Chapter 14 #2
‘Come on,’ Miriam urged. ‘It’s time to go and I want to get out before the crush, or we’ll never get home.’
‘I’ve seen someone I know.’ Jenny pointed down to where Miss Salisbury was sitting.
‘In one of the courtesan boxes?’ Miriam’s eyes widened in interest. ‘Show me who you mean!’
Jenny had never heard the term before, but was familiar with Miriam’s meaning.
High-class courtesans were known to hire a box at the theatres to entertain clients.
She was about to contradict Miriam, because that couldn’t be why Miss Salisbury was there, but she hesitated.
Doubts crept into her mind. Miss Salisbury wasn’t married, and her hand had been resting on her companion’s leg in a very inappropriate manner.
And Miss Salisbury had definitely been engaging in enthusiastic lovemaking when Jenny and Gwen had visited.
‘I’m sure my acquaintance is not a courtesan,’ she said. Questions that Jenny would rather not contemplate crept into her mind, regarding how Uncle Conrad knew her. It was probably more likely that he was not her only possible choice of future husband.
‘Well, whether she is or isn’t, what does that matter? I’d still like to see who you mean,’ Miriam retorted, gathering her stole around her neck. ‘We all have to do what we can to survive, don’t we?’
‘Yes, but not that,’ Jenny said. She looked back to where Miss Salisbury had been, but the box was now empty.
Miriam looked impatient. ‘There are worse ways of paying the rent.’
‘I suppose so,’ Jenny mumbled. Would Miriam rather Jenny actually sold her body instead of selling the tincture? She wasn’t sure she wanted to discover the answer.
They made their way back home, alighting from the horse-drawn bus near a street vendor, his cart laden with roasted chestnuts.
He called out to passers-by, and Jenny and Miriam both stopped as the warm aroma punctuated the scents of the coal smoke and horses.
They strolled over and joined the queue, waiting at the bank of the canal for the paper bags full of steaming hot nuts.
As they neared the head of the queue, a volley of uncharacteristically alarmed voices began to shout around them.
‘What’s that fuss? What’s going on over there?’ Miriam asked. She walked to the bank of the canal, where there appeared to be a riot happening. Jenny followed reluctantly.
‘If there’s trouble, why do we want to get involved?’ she muttered under her breath.
‘I just want to see,’ Miriam said, rolling her eyes and dancing towards the crowd. Then she gasped and put her hand over her mouth. ‘Oh, my goodness!’
Jenny peered around her in time to see two men in a small craft heaving a large bundle onto the bank, aided by a third man on the bank who held a large hook. It looked like a sack until one pale arm flopped out to the side.
Jenny retched. She swallowed quickly before the bile that she tasted in the back of her throat erupted.
The sack was actually a shabby, grey cloak and the bundle was a body.
Even in the dim evening light, she could see the body was a woman’s – and clearly dead.
The man who had hauled her off the boat pulled back the cloak.
The woman was younger than Jenny or Miriam – and her face was smoothed by bloating.
Red hair that was obviously fake made her pale face even paler. She looked like a China doll.
Jenny turned her head away and reached for Miriam’s hand. ‘Who do you think she is?’
‘Some poor streetwalker,’ Miriam muttered, her voice thick with horror.
A small crowd was gathering, and the cries of shock or anger threatened to draw a larger one.
‘Or a poor scrap whose husband took out his temper on her,’ growled a weary-looking woman who had joined their side.
‘Or a suicide.’ This was said by a heavy-set man with a dog on a length of rope. The dog keened and pulled towards the body, but was pulled roughly back.
‘Or all three,’ said the first woman.
‘Maybe it was an accident. She might have fallen in the dark?’ Jenny said. Her throat grew tight and she felt the sting of tears. Speculating about the poor woman’s end, and the audience assigning so many dark explanations, was dreadful.
Miriam put her arm around Jenny’s waist and drew her closer. ‘Whatever happened, it is a horrible way to go,’ she said through her gritted teeth. ‘Poor girl.’
The two boatmen pushed the limp arm back under the cloak to give her a little more decency. Now that the drama was over and the dead woman was no longer visible, people moved away, Jenny and Miriam included. The chestnut seller began shouting his wares again, hoping to attract the crowd back.
‘What will happen to her?’ Jenny asked.
The man with the dog spoke. ‘She’ll be taken to the morgue. Someone may claim her, most likely not, and she’ll cost the city for her burial.’ He scowled, ‘Even a pauper’s grave doesn’t come for free.’
The cost to the ratepayers was clearly more of a concern to him than the poor woman. Jenny turned to him, intending to chastise him, but Miriam tugged her sleeve.
‘If there’s any item that might identify her, then that will help, but I imagine any money she had will have fallen to the bottom of the canal, if you know what I mean.’
Miriam raised an eyebrow meaningfully and Jenny understood that by the canal bottom, she meant the pockets of the two men who had found her.
The mudlarks and boatmen would have seen it as some sort of grisly ‘finder’s fee’ for their efforts, but anything too identifiable would be handed in, lest the threat of being accused of theft, or worse, murder, fell on their shoulders.
The discovery had thrown a dark cloud over the evening, and when Miriam suggested they fortified themselves with a drink, Jenny agreed, and they found a pub close by.
Other people who had witnessed the grim discovery had the same idea, and the room was crowded but they found a table close to the piano.
They regretted it almost immediately as the instrument was badly in need of tuning and the pianist struck up a bawdy sea shanty about drowning sailors and mermaids, which felt inappropriate under the circumstances.
It had struck Jenny before that women of a class lower than the one she’d been born and raised in appeared to have more freedom; because here and there were groups of women accompanied by men, or individuals sitting with men and unchaperoned by matrons.
Of course, being thirty, Jenny and Miriam had attained the status of matrons themselves, which was rather a depressing thought.
They ordered two glasses of porter and a plate of chopped liver and onions, which Miriam swore Jenny would enjoy, though Jenny withheld judgement.
Her stomach was knotted from the horrible sight and her shoulders felt tight with tension.
When the plate was delivered, she decided she would rather remain hungry than eat the greyish lumps swimming in equally grey gravy.
Miriam poked the liver around her plate, clearly indifferent towards it, too.
‘This hasn’t been the nicest end to the evening. Would you like to meet again tomorrow? I will treat us to tea and cake,’ Jenny said.
‘You paid for the tickets to the theatre and now you’re suggesting a treat. It isn’t your birthday, is it? Please tell me I haven’t missed that.’
‘No, my birthday is in October, and I don’t really celebrate that in any case, because Uncle Conrad doesn’t like cake. I fancied doing something frivolous, to put my earnings to good use, rather than something sensible.’
‘Your earnings?’ Miriam frowned and rested her fork down. From the look on her face Jenny realised she had blundered horribly. ‘What have you been doing to earn money? Please tell me you aren’t hosting the salons to sell your opium tonic for women.’