Chapter 8 #4
Mark stood silently, one hand still on the door handle, watching the exchange like he was an explorer attempting to decipher a newly discovered language.
“Of course not.” Mrs. Finley blinked, as if not sure she’d been chastised. “It’s an adventure to be sure.” Her voice dropped to a conspiratorial near-whisper. “I shan’t tell my husband where we went today, though. He takes my safety so seriously.”
Mark frowned and looked to Ellen as if to confirm the subtext embedded in the conversation.
Mrs. Chisom, distracted by whatever freight driver she’d paid to deliver the crates, finally turned back to re-enter the conversation. “This is our first time donating to Dr. Hart’s charity work.”
Ellen nodded. “We’re very excited to see what you’ve brought.
Amelia, Mrs. Daugherty, and I are always running out of supplies, as this community needs so much.
” She paused, hunting for words. “I know Amelia has great plans for the dispensary. If we are able to secure funding, she plans to purchase a wheeled chair and other equipment. Perhaps your quilting group can consider that in the future.”
Mrs. Chisom sniffed, causing her front to rise and fall like the tide.
“Perhaps. I’ve found, however, that we must be very cautious with our pounds and shillings because of the propensity for the poor to misspend.
So many have a great love for gin, as I’m sure you well know.
We’d be loath to inadvertently enable the able-bodied to remain paupers rather than seeking independent labor. ”
Mark looked distinctly uncomfortable.
Ellen cocked her head and folded her arms. “Oh?”
Mrs. Chisom either didn’t notice Ellen’s frostiness or didn’t care.
“It is our Christian duty to care for the widows and orphans among us, of course. But we try to focus our efforts on the deserving poor. Those who would rise above the sin in their nature and overcome their poverty with virtue, rather than paupers who would continue their path of iniquity.”
Mrs. Chisom, it seemed, could rival a vicar when it came to sermonizing.
Ellen took pity on Mark. She turned to him. “Would you please help bring the boxes inside?”
He slipped by Mrs. Chisom and Mrs. Finley with a nod.
“Good idea,” Mrs. Chisom commended crisply, as though she had the moral rectitude to approve or disapprove of everyone’s behavior. “We’d hate for it to be stolen from your own steps.”
Ellen was tempted to toss the woman back out into the street.
We need baby bottles, she reminded herself.
Just finish this up and then Amelia can handle any other interactions with the woman.
I never need see her again. She forced a bright smile.
“Well, I thank you both for the donations. Amelia sends her regrets that she could not thank you in person. I am delighted to open the boxes and discover what you’ve gathered for us. ”
Mrs. Finley beamed like a child who’d received praise for winning a spelling bee.
Mrs. Chisom gave a sharp nod. “We included some literature with the items. I’d request that you pass the pamphlets out with the donations.”
“I’d be happy to do so,” Ellen lied cheerfully. Anything to get them to leave.
Mark coughed behind the women, a small wooden crate in his arms.
Mrs. Finley squeaked and moved out of the way.
He slipped past Mrs. Chisom, angling to get by, and set the first crate on the floor beside the counter, then silently went back outside for the second box.
“I shall be reaching back out to Dr. Hart in a few weeks to see how donations were distributed,” Mrs. Chisom said, stern as a governess. But between her front and her bustle, she made the perfect, fashionable S shape when sideways, which made for a rather bewildering experience for Ellen.
Ellen fought to keep her expression pleasant. “We have the utmost respect for people who donate to our work, as well as the people who will benefit from these items. I assure you they will be put to good use immediately.”
Mark silently walked past with the second crate.
Mrs. Chisom sniffed. “Good. I suppose I must trust that the dispensary has its own system of weeding out those who would take advantage from the deserving.”
“We have it well in hand,” Ellen got out, her hands balling into fists behind her crossed arms. “Have a safe journey home.” I’m not sure the bottles are worth all this.
Mrs. Finley trotted outside, clearly looking forward to being safe and snug in her own home in time for tea. She was ready for her adventure to end.
Mrs. Chisom paused on the threshold, bustle swaying, and turned back to Ellen.
Ellen stifled a groan. Of course this woman was the type who had to have the last word.
“People like us, who have been blessed with good fortune, must tend to the downtrodden, even if the straits they find themselves in are of their own making.” She bestowed a smile upon Ellen, magnanimous as a saint.
“My friends and I are happy to help Dr. Hart’s cause. ”
They are poor because of weak character, she’d practically spelled out.
Therefore, I am virtuous because my husband is a banker and I have three silk dresses, four plump children, gaslights in the house we own, and the leisure time to perform good deeds.
She turned, her bosom jutting like the prow of a magnificent ship, and left.
Ellen had the sudden, childish urge to stick her tongue out at the woman’s back as she stepped out of view of the open door.
Mark shouldered in with the third box. “Last one,” he said unnecessarily and shut the door with a kick of his foot.
Ellen watched her husband set the crate down with the others and dust off his hands, then brush lingering sawdust from his coat sleeves.
Her lips quirked upward, imagining the look on Mrs. Chisom’s face if she discovered the man who’d moved her boxes was an aristocrat, the son of a baron.
After the lecture about strong moral fiber and the strong implication of its connection to good fortune, she’d no doubt struggle to gracefully admit that Mark—and perhaps Ellen by extension—must have the most noble character of all.
Dust motes and sawdust drifted around Mark. He folded his arms, a facsimile of Ellen. “Well,” he said, imbuing the word with a wealth of meaning.
“Well.” Ellen bit her lip to hide a smile when she met his gaze.
“I believe I’ve just listened to enough preaching to last for several Sundays,” he commented. “No church required.”
Ellen nearly snorted. “They’re not all as…forceful, I suppose, as Mrs. Chisom.”
“She’s certainly deciphered the workings of the world and where everyone fits,” Mark continued.
“And places herself near the top,” Ellen muttered. She looked down at the boxes. “As priggish as she was, the donations are usually worth the bother.”
In the silence that followed, Mark mused, “I didn’t think women of such piety were supposed to have such large bubbies.”
Ellen gasped. “Mark!” It was so unlike her studious husband to say something like that. At least to another woman. To his wife. She remembered suddenly he’d spent the better half of a decade in the Navy.
Mark flashed a wicked grin. “Come now. You were thinking it, too.”
Ellen sniffed, the soul of propriety. “I thought no such thing. And it is below our dignity to comment on someone’s body, especially if they cannot help it.” But then she ruined it with a laugh.
Mark grinned back, surprise and delight filling his eyes, as if he’d won a prize he’d striven for but secret thought he’d never grasp.
“Oh I wasn’t critiquing her bosom, just her self-righteousness.
” After another moment of silence, this one far more tense and filled with…
something, Ellen wasn’t sure what, Mark spoke again. “Should we go through it?”
Ellen mentally shook herself from wondering what Mark thought about her bubbies. She knelt beside the crates, moving her skirt out of the way. “Might as well.”
The door flounced open, and Ellen’s first reaction was horror that Mrs. Chisom had returned to expound more on virtue. Thankfully, it was Amelia.
“Did I miss them?” she asked, pulling the hat off her head and tossing it into the nearest chair.
“You’re lucky you did,” Ellen retorted.
It was Mark’s turn to snort beside her.
Mrs. Chisom wasn’t entirely wrong about wanting to be careful who and how they helped. For example, Ellen would—and had—willingly handed over sixpence to Tina O’Malley, but she’d never give Seamus so much as a ha’penny.
“Ah, one of those types?” Amelia asked knowingly, stepping forward to kneel beside Ellen. “Let’s see what’s in here.”
Mark stood to the side, arms folded, content to silently watch and lend a hand if requested.