Chapter 6
Anne did not desire the following day to start, but it began without her consent when the sun rose and dappled her linen curtain with apologetic rays. Wiping sleep from her eyes, she sat up and walked to the breakfast table, where her mother was slicing a loaf of bread, her voluminous skirts spread out across a mahogany chair. She looked up and put down the knife.
“Good morning, Anne.”
“Good morning, Mother,” her daughter sighed, flopping into a chair and brushing her fingers absent-mindedly through her hair.
Mrs Lincombe extended a cup of tea. “Drink this,” she said. “Then we’ll have you ready to leave for the theatre.”
“But Mother. I thought I had already explained to you. I am not returning, Mother. I am not,” Anne burst out, her heartbeat quickening once more as the events of the previous day began to darken her morning.
Her mother expostulated. “Nonsense, Anne. I’ll hear no more of it. Go on with you. Don’t ye want to keep us in good fortune. If the money keeps ‘a comin’ in, we’ll soon be in the lap o’ luxury. Don’t ye want that, girl?”
“I do not want to obtain it through such a lowly manner,” replied Anne, trying not to let her frustration spill out. “Mr Murdoch is not a good man. You cannot make me do this against my will.”
Upon this her mother leapt up from her seat at the table, extracting a handkerchief from her breast pocket and pressing it against her mouth. “Oh...oh, it is too much,” she said, a sob escaping her chapped lips. “How could I imagine – your being my own daughter, an’ all, turning against me like that? Does ye want us thrown out on the streets – me in my condition, in my old age.”
Anne looked up at her, blinking with the shock. “Mother,” she started weakly, trying to assert whether the woman was employing theatricals or was sincere in her imploring. Had Anne been a girl more acquainted with worldly ruses, more inclined to believe the worst of everybody, then maybe she would have realised that her mother was merely toying with her emotions, making use of her daughter’s tractability.
“Mother...” she repeated, taking hold of Mrs Lincombe’s cold, rheumatoid hand. “I...I am not refusing you with an intention of causing you pain. Indeed, I would always want to care for you. But I cannot go back to Mr Murdoch.”
Mrs Lincombe let out a cry of dismay, tearing away from her daughter’s gentle grip and turning her hunched, buxom figure to the mantelpiece, upon which marble surface she laid her hands.
“See?” she admonished. “See how you talk to me? Plain cruelty, that’s what it is. Me own daughter...” and she wept dramatically into a handkerchief.
“Do not cry so, Mother!” said Anne, placing a hand on her mother’s woollen-clad back. “I cannot bear it.”
“Oh Anne,” wailed Mrs Lincombe. “I cannot fall back into pover’y again, girl, I can’t. Maybe...maybe it would be better if I were dead.” With that, she burst into melodramatic tears.
Anne heaved a heavy sigh which seemed to send a shudder through the entirety of her tiny frame. “Then I will go, Mother,” she said resignedly, seating herself in her chair and tapping her fingers nervously on the arm. “I will go.”
Her mother could not repress her eagerness at Anne’s agreement, and her tears magically seemed to dry on their own, upon her daughter’s statement. “A good decision, my girl,” she gabbled, nodding approvingly. “For your face is your fortune, and there’s no use in ‘a pretendin’ we’ve any other means of keepin’ ourselves in good stead.” Mrs Lincombe glanced at her daughter expectantly, as if she should be making a speech of the kind.
But Anne’s eyes were too full and her voice too choked to utter the sentiments that were nestling within her. “Yes,” she managed hoarsely, but her mother’s attention was too absorbed in the window for her to reprove Anne for not saying more.
“Come here, Anne,” she hissed, gesturing at the window sill. Mother and daughter peered into the diamond pane, surveying Coal Yard Alley. There, Anne saw a vehicle waiting at the edge of the road – the fine black carriage she had ridden in so many times before, varnished and equipped, horses standing alert. Mr Murdoch was driving it, for once.
Mrs Lincombe saw the swarthy, muscular man in fuller view for the first time, and smiled approvingly. Wearing a dandy cap, drab jacket, top hat, stiff white collar and brown driving gloves, an expensive cigar between his teeth, he seemed the picture of wealth.
“I do believe it’s yer fine gentlemen, come to take ye to the theatre hisself. It’ll make a nice change from you ‘aving to walk there every day.”
She looked pointedly at Anne. “Well? What are ye waitin’ fer?” She hustled her daughter along to the door, smoothing out her blue muslin gown and tidying her hair. “Get along with ye.”
Anne’s fragile, muslin form hurried down the stairs, while she tried to control the frenzied beating of her heart, threatening to leap up her throat and choke her. She attempted to restrain the fear building up within her, and took long, deep breaths, all the while inhaling the infamous coal dust.
Mrs Lincombe watched her daughter walk self-consciously to the carriage, standing on the ground, uncertain. Anne scuffed her satin boots on the ground, uncaring that they had been newly purchased with the help of Mr Murdoch’s money, of course. She cast her eyes down, refusing to look at the ‘benefactor.’ Her mother rested on the sill, watching the fine gentlemen urge Anne to ascend, helping her mount and seating her beside him. He cracked the whip, and in a moment they had turned the shoulder of the alley and were out of sight.
Mr Murdoch drove the carriage rapidly, his hands firmly gripping the reins, though most of his attention was directed at Anne. He fixated his stormy eyes on her during the entire course of the journey.
“Anne,” he began, in his deep, unfathomable voice, “Allow me to apologise for the events of yesterday evening. I did not mean to alarm you.”
Anne cast him a quick, crisp glance, and then turned her tealight eyes back to the cobblestones, refusing to favour him with so much as an answer.
“Come now,” said he, the tone of his voice so genteel it was almost patronizing. “Not even one kind word for me?”
Anne remained silent, pursing her lips and shifting as far away from him as the carriage seat would allow.
“A pity,” he remarked, “though I will content myself with admiring you. And what a pretty sight it is too. Anne, my dear, you really are a ravishing creature, aren’t you.”
Anne did not trust her lips to utter the correct words, as she could not work out in her head whether she liked being described so, nor could she make sense of Mr Murdoch’s ever changing temperament.
“And yet she remains silent,” he mused, pulling in the reins and bringing the horses to a standstill. “Et encore elle reste silencieuse. French. From ‘Pour L’Amour D’une Rose.’ Do you like poetry, Miss Lincombe?”
“I cannot say,” she shrugged. What did he care of her interests? Anne wanted to blurt out.
"I thought as much. I care not much for it myself." Seeing that she still remained quiet, he loudened his voice. "Anne, I have told you that I am sorry."
“It is no matter,” his young companion replied coldly, rendering her body stiff as Mr Murdoch descended from the carriage and lifted her down. Even though Anne had already started to despise him, she could not help feeling a guilty wave of pleasure wash over her as the powerful arms swept her up and deposited her effortlessly on the autumnal ground. Silently admonishing herself for harbouring such shameful feelings, she reluctantly took the proffered arm and accompanied Mr Murdoch along the path leading to the theatre.
Anne found herself shivering in the cold November wind, blowing stiffly into her small face. Has it really been a month? she wondered, thinking back to that cold October morning. She cast her mournful eyes upwards and saw clouds the deep grey of slate scudding overhead.
He led her through the great doors with a smile, the cynical humour that irked Anne so dancing in a corner of his mouth. He paid for the tickets at the box office and they took their seats in the audience just as the musicians were starting to tune up.
Wintry sunshine escaped into the room, the cream coloured walls glowing with light and the mahogany seats flowing deep red, like rich wine. James Murdoch caught a picture glimpse of Anne in that moment, her bare, un-painted lips tenderly parted in awe, the huge tea-sparked eyes in her small white face – eyes too large for beauty and yet so captivating, so bewitching. For a split second, his breath caught in his throat.
In the flaring stage lights, Mr Murdoch looked at Anne through his dark impenetrable eyes and smiled jauntily. “Maybe we hadn’t better see the play today, Miss Lincombe,” he said, reverting to his formal addressing of her name. “A drive, perhaps? The park is so peaceful this time of year.”
She shrugged, trying to remain calm. “Is...is your son not here today.”
He frowned, knitting his coarse eyebrows together. “No,” he said. “Besides, Henry dislikes these visits to the theatre, he has a contempt for acting. He’s out cavorting somewhere, just like every other young man in London these days.”
“Oh,” said Anne, trying to conceal the dismay that was pushing her heart down to the bottom of her lace-trimmed shoes.
Mr Murdoch drove them along the High Street in his carriage, shops and houses flashing past them, James Murdoch’s dark profile standing out as clearly as a head on an ancient coin – handsome, cruel, decadent. They circled the park, empty because of the cold weather, the wind whispering through leafless hazel bushes and bowed saplings. Mr Murdoch said nothing, the reins lax in his strong, swarthy hands.
“I should like to go home now, sir,” Anne said in the uncomfortable silence that unnerved her so, after Mr Murdoch’s never-ending string of unfathomable talk.
He turned towards her. “Of course you shall, my dear, in due time. It is a little early now, perhaps.”
James drew in the reins and stepped down abruptly from the carriage. “Get down, my dear,” he ordered, reaching up, catching the bird-like girl under the arms and swinging her down to the earthy ground beside him. He extended a crooked arm and they strolled along the side of the green, Mr Murdoch talking in a slow drawl. Anne seized the opportune moment and gathered up the courage to question him.
“Yesterday,” she started. “You made claims of...of knowing me, before. How is that possible?”
He smiled and his black eyes gleamed ingenuously. “I think you will find matters are a lot more tangled than they appear. Though I am not the person from whom you should hear it spoken. Although maybe if you would be a bit more affectionate...”
Anne smarted, but she knew not whether it was an effect of the biting wind turning her face raw, or Mr Murdoch’s words. “Sir,” she began, her voice cracking and breaking into pieces, the wind gathering it up and carrying it away into the slate-gray sky, “Sir, I know not why you are persisting in this manner. I thought...I thought we were merely friends.”
James stopped in his tracks and cast her a look inferring that he regarded her statement with most high disparagement. “Do not be foolish, Anne,” he said in a cool voice which cut deep into Anne even sharper than the cruelly blowing wind. “I think we know full well that – ”
“No,” Anne retorted firmly. “I know nothing of the matter. What happened last evening was a lie, and it...it never happened.”
Mr Murdoch caught her wrist and held it tightly; in that moment she knew he could break her, break every bone in her body if he wanted to, but for some strange reason she was not afraid, but weary. “How can you say that?” he asked in a menacing tone; it was half-hiss, half-sob. “I thought...How can you be so untrue to yourself, Anne?”
“I am always true to myself,” she enunciated, pulling away from him. “You are the only one making up lies.”
She drew her lace parasol shut and rested its tip on the ground. It was performed awkwardly, Anne not having been in possession of such an item for more than a week, and James’s maliciousness disappeared as he watched her in amusement, finding her ineptness endearing.
“You are quite charming, my dear,” he said, tipping her pointed chin upwards with a flick of his fingers. “Quite charming.”
Anne’s brain was swirling with confusion and panic overpowered her. “Do...do not mock me, sir.”
“Mock you? Me? Whoever heard of such a thing?” he asked, raising his eyebrows, though it was well apparent that his thoughts were elsewhere.
“Please, sir,” said Anne. She tried to keep her head clear by thinking; but thoughts eluded her, darting in and out of her mind like frightened, stunned hummingbirds.
“You don’t like me kissing you, do you, Anne?” Mr Murdoch asked. As Anne remained silent, he persisted, “Why?”
“I suppose...” she started, “It is because I do not love you.”
“You find me displeasing?” Mr Murdoch questioned.
Anne could not answer. James’ drawl was caressing as he stood towering over her tiny form, latently dangerous in his corpulent yet lazy frame.
“It is only that I do not love you, sir,” she murmured.
“Are you quite sure?” he asked, though obviously not expecting an answer. He abruptly pinched his cigar between his large white teeth, took a final drag and threw it into the soil, stubbing it out with his toe. His hand still lightly cupping her chin, he stared at her intently. Anne looked up at him openly, completely vulnerable in that moment; her thick eyebrows arching gently, creating a strange contrast against the ethereally white face which held an uncompromising air of dignity.
“Oh,” he murmured, overcome, and the next minute his powerful arms were encircling her tiny waist, Anne feeling like she were about to be snapped in two. A warm tide of emotion; bewildering and frightening, swept over her. She had never been less sure of her feelings, and the time, place and circumstances had vanished out of her mind.
The hard muscles of his thighs were barricading her body and the copper buttons of his drab coat pressing into her breast. She felt as weak and helpless as a limp ragdoll, and also inexpressibly weary, overcome by drowsiness and in that oblivion, ended up leaning against him for support.
“Please,” she murmured, feebly attempting to resist him, but her actions and body comportment made a strong contradiction to her words, which therefore made little impression.
Mr Murdoch was kissing her now, moustache and beard tickling her mouth, kissing her with strong, hot lips. Her body arched backwards as she clung for him to support yet tried to push him away.
“You belong to me,” he murmured, “We’re of the same kind. And you’re mine, Anne. Mine...”
Her swirling, darkened mind struggled to grapple with consciousness and then finally, chill sanity washed over her, and Anne suddenly realised the actuality of the situation.
Rage flew into her system, stiffening her spine. She twisted around James’ powerful grip, tearing away from him and choking down humiliation. He did not relinquish her waist, however, but instead continued walking in silence, as if nothing had happened. With every step Anne’s heart brimmed up with loathing, for Mr Murdoch, but most of all loathing for herself.
I keep confusing his name with James. I meant James, when I said Henry. Anyway, it's edited now.
You need to introduce your characters and distinguish them. I still don't know who Henry is, I might have seem him once. Anne's fried has disappeared, so have the other orange girls. It's like you introduce characters and they're gone before the reader even knows who they are and it just becomes work to read and figure everything out. That's not a good thing.
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