‘I’d better stand by and hold your horse for you, Sir.’
Armstrong passed Fleet’s reins to Ben and passed him an apple. ‘If you give this to Fleet, you’ll have a friend for life,’ he said, then he turned and knocked at the door of the large, plain house.
The door opened slightly and he caught a glimpse of a face almost as narrow as the crack it peered out of. The woman took one look at his black face and her sharp features twitched.
‘Shoo! Off with you, dirty devil! We’re not for your sort! Be on your way!’ She spoke more loudly than she needed to; slowly too, as though to a half-wit or a foreigner.
She tried to close the door but the tip of Armstrong’s boot blocked it, and whether it was the sight of the expensive polished leather or the desire to give him a piece of her mind more forcefully, she reopened the door. Before she could open her mouth to speak, Armstrong addressed her. He spoke softly and with great dignity of expression, as though she had never called him a dirty devil, as though his boot were not in her doorway.
‘Forgive my intrusion, Madam. I realize you must be very busy and I won’t detain you a minute longer than necessary.’ He saw her register the expensive education that lay behind his voice, appraise his good hat, his smart coat. He saw her draw her conclusion and felt the pressure against the toe of his shoe cease.
‘Yes?’ she said.
‘I understand you have a young woman by the name of Mrs Armstrong lodging here?’
A snidely triumphant smile pulled at the corners of her lips. ‘She works here. She’s new to it. You’ll have to pay extra.’
So that was what Ben meant by a bad house.
‘All I want is to speak with her.’
‘It is the letter, I suppose? She’s been expecting it for weeks. Quite given up hope.’
The sharp, narrow woman put out a sharp, narrow hand. Armstrong looked at it and shook his head.
‘I should very much like to see her, if you please.’
‘It is not the letter?’
‘Not the letter. Take me to her, if you will.’
She led him up one, then another flight of stairs, muttering all the while. ‘Why should I not think it is the letter, when all I have heard, twenty times a day this last month, is “Has my letter come, Mrs Eavis?” and “Mrs Eavis, is there any letter for me?”’
He said nothing but gave himself a mild and amenable countenance whenever she turned to glance at him. The stairwell, rather smart and grand at the entrance, grew shabbier and chillier the higher you got. On the way up, some of the doors were ajar. Armstrong caught glimpses of unmade beds, garments strewn on the floor. In one room, a half-dressed woman bent over to roll a stocking up over her knee. When she caught sight of him her mouth smiled, but her eyes didn’t. His heart sank. Was this what had become of Robin’s wife?
On the bare top landing where the paint was peeling, Mrs Eavis stopped and rapped sharply at a door.
There came no reply.
She rapped again. ‘Mrs Armstrong? A gentleman for you.’
There was only silence.
Mrs Eavis frowned. ‘I don’t know … She has not gone out this morning, I would have heard.’ Then, with sharp alarm, ‘Done a runner, that’s what she’s done, the little trollop!’ and in no time she had the key out of her pocket, opened the door and burst in.
Over Mrs Eavis’s shoulder, Armstrong perceived all in a flash. The stained and rumpled sheet of the iron bed and, against it, that other, awful whiteness: an outstretched arm, the fingers splayed rigid.
‘Good Lord, no!’ he exclaimed, and his hand came to his eyes as though it were not too late to unsee it. So he stood, for some seconds, eyes squeezed shut while Mrs Eavis’s complaints went on.
‘Little minx! Two weeks rent she owes me! When I get my letter, Mrs Eavis! Oh, the lying vixen! What am I to do now, eh? Eating my meals, sleeping in my linen! Thought she was too good to work for money! “I’ll have you out of here if you don’t pay up prompt,” I told her. “I don’t keep girls here for nothing! If you can’t pay, you’ll have to work.” I saw to