Belle (32 page)

But then, it was easy to laugh at an undignified death in an inappropriate place, when it was a stranger. Suzanne had claimed that most men, if they could pick their way to die, would choose to be fucking her. She joked she was going to send a card with some flowers to his funeral and write on it, ‘I always said I’d show you heaven!’

But even if Belle had all the other girls here right now, she knew she still wouldn’t be able to find anything even vaguely amusing about Faldo’s death. He was a complicated, contradictory man and he’d been a brute tonight. He’d said that he wanted her heart, so why was he so horrible to her?

Was this the way it would always be with men? They would want her body, but never her mind, and never be able to see past her being a whore?

She lay down on the bed and pulled the quilt over her. But all at once it dawned on her that she had far more to worry about than what men might think of her. She was in fact destitute. The few dollars Miss Frank gave her wouldn’t keep her. Once the rent stopped being paid, the landlord would reclaim the house too. How on earth was she going to live?

Martha would block her being taken on by any of the good sporting houses: that would leave only the dreadful places down in Robertson Street.

Panic overwhelmed her. What was she going to do?

Chapter Twenty-five

‘So that’s how it is, Miss Frank.’ Belle’s voice quivered a little because she could see the older woman was horrified by what she’d been told. ‘I felt I owed you the whole truth because you’ve been so very kind to me.’

She hadn’t slept a wink through terror of what was going to become of her. The greater part of her just wanted to run, to throw her belongings quickly into a case and catch the first train out of New Orleans. But a small, sensible voice asked her where she thought she was going to run to, because it would be hard to start again in a strange town where she didn’t know anyone.

That same sensible voice suggested she went to Miss Frank and told her the whole story. As the older woman appeared to be fond of her, Belle thought she might agree to pretend to the police that her name was Anne Talbot if they came round asking questions. Belle hoped that with the money she earned at the hat shop, and perhaps finding some waitressing work too, she could stay in New Orleans.

‘You really think I would be prepared to tell lies to the police and say I know you as Anne Talbot?’ Miss Frank finally exclaimed.

Belle heard the animosity in the woman’s voice and her stomach flipped. While she’d seen the horror on Miss Frank’s face as she was explaining, she’d made the mistake of assuming that was because the woman was distressed at the idea of her going through so much. But it was now clear she’d felt nothing but repugnance.

‘I wasn’t asking you to tell a lie. I have been working for you, and I can’t see that it matters what name you knew me under,’ Belle pleaded.

‘It matters very much to me,’ the older woman snapped. ‘No one changes their name unless they are up to no good.’

‘But I’ve explained why Mr Reiss made me use that name, and how I came to be here in New Orleans. Don’t you think I’ve suffered enough by being abducted and sold into prostitution? If that happened to you, wouldn’t you have got out of it any way you could?’

‘I don’t believe you had no choice in the matter. I think it’s far more likely you got led astray and then made up this ridiculous story to make yourself look like a victim,’ Miss Frank said tersely, her small face and body rigid with indignation. ‘I don’t even know that I believe this man who was keeping you died of natural causes. Not when it’s clear from your bruised cheek that you were fighting! But setting that aside, have you any idea what it would do to my business if my customers knew what you are? They wouldn’t want to step inside the shop, much less try on a hat you’d touched.’

Belle felt as though she’d been kicked in the stomach. She hadn’t for one moment expected that she wouldn’t be believed, nor had she anticipated that Miss Frank would see a whore as being as dangerous as someone with leprosy.

‘They won’t catch anything from me,’ she retorted. ‘Though they might from their own husbands, as you can bet most of them visit the District on a regular basis.’

Miss Frank gasped in shocked horror. ‘How dare you say such a wicked, slanderous thing?’

All at once Belle saw that she had been a fool to imagine this little spinster could possibly understand and sympathize with what she’d been through. The society she had been raised in was completely blinkered, and most women like her were entirely ignorant about even their own bodies. Even if Belle had only admitted a man had kissed her, Miss Frank would probably have reached for her smelling salts.

But Belle was not going to beg her forgiveness for something that was not her fault. She certainly wasn’t going to resort to tears either. And she wasn’t going to let the silly woman hide behind her ridiculous, prudish views.

‘Because it’s absolutely true,’ Belle said stubbornly. ‘Why is it that people always cast prostitutes as the lowest form of life? They wouldn’t exist but for men. And I can tell you first hand that it is invariably so-called “respectable” married men who use them. If their wives fulfilled their role in marriage, they wouldn’t resort to it. So your outraged customers ought to look to themselves before they point a finger at me.’

‘I’ve never heard anything so shocking!’ Miss Frank gasped, her face flushing rose pink.

‘Shocking! I’ll tell you what’s shocking,’ Belle said angrily. ‘That you’ve had me working here day after day, acting as if you liked me. Yet when I tell you the truth about how I came to be here, you turn against me. I took you for a kind woman. I actually believed you would want to help me.’

‘I want you out of my shop immediately.’ Miss Frank’s voice was shrill and cold. ‘Go on now, you little strumpet.’

Belle knew she had to leave; nothing she could say was going to overcome this woman’s prejudices.

‘Fine, I’ll go,’ she said, darting forward and snatching up a small pile of her designs from the work bench. ‘But you can’t keep these, and I’ll just slip down to Angelique’s to inform them their latest order was designed and made up by a whore. They’ll probably want to return the lot if they are anything like you!’

She saw Miss Frank’s small face crumple and for a split second she was tempted to say she didn’t mean that. But she was too hurt to back down; she’d truly believed the affection she had felt for this woman was reciprocated.

‘I’m just seventeen. I’ve been through hell since I was snatched from my home a year and a half ago, and I’m over four thousand miles away from there, without any idea of how to get back,’ she spat out, waving the sheaf of designs she held in her hand. ‘What little security I had died yesterday with Mr Reiss, but I thought I had one true friend who would listen and advise me what to do without judging me. What a fool I was!’

She took some small satisfaction in seeing shame flood across the small woman’s face, but turned and walked out of the shop.

Almost blinded by tears, Belle returned home. She had no alternative now but to leave New Orleans. This was, by anyone’s measure, a very juicy story and she knew Miss Frank would not be able to keep it to herself. It would get back to Martha in no time and then she’d be after Belle.

Then there was the police. They were bound to come back and ask her more questions, especially if anything odd came up at Faldo’s post mortem. Once they found out about her past they might even blame her for his death. Yet even more alarming now was that the people who had been behind buying and selling her might want to silence her permanently.

She was terrified. If she went to the train station one of Martha’s spies might tip her off and they’d come after her. A ship was probably the best plan, but she didn’t have the first idea how to fix that up.

As she packed her suitcase, she tried to tell herself that she’d always known this day would come, because she’d bought the suitcase for this very eventuality. But still she sobbed, for she had never expected that it would be under these circumstances. She had selected things for her home with such care, and it hurt to have to leave them all behind. The blue fan decorated with gold cherubs that she’d fixed above her bed could go with her as it folded away to nothing, but she couldn’t take the picture of an exotic beach because it was too big. She had idled away so many hours imagining staying in a little straw-roofed hut on such a beach, with swaying palm trees, white sand and turquoise sea. She’d dreamed too of a man like Etienne taking care of her. But the picture and the lovely red hearth rug in the living room and all the other pretty things she’d bought would have to stay here.

She had more clothes now than she’d arrived with, four dresses, various petticoats, chemises, stockings, drawers and shoes, but she no longer had a warm coat, for the old fur one she was given in France had been left on the ship when she arrived in New Orleans. The weather here might still be mild, but she knew that once she got nearer to New York it would turn very cold.

An hour later Belle was in Canal Street, her arm aching from carrying the heavy suitcase the short distance. She had pushed the keys of the house back through the letter box as she left, assuming the landlord would call once he’d been notified that Faldo had died.

Waving down a cab, she asked him to take her to Alderson’s and wait while she shopped, then to take her down to the docks.

Belle felt a slight pang of conscience as she charged the expensive grey coat with black lamb collar and cuffs, plus a black lamb hat to match, and a dark blue wool dress, to Mr Reiss. But she reminded herself that she had always been careful with her spending until now, and he owed it to her anyway for the bruise on her cheek and for treating her so badly before he died.

By mid-afternoon Belle was close to tears for she was unable to get a passage on a ship. While she understood from the various agents she’d spoken to that most of the ships were merchant vessels which didn’t carry passengers, the ones who did take them wanted to see her papers before selling her a ticket.

The docks were a stinking, sweltering, raucous hive of activity. Burly men sweated as they loaded and unloaded ships, shouting to one another as they lowered or lifted huge wooden cases with pulleys. Others rolled barrels down gangplanks, then trundled them over the cobblestones to waiting drays.

Overloaded carts and barrows drawn by tired old nags rumbled through the throngs of people. There were even cattle, horses, and goats being driven off ships. At one point a few steers had broken away in panic, scattering the sailors, stevedores and other people on the wharf. Belle had been constantly jostled, leered at and pestered by beggars, and a young negress in rags had even tried to snatch her hat from her head.

She was hot, tired and very anxious. She had been told a thousand times that New Orleans was a dangerous place but it wasn’t until today at the docks that she really felt it. There were gangs of filthy, tow-haired, almost naked children no older than five or six darting around looking for things to steal; she had seen the very lowest kinds of prostitute with most of their breasts on show haranguing men in broad daylight. There were countless drunks, and others, she felt sure by their yellowing gaunt faces, were opium addicts. She had heard so many different languages, and seen every nationality from Chinamen to Red Indians. While it was true that she’d been aware from her first day in New Orleans that it housed people of every colour and creed, she hadn’t until now been brought face to face with those who lived at the very lowest and poorest level.

As a precaution she had tucked most of her money into a purse secured inside the waistband of her skirt before she left the house, but she could see from those around her that everything she had – clothes, shoes, and her suitcase – were prime targets for thieves. She didn’t dare relax or allow herself to be distracted for a second. Yet as time passed she became more afraid, for if she hadn’t found a ship by nightfall she would be forced to find somewhere to sleep, and the prospect of the kind of bed she’d find in this area was too horrible to contemplate.

‘Here, miss, the
Kentucky Maid
is shipping out to France tonight.’

Belle was surprised by the young boy addressing her, and she was reminded poignantly of Jimmy back in London, for he had the same red hair and freckled face.

‘Where? Is she carrying passengers?’ she asked.

The boy pointed further down the wharf. ‘She ain’t really a passenger ship,’ he said. ‘But I knows the skipper and I reckon he’ll take you.’

‘Who are you?’ she asked sternly for she’d never seen the boy before, and it was odd he knew what she was after.

‘I’m Able Gustang, I do a few odd jobs down here on the docks. I heard you talking to the shipping agent, and reckoned you seemed like you was desperate to get away. Are you on the run?’

‘Of course not,’ she said, but she almost laughed, for his similarity to Jimmy was striking and it made her feel she could trust him. He was very skinny, bare-footed, and his ragged pants were cut off at mid-calf length. She thought he was probably only about twelve. ‘But I came into America without any papers and I do so want to go home,’ she explained.

‘Was you a whore? They’re the ones that usually ain’t got papers,’ he said.

‘No, I wasn’t,’ she retorted, but she wasn’t sure she sounded indignant enough.

‘Well, I ’spect it were a man that brought you here anyways,’ he said, squinting at her because the sun was in his eyes. ‘That’s what happens to pretty girls.’

Belle smiled. ‘You remind me of someone back home. But I’m tougher than I look, so don’t even think of trying to cheat me. You get me fixed up and I’ll reward you.’

‘Ten dollars?’ he asked.

‘Fair enough, as long as the ship is seaworthy and I won’t have to sleep in the hold, or with the skipper.’

Able grinned then, showing several missing teeth. ‘This one will want to, but he can be a real gent. I done a few jobs for him, he’s all right.’

The
Kentucky Maid
was a sizable steamer, but Belle’s heart sank as she got closer for it looked rusting and neglected and she doubted a freighter would offer the kind of comforts she’d had on the passenger ship she’d arrived in New Orleans on. But it was going to Marseille, which was at least a whole lot nearer England than New York. And anyway, this late in the day she couldn’t afford to be fussy.

‘You stay here a minute and I’ll go and see the skipper,’ Able said. ‘Don’t run away, will you?’

Belle assured him she wouldn’t, and watched the boy bound up the gangplank with the confidence of a grown man. About ten minutes passed, in which she got more anxious by the minute, when suddenly Able appeared on deck with a short, stout man wearing a peaked cap and with gold braid on his dark jacket. He was looking at her and Able was talking excitedly, waving his hands as if driving home a point.

Able ran down the gangplank to Belle. ‘He’s scared you’ll be trouble,’ he said. ‘He don’t like carrying unaccompanied ladies because they get seasick and expect special treatment. But if you can convince him you ain’t like that, maybe even give him the idea you’ll be useful for a bit of cooking and what-not, I reckon he’ll come round.’

Belle braced herself as she went up on deck to meet Captain Rollins. She knew she’d got to be very careful. If she was too accommodating he’d assume he could have his way with her the whole way to France, but if she was too frosty he’d find an excuse not to take her.