Birdcage Walk (4 page)

Though his staring had grown more brazen during the weeks she’d been living on the street next to his, she had yet to acknowledge him. When, on that morning, she had finally lowered her small chin and looked directly at him with her cat’s eyes, he hadn’t been able to ask the questions that he’d rehearsed. Instead, he’d quickened his pace and looked down at his feet, not daring to glance back. He’d cursed his shyness all day and then fate saw to it that he didn’t happen upon her for a couple of weeks after that.

Finally it was Annie who hastened things on for them, asking George how his father and sister were keeping as he walked past their house one day, when the two sisters were employed in scrubbing the window. Charlotte’s arch gaze made him feel foolish and clumsy, but he couldn’t ignore Annie so he’d stopped, feeling his cheeks heat.

“They are both well, thank you, Mrs. Matthews. And—“ he rushed the words, glad he had remembered them in time. “I was sorry to hear about your mother’s passing.”

“That’s kind, George, thank you,” said Annie approvingly. “It was very sudden, how she went, but it’s been a comfort having Charlotte come here to live. She was set on staying in the house our ma kept, but I wasn’t having that. She could never have kept up the rent on her own anyway. Have you met George, Lottie?” In reply, the younger girl stuck out her small hand.

“Charmed, I’m sure,” she said in a strong but sweet voice.

“Hark at her!” exclaimed Annie, with an expression of mock outrage. “Don’t take any notice, George, she’s after a job in a shop and she’s gone all hoity-toity over it.”

Charlotte went pink and stalked into the house, banging the door shut behind her. Annie tutted and apologised to George.

“She’s missing her mother, that’s what it’ll be. She’s a good girl when she’s not putting on airs. Listen, I must be getting on. After this window that baby will want feeding again. Nice to see you, love.”

Before she could resume her scrubbing, George took the plunge, clearing his throat. “Mrs. Matthews, do you think that if I were to . . . Well, I wondered if I could take . . . ask to take your Charlotte out one day. Perhaps I would be some company to her.”

Annie smiled broadly. “Now there’s a good idea. I’m sure she’d like that, though you might be better asking her another day, mood she’s in now. Nice young man like you might cheer her up. You’ve got my blessings if you like her. She can be quite a handful, mind.” Chortling to herself, she turned back to her task leaving George to sidle off.

He wondered afterwards if he would have been better off getting Annie to do the asking for him but, as it was, she had done most of the work for him. The following Sunday, George was sitting sketching on his own building’s warm front step when he found himself thrown into shadow. Looking up, a halo of the sunlight behind her, he found Charlotte standing in front of him, appraising him frankly.

“My sister told me you want to take me courting,” she said bluntly.

George got up, not keen to be addressed from such an inferior position. His sketchbook dropped unceremoniously into the dust, though they both ignored it. Before he could speak, she continued evenly.

“If you want to ask me out then you might do it yourself. You’re a man, ain’t you?”

Humiliated, he cast around for some sharp retort, but then saw that a smile hovered at the corners of her mouth.

“So where you taking me then?” she said. “I’m free tonight.”

And that was how they had come to be at the Rosemary Branch a few months on, mild spring turned to Indian summer and George’s feelings altered and soured.

* * *

24 February 1902

To my dear Lottie,

What good it will do, me writing you a letter, I’m sure I don’t know. All I know is that I will go raving mad if I don’t write, for the words keep turning over in my mind like music from a barrel organ, and have kept me from a wink of sleep these past five nights. Because it is only five nights since I have been here. It is the nights I count, rather than the days. The light never gets very bright here. Even at midday you could be told it was dusk or dawn and you’d believe it readily enough. I think that it must feel like the very beginnings of spring away from here, with the flower girls selling the first snowdrops and daffs, the working men whistling in the streets once more, and the easterly wind that blows up the Thames having lost some of its bite. Here, though, it might be deepest winter still, and never mind what the calendar says. It’s no surprise I’ve come to treat it all as night and keep count that way.

Lottie, lately I have thought of you a good deal. Truthfully, I have thought of little else. I feel as though I can see you more clearly now than I ever could before, which is strange, I know, given our circumstances. I can remember your eyes as clearly as if they had been stamped on my memory, and perhaps they have, and with indelible ink so they will never fade. Wide-set, slanting eyes, like a cat’s. I remember their colour too, and how that would change with the weather. Where I am, they would look ash-brown, just like everything else round here. But on a Spring morning like you might be enjoying, when the sky is high and clear, then anyone might see that those same eyes were not a single, muddy shade but a thousand tiny flecks of light, picked out in gold and amber. I always said you had funny eyes, teased you that they made you look foreign. What I meant to say was that they were beautiful eyes.

Lottie, you were always one for asking me questions, questions about everything and anything, and then when I went quiet you’d say I was too much like my father, keeping everything to myself, buttoned up to the collar. So I will try to tell you a little more about how it is here, and what sort of life I am living. I will not be very good at it but I will try for your sake, and where I didn’t before.

The first thing you notice—and the last thing you grow accustomed to, I’ve been told—is the smell. You scarcely want to breathe at all, in case you take the stench and the rot of the place down into you forever. When I am lying down on my cot but unable to sleep, I imagine one day getting on a train, bound for north or south, it doesn’t matter. I stay on it until it reaches the end of the line, where the iron buffers are overgrown with wild flowers and weeds. In my mind, the platform is empty and I sit down on a bench of new wood with white painted legs. A small suitcase with everything I call my own is on my lap. Then I look back down the tracks towards the city I’ve left behind and start breathing, deep and long, filling my grimy lungs with clean, country air.

That is enough from me for one letter, Lottie. Perhaps it goes against my nature to tell too much in one sitting so I will stop here. It has been some relief for me to write these few lines to you and I mean to write some more soon. I don’t expect a reply from you, Lottie. I know that my writing to you will have to be enough.

Your loving,

George

Late in the afternoon on the appointed Thursday in October, George extracted a piece of paper from his trouser pocket. It had got crumpled and somehow stained with food and he smoothed it out between his fingers. He didn’t know Highbury; he’d never had any reason to venture so far north. As he’d once admitted to Charlotte, the entire geography of his existence was probably no more than a square mile, with the printworks in one corner and Wiltshire Row in another. He’d only seen the Thames a handful of times and had been awed by its breadth and tides, so different from the opaque syrup of the canal he could see from the window by his narrow bed.

He knew from asking his friend Alf that the park he now stood at the edge of was probably Highbury Fields. Around its perimeter was a collection of elegant red brick houses, their windows flung wide to catch a meagre breath of moving air. On the green itself, a group of nursery maids clustered in a sober-coloured gaggle, gossiping while their charges tore about brandishing sticks, hoops and balls.

While he was deliberating whether he dared approach them to check his whereabouts, he noticed a lone gentleman walking in his direction, his stately bearing making a pronounced limp look distinguished. As he drew close, George lowered his gaze without thinking, and blindly reread the scrap of paper, shifting his awkward parcel, now grown wearily heavy, into a more comfortable position against his shoulder.

“Are you lost, boy?”

George looked up to find that the gentleman had stopped and was tapping his cane in a impatient way as he eyed George intensely.

“I’ve walked these streets for many years. What are you looking for? Speak up, boy!” he cried.

George cleared his throat. “I need to find Aberdeen Park, sir, but my directions weren’t very good.”

“Ah! I know the road well,” the gentleman replied. “I live close to it myself. Follow the Fields until the northern perimeter is in clear view, keeping all the while to the right, and you can’t miss the gates at the entrance to Aberdeen Park. Five minutes walk, no more.” He gesticulated wildly with his stick, causing a tiny errand boy who was at that moment passing to duck in fright before scuttling away. George thanked the eccentric stranger and set off again, pleased that he had not disgraced himself during the exchange.

It seemed to George that the light had dimmed in the last few minutes and, looking up, he saw that a cluster of bruised-coloured clouds had formed above. Anxious that he shouldn’t arrive with a cage wrapped in sodden brown paper, nor dripping himself, he hurried off in the direction that the gentleman’s cane had indicated.

It was just as he turned into Aberdeen Park that he heard it, far off in the distance—a long, low rumble of thunder. Beneath the thick bank of cloud that seemed to be rolling and spreading out to cover the whole of London, the air had lost all but a vestige of its earlier warmth. Nevertheless, George could feel a runnel of sweat edge down his spine as he swapped the cumbersome cage to his other arm once more, feeling only momentary relief before the metal bars dug into another part of his flesh. If only the rain would hold out until he had delivered the damn thing, he would enjoy strolling empty-handed back to Hoxton in a downpour, plump drops soothing his brow.

He hastened into a sort of loping stride, eyes searching the garden wall posts that stood like brick sentries for the number Charles Booth had written down. In his hurry, George barely noticed the easy grandeur of the houses. Finally, his eye snagged on the right number. He clanked his way through the gate, the wrapped cage briefly colliding with it, slightly tearing the paper. Swearing quietly through gritted teeth he climbed the steps to the door just as the sound of a nearby church bell began tonelessly ringing in the hour of six.

Smoothing down his hair, he lifted the brass knocker and rapped once. Only then did he become aware of the noise within, where a piano was being played haltingly in order to keep time with a reed-thin voice. It was warbling its way through a song whose words George couldn’t make out, and didn’t much wish to. From an open window somewhere, the scent of baked sweetness rose up and made him inhale deeply. Just as he had closed his eyes to savour it, the door was pulled back and he was faced with a tiny maid, her left eyebrow raised.

“Round the side for deliveries,” she said sharply before shutting the door, which closed with the thunk of heavy oak and solid brass. George went to retreat down the steps to find the servant’s entrance but indignation at the maid’s manner held him. Before he could change his mind, he turned and knocked on the door once again, louder this time.

It opened almost immediately and George, expecting the taciturn maid, opened his mouth to explain his presence before she could slam the door in his face again. But she was nowhere to be seen, and before him was a silver-haired gentleman wearing a scarlet waistcoat under his dark suit.

“Do you know, I could have sworn I heard distant thunder a few minutes ago,” he said thoughtfully in the direction of the sky while a surprised George shut his mouth again. “They say we’re in for a bitter winter but I for one will relish it after this interminable summer we’ve had. It will be a positive pleasure to wear my overcoat and shiver again. I don’t think I am mistaken about the thunder but it was difficult to tell during the musical recital we’ve been enjoying so much, and for so long.”

He chuckled, still apparently addressing the leaden sky above them, while George shifted awkwardly from foot to foot and tried to smooth down the ripped part of the paper.

“You must be the boy with the cage,” the gentleman suddenly cried, as if he’d noticed George’s presence on the doorstep for the first time. “Right on time, jolly good. I was hoping to intercept the delivery so that it would be a surprise for my goddaughter. As a consequence, I have been casting distracted looks out into the hall these past ten minutes and made both goddaughter and the lady of the house quite suspicious. When I heard the knock I darted out and asked the maid who it was at the door and when she replied ‘some boy with a parcel and a cheek for coming round the front,’ I knew it was my man. She’s a formidable girl, for all her diminutive stature, and I apologise if she frightened you. I’ve told Captain Drew that she probably sends all sorts of important people on their way because she doesn’t like the look of ‘em. My goddaughter must be the only person she doesn’t despise in the entire world. What’s your name again, my boy? I was told but it’s gone. I have to write everything down in my notebooks these days, you know.” He patted his breast pocket.

“It’s George, sir. George Woolfe.”

“Ah, that’s it—Woolfe. Now, let me see this cage again.” He tore off the paper without hesitation and inspected it closely. “As I said to your father and sister, it’s excellent work. I shall pass on your father’s name to my goddaughter and then, should anyone admire it, and I feel certain that they will, then he might be sent further business. Thank you for delivering it so reliably, Master Woolfe. Now, what did I say, was it two shillings or half a crown for delivery?”

He put the cage down on the step and rummaged for his wallet while George deliberated furiously over his answer.

“It was just two shillings, sir,” he finally blurted out. After all, he didn’t think anyone had ever addressed him so politely before.

Just then, a slender figure dressed in white emerged out of the gloom of the hallway behind Mr.Booth.

“Who is it, Uncle Charles?” she asked brightly, “and what is this lovely cage?”

“This is George Woolfe, Clemmie, and he has just delivered your birthday present—something you weren’t supposed to see quite yet. I thought I would have it delivered to your own house to maintain the surprise for as long as possible. Of course I meant to present it to you in the drawing room but I don’t suppose ten or twelve feet makes too much difference.”

“Oh, you are clever, Uncle Charles,” she cried, clapping her hands together. “It’s such a good one and I’ve always wanted a birdcage. I can put a canary in it and it will sing. How did you know?”

Mr.Booth winked at George. “I am rather good at birthday presents, I must admit to it. Of course, this is surely the sole purpose of godfathers, to provide excellent birthday presents.”

Clemmie kissed him on the cheek in reply and then smiled at George shyly. “It’s a beautiful cage, did you make it yourself?”

“No, it’s my father that makes ‘em,” he replied gruffly. “I work at the print.”

“Books or newspapers?” she asked, quick as a flash.

“Books. Botanical books, mostly. You know, plants and flowers and things like that.”

“My father has lots of books like that in his library. You should come and see them. He’s away at sea so often that he hardly looks at them, and I’m ashamed to admit that mama and I don’t venture in there very often. It’s a terrible waste, really, no one ever enjoying them.”

George looked at his feet, feeling her eyes on him. “I draw them sometimes,” he mumbled, almost inaudibly. “Well, I copy them. Into a little book I’ve got. I draw them as well as I can remember.”

Clemmie had leant forward to catch his words. “What, the flowers? Oh, you really must have a look at some of papa’s then,” she said. “He has lots of rare first editions and books bought abroad that you might not have seen.”

George thought that was more than likely. Booth smiled benevolently at George and handed him a silver coin.

“There’s your payment,” he said. “Half a crown for being honest about it. Now we must be getting back to Miss Clemmie’s birthday celebrations, mustn’t we, my dear? It doesn’t do for the birthday girl to be loitering about in the hallway keeping her guests waiting. Goodbye then, George, if I may call you George. If you hurry, you might beat the rain home.”

George performed an awkward half bow to both, cursing himself for forgetting his cap again. “Thank you very much, sir. I’ll be off then.”

“Goodbye, George,” said Clemmie as he descended the steps. “Don’t forget about the books.”

George turned to thank her, and ask her how he might see them, but Mr. Booth had softly closed the door. As George passed back through the gate, there was still no sign of the rain, though the air crackled with the promise of it.