Burning Bright (20 page)

Normally Maisie would have stayed longer at the amphitheatre, watching rehearsals all afternoon if she could, but after Miss Laura Devine spoke to her she was eager to leave. She did not want to stay and see the slack-rope dancer rehearse with her own replacement. Moreover, John Astley had disappeared, and Maisie doubted he would be able to convince Miss Hannah Smith to get back on her horse. Besides, she should be helping her mother with the cabbage, or getting on with the sewing the Kellaway women were taking in to replace the buttons they used to make. For Bet Butterfield had bought all of their buttons and materials off them, and got them to show her how to make several sorts. Maisie had expressed surprise when her mother agreed to give up the buttons, but Anne Kellaway had been adamant. “We live in London now, not Dorsetshire,” she'd said. “We have to leave Dorset things behind.” At first Maisie had been glad of the change, but lately she had begun to miss her Dorset buttons. Mending others' clothes was not as satisfying as the thrill of making something entirely new out of nothing—a delicate, cobwebbed button out of a ring and a piece of thread, for instance.

Now she stood on the front steps of the amphitheatre and peered out into the fog engulfing London. The Kellaways had heard much about this thick, choking blanket, but had been lucky enough not to experience it fully until now, for the spring and summer had been breezy, which kept the fog from settling. In the autumn, however, coal fires in houses were lit all day, billowing smoke into the streets, where it hung in the stillness, muffling light and sound. It was only midafternoon, but street lamps were already lit—Maisie could see them disappearing up into the gloom on Westminster Bridge. From habit she studied the people appearing out of the fog as they walked over the bridge toward her, looking in each figure for Rosie Wightman. Maisie had been watching for her this past month, but her old friend had not come.

She hesitated on the steps. Since getting lost in London the month before, Maisie had stopped taking the back-street route between the amphitheatre and home, even though she knew the way and several of the people and shops along it as well. Instead she usually walked along Westminster Bridge Road, where there were more people and the route was clear. It had grown so foggy since she'd come to the amphitheatre earlier, however, that she wondered if she should walk even there. She was just turning to go back in and ask Jem if he would accompany her when John Astley pushed through the door and ran straight into her.

“Oh!” Maisie cried.

John Astley bowed. “My apologies, miss.” He was going to pass her but happened to glance at her face, and stopped. For John Astley saw there a look that balanced out the fire of Miss Laura Devine and the tears of Miss Hannah Smith. Maisie was gazing at him with the complete earthy adoration of a Dorset girl. She would never glare at him, or call him a shit sack, or slap him—as Miss Hannah Smith had just done when he followed her backstage. Maisie would not criticize him, but support him; not make demands on him, but accept him; not spurn him, but open herself to him. Though not as refined as Miss Hannah Smith—this was after all a raw country girl with a red nose and a frilly mop cap—yet she had bright eyes and a fine slight figure that a part of his body was already responding to. She was just the tonic a man needed after being the target of rage and jealousy.

John Astley put on his kindest, most helpful face; most importantly, he appeared interested, which was the most seductive quality of all to a girl like Maisie. He studied her as she hesitated on the edge of the dense, sulfuric, all-enveloping fog. “May I be of assistance?” he asked.

“Oh thank'ee, sir!” Maisie cried. “It's just—I need to get home, but the fog do scare me.”

“Do you live nearby?”

“That I do, sir. I be just two doors away from you at Hercules Buildings.”

“Ah, so we are neighbors. I thought you looked familiar.”

“Yes, sir. We met at the fire in the summer—do you remember? And—well, my father and brother work here for the circus. I be here often, bringing them their meals and such.”

“I am going towards Hercules Buildings myself. Allow me to escort you.” John Astley held out an arm to her. Maisie stared at it as if he were offering her a jewel-encrusted crown. It was rare in the life of a modest girl such as Maisie to be given exactly what she had been dreaming of. She reached over and touched his arm tentatively, as though expecting it to melt. But the cloth of his blue coat, with its flesh underneath, was real, and a thrill visibly shook her.

John Astley laid his other hand over hers and squeezed it, encouraging Maisie to tuck her hand in the crook of his elbow. “There we are, miss—”

“Maisie.”

“I am at your service, Maisie.” John Astley led her down the steps and left into the murk of Stangate Street rather than right into the marginally brighter fog of Westminster Bridge Road. Maisie was in such a warm fog of her own that without a murmur she allowed him to take her along the shortcut she had avoided for a month. Indeed, Maisie didn't even notice where they were going. To be able to walk with—and even to touch—the handsomest, ablest, and most elegant man she knew was beyond a dream. It was the most important moment in her life. She stepped lightly alongside him as if the fog had got under her feet and cushioned her from the ground.

John Astley was fully aware of the effect he was having on Maisie, and he knew enough to say little as they first went along. To start with he only spoke to direct her through the fog—“Careful of that cart”; “Let's get you out of the gutter, shall we?”; “Just step to your right a moment to avoid that dung.” John Astley had grown up with London fog and was used to navigating through it, allowing his other senses to take over—his nose sniffing out horses or pubs or rubbish, his feet sensing the slope of the gutter on the sides of the road or the cobbles in mews. Though the fog muffled sound, he could still tell whether one, two, or four horses were coming along, and distinguish a gig from a chaise. And so he walked confidently through the fog—slowly too, for Hercules Buildings wasn't far, and he needed time.

Once he had gained Maisie's physical confidence, he began gently to lead her along in conversation. “Did you bring dinner to your father and brother today?” he suggested.

“Yes, sir.”

“And what did you bring them? Wait, let me guess. A meat pie?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Did you buy it or make it yourself?”

“I helped Ma. I made the crust.”

“I'm sure you make a very fine crust, Maisie, with your delicate fingers—the finest in Lambeth.”

Maisie giggled. “Thank'ee, sir.”

They walked a little farther, passing the Queen's Head at the corner where Stangate Street ran into Lambeth Marsh, the yellow light from the pub staining the fog the color of phlegm. No one was outside drinking in such weather, but as they passed, the door burst open and a man reeled out, laughing and cursing at the same time. “Oh!” Maisie clutched John Astley's arm.

He put his other hand over hers again and squeezed it, pulling her arm through his so that they were closer together. “There, now, Maisie, there's no need to worry. You're with me, after all. He wouldn't lay a finger on you.” Indeed, the man hadn't noticed them, but began weaving one way up Lambeth Marsh while John Astley and Maisie turned down the other. “I expect he's gone up the Marsh to buy vegetables for his wife. What do you think he'll buy—swedes or turnips?”

Maisie chuckled, despite her nerves. “Oh, swedes, I do think, sir. They be much nicer.”

“And leeks or cabbages?”

“Leeks!” Maisie laughed as if she had made a joke, and John Astley joined in.

“That is an unsavory pub, that one,” he said. “I should not have brought you past it, Maisie. I do apologize.”

“Oh, don't worry, sir. I be perfectly safe with you.”

“Good. I am glad, my dear. Of course, not all pubs are like that one. Some are very nice. The Pineapple, for instance. Even ladies can go there and feel quite at home.”

“I suppose so, sir, though I never been in.” At the mention of that pub, Maisie's face lost its clear brightness as she was reminded of waiting outside it to see John Astley come out with one of the costume girls. Without quite meaning to, she pulled her hand a little way out of the tight grip of his elbow. He felt the shift and inwardly cursed. Not the Pineapple, then, he thought—she clearly didn't like it. Perhaps it was not the best place, anyway—though it was handy for Astley's stables where he intended to end up, it was also likely to be full of circus folk who might know her.

Before John Astley's mention of the Pineapple, Maisie had been able to float along happily on their mild, flirtatious chat and her imagination. Naming the pub, however, forced her to acknowledge to herself his intentions. After all, a visit to a pub with John Astley was a concrete event. She hesitated. “I watched you riding with Miss Smith just now,” she said. “You looked so fine together.”

This was not where John Astley intended their conversation to go. He wanted to get it back to laughing over vegetables. “Miss Smith rides very well,” he answered simply, wondering how much Maisie had seen during the rehearsal. Had she heard what his father shouted at Miss Laura Devine?

For her part, Maisie was also thinking about what she had seen and heard, the piece of the puzzle that linked John Astley with Miss Devine. She thought about it, and found that his actual presence at her side—his broad shoulders and tapered waist under his well-cut blue coat, his gay eyes and ready smile, his light, sure step and firm grip, even the meaty smell of horse sweat on him—was far more potent to her than anything he had done to anyone else. With only a twinge of guilt for the kindness Miss Devine had shown and the warning she had given her, Maisie shut her mind to John Astley's history and thought only of this moment. He might pay attention to many women, but why shouldn't she have a share of that attention? She wanted it.

She even made it easy for him. When they emerged from the lane into Hercules Buildings, with the Kellaways' rooms just to the right of them, Maisie said, “Here so soon!” in as sad a tone as she could manage.

John Astley immediately took her up. “My dear, I thought you would be pleased to arrive home safely! Are you expected?”

“No,” Maisie answered. “Not yet. I'll help Ma with the cabbage, but really she's not so busy.”

“What, no leeks or swedes for you?”

Maisie smiled, but he was leading her across the street now, and her stomach churned with the thought that he would soon deposit her at her door and she might never again talk to him or touch him.

“It has been such a pleasure escorting you home, Maisie, that I am loath to give up the sensation,” John Astley announced, stopping short of Miss Pelham's house. “Perhaps we might take a drink together before I leave you at home.”

“That—that would be—very nice.”

“Perhaps the tavern at the top of the road would suit. It is close—we wouldn't want to go far in this fog—and it has a snug little corner that I think you will like.”

“All—all right, sir.” Maisie could barely utter the words. For a moment she felt dizzy with a heady mix of guilt and fear. But she gripped John Astley's arm tightly again, turned her back on her barely visible home, and walked in the direction he—and she—wanted to go.

Hercules Tavern completed the line of houses along Hercules Buildings just where it met Westminster Bridge Road, with the Pineapple shoring up the other end. It was bigger and more crowded than the Pineapple, with booths and bright lights. John Astley had drunk there a few times but preferred to conduct his seductions in quieter, darker places. However, at least there were no circus people here; nor did anyone look up as they came in.

John Astley paid a couple to move, and sat Maisie in a corner booth screened with shoulder-high wood panels that gave them a little privacy from their neighbors in the booths on either side, but with a clear view of the room. Then he went to the bar and got her a rum punch, with a glass of wine for himself. “Make it sweet and strong,” he said of the punch. The barman glanced at Maisie in her seat, but made no comment.

Once they were sitting together with their drinks, John Astley did not take the lead in conversation as he had out on the street. In fact, he felt little desire to talk at all. He had achieved his first aim—to get Maisie sitting in a pub with a drink in front of her. He felt he had done enough, and the rum and his physical presence would do the rest to bring him his second aim. He did not really enjoy talking with women, and felt he had little now to say to Maisie. She was a pretty girl, and he simply wanted solace from the more trying women in his life.

Maisie said nothing at first because of the novelty of sitting with a handsome man in a London pub. She had been to pubs in the Piddle Valley, of course, but they were dark, smoky, and poor compared to this. Though Hercules Tavern was itself only a shabby local pub, its wooden tables and chairs were better made than the rough, half-broken ones at the Five Bells in Piddletrenthide, where the landlord bought secondhand chairs from traveling bodgers rather than pay for Thomas Kellaway's superior work. Hercules Tavern was warmer too, for despite the larger room, its coal fire drew better, and there were more customers to heat it as well. Even the pewter mugs for beer were not so dented as in Piddletrenthide, and the glasses for wine and punch were of a better quality than she'd seen in Dorsetshire.

Maisie had never been in a room with so many lamps, and was fascinated by the detail she could now make out—the patterns on women's dresses, the wrinkles on a man's brow, the names and initials carved into the wood panels. She watched people passing to and fro much as a cat might spy on a tree full of birds—hungrily following one, then being distracted by another, her head whipping back and forth. The other customers seemed to be in high spirits. When a group across the room guffawed, Maisie smiled. When two men began to shout at each other, she raised her eyebrows, then sighed in relief as they suddenly laughed and thumped each other's back.

She had no idea what the punch cup John Astley set in front of her contained—she'd only ever drunk weak beer—but took it up gamely and sipped. “Oh, it do have something in it—makes it spicy.” She licked her lips. “I didn't think drinks would be different in London. But so many things are. This pub, for instance—it be so much livelier than the Five Bells!” She sipped once more—though she didn't actually think much of the drink, she knew it was expected of her.

John Astley wasn't really listening, but calculating how much rum he would need to buy her before she was pliable enough to agree to anything. He glanced at her red cheeks and silly smile. Two should do it, he thought.

While Maisie didn't look closely enough to recognize any of the customers, one of them recognized her. In the crowd of men gathered at the bar, she did not see Charlie Butterfield waiting for drinks, even when he began to stare at her. Once John Astley was sitting with her and she was well into her rum punch, Charlie turned away in disgust. However, he couldn't resist saying as he set down beer in front of his parents, “Guess who's sitting in the next booth. No, don't, Mam!” He pulled Bet Butterfield down as she started to get up so that she could peer over the screen. “Don't let 'em see you!”

“Who's there, boy?” Dick Butterfield asked as he brought the beer to his lips and took a dainty sip. “Ah, lovely.”

“That nan-boy Astley with little Miss Dorset.”

“Dorset? Not Maisie?” Bet Butterfield said. “What's she doing here, then? This an't the place for her.” She turned an ear toward the neighboring booth to listen. Maisie was growing louder with each sip of rum punch, so the Butterfields could hear at least one side of the conversation—John Astley's voice was low, and he said little.

“Ma and me goes to the circus twice a week,” she was saying. “So I've seen everything you've done, several times. I do love your horse, sir. You sit her so beautifully.”

John Astley merely grunted. He never talked about work at the pub, nor did he need to hear compliments from her; but Maisie was not experienced enough to sense this. In truth, he was beginning to tire of her. He had spotted a couple of women in the room who he expected would have given him a better time than Maisie. She was clearly a virgin, and in his experience he'd found that virgins were better in theory than in practice. Deflowering them required a certain patience and responsibility that he was not always keen to take on; often they cried, and he would prefer a woman to take some pleasure in being with him. Only Miss Laura Devine had shown any virginal sophistication, laughing rather than crying during the act, and aware of the ways a woman might please a man without his having to teach her. He had been surprised that she was still a virgin; surprised too that she then displayed a virgin's other characteristic besides tears—the belief that she now had some claim on him. After a few pleasurable meetings he had shaken her off, and refused to believe she was carrying his child until Miss Hannah Smith slapped the knowledge into him earlier today.

Still, whatever John Astley thought of Maisie, he had already made his claim to her by seating her in the booth and plying her with punch in full view of the other drinkers. The women in the room could see full well what he was up to and had no interest in being second choice of the day.

He would at least make this quick. The moment she finished her rum punch, he got up to renew it and his wine. On his way back to their seats, a drink in each hand, he stepped aside to let a boy with a scarred eyebrow pass. The boy stepped to the same side as him, then stepped back as John Astley did, sneering all the while. After blocking John Astley's passage for a moment more, he bumped his shoulder, jolting the horseman's glass of wine so that half of it slopped onto the floor. “Nan-boy,” he hissed as he passed.

John Astley had no idea who he was, but was familiar with the type: The boy had probably been to the show and was jealous of Astley's fame and skill. Men sometimes stopped him in the street or at the pub and taunted him; occasionally a fight would break out as jealousy flared into action. John Astley tried to avoid this when possible, as it was undignified for someone in his superior position to be brawling with common folk. But he did defend himself very ably, and fought off attacks in particular to his handsome face. Despite several falls and kicks from horses, he had managed to keep his face clear of damage and scarring, and he had no intention of losing his looks to a mere punch-up with a drunk working lad.

Maisie had not noticed the exchange, for she was now listening to a buxom woman with chapped cheeks and beefy arms leaning over the partition from the adjacent booth.

“I been meanin' to drop in on you and your mam both,” the woman was saying. “I've a lady wants a different kind of button, for waistcoats she's making. Do you know how to make a High Top?”

“Course I do!” Maisie cried. “I be from Dorsetshire, don't I? Dorset buttons from a Dorset maid!” The punch made her voice loud and a bit shrill.

Bet Butterfield frowned—she had caught a whiff of rum. “Your mam knows you're here, does she?”

“Of course she does,” John Astley interrupted. “But it's not your business, is it, Madam Nosy?”

Bet Butterfield bristled. “It is too my business. Maisie's my neighbor, she is, and we look out for our neighbors round here—some of 'em, anyway.” She cut her eyes sideways at him.

John Astley considered how to handle her: He could flatter her, or he could treat her with disdain and indifference. It was not always easy to judge which method would work with which type of woman, but he had to decide before he lost Maisie to her neighbors. Now that there was a chance that he could not have her, he wanted her more. Setting down the drinks and turning his back on the laundress, he slid onto the bench next to Maisie and boldly put his arm around her. Maisie smiled, snuggled back against his arm, and took a gulp of rum punch.

Bet Butterfield watched this cozy display with suspicion. “Maisie, are you—”

“I be fine, Mrs. Butterfield, really. Ma knows I be here.”

“Do she, now?” Though Maisie was becoming more adept at lying, it took some doing to convince Bet Butterfield.

“Leave it, Bet,” Dick Butterfield grumbled, with a tug at her skirt. It was the week's end and he was tired, wanting nothing more than to sink into a few drinks with family and friends. He often felt his wife interfered too much in others' dramas.

Bet Butterfield satisfied herself by saying, “I'll come and see you later about those High Tops, shall I?” as if to warn John Astley that Maisie should be at home soon to receive her.

“Yes, or tomorrow. Best make it soon, as we may be leaving shortly.”

“Leaving? To go where—back to Dorsetshire?”

“Not Dorsetshire.” Maisie waved her hand about. “To Dublin with the circus!”

Even John Astley looked surprised—if not horrified—at this news. “You are?”

“I heard your father ask mine to come. And of course you can convince him to let Pa bring all of us.” She sipped her punch and banged the glass down. “We'll all be together!”

“Will you, now.” Bet Butterfield frowned at John Astley. “Perhaps I'd best go with you now to your mam, then.”

“Bet, sit down and finish your drink.” Dick Butterfield used a commanding tone Bet Butterfield did not often hear, and she obeyed, sinking slowly into her seat, the frown still glued to her face.

“Somethin' an't right there,” she muttered. “I know it.”

“Yes, and it an't your business, is it. You leave those Kellaways be. You're as bad as Maggie, lookin' out that Kellaway boy every chance she gets. Maybe you should be more worried about her than that girl in the next booth. Miss Dorset is old enough to know what she's about. She'll get what she wants from Astley. Now, when you do go round to see Mrs. Kellaway, be sure and ask what her husband's goin' to do with all his wood if they're off to Ireland. Tell him I'll take it off him for very little—chairs too, if he's got any. Now I think on it, perhaps I'll come with you when you pay your visit.”

“Now who's buttin' into Kellaway business?”

Dick Butterfield stretched, then took up his mug. “This an't Kellaway business, my chuck—this is Butterfield business! This is how I keep that roof over your head.”

Bet Butterfield snorted. “These are what keep it.” She held out her chafed, wrinkled hands, which had been handling wet clothes for twenty years and looked much older than Bet was herself. Dick Butterfield seized one and kissed it in a combination of pity and affection. Bet Butterfield laughed. “You old sausage, you. What am I going to do with you?” She sat back and yawned, for she had just finished an overnight wash and not slept in more than a day. She settled into her seat like a rock set into a stone wall and allowed Maisie to slip from her mind. She would not be moving for several hours.

John Astley, in the meantime, was pondering Dublin. One of Maisie's attractions was that he would be leaving her here in a few days and not have to wrestle with any virginal claim she made on him. “What's this about Dublin, then?” he said. “Your father is going to do what?”

“Carpentry. He be a chairmaker, but Mr. Astley asked him to join the circus to build all sorts of things.” Maisie slurred the last words, the rum taking effect. She wanted to lay her spinning head on the table.

John Astley relaxed—his father would certainly never allow a carpenter's family to join them in Dublin. He drained his glass and stood up. “Come, let's go.”

Not a moment too soon, either. The surly lad who had made him spill his wine was now with a group across the room and had begun to sing:

Maisie's cheeks were fiery red now, and she looked a little dazed. “Come, Maisie,” John Astley repeated, glaring at the singers. “I'll see you home.”

Around the room others had taken up the song:

Maisie was taking her time arranging her shawl around her shoulders. “Quick, now!” John Astley muttered. Pulling her to her feet, he put an arm around her and led her to the door. Over the singing, Bet Butterfield called out, “Don't forget, now, duck—I'll be comin' to your mam's shortly!”