Chapter 7
Seven
With the clouds gone and the sun free to blaze out and lighten the sky to a bright blue, the air began to warm up and lose the damp coldness which had made going outside so unpleasant these past two weeks.
The days of rain had turned the square’s park greener than ever, and the fullness of the trees and the banks of flowers added color to what had been a dull, drab world for so long.
Aurora was warm enough to be able to shake off a disapproving Hyacinth’s attempts to tuck a lap robe around her as they took their places in the carriage.
She eagerly settled herself into a corner where she could look through the glass windows.
Missie established (that was the only word Aurora could think of to describe the air with which her friend took her seat) herself onto the other end of the carriage’s padded bench and also waved off Hyacinth’s attempts to cover her with the robe.
Aurora knew from long experience it was because she didn’t wish to get her skirt crushed.
The handful of excursions they had been on since their arrival had been short trips, and only to the emporiums on Regent and Bond Streets and their tributaries.
As the carriage pulled out of the quietness of the square and turned eastward toward the City, they were hit by the noise and bustle of London’s West End coming to life.
Carriages and men on horseback vied with servants running errands and clerks hurrying to their offices.
Sellers of flowers and pasties and hot tea jostled each other as they claimed their respective patches of ground.
Their cries blended with the whinnying of horses, clatter of hooves, and grinding of carriage wheels over the stone paved streets.
Missie leaned back on her side of the carriage, eyes closed, trying to shut it all out.
Hyacinth sat stiff as a board on the seat facing the two young women, her white face pulled and strained, deliberately not looking at either of them.
Aurora kept her face pressed to the window, absorbing it all.
This was London! The cities of the North and Midlands were nothing compared to this.
The clear morning was aided by the warmth, which meant no braziers had been lit and no coal smoke choked the air with the fog that grew and swirled as evening approached, blinding those who ventured out.
Aurora hated that fog and was glad to be indoors when it appeared.
The colors and the freshness of the air this morning lifted her spirits as the coachman negotiated his way through the throng.
The traffic became heavier as they reached the Strand and continued their eastward route.
The blend of noise only became louder. Vendors shouted, whips cracked, and drivers cursed.
It was an expensive carriage, and well sprung.
Regardless, the constant stopping and starting caused it to rock, leading the women to grip the edges of their seats to keep from being jostled about inside.
Tearing her eyes away from the window, Aurora opened her guidebook and began to follow their progress onto Fleet Street, occasionally peering outside to see if she could glimpse a landmark highlighted there.
And then they were at St. Paul’s, which loomed over them.
“It says here,” she began, “the dome of St. Paul’s reaches—”
“Oh, do stop with your horrid book, Rorie. Are we there yet? If I had known it would be such an age, I would never have consented.”
Aurora ignored her friend’s fussing. She was sure, once they arrived, her mood would come round.
The speed at which Missie had agreed to the expedition in the first place was proof positive she was as bored as Aurora.
Nevertheless, she attempted to soothe her.
“It will be soon, Missie. We are in the City now. How close the buildings are here! What a shame we shall not see the Bank of England; it would be a slight detour, but no.” She noted Missie’s rebellious face.
“The Monument to the Great Fire should be somewhere around here and then, oh, yes, Missie. There it is. The Tower. You can see the great walls. See?”
In her eagerness, Aurora was pointing with her finger. A disapproving sound, something between a snort and the grinding of teeth (How does she do that? wondered Aurora) from Hyacinth caused her to quickly bring her hand down.
But it was enough to catch her friend’s attention again and keep it until the carriage was heading over the moat and into the grounds of the Tower.
Truth to tell, even Missie was silenced by the forbidding solidity of heavy Norman stonework, which declared in no uncertain terms that it was a fortress and not a pleasure palace.
Even for someone who pointedly refused to recognize actual history, there was no escaping the weight of the stories and events of the past which infused the outer walls and the inner buildings.
A stiffly bowing Yeoman Warder opened the door and helped the three women out. On being told they were there to see the bears, he began to lead them to the particular tower which housed them, regaling the ladies with stories of famous prisoners and beheadings and tragedy and heartbreak en route.
“Poor Sir Walter Raleigh. Poor, poor Anne Boleyn,” Aurora murmured sympathetically under her breath and, to Missie, “It is better than a storybook, or a romance.” And then they were there.
“Oh, Missie.” Aurora completely forgot about her guidebook and its description of how the Royal Menagerie had been founded in the thirteenth century and filled with an array of exotic animals.
Well, once upon a time. The picture she had carried in her mind’s eye of something monumental and splendid, filled with all manner of strutting beasts, evaporated as she stared around her.
“Oh, my,” she said with dismay.
What might have once been an impressive zoo had been reduced to a handful of animals, thin and mangey, listlessly lying or pacing around their tiny cages in the large open space they faced.
There were at least two lions she could identify, and several bears were quickly spotted.
The latter were shuffling around in shackles, occasionally raising a snout upward in what appeared to be a futile prayer to get some food.
A half-hearted attempt had been made to clean the floor of their cages to reduce the odor of rotten food or excrement, but stains of what she did not even wish to begin to guess were evident everywhere.
Aurora brought a handkerchief up in front of her nose.
Hyacinth had nearly covered her entire face with hers.
Missie appeared untouched, only raising a pristine handkerchief up to dab at her face with a delicate hand.
It was not the first time in her life, Aurora sadly reflected, that imagination and reality were not at all the same things. She did hope Missie would not be too cross with her for what appeared to be turning into a disappointing and, yes, well, disagreeable experience.