‘Hello, Ma,’ Belle said from her position on her knees scrubbing the floor. ‘We’re giving it a spring-clean, and not before time, it’s filthy.’
‘We’ll leave the rug outside till we’ve finished,’ Mog added.
‘You should give the girls some instruction on cleaning,’ Annie addressed Mog tartly. ‘Their rooms are like rats’ nests, they do no more than make the bed. It’s not good enough.’
‘That’s not good for business,’ Mog replied. ‘No point in keeping the parlour beautiful, then taking a gentleman into a midden.’
Belle was still looking at her mother as Mog was speaking, and she saw Annie’s eyes widen in shock at the remark about taking gentlemen into a midden. Mog saw the look too and blanched, and as Belle glanced from one to the other she realized her mother hadn’t wanted her to know the gentlemen went to the girls’ rooms.
Belle had learned long ago that if she wanted to keep on the right side of her mother it was best to pretend she was too dumb to understand much of what was said around her. ‘I could spring-clean the girls’ rooms,’ she offered. ‘I could do one each day and get them to help.’
‘Let her do it,’ Mog said. ‘She likes to keep busy.’
For a few seconds Annie just stood there, looking down at Mog and Belle, not saying a word. It seemed to Belle she was trying to find a way of dealing with the information which had slipped out.
‘A good idea. She can make a start on Millie’s today because that’s the worst. I doubt Millie will be much help though, she can’t stick at anything for long.’
By half past one, with the parlour now gleaming and smelling fresh, Belle embarked on cleaning Millie’s room at the top of the house. Millie had gone out somewhere with Sally, and the other girls were in one of their rooms downstairs. Belle had had a huge bowl of soup for dinner, followed by treacle tart, and the appeal of spring-cleaning was waning fast. But it had just started to snow so she couldn’t go out, and Millie’s room was the warmest in the house as all the heat from the many fires wafted up there.
Millie held a unique position in the house. Although she was much older than all the other girls, around twenty-eight, she was still outstandingly lovely, with silky, long blonde hair, wide blue eyes and a soft, childlike mouth. Being slow-witted, she had everyone’s affection: indeed it was perhaps because of her childlike, naive nature that everyone cared about her.
Millie was also the only girl remaining from the days when the Countess ran the house. Belle sensed that both Annie and Mog tolerated her laziness because of a shared past. It had also been said on many an occasion that she was very popular with the gentlemen because of her sweet nature.
Belle was equally fond of Millie. She liked her sunny, friendly temperament, and her kindness and generosity. She often gave Belle little presents – a few beads, a hair ribbon or some chocolates – and would hug her tight if she was hurt or sad.
Millie’s room reflected her childlike nature. She had cut up chocolate box lids with pictures of kittens and puppies and tacked them to the walls. She had tied a lace parasol to a chair back with a length of pink ribbon and beneath it sat several dolls. Some were rag dolls in gaudy cotton dresses which looked as if she might have made them herself. But there was also a rather grand doll with a porcelain face, wavy blonde hair and a pink satin gown.
As Belle looked around she saw that Millie had ten times more possessions than any of the other girls: china ornaments, silver-backed hairbrushes, a wooden toy train, a cuckoo clock that didn’t work, and many ribbon-trimmed cushions.
Belle got to work, making the big brass bed first, then covering it with a dust sheet before piling on to it as much of the furniture and other items as she could.
The floor was thick with dust, and the only rug a small one which could be shaken from the window. Once she’d cleaned out the fire grate and swept and washed the floor, she laid a fire and lit it to dry the floor more quickly.
An hour later she was almost finished, shelves cleaned and dusted, mirrors and windows gleaming, all Millie’s possessions arranged carefully again.
It was dark now and still snowing hard. Looking out of the window on to Jake’s Court, Belle saw the snow had transformed it. Seven Dials was notorious in London for having the most brothels, gambling dens, public houses and other low dives within a square mile. With the Covent Garden market starting its day in the middle of the night just as the drinkers and gamblers were going home to their beds, there was never a silent time. It was always being said that the slums in London would soon be a thing of the past, and it was true that many such areas were being cleared, but no one in the government took into account where the residents of a cleared slum would go. At present they were flocking here, finding a modicum of shelter with hundreds of other desperate men, women and children in the many courts, fetid alleys and narrow winding lanes. Even to Belle, who had never known anywhere else, it was a dirty, stinking, noisy place, and she could understand how terrifying it must be to anyone who stumbled into it by accident when they’d taken a wrong turning from the neighbouring smart streets.
But now, in the yellow glow of the gaslight, the Court looked enchanted and beautiful under a thick blanket of snow. It was also deserted, a very unusual occurrence, and Belle guessed the house would remain very quiet tonight.
The room was very warm now and, with the curtains closed and just the light of the fire and the gaslight turned down low, it was so cosy that Belle couldn’t resist lying down on the bed for a rest. She expected Millie to come in at any minute, and be thrilled to find her room looking so nice.
She felt herself growing drowsy and attempted to rouse herself to go back downstairs, but she was too warm and comfortable to move.
The sound of feet on the stairs woke her with a start. She had no idea what the time was, but the fire was almost out, which suggested it was now evening and she’d been asleep a long time. Her stomach lurched with anxiety, for the rule that she was never to go upstairs after five was one of Annie’s strictest. Belle could still remember the beating she’d got at six years old for daring to disobey it.
It was just blind panic which made her jump up, straighten the covers and slip underneath the bed. Once there, she told herself that if Millie was alone she could explain why she was there and get her to smuggle her back to the kitchen without anyone else seeing her.
But her heart sank as the door opened and Millie came in, followed by a man. Millie turned up the gaslight and lit a couple of candles too. From her position beneath the bed, Belle could see no more than the lower half of Millie’s pale blue dress with its lace flounces, and the man’s dark brown trousers and side-buttoned boots.
‘Why did you pretend not to be here last week when I called?’ the man asked. His voice was gruff and he sounded cross.
‘I wasn’t here,’ Millie replied. ‘I had a night off and went to see my aunt.’
‘Well, I’ve paid for the whole night with you tonight,’ he said.
Belle’s first reaction was shock that he’d paid to share Millie’s room. But then her stomach lurched when she realized that meant she was trapped. How was she going to get out? She couldn’t possibly stay here, but then she couldn’t possibly come out from under the bed, apologize for intruding and then leave, either.
‘The whole night,’ Millie repeated, and it sounded as if she was as horrified by the idea as Belle was.
There was silence then, and Belle guessed they must be kissing as they were standing close together. She could hear heavy breathing and the rustling of clothes and all at once Millie’s dress was tossed to the floor just a few inches away from Belle. A petticoat fluttered down too, and then the man’s boots and trousers came off, and it finally dawned on Belle exactly what a whore was. Men paid whores so they could do that thing they were only supposed to do to their wives to have children. She couldn’t understand why she hadn’t worked that one out before. But now she had, it sickened her to think that Jimmy and other people she knew believed she was allowing men to do that to her too.
Millie was down to her chemise, stockings and white lace-trimmed drawers. The man had removed his jacket along with his trousers and boots, but he’d kept his shirt on and it came down almost to his knees, exposing very muscular, hairy legs.
‘Let me put some more coal on the fire, it’s nearly out,’ Millie said suddenly. As she bent over to put the shovel into the coal bucket, Belle thought of trying to signal to her so she’d get the man to leave the room, but before she could even attempt it, the man moved and grabbed Millie around the waist from behind, pulling her drawers off so roughly that they ripped.
Belle was so shocked that she felt her heart might stop beating. From her position she could still only see the couple from the waist down, but that was far too much. She didn’t want to see Millie’s plump, dimpled thighs and buttocks, or the man forcing her to bend over so he could push his cock into her. Belle had only seen a couple of cocks in her life, and they had belonged to small boys being cleaned up by their mothers under a street pump. But this man’s had to be seven or eight inches long and as firm as a barber’s pole. She could see by the whiteness of Millie’s knuckles as she supported herself on the fireplace that he was hurting her.
‘That’s better, my lovely,’ he said breathlessly as he hammered into her. ‘You love it, don’t you?’
Belle closed her eyes to shut out the sight but heard Millie reply that she loved it more than anything else in the world. This was clearly a lie, for when Belle opened her eyes again Millie had moved enough so she could see her face sideways on, and it was strained with pain.
Suddenly Belle understood why the girls so often looked sullen and dejected. She had been mystified by this for the parties sounded so much fun. But clearly they didn’t get a jolly time in the parlour for long. Instead they were whisked away to their rooms to be subjected to this kind of ordeal.
As the man bent down further over Millie’s back, Belle saw his face in profile. He had dark hair, slightly grey at the temples, and a thick, military-style moustache. His nose was quite prominent, with a slight hook. She thought he might be around thirty-two, though she always found it hard to guess men’s ages.
The couple moved on to the bed then, and the twanging sound of the springs just inches from her head, and the foul things he was saying to Millie, were horrible. Worse still, she could see them reflected in the mirror above the fireplace. Not their faces, just from their necks down to their knees. He had a hairy, very bony backside and he was holding on to Millie’s knees and seemed to be forcing them further apart so he could drive himself further into her.
It went on and on remorselessly, the slapping sound of flesh against flesh, squeaking springs, grunting, swearing and panting. From time to time Millie would cry out in pain – at one point she even urged him to stop – but he carried on regardless.
Belle realized that this was what ‘fucking’ was. She heard the word daily out on the streets where it was mostly a swear word – some men used it in every sentence they uttered – but she had heard it used in relation to men and women too, and now she understood this was its real meaning.
She hated being witness to it and was tempted to take a chance and crawl out from under the bed to the door. But common sense told her there would be hell to pay if she did, from the man and Annie too. She wondered as well why Mog hadn’t noticed she was missing and come looking for her.
Just when she thought Millie’s ordeal was never going to end, all at once the man appeared to be reaching some kind of crescendo, for he was panting furiously and moving even faster. Then it stopped abruptly and he rolled off Millie and sank on to the mattress beside her.
‘Wasn’t that splendid?’ he asked.
‘Oh yes, dear,’ Millie replied, her voice so weak and feeble it was hardly there at all.
‘So let’s have no more of this shilly-shallying,’ he said. ‘You’ll leave here tomorrow morning and come with me to Kent?’
‘I can’t,’ she said weakly. ‘Annie won’t let me go, she needs me here.’
‘Rubbish! Whores are ten a penny, and most far younger than you. And why did you lie to me about last week?’
His voice, which had never been tender with her, was now becoming positively menacing.
‘I didn’t lie to you,’ she said.
‘You did. You never have a night off from here and you have no aunt. You purposely avoided me last time I came. And you never intended to come and live with me.’
Millie denied it. Then a sharp crack punctuated by a cry revealed that he’d hit her. ‘That will show you what happens when I’m lied to,’ he hissed at her.
‘I avoided you because of this,’ she cried out. ‘Why do you hurt me when you say you want me to live with you?’
‘A whore must expect such things,’ he said, as if surprised by her protest. ‘Besides, you love me fucking you.’
All at once Millie jumped off the bed and Belle saw she was wearing nothing but a little lace-trimmed camisole, her big soft breasts billowing over the top, and her abundant pubic hair showing beneath. ‘I don’t love it at all. I pretend to because that’s what I’m supposed to do,’ she said defiantly.
Belle instinctively knew such a statement was not going to please this man, and that Millie might even be in danger from him. She willed her to run to the door and get out now while she could.
But before the girl could even think of fleeing, his arm reached out to grab her and he hauled her back to him on the bed.
‘You bitch,’ he snarled at her. ‘You led me on with your sweet talk, fed me lies and more lies. I’ve made plans for us, and now you say you were pretending!’
‘Us girls are told to be nice to our customers,’ Millie argued.
He hit her again and this time she yelped with pain and begged him to let her go.
‘I’ll let you go all right,’ he responded. ‘Straight to the devil where you belong.’
Just the crazed way he spoke suggested to Belle that he was going to kill Millie. She so much wanted to be brave, to get out from under the bed and whack him over the head with the chamberpot before alerting Annie to what was going on. But she was frozen with fear and unable to move a muscle.