A Handful of Ashes Read online

  Daisy used the moment to push her own agenda. ‘Well, I’m not going to leave you, ever.’

  ‘Nor am I,’ said Susannah.

  But Daisy wasn’t about to relinquish the floor. ‘I’m eleven, and too old for the nursery now. Please may Goldie and I share the room Maryse used to have?’

  ‘Then Bryn will be lonely.’

  ‘He has Susannah for now, and you could get another baby to keep him company,’ Daisy suggested artlessly.

  Siana exchanged a wry glance with Francis. There was nothing she wanted more than to conceive his child and suckle it at her breast. But her husband’s glance was still on Bryn, stealthily reaching for the honeypot with his spoon. Francis’s eyes were full of affection and pride in the boy. Uneasiness settled in her stomach like a lump of cold gruel.

  ‘You’ve had enough,’ Francis said quietly. When Bryn turned and offered him an angelic smile, he chuckled. ‘That smile only fools your mother and your nursery maid.’ He nodded to the servant, who wiped the boy’s sticky hands and face with a wet flannel. His smile disappearing, Bryn began to wriggle and protest at such cruel treatment.

  ‘Stop being naughty. You’ll give Miss Edgar a headache, and she won’t let you play with the animals in the Noah’s ark on Sunday,’ Susannah informed him primly.

  Siana exchanged a grin with Francis as they edged out into the hallway, for he rarely escaped in the morning without them all trying to delay him with one thing or another.

  ‘I hope Goldie’s brother doesn’t bring her back from London with a sore throat again,’ she said. ‘And it took months to remove the printer’s ink from her fingers and clothes. I sent a letter to Sebastian Groves, reminding him to make her wear the aprons I packed. Did you remember to give it to him?’

  Pansy had followed them out. ‘Be thankful Goldie arrived home with nothing worse. London is a disgusting place. The roads are so full of horse dung you’re compelled to lift your skirts to cross a road, and sweeps are employed to clear a path for you. Sometimes the air is so foul you can hardly breathe, and a thick yellow fog rises from the River Thames. It’s so vile and choking that everyone walks around with handkerchiefs clutched to their faces, in case they catch lung sickness from it.’

  Francis gazed at her, a slight frown upon his face. ‘I thought you enjoyed going to London with Aunt Prudence.’

  ‘Actually, it was easier to give in to her than oppose her. To be fair, I did enjoy it at first. The parties and dressing up were so exciting and new. But I was still a child then. Now it’s worn off and I find it such a bore. But Alder loves London and wants to live there. We’re having a big argument about it. He calls me a country bumpkin.’

  ‘My dear, you will have to learn to compromise.’

  ‘Why should it be me who does the compromising? Alder is so stubborn, and he wants his way all the time. Well, he shan’t get it with me. I’d much rather stay here with people I love.’

  All this was said indignantly. Pansy will never marry Alder, Siana suddenly thought, and her heart lightened.

  Pansy gave her father a kiss before dashing up the stairs, two at a time. She turned at the top. ‘Goodbye, dear Papa. Don’t work too hard today.’

  ‘Give my grandchildren a kiss from me. Tell Maryse I expect them to have a name by the time I get home.’

  ‘Don’t worry. I shall suggest so many names she will choose one, if just to shut me up,’ floated down at them.

  Francis gave her a wry smile. ‘I doubt if Prudence will ever make a lady out of her. And now, my dear, I must be off. I might be late home tonight.’

  ‘I know.’ Siana gave him a prolonged hug to help him on his way, then gave voice to the niggling little worry lingering in her head. ‘Do you think all is well with Goldie? She usually sends us a letter every week when she visits her brother.’

  ‘Of course it is. Sebastian would have written otherwise.’ A kiss landed on the end of her nose. ‘Stop worrying, Siana. Sebastian Groves is a responsible young man. He’s aware that Goldie has lived a different life than the one he can offer, and it will take time for them both to adjust. I’ve made enquiries, however, and am assured that he’s decent, honest and trustworthy. If I didn’t think so, I wouldn’t have allowed Goldie to visit him in the first place. Now, I must go. I have patients waiting.’

  Her worry now eased, she sent him off with a kiss. ‘Take care.’

  Had they but known it, things were far from well for Goldie in Sebastian Groves’s household.

  She’d been handed over to her brother by Francis and introduced to his wife, a handsome woman some six years older than Sebastian. Betty had a daughter from a previous marriage whose name was Alice.

  The friendliness had fled from the woman’s smile as soon as Francis had departed.

  The accommodation over the print shop, previously adequate for Goldie and Sebastian, was now too small. Alice had claimed the spare bedroom as her own. Similar in age and size, Alice lacked Goldie’s fair, rose-tinted complexion, her shining hair and her clear blue eyes. Alice looked grey. Her hair was lank, her skin dull and her eyes small, muddy and artful.

  ‘Don’t think I’m giving my bed up for you,’ she said sullenly at dinner that first night. ‘You’ll have to sleep on the floor.’

  ‘Goldie can share the bed with you,’ Sebastian told his stepdaughter, sounding none too pleased with her manners. ‘She’ll be standing in for Betty in the print shop during the day, so your ma can have a bit of a rest.’

  ‘You promised I could work there,’ Alice cried out immediately.

  ‘And so you can, but not yet. You’re not as good with your letters as Goldie. While she’s here you can help your ma with the housework.’

  Goldie helped her brother quite happily. Her skills were mostly used at the composite bench, reversing the characters as she arranged the metal type in the compositing sticks, then the sticks and illustration blocks into the iron chase, her fingers flying nimbly over the compartments to pick out letters and punctuation. Time passed quickly, for it was work that made her concentrate. It wasn’t long before it became second nature to her to read print back to front.

  She’d stand and watch her work reproduced by the letterpress in a variety of types. There were business cards, theatre posters and sometimes wanted posters, with pictures of criminals so fearsome, their faces made her shiver. She was careful to stand back when the heavy platten was lowered onto the tympan, in case she was careless and her fingers were caught between the two and crushed.

  The print shop was situated in a narrow street. They worked in a back room, the shop front the other side of a curtained doorway. The shop itself was a small space with a counter, samples of work and a variety of personal card styles in a glass cabinet attached to the wall.

  ‘A pity she isn’t a lad,’ Zeke, the journeyman who came in on a daily basis told her brother. ‘You could take her on as an apprentice, then.’

  Sebastian winked at her. ‘Perhaps I’ll take her on anyway. We could always cut yer hair off and call you Alfred, after the prince. You’d have to live here, though. But I daresay you’d rather be with your own brother than living in that big draughty house in Dorset and having to mind your manners all the time. We could give you your own bedroom under the shop counter.’

  When she gazed in uncertainty at him, he laughed. ‘Don’t worry, love, I won’t make you do nuthin’ you don’t want to do.’

  Goldie couldn’t help thinking about it, though. She’d been happy when she’d learned she had a blood relative after years of knowing she was unrelated to the Matheson family. Yet she loved them with all her heart, and Siana, the woman she thought of as her mamma, in particular. Siana often told her of the incredible story of how she’d been found.

  ‘I discovered you in the burnt-out shell of a cottage, starving and frightened and snuggled against the body of your dead mother. Your hair danced like flames on the wind and I knew the spirit of your mother had drawn me to you. She wanted you to be loved before her spirit could r
est. And fancy, it was the very cottage I grew up in,’ Siana had told her, making Goldie feel very special. ‘Life sometimes brings trials for us to face and we must face them with courage, as you did then, even though you were so very young. It strengthens us and helps us to trust the people we love.’

  But her mamma was like that. Siana made each one of them feel special. Sometimes she sensed things others didn’t, and although that was odd, she made it seem so natural. Goldie often wished she was the same.

  Goldie had grown to like her brother, Sebastian, who was easy-going and happy, and who sometimes reminded her of Josh Skinner with his cheery ways. However, she felt no special attachment to him. When the time arrived for her to choose, she knew she would not stay in London with him. Used to country life and her family in Dorset, she would miss them all too much, especially Daisy, who was more of a sister to her than Sebastian was a brother. She considered London to be smelly, noisy and confusing. It was such an easy place in which to get lost, with its back alleys, twists and turns.

  When she went upstairs that first night, it was to find that Betty and Alice had been through her trunk. The girl was parading in the gown and shoes she kept for best.

  ‘Why have you been through my things?’ Goldie said, outraged by the invasion of her privacy. She was dismayed when she saw that Alice was wearing the silver bangle Daisy had given to her for a Christmas present. ‘And that’s my bracelet. It has my name etched inside.’

  ‘What if it is?’ Betty snapped. ‘Alice was putting your stuff away in the cupboard, you ungrateful miss. She was just trying the dress on, wasn’t you, Alice dear?’

  Alice gave a sly smile. ‘Course I was. You don’t mind, do you? I ain’t never had anythin’ pretty to wear, like this. This bracelet’s fit for a toff to wear. Them people you live with . . . got plenty of money have they?’

  ‘I don’t know. My sister, Daisy, gave me that bracelet for Christmas.’

  Hands on hips, Alice swayed forward. ‘Sister, is it? Well, there’s a thing. That being the case, I’m your niece, so wotcher goin’ to buy me for Christmas, then, Auntie?’

  ‘I won’t be here for Christmas.’

  ‘Then I’ll keep the bracelet, shall I? It’s share and share alike around here and your sister can afford to buy you another.’

  ‘But what will I tell her?’

  ‘That it was snitched off yer arm by some dip in bad old London town. It’ll only be the truth.’

  ‘Shut yer trap,’ Betty snarled, jerking her head towards the door. ‘D’you want him to hear?’

  Alice poked Goldie in the chest with her finger. ‘This country bumpkin doesn’t know what a dip is, and if she says anythin’ I’ll thump her from here to next Monday, then back again. I might even set me uncle onto her. He’d give her what for.’

  Alice smiled falsely at Sebastian when he came in just then, saying swiftly, ‘Look what Goldie gave me, Pa.’

  ‘And a right princess you look in it, too,’ Sebastian said with a smile. ‘That’s real generous of you, Goldie. You’re a good girl. I’m glad you two are getting along.’

  Alice’s eyes narrowed warningly on her. Finding it impossible to protest now, and not wanting any trouble during her visit, Goldie pressed her lips tightly together.

  Alice smirked.

  Over the next few weeks, most of Goldie’s things gradually disappeared. When she dared to question it, Betty gave her a stinging slap across the face. ‘I had to sell them to pay for your keep, didn’t I? And don’t you tell that brother of yours, else it’ll be the worse for you.’

  With tears in her eyes and nursing her sore face, she whimpered, ‘I’ll tell my father when he comes for me.’

  Betty shrugged. ‘Tell him, then. He can keep you as far as I’m concerned. Her hands came over her stomach. ‘We won’t have room for you anyway. I’ve got a brat in the oven, though with a bit of luck it’ll not be there much longer.’

  Two days later Betty went out, returning pale and tired-looking. She went to her bed, leaving a grumbling Alice to do the housework.

  Later that night, when Alice and Goldie were in the living room, there was an argument between husband and wife in their bedroom.

  ‘What do you mean, you got rid of it?’ Sebastian yelled. ‘That was my infant, as well as yours.’

  ‘Well, I didn’t want it. Now it’s gone. It wasn’t your brat, anyway.’

  ‘If I’d known I never would’ve wed you. You took me in with your weeping widow act. I wouldn’t be surprised if you was a street slut with all the tricks you brought with you.’

  ‘What if I was a slut? My tricks kept you happy, didn’t they, and they cost you nuthin’?’

  ‘Except a roof over your heads and food in your stomachs.’

  ‘Well you did wed me. I’m your wife, and you’ll have to put up with me.’

  ‘Will I, by God? You tricked me into marriage as as far as I’m concerned. You can go back and keep house for your damned brother.’

  ‘I’m staying right here. I’m your wife and it’s your duty to look after me. I’m not having that sister of yours put before me and Alice, either. From now on, she can sleep under the shop counter.’

  ‘Don’t you tell me what to do in my own house. Goldie is worth ten of you and Alice. At least she earns her keep.’

  The sound of a slap was followed by an obscenity from Sebastian. ‘You’re a scheming witch, and you and your nasty little daughter can pack your things and get out – right now.’

  Betty began to scream and hurl abuse at him. There came the sound of a meaty blow followed by a crash – then silence.

  Looking scared, Alice picked up the heavy poker.

  ‘What are you going to do with that?’

  ‘I’m going to see what’s going on. I might need it to defend myself with. Coming?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Coward,’ Alice taunted.

  Petrified, Goldie sat there, listening to the floorboards creak as Alice crept away. A few moments late she heard Betty sob, followed by Alice’s voice. ‘He’s bleedin’. What the hell have you done?’

  ‘Crowned him with the chamber pot.’

  ‘Is he done for?’

  ‘I reckon he is. There’s blood on the floor.’

  ‘What about the girl?’

  ‘She heard everything.’

  ‘Then we’ll have to stop her going to the police. Give me that poker. We’ll give her a couple of good thumps and throw her in the river.’

  ‘Gawd, Ma, you’re not going to do fer her as well, are you? She’s connected to those posh folk. They’ll come lookin’ for her before too long.’

  ‘They can’t hang me twice, and it’s either her or me.’

  ‘We’ll chuck her out, then. If she sets up a hue and cry, we’ll tell the peelers she did it and ran away. She won’t last long on the streets by herself. If the police find her and she rats on us, we’ll just say she’s lying. By that time we’ll have found someone to witness for us and they’ll probably transport her. If she keeps quiet they’ll take her to the workhouse, and no harm done.’

  ‘What about her folks?’

  ‘We’ll send a letter from her every month, saying she’s all right, telling them she’s decided to stay in London a bit longer.’

  ‘They’ll know it’s not her writing.’

  ‘You can print it, and I’ll sign it by hand. I’ve been practising her signature. You never know when things like that might come in handy.’

  ‘You’re as artful as a cage of monkeys, you are,’ Betty said, admiration in her voice. ‘I’ll do it now, you go and watch the girl.’

  Goldie edged herself into a corner behind a chair, where she tried to make herself very small as she shook and shivered with fright while Alice stood over her, the poker clutched in her hand and a smirk on her face. Betty returned, thumping heavily up the stairs.

  Goldie, wondering if she should make a run for it and try and find her way back to Dorset, where she’d be safe, tried to scramble away.


  But she ran out of courage when Alice’s hand clamped down over her wrist, strong and wiry. ‘No you don’t, else I’ll thump you. Now, come outta there.’

  ‘I won’t tell, I promise,’ Goldie yelled as Alice began to drag her out. ‘I want my mamma and papa.’

  ‘Well there’s a pity, ’cause mamma and papa ain’t here. Instead, me and my ma are goin’ to take you on a tour of the city, yer ladyship.’

  ‘Not in them clothes, someone’ll have them off her,’ Betty said sharply. ‘It might as well be us, for they’ll fetch us in a bob or two.’

  Ten minutes later, Goldie found herself dressed in a ragged skirt and bodice. Alice threw her a dirty shawl. ‘Put that around your head, girl. Hang on tight to it if you want to keep it. Best to keep that hair of yours covered, too, else someone’ll take a cut-throat to it.’

  ‘It’s nice and long. We should cut it off and sell it to the wig-maker,’ Betty suggested.

  ‘We need something to attract the attention of the police. What better than that flaming, carroty hair of hers?’

  Betty laughed when Goldie put her hands over her hair. ‘If someone sees it, they’ll likely take her scalp as well.’

  ‘That’s her hard luck. I reckon she won’t be out there long before she gets caught by the police, for we’ll leave her nice and handy to them.’

  Tears trickled down Goldie’s cheeks as they bustled her out of the door. Betty and her daughter dragged her along dark alleys that turned this way and that. Although she tried to keep track of the twists and turns it became impossible, and soon she was lost. To complete her confusion they blindfolded her and took her on another long twisting route.

  There was a screeching sound as a gate opened on rusty hinges. ‘Sit there for a minute,’ Alice said, pushing her down onto a hard and cold surface. ‘We’re just going to check on something.’

  Betty and Alice went to an inn, from which Betty had once plied her trade.

  ‘How’s married life then, Betts?’ the landlord shouted out. ‘Has yer husband thrown you out on yer arse, yet?’

  ‘It beats lying on me back in the dirt, though its not quite so lucrative. No, my old man is working late and we’ve been over to visit me bruvver. We was on our way home and got thirsty. Pass me a pot of ale and a watered-down one for my girl, here.’