Sapphire Battersea (37 page)

I negotiated my way around the station and found a train bound for Kingtown. I remembered making the journey with Mrs Briskett when I left the hospital. It seemed many years ago, and yet it was only a matter of months. I’d been so young and innocent then, so full of hope. Everything had seemed so bizarre and new and puzzling, but I’d had the thought of Mama sustaining me. She had seemed so far away then – but it was so much worse now, when she’d gone away for ever.

I shut my eyes and pressed my lips together. I
would
not let myself think that. I had to believe that Mama was still here – soon I might even be talking to her …

It seemed so strange stepping out of Kingtown station early that evening. I thought of Bertie and longed to see him. Did he still care for me – or had he forgotten about me already? Was he out walking with some other girl today? I thought of Kitty and Ivy in the draper’s shop. Had Bertie taken Kitty out in the rowing boat, along the river to our secret island? Was he strolling in the park with Ivy, picturing for all he was worth?

No, surely Kitty would squeal and fidget and capsize the boat – and dim Ivy could not conjure up any fancies worth a farthing. I tossed my head. Bertie might well find it difficult to find a girl to replace me.

But I was not here to try to find Bertie. I walked along the familiar roads until I reached Lady’s Ride. I passed Mr Buchanan’s splendid big house, peering up at his study window. I was ready to thumb my nose at him, but there was no sign of little Monkey Man. I looked at the area steps and wondered whether to slip in to see dear old Mrs Briskett – but it was getting late and I didn’t think there was time. I was sure I would see Sarah shortly.

I walked on, trying hard to remember the way,
once
anxiously tracing my steps when I took a wrong turning. At last I found myself in the little street of cottages with bright flowers in the gardens. I counted along to the right one and walked up the garden path. I saw that the blinds at the windows were closely drawn.

I took a deep breath and knocked on the door. After a few moments the same tall dark woman, Emily, opened it and gazed at me enquiringly.

‘Good evening. Is Madame Berenice holding a seance tonight?’

‘Yes, she is. Please come in.’ Emily looked at me closely in the dimly lit hall. ‘I think you have visited us before …’

‘Yes, with Sarah.’

‘Ah! You are the little girl who ran away! I believe your brother made contact from the spirit world and it frightened you a little.’

‘It frightened me a great deal! I never cared for that brother.’

‘But you wish to communicate with him again?’

‘No! No, I’m here because – my dear mama has died and I’m desperate to make contact with her again.’

‘Oh, you poor child. Well, I’m sure Madame Berenice will do her very best. Would you care to leave your remuneration on the silver plate on the hallstand? It will be five shillings to hear her voice,
and
ten for an actual materialization. I’m afraid there are no guarantees, though. The spirits are contrary creatures and won’t always come when they are bidden.’

‘I understand,’ I said, counting my coins. ‘There!’ I let a handful of threepennies, sixpennies and shillings clatter down on the plate.

Emily’s dark eyes flickered over the coins, clearly counting. ‘Yes, that will be sufficient,’ she said. ‘Follow me.’

She led me into the darkened room. Just like last time, I could barely distinguish anything. I sensed, rather than saw, my fellow clients.

‘Come and join us, child,’ said the deep, thrilling voice of Madame Berenice.

I felt my way to the chairs around the table.

‘Hetty! Is that you?’ Sarah whispered. She reached out and took my hand. ‘Oh, Hetty, how we’ve worried over you! How are you, dear? Did you come here specially to find me?’

‘I – I came here to find … someone else,’ I said. ‘Oh, Sarah, my mama …’ I couldn’t continue, but she understood, and gripped my hand harder.

‘Oh, you poor child! I am so sorry. But you have come to the right place. You will be wondrously comforted,’ she said.

Emily was whispering to Madame Berenice.

‘I believe you have requested a materialization,
Hetty
?’ said Madame Berenice. ‘I’m afraid Sarah has requested one too, but there can only be one each night. There is no greater wonder in all nature, but it takes immense effort to summon up psycho-plastic matter. I cannot possibly manage two such projections in quick succession.’

‘Let it be Hetty’s materialization, Madame Berenice,’ said Sarah. ‘I have experienced this wonder many times.’

‘That is very generous of you, Sarah,’ said Madame Berenice.

‘Thank you! Thank you so much!’ I said, giving Sarah a hug.

‘Now now, settle down, child. Let us all concentrate. The spirits are restless tonight, eager to communicate. We will join hands anew and see who visits us first.’

I sat between Sarah and an old lady who clung to me with her dry little mittened hand. I could dimly see the old lady on her other side, and the drooping figure of Mr Brown. There were three other women. It was going to be a very long evening. My heart pounded in my chest. Would Mama come? Would she speak to me? Would I see her dear face again?

‘Is there anybody there?’ Madame Berenice asked throatily. ‘Yes! Yes, there is a child here, an eager young chap.’ Her own voice became little and piping. ‘Hello, Father dear!’

‘It’s my Cedric!’ said Mr Brown, choking with emotion.

We sat in our circle while little Cedric chatted inconsequentially and Mr Brown shed happy tears. Then long-lost sweethearts and cherished companions took it in turns to commune. They talked of heavenly peace and shining light and cosmic harmony, but they didn’t say anything specific about their spirit world. They were all very loving, but their messages seemed unbearably tedious as time ticked slowly by in the dark, stifling room. They enquired genteelly about someone’s cough or bad back. One of the old ladies in the spirit world explained to her friend in the room exactly how to make a beneficial peppermint tisane.

I fidgeted desperately, willing her to
hurry up
. My mama might be waiting to get a word in while we were being solemnly instructed to add a teaspoon of sugar to each pint of peppermint.

I managed to curb my impatience when it was Sarah’s turn at last, and her mama spoke to her softly and warmly, as if big lumpy Sarah were a small girl again. I could scarcely breathe now. It was
my
turn! Would
my
mama cross over from her new home in the spirit world to talk to me?

‘Is there anybody there – a new spirit, anxious to reassure her little daughter?’ Madame Berenice asked.

There was no answer.

‘Is there anybody there?’ Madame Berenice repeated.

We waited, again in vain.

I gave a little sob, and Sarah’s hand tightened over mine.

‘Won’t you come, Mama?’ I whispered in the dark.

‘Hush, child. The spirits can only communicate through me,’ said Madame Berenice. ‘We must all stay holding hands, shut our eyes, and pray for a materialization. I sense a presence – but the spirits are shy, especially when asked to materialize.’

We held hands, we shut our eyes, we waited. Then I was aware of a slight rustle of material. I opened my eyes. An indistinct figure, all in misty white, was standing near us, very slowly moving towards me. Her face was obscured by a long white veil.

‘Is it
you
, Mama?’ I asked. ‘Oh, Madame Berenice, is it really my mama?’

‘It is your own dear mother, Hetty,’ a strange, eerie voice whispered.

‘You sound so – so different, Mama. Are you all right? Are you still coughing?’

‘There are no ailments in the spirit world, my dear. I am in perfect health now. I am very happy. You must not grieve for me, Hetty.’

She glided nearer. She walked with slow strange grace, her skirts rustling.

Mama had always walked with quick darting steps
.

She bent down before me. She was tall and stately.

Mama was scarcely taller than me
.

She bent nearer and I smelled her rose cologne.

Mama never used cologne in her life – she simply smelled of her own sweet warm flesh
.

She kissed me on the forehead with smooth cool lips.

Mama’s lips were chapped and rough because she licked them anxiously – and she never kissed my brow. She kissed my cheeks and lips, and sometimes the tip of my nose when she was being playful
.

‘Mama?’ I said.

‘My dear little child.’

I wasn’t her dear little child at all. She wasn’t my mama. I started trembling. I knew who she was – Emily, the tall woman who had let me in and taken my money. Madame Berenice’s sister – and accomplice. I wanted to rip her white floating veil from her head, switch on the light, and expose her to all the people sitting there so stupidly, paying their money week after week for a fraudulent trick. But somehow I held myself rigid. I bit my lips in an effort not to fly into a temper.

All these people sitting with me in the dark believed utterly. My dear friend Sarah lived for these moments with her ‘mother’. She had given up her chance of a materialization tonight for my sake. I could not take away the most precious consolation of her hard life.

So I held my tongue while the ghastly false Mama kissed me again and circled the table, and the others cried out and marvelled. She told me to be a good brave girl, and she promised to watch over me and visit me often on Sunday evenings. Then Madame Berenice told us to close our eyes again and give thanks for this marvellous materialization from the spirit world.

I kept my eyes open and watched the white woman steal silently out of the door. I waited while Madame Berenice murmured some spirit mumbo-jumbo, taking short rapid breaths as if she’d been running. Then she called out for light. Emily returned, bearing a lamp. She was dressed all in black now. She had obviously thrust her ghostly white garments into some cupboard. It seemed quite clear to me that she was the apparition pretending to be Mama. She had the same stance, the same walk, even the same smell – but all the others were totally oblivious to this. They marvelled at the success of the evening and crowded around me joyfully.

Sarah gave me a warm hug. ‘I’m so very happy for you, Hetty,’ she said.

The others patted me fondly and congratulated me.

‘Say thank you nicely to Madame, Hetty,’ said Sarah. ‘She has worked so hard on your behalf.’

I stared at Madame Berenice. She was worse than Mr Clarendon. At least he only charged a few pennies per person, and he didn’t just prey on the bereaved. I bent forward and whispered into her turbaned ear, so that only she could hear me: ‘You’re a wicked old fraud. I want my ten shillings back!’

She looked at me with narrowed eyes, her rouged lips set in a strained smile. She did not acknowledge me in any way – but at the door on the way out, Emily took me a little roughly by the shoulder and thrust a ten-shilling note at me.

‘Take it and never come back,’ she hissed.

Then Sarah caught me up, still so innocently happy for me. I had to keep up the pretence, though inside my heart was breaking. I so wished I’d been convinced by the clumsy materialization, but I was too close to dear Mama to be fooled by a charlatan.

Sarah burbled on and on about
her
dear mother. I listened sadly, trying my best to make encouraging responses.

‘But you must tell me all about you now, Hetty
dear
. How have you been keeping? Have you got a new position? Come back and have a cup of tea with Mrs B and me and tell us everything!’

Sarah was so persuasive, linking her arm in mine, smiling at me fondly as if I were her long-lost sister, that I took her up on her offer. I had nowhere else to go, after all.

It seemed very strange approaching Mr Buchanan’s house and going down the area steps. Sarah looked anxiously up at the dimly lit study window, but Mr Buchanan was safely at his desk out of sight. Sarah put her finger to her lips even so, and I tiptoed down the steps as if I were her silent shadow.

The kitchen smelled warmly and wonderfully of savoury pie. The table was all set for supper. Mrs Briskett was busy cutting the pie into slices. She paused dramatically when she caught sight of me, and then rushed towards me, mercifully dropping the knife before embracing me, hugging me hard against her upholstered chest.

But there was another person in the kitchen – a pretty little fair girl with big blue eyes, almost as blue as my own.

‘Who are you?’ I asked, taken aback.

She smiled sweetly at me. ‘I am Rose-May. I know exactly who
you
are. You’re naughty Hetty Feather! I’ve heard such tales about you!’

‘Rose-May’s our new little maid,’ said Mrs Briskett, and she gave her a fond pat on her curly head. ‘She’s shaping up nicely now.’

‘Mrs Briskett and I have been making rabbit pie,’ said Rose-May. ‘Won’t you try a slice, Hetty?’

I looked at the steaming pie, the pastry crust crisply golden, risen high, a fancy edging pricked all the way around. ‘Did you do the pastry?’ I asked Rose-May.