Stephanie Barron - Jane and the Prisoner of Wool House

“I DECLARE, MISS! YOUR COLD IS MUCH IMPROVED.” JENNY had torn herself from the embrace of sleep quite early this morning, and her comfortable face was quietly cheering. She is nearly forty, our Jenny — as yet unmarried, and likely to remain so; plain of feature, ample in girth as she is in kindness. No one may equal her at frying a chop or dressing a salad; but the chocolate and rolls she carried this morning were all that I could desire.

“It will be the mustard plaster, I'm thinking,” she continued. “It's just as well you employed it — what with that dreadful fever as the Frenchmen are spreading, and you so insistent upon ministering to them yourself, miss. I don't wonder Captain Austen was put out to find you'd gone to Wool House. But there, a lady must do her duty.”

“Indeed,” I replied. I sat up in bed and prepared to have my breakfast on a tray, like an indolent marchioness. I had never employed Jenny's mustard plaster, and had no intention of informing her of the fact. “Has any messenger come from Mr. Hill this morning?”

“No, ma'am.”

I was sure that Jenny knew everything to do with our smallest concerns. From her piercing search of my countenance this morning, I guessed that she was disturbed in her mind — undoubtedly because of my correspondence with Wool House. Did she think me likely to lose my heart to a foreigner? Or was she nettled at the vagaries of Frank's temper? “I am afraid we are all a sad trial, with our adventures and our disputes. It is a wonder you put up with us, Jenny.”

“I'd never call it a quiet household, what with your taste for murder and the Captain's for drabs.” [18] Jenny's long acquaintance with the Austen family — she had been in their employ since 1803—meant that she had witnessed Jane's involvement in the investigation of previous crimes, in Lyme and Bath particularly. — Editor's note.

I nearly choked on my chocolate.

“He did ought to be ashamed of himself! There's that poor young wife of his so far gone with the first, and her still a bride. I never thought I'd live to see the day when we should have women of the street lurking in the back doorway — but there, he is a man of the Navy, and we all know what they are. Mrs. Davies will never be done talking of it. If it weren't for the spoke I planted in her wheel, she'd have told all of Southampton.”

“Did you see the young woman who enquired Thursday for the Captain?”

Jenny shrugged. “She weren't much to see. Long in the tooth and short on washing, if you ask me. But I knew it was her straightaway, when she come round again this morning. I told her to be off in three ticks, and no mistake!”

“This morning!” I thrust aside the covers and made to get out of bed. Jenny hastened to fetch my dressing gown. “Why did you not call my brother?”

“Captain Austen quitted the house at half-past six,” Jenny returned with asperity, “no doubt upon business of his own. The Captain made sure to tell me I was not to disturb Mrs. Frank, and that I was to tell you he was gone to Gaoler's Alley.” These last words were uttered with extreme contempt.

Gaoler's Alley. We had agreed last night, before retiring to our respective bedchambers, that Tom Seagrave should be interrogated on the subject of Mrs. Carruthers. Frank was doubtful that a direct assault might persuade him to yield a confidence he seemed so determined to keep. The lady, however, might save Seagrave's neck if she could swear before the magistrate that it was she he had sought on Wednesday night — and not Eustace Chessyre.

“Even so,” Frank had told me doubtfully as we stood in the passage, “it cannot account for the entire period before the body's discovery. I do not know what we gain, Jane, by exposing Seagrave so dreadfully.”

“He may stand the test of a trifling exposure,” I retorted. “If you intimate that we shall appeal to Phoebe Carruthers if Seagrave preserves his silence, he may well unbend to spare her the mortification.”

And so my brother was not at home to answer the plea of a Southampton jade. The woman had come in search of him twice. I knew Frank well enough to believe it was not on business of a personal nature. This woman sought him as a certain authority. It was imperative that we learn what intelligence she guarded.

“Would you know the woman again?” I asked Jenny directly. “The one who wished to speak to my brother?”

She started, a slight frown between her eyes. “Happen I might. But I'd'a thought you'd be glad to see the back of her, miss.”

“So we probably shall,” I murmured, “once we apprehend what we have undertaken. Nonetheless, she must be found.”

Jenny's gaze slid guiltily away. “The poor wretch begged me to take a message to the Captain. I told her I wanted none of it. But she stood her ground. All manner of nonsense she uttered.”

“You must try to remember what she said. It is of vital importance, Jenny.”

The maid hesitated. “Has it to do with the murder? Of that sailor as all the town is talking of? He weren't a friend of the Captain's, surely.”

“The man accused of Mr. Chessyre's death may hang for a crime he did not commit. And he is Captain Austen's dear friend. My brother cannot bear to see an injustice done.”

“You think the light-skirt as is skulking about the back door knows summat she oughtn't?”

“Please try to remember what she said.”

” 'My soul must be quit of it' — that was one part, like she had a sin she needed shriving of. Of course, at the time, I reckoned she meant the Captain. That her conscience was devilling her on account of Mrs. Frank.”

“She gave you nothing? No note for Captain Austen's perusal?”

“I doubt as she can write, miss; and that sort don't go carrying of cards.”

“No,” I admitted. Even with Jenny's sharp eyes as aid, the search for a single young woman in all of Southampton must be fruitless.

“I suppose we could ask at the Bosun's Mate,” she said thoughtfully.

My head came up. “What is that? A tavern, of some sort?”

Jenny shrugged. “I haven't the slightest idea, miss. But that's what she said. 'Tell the Captain he must ask for Nell Rivers. The Bosun's Mate will find me.' ”

“It does sound like a tavern. I shall just have to find it”

“You're never going into that part of town, miss! Not alone! I won't allow it!”

I handed Jenny my cup. “Then you'll come? Thank Heaven! I do not know how I should manage without you, Jenny.”

The maid rolled her eyes. But she did not decline the office; and as she thrust her large frame into the passage, I saw that she was smiling.

WE SET OUT TWENTY-FIVE MINUTES LATER. I HAD TAKEN just time enough to dress and pen a swift note to Mr. Hill, begging the earliest news of the manner in which Monsieur LaForge had passed his night; I might hope for an answer upon my return to East Street. The bells of St. Michael's were tolling a quarter-past nine as we descended to the pavement. Jenny wore the hood of her cape well over her head, as though to ward off the impertinence of the common sailor; and though my bonnet presented a wide brim, and was secured with ribbon over my ears, I found that I could wish for a disguise as thorough as my maid's. It seemed unlikely that I could ever be taken for a slattern; but my appearance in such a part of town must occasion comment.

“Have you any notion, Jenny, which streets might be considered … of ill-repute? My brother spoke of the quayside — and of the district beyond the Walls.”

“The quayside you know,” Jenny replied. “It's a pother of houses for the common seamen, and a few taverns where food as well as drink is served. The Bosun's Mate might well be there, but I cannot say as I recollect the name. If that bit o' muslin hails from one of the nunneries, I'm thinking we should search out past the Ditches. [19] Southampton's medieval walls still enclosed a good part of the city during Austen's time, and the eastern wall was bounded at its far side by a drained moat. The Ditches, as this area was known, ran north from Winkle Street, which fronted Southampton Water, to Bar Gate, a distance of more than half a mile. — Editor's note. There's a snarl of lanes new-laid just there, and poor ramshackle places as no one should be proud of biding in.”