Belle - Lesley Pearse [14]
‘Go to sleep now.’ Mog nudged her back on to the bed and pulled the covers up to her ears, tucking them in so tightly Belle could barely move. ‘Tomorrow things may look different for everyone.’
The snow lay even thicker the next morning as there had been a fresh fall during the night, concealing any tracks made by the killer. Millie’s body was collected by the mortuary van early in the morning, and the first lot of policemen arrived soon afterwards to search her room thoroughly.
Annie ordered Belle to stay in the kitchen. She didn’t even want her upstairs to clean, lay the fires or empty chamberpots. She was grim-faced and sharp-tongued, though Mog pointed out that this was partly because she’d been forced to get up and get dressed at what she considered an unearthly hour.
Mog remained upstairs, whether this was because she was asked to do so by the police or because she chose to keep a close eye on the girls, Belle didn’t know. She heard the girls being called into the parlour for questioning, one after another, and when Ruby, one of the youngest, came down to the kitchen to get a cup of tea, she said the police were asking about the men who especially liked Millie.
‘I told ’em they all liked Millie,’ Ruby said with just a touch of bitterness. She wasn’t very pretty, her skin was bad and her brown hair dull. ‘I’m buggered if I know why they chose someone as old as her. And she were soft in the head!’
‘She were nice though,’ Belle said. ‘Kind and smiley.’
Ruby grimaced. ‘Smiling shows she were soft in the head, there ain’t a lot to smile about in this place, I can tell you! The bluebottles had Dolly in there for ages just because she didn’t come with the rest of us last night. She said she went to bed ’cos she had one of her bad heads and never heard nothin’.’
It was unusual for Belle to get this long talking to any of the girls; Annie discouraged it. Now that Belle had a chance to talk to Ruby she was determined to find out more about the activities upstairs.
‘Funny she didn’t hear anything,’ Belle said.
‘Well, she likes her la-la medicine, don’t she! A coach and horses could come galloping through the house when she’s on that and she wouldn’t wake up.’
‘La-la medicine?’ Belle asked.
‘Laudanum,’ said Ruby, looking quizzically at Belle as if surprised she had to ask what it was. ‘The brown stuff what makes the day a bit smoother.’
Belle had heard of laudanum, but she thought doctors only gave it to people when they were in pain. ‘Does it hurt a great deal when you do the thing with the gentlemen then?’ she asked.
Ruby tittered. ‘Ain’t you done it with nobody yet?’
Belle was about to retort that of course she hadn’t when Annie appeared at the top of the stairs and ordered Ruby upstairs again.
‘I just wanted a cup of tea,’ Ruby replied.
‘You’ll have one when I say you can have one,’ Annie snapped. ‘So come on up. Belle, you can iron that pile of bed linen.’
Belle put the flat iron on the stove and laid the thick blanket over the table ready to start ironing. But on hearing a policeman call Annie into the parlour, she crept up the stairs and opened the door into the hall just a crack so she could listen to what was being said.
The policeman asked several general questions, about who lived in the house, what Annie knew about each of them, and how long they’d worked there. After that he moved on to ask her about the gentlemen callers and whether they picked out the girl they liked best, or if she selected a girl for each man.
‘When it’s the man’s first visit he’s often shy, so I usually pick someone for him,’ Annie replied. ‘But by the second or third visit they mostly like to come in here and have a drink and a chat with the girls. If I’ve got a pianist they dance too. Then they pick who they want out of