Girl of Shadows (9 page)

Even while jammed in an oleander bush sweating with terror, Harrie felt envious. Bella Jackson was an evil, evil woman,
and
a bonded convict, and here she was swanning about Sydney Town virtually free, wearing beautiful clothes no doubt paid for by her new rich husband. She noted with satisfaction, however, that Bella’s scarf lent the outfit a slightly common air.

The other woman — pleasant-looking, smartly dressed and somewhere in her forties — said, ‘Thank you so much, Mrs Shand. I’m so sorry my husband couldn’t be here today, but I know he’ll be
delighted
when he returns. It’s been a pleasure to do business with you.’

Harrie stifled a gasp. But Bella Jackson was a whoremonger! Was this woman condoning her husband’s infidelity? Or, even worse, facilitating it?

Bella replied graciously, ‘The pleasure has been all mine, Mrs Clayton. And I’m sure Dr Clayton will be satisfied. As you know, I procure only the very highest quality. Thank you for the tea and cake. Most delicious. I’ll be in contact when the time comes.’

They smiled, exchanged limp handshakes, the woman went inside again and Bella walked down the little path, opened the gate and passed through, closed it behind her, and climbed into her curricle. And just sat there.

Harrie grimaced and closed her eyes.

‘You can come out now,’ Bella said loudly, ‘you cowering little squirrel.’

Harrie stayed where she was, face on fire, blood pounding in her head, so frightened she thought she might be sick.

A moment later the driver cracked his whip and the curricle clattered off.

Harrie waited until the sound had faded completely, then, branch by branch, disentangled herself from the oleander and crept out of Mrs Clayton’s yard. Bloody,
bloody
hell. She lived in complete terror of encountering the rotten woman, she really did, but why did it have to be today? And would seeing Harrie remind Bella of what she knew about them? Of course it would. Would there be a demand soon? Or would it be the police knocking on the Barretts’ door early one morning?

God, she couldn’t
bear
this! Her mind felt so tormented and jagged and …
brittle
. Once again her hands suddenly felt like ice, she couldn’t feel her mouth, and the sensation of falling swept over her. Her arms flew out, but she was fine, it was only in her head. Then she bent over, hands on knees, and vomited. Not much came up and it wrenched at her belly, but she felt better. She spat, wiped her mouth on the hem of her skirt and started walking again.

The house called ‘Swansea’ was fourth from the end, one of the last houses on Princes Street. It was two-storey, with three dormer windows, three chimneys and a verandah. Harrie went around the back and knocked on the door.

When Matthew Cutler himself opened it she wanted to weep. It was so unfair; in a proper house the servant always answered the door!

‘Harriet!’ he exclaimed: the first word he’d ever spoken to her.

Despite the hour he was still wearing his nightclothes and a robe belted at the waist, a woollen scarf around his neck and leather slippers. His eyes were bleary and his nose bright pink, his sandy hair stuck up at the back, and he had a scabbed-over canker in one corner of his mouth. He looked awful.

‘The Vincents aren’t home. And neither’s Dolly, our girl. Just me. I’m indisposed with an early summer ague,’ he wittered on apologetically.

Wishing she could disappear into a hole in the ground, Harrie
knew if she didn’t do it now, she never would. She thrust her note at him.

‘For me?’

She nodded.

He opened and read it, and a grin spread across his face, cracking the canker on his mouth. He winced and dabbed at it with a finger.

‘Thank you very much, Harrie. May I call you Harrie? Or would you prefer Miss Clarke?’

‘Harrie, please.’ What did it matter?

‘I’m truly honoured. I would love to attend afternoon tea with you next Saturday. Thank you.’

Harrie finally allowed herself to relax slightly. ‘Thank you, Mr Cutler.’

Matthew waved his hand dismissively. ‘Oh, please, it’s Matthew, if I’m to call you Harrie.’

‘Thank you, Matthew,’ Harrie said.

They were quiet for a minute. Uncomfortably so.

‘You’ve some sort of stick in your hair,’ Matthew said. ‘Under your brim.’

Harrie felt around for it, found it and pulled it out.

‘And pardon me for saying so, but have you recently been unwell?’ Matthew pointed to a dribble of vomit on Harrie’s front.

She rubbed at it with her sleeve, her face burning.

‘Would you like something to drink?’ Matthew asked.

‘No, thank you. I have to go back to work. I’m in service on Gloucester Street.’

‘Yes, I know where you are,’ Matthew said, then winced again in case it occurred to Harrie to ask how he knew that. James had told him, of course. ‘Well, until Saturday, then? I’ll call for you if I may?’

Harrie nodded. ‘Thank you.’

As she hurried off, Matthew gently closed the door. What a tremendous shock; what a wonderful, marvellous surprise! God,
what was James going to say? Should he tell him? And would this hideous sore on his mouth be healed by Saturday?

Two minutes along Princes Street Harrie started to giggle. Lord, that had been a shambles; her covered in vomit and him full of snot and with that awful sore on his face!

And then her giggles turned into hiccups and she began to cry.

James leant back so Rowie could set his breakfast plate on the table. Today she’d prepared scrambled eggs — pale yellow and fluffy and with a sprinkle of chives, just the way he liked them — accompanied by toasted bread and slices of black pudding; a far cry from the rubbery, incinerated fare he’d been consuming before she’d arrived.

This morning, having risen from a bed made up with recently laundered and lavender-scented linen, he would be setting out for the surgery wearing a pristine shirt starched and ironed only yesterday and a coat bearing not a trace of egg, leaving behind him a cottage that would be cleaned, swept, polished and dusted to within an inch of its life, and returning home this evening to be served another filling and beautifully cooked meal.

He had to admit that in the beginning he’d been very wary of taking on Rowie Harris, particularly with regard to her previous vocation, but she’d turned out to be a Godsend. He didn’t know how she did it but no longer were there cockroaches running roughshod through his pantry or giant spiders squatting in his clothes press, and of late he’d not seen a single skink or lizard darting across his parlour floor.

Ironically, however, it had been he who had upset
her
during their initial interview, and he cringed at the thought of what he
would have missed, had she declined the position. She possessed a ticket of leave, which meant that although she was still legally a convict she was entitled to live and work as a private individual. After a certain period of time, providing she behaved, she would be in a position to apply for a conditional pardon. In his opinion she had been risking her very future working in Elizabeth Hislop’s brothel, and he’d told her so in no uncertain terms. It was at that point she had tearfully informed him of the destitute family members she financially supported in England, explaining that her position with Mrs Hislop had been the most expedient way of earning the income she so desperately needed. However, she’d said, if he couldn’t reconcile himself with her employment record she would understand, and take her recipes for Yorkshire and Devonshire pies, lamb cutlets, beefsteak and oyster pudding, apple charlotte and pear tart somewhere else.

The interview had been all the more disturbing for him because she was a very attractive girl, which had made him feel uncomfortably on edge and even more conscious of potential rumours regarding any relationship between them. He had been unable to stop himself envisioning the graceful lines of her ripe body rising naked from his bed each morning, and had had to cross his legs to conceal the evidence. It had been sixteen months since Emily had passed away, seventeen since he had seen and been intimate with her. Or any woman.

But it wasn’t Rowie Harris he wanted, it was Harrie Clarke, and it had been since before he’d learnt of Emily’s death, if he were to be truly honest with himself. Harrie, however, was refusing even to speak to him, never mind demonstrate an inclination to share his cottage. So, feeling guilty because his libido had betrayed him, he’d apologised to Rowie for lecturing her, then surprised himself by hiring her. She’d driven a hard remunerative bargain, his position somewhat undermined by the tale of woe she’d spun about her family in England because it had resonated so closely with Harrie’s,
and he strongly suspected he was paying her over the odds, but what did that matter? He could afford it.

The room Rowie occupied was external, a skilling built on to one side of the cottage and not accessible from within. The day after she’d moved in she’d asked him to have a lock fitted to the door. He’d assumed she was concerned about her personal safety and had obliged, but it had taken several more days for him to realise, with considerable shock, that it might be
him
she was worried about. He’d very awkwardly broached the subject and had been relieved — and vaguely insulted — when she’d admitted that an advance from him had been the
last
thing on her mind. But she confessed she was concerned about her safety, and that she had friends with whom she wanted to spend private time, which he could hardly prohibit on moral grounds, given her previous job.

So the tension that clearly only he had been experiencing had abated, and they were now getting along together very well. He couldn’t imagine how he had managed before without her. She was very capable in terms of domestic affairs, cheerful, somewhat cheeky, and seemed to know a fair number of Sydney’s townsfolk. And if people were gossiping about the fact he had a live-in servant, James no longer cared. It was worth it, even if just for Rowie’s scrambled eggs.

‘Will you be here for supper?’ she asked as she set the teapot down near his plate.

‘I’m not sure yet. We’ve been very busy this week. Outbreak of dysentery again. Is there any black pudding left?’

‘Two slices or three?’

‘Three, please.’

Rowie served them and James ate them in four minutes flat, stifled a burp, blotted his mouth with his napkin, then checked his watch. ‘Excellent breakfast as usual, thank you, Rowie. What are your plans for today?’

She glanced around the cosy dining room-cum-parlour. ‘Cleaning up, I’ve those shirts of yours to starch, a bit of ironing, the windows, some shopping. Then I’ll be back to get the supper on, just in case you are home on time.’

James took a last hurried sip of tea, rose from the table and collected his bag from the floor next to a fireside armchair. He walked to the door, Rowie behind him. He turned and … only just stopped himself from kissing her goodbye. Good God! He must be feeling a
lot
more settled these days!

Seeing the tiny smile on her lips and feeling himself reddening, he said, ‘I’ll see you this evening.’

Sarah waited until Esther had slammed the shop door on her way out, told Adam in the workshop she was going ‘down the yard’, but instead crept upstairs to the best bedroom. Harrie was visiting this afternoon and Sarah wanted her mistress in a suitably precarious state of nerves.

She gazed around, brow furrowed, lower lip caught between her teeth, searching for something that would cause the biggest impact for just a small amount of effort, as she didn’t have much time.

What if she emptied Esther’s rice powder jar and put a dead mouse in it? Would a ghost do something like that? More to the point, was Esther likely to powder her face this afternoon? Because if she didn’t, she wouldn’t see it.

Perhaps if she pulled all the bedclothes off the bed? No, that wouldn’t work; she wasn’t sure if Esther had been up to her room between breakfast and leaving the house. If she hadn’t, she would just accuse Sarah of not making her bed today.

Foot tapping, she thought about it, letting her mind wander wherever it wanted to go.

And then she had it.

From the clothes press she lifted out the cream muslin dress Esther had worn the evening Jared Spider-Fingers Gellar had come
to supper. Placing her feet carefully to avoid creaky floorboards, and working quickly because she knew Esther had only gone to the chemist’s, she laid the dress on the floor and spread out the sleeves and skirt. Then she arranged Esther’s best satin slippers below the skirt, the toes turned out slightly, and took a pair of lavender kidskin gloves from the dressing table and placed one at the end of each sleeve.

They weren’t really suitable for evening wear, though, were they, kidskin gloves? Sarah opened a drawer of the press and discovered at least two dozen more pairs. Christ, no wonder Adam was always scolding Esther for spending money. She grabbed a white lace pair and swapped them for the kidskin, then cast a critical eye over her handiwork. Not bad, but she needed something else. What, what, what?

Then her gaze fell on the perfect finishing touch; Esther’s hairpiece, a collection of long blonde ringlets she occasionally pinned into her hair. Sarah artistically spread them on the floor above the bodice of the dress, leaving a gap that would accommodate a neck and a face, and tucked a tortoiseshell comb ornamented with paste diamonds into the ringlets. Perfect.

The whole ensemble looked really quite grotesque, as though a woman not even a second earlier had been wearing the costume but had suddenly vanished. Which was exactly the effect Sarah intended.

She crept downstairs, banged the back door, went through the shop to the workshop and took her place beside Adam.

‘Warm, isn’t it?’ she commented. ‘I nearly fainted in the privy.’

‘That,’ Adam said as he polished the shank of a newly repaired ring, ‘could more likely be attributed to the state of the privy. It’s time I paid someone to dig a new pit and move it.’

Sarah grunted. They worked companionably together for some minutes, though she sensed Adam had something on his mind. At last he came out with it.

‘Sarah, I need to go to Van Diemen’s Land soon. I’ll be away for perhaps three weeks. I know Esther pushes you to the limit at times, but while I’m gone do you think you and she can get along without too much aggravation?’

Bloody unlikely. ‘I can’t see why not,’ Sarah said.

‘She’s rather unsettled at the moment.’

‘I had noticed.’

‘I might even be home in less than three weeks, if I can complete my business quickly.’

‘What will happen with the shop?’ Sarah asked. ‘We’ve been busy lately. I can’t be in the workshop and behind the counter at the same time.’

‘I’ve arranged for another jeweller to step in while I’m away, a friend and colleague of mine, Bernard Cole,’ Adam said. ‘He has premises on Pitt Street, but his wife is perfectly capable of managing the shop by herself. And willing,’ he added a little sourly.

Sarah experienced a vague pang she recognised as disappointment, though to feel that, she knew, was ridiculous. What might she do were she to be left unsupervised? Pile the safe and the entire contents of the shop onto a handcart, push it along to Mr Skelton’s and pawn the lot? Surely even Adam would notice that. Or was she disappointed because he didn’t trust her?

‘Won’t your colleague be short someone in
his
workshop?’

‘He doesn’t manufacture, he’s retail only. And he’ll only be here during opening hours. I think you’ll like him, Sarah.’

Not if he was as odious as Jared Gellar, she wouldn’t. Mentally she crossed her fingers, but without much hope.

The shop door opened then closed with such a bang Sarah knew Esther had returned. With a pleasant sense of anticipation she settled more comfortably onto her stool and waited for the explosion. Footsteps could be heard on the stairs, a door squeaked overhead, then a very rewarding shriek echoed down the stairwell.

Adam started, fumbling his pliers, and stared wide-eyed at Sarah. ‘Christ, was that Esther?’

‘Was it?’

But Adam was already rushing out of the workshop.

Sarah thought Harrie was doing an excellent job of pretending to be upset. Her normally rosy face was almost haggard and she looked as though she hadn’t slept properly in days.

They were in the dining room this time, taking advantage of the fact that Esther had taken to her bed after her dreadful shock that morning. Or rather, she’d taken to Adam’s bed as she’d refused to go back into her own chamber.

‘You should have seen her,’ Sarah said, her voice low but full of glee. ‘Her hair was almost standing on end. It was my best trick yet!’

‘She’s not going to want to hear any more ghost stories, then, is she?’ Harrie said.

‘She won’t be able to help herself. Wait and see.’

Sarah went upstairs and knocked gently on Adam’s bedroom door.

‘Who is it?’

‘Just me, Mrs Green,’ Sarah called out softly. ‘Do you need anything at the moment? Tea? Brandy?’

‘No. Go away.’

‘It’s just that Harrie’s here. She’s in a bit of a state and needs my help. It’s about our friend. The one who died.’

There was a long silence. Then Esther said, ‘You can have ten minutes with her. That’s all.’

‘Thank you, Mrs Green.’ Sarah smirked and returned to the dining room.

She poured tea for herself and Harrie and when she heard Esther step off the bottom stair and come to a rustling halt in the short hallway, she started talking.

‘Have you actually
seen
her, though, Harrie? Properly? When you’re not dreaming, I mean.’

‘Yes. Yes, I have,’ Harrie replied. ‘Standing at the end of my bed. Or sometimes sitting in the rocking chair in my room.’

Sarah thought that was an inspired touch. ‘Yes, I’ve seen her, too, though I haven’t told anyone. And she’s been moving my things around. And Mrs Green came home this morning and found her clothes all over her bedroom floor!’

Harrie hesitated; she’d forgotten what to say again. Sarah gently kicked her shin and mouthed the words.

‘Well, I wonder why Rachel would be bothering Mrs Green?’ Harrie parroted woodenly.

‘I don’t know. Perhaps she’s angry at her because she wouldn’t permit me time off to go to her funeral.’

A muffled gasp came from the hallway.

‘I hope she goes away soon,’ Harrie said.

‘So do I. God knows how far Rachel will go to get her revenge.’

Harrie burst into tears.

Sarah nodded in approval: this wasn’t in the script but it was good. She jumped as she heard Adam’s voice.

‘Esther, shouldn’t you be resting?’

‘Get your hands
off
me!’ Esther hissed.

There was a scuffling noise, then hurried footsteps retreating up the stairs.

Adam appeared in the dining-room doorway. ‘Oh, I beg your pardon. I thought you were in the yard.’

Sarah stood. ‘We can go out there if you’d prefer.’ Bugger; he’d ruined everything.

‘No, stay where you are.’ Adam glanced at Harrie, who was surreptitiously dabbing at her eyes with a handkerchief. ‘Is everything all right?’

‘Yes,’ Sarah said.

Adam eyed them a moment longer, then nodded and disappeared back down the hallway.

‘Shite,’ Sarah said. But Harrie was still crying. ‘What’s the matter?’

‘I don’t know.’ Harrie blew her nose. ‘I just feel … I don’t know.’

Overhead the floorboards creaked.

‘Is it James and that girl he’s hired?’ Sarah asked shrewdly.