Jack the Ripper Victims Series: The Double Event (24 page)

Katie didn’t want to go to the workhouse, but in the winter of 1865 Conway took her there anyway. That was where he’d planned for her to have the baby all along and she’d known that, but Katie was so afraid of the workhouse she’d waited until it was almost too late. Presently, at dreadful intervals, there was a dull ache in her back and lower abdomen, pressure on her pelvis and her belly became hard. The periods of time between the combined pain and pressure, when her belly relaxed, were becoming shorter. She told Conway the baby was coming.

“You can’t have the baby at home,” Conway said. “If it goes badly, I cannot help you. Everyone knows the infirmary at the workhouse is for lying in too. How many women use it for just that? You know you’ll be fine.”

He put her in her coat and bonnet, donned his own coat and hat, and ushered her out the door and into the cold and damp winter air.  But as they walked up the lane, it quickly became obvious she wouldn’t be able to walk to the workhouse fast enough.

Mr. Pettit was returning home from market with his gaily painted coster’s barrow. Conway hailed him and asked for the use of the cart.

“I’ve still got half a barrel of pickled whelks,” Mr. Pettit said. “I’ll take them home and return with the cart.”

“There’s no time,” Conway said with urgency.

Another bout of pain and pressure caused Katie to cringe and let out a moan.

“All right, I can take the whelks with me,” Mr. Pettit said, nodding his head. “Let’s get her comfortable.”

Mr. Pettit removed a small barrel and a drum, then he and Conway helped Katie climb into the cart, allowing her to rest her back against a pile of empty canvas sacks that smelled of smoked fish.

“Good luck,” he said, and Conway began pushing Katie in the cart through the deepening dark.

“I’m afraid you’ll leave me there,” Katie said, her voice more pitiful than she intended, as it bumped along with the cart over uneven paving stones.

“And lose my best patterer?” Conway said, his words puffing out plumes of vapor. “I wouldn’t sell half the ballads if you weren’t there to show them how it’s done.”

When they arrived, Conway helped her out of the cart. “You must make your own way from here. If they’re short of beds and they see you have a husband, they won’t take you in.”

“No, I can’t stay here alone.”

“You won’t be alone. There are nurses to help you along. You’ll see.”

Katie clung to Conway.

“I can’t leave Mr. Pettit’s coster barrow in the street.”

Katie gave him a cold look.
No
,
but you’ve threatened to leave me in the street.

He kissed her on the head and turned her toward the building’s entrance. “In you go,” he said, as if talking to a frightened child. “I’ll come back tomorrow.”

Katie took a step toward the grim dark brick building. The cart’s wheels made a grinding sound as Conway turned it. She glanced back and he was already headed away down the lane.

Two elderly inmates acting as nurses greeted her inside the building. Their faces held no expression. They led Katie into a long, thin, high-ceilinged room filled with beds occupied by women of different ages, in various states of awareness. The stares from some of the patients were disquieting. The odors were odd.

The matrons found her a bed and put screens around it to provide privacy. Katie kicked off her shoes, exposing her tattered stockings. Seeing them, one of the matrons left and returned shortly to offer Katie a pair of brown ribbed stockings that had been mended with white yarn.

“Thank you,” Katie said. The woman, still expressionless, turned away from her without a word. She was relieved when the two matrons left her, but worried they might not be available when she needed help.

The straw mattress was thin and the room so cold and drafty, Katie took only her coat and bonnet off before getting in the bed. She located her thimble in an outer pocket and slipped a finger into it.

A few conversations could be heard, but there was no reason to focus on the words. Some of it sounded casual and thoughtful. A quiet ranting came from someone senile or insane. One of the patients in a nearby bed kept up a low moaning, while another across the room periodically cried out in pain. Through a crack between the screens a woman could be seen conversing with an unseen companion.

The activity was nearly enough to take her mind off the intermittent pain and pressure, but soon the distraction was not nearly enough.

Katie named her baby girl, Anne, but she and Conway called her Annie. All the women in the neighborhood came to visit the infant. Conway complained, but Katie put him in his place. “If you expect me to hawk chapbooks in the street with you, Annie had better makes friends with a few of the local women.”

Fortunately, Annie was a charming, cooing baby who made friends with everyone she met. She didn’t cry often and was easily amused. Annie was a flawless representation of what Katie had been, with her delicate toes and fingers, velvet-soft skin, dark silken hair, and jewel-bright blue eyes that with time turned green. She was Katie’s chance to start over. What would be hers would be Katie’s. She would grow strong and whole and have a good life. Her mother might be a music hall singer. Her father would not die and leave the family in abject poverty. She would grow up and marry a proper gentleman who earned a good wage. They would have a large and loving family, all of them educated, well-fed, healthy and happy. In Katie’s declining years, Annie would embrace her and keep her, providing a comforting respite from all of life’s hard work. Old age would be tolerable. She would be let down easily and gently, and finally join Catherine in peace.

But that was in the future. For now, there was work to do. Little time passed before Katie was back on her feet and had several neighborhood women willing to spell her if she needed a little time away from her infant. Conway kept a list of them. If he ever saw one of the women drunk, she was scratched off his list and Annie would not be seeing her again.

Conway wanted Katie to return to work at the laundry and hired a childminder, a Mrs. Patricia Ennis, to keep Annie throughout the workday. Unhappy to be allowing a stranger to take care of her infant, Katie nevertheless delivered Annie to the childminder one Wednesday morning in early spring.

The wooden house had a sagging roof with holes in it and a broken chimney pot puffing smoke unevenly. The old woman who answered the door reached for Annie without introduction. Perhaps in her seventies, she was gray; her hair, her clothes, her complexion and expression. She wore an old-fashioned bonnet with ties at the chin.

“I’ll carry her in,” Katie said.

“Surname?” The woman asked.

“Conway,” Katie said. “And you are Mrs. Ennis?”

“Yes.”

The woman turned and led the way, mounting the stairs to the second floor. At the top of the stairs, they came to a short dark hall which served as a storage area. A thin path for walking had been cleared between heaps of various household items and building supplies that included bricks. The path branched to provide access to doors on both sides of the hall. They entered a room on the right filled with numerous infants in crude cribs.

No wondered the woman was too distracted for introductions. Eight of the cots were occupied, and at least ten more were not.

The empty ones must be filled with infants as they are delivered by their mothers.

The smell of fresh, as well as old, feces and urine was strong. Bedding in the cribs was soiled and the walls and floor bespattered. The ceiling was in need of repair from roof leakage and a haze of fireplace smoke hung in the air.

“Put her anywhere,” Mrs. Ennis said, moving to a table in the corner and picking up a small, tapered bottle containing a small amount of dark liquid.

Katie didn’t want to put Annie down. She moved toward the corner because the table was somewhat clean.

Mrs. Ennis pulled the cork from the bottle, measured out a spoonful of the liquid and fed it to the nearest infant.

“Is the poor child ill?” Katie asked.

“No ma’am,” she said, moving on to the next infant in the row. “This keeps them quiet. I give it to all of them. They sleep through the day and are bright and happy when their mums come for them in the evening.”

An empty bottle of the elixir sat on the table. Katie picked it up and read the label.

Godfre
y’
s Cordial

For a child 1 month old—4 or 5 drops

For a child 2 month old—7 drops

For a child 3 month old—10 drops

For a child 6 month old—20 drops

For a child 12 month old—half a teaspoonful

Shake well

“The label on the bottle says it is to be given in drops, not spoonfuls,” she said loudly and with urgency.

“Yes, Ma’am,” Mrs. Ennis said. “I measured out only half the spoon.”

Katie tried to watch her more carefully the next time she dosed an infant, but she turned away as she began to pour.

She puts them to sleep so she doesn’t have the bother of keeping them happy.

Mrs. Ennis held up the empty bottle. “I’ll have to get more.” She set the bottle and gray metal spoon on the table next to Katie and left the room, moving unsteadily.

She acts as if she’s taking the medicine too.

Katie set the bottle back down. She took the teaspoon from the table and slipped it in a pocket.
The medicine is probably harmless, but perhaps she’ll have a harder time giving it to the children without a spoon.

She turned with Annie to leave as one of the infants began to cry. 

No doubt she’ll find another spoon.
Katie hurried down the stairs
.
She exited the building and didn’t look back. The first in a long series of battles she would fight to protect Annie was over. The next one would be with Conway. Unless he was willing to keep Annie, Katie would not be going to work today. Whatever the case, Conway would not be pleased.

Katie took the long way home through Covent Garden Market to see the new domed Floral Hall that replaced a part of the old arcade. Although still under construction, it was already a beautiful steel and glass building. The Covent Garden Market, a bloodless market where only products of the garden and orchard were sold, smelled good. New vegetables had not come in yet, but flowers of every hue were in abundance. Katie breathed deeply of their combined fragrance. The costermongers were on their best behavior as the proper ladies, in their finery, bought things they didn’t need.

One day Annie will buy flowers here.

A young Irish girl with pale orange hair approached Katie. “Please ma’am, a farthing to carry your beautiful baby while you shop.”

She had a pretty face and a trusting smile.  She gazed at Annie with an innocent longing that made Katie proud to be the infant’s mother. Her back was sore and she needed to trust someone, a stranger. Conway had given her a few pence so she wouldn’t be on the street without money. He’d ask for it back later or want to know how it was spent, but she could always replace what was missing with some of her savings. “I’ll give you ha’penny to carry her a mile,” she said.

The girl’s eyes became large and she grinned. “My name is Aisling
,
” she said, reaching cautiously for the infant. 

Katie tucked in Annie’s swaddling and lowered her into Aisling’s arms and they set off for home
.

~~~

Conway was seated at the table, working with some papers when Katie and Annie returned. “You brought her home?” he said, clearly outraged. “You are daft as a brush, woman. You know you cannot work with the child in your arms. There must be a time when you are prepared to put her down.”

“The childminder was a mistake,” Katie said as calmly as possible, putting Annie in the bed.

Conway stood and raised his voice. “The mistake is that you think we can get along on my income alone.”

Annie began to cry.

Katie leaned in toward Conway and said evenly, “Mrs. Ennis acted like she was drunk. She was giving the children a medicine, Godfrey’s Cordial.”

Conway’s eyes became wide, his nostrils flared and his lips pulled back from his gritted teeth. He balled his fists and Katie cringed. “Opium and alcohol!” he shouted, turning away from Katie toward Annie. “That elixir kills small children. It’s been in the courts. It should be outlawed! She should be hanged.”

Annie’s crying became louder.

“I didn’t know!” Katie said, fearing he might find a way to blame her and lash out with his fists, “but I couldn’t leave Annie with her.”

“No... no, you were right to bring her home.” His voice was soft and he gently took Annie from the bed. As he held her close, she became quieter.

Conway was confused, frightened. His eyes cast about restlessly. Katie had never seen him that way before. He’d made a mistake hiring the childminder and didn’t know how to make it right again. “She’ll be lucky if she never hears from me,” he blustered in a powerless whisper.

Katie’s fear of Conway fled and she turned to him, speaking with authority. “We will not leave Annie with another childminder. I will stay home with her when you work by day. When you don’t work in the daytime, I’ll go to the laundry.”

Conway, his eyes clouded with regret, nodded his approval.

She had not expected him to acquiesce so easily. He clearly loved his daughter. Perhaps Annie would indeed have a good future.

~~~

Katie returned to the laundry to work for a few weeks, and Conway did what he could to find local women willing to care for Annie while he slept by day. But he couldn’t always find one, and complained that his sleep was too frequently interrupted by Annie. Quickly he’d had his fill of the arrangement and allowed Katie to stay home.

When they traveled to an execution, Annie stayed with Charlotte Neet, a woman in her late sixties who lived nearby in the rookery of Old Pye Street. Katie had recommended her to Conway because she’d worked with her at the Hargis Laundry, had got to know her and liked her.

“She’s not like so many at the laundry who drink their lunch,” Katie told him. “She says she takes home a pint in a pale from a pub near her home and drinks it in the evening after her supper for ‘good health.’”

Conway had a look of skepticism. 

“She’s a delight to be with as she’s always smiling. We like to sing together while we’re working. She’s taught me some old songs. Charlotte’s hands aren’t strong enough to wash clothes anymore, but she can take care of Annie. She’ll do it for a half-shilling per day.”

Katie took Conway to see Charlotte. She lived in what had once been the pantry in a drafty, leaking house a quarter of a mile to the Southwest. At one time the house had no doubt held one family. With so little room in the old pantry, Katie and Annie stayed in the hall while Conway went in, shut the door and spoke to Charlotte. A chamber pot and makeshift bed at her feet made it clear that she was standing in the dwelling place of another tenant.  Charlotte said the house had thirty-two tenants altogether.

Katie tried to hear what Conway and Charlotte were saying, but their voices were too muffled behind the door.

On their way home, Conway said, “Sixpence is a dear price, but it’s not like she’s keeping a full nursery, and I suppose it’s worth it to leave Annie in trusted hands.”

~~~

In 1868, executions ceased to be public events. Although hangings retreated behind the walls of prisons, crowds still gathered outside the prison gates to read the posting of the death notice and celebrate or protest the executions. Katie and Conway sold chapbooks at these events, but because the crowds weren’t as large and there was less of a festival atmosphere, sales suffered. Katie’s singing to attract customers was more important than ever and that pleased her.

Conway dipped more and more frequently into his savings to support the family. Katie was finally getting paid, her wages invested in something she felt good about: the welfare of her daughter. Nothing would be left over to provide Katie with fine clothes and the dream that came along with them, but she was content, for her second chance to live was well started.

~~~

In the autumn of 1870, Katie read in the London Gazette that Parliament had passed the Elementary Education Act that funded schools for all children ages five to twelve.  She was so excited about it, she read the article to Conway.

“The charity schools did a good enough job for you,” was all he had to say about it.

Annie was five years old that winter and began her education at the St. Marylebone School in the spring. Walking her daughter to school in the mornings took her in the direction of the Hargis Laundry. After delivering Annie to St. Marylebone, Katie went to work.

Conway was pleased with the extra income and the couple was getting along better than they had for a long time, until the day Katie told him she was pregnant again. After that, days passed when Conway would not speak unless spoken to. Over the course of her pregnancy, he became more distant.

Katie was glad for the time when he was away working with the night soil men. On those evenings, she helped Annie with her reading and writing lessons, giving her skills well beyond those of her classmates at the St. Marylebone School. With her daughter’s language skills rapidly developing, Katie taught her to play word games. The first was
I’m Thinking of Something
, which was simple enough for a young girl, the questions involved requiring only
yes
and
no
answers.