Evan Hunter: Lizzie

An Englishman was standing nearby, tipping a porter who had performed a similar service for him only moments before. Lizzie detected at once that only a single bronze coin changed hands — twopence, as she reckoned in the swift exchange. Had she grossly overtipped the custom-shed porter? She fished in her purse, found what she hoped was a half shilling, and handed the silver coin to the porter. He gave her a baleful look until she added several bronze coins to the one in his palm, and then his craggy face broke into a wide gap-toothed grin, and he murmured, “God bless, madam,” and led them immediately to the first-class compartment of the nearest passenger car, where he stood by the steps and bowed them aboard, his cap in his hand.

No sooner were they seated than a freckle-faced, towheaded newsboy wearing a cap tilted over half his face, a loose baggy sweater that came almost to his thighs, and kneebreeches falling loose over equally fallen stockings, came along the platform crying, “Papers, papers!” and stopped at the open door to the compartment. “Papers, ladies?” he asked, and Felicity, making herself comfortable in the seat next to the window, looked at the array of newspapers he proffered, rolled her blue eyes, and said, “Oh, my, whichever one shall we read?”

“Depends on your politics, miss,” the newsboy said. “If you’re Gladstonian, I’d advise the News. If on the other hand you’re Tory, you might do well to take either the Times or the Standard! ”

“We’ll have the Times,” Lizzie said.

“Are we Tory?” Felicity asked.

“Y’could be worse, miss,” the newsboy said, grinning, and counted out the change for the coin Lizzie handed him. “Thank you, ma’am,” he said, and Lizzie wondered when “ miss” became “ ma’am” in Europe. In Fall River, she was Miss Lizzie. Here in England, Felicity was miss, but she herself had been ma’am or madam on more than one occasion now. She had celebrated her thirtieth birthday on the nineteenth day of July, three days before they’d boarded the Teutonic. Felicity was twenty-four. Did those six years make such a difference here? Vaguely troubled, she opened her purse and was dropping the loose change into it when the door on the corridor side suddenly opened.

A man with the word Inspector stamped onto a round brass plate pinned to his cap stepped into the compartment and said, “Tickets, please, tickets.” She rummaged in her purse for the tickets she had purchased, regretting more and more the chore the others had imposed upon her. The uniformed man took the tickets, and with a heavy punch gouged into each of them a pie-shaped wedge. “Have a pleasant journey,” he said, and touched the peak of his cap. Outside on the platform, there was a sudden bustle of activity as uniformed men ran along slamming the doors of the cars. Just as suddenly, the train began to move.

She sat opposite Felicity in the narrow compartment, their skirted knees almost touching, and began reading the London Times.

They learned soon enough that the train offered none of the comforts or conveniences to which they were accustomed on American railroad coaches. Not anywhere in the car was there a toilet stand, a closet, a heating apparatus or a drinking-water cylinder. The weather was brisk compared to what they were used to in July, and with the windows closed, the compartment was quite close. Anna complained of a headache. Felicity, after a tour of the car and a search for toilet facilities, indelicately suggested that had she known such accommodations would be lacking, she would have carried along her own slop pail. Rebecca, now reading the Times Lizzie had already read from first page to last, visibly winced at Felicity’s comment.

It was with considerable relief, therefore, that they learned from the inspector, who flung open the corridor door again just as the train was pulling into the Chester station, that they would be stopping here for twenty minutes should the ladies care to stretch their legs. He assured them he would make certain that no one occupied their seats, and Lizzie wondered if he expected a tip for his concern. As if to confirm her surmise, the inspector returned just as the train was pulling into the station, carrying a narrow strip of paper dripping with paste. The paper, Lizzie saw as he affixed it to the window of their compartment, was a printed form that he had filled in with pencil. It read:

What then to tip this great grinning ape who now backed away from the window and stood beaming with pride at his primitive accomplishment? According to Lizzie’s calculations, a shilling was the equivalent of twenty-five cents. But surely even a man with the word Inspector emblazoned in brass on his cap would not expect so exorbitant a fee for posting his simple bill and insuring his vigilance. Would a half shilling suffice? She glanced across the compartment to Rebecca and by the look on her face saw that she was engaged in the same process of calculation. Rebecca shrugged behind the waiting inspector’s back. Lizzie dug into her purse and handed the man a shilling after all. He seemed satisfied; at any rate, he touched the peak of his cap before he left the compartment.

His little sign, in fact, worked remarkably well almost all the way to London. But as the train was pulling out of the Oxford station, the door on the corridor side was yanked open, and a man peered into the compartment and said, “Excuse me, ladies, may we join you? The other first-class sections are fully occupied.”

She wondered for a moment who the “we” might be; she had no desire to share the compartment with two strange men. But the man seemed to be utterly alone, a tall, brown-eyed Englishman (judging from his speech), wearing a single-breasted lounge jacket cut to button four but worn to button one, the sleeves short enough to show his fashionable, colored linen cuffs, his close, small-buttoned trousers cut well up to reveal his fancy patent leather buttoned boots. He wore beneath the jacket a vest with a small check repeated in the fabric of his hat, which in every other respect resembled a bowler. Like most of the other men Lizzie had seen here in England (and it was a relief from the bearded men at home), he was clean-shaven except for short side-whiskers and a mustache. Without waiting for their reply, he threw the small valise he was carrying up onto the overhead rack, said, “Thank you,” and then ducked out into the corridor again and called, “Allie! I’ve found us some spaces!” and backed away a few steps, waiting.

The woman who appeared in the doorframe was quite the most beautiful woman Lizzie had ever seen in her life. She stood almost as tall as her companion, some five feet eight or nine inches, Lizzie guessed, her extraordinary height exaggerated by the modest gabled toque she wore, a close-fitting hat trimmed with velvet and feathers, its inverted V-front exposing a fringe of frizzed blond hair. The toque was green, echoing the green of her eyes, as deep as any forest glade, perfectly matching the Norfolk jacket bodice and plain-fronted skirt she wore. Her face was as pale as milk, a perfect oval with a generous mouth and an aquiline nose. Her eyebrows lifted slightly when she saw how nearly full the compartment already was. “I do hope we shan’t be crowding you,” she said, and behind her the man nodded a belated apology.

“Please join us,” Lizzie said graciously, and first the woman and then the man entered the compartment. She had given her window seat to Rebecca when the train left Warwick. The woman sat beside her now on her right — Lizzie noticed with relief that her bustle was small and fashionable — the faintest scent of eau de cologne wafting about her as she smoothed her skirt. She was wearing black stockings, Lizzie saw, and laced shoes with rounded toes and low heels. The man sat diagonally across from Lizzie, beside Felicity, who had swapped her window seat with Anna.