Трейси Шевалье - Falling Angel

Luckily Grandmother decided to go then, or I might have had a tedious afternoon with her all alone, as she said Mummy had gone to bed with a headache. I saw her to the door, and as she left she said I was to tell Mummy later that everything was sorted out satisfactorily. I knew better than to ask what she meant.

After she had gone I went downstairs again and asked Mrs. Baker instead. “Is Jenny going to leave us?”

There was a pause, then Mrs. Baker said, “I expect she will.”

“Is she very ill, then?”

“Ill? Is that what she’s calling it?”

There was a knock on the outside kitchen door. “Perhaps that’s Lavinia,” I said hopefully, and ran to the door.

“Don’t tell her any of this,” Mrs. Baker warned.

“Why not?”

Mrs. Baker sighed and shook her head. “Never mind. Tell her what you like. She’ll find out soon enough.”

It was Simon. He did not say hello; he never says hello. He stepped inside and looked around. “Where’s our Jenny? She upstairs?”

I glanced at Mrs. Baker, who was gathering up the bowl and sieve we had used for the bread. She frowned but did not answer.

“She’s ill,” I said. “She may have to go away.”

“She’s not ill,” Simon said. “She’s banged up.”

“Banged up-is that like knocking?” I asked uneasily. I hoped no one had hurt Jenny.

“Maude!” Mrs. Baker barked, and I jumped. She never shouted at me-only at the butcher’s boy if the meat was off, or the baker, who she once accused of using sawdust in his loaves. She turned to Simon. “Is it you been teaching her this filthy language? Look at her-she doesn’t even know what she’s saying. Shame on you, boy!”

Simon gave me a funny look. “Sorry,” he said. I nodded, though I didn’t really know what he was apologizing for. In many ways he knew so little-had never been to school, could barely read, and that learned from gravestones. Yet he clearly knew about things in the world that I had no notion of.

Simon turned to Mrs. Baker. “Is there any bread?”

“It’s in the oven, little beggar boy,” Mrs. Baker snapped. “You’ll have to wait.”

Simon just looked at her. He seemed not the least bothered that she had just called him a beggar. She sighed, then set down the bowl and sieve and went to the sideboard, where she found an end of a loaf. “Go and put some butter on it,” she said, handing it to him. “You know where it is.”

Simon disappeared into the larder.

“Make him a cup of tea, Maude,” she ordered, picking up her dishes again and heading for the scullery. “Just one sugar,” she added over her shoulder.

I gave him two sugars.

Simon had spread the bread with great hunks of butter, as if it were cheese. I watched him eat it at the table, his teeth carving rectangular grooves in the butter.

“Simon,” I whispered. “What does banged up mean?” It felt wicked saying the words, now that I knew they were shocking.

Simon shook his head. “Not for me to say. Best to ask your ma.”

I knew I never would.

The sody bread smells good, baking in the oven. I want to wait for it, but I know I was lucky to get anything at all from Mrs. Baker. She ain’t so generous with the bread as our Jenny is.

I want to see our Jenny. Maude thinks she’s in her room upstairs. So when I’ve finished the bread I pretend to leave, but don’t pull the back door closed. I wait and peek through the window till I see Maude and Mrs. B. go into the scullery together. Then I sneak back in real quiet and run up the stairs before anyone sees me.

I never been in the rest of the house. It’s big, with lots of stairs that I keep stopping on ‘cause there’s so much to see. On the walls there’s paintings and drawings of all sorts of things, buildings and people but mostly birds and flowers. Some of the birds I know from the cemetery, and some of the flowers too. They’re proper drawings, with all the bits of the plant as well as the flower. I seen a book of Mr. Jackson’s at the lodge with pictures like that.

The rugs on the stairs and in the hallways are mostly green, with some yellow and blue and red bits in a pattern. Each landing has a plant on it, them ones with long thin leaves what wave up and down as I go past. Our Jenny hates ‘em ’cause she has to clean all the little leaves and it takes so long. “No one asked me what plants they should have,” she said once. “Why don’t she get one of them aspidistras with a few big leaves that are easy to wash?”

I go on up until I’m on the top landing. There are two doors up there, both closed. I have to choose, so I open one and go in. It’s Maude’s room. I stand and look a long time. There’s so many toys and books, more than I ever seen in a room. There’s a whole shelf of dolls, all different sizes, and another shelf of games-boxes full of things, puzzles and such. There’s lots of shelves of books. There’s a brown-and-white hobby horse with a black leather saddle that moves back and forth on rollers. There’s a wood dollhouse with fancy furniture in all the rooms, miniature rugs and chairs and tables. There’s pictures on the walls of Maude’s room, children and dogs and cats, and something that looks like a map of the sky, with all the stars connected up with lines to make pictures like what I saw in the stars that cold night in the grave.

It’s toasty warm in the room-there’s a fireplace just had a fire burning, and a fender in front of it with clothes hanging on it to air. I want to stay here, but I can‘t-I has to find our Jenny.

I go out of the room and up to the other door and knock.

“Go away,” she says.

“It’s me, our Jenny.”

“Go away.”

I kneel down and look through the keyhole. Our Jenny’s lying on her bed, her hands tucked under her cheek. Her eyes are red but she’s not crying. Next to her is her corset. I can see the shape of her big belly under her skirt.

I go in anyway. She don’t shout at me, so I sit on a chair. There ain’t much in the room, just the chair and bed, a chamberpot and a bucket of coal, a green rug on the floor and a row of pegs with her clothes hanging on ‘em. On the window ledge are a couple of colored bottles, blue and green. The room is dark ’cause there’s only a little window what faces north over the street.

“Jenny, our Jenny,” I says, “what’re you going to do?”

“I dunno,” she says. “Go back to me mum, I suppose. I have to leave by the end of the day.”

“You should go to our ma-that’s what she does, delivers babies. Nellie off Leytonstone High Street, next to the Rose and Crown. Everybody knows her. Mind you, you should’ve gone to her earlier and she’d have got rid of it for you.”

“I couldn’t do that!” Our Jenny sounds shocked.

“Why not? You don’t want it, do you?”

“It’s a sin. It’s murder!”

“But you sinned already, ain’t you? What difference does it make?”

She don’t answer, but shakes her head back and forth and brings her legs up so they’re curled round her belly. “Anyway, it’s too late,” she says. “The baby’s coming soon, and that’s that.” She starts to cry, big ugly sobs. I look round and see a brown knitted shawl on the chair. I put it over her.

“Oh God, what am I to do?” our Jenny cries. “Mum’ll kill me. I send her most of my pay-how’s she to get by without it?”

“You’ll have to get another job, and your ma can look after the baby.”

“But no one’ll hire me when they find out what’s happened. She’ll never give me a reference. This is the only job I’ve had. I need her reference.”

I think for a minute. “Mrs. C. will if you make her,” I say finally. I feel bad saying it, ‘cause I like Maude’s ma. I still remember how she smiled at me that day she wore the green dress.