A Victorian Demon’s Guide to London, Love, and Being a Hero (Time for Monsters)

Polly

“A righteous woman should have no fear. I didn’t lay a hand on Mr. Bunson. I tried to stop him from laying a hand on me.” My voice is a soft, firm whisper as I tug my skirts into place. “I can walk freely into the market nearest Mr. Springton’s lodgings and get eggs, bacon, potatoes, cabbage, flour, salt... Everything.”

There is nothing in his larder but pots and pans. I found an old dress in the room where I slept—a dress far too fine for a servant to wear, but I will risk wearing it to the market and back. Just as soon as I gather my nerve to go.

Because even if the righteous shouldn’t walk in fear... I’m terrified that Mr. Bunson (the other Mr. Bunson) will find me and... I don’t know what. Something horrible that leaves me dead or wishing I was.

I wonder if Mr. Springton has an account at the market like Mr. Bunson does? If he doesn’t, I need money, and I don’t have any. And if I don’t have any money, I can’t make him a nice breakfast to show that I can cook.

If I find money lying about and take it, I’ll have to leave a note to explain that I’ve only gone to the market—and my writing is so poor, I’m not sure Mr. Springton would understand it. What if he thinks I’m a common thief after he saved me?

My thoughts are all in a whirling muddle—and the faces of Jasper and Anna and Henry start weaving in. Who will look after them? What if it’s one of the little ones who sees the body in the alley? Their poor little eyes! Their poor, sweet, young hearts shouldn’t see such things or know such things. They’ve already had to live through so many hardships if they’ve landed at Bunson’s!

And damn this dress! I break off buttoning it with a sob. It must have been left by some rich woman with servants because no woman’s arms bend all the way up and around to reach the three buttons in the very middle.

“! You—you’re awake.”

I whirl. Mr. Springton is in my doorway, a furtive, stealthy look about him—and it’s not hard to guess why. He’s having second thoughts about hiring some possible strumpet off the street in the dark—and now he finds me looking as if I’m about to steal one of his guests’ dresses.

“Oh, Mr. Springton! I wanted you to sleep longer, sir, and I am going to the market to fetch things because the larder is empty, completely empty, sir, but I don’t know if you’ve an account or if I should write a note if I found money left for the household shopping, sir, and then—this dress. It was in this room, and I... Mr. Bunson has a younger brother who is often in the countryside, sir, but if he should know—a-and if he should see me out today—”

Mr. Springton cocks his head, dark curly hair falling over arched eyebrows. His lips form an amused little quirk that makes me very aware that he’s in my room and the back of my dress is undone.

“I can’t reach the buttons in the middle,” I whimper.

“I can.” He strides to me.

Mr. Bunson had an oily voice. Mr. Springton has an oily step, but I don’t mind it. It glides. He moves like dragging your fingers through water.

Push, pull, push, pull, push, pull, and tug. I’m done.

“It looks better on you than it ever did on her,” he says with satisfaction, standing back and admiring me like I’m some painting. “It’s the crack of dawn, .”

“Marketing is best done early, sir! Fresher goods, less spoiled bits.”

“Hm. All right. What will you buy?”

“Oh, anything you tell me to, sir.”

“I’m... I’m not one to fuss over the menu. Tell me, what do you think I’d like to eat?”

For some reason, the way he speaks and the tone of his voice as he says those words make my stomach go hot and shaky. He looks at me with that same burning gaze I first saw last night, and everything in me prickles. Fear and something else race through me. “Is it some foreign dish, sir? I don’t know any, but I will learn them for you, sir. I’ll learn anything you like.”

“Anything I like?”

I know there could be a trap in those words, but I think I’ve lived in a trap most of my life. I swallow and nod. “Anything you like to eat, sir, I’ll learn to make it for you.”

“.” He reaches his hand out—and then snatches it back and fumbles in his pocket. “Here. I’ll learn to eat what you make, and you learn to cook what I ask. It’s a deal.”

He shoves coins into my hand, more than Mr. Bunson would give me for a week for twenty or thirty children for just one man. “That’s too much!”

“Buy plenty.”

Buy plenty...

I wonder if I can slip a few turnips and apples to someone to take to Bunson’s for me?

But first— “Do you have soap?”

“That I do have. In great quantity.”

“Since you’re up, I’ll start the laundry to soak, sir, and then I’ll do the marketing, and you’ll still have a nice early breakfast of eggs, bacon, toast, tomatoes, mushrooms, and kippers. Is that all right, sir?”

Mr. Springton looks at me in silence for a moment, then sighs. “Well, it is certainly not what I had planned to eat for breakfast, but oddly enough, I’m looking forward to it.”

I BUY MORE FOOD THAN I can carry, and a boy delivers what I can’t, riding behind me on a bicycle with a basket strapped to the back.

“What have you bought?”

Mr. Springton must not care for sleep. Perhaps he’s one of those gentlemen who does not need to work. He pounces on the shopping bundles with curiosity, an oversized cat sniffing the meat wrapped in paper, picking it up and turning it over in his hands.

“Sir, I’ll see to everything, please. Oh. You need more ice for the icebox. This is ever so posh, Mr. Springton. I’ve seen them, but not in the children’s home.” I look at the little box in the kitchen, one that stands as high as my waist and has Harrods stamped in gold in the dark brown wood. Inside, metal shelves wait, one thick top compartment for a block of ice to go on top and for cool air to drift down and keep the rest cold.

“Ice? Yes. Of course. I’m sorry, the last housekeeper or maid must have failed to request that deliveries continue after their—departure.”

I think Mr. Springton is lonely—and probably hungry. No rich gentleman comes in to watch his maid put away the shopping. Ooh. I suppose I’m the housekeeper! Me, a housekeeper at only twenty! “Am I the housekeeper, sir? Or the maid? Or cook?”

He looks at me, holding the beef kidneys I’ve got to soak and peel if I’m to make steak and kidney pie for his tea. Or supper. I suppose he’ll have supper. People in the upper classes do, that’s what Kitty used to say, and Kitty said she’d grown up in a posh house until her mother ran off with the husband of the house and the angry wife sent her to Bunson’s, even though she was twelve and could easily have kept on as a maid.

“You’re the housekeeper, I suppose,” he muses in that slow, elegant voice. I don’t like it. There’s something dangerous about it, but...

Well, I suppose angels are dangerous, too, and Jesus most surely was, what with Him being able to send a whole herd of swine over the cliff into the sea.

And part of me likes it in a way that’s very wrong.

I must always remember that he’s my employer and a rich man, and he would never have any honorable intentions towards someone like me unless those intentions related to having his shirts washed and his supper made.

“Do you have tea or supper, sir?” I gasp out.

“What’s the difference?” Sleek eyebrows slide high on his noble forehead.

Not a wrinkle on that forehead, and yet he has white hair mixed in among the black. I wonder how old he is?

“? Is there a difference between those two meals?”

“Don’t you have them where you’re from, sir? Begging your pardon. I mean— Ah. How long have you lived in London, sir, if I might ask?”

“I’ve lived in London for a year. My home was very informal about meals. Catch as catch can, I believe I’ve heard the English say.”

“Tea is earlier and heavier, sir, but the food is often simpler. People like me have tea. People like you have supper,” I explain.

“Oh. Well. We can’t have that. There’s only the two of us here. It would be a shame to make two meals. Let’s have supper together, .”

I swallow.

His smile shows that he’s teasing me. Playing with me. He knows it’s wrong, and yet he means it.

I think.

“I will eat at the same time as you, sir,” I say, turning with a curtsey.

“No. You will dine with me. Sitting at the table with me. I am lonely, and I would like you to join me for my meals.”

That iron grip is back on my arm, and I’m forced to face him. His eyes are cold and hungry, and I know I should be afraid.

Why aren’t I more afraid?

“Yes.”

He drops my hand and pokes the kidneys again. “Tell me all of these foods, . Please.”

My lower lip wobbles as I list them off. I don’t wish I was back in Bunson’s clutches, but I wish... I wish I understood Mr. Springton better.

I name things as I sit them on the small wooden workspace in the flat’s long, narrow kitchen. “Kidneys. Steak. Bacon. Eggs. Bread. Flour—I can make my own bread, sir, and I will from now on, but we needed it for breakfast. Milk, potatoes, tomatoes, mushrooms, carrots, onions, spring onion, lettuce, liver, apples, butter, cheese, lard, salt, pepper, sage, rosemary, parsley, thyme.” I stop. I’ve never used the last few items, but I don’t want him to know that. They smell good. I can tell what things go with what else by smell.

“I want the steak, the kidneys, and the liver. They smell the best.”

I smile a little to myself.

“What is it?”

“I cook by scent, too, sir. There is something heavenly about a good bit of steak and kidney pie. I had it. Once. I know how to make it. I used to make it for Mr. Bunson and Mr. Bunson all the time.”

Mr. Springton looks perplexed for just a moment. “There are two Mr. Bunsons. That’s rather confusing.”

“Eric Bunson and Robert Bunson, sir, but I daren’t call them that.”

“Which one did I remove?” he asks, polishing his nails against his thumb.

In the dark, they almost look like claws, like a dog's claws, short, sharp, and black.

Need to open the shutters in here.

“Robert. The older one.”

“Then I’ve done his brother a kindness. He’ll get the other’s holdings, isn’t that the way it works?”

“Often, sir.”

“Sir. No one ever calls me sir in that rather sweet, respectful way that you have, .”

I gasp when his hand catches my chin and squeezes my cheeks, pushing my lips out a little. For a second, I think he’s going to kiss me. Force me. Like Bunson.

“Why is your mouth so pretty? No other hu—woman that I’ve met has such a pleasing mouth.”

I whimper a little, and he lets me go. “Mr. Springton, I won’t tell the police, sir. But if you want me for bedding, I’m not... I’m not.” I can’t explain the rest. I’m not going to let myself be bullied into being his housekeeper with my body as some sort of pudding, even if he saved my life and gave me a job.

But there’s the tiniest bit of my brain that jumps with excitement when he grabs me. Smiles at me. Looks at me like I’m the only good thing he’s ever seen. He talks to me in a way that matches, not like Mr. Bunson, who would talk down to everyone, even his own brother.

“I see. Well. What if I only did things you liked, ? Would that be acceptable?” His smile stretches.

I rub my cheek once and drop my hand. “Yes, sir, that’s acceptable.”

What did I just agree to?

“Would you like to have supper with me? I promise I can be quite convivial.” A laugh that rings in the empty flat. The whole house is silent. It occurs to me that I haven’t heard or seen a speck of movement in this place, and I wonder if he owns all of it, not just this flat.

“I don’t know what that word means, sir.”

“It means I could be a fine friend if I’m so inclined.”

“I don’t think we could be friends, sir.”

“Ah, well. Probably not. But a dinner companion is not a friend, necessarily. It’s more of someone to keep you from being bored while you dine. You have no servants to talk to, and I have no guests, save you. You are my guest, you are my housekeeper. I invite you to sit at my table and talk to me of London. Will you accept? Would you like that?”

Would I like to sit with a fine, handsome gentleman and simply talk to him—and look at him? Maybe learn more big words and learn about far-off places where they don’t have tea and supper or steak and kidney pie? Where the men save the women and tell them their mouths are pretty, but that they will only do what pleases her?

Yes. “I would like that, sir, thank you.”

And again, I find myself wondering—what have I agreed to?