Jane Feather - Vice

Tarquin whipped up his horses. It was the only indication of his urgency as he fought to subdue the images of what Juliana could be going through at this moment. She was so intractable, so bold and challenging, that it wouldn't be long before she would provoke the jailers to break her spirit. They had crude but sure methods of doing so.

Juliana stumbled forward under a vigorous shove from her escort, through a doorway and into a long, narrow, filthy room. An iron-barred door clanged behind her. A minute or two earlier the cart had drawn up in a stinking courtyard, surrounded by a high wall. The three women had been hauled down to the cobbles by two men wielding rods, and driven like cattle into the low building. Rosamund had tripped over an uneven flagstone and, unable to help herself with her bound hands, had fallen to her knees. One of the jailers had promptly brought his rod down on her shoulders, cursing her vilely. Sobbing piteously, she'd managed to stand up again and totter forward.

Now the three women stood with their bound hands facing a sea of hostile, predatory eyes as the women in the dimly lit room stared at them, hungrily taking in the quality of their clothes. The walls were of bare brick, glistening and slimy with oozing damp; the air was dank and foul; the only light came from a minute window high up in the far wall under the roof timbers. Far too high to reach from the ground, and far too small to admit even a climbing boy.

The women, for the most part clad only in ragged underpetticoats, coarse stockings, and clogs, stood in front of rows of massive tree stumps beating hanks of hemp with heavy wooden mallets. Juliana saw with dread that several of them wore leg irons, shackling them to the stumps. The dull, rhythmic pounding bounced off the stone walls. A woman with a slit nose cackled as Rosamund gave a low moan and swayed.

"First time 'ere, is it, dearies?" She dropped her mallet and came over to them. Her hands were flayed and bleeding from the hemp. Juliana wondered what crime had merited the slit nose, even as she drew back from the unequivocal malice in the woman's eyes. The woman reached for Rosamund's muslin fichu. 'Fancy gewgaws ye've got. Fetch quite a pretty penny, they will."

"Leave her alone," Juliana snapped.

The woman's eyes narrowed dangerously, and she tore the fichu from Rosamund's quivering neck. "I'll 'ave 'er clothes, and your'n, too, missie. Soon as the day's work's done. An' if ye don't watch yer tongue, we'll strip ye nekkid. We knows 'ow to tame a proud spirit in 'ere. Innit so, girls?"

There was a chorus of agreement, and the eyes seemed to move closer, although the women remained at their posts. Juliana involuntarily turned to the jailer as if seeking protection.

The man merely laughed. "Don't go upsettm' Maggie. She'll scratch yer eyes out soon as look at ye. An' 'er word goes in 'ere. What 'appens in 'ere, when y'are locked up fer the night, is none of me business." He moved in front of them and sliced their bonds with his knife. "Get to work now. Them three stumps over there." He gestured to three unoccupied work sites, the massive mallets resting atop.

Maggie followed them over and stood, hands on hips, as the jailer pulled three thick hanks of hemp from a basket on the wall and threw them onto the stumps. The woman reached over and took Rosamund's shrinking hand. "This'll not last long," she observed, turning the small white hand over in her grime-encrusted, blood-streaked palm. "I give ye an hour, an' yer 'ands'll be bleedin' so 'ard ye won't be able to bear to touch the mallet." She cackled, and a ripple of mirth ran around the room from the others, who had taken a rest from their labors to watch the induction.

The jailer grinned. "Them what won't work goes in the pillory."

Rosamund was dazed with fright and was weeping so hard now, she couldn't take anything in, but Juliana and Lilly both looked to where the man's finger was pointing. A wall pillory, the holes high enough to keep the victim on her toes and to put an intolerable strain on her shoulders. Above it inscribed the legend: Better to work than stand thus.

Juliana picked up the mallet and brought it down on the hemp with an almighty swing. The weight of the mallet astounded her, and any effect of the blow on the hemp was invisible. The stuff had to be pounded until the core fibers split and could be separated from the thick fibrous covering. After three blows her wrists ached, the skin of her palms was beginning to rub, and the hemp showed no more than a slight flattening. She glanced at Rosamund, who was tapping feebly through her tears and making no impression at all on her hank. Lilly, tight-lipped, white-faced, was swinging her mallet above her shoulder and bringing it down with resolute violence. In a short while she'd be exhausted, Juliana thought apprehensively. If she was exhausted, she wouldn't be able to continue.

She glanced again at Rosamund's hemp, then swiftly picked up her own partially split hank and swapped it with Rosamund's barely touched one. Lilly gave her a quick approving nod, whispering, "Between us we should be able to keep her going."

"Eh, stop yer jabberin' over there." The jailer came toward them swinging his rod. "There's no time fer talkin'. Ye'll 'ave six of 'em ready by noontime, or ye'll find yerself at the whippin' post."

A chilling desperation took a hold on Juliana. She could see no way out. There was no one to appeal to. They were imprisoned in this fetid hole so far from civilization that they could have dropped off the face of the earth for all the contact they would have with the outside world. But surely someone would be wondering where she was. The coachman would be looking for her. Someone would discover what had happened.

But why would they do anything to help her? What right had she to expect help? The duke would be thinking that it served her right. To obtain her release, he'd have to acknowledge his connection with a convicted whore in a house of correction. She couldn't imagine why anyone, let alone the Duke of Redmayne, would wish to do that.

Except, of course, to protect his investment. Furiously, she swung the mallet, ignoring the pain in her hands, ignoring the drops of blood that began to fall on the stump and made the handle of the mallet slippery. She welcomed the anger because it defeated the dreadful, numbing desperation that she knew instinctively was her greatest enemy.

She and Lilly must do their own six hanks and share Lilly's if they were to keep her from the pillory-or worse, the whipping post. In this hellhole, inhabited by the dregs of humanity, the weak would go to the wall. Juliana knew that she would be able to stand up to the jailer, and to the vile Maggie, as long as she kept her strength and diverted the deadening sense of helplessness. Lilly, too, would be difficult to break. But Rosamund stood not a chance. Her spirit was already broken, and to watch her complete disintegration would provide merry sport for the degraded wretches who surrounded them.

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Sir John Fielding regarded his visitors in polite astonishment. "Lady Edgecombe among the whores I sent to Tothill Bridewell? My dear sir, surely you must be mistaken."

"I don't believe so," Tarquin said, his mouth so thin and tight it was barely visible. "Red hair, green eyes. Tall."

"Aye, I marked her well. A bold-eyed wench," the magistrate opined, stroking his chin. "Now you mention it, she did seem rather out of the common way for strumpets. But why wouldn't she identify herself? How could she get caught up-"

"Forgive me for interrupting." Quentin stepped forward. "I believe it must have had something to do with Juliana's interest in the lives of the street women." He coughed discreetly. "She was much exercised over young Lucy's plight, if you recall, Tarquin. Insisted upon bringing her out of the Marshalsea. I believe it would be in character for her to… to extend her field of operations, if you will."