Chapter 4

Hester sat in the back of the black closed-in police van between the constable and the sergeant. She could see nothing, in fact only feel the jolt and sway of movement as they drove from Callandra’s house to wherever they were taking her. Her mind was in a senseless whirl. It was as if her head were full of noise and darkness. She could not grasp hold of any thought. The moment she had it, it was whipped away from her.

How had the pearl brooch come to be in her bag? Who could have put it there? Why? Mary had left it at home, she had said so. Why would anyone have wished Hester any harm? She had not had time to make an enemy, even if she were important enough to any of them.

The van came to a stop, but she could see nothing through the closed-in sides. A horse whinnied somewhere ahead, and a man swore. They jolted forward again. Was she merely the victim of some plot, some scheme or vengeance she knew nothing about? But what scheme? How could she defend herself? How could she prove any of it?

She glanced sideways at the sergeant, and saw only his rigid profile as he stared ahead of himself at the far wall of the van. The disgust in him was so palpable she could feel it like a chill in the air. She could understand it. It was contemptible to steal from a patient, an old lady, an invalid who trusted you totally.

It was on the tip of her tongue to say again that she had not taken it, but even as she drew breath, she knew it would be futile. They would expect her to deny it A thief would. It meant nothing.

The journey passed like a nightmare, and eventually they reached the police station, where she was taken into a quiet, drab room and formally charged with having stolen a pearl brooch belonging to her patient, Mrs. Mary Farraline, of Edinburgh, now deceased.

“I did not take it,” she said quietly.

Their faces were sad and scornful. No one made any answer at all. She was taken to the cells, pushed in gently with a hand in the small of her back, and before she had time to tum around the door was closed with a heavy clang and the bolt shot home.

The cell was about ten or eleven feet square, with a cot on one side and a wooden bench with a hole in it, which obviously served the calls of nature. There was a single high, barred window above the cot, the walls were whitewashed and the floor blackened stone of some smooth, seamless nature.

But the most surprising thing was that there were already three people in it, one an elderly woman of perhaps close to sixty, her hair unnaturally yellow, her skin putty-colored and curiously lifeless. She regarded Hester expressionlessly. The second occupant was very dark, with long loose hair that hung in a knotted mass. Her narrow face was handsome in its own way. Her eyes, so shadowed as to seem almost black, looked at Hester with growing suspicion. The third occupant was a child, not more than eight or nine years old, thin, dirty, and with raggedly cut hair so it was impossible to tell at a glance whether it was a boy or a girl. Clothes were little help, being a conglomeration of adult clothes shorn down to size, patched, and tied around with a length of twine.

“Well, you look like a dying duck in a thunderstorm,” the dark woman said critically. “First time, eh? What yer do? Thievin’?” Her sharp eyes took note of Hester’s borrowed dress. “Dollymop? You don’t look like no tail, not in that square-rigged thing!”

“What?” Hester was slow-witted, confused.

“You’ll never pull no gents dressed like that,” the woman said contemptuously. “No need to stand on your importance wi’ us, we’re all family.” Her eyes narrowed again. “Which you ain’t-are yer.” It was an accusation, not a question.

“ ‘Course she ain’t,” the older woman said wearily. “She don’t even understand yer, Doris.”

“Are you… related?” Hester asked slowly, including the child in her remark.

“No we ain’t related, yer dimwit!” The woman shook her head dismissively. “I mean we’re all professionals. Which you ain’t, are yer? Jus’ thought you’d try yer ‘and and yer got caught Watcha do… nick summink?”

“No. No, but they said I did.”

“Oh. Innocent, eh?” Her sneer was totally disbelieving. “In’t we all! Marge ‘ere didn’t do no abortions, did yer, Marge? And Tilly ‘ere didn’t spin no top. An’ o’ course I don’t keep no bawdy ‘ouse.” She put one hand on her hip. “I’m a decent, respectable woman, I am. Can I ‘elp it if some o’ me clients is bent?”

“What do you mean, ‘spin a top’?” Hester moved farther into the small cell and sat down on the cot, about two feet from the woman named Marge.

“You simple or summink?” Doris demanded. “Spin a top,” she said, and made a spiral movement with her fingers. “In’t yer never played wi’ a top when you was a kid? Yer must ‘ave seen one, less yer blind as well as daft.”

“You don’t go to jail for spinning tops.” Hester was beginning to get annoyed. The gratuitous insults were something she could fight against.

“Yer do if it gets in people’s way,” Doris said with a curl of her lip. “Don’t yer, Tilly, eh? Cheeky little sod.”

The child looked at her with wide eyes and nodded slowly.

“How old are you?” Hester asked her.

“Dunno,” Tilly said with indifference.

“Don’t be daft,” Doris said again. “She can’t count”

“I can so!” Tilly protested indignantly. “I know ‘ow many’s ten.”

“Yer in’t ten,” Doris said, dismissing the subject She looked back at Hester. “So what didn’t you steal then, my fine lady wot got caught at it?”

“A brooch with pearls in it,” Hester replied tartly. “What are you respectable ladies doing that brings you here?”

Doris smiled, showing stained teeth, strong and regular. They would have been beautiful had they been white. “Well, some of us was letting gentlemen pay for their pleasures, which is only fair, as I sees it. But there was one in me back room as was screevin’, and the pigs don’t like that, cos’ the briefs don’t like it.” She watched Hester’s confusion with evident complacency. “Or to put it fancy like, so your ladyship can understand it: they says I was taking money for fornication, and the geezer in the back room was writing recommendations and legal papers for people as wanted ‘em but couldn’t get ‘em the usual way. Very good wi’ a pen, is Tarn. Write anything for yer… deeds in property, wills, letters of authority, references o’ character. You name it, ‘e’ll write it, and takes a good lawyer to know the difference.”

“I see…”

“Do yer? Do yer now?” Her lip curled. “I don’t think yer see anything, yer stupid cow.”

“I see you in here the same as I am,” Hester said. “Which makes you just as stupid, except you’ve been here before. To do it twice takes a real art.”

Doris swore. Marge smiled mirthlessly. Tilly slunk backwards and crouched by the end of the cot, expecting a fight.

“You’ll get yours,” Doris said sullenly. “They’ll put yer somewhere like the ‘Steel’ down Cold Bath Fields for a few years, stitching all day till yer fingers bleed, eating slops, ‘ot all summer and cold all winter, and nobody ter talk ter wi’ yer fancy voice.”

Marge nodded. “That’s right,” she said dolefully. “Keep yer in silence, they do. No talking. An’ masks, too.”

“Masks?” Hester did not understand her.

“Masks,” Marge repeated, dragging her hand across her face. “Masks, so yer can’t see nobody’s phys.”

“Why?”

“Dunno. Just to make you feel worse, I suppose. So yer alone. Don’t learn nothing wicked from nobody else. It’s the new idea.”

Hester’s day was taking on more and more of the proportions of a nightmare. This last piece of information lent it a quality of total unreality. Hester tried to imagine troops of women in gray dresses, silent and masked, faceless, laboring, cold, filled with hatred and despair. In such a world, how could they be anything else? And children who spun tops in the street and got in people’s way. She was choked with a mixture of rage and pity, and the almost hysterical desire to escape. Her heart was beating high in her throat, and her knees were suddenly weak, even though she was sitting down. She could hardly have stood, even if she had wanted to and there had been any point.