Belle - Lesley Pearse [133]
One night she asked him why he didn’t want to talk to her any more.
‘What is there to say?’ he shrugged. ‘I don’t come here to be quizzed, I’m tired at the end of the day.’
On each successive visit Belle felt a little more deflated and used by him, but she counteracted this by reminding herself she had a roof over her head, and blamed herself for jumping into the arrangement without getting to know him better.
By day, though, she was cheered considerably because her designs began to improve dramatically once she understood how hats were constructed. She would go rushing into the shop with them in the mornings and Miss Frank would laugh at her enthusiasm and say she would look at them carefully later.
Mostly she told Belle they weren’t practical, sometimes because they would be too heavy or unbalanced, other times because they involved too much work, but finally she examined one design which looked like a large, flat rose and she said jubilantly that Belle had come up with a good design.
‘It’s perfect for women who don’t want a hat which will flatten or spoil their hairstyle,’ she said. ‘I can make the base it sits on quite small; it could be secured with a hat pin. I think they’ll love this at Angelica’s. So we’ll make one up and I’ll take it in to show them.’
They made the first rose hat in pink. The stiffened, shaped base was covered in deep pink velvet, and the rose itself was made of wired silk, the underside of each petal just a shade darker. They finished it mid-afternoon, and when Belle put it on, Miss Frank clapped her hands in delight.
‘Honey, it’s a triumph,’ she said. ‘I’m going to take it along to Angelica’s right away. You go on home and I’ll shut up the shop.’
It was nearly four in the afternoon when Belle left the shop, and on the way home it began to rain, so she ran the rest of the way.
By the time she’d unlocked the door and gone in, the rain was coming down so heavily that the street was awash and it had become so dark she had to light the gas immediately.
She’d felt so happy back at the shop because she’d pleased Miss Frank, but now, plunged back to reality, all alone for yet another long evening with the rain drumming on the roof, she suddenly felt she couldn’t stand much more of it.
It didn’t feel right to be kept by a man who was so cold towards her. She should be able to tell him about learning to make hats, to show him her designs and admit her dream of having her own hat shop. She’d once told him she’d caught the tram to look at the big houses in the Garden District and his face had tightened with disapproval. Since then she only told him things like how she’d baked a cake, or started some embroidery or knitting, but it was all wrong that she felt unable to tell him anything else.
‘I swopped one slave master for another,’ she murmured to herself, and tears started up in her eyes. ‘All he wants is a place to stay when he’s in town and a girl in the bed so he doesn’t need to pay for one in a brothel.’
Yet that didn’t make any sense to her, for it cost more to keep her than for a hotel for the night and a whore. It was so puzzling: she knew about men, and she knew few of them would set anyone up in a house and pay all the bills unless they were smitten with the woman.
Why didn’t he ever tell her when he was coming next? Why didn’t he want to share a meal with her, take her for a walk or to the theatre? Why, when he’d been so warm and chatty back at Martha’s, had he changed so dramatically?
As a kept woman Belle didn’t feel she could challenge him about anything, and she believed she must always show enthusiasm for his lovemaking too. She had even thought that would encourage him to try harder to please her. But that hadn’t worked; he made no attempt to please her, and that, along with his callous attitude that as his kept woman she should do whatever he said, made it increasingly