The Dollmaker's Daughters (36 page)

Ruby was snatching a few hours’ much-
needed rest in the middle of an afternoon, having been on duty for twenty-four hours without a break. Typhoid was now endemic in the hospital and more soldiers had died of the disease than of their injuries. Shaken awake by one of the nurses, Ruby struggled into her shoes and hurried as fast as she could to the isolation ward. Adam was already at Pamela’s bedside, clutching her hand in his. The duty doctor held a stethoscope to her chest, listening intently. He looked up at Ruby, his expression bleak, but the agonised look in Adam’s eyes conveyed more than any words. Silently, Ruby pulled up a chair to sit beside him. Pamela’s skin was almost transparent as she lay propped up upon several pillows, her breathing shallow and rasping. Her eyelids fluttered and she opened her eyes, a smile of recognition transforming her face. Her lips moved but no sound came out.

As he clasped her hand to his cheek, Adam’s voice was thick with tears. ‘Save your strength, darling. Don’t try to talk.’

Pamela’s blue lips curved into a shadow of her old smile. ‘I love you, Adam,’ she whispered. ‘Don’t forget me.’

Bending his head over her hand, Adam’s shoulders shook silently.

‘That’s foolish talk, Pam,’ Ruby said, struggling to keep her voice steady. ‘You’ll soon be up and about. You’re getting better every day.’

‘I’m dying, Ruby.’

‘Don’t leave me, Pam.’ Adam’s voice broke on a sob.

‘Look after him for me, Ruby.’ Pamela closed her eyes and sighed.

Feeling for a pulse, the duty doctor shook his head. ‘She’s gone. I’m so sorry.’

Adam collapsed onto the bed, his body racked with agonising sobs. Exchanging helpless looks with the duty doctor, Ruby tried to comfort him, but his grief was so intense that he was deaf to everything and everyone.

Getting to her feet, Ruby bent double as jagged shafts of pain tore into her belly. Dimly she could hear the duty doctor’s voice as he made her sit down again.

As the pain subsided, Ruby sighed with relief. ‘I’m all right, doctor.’

‘You’re far from all right, Nurse Capretti. I can’t say without a proper examination but I’d say you’re in the first stages of typhoid fever.’

Seeing Jonas again had only made things worse. However hard she tried, Rosetta could not get him out of her mind. His prosperous look and powerful presence had made her plight seem even more wretched. If she had been Jonas Crowe’s woman, she would not be expected to stand behind a counter all day, serving poverty-stricken people who could barely afford the price of a loaf of bread. She would be dressed in fine clothes, pampered and adored like the heroines in
The Princess’s Novelettes:
a complete story for only one penny. Of course, the beautiful heroine had to suffer dreadfully before the handsome hero finally saved her, but he always came through in the end. Ruby had been a fool to give up her comfortable life in his house to follow a ridiculous dream. You wouldn’t catch me doing anything so daft, Rosetta had thought bitterly, as Jonas left the shop. Tense to the point of screaming, she had struggled through the rest of the day, but in doing so she had managed to upset everyone from Elsie to Billy. Refusing to keep the shop open any longer than was necessary,
Rosetta had shut the door and stamped up to the bathroom where she had locked herself in and wallowed in a chin-deep bath. The one good thing about the hateful flat above the shop was the luxury of having a proper bath instead of a zinc tub, filled laboriously with kettles of hot water, and set in front of the fire once a week, when everyone had to take turns. Here at least there was always plenty of hot water, providing Billy had remembered to stoke the boiler with coke.

As she stared at the brownish stain where the constant drip of water from the taps had left a rusty streak, Rosetta felt the cold chill of the cast iron through the thinning enamel on the bottom of the bath and she shifted her position. Jonas wouldn’t have an ancient, rusting bathtub. He would have the best and it was so unfair that Ruby had been enjoying all that luxury when she didn’t even like him. In fact, Rosetta thought, frowning, Ruby actually hated Jonas; she was hankering after that toff of a doctor who wouldn’t give her a second look. Reaching for the cake of Pears’ soap, Rosetta closed her eyes, sniffing its scent. Lillie Langtry herself used Pears’. She might have been just as famous as the beautiful Lillie if she hadn’t fallen for Martha. Opening her eyes, Rosetta soaped her flannel and scrubbed her body until her flesh turned bright pink. However hard she tried to ignore
her conscience, she couldn’t help feeling just a bit guilty for lying to Jonas about Ruby being engaged to Adam. Maybe she had gone too far in saying they were actually engaged, but the shocked look that had flashed across Jonas’s face had been a bit of a surprise. Surely he wasn’t interested in Ruby, at least not in a caring way? He might have thought that Ruby was easy, but he would have soon discovered that she was not.

Splashing the rapidly cooling water over her exposed breasts, Rosetta chuckled out loud at her own stupidity. Ruby was a good sort, the best really, but she was too serious and straight-laced to be attractive to a man like Jonas. He needed someone who could entertain his punters, someone vivacious and charming. Someone like me, she thought, snapping upright and sending a wave of water splashing onto the linoleum. Suddenly, Rosetta knew what she must do.

Someone rattled the door handle. ‘Why have you locked the door? Are you all right in there, pet?’ Billy’s anxious voice crashed in on her dream, bringing her rapidly back to earth.

‘Can’t a girl have a bath in peace? Leave me alone.’

‘Sorry, Rose. I just thought …’ Billy’s voice trailed off miserably.

‘I been on me feet all day. I just want a bit of time for meself.’

‘Martha needs her bedtime feed, pet.’

‘Tell Elsie to give her some cow’s milk.’

‘Elsie’s scrubbing the bakery floor and Martha’s crying.’

Rosetta reached for a towel. ‘All right, I’m coming.’ Stepping out of the bath, she came to a sudden decision.

Rosetta was wide awake but she feigned sleep as Billy clambered out of bed long before dawn to start the day’s baking. Giving him time to reach the bakehouse, Rosetta leapt out of bed, her heart racing with nervous tension and just a little thrill of excitement. Today was the start of her new life, a life far away from the drudgery of the bakehouse and away from the shabby rooms above the shop. Martha would be well cared for by people who loved her, although, quite unexpectedly, Rosetta felt a twinge of conscience at the thought of deserting her child. Throwing her things into a cardboard suitcase, she tried to put Martha out of her mind. She had never wanted a baby, especially Alf’s baby, and she had done her utmost not to bond with the dark-eyed little girl who already looked ridiculously like Ruby and herself. Some women were made for motherhood and some were not; that didn’t make her a bad person, and when she had money she would see to it that Martha never wanted for anything.

Creeping out of the building by a side door,
Rosetta couldn’t help taking one last glance at the attic window. Martha would be sound asleep in her wooden cot with the rag dolly that Granny Mole had made for her tucked in at her side. For a brief moment, Rosetta hesitated, and then bracing her shoulders she stepped out onto the wet pavement. Already people were hurrying to work in the docks or the manufactories that had grown up alongside the wharves and the railway lines. No one took any notice of her as she put her head down and turned in the direction of Shoreditch. There was only one place where she could go and be reasonably sure of being taken in off the street.

‘So,’ Lottie said, holding her hands out to the warmth of the fire. ‘You left your husband and baby and you expect me to take you in?’

‘Only for a while,’ Rosetta said, shivering in her damp clothes. ‘I got plans but I need somewhere to stay for a bit.’

‘You got money?’

‘Enough for my keep.’

Lottie’s lined face crinkled into a smile. ‘Then take off those wet things and sit by the fire. You’re a chip off the old tree after all, Rosetta.’

‘Block, Aunt Lottie,’ Rosetta said automatically. ‘I ain’t proud of leaving Martha but I know she’ll be better looked after than if I stayed on. I ain’t the motherly sort.’

‘Like I said, cara, you’re so like me. I left my little Gianni more than thirty years ago.’

‘And were you sorry you left him?’

‘It was a long time ago. I don’t remember.’

‘But you never wanted to go back and find him?’

‘Cara Rosa, can you imagine me as a mother?’ Lottie shrugged her shoulders, chuckling. ‘Now tell me this big plan of yours. You going back on the stage?’

‘Yes. Well, not exactly. I thought with Lily gone that Jonas might need someone to entertain the punters.’

Reaching for the gin bottle, Lottie poured a generous measure into her glass. ‘You want some to keep out the cold?’

‘Ta, but it’s a bit early for me.’

‘It ain’t never too early for me.’ Taking a mouthful, Lottie rolled the neat spirit around her gums and swallowed. ‘You still got a fancy for Jonas?’

‘I might have.’

‘Well, so far as street gossip goes, he ain’t had no woman since Lily. You might be in with a chance.’

‘He came to the bakery, wanting Ruby’s address.’ Rosetta hesitated, wondering why she had said that, but having started she couldn’t stop. ‘I told him that Ruby was engaged to her doctor friend, Adam Fairfax.’

Lottie’s shrewd eyes glinted. ‘So, that sounds like the good idea to me. You don’t want no competition.’

‘Ruby hates him, she said so, and she don’t like the way he makes his money.’

‘Ruby is a nice girl; too nice. You and me, we’re bad girls, Rose. You get on with your life and let her get on with hers the way she wants. As for Crowe, there’s something not right. He don’t send the punters round here for a night’s lodgings no more and we’ve had to take in commercial travellers. That means hard work and Sly don’t like hard work. You get in with Crowe, find out what’s going on, and maybe we get our business back.’

‘I’ll do it, but I wish I knew why he wanted to get in touch with Ruby.’

‘Only one way to find out. Put on your Sunday best and a bit of slap to make your cheeks rosy – you too pale, by the way – and you go and get him. A pretty woman can get any man she like.’

‘You won’t tell anyone I’m here, will you?’

‘You get our business back and I promise I won’t tell no one, not even your Billy.’

Corseted so tightly that she could scarcely breathe, Rosetta had just managed to squeeze into one of her gowns from her theatrical days. Wearing a silver fox fur cape borrowed from Lottie, and disguising the smell of mothballs
with a generous sprinkling of cologne, Rosetta fixed her hat at a jaunty angle over one eye, and went to knock on Jonas’s door. She could hear footsteps approaching and she closed her eyes in an effort to control her breathing, which was difficult with her lungs constricted by tightly laced corsets.

Tucker opened the door and his face lit up with a huge grin but, as he stared at Rosetta through narrowed eyes, his smile faded into a frown. ‘Oh, it’s the other one. I thought it was Miss Ruby come back.’

‘I’ve come to see Mr Crowe. Is he in?’

‘Might be.’

‘Well go and see, there’s a good chap. Tell him Mrs Noakes would like a word.’

‘Hoity-toity,’ muttered Tucker, shambling off and leaving Rosetta standing in the hall.

Primping in the hall mirror, Rosetta waited impatiently, her nerves stretched taut and vibrating like plucked harp strings. She had been rehearsing what she would say ever since she woke up that morning but now her mouth had gone dry, and when Tucker left her outside the door to Jonas’s office she was afraid that her voice would come out strangled and high-pitched.

Looking up from a pile of papers on his desk, Jonas raised his eyebrows. ‘Mrs Noakes, what can I do for you?’

Annoyed that he did not get to his feet, as any gentleman should, but determined not to let him see that she was ruffled, Rosetta perched on the edge of a chair facing him. ‘It’s more what I can do for you, Mr Crowe.’

Resting his elbows on the desk, Jonas steepled his fingers. ‘I’m intrigued.’

‘You need someone to entertain the punters and I’m available.’

‘You get straight to the point, I admire that, but what makes you think I need an entertainer?’

‘You still run the gaming club, don’t you? You need someone classy to take the punters’ minds off stale sandwiches and watered-down booze.’

Jonas threw back his head and laughed.

‘What’s funny?’ Rosetta demanded, bristling.

‘Why, Mrs Noakes, I believe you’re just as much a crook at heart as I am.’

Jumping to her feet, Rosetta glared at him. ‘Don’t laugh at me. I’m offering to work in your lousy club but I can see I’m wasting my time.’

Jonas was silent for a moment, observing her with a thoughtful look in his eyes. The sudden leap to her feet had made Rosetta’s head spin and she would have stalked out of the room, but she was afraid that if she made a move she might topple over. She had not eaten since yesterday’s midday meal, which had been a bun and a cup of tea, and now she was feeling light-headed. Sticking out her chin, she gave him back stare for stare.

‘Sit down,’ Jonas said, adding, ‘please.’

Rosetta sank gracefully and thankfully onto the seat. ‘Well?’

‘What I don’t understand, Rosetta, is why you would want to leave your husband and child to come and work for me?’

‘Maybe I ain’t cut out for domestic life.’

‘And what does Billy think about all this?’

‘That ain’t none of your business. All right, you want the truth? I only married Billy because I was in the family way. I was all set to be a star at the Falstaff and you’d be a fool to turn me down, but if you do there are plenty more music halls in the East End.’

‘Then it would be my loss,’ Jonas said, shrugging, ‘and their gain.’

‘You was quick enough to take Ruby in and set her up like a lady.’ Jumping to her feet, Rosetta leaned her hands on the table, looking Jonas straight in the eye. ‘All I’m asking for is the same chance.’