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Authors: Gaie Sebold
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thought. Besides, fear would do her no good at all, nor would thinking about what would happen to the others if Ma got taken up. Saffie, pretty little curly-haired Saffie who wiggled like a puppy at the slightest kindness, out on the street with no-one to watch her... she’d not last a day.
She kept her voice calm. “You said housing, clothing, food?”
“You will be housed in a dormitory with other young women, and of course, fed. On completion of your training, you would be provided with accommodation. Clothing as necessary and, once you are trained, a personal allowance.” He looked down at her feet, which were clad in a pair of broken-down black boots that were too big and stuffed with paper at the toes to keep them on. “Shoes. New ones. That fit. And a pension, do you know what that is?”
“No.” Although she had heard the word. She remembered hearing it in those dreadful days after Papa had died, when everything had started to go so wrong. There had been supposed to be one, but there wasn’t.
“A sum of money, regularly paid, once you are too old or otherwise unfit to work.”
Food. A roof. A personal allowance. Shoes she didn’t have to share. And money when she was too old to work.
She had a vision, then. A room, her own room. An armchair. A little footstool, a roaring fire, a plate of sausages. A door that locked. Even when she was old and too crippled with the rheumatiz to lift a handkerchief.
She wasn’t scared of work; she worked hard for Ma. And a pension sounded like a very good deal indeed. The thought of it was like a big soft blanket. As for an education... Ma wasn’t the only one who believed in knowledge. Knowing her letters and numbers gave Evvie an edge others didn’t have – not to mention that reading helped you forget cold feet and an empty belly in a way nothing else did. An education meant books, of which she’d never had enough, and chances, of which she could do with as many as she could grab.
A good-sounding deal, right enough. But she knew about good deals. She’d offered them herself. They tended to have a great big fishhook stuck somewhere in the middle.
“And if I don’t ‘complete my training’ in whatever it is you want me to do, fall off me tightrope too many times, maybe?”
“A return to the streets, without even the fragile protection of Ma Pether. You may be lucky enough to find employment in the factories.” He leaned forward. “Clever as a monkey you might be, Miss Duchen, but you are young, poor and female. You have been lucky so far. Luck runs out.”
He was right, she knew. And she also knew, in the depths of her gut, that he was lying, or at least, not telling her something. What?
Clever as a monkey.
That wasn’t such a compliment, when you thought about it. Monkeys got caught and put in a fancy jacket and a little red hat and chained to a barrel organ, holding out a tin cup in a shivering paw.
I’m nobody’s monkey, mister, Eveline thought. Not yours, not Her Majesty’s Government’s, not even Ma Pether’s. I’ll go along. And I’ll see what’s to be seen.
And we’ll find out who’s the clever one, Mister Holmforth.
The Britannia School
T HE CARRIAGE MOVED steadily out of the centre of town, up through St James’s, into the park and out the other side, uphill, always uphill. The shuffling foot-traffic, the clatter of iron wheels and clopping of hooves, the chuff and rattle of steam-cars all dropped away. As the last of the daylight faded, leaving only a sullen red glow in the west, they were out in the country, with no light but the carriage’s own swaying lamps to show the road ahead and no sound but the brisk clopping of a single set of hooves, the rumble of just four wheels, the creak of springs and leather. As the roar and stink of town and its endless smoke faded into the scents of a spring night, dewy green and sweet, these small, familiar sounds seemed to make the surrounding silence bigger; as though all
She kept her voice calm. “You said housing, clothing, food?”
“You will be housed in a dormitory with other young women, and of course, fed. On completion of your training, you would be provided with accommodation. Clothing as necessary and, once you are trained, a personal allowance.” He looked down at her feet, which were clad in a pair of broken-down black boots that were too big and stuffed with paper at the toes to keep them on. “Shoes. New ones. That fit. And a pension, do you know what that is?”
“No.” Although she had heard the word. She remembered hearing it in those dreadful days after Papa had died, when everything had started to go so wrong. There had been supposed to be one, but there wasn’t.
“A sum of money, regularly paid, once you are too old or otherwise unfit to work.”
Food. A roof. A personal allowance. Shoes she didn’t have to share. And money when she was too old to work.
She had a vision, then. A room, her own room. An armchair. A little footstool, a roaring fire, a plate of sausages. A door that locked. Even when she was old and too crippled with the rheumatiz to lift a handkerchief.
She wasn’t scared of work; she worked hard for Ma. And a pension sounded like a very good deal indeed. The thought of it was like a big soft blanket. As for an education... Ma wasn’t the only one who believed in knowledge. Knowing her letters and numbers gave Evvie an edge others didn’t have – not to mention that reading helped you forget cold feet and an empty belly in a way nothing else did. An education meant books, of which she’d never had enough, and chances, of which she could do with as many as she could grab.
A good-sounding deal, right enough. But she knew about good deals. She’d offered them herself. They tended to have a great big fishhook stuck somewhere in the middle.
“And if I don’t ‘complete my training’ in whatever it is you want me to do, fall off me tightrope too many times, maybe?”
“A return to the streets, without even the fragile protection of Ma Pether. You may be lucky enough to find employment in the factories.” He leaned forward. “Clever as a monkey you might be, Miss Duchen, but you are young, poor and female. You have been lucky so far. Luck runs out.”
He was right, she knew. And she also knew, in the depths of her gut, that he was lying, or at least, not telling her something. What?
Clever as a monkey.
That wasn’t such a compliment, when you thought about it. Monkeys got caught and put in a fancy jacket and a little red hat and chained to a barrel organ, holding out a tin cup in a shivering paw.
I’m nobody’s monkey, mister, Eveline thought. Not yours, not Her Majesty’s Government’s, not even Ma Pether’s. I’ll go along. And I’ll see what’s to be seen.
And we’ll find out who’s the clever one, Mister Holmforth.
The Britannia School
T HE CARRIAGE MOVED steadily out of the centre of town, up through St James’s, into the park and out the other side, uphill, always uphill. The shuffling foot-traffic, the clatter of iron wheels and clopping of hooves, the chuff and rattle of steam-cars all dropped away. As the last of the daylight faded, leaving only a sullen red glow in the west, they were out in the country, with no light but the carriage’s own swaying lamps to show the road ahead and no sound but the brisk clopping of a single set of hooves, the rumble of just four wheels, the creak of springs and leather. As the roar and stink of town and its endless smoke faded into the scents of a spring night, dewy green and sweet, these small, familiar sounds seemed to make the surrounding silence bigger; as though all
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