Chapter 6 #3
“I’m not a thief!” Tamsin grasped Mrs. Brown’s wrist and tried to loosen the woman’s hold on her hair. “Let go!”
Her scalp stung and her eyes had begun to water, but Mrs. Brown’s grip only tightened. Tamsin kicked her shin, and Mrs. Brown twisted her hair more violently.
“Mrs. Brown!” Mama was calling over and over. “She didn’t steal anything. I gave her food bound for the rubbish bin.”
Mr. Brown burst into the room and began to bellow. “What is the meaning of this?”
Everyone was yelling at once. Tamsin’s mother was repeating that the food was destined for the rubbish bin.
Mrs. Brown was screaming about catching the thief.
Mr. Brown kept hollering that he wouldn’t tolerate thievery.
Tamsin was slapping madly at Mrs. Brown’s hand.
Finally, she grabbed hold and dug her nails in, causing her employer to release her with a curse.
Tamsin barely straightened before the blow to her head forced her to bend over again.
Mrs. Brown yanked Tamsin’s apron, tore it half off her body, and held up the apple triumphantly. “Aha!”
Tamsin straightened and wiped the tears from her cheeks. Molly, Peggy, and George stood in the doorway with wide eyes. Mr. Brown turned to look at Tamsin. “What do you have to say for yourself, girl?”
“I didn’t steal it. My mother saved it from a plate that came back.”
Mama rushed to stand at her side. “That’s right. Tamsin was so hungry, and it seemed a waste to put it in the rubbish—”
“That’s a likely story,” Mrs. Brown said. “But I’ve been noticing things gone missing. At night we have five apples and then in the morning only four. Now I know where they’ve gone.”
“I didn’t steal from you,” Tamsin said, straightening her shoulders.
“Then how do you explain the missing food?” Mrs. Brown demanded.
“I don’t know.” Tamsin glanced at the Brown children crowded in the doorway. “I saw Molly eating an apple yesterday morning. Maybe she took it.”
Molly gasped. “Liar!”
“I’m not—” Tamsin’s head snapped to the side from the force of the slap.
“How dare you accuse my child, you filthy, lying slattern!” She raised her hand again, but this time Mama reached out with her one arm and caught Mrs. Brown’s hand before it could come down on Tamsin.
Her mother had become accustomed to doing everything with that one arm, and it had grown strong from use. She easily held Mrs. Brown in check.
“Touch her again,” Mama said, “and I’ll blacken your eye.” She released Mrs. Brown with a push, sending the woman tumbling to the floor and landing on her backside.
Mrs. Brown looked completely shocked for a moment, then she opened her mouth and began to wail. “Constable!” she cried. “Call the magistrate! I’ve been attacked!”
“Are you hurt, Tamsin?” Mama asked, taking one shoulder in her hand.
“Mama, you shouldn’t have done that.”
Her mother blew out a breath. “I should have done it a long time ago.”
Molly and Peggy attempted to help their mother to her feet while Mr. Brown stomped over to Tamsin and her mother.
“You have exactly a quarter hour to pack your things and get out. And if you take even one thing that’s not yours, I will call the magistrate and have you thrown in jail.
And don’t even think of coming back and begging for your position. ”
“Oh, no danger of that,” Mama said. “I’ll be happy never to see you again.
If there’s any justice in this world, you’ll be cursed with boils and die a miserable death for what you did to my little ones.
” She took Tamsin’s hand, and the two marched out of the kitchen with heads held high.
They continued marching right up to their small chamber.
Once the door was closed, her mother leaned against it and burst into tears. “What have I done?” Mama whispered.
Tamsin put her arms around her mother. “Everything will work out.” Tamsin didn’t believe this, not for a moment. Inside, she was panicking. Where would they sleep tonight? How would she keep her mother safe and fed?
“I should have held my temper,” Mama said, looking at Tamsin with eyes red from tears. “But I couldn’t allow that woman to touch you one more time. It’s bad enough that awful man sold my children, but I won’t allow them to starve you and beat you. And to be accused of stealing! Enough was enough.”
“Thank you, Mama.” Tamsin put her hand on her mother’s cheek. “Thank you for always loving me.”
“I love you more than anything else in this world, Tamsin. I only hope my actions today haven’t made everything worse.”
“Ten minutes left!” Mr. Brown bellowed up the stairs.
“Hurry! Get Mr. Kildare’s coat,” her mother ordered, jumping into action.
“Lay it on the floor. We’ll pile all our clothes and belongings on top of it and tie it up like a sack.
” Tamsin did as was ordered while her mother threw their few belongings on top of it.
While her mother did a last check of the chamber, Tamsin tied a rope around the coat and heaved it over her shoulder.
At the last moment, she tucked Kildare’s handkerchief, which still smelled faintly of oranges and bergamot, down the front of her dress.
Mama and Tamsin walked down the stairs, past the Brown family, and out the back door.
Mrs. Brown slammed the door, almost catching the hem of Tamsin’s skirt in the frame.
Tamsin led her mother out of the yard and to the street in front of the building next door.
She looked up the street and back down it, hoping some magical solution to the problem of where to go now would appear.
“Do you think if we went to Papa’s family we could stay with them?
” Tamsin asked. When her father had died after being impressed by the British Navy, Tamsin and her mother had lived with her aunt and uncle for several years before her mother had remarried.
“I went to them when I lost my arm,” her mother said.
Tamsin turned to her. “I never knew that.”
“Because there was nothing to tell. Your aunt was ill, and her husband said he couldn’t feed four more mouths.
The children, your cousins, didn’t remember me.
They were too young when we were there before.
If they wouldn’t take us in then, they won’t take us in all these years later.
And your stepfather didn’t have any family in London.
I think his people are from the north, but I don’t know how to begin looking for them. ”
“We can’t leave London without Charlie and Joanna,” Tamsin said.
“There we are in agreement, though how we’ll ever pay to buy their freedom now is beyond me.”
“Me too,” Tamsin said quietly.
Across the street, Big John stepped out of the pawnshop, shook out a rug, narrowed his eyes at the two of them, and went back inside.
Her mother was staring up at the sky. “It looks like rain. Maybe we should see if we can find a spot under Strand Bridge.”
Tamsin was no stranger to sleeping under bridges.
Before her mother had secured their positions at Brown’s Coffee Shop, they’d slept under just about every bridge in London.
Sometimes they could afford a few days at a filthy boardinghouse, but when they couldn’t, they huddled together in the only free shelter they knew of.
“Let’s go,” Tamsin said. But instead of walking on their side of the street, she took her mother’s hand and crossed the street, so they’d have to pass in front of the pawnshop. Big John was at the window. Tamsin slowed her step.
“What are you doing?” her mother asked.
“Hoping for a miracle,” Tamsin murmured just as the door to the pawnshop opened.
“Wot’s this then?” Big John asked, hands on his hips.
“Good afternoon, Mr. Price,” her mother said, using Big John’s surname. She was the only one Tamsin had ever heard call him by that name. Everyone else called him Big John.
“Where are ye off to? Don’t ye ’ave work to do?”
“Brown terminated our employment,” Tamsin told him, pausing and hefting her pack to the other shoulder.
Big John narrowed his eyes. “Why would ’e do that?”
“Because I’d had enough of his abuse,” Mama said.
Tamsin nodded. “You should have seen her, Big John. Mrs. Brown was about to beat me, and my mother stepped in front of me and pushed that old hag right onto her arse.”
Big John gave her mother an incredulous look.
“I don’t think it happened quite like that.” Mama blushed.
Big John glanced at Tamsin for confirmation. She nodded to indicate it had happened exactly like that.
“I never did like the way they treated ye,” Big John said. “Selling yer children without even asking.”
“And pocketing the money,” Tamsin added.
“Wot now?” Big John asked.
“Oh, we’ll get by,” her mother said and pushed Tamsin to keep walking. Tamsin dug her heels in.
“Hopefully, it’s not too late to find a place under Strand Bridge for the night.” Tamsin made a show of peering up at the sky. “Looks like rain.”
“Ain’t ye got family who will take ye in?” Big John asked.
“We’re fine,” her mother said, pushing Tamsin more forcefully. Tamsin held her ground.
“No. We don’t have anyone.” She hefted the pack to her other shoulder. “This is all we have in the world.”
“Wot about a boarding ’ouse? I paid ye for them baubles ye brought me.”
“I gave the blunt to Snoozer for Charlie and Joanna.”
“Thank you for your kindness, Mr. Price,” her mother said. “We’ll be on our way.” She started walking, and Tamsin gave Big John a last look then hurried to follow her mother. They walked about ten steps, Tamsin losing hope with every single one, but finally Big John shouted.
“Wait.”
Tamsin spun around. “Yes?”
“Good day, Mr. Price,” her mother said, walking on.
“Ye can stay ’ere tonight,” Big John said.
“Thank you!” Tamsin said.
“No, thank you,” her mother said. “We couldn’t impose on you.”
“Yes, we could,” Tamsin said.
“Tamsin!” Mama hissed.
Tamsin turned to her. “Mama, he’s offering us a place to sleep and maybe a meal. He can afford it. It’s better than under the bridge.”
“I don’t want charity.”