Justine Cole: The Copeland Bride

Only after she was done did she cross the room to the child curled peacefully in their narrow bed, her breathing deep and even. "Noelle, wake up." She shook the small child gently and whispered, "Wake up, sweetheart."

Noelle's lids opened heavily, then closed, and then opened again.

"You must get up and dress quickly." She pulled the covers off the child and began tossing clothing at her. "Put these On. You'll have to dress warmly, child. It's bitterly cold outside."

"What's happened, Mama? Where are we going?" Noelle's clear voice cut into the silence of the room.

"Shh! There's not time to explain now. Hurry! We must leave very, very quietly." Daisy thrust the sleepy child into her garments, handed her the bandbox, and then led her quietly down the stairs and out into the bitter night. She carried the heavy valise herself.

Wordlessly Noelle followed, clutching her mother's cloak. The bandbox bumped against her thin legs. When it was caught by an icy gust, it fought against her, the silken cord cutting deeply into her fingers. Sometimes she stumbled; once she slipped on an icy puddle and landed painfully on her hip. But she did not protest. The fear in her mother's face drove her on.

They fled across cobbled streets and dark lanes, through frozen alleyways and past stinking tenements. The cold crept through Noelle's clothing until she was shivering violently. She began to whimper softly, but still she did not protest.

Finally they reached the river. Spanned by a massive stone bridge, it stretched inky black and uninviting on both sides of them. Noelle followed her mother onto the bridge and then, abruptly, Daisy stopped and stared at her surroundings. She seemed confused, disoriented.

"It's the river, Mama," Noelle prompted hesitantly.

"The river?" Daisy's eyes were vague; they chilled Noelle far more than the cold. She stood there quietly, unnaturally still.

Noelle looked around her. Four square recesses were set into each side of the stone bridge. In one of these an old crone huddled; in another, two urchins slept. Noelle led Daisy to one of the empty niches and gently pushed her down against the cold stone wall where there would be some shelter from the bite of the wind. She crouched next to her.

"Mama, what has happened?"

Daisy looked at her blankly.

"Tell me what has happened," Noelle pleaded.

The shadow lifted from Daisy's eyes. It was replaced by a terror so stark that Noelle recoiled.

"Newgate!"

The name of the infamous debtors' prison hung between them like a death sentence. "They are coming for me. This very morning they are coming to take me to Newgate. The watchman on Oyster Lane is my friend. He overheard two men talking. I'm to be jailed for my debts."

Daisy clutched Noelle to her and began to cry bitterly. "We can never go back," she said, sobbing.

The next day they found crude lodgings in a drab, crowded tenement. By pawning Daisy's few remaining belongings, they were able to buy food and pay their rent in the months that followed. Finding work, however, proved impossible for Daisy.

She was afraid to inquire at any of the theaters on the chance that she would be recognized, but she had no other skills and was so frivolous in appearance that no one would take her on for heavier work.

Gradually she began to lose interest in her own life, caring only about her daughter. Where before she had been a loving, if somewhat careless, parent, now she was obsessed with everything Noelle said and did. She harped at her to watch her diction, walk properly, behave like a lady. Terrified that Noelle would pick up the strident accent of the streets, she forbade her to play with any of the swarms of ragged children who glutted the chokingly overcrowded tenements.

They were empty-eyed urchins, many with swollen bellies and festering sores on their bodies. In Noelle, who looked and spoke so differently from them, they found a target for their own wretchedness. They called her "Highness," bowing when she passed them and then sticking out scrawny legs to send her sprawling headlong onto the slimy streets. They mocked her speech and assaulted her with obscenities.

Noelle ran to her mother, but Daisy could not seem to comprehend what was happening. Noelle was a pariah, out of her element and unable to defend herself. Helplessness was something the others understood. Seeing it in her, their abuse intensified. They chased her through the streets, hurling filth from the gutters at her.

Finally, when a group of boys held her down and urinated on her, something inside her snapped. Dry-eyed and furious, she fought them. She was beaten badly, but not before she had done some damage of her own. From that day on she no longer heeded whether there was only one or an entire group. She took them all on. Each time she lost a fight, the incident repeated itself again and again in her mind, Noelle learned from her mistakes, determined not to repeat them. She found that, if she could survive the initial brutal assault, she could outlast her antagonist. Having been better nourished than the other children, she had a wiry strength that drove her on after they were exhausted. She began to choose her opponents more carefully, refusing to be drawn into a fight she knew she couldn't win.

By the end of her first year among them, they had learned to leave her alone and even accorded her a grudging, if distant, respect. They still called her "Highness," but no longer to mock her. It was the only name they knew her by; her real name had been lost to everyone but her mother.

In time Daisy's tiny horde of money was exhausted. For two days they had no food.

In the evening of the second day, Daisy pressed her lips to Noelle's hair and slipped out into the night. She had nothing left to pawn, nothing left to sell except herself. The next morning she returned, bringing with her two savory meat-filled pastries, a bag of new potatoes, and half a plum cake.

Daisy's unexplained disappearances continued, and gradually Noelle became used to them. Sometimes Daisy returned with food or coins, sometimes empty-handed. Once she stumbled in almost unconscious. Blood dripped from the corner of her mouth, and her eye was badly bruised and swollen shut. Noelle cleansed her gently and helped her onto the rough sacking that formed Daisy's bed.

When she pressed her mother for an explanation, Daisy only smiled at her vaguely and murmured, "Don't fret, my pet. Remember, you have the blood of kings."

At night the eight-year-old child sat by her mother's sleeping form. Hugging her knees with her thin arms, she thought about what Daisy had said. Surely only wonderful things should be happening to a little girl with the blood of kings. She shouldn't ever be dirty or hungry or have to wear such ugly clothes.

Something cold clutched at Noelle's heart. What was going to happen to them? She looked at Daisy. Although her mother was only thirty-one, the past year had prematurely aged her. Her skin was rough and lined, her shiny curls were now drab and tangled, covered by an old gray shawl. Daisy had lived on hope and pleasure, and now that the dreams were gone, she was barely able to survive.

One morning, before Daisy was awake, Noelle donned a shirt and a pair of canvas trousers she had found. Biting on her bottom lip, she used a dull knife as she concentrated on sawing off her hair until it was as short as a boy's. She picked up a rough piece of sacking, quietly let herself out of their dingy cellar, and walked to the river.

A group of urchins were scattered across the bank, searching for pieces of coal dropped by the bargemen. They were the mudlarks, young scavengers who collected bits of coal to sell to the poor and pieces of metal that brought a farthing a pound as scrap.

Noelle watched the; boys from a distance and then began to search the banks herself. She realized she had started too late; only the smallest pieces of coal were left. She picked them up anyway and tied them securely in the sacking she had brought. Soon she noticed the boys rolling up their breeches and wading barefoot into mud that came up to their knees.