The Darling Strumpet

CHAPTER THREE

AS MADAM ROSS HAD PREDICTED, THE DAYS FOLLOWING THE KING’S arrival were busy. The town was crowded with Royalists returning from the years of exile at country homes, with village lads who had come to see the king’s arrival and stayed to look for work, with sailors eager to ship once more under the proud flag of a monarch, and with huge numbers of soldiers glad to be done with fighting and hardship. London was mad with joy. Anything seemed possible now that King Charles was back, and Nell listened enthralled to the gossip and stories about the growing court at Whitehall. “That Barbara Palmer doesn’t trouble to hide from anyone, not even her husband, that she’s the king’s mistress!” Rose exclaimed. “I’ve heard that he spent his first night at the palace in her arms.”

“Of course, he has no wife,” chimed in plump Jane, one of the girls who had taken a special liking to Nell. “But still, he makes mighty bold with his dalliance.”

“And who’s to stop him?” asked Rose. “Harry Killigrew told me that the king has half a dozen bastards. He’s got a boy that was born to him on Jersey afore he and his court moved to France, and he’s brought the lad to live at the palace. Thirteen years old, and the spitting image of his father. Harry says the king so dotes on and dandles him the whisper goes he might be acknowledged a lawful son.”

When she heard bits of news about the king, Nell thought again of his darkly handsome face, jaunty carriage, and booming joyous laugh as he had ridden by, and the electric excitement she had felt when his eyes met hers. It was unbearably tantalizing to know that he was even now somewhere only a few miles away, doing—what? Whatever kings did, though what exactly that might be, she was not sure. Each piece of information she gained only made her long for more, and she added each new fact or story to the growing picture in her head of a life unimaginably different from hers.

Some of what Nell heard about the king and the goings-on at court fitted in some shadowy way with her own new observations about men. They seemed to be ruled by their desires in a way that she was not, and she realised that she held a kind of power over the men whose attention she caught. This was a novelty, and a mystery to be explored.

“They’re like pups, these lads,” laughed Jane, “tumbling all over themselves to get at you, their heads so full of cunt they can’t think of aught else. Mr. Killigrew says his new young actors are so bad, he’s going to hire me a-purpose so they can keep their minds on their work.”

“Actors?” Nell asked.

“Aye,” said Jane. “The playhouses are to open again. Tell her, Rose. I forgot all that Harry said.”

Nell had met Harry Killigrew a time or two. He was a wild young buck who had burst onto the scene in London recently, having fled from Heidelberg, where he had wounded a man in a duel. He ran with a rakish crowd of young bloods and visited Rose frequently. Nell thought his dark unruly hair and golden-hazel eyes were striking, but she was a little afraid of him.

“Harry’s father, Tom Killigrew, was a theatre man in the old days,” Rose said. “He fought for the king in the war, and now his loyalty is rewarded. His Majesty has given him one of the patents for the new playhouses.”

“That’s it,” said Jane. “It’s to be the King’s Company, and Mr. Davenant will run the other one.”

Never having been in a theatre or seen a play, Nell could not quite imagine what they might be like. Perhaps she would find out later. For the present, she had matters of more immediate interest.

Jimmy Cade, her client from that first night, had become a regular. Nell liked him well enough, and as Rose had said, there was a certain ease in bedding a man she was used to. She need not fear what the encounter would bring, and as she became more familiar with his preferences, she could better give him what pleased him, ensuring herself a steady source of money.

In contrast to the hot haste of their first encounter, Cade became more relaxed with Nell, not only stopping to take his boots off before he joined her in bed, but frequently chatting with her after. He was young, but he had seen action in the war, and she liked to hear his stories about battles and military life.

She watched him dress one hot afternoon, when they had dozed off after their bout and then awoken for a second round. His uniform made her think of her father, and she wondered if he had looked or moved as Cade did.

“My da was in the army,” she said.

“Was he? And where is he now?” Cade asked, struggling with his boots.

“He died,” Nell said softly. “In prison in Oxford. He lost all in service of the king.”

“Long since?” Cade asked, looking at her more carefully.

“When I was but a baby. I never knew him.”

“I’m sorry for it, Nelly. There were too many died, too many babes left fatherless.”

Nell nodded silently. There was nothing to say, nothing that could express the pain that flooded her heart, the longing for something she had never known and would never know. Tears welled from her eyes, and she knuckled them away.

Cade buckled on his sword belt and picked up his hat, then gave Nell’s damp cheek a gentle stroke. She wished he wouldn’t leave her alone, but he was already at the door and spoke over his shoulder.

“I’ll see you soon, little one.”

“WHAT WAS OUR DA LIKE?” NELL ASKED ROSE LATER. “WHY DID HE go to prison?”

Rose shook her head sadly. “I don’t remember much. I was very small myself. I remember him coming in the door and sweeping me up into his arms, laughing as he talked to me. Least, I think I do. Then he was gone. I remember Mam crying. It frightened me and I ran to her. But she pushed me away and shouted at me to leave her be.”

The sisters sat in silence for a few moments. The past was locked away, behind an impenetrable wall. Their mother was the only link to that distant time. But Nell found it impossible to think of her mother as other than she was now—bitter, blowsy, and hard. Was it possible that Eleanor Smith had once been young and happy, had brightened at the sound of her man’s footsteps at the door, had had a tender smile for Rose and Nell or ever regarded them as other than a burden? If so, that woman was long dead. And Nell knew that Rose was her only ally in a harsh and unpredictable world.

THE CONVERSATIONS WITH CADE AND ROSE SEEMED TO HAVE OPENED a rift in Nell’s mind, a doorway to a rolling mist of fear and sadness. She could not shake off the dark shadows, and for the rest of the day she was weighted with a profound sense of loss and terror.

That night, Nell tossed fitfully before finally slipping into a dream. She was alone in a dark and narrow passageway. It might have been the lane outside her mother’s home, or the alley where she had spent the night when she had run away, or perhaps it was a place dimly remembered from deeper in her memory. It was night, and a thick fog swirled, obliterating the moon and stars. The wintry wind bit into Nell’s bare feet, penetrated the thin rags that covered her. Her teeth chattered in the cold, and she was so hungry that a pit seemed to gape at her very core. An aching loneliness seized her. She knew she would die if she did not find shelter and company.

The fog deepened. She crept forward, reaching out a hand to feel her way. Her fingers scraped along something clammy and hard, like the stone landing steps left bare when the river’s tide receded, their surface greened over with the teeming life of the water. The slimy feel of the wall repulsed Nell, but a gust of air blew from the opposite side of the passageway and it seemed that some cliff yawned there. She feared that she would fall into oblivion and hugged close to the cold stone.

A shaft of light shot through the darkness. A door had opened ahead, and Nell knew that if she could just get through it, she would be safe. She stumbled forward, clawing at spectral cobwebs that drooped from above. Each step was a battle, and she despaired of getting to the door. But it was close now, the warmth and light beyond it a beacon to her soul, and she could hear voices and laughter within.

She reached the threshold, fingers scrabbling on the cold damp stone. Behind her loomed darkness, the icy and fetid reek of a tomb, and nameless terrors. Another few inches and she would be safe.

The door slammed shut with a reverberating thud.

“No!” The night enveloped Nell’s cry. Her hands blindly sought a way to open the door, but its surface was smooth and heavy iron, with no knob, no keyhole, no way in. She beat against the door with her fists, but her hardest blows made no noise. Shrieking, begging, she pounded. But nothing happened and no one came.

In that moment of desperation and hopelessness Nell awoke and found herself alone in her bed. She was cold, and clutched the covers around her. She longed for someone to hold her and make all well. Her thoughts went to her mother, and she began to weep.

Erratic, frequently drunk, and occasionally violent though her mother might be, she was the only parent Nell had ever known, and she found that the loss of her mother terrified her even more than the unpredictability that living with her had meant.

She clung to her pillow and sobbed. All the bravery and cheer she had thought she had was hollow. She felt ashamed and an utter failure. In the endless watches of the night, with the world in cold blackness outside the window, she was only a frightened and wretched child.

She went from her room, pushed open the door of Rose’s little chamber, and slipped to the side of the bed. Rose was alone, and Nell crept in beside her. She had shared a pallet bed with Rose for most of her life, until Rose had struck out on her own, and it was immeasurably comforting to feel the warmth of Rose’s body and smell her scent. Rose stirred.

“What’s amiss?”

“I was afeared. A dream.”

“All’s well. Come to sleep now.” Rose drew Nell to her and draped a protective arm around her. Nell nestled closer. Safe in the snug cocoon of the shared bed, the demons receded and her shivering ceased, and soon she was asleep.

IN THE BRIGHTNESS OF THE MORNING SUN, NELL’S FEARS OF THE previous night lost their overwhelming power. She would not go back to live under her mother’s thumb. She would see her mother when she could stand proudly, and prove that she had done well for herself. What that might mean, Nell had no clear idea. But she had a new determination. She would be someone to be reckoned with.

THE SUMMER BROUGHT BRILLIANT BLUE SKIES, SUNLIT DAYS, AND balmy evenings. Although the long hours of daylight meant that the crowds at Madam Ross’s stayed late, and the hours of sleep were fewer, Nell woke with the dawn. The house was quiet then and the glorious new mornings held the promise of adventure.

One sparkling August morning it occurred to her that she missed the river. She hadn’t been near it since her daily sojourns to Billingsgate fish market to buy oysters, and she made her way towards London Bridge. She didn’t mind the long walk into the City—she had made it often enough pushing the oyster barrow, and it was unutterable freedom to dance along unencumbered.

Shopkeepers were just opening for business, folding down the bulkheads that served as counters by day and shuttered up their shops by night. Street vendors were out in great numbers, their wares fresh and their spirits not yet worn down.

“A brass pot or an iron pot to mend!” called a man with a bag of tools slung on his back, beating the butt end of a hammer on the bottom of a pot.

“Knives or scissors to grind!”

“Delicate cowcumbers to pickle!”

“Fine ripe strawberries!”

The cries of the hawkers rose and mingled in pleasant chaos. A man and a boy sang out in harmony, “Buy a white line! Or a jack line! Or a clothes line!” their words cascading in a catch.

“Buy a fine singing bird!” Nell stopped to admire the pretty little finches a small boy carried in a wicker cage. She was hungry and her attention was momentarily caught by a middle-aged woman balancing a great basket of green muskmelons atop her head, but instead she bought a dipper of milk from a milkmaid, whose buckets were suspended from a wooden yoke over her shoulders. Nell could imagine too well the weight and was grateful she had no buckets, baskets, or barrows weighing her down.

She made her way onto the bridge. She knew of a child-sized gap between two of the houses that crowded the bridge’s span, and from this secret perch, she surveyed the scene. London stretched away to the west, its fringes fading into green countryside. The river surged beneath her, the high tide creating powerful eddies around the great starlings that supported the bridge. The boats travelling downstream glided easily, while the boatmen making their way upstream against the current pulled and strained mightily.

Nell watched the passengers in the crafts with a mixture of curiosity and envy. She had never been in a boat. Quite apart from the cost, she had never had reason to go anywhere that her own feet could not take her.

She watched two gentlemen getting into a wherry upriver at Three Cranes Stairs. Several more watermen waited for passengers, and Nell made up her mind that she would go down there, and perhaps even get into a boat.

As she made her way to the landing stairs, the scent of the river, fresh and alive, stirred her excitement. Three burly watermen were gathered on the stairs, their tethered boats bobbing in the current. A leaping fish broke the surface of the water and then disappeared once more into the greeny depths. The youngest of the men, his dark hair tied into a queue at the back of his head, squinted into the sunlight as he lounged on one of the steps. He cocked his head to the side as Nell approached, and the two others broke out of their conversation and turned.

“How much does it cost? To go in a boat?” she asked.

“That depends!” laughed one of the fellows, his face a deep red-brown from years of working in the sun. “Where do you want to go?”

“I don’t know,” Nell said. “I’ve never been anywhere.”

“It’s sixpence for a pair of oars,” he began.

“That’s ‘oars,’ now, mind,” put in another of the men, “not ‘whores.’ But perhaps you’d know better than I about the socket money for a brace of bobtails?” The others laughed, but the first waterman swatted the joker with his cap.

“’Ere, leave the girl alone, Pete.” He turned back to Nell, his blue eyes startling against the mahogany of his skin. “Pay no mind to ’im, sweeting, ’e has the manners of a dog. It’s a twelver to Whitehall, eighteen shillings to Chelsea, three bull’s-eyes to Windsor. Half again as much if the tide’s against you.”

It seemed silly to spend money to get to the other side of the river or to the palace, and even if she had the five-shilling fare to Richmond, what would she do there?

“Another time,” she smiled. “I’ll take shank’s mare today.”

“Another time then, sweeting,” the man grinned. “When someone else is paying.”

CHAPTER FOUR

IN OCTOBER THE EXECUTIONS OF THREE OF THE MEN WHO HAD instigated the execution of the king’s father, King Charles I, were to take place at Charing Cross. The king had spared the lives of dozens, but the few who had been directly responsible for his father’s murder would die the terrible death reserved for traitors. A blood thirst seized London, and Nell listened to some lads in the street describing what would happen.

“They’ll hang them first,” one said. “But not until they’re dead—only insensible, like. Then they’ll cut them down, still breathing, and carve out their guts and hearts. And then they’ll hack their carcasses into quarters, coat them in tar to make them keep, and post them on pikes at all the gates of the City.”

THE DAY OF DEATH ARRIVED, AND NELL AND ROSE JOSTLED FOR standing space around the scaffold. The crowds reminded Nell of the throngs that had welcomed the king only a few months earlier, but the mood was savage and sour. Packs of drunken lads roved, as they had on that spring day, but today they seemed like feral dogs.

Surrounded by tall strangers, Nell could not see anything but a patch of sky above, and suddenly she began to feel that she couldn’t breathe. She clutched Rose’s hand, fearful of losing her in the crush, and to her shame, she began to shake and cry.

“Let’s go,” she pleaded. They threaded their way out of the seething mob. Nell fought down a rising sense of panic, and by the time they reached the edge of the crowd, her breath was coming in ragged gulps and her heart was pounding.

She sank to the ground and hugged her knees to her chest, trying to stop her shivering. Rose squatted and peered at her.

“What is it?”

“I don’t know,” Nell gasped. “I don’t want to see it. I’m afraid. Do you mind?”

“No,” Rose shrugged. “I’ve no great desire to watch anyone being butchered.”

There was a roar from the crowd. The condemned men must be arriving. It would begin soon. Nell struggled to her feet.

“Let’s get away now.”

MADAM ROSS’S ESTABLISHMENT WAS FULL TO BURSTING THAT evening, and Nell had her first taste of the phenomenon of men who have felt the brush of violent death wanting to deaden the resultant chill by immersing themselves in warm flesh. The men she took to her bed that night were sodden with drink and un usually sombre, brutal, or even tearful. All wanted to erase the sights and sounds of the day and to remind themselves that they still lived and breathed.

Jimmy Cade and some of his officer friends came late in the evening, and after he had spent he lay with Nell, stroking her hair and face with unwonted tenderness.

“It had to be done,” he said. “There must be severe punishment for a crime as foul as the murder of a king. But it’s not a spectacle I’d want to see again. You can’t help but feel the blade in your own gut as you watch it going into the poor bastards, imagine your own innards being wound out before your eyes, seeing your own blood sluicing over the scaffold.”