The Whitechapel Girl Read online

  ‘You protest too much, sir,’ she countered. ‘Do you have a secret of your own to hide, perhaps? Maybe you pay visits to the brides yourself.’

  ‘Get her out of here,’ the man bellowed, his face drained of the blood which moments before had reddened his cheeks.

  ‘Does female emancipation frighten you so very much?’ she asked, a challenging smile playing round her lips.

  ‘Go and join the other whores.’ The offended man’s eyes bulged with fury and he raised his hand as if to slap her. ‘You’re no better than the rest of them.’

  With no thought for the risk to her balance, the elderly woman set about the man with her cane. ‘Threaten an old woman, would you? Take that, you so-called Christian. You know nothing of the way of God. Nor of women.’

  While several men surged forward to help their fellow philanthropist in his struggle, Sophia hugged her aching sides, almost beside herself with laughter, delighted that the meeting was proving so amusing after all.

  Next to her, Celia sat absolutely still, save for her head which she turned back and forth to catch each development in the amazing spectacle which was unfolding around her. The whole place was in uproar. The woman in grey who had opened the meeting only added to the general melee by re-mounting the platform and leading the front few rows in a rousing chorus of ‘Shall We Gather at the River?’.

  Sophia turned her attention to the man who had earlier gone to her rescue by throwing out the prostitute. She accepted sweetly as he offered her his protection against the growing rowdiness of the meeting, but would have been furious if she had known what she was missing while she smiled into his pale grey eyes. Having decided to leave the hall before any damage was done to his person, Stedgely walked swiftly past the front row and, as he did so, he discreetly pressed a note into the astonished Celia’s hand.

  Celia unfolded the paper and read the hastily composed words. They invited her to join him in private prayer for the unfortunates who chose to corrupt their daughters into walking the streets of the night.

  She glanced to her left. Satisfied that Sophia – who was even now accepting her new companion’s help to clamber on to her chair so she could get a decent view of events – would not miss her, Celia slipped away to follow the departing figure of Stedgely.

  Roland Stedgely opened the door to his luxurious set of rooms which were connected to the League’s meeting hall, and let Celia into his inner sanctum. She passed by him with a shush of apricot watered silk, but even the sound of her expensive skirts was not able to veil the drumming of her pulse beating in her ears.

  ‘It has been remarked to me, Miss Taylor,’ he began. ‘Or should I say Miss Tressing?’

  Celia opened her mouth to speak but he raised his hand authoritatively to silence her.

  ‘Do not be surprised that I know your true name,’ Stedgely continued. ‘I know many things about many people.’

  Celia bowed her head to hide her embarrassment at her lie being exposed then whispered: ‘Do you know anything about the disease which the brides pass on, sir? And of the consequences for those they infect?’

  Stedgely’s dry-lipped mouth cracked into a leering smile. ‘You need have no worries about such things, Miss Tressing. Our work does not expose us to such risks. Syphilis is not a problem for the likes of us.’

  Celia felt the flush of embarrassment creeping up from her throat.

  ‘It has been remarked,’ he went on, seeming not to notice her discomfort, ‘that you have become a regular, and most enthusiastic, attender of our meetings.’

  Celia looked up at him through her lashes. ‘This is my fourth meeting.’

  ‘And I have been watching you, Miss Tressing. I know that you can be a power of good in our battle.’

  ‘Me?’ Celia could barely raise her voice above a cracked whisper.

  ‘Yes, Celia. You.’ His thin, scrawny hand reached out to her, the desiccated old man’s flesh of his fingertips catching on the silk of her sleeve. ‘You are a most handsome young woman,’ he said. His voice began to quaver in the way it did when he was preaching. ‘You are a girl who could surely stir the souls of even non-believers.’

  Celia grew alarmed as his breath began to come in short wheezing rasps – a sound so like that which her father made when he… But no, she thought frantically, he couldn’t be like that. Then a new horror as Stedgely fell to his knees, threw his arms round her ankles and began mewling and moaning at her feet.

  ‘We can do so much together, Celia,’ he groaned from the floor, ‘but I need your strength.’ He lifted his head and clawed at her skirts.

  Celia was horrified to see the trail of spittle running from the corner of his old, cracked mouth.

  ‘I need your strength, Celia,’ he whimpered. ‘Your youth. Help me.’ Then, without any warning, he thrust his hand up under her skirts.

  Until that moment Celia had felt herself without power, unable to speak or move. But the fury she now felt gave her all the power she needed. She drew back her hand and brought it swinging round in an arc, striking him directly above his ear. She had contact with his head for just a moment, but his straggly grey hair left a greasiness on her palm which, even in her terror, made her shudder with disgust.

  She took a long, slow breath and spoke to him as calmly as she could manage. ‘Take your hand from me,’ she insisted. ‘And get up from your knees and open the door.’

  Stedgely collapsed sideways on to the richly carpeted floor and rolled into a tight foetal ball, hugging his knees. ‘You don’t understand,’ he whined. ‘It is an honour I am bestowing upon you. Only a few are admitted to my inner circle.’

  ‘Stand up,’ demanded Celia, her fear now completely supplanted by cool anger. ‘I can hear someone outside.’

  With astonishing agility Stedgely sprang to his feet and rushed to unlock the door.

  As he pulled it open Celia saw the hymn-singing lady in grey standing in the doorway. No longer a composed, tight-lipped figure, her wiry, unravelling locks flopped about her face.

  ‘Someone summoned a police constable and he has called for reinforcements,’ she cried wildly. ‘Oh Reverend Stedgely, please, come and do something.’

  The woman at first appeared to be completely blind to anyone but Stedgely, but as soon as he had pushed past her to return to the affray, the woman strode over to the still stunned Celia.

  ‘Do not think you are in any way special, young woman,’ she said contemptuously. ‘There are those who have been here before you, and there are others who will be here in the future. Being chosen is an accident of nature – your youth and lack of disfigurement is what makes you different: nothing else.’

  Celia shook her head in horrified incredulity. ‘You think I succumbed to him? You think I let him touch me?’ Celia raised her chin and looked down her fine, aristocratic nose at the now rather uneasy woman in grey. ‘I understand exactly what goes on here now, and I am appalled. You think you are, but you are no better than that girl they ejected from the hall this evening.’

  Celia pushed past the open-mouthed woman and went out of a side door which opened on to a long corridor. As the door closed behind her, she lifted her skirt and ran as fast as her layers of petticoats would allow, almost skidding to a halt as she realised that she had re-entered the hall by a back door. She skipped nimbly around the loudly arguing groups of League members and police officers, managing to avoid Sophia, who anyway seemed happily preoccupied with the man whose acquaintance she had so recently made and, with a final dash for the double doors, found herself in the freedom of the street outside.

  She leant against the sooty brick wall to regain her breath, her chest heaving with the unaccustomed exertion of running.

  A plane tree, planted in the wide pavement, was just coming into leaf. She looked up through the branches into the deepening blue of the evening sky and saw a beady-eyed blackbird balancing on a slender twig, going through its last trills and warbles of the day. Something suddenly made it take fright and it flew hasti
ly away from whatever danger it had seen.

  As Celia watched the bird winging away from her, tears flowed uncontrollably down her cheeks. With a great deal of effort, she pushed herself away from the wall and began walking slowly along the road in the direction of Belgravia. She could no longer trust anyone but herself, she thought, the despair almost choking her. She was alone in the world and, no matter what, she would have to make up her own mind about what was right and what was wrong.

  Chapter 10

  ‘All these fancy frocks and posh manners,’ she sighed. ‘I wish me old mates…’

  ‘Friends,’ Jacob corrected her as he came into the bedroom. He looked over Ettie’s shoulder at her reflection in the cheval looking-glass. ‘You’re pleased with the seamstress’s work?’ he asked.

  ‘My old friends won’t know me,’ said Ettie, twirling around the room admiring her new outfit. ‘Yellow and grey striped satin, eh? Who’d have thought Ettie Wilkins would ever wear something like this?’

  ‘Anyone who had really looked at you, Ettie, could have seen past your poverty, and could have recognised you for what you really are – a beautiful, clever and wonderful girl.’

  ‘You’ve quite turned my head, Jacob Protsky,’ she said coquettishly as she walked over to him and put her hand on his arm. ‘You’ll have me actually believing all your pretty words before you know it.’

  Jacob didn’t move away from her, but neither did he respond to her touch.

  ‘In these couple of weeks you’ve shown me how I can be a lady, Jacob. And I feel as good as anyone now. Thank you.’

  ‘You always were as good as anyone, Ettie. It was just that you weren’t aware of it before.’

  ‘It really, I don’t know, it amazes me, that a geezer…’ she laughed happily. ‘A gentleman, I mean, should sort of like women like you do. It’s kind of, well, funny, don’t yer think?’

  ‘Funny? In what way funny?’

  ‘To like us, not just to want to, you know, do it with us.’

  ‘I learnt many things whilst I was in France, Ettie. Many funny ideas, as you put it.’

  She turned back to her reflection in the mirror and primped at her hair. ‘Yer never did tell me, Jacob,’ she said matter-of-factly. ‘Why did yer leave Paris if it was so good?’

  ‘“You”, Ettie, “you”. Not “yer”. Your voice, concentrate.’

  ‘Just who d’yer think I bloody am?’ she demanded, angry at his continual evasion. ‘A sodding princess?’

  ‘Princess or not, Ettie, we have work to do. We are becoming dilatory, we must proceed with our plan of action.’

  ‘If you like,’ Ettie said.

  ‘You sound reluctant,’ said Jacob.

  ‘If that means I’m fed up with being taught table-knocking, ecto-bloody-plasm appearances, trances and all the other rotten tricks of the trade, then yes, I bleed’n am reluctant.’

  He took out his gold half-Hunter watch from his waistcoat pocket. ‘Oh, Ettie, I’m sorry. It’s almost five o’clock. We’ve been working for hours. I’ve been very selfish. Shall we go for a walk? Or would you like some tea?’

  Ettie put her hands on her hips and narrowed her eyes at the man she found fascinatingly handsome, but whose face was now crumpled with concern for her. ‘You know just how to get round a girl, don’t you, Jacob? You’re such a bloody good actor. I must be bonkers, but come on then, let’s get on with it. What do you want me to do next?’

  ‘Get into the box,’ he said, his enthusiasm returning immediately. He drew back the muslin curtain covering the front of the three-sided cabinet which stood in the corner of the bedroom and indicated that she should enter. ‘Mind your head. You’re a bit taller than my last assistant.’

  ‘Oh, is that right? Who was she then?’

  She should have known better than to have asked. As usual, he did the trick he did best of all: that of changing the subject whenever he chose not to answer her questions.

  ‘Is your mother tall?’ he asked, friendly and kind, helping her into the seat at the back of the black painted box.

  ‘Not especially,’ she answered tersely, settling back.

  ‘Your father, then?’

  She laughed. ‘Who knows? He could have been a bleed’n giant for all I know. Or care.’

  ‘Look,’ he said, concentrating on fiddling with a small brass eyelet on the side of the box. ‘This is where I fix the string that allows you to move the spirits around the room.’

  ‘But that’s so obvious. They’ll see it’s all done with tricks.’

  ‘Oh no. The spirits can only commune in the dark, Ettie. Our earth light hurts their ethereal bodies. Watch.’ He turned the gaslights down to the faintest glow and began mumbling incomprehensible phrases. Then in a loud, clear voice he called on the spirit world to join them, there in the room. ‘I can feel them with us, Ettie,’ he moaned, and began panting alarmingly. ‘Yes! Yes! Oh yes! They’re here.’

  Ettie could see both his hands on the table, in full view, but she could also see a hand – not Jacob’s – reaching up from under the table and waving its frightful fingers in her direction.

  She screamed.

  ‘Please! No!’ Jacob groaned as though he were in great pain. ‘The spirits will be afraid. Oh,’ he moaned. ‘Too late. Too late. They have departed. They have left us.’ His voice took on a saddened, disappointed tone. ‘Please, turn up the lights, Ettie.’

  Ettie took a deep breath and levered herself out of the box. Feeling her way across the room and only turning her back on the hideous apparition of the hand at the last possible moment, she turned up the lamps to shed their full light. Then she swallowed hard and turned her wide-eyed gaze back to the table where the vile thing rested. She burst out in loud, relieved laughter.

  ‘You’re a bloody… Aw, I dunno, but you are one.’

  Jacob was still sitting at the table, waggling his hands high above his head. One of his legs was also raised so that his foot rested on the table top. And there, clear for her to see, was the spirit hand, a luridly coloured rubber confection, which he had slipped neatly over the toe of his boot.

  ‘Easy,’ he said grinning, ‘all you have to do is cross your leg and bend your knee, and,’ he lowered his voice to a slow, dramatic growl, ‘up pops the spirit.’ He resumed his normal, persuasively gentle tone. ‘And putting a shoe on your hand and brushing it over the sitters’ heads in the dark gives a wonderful impression of flying spirits.’

  She laughed until tears rolled down her cheeks. She hadn’t admitted it, even to herself, but she was falling in love with him: a rogue. But such a handsome one; such a charming, funny, kind, con man.

  * * *

  ‘And now,’ trilled Lou. ‘The first ever performance in England of the World Famous Silent Beauty!’

  ‘Well I ain’t never heard nothing about her,’ shouted a wag from the back of the penny gaff.

  ‘How yer gonna hear about someone who can’t talk? Yer dozy great nit,’ Lou hollered back at him.

  Satisfied that she had confused the heckler enough to silence him, Lou flipped her train to one side, treated the front row to a slow wink, and then wiggled away behind the curtain, leaving the makeshift stage clear for Jacob and Ettie.

  Within moments of taking their first, introductory bow, Professor Protsky and the Silent Beauty had the audience totally captivated, and Ettie was enjoying every moment of being on the stage, just as Jacob had promised her she would when she had said she could not go on in front of everyone. Now each face in the audience was turned eagerly towards her, hoping above hope that the spirits might have a message just for them. It didn’t matter whether the message was good news of a fortune to come, or a warning of possible danger: the fact they were singled out was all that mattered, exactly as Jacob had said.

  During the next few weeks, they worked almost non-stop. By night they played the penny gaffs, with Jacob always making sure that they didn’t set up too close to her old haunts: he wanted her to make a clean break with her old life. And
, during the day, they worked on practising the more sophisticated patter and tricks for a new act intended for a very different audience to that of the East End. They laboured ceaselessly. Sometimes they would return from a penny gaff and fall asleep in their clothes, but still they worked.

  Jacob taught her all about melodrama, the importance of fanciful rituals and the use of ambiguity. He showed her how someone in an audience would always respond to a message – so long as it came from a spirit with a common enough name, of course.

  Even as they ate their breakfast he instructed her.

  ‘People will always hear what they want to hear, Ettie. Remember only that which matters to them,’ he said, slicing at the cold mutton that Mrs Hawkins had set out for them the night before. ‘And they simply forget any message without significance for them. Believe me, we all only hear what we want to.’

  Ettie was doubtful. ‘I know people can be daft, but they aren’t that stupid, Jacob,’ she said, taking the plate he held out to her.

  ‘Oh, but they are,’ said Jacob, joining her at the table. ‘We see it every night in the gaffs.’

  ‘Yeah, well, the gaffs are one thing, but this new act…’

  ‘Not only the gaffs, Ettie. Think of those crowds who flocked for the Jubilee,’ he said, swallowing a mouthful of meat. ‘They forgot, they chose to forget, for that day how much they resented the privilege of the crown. They ignored the discomfort as they stood and waited for the parade to pass by. Took no note of the stink of the bodies pushing against them, as though none of it existed. Forgot even the calls they had made for so long for the monarchy to be destroyed once and for all. And now they only recall the wonder of seeing their beloved Victoria. People act like stupid fools, Ettie. No, worse, they are self-deluding fools.’

  ‘It’s all right for you to say all that, Jacob, but I ain’t the bloody Queen, now am I? Girls like me are a penny a dozen. We don’t ever really get out of the East End.’ She concentrated on her plate as she spoke, as though it held all the answers to her confusion. ‘See, no matter what you do, it’ll always be in me. Always. The people who you’re aiming at with all this new stuff, they’ll never believe that I’m anything special. Not little Ettie Wilkins from Whitechapel.’