she is not particularly wilful or wicked.'

‘I see.'

Emma sensed disappointment in her tone, and for a moment thought that she was not going to be chosen. She could not have said if this were more a cause for relief or for disappointment. The chance to leave the grim reformatory was appealing, and the opportunity to get a good position did not come often to girls in her situation. Yet something about Lord and Lady Feversham made her feel a deep sense of foreboding, and she had heard the rumours, dark rumours whispered by the girls in the dormitories at night, about the things that happened at Hope Hall.

‘Alex, do you see anything that might suit you or shall we look elsewhere?'

Lord Alex stood and strode over to his wife's side. He studied the girl standing next to Emma, a tall and leggy beauty with a mane of long dark hair.

‘This is the girl I wrote of, sir.' The directress hovered eagerly. ‘Polly Thomas.'

‘Yes, well,' the Marquis said, ‘fortunately that is no matter to change. Certainly this is the only filly that might be any use.' His voice was a bored, disdainful drawl. ‘She is certainly quite a height.'

‘Six foot, near as dammit. She is twenty years of age,' the directress put in.

‘Twenty, eh? Hold this!' He handed his crop to Mrs Fraser and removed his grey silk gloves. Seizing the tall girl's upper and lower lips, he forced her mouth wide open and peered inside, to the accompaniment of a startled gurgle. ‘Good strong teeth, anyway,' he conceded after a thorough examination. He pulled his gloves back on and took back his crop.

Emma heard a stifled gasp and, glancing sideways, saw that his Lordship was now raising the girl's shift with the handle of his whip, perusing her revealed thighs with an air of weary scepticism.

‘Mrs Fraser, I hope you feed your livestock properly. These fetlocks are really rather lean!'

‘Polly is fresh off the train, your lordship. We have only had her for three days. I sent word as soon as she arrived, being as you had asked for a long-shanked girl. I do assure you, Lord Alexander—' the directress spluttered on.

‘Yes, yes,' Lord Alex interrupted. ‘I'm sure, I'm sure… Anyway, I'll take her. She has the length of leg I'm looking for and she looks strong. There should be time to feed and train her up before the Cup. Do you want this little chit as well, Alicia?'

Emma swallowed as the man's riding-crop lifted her chin.

‘I rather think so. Lift your shift, girl, let us see what we are getting for our money!'

With cheeks aflame, Emma tentatively lifted the hem of her chemise, mortified that she was revealing naked legs, not only to the grand couple but to the massed ranks of inmates peering down from their cells, yet not daring to disobey the order of so formidable a lady. Even so, part of Emma felt outraged at the order. This usage seemed to her more suited to that of a concubine, displayed on some eastern slave block, than the proper scrutiny of a maid by her prospective employers. Still, she did as she was told, and she did not protest. For one thing, Emma had no wish to renew her acquaintance with the reformatory birch. For another, something told her that Lady Alicia was the sort of lady who would enjoy dealing with rebellion.

‘Higher, girl! Right up. I want to take a look at your titties.'

Almost swooning with the shame, Emma hoisted up her garment. She buried her beetroot cheeks in the folds of the shift, and tried vainly to close her ears to the conversation.

‘Also a bit skinny, perhaps, but I think she will fill out nicely. What do you say, Alex?'

‘Nice high titties, round and firm as peaches. Neat little nipples, shapely legs, trim waist. Should clean up quite a pretty little chit.'

‘I believe so. She can start out in the kitchens, helping cook. Since Lucy's elevation, she is always complaining about being short-staffed.'

‘We're sadly short of staff all round since we lost Daisy and Grace, of course,' Lord Alex said a little mournfully.

‘Yes, well, darling,' his wife said, perhaps a little tartly, ‘if you will play cards with blackguards like Jack Campion…' She paused and a fonder note entered her voice. ‘I wonder when he's coming back?'

‘When he wants, if he hasn't got his head chopped off by some foreign potentate!' Lord Alex said, laughing as he turned to the directress again. ‘Very well, Mrs Fraser, how much for the pair?'

‘The usual fee for Polly, plus ten guineas for the paperwork. Emma comes a little steeper, I'm afraid.'

‘But you said a minute ago that she was not so sturdy,' Lord Alex's deep voice broke in.

‘Your lordship, I was not so keen to get rid of her. She is particularly pretty and Justice Ormorund expressed an interest when he sent her down.'

‘Oh, he did, did he?' Lady Alicia's rich voice was full of merriment. ‘That old lecher goes through maidservants like a fox through a hen-house! Well, I want the girl. The old sot shan't have her – at least, not until he comes to tea. What do you want, then, Mrs Fraser? Name your price.'

‘Twenty would compensate for the Justice's displeasure. I think I could interest him in some of the others. She is the prettiest, but he does tend to like them more robust.'

Laughter echoed around the yard: Mrs Fraser's ugly cackle, Lady Alicia's high peal of merriment and her husband's throaty chuckle. Emma kept her face buried in the folds of cotton in her hands and smothered a sob.

‘Very well.'

Lord Alexander did not seem too put out at the price, but the cold clink of golden guineas sent a shiver through Emma's soul.

‘When can you let us have them?'

‘Not till after Sunday. I can't give them their farewells before then. I'd suggest Thursday. Then they won't have to kneel in the carriage the whole way!' The directress guffawed heartily.

Emma felt as if she had been struck. She had thought – at least she had hoped most fervently – that this unlooked-for parole would have spared her the dreaded ‘farewell'. A sigh from her side told her that Polly had just seen similar hopes cruelly dashed.

As a minor first-time offender, Emma had been spared the full rigour of the reformatory ‘welcome' and ‘farewell'; whippings which were administered pitilessly with a stretched bull's pizzle. Even so, her ‘gentle welcome', bestowed with a moistened cord cat, had been quite enough to ensure that she slept on her stomach for two nights in a row.

No one had told Emma that she might drop her chemise but the attention of the gentry seemed to have shifted, and so she took the chance to let go of the hem and cover her nakedness again. Fortunately no one took any notice. It was as if she and Polly were insects, peered at briefly by these grand visitors before being relegated once again to utter invisibility.

Mrs Sykes, the wardress, barked an order and Emma turned on her heel in obedience, finding herself looking at the base of Polly's neck. It was, she realised for the first time, a particularly shapely nape, long and elegant with flawless golden skin that contrasted both with the plain white collar of the big girl's chemise and with her tightly bound black hair. A wisp of this had escaped from the bun, and the strands of fine dark hair curling around a single mole on that shapely back seemed strangely sad to Emma.

Yet more poignant, however, was the paler ring of skin encircling the base of her nape. There was no mistaking the mark of a neck-iron, worn by a poor captive trudging, or perhaps labouring, under the hot sun. Well, Polly, Emma thought as the order barked out and they moved off in single file, perhaps life will be kinder to us both from now on!

The file of girls was made to pause at the door of the north wing and stand aside. Solemn young women, clad in the grey uniform of the reformatory, were bringing out equipment. Four girls grunted with effort as they hauled out a heavy birching bench. Other young women trotted glumly past with burdens, birch rods, in their arms. Emma waited with mounting impatience as a second bench was taken out and set down in front of the visitors' chairs. The directress is putting on a show for them, she realised. A pretty girl from Humility Block hurried past, carrying a pail of brine and another full of sponges. The expression on her face, and those of the other grey-clad girls, left no room for doubt who the stars of the imminent performance were about to be.