Black Silk and Sympathy, page 1
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Page numbers taken from the following print edition: ISBN 9781460763667
Dedication
For my excellent friend Ngahuia Te Awekotuku
Contents
Note to Readers
Dedication
Prologue
Part One
Chapter One
Part Two
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Part Three
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Part Four
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Author Notes
Acknowledgements
An Excerpt from Tatty Crowe Book 2
Chapter One
About the Author
Also by Deborah Challinor
Copyright
Prologue
April 1868, Sydney
Tatty Crowe sat near the back of the crowded room at the Printer’s Arms Hotel, attending the inquest of her late husband, Titus, who had died seven months earlier. The cause of death, as stated by his physician on his death certificate, was perforated stomach ulcers. Titus had been an undertaker, and not always well regarded by customers or colleagues, and Tatty could see plenty of people in the crowd she knew hadn’t liked him who, she suspected, were there hoping to hear any salacious secrets about him.
She was doing her best to appear calm and confident despite being anxious to the point of feeling sick. She owned Crowe Funerals now, making her Sydney’s first woman undertaker, but if things went badly she stood to lose everything. Though she was popular with her customers, especially the poorer ones, she knew that she most certainly had an enemy or two. She was grateful she had her friends around her, but if the inquest went against her, they would not be able to help. She squeezed her assistant Cora’s hand and received an encouraging squeeze back. To one side of the room stood the rest of her faithful crew – Ben and Robert and Henry. It hurt her to think that, if things did go awry, she might never work with or even see them again.
And then there was Elias Nuttall, her nemesis, sitting near the front of the room, just waiting for his opportunity to tell Coroner Shiell, the audience, and anyone else who would listen that she had poisoned Titus to death. It was his fault the inquest had been convened, it was his fault Titus’s body had been exhumed, and it was his fault she was in such a perilous position. She should have realised how far he would go to ruin her and done what she could to stop him, but now it could be too late.
She turned to the back of the room to make sure Friday and the others were still there. They were, and she was grateful. If the coronial jury found that she had poisoned Titus, and Coroner Shiell referred the matter to the criminal court, she would very likely be hanged at Darlinghurst Gaol if found guilty. She would most definitely need the help of every friend she had if that were to happen. But if the jury’s decision favoured her today, it was still good to know she could call on associates with resources: she would certainly need assistance to put a stop to Nuttall’s vendetta against her.
Tatty sat very still as the coroner called prominent surgeon Mr George Montague to the front of the room to report on the postmortem he had conducted on Titus’s exhumed body. Her shoulders ached with tension and her fingernails dug into her palms as he impassively read out a summary of what he’d found.
And then she held her breath.
Coroner Shiell said, ‘Thank you for your findings, Mr Montague. Is it your opinion then, as a senior medical professional, that Mr Crowe died as a result of perforated stomach ulcers or of deliberate arsenic poisoning?’
Part One
1864
When I am dead, my dearest,
Sing no sad songs for me
Christina Rossetti, 1862
Chapter One
Early September 1864, London, England
Tatiana Caldwell lay in bed, suspended between sleep and wakefulness, half dreaming of a time little more than a year earlier when she had been sixteen and her loving family was whole and happy and life was good. Then she awoke completely and realisation hit her like a physical blow: none of that was true any more. Her beloved father, Hector, was dead; her mother, Betsy, had been cheated of the ongoing allowance Hector had so cleverly left her in his will; and to stop the bank from foreclosing on their five-bedroom house, the only asset they had left, they’d had to take in lodgers. Worst of all, Betsy was extremely ill herself now.
With a sigh Tatiana pushed back the bedclothes and sat on the side of the bed, her bare legs dangling. Her bedroom smelt stuffily of the beeswax Mrs Seddon used on the furniture, and the stale water in a vase containing a decaying arrangement of delphiniums and hydrangeas she hadn’t had time to replace. The clock on the mantel read just past six: time to get up, go downstairs and help Mrs Seddon and Lorna prepare the breakfasts for Mr Denham, the young and quite nice lodger, and Mr Wooten, the middle-aged, not-nice one. But first she’d pop into her mother’s room and make sure she was all right, and that Lorna had taken her a cup of tea.
She used the chamber pot then poured a few inches of cold water from a jug into its basin, stripped off her nightdress and had a quick wash and cleaned her teeth, shivering slightly in the cool air. Summer was on its way but the north-facing side of the house rarely warmed up before midday. Then she dressed – chemise, stockings, drawers, stays, camisole, petticoats, gown (black, as she was still in mourning for her father), and boots. No crinoline. Doing housework in a crinoline was almost impossible. She unplaited her long coal-black hair, gave it a quick brush, then tied it back in a low ponytail.
Next door she knocked gently and waited for Betsy to call out. When she didn’t, Tatiana immediately thought the worst and pushed the door open, stepped inside and stood in the dimness, gripping the knob, her heart pounding, listening desperately for her mother’s laboured breathing. And then, to her knee-buckling relief, she heard it – slow and shallow and raspy, but reasonably regular.
‘Ma?’ she said in a loud whisper, not wanting to wake her mother if she needed to sleep. ‘Are you awake?’
A sigh from the bed, then nothing, then a grunt followed by a snotty sniff. ‘Tatty, love.’
Tatiana crossed to the bed and kissed her mother’s forehead. Her skin felt sweaty and strands of her hair stuck to her face. There was an unpleasant smell about her, like rancid milk, though she was bathed in bed at least once a day. Tatty had decided it was the smell of illness. She’d heard Lorna say the other day it was the smell of death, which had earnt Lorna a sharp smack on the arm from Mrs Seddon, but she was choosing to ignore that. Lorna said all sorts of silly things.
‘Do you want some light?’ Tatty asked.
Betsy indicated yes, so Tatty lit the oil lamp on the nightstand as the sun hadn’t yet quite risen. ‘How do you feel this morning?’
‘Not so bad,’ Betsy said, rolling onto her back with a groan.
Tatty thought her mother looked awful. Her skin appeared grey and slack, and enormous bags like bruises darkened the skin beneath her eyes. She was forty-three but looked at least a decade or more older. Her appearance frightened Tatty badly. ‘I’ll fetch you some tea, shall I?’
‘Have you started on the breakfasts?’ Betsy said, then exploded into a horrible, bubbling fit of coughing. Tatty quickly handed her a cloth but not before a small spray of blood had stained the bedclothes.
Tatty stared at the mess, then pulled her mother up into a sitting position and secured her there with pillows.
Betsy wiped her mouth with the cloth and said, ‘Shit.’
‘Do you want your laudanum?’
Betsy nodded and Tatty passed her the brown bottle from the nightstand. Betsy took a good swig, closed her eyes as it went down, then handed the bottle back.
‘I’ll get that tea,’ Tatty said and hurried out of the room before her mother could see she was about to cry.
She met Lorna at the top of the stairs, the tip of her tongue sticking out as she concentrated on not dropping a tray loaded with a teapot, cup and saucer, spoons, extra hot water, and a plate of biscuits. Lorna wasn’t the brightest or most competent of housemaids, but she was Mrs Seddon’s niece and if you employed Mrs Seddon, which Hector and Betsy had since Tatiana’s birth, you also employed Lorna. She had been fifteen then and was thirty-two now and no brighter, but Tatty loved both her and Mrs Seddon and considered them part of her family.
When Lorna saw the tears in Tatty’s eyes, her own face crumpled.
Tatty knew what would come next, forgot about her own misery and thought, Rats.
‘Oh no, she’s dead, isn’t she?’ Lorna wailed. ‘Oh no, oh Lord save us, what will —?’
‘No!’ Tatty reached up and gently rearranged Lorna’s house-cap, which was slipping down over one eye – a slightly awkward manoeuvre as Lorna was five inches taller than her own five feet two. ‘No, shush, it’s all right, she hasn’t died. Really, she hasn’t. I just felt a bit sad, that’s all. It’s all right, you can take her tea in.’
Lorna’s face relaxed. ‘Can I?’
Tatty nodded. ‘Go on. She’s sitting up, waiting for you.’
Lorna’s smile was radiant as she headed off down the hallway towards Betsy’s room.
Downstairs, in the kitchen at the rear of the house, Tatty found Mrs Seddon stoking the range and getting the breakfast things together.
‘Morning, dear. Have you been in to see your mother?’ she asked.
Tatty nodded. ‘She’s not very well. Lorna’s just taken in her tea. She was a bit upset. She got it into her head that Ma had died.’
Maggie Seddon looked at Tatty beadily through her wire-rimmed spectacles. ‘Had she? Why was that?’
Tatty looked away. ‘Perhaps because I came out of Ma’s room nearly crying.’
‘Mmm?’
Tatty knew Mrs Seddon was waiting for her to go on. She was in her early fifties and, unlike Lorna, not remotely simpleminded. In fact, she was as sharp as a boning knife. ‘Ma had a coughing fit and brought up some blood.’
‘A lot?’ Mrs Seddon looked concerned.
‘Not a huge amount but we’ll have to change her sheet after we’ve done the breakfasts.’
‘You do know that isn’t a good sign?’
Tatty swallowed down a surge of panic and willed herself to keep calm. She didn’t want to talk about any of that. She took the lid off the breakfast teapot to see if there were tea leaves in it yet. No, there weren’t.
‘Don’t ignore me, Tatiana,’ Mrs Seddon said. ‘You’re going to have to face facts.’
‘I have.’
‘Have you? Really?’
Tatty had, sort of. ‘I know she’s sick. Of course I do.’ She reached for the tea caddy and spooned leaves into the teapot. ‘But as she’s refused to ever see a doctor we don’t even know what’s wrong with her, do we?’
‘How do you know she hasn’t seen a doctor?’
‘Because every time I’ve asked her to, she says there’s no need.’ Tatty added more leaves to the teapot.
Mrs Seddon said, ‘That tea will be undrinkable. Tip some of those out. And she has seen a doctor.’
This was definitely news to Tatty. ‘When?’
‘After your father passed away, and again four or five months ago, when her cough started getting worse.’
‘Why didn’t she tell me?’ Tatty didn’t know whether to feel angry, relieved or jealous because she’d been excluded.
‘I expect because she didn’t want to worry you.’
Well, that was pointless, Tatty thought – she was worried anyway. ‘What did the doctor say?’
‘I think your mother should have told you this by now,’ Mrs Seddon said, sounding grumpy, ‘and I don’t think not telling you is doing anyone any good. So I’ll tell you. She has consumption.’
Tatty was still for a moment. She knew what consumption was, and that it was common, and that most sufferers died from it. ‘There’s no cure for that, is there?’
‘I’m really not sure.’
Tatty looked at Mrs Seddon and saw she was in fact sure of the answer to that question. So was Tatty. She tried to speak but only a squeak came out. She cleared her throat and tried again. ‘When will she die?’
Mrs Seddon sighed and scooped the excess tea leaves out of the teapot herself. ‘I don’t know, love. Let’s just make the best of what time we have left with her, shall we? It could be months and months, even years, for all I know.’
Tatty didn’t think Mrs Seddon really believed Betsy would live on for years. ‘Will I get it now?’ she asked. ‘Do I already have it?’
Mrs Seddon shrugged. ‘Who knows? Do I have it? Does Lorna?’
‘Does Lorna have what?’ Lorna said as she entered the kitchen.
‘Fleas,’ Mrs Seddon said.
‘Fleas!’ Lorna looked horrified. ‘I don’t have fleas!’
‘Well, that’s all right, then, isn’t it?’ Mrs Seddon said.
‘Did Ma drink her tea?’ Tatty asked.
Lorna nodded. ‘Some of it.’
‘And did she have a biscuit?’
‘No. She said maybe later.’
‘Well, I’ll take her up some breakfast,’ Tatty said, knowing her mother probably wouldn’t eat that either.
Mrs Seddon said to Lorna, ‘Go and look in the downstairs linen cupboard for a clean cloth for the breakfast table, there’s a good girl.’
Lorna was back in five minutes. ‘I can’t find one. We must have run out.’
‘Don’t tell me they’re all in the washhouse?’ Mrs Seddon exclaimed.
‘We probably have run out,’ Tatty said. ‘They’re bad enough at the table as it is, Mr Denham and Mr Wooten, but I’m sure Mr Wooten’s been making messes on purpose since Ma’s been sick and not able to … you know.’
Every single morning, it seemed, either Mr Denham or Mr Wooten managed to slop porridge, egg or their beverage on the cloth. This meant it had to be laundered, dried, starched and ironed before it could be used again, a process repeated with every dirty supper cloth. It was as galling as Betsy providing the lodgers with porridge and ham and eggs for breakfast, just so she could charge them more. The Caldwell family hadn’t even eaten that well when Hector was alive. Tatty didn’t really mind Mr Denham getting ham and eggs, but Mr Wooten certainly didn’t deserve such bounty.
‘Not able to what?’ Lorna asked.
Mrs Seddon said, ‘Never you mind. We’ll use one of the cloths from the big table and fold it in half. Fetch one of those, will you, love?’
Off Lorna trotted again.
‘In fact I know it’s Mr Wooten,’ Tatty said. ‘The other morning I saw him deliberately wipe his eggy knife on the cloth.’
Mrs Seddon said, ‘How uncouth.’
‘I think it’s my fault.’
‘How can your mother’s illness and Mr Wooten’s conniptions regarding her unavailability be your fault?’
‘Because after she took to her bed, I had a talk to him in the parlour. You know how he likes to read his papers and smoke his smelly pipe in there?’
Mrs Seddon nodded.
‘Well, I was very polite, to start with, anyway, and I informed him that due to her ill health Ma would no longer be providing him with any manner of personal services. And he said, “Oh, I see.” And then he said, “I don’t suppose you’d be interested? You’re young and quite pretty and your mother is lacking a little …” And I can’t remember the word he used, but it was something like radiance or vitality. Something he intended to be insulting. And then he said, “I pay well.”’
‘The rude bugger!’ Mrs Seddon said. ‘Has he not looked in a mirror in recent times?’
‘Clearly not,’ Tatty said. ‘So I said, “No, I’m not interested, and how dare you say that about my mother?” And then I thought I was going to be sick because of how nasty he’d been about Ma and had to rush out of the parlour.’
She glanced over her shoulder to make sure Lorna wasn’t hovering within earshot. She was practically twice Tatty’s age, but too naive to understand why Betsy had done what she’d done, if she’d even noticed what had been going on, which Mrs Seddon said she very much doubted.
Tatty had known when her mother had first commenced her arrangement with Mr Wooten, and so had Mrs Seddon, and she’d known before that of Betsy’s history as a prostitute.
Because her little family had been so insular and self-contained, she hadn’t realised her parents were an odd couple even though, when she was old enough to hear it, they’d shared with her the story of their courtship. So she knew that her mother had been a pretty twenty-five-year-old croupier and sometime ‘demi-mondaine’ when she’d met and married Hector, who’d been forty-six, stout and balding, a successful accountant with his own business, and addicted to the card tables. However, she hadn’t known what a demi-mondaine was until at the age of sixteen she’d attended Mrs Belvedere’s Academy for Young Ladies, a finishing school where she’d been nastily informed by a clique of girls that her father had married well beneath his social standing and that her mother had been a prostitute – another word for a demi-mondaine. But over the years she had seen for herself that her parents’ union was a very happy one, so she decided that if they didn’t care, why should she?
And then everything changed when halfway through her year at Mrs Belvedere’s her father dropped dead of apoplexy in his office, his death revealing the devastating news that he’d remortgaged the house and there was no money in the bank – all apparently spent on gambling. But as the law dictated that wives couldn’t inherit property, businesses or money in any case, he’d evidently tried to make amends for his failings (and flout the law) by making arrangements in his will for his senior clerk, at that time Selwyn Boyd, to direct funds from the accounting business into a trust, which would afford her mother a regular allowance and pay the mortgage on the house. Mr Boyd, however, soon drank the business into bankruptcy, leaving her and her mother penniless, hence their need to take in lodgers to pay the mortgage. The only good thing to come out of that awful year was that she’d had to withdraw from Mrs Belvedere’s because there was no money for the fees.
