Elyse Mady (4 page)

“Thank you, sir.” She stumbled blindly from the room, the turmoil of her emotions so thick that had it not been for Thomas’s hand beneath her elbow, leading her from the office and out through the still crowded waiting room, she would have fallen more than once.

She felt off-kilter, as though the world had been knocked askew and set back up out of place. Her life, which only this morning she had lamented for its predictability, now seemed as disordered as a game of spillikins. It was the same sensation she’d endured four years ago, when in the span of a fortnight she’d lost both her mother and father to illness, only to learn on the day of their interment that her intended had been lost at sea.

How could she begin to pick up the pieces again? It had taken her years to recover her spirits and her brother was now her only family. She stood for a moment, her face turned towards the sun, as though its heat might dispel the pervasive chill that permeated her bones. How could she manage without him?

Her thoughts were disjointed, coming in fits and starts that made it difficult to decide on a course of action. But two considerations weighed most heavily.

Robert was jailed.

In Newgate.

These two tolled in her mind again and again, a desperate plan cementing itself at last. She would go to the prison and speak to Robert. She must hurry, for though the days were long, it would still take her some time to walk to the prison and even longer to locate him in its loathsome depths. Somehow, she would make this right. Speak to the warden. Convince him of her brother’s innocence. She stepped off the curb, mindless of the hackney cab navigating the narrow street.

Thomas stopped her, drawing her back with a strong arm.

“I must go.” She looked at him without seeing him properly. Her shock had dimmed the effect of his male beauty on her senses.

“Not yet,” he said, frowning. She watched as if from a distance as his handsome face swam in and out of focus. She thought she might faint. Clearly, he thought likewise, for he did not remove his arm from about her shoulder. “You’re trembling. You’ve had terrible news. You need to sit.”

He peered up and down the length of Bow Street, past the theatre to the north and then south, towards Russel Street, “Come. A cup of tea will restore you,” he said, trying to lead her towards a respectable looking coffee house nearby.

His words penetrated slowly.
Tea. What was tea at a time like this?
“I don’t want it.” She tried to shake off his hand. “Robert is waiting.”

“You are distraught. You cannot go,” he said. “Sit. Drink your tea. When you feel ready to undertake the journey, I will drive you to Newgate and help you search out your brother.” His handsome face, so close to her own now, twisted in what she perceived to be disgust.

How many slights and indignities had he already endured today, in coming to her aid? She had lost count. Why would he not let her go? She struggled against his confinement and his arms tightened. His strength was superior and her rebellion futile. But with each moment, her anger and frustration grew. Her traitorous body cared nothing it seemed for her brother’s fate.

It cared only that Thomas Ramsay was marvellously strong and agile. That his scent was elusive yet masculine. That his chest was broad and his lips treacherously near her own. Tears of mortification and shame pricked her eyes. She wanted to dash them away, to deny their existence. Tears accomplished nothing.

Had not she learnt that bitter truth when Jamie had died?

Had not she not learnt that letting sensation and desire have free rein led to nothing but heartache?

Apparently not. Her frantically beating heart and trembling awareness of Thomas Ramsay as a man were damning proof of her weakness.

With a renewed burst of determination, she broke free of his grasp. He did not detain her, but the displeasure on his face goaded her.

“Do not presume on my person, sir. I do not rely on you to tell me where I may or may not go.”

The words, sharp and hurtful, were out before she could censor them. She knew them to be unjust but somehow, her ability to shield her thoughts, to weigh and consider how they might be taken had escaped her. She must maintain her distance. Regain her equilibrium.

Hester froze.

It would be all too easy to allow herself to be ferried about, swept up in the wake his solicitude and the magnetism of his personality. Thomas was the sort of man to whom leadership came instinctively and she knew now that she was not as strong as she ought to be in the face of his appeal. But the pity she saw in his face decided her. If she had seen mere politeness or even, as unlikely as it was to imagine, attraction, she might have succumbed.

She could not allow herself to forget that this gentleman had already inconvenienced himself to the greatest degree today. He had offered his help this morning, ignorant of the true situation her brother faced. Now that the true magnitude of Robert’s catastrophic difficulties were known, accepting Thomas’s assistance or aid was unconscionable. He had been witness to the darkest moments and knew the damning nature of the charges arrayed against her brother. But pity was not to be borne. Her independent nature rebelled.

She could not forget what she owed to her brother. He had stood by her unflinchingly when her recklessness had threatened their good name. Now, she must stand by him until he was found innocent. She could not be distracted by own weakness. Not now.

“I beg your pardon?” He sounded wounded, his eyes fixed on her face. Slowly, the confusion disappeared, and the lines around his mouth hardened.

“I thank you for the service you have rendered me. It was very handsomely done, to be sure. Now I bid you good day, sir.”

“You would take your leave? I have already said that I will take you where you need to go. If you insist on departing immediately, so be it. We will go now.” He stalked to the front of his carriage and handed the boy minding the horses a coin.

“No. I will walk.” She gestured eastward, where the dome of St. Peter’s was visible, a beacon of sorts, to guide her.

“Walk? By yourself? In this heat, unaccompanied, to Newgate Prison?” Thomas scoffed, his handsome face hard and implacable. “It is out of the question.”

His refusal to even countenance her suggestion renewed the embers of her anger, and the calmness she had striven for so painfully all day evaporated.

“I
will
walk, sir, by your leave or no.”

“Good God, Miss Aspinall, I always supposed you to be a sensible woman. Now I would credit that ridiculously unbecoming bonnet of yours with more sense. You cannot attend your brother in Newgate Prison on your own. It is the height of folly. You must see that.”

“I will be with my brother. He will take care of me.”

“Take care of you? How? Clapped in irons, caked in mud and who knows what filth from the streets?” Thomas paced back and forth, running an agitated hand through his short hair. “Here is the press yard, my sister,” he said, pointing his finger in a mocking imitation of a gracious tour. “And over there, the keeper’s house and here, the inner yard. Won’t you sit down? Pray, don’t mind the murderers and cutpurses eyeing your person.”

He was truly angry, she was surprised to note. She had not expected that of him. He was too much a gentleman to ever give way to such base emotion. But Thomas seemed unconcerned that their dispute was attracting the attention of passersby. His whole attention seemed fixed on her.

The horses shifted uneasily in their rails, perturbed by the disagreement.

Still glaring at her, his dark eyes sulphurous, he went to stand by them. Long fingers reached up and stroked their foreheads. Even in his anger, his touch against their necks was gentle. The beasts calmed, their pawing and stamping ceasing almost at once. She wished she did not feel such envy at his obvious regard for the animals.

Or wonder what it might feel like to have those same hands stroke her.

“It is none of your concern, sir, how I comport myself or with whom. I will walk and you will not persuade me otherwise. You are not my brother nor my father nor my husband to direct my course as you see fit.” Her voice had risen but as soon as the words escaped her lips, she wished them back again. The impertinence of her accusation stung her conscience but once spoken, she could not undo the heated charge.

His face flush with anger, he straightened and through tight lips, conceded, “You are correct, madam. I am none of those things. I will not impose myself on you any further.” He stalked round the carriage and climbed up in a swift motion. “I had thought my presence a help to you but clearly, I was mistaken and you find it a burden. I will relieve you of it forthwith. If it suits, you may send word of your brother’s fate to my offices, but I will not insinuate myself
unwelcomed
into this matter further.” His pointed emphasis stung.

“Sir…” As quickly as it had erupted, her anger dissipated, leaving her feeling achingly vulnerable and unsure. She reached out a pleading hand, trying to make him understand that it was a desire to preserve what precious little was left of her pride, and not a disgust of his company, that compelled her to act so. “Sir, I am grateful…”

He did not look down from the driver’s seat, taking up his whip in one hand and the leather reins in the other. “Your gratitude is noted, Miss Aspinall, but unnecessary. I comported myself as any gentleman in a similar situation would. Now I bid you good day.”

He snapped the reins and the horses pulled away with neat, quick steps. Hester watched him go, tears of frustration pricking at her eyes. But she would not give in to such a weakness. All her efforts must be directed towards her brother’s release. She had no time for other regrets.

Chapter Four

London stank.

One could not expect hundreds of thousands of people to live in close quarters without such an outcome. The boghouses and privies, often overflowing, were dank, and refuse tossed for the scavengers to pick over littered the thoroughfares and alleyways. In the streets, the droppings of oxen and horses mixed with offal and butchers’ leavings, alongside dead animals—cats and dogs and rats—left to rot where they dropped. Tallow makers and dyers and tanneries and the thousand and one other industries that made the metropolis so wealthy contributed their own particular scents to the city, until it was hard to divine the origins of even a fraction of the smells.

And prior to the moment she stood across from Newgate Prison, Hester would have claimed to be inured against such olfactory assaults. She knew now that she was wrong.

She’d had no conception of what true rankness could consist of. Now, she could only pray she would not have to endure it long.

She fumbled in her reticule for Thomas’s wrinkled handkerchief. A faint hint of his baywater cologne clung to the soft fabric, and she was transported back to the startling moment when he had embraced her and it had seemed as though time itself stood still. She remembered the feel of his coat beneath her cheek, and beneath his coat, the breadth of his muscles. She could recall the crispness of his neck linens against her brow, when she’d turned her face away. More shockingly, she could also remember the feel of his thighs through the thin barrier of her summer cottons, the heat and the coiled strength calling to her even now.

But her shameful fantasies could not sustain themselves against the encroachment of reality.

She pressed the cloth against her face and willed herself not to be sick. She darted into the street, past the tall monument that marked Newgate’s westernmost corner, towards the massive gates.

At the front of the prison, a short queue issued into the street. Hester joined it, unsure of the proper procedures for securing an audience with a prisoner. She’d never visited a place like this before and had no idea of the policies governing visitors. Would she be allowed to meet with Robert? Would she be asked to pay admittance? She had a few shillings and odd pence on her person but if the fee were more than that, she would not be able to pay it without returning home first. She bit her lip and concentrated on what she would say to the guards when her turn arrived.

A middle-aged woman carrying a basket, her clothes worn but neatly darned, stood ahead of her.

“Excuse me, ma’am?” Hester asked, regretting the action as soon as she spoke, for she was obliged to remove the handkerchief from her face and the smell was even more overpowering. It had been many hours since she’d picked at the nut cakes and summer fruit in Thomas’s office, but another wash of bitter saliva flooded her mouth. She swallowed back her revulsion with difficulty.

The woman smiled sympathetically. “First visit?”

“Yes.”

“Here. Take this,” she offered, reaching beneath her petticoats to rummage in her pocket, before shoving a pungent square of checked linen into Hester’s hand. “Oil of clove. Helps mask the smell and eases a roiling tummy. Protects against gaol fever too. You can’t be too careful. God alone knows how many are struck down in this pestilent place.”

Hester brought the fabric to her face and took a hesitant breath. The woman was right. The scent of cloves, while strong, did seem to settle her stomach and it certainly masked the less pleasant odours.

“Thank you,” she said gratefully.

“No more than I’d do for anyone. I remember the first time I set foot in here, visiting my husband. I thought for sure I’d be seeing my luncheon again, it were that strong. But now I’ve been coming here on six months and it’s gotten so I don’t hardly notice it.”

“Your husband is here?”

“Aye. In the north quadrangle. Had a business, he did, that went for nought and the debt landed him here. Now he’s in ’til we can see clear to paying it off,” the woman confided. She took in the quality of Hester’s clothes and boots. “Is your husband in for the same?”

“No. And it’s my brother, not my husband I come to see. He is not amongst the debtors, though he too runs a business. He’s a tailor. He was arrested for…brawling…last night,” Hester lied, reluctant to share the true nature of the charges her brother faced with anyone. The waiting line inched forward as several more visitors were deemed fit to enter. “I have only just learned of his being taken up and I am most anxious.”

The woman looked surprised and then suspicious. “In with the criminal lot? And you going to visit him on your own? You’d best watch yourself. I’ve seen the types what are locked up within and they’re a fearsome lot. And the visitors! Especially the women, who you can believe are no better than they should be.”

Mr. Taunton’s assessment of the character of the incarcerated returned to her and Hester wondered for the twentieth time why she had so peremptorily dismissed Thomas’s protection. The line moved ahead once again and the woman, her basket tucked beneath her arm, greeted the gatesmen at the door by name. Hester was surprised to see that some of the men had iron shackles round their wrists. Prisoners afforded such jobs? Her companion didn’t seem surprised however and the search of her basket complete, made to move off into the prison. She spared a last glance at Hester before disappearing through the heavy inner gate.

“I hope you find your brother well, miss.”

“As do I,” she replied, watching as the woman was swallowed by the prison’s dark interior.

“Name?”

“Hester Aspinall. I am come to enquire after a prisoner.”

The guard rolled his eyes. “Name of the prisoner?”

“Robert Aspinall. My brother. He would have been brought here earlier today. From Bow Street. He is a tailor by trade and—”

The man, whose bulk and size made him a menacing figure, seemed uninterested in the details. “Prisoners that were brought in today share quarters on the third floor. I reckon you’ll find him in the press yard, mingling with the rest of them.”

“His quarters? He must share?” When she had imagined the prison, she had envisioned a cell for each man, cramped and austere to be sure, but private. Clearly, she had been naive.

The guard laughed as though Hester had uttered a particularly choice witticism. “We don’t run a coaching inn, soft beds and pillows for all. How many bodies you think we’ve got here?”

“I’m sure I have no idea.”

“There’s more than eight hundred behind these walls, men, women and children. They’ll share a pallet and be damned grateful they’re not sleeping on the floor.” He must have seen Hester’s horror, for he continued with brusque reassurance, “But there’s Dr. Box to tend to their bodies if they fall sick and Dr. Forde to tend to their souls—not that there’s much hope of his improving on them that are incarcerated here.”

“Surely better accommodations exist?”

“I didn’t say that they didn’t,” the hulking man replied with an avaricious glint. “There’s plenty can be done to make a stay more comfortable, but the prisoner must bear the cost.”

“How much?”

“If you’ve the money and the interest, it’s thirteen shillings, six pence a week for lodgings in the master’s side. Twenty and six, state side. No more than forty men in the master’s side, and they have a pallet to their own selves. And the right of a trade, provided it isn’t dangerous or disruptive.” He said this as though it were something to be excited at.

“Thirteen and six?” Hester echoed, already toting up the sums in her head and blanching. In a good week, Robert had usually been able to claim twenty-five or thirty shillings after all his expenses had been paid. Now, without his income, how long could their carefully marshalled savings last? Evenly roughly figured, the totals were disheartening. “And when can my brother expect to have his case resolved?”

“If he’s keeping company in the criminal quarters, he’ll be kept for the king’s pleasure until the next quarter sessions when it’s their turn to face the bench.”

September.
The next quarter sessions would not be held until the end of September, sometime around Michaelmas. Robert would be incarcerated in this stinking cesspool for two and a half long months, if Hester could not secure his freedom immediately.

“Thank you, sir,” she said, trying to mask her dismay. “If I may, I will go through now and find my brother.”

“Visitors needs must leave the prison by nine o’clock.”

Hester shuddered at the notion of remaining in this fearsome edifice a moment longer than necessary. She could not imagine what it would be like here after dark. “My visit will be concluded by then.”

The guard merely gestured towards the heavy iron gate that separated the outer portion of the prison from the areas inside. Her mouth dry and her heart hammering, she moved with faltering steps through the central passage, dotted with a regular pattern of thick stone columns, towards the inner gate.

The prison yard opened before her, surrounded on all sides by three towering stories, narrow windows marching with absolute regularity across the face of the imposing inner quadrangle. In places, narrow walkways ran along the perimeter, with staircases down to crowded, stone-paved yard. The masonry radiated back the baking heat of the day, although much of the yard was already cast in long shadows, such were the height of the walls in relation to the late afternoon sun.

There were no flourishes or carvings to relieve the severity of the soot-darkened walls. Hester did not think she had ever seen a more unhappy situation, and it was all she could do not to turn and flee. Indeed, the very design of the place seemed calculated to inspire hopelessness in all those unlucky enough to be within its walls. She forced herself to move deeper into the prison yard, putting one reluctant foot in front of the other.

Everywhere she saw wretched masses, manacled with cumbersome iron at their wrists, most wearing clothes in an appalling state of disrepair and filth. The stench of piss and unwashed bodies caused her throat to sting and itch. She was forced to avert her eyes at the sight of a prisoner relieving himself in full view. Two men, tankards in their hands, wove drunkenly through the haphazard groupings of prisoners, eliciting barbarous threats when they stumbled through a game of dice. One of the men was knocked swiftly to the ground in retaliation for his transgression. His cup smashed against the stone as he fell and sent a spray of hard ale across the hem of Hester’s dress. She reared back with a muffled exclamation of fear.

“Hester! My God, Hester!” The shocked cry rang out, and she turned to see her brother limping quickly across the yard towards her.

If she had not known it to be him by the sound of his voice, Hester was not sure if she would have been able to recognize him.

All his life, Robert had been accounted handsome, first as a boy and then as a man. He took his colouring from their father, sharing the same dark eyes and thick, curly hair. He was broad of shoulder, with a fine set of teeth and a dimple that made its appearance when he laughed. He stood nearly six feet without his shoes. He dressed well, a testament to his skills with a needle, and Hester knew that many of the young ladies in their parish had fancied themselves very hard done by in light of Miss Stroud’s recent success.

Now, his curls were nearly impossible to distinguish, they were so disordered and filthy. His face was a welt of bruises and discolouration, one eye swollen shut completely. His coat and costume were caked in the most revolting substances imaginable—a mixture of what looked to be blood and mud and dung. One sleeve was almost entirely torn from the armscye, while his filthy neckcloth had been pressed into duty to support his left arm in a sling.

He made his way past the other inmates with painful deliberation, favouring his bandaged arm and ribs. It made her heart ache just to look at him.

“Robert,” she gasped as he came to stand before her. “Oh, Robert. What has happened that you should look like this?” Without thinking, she pressed her handkerchief to her lips to wet it and reached up, trying to clear away the worst of the blood from his face.

Her brother grimaced and pulled his head away. “Gently, please. Gently.”

“Of course,” she said, patting with as light a touch as she could manage. Even that seemed to pain him, and when he drew his lips back in a silent hiss, she saw that at least two of his teeth had been knocked free in the melee he had endured.

She bit back another exclamation of horror only with difficulty, not wanting to distress him further. “Good God, Robert. How can it be that I find you amongst such creatures as this? Will you not tell me what happened last night?”

It was difficult to tell, such were the extent of the injuries and filth, but a look of displeasure flashed across her brother’s face and his single undamaged eye darkened.

“How did you find me here?” he demanded, taking her arm and leading her away from the crush. “I was given no leave to send word and had no money to bribe a guard otherwise. My purse was lost.” He brushed down his ruined clothes with his remaining hand, hampered in the gesture by the iron chain between his wrists.

“Luck, if you can call it that. I went to the shop in search of you. Mr. Ramsay happened upon me there. Perceiving my distress, he bent all his resources to finding you.”

The news did not seem to hearten Robert as Hester might have hoped.

“Ramsay? He knows of this…debacle?” An angry glower settled on his face.

“I imagine many will know of it. It has been published in at least one paper, perhaps more,” she admitted. She hesitated, unwilling to hurt her brother further. “It will be much talked of, I fear.”

“Much talked of?” Robert scoffed. “It will be more than talked of, if the reaction of the Londoners I encountered today is anything to judge by.”

“Did they do this? A mob? But why?”

Robert shrugged. “There is a distaste for individuals who are believed to have committed…” His voice trailed off, as though he could not bring himself to utter the word.

“Sodomy,” she whispered, almost to herself. She had not intended it as an indictment, but as soon as it escaped her lips, her brother’s anger erupted.