Belle - Lesley Pearse [25]
Annie’s lips were trembling. She squeezed Mog’s hand and tried hard to prevent herself recalling the horror of what had happened to her twenty-five years earlier.
It was the most painful, disgusting and humiliating experience, and even now, after so many years, she could smell that man’s sweat, the whisky on his breath, and feel once again that sensation of being crushed alive by his heavy body on top of her. She screamed, it hurt so much, but he seemed to like that, and when it was finally over he examined her private parts and took pleasure in seeing blood.
She was just a child then. She had no breasts – just a skinny little body like a boy’s!
Annie knew now that she was just one of thousands of children snatched from the streets. All over London unscrupulous brothel keepers paid people, often motherly-looking women, to procure pretty young girls for this trade. Mostly the girls were treated much like Annie, imprisoned and semi-starved to make them compliant. Sometimes they were beaten too until their spirit was completely broken.
Mostly, once children had been abused in this way, they felt ruined both mentally and physically, and they stayed in prostitution because they couldn’t face going home. Annie was the same; she knew that if her mother learned what had happened to her, she’d never get over it. So she lost her family for ever; she thought it was preferable for them to think she didn’t care about them than know what kind of work she did.
She did find enough spirit a couple of years later to run from the evils of that brothel, and luck shone on her in as much as she found the comparative safety of the Countess’s place in Jake’s Court. There she learned to tolerate, if not like, the profession she’d been thrown into. Sometimes, in the company of the other girls, she was even happy.
At the time the Countess passed the house on to her, Annie did consider selling it and using the money to open a shop in a respectable area. But it was all she knew by then, and if she started another business and failed, losing all her money, how would she and Belle live?
She thought about it long and hard and it seemed to her that as long as men had the urge for sex, there would always be people making money from it. So she made the decision to stay in the business but promised herself that her house would be a good one. She would only ever take on willing, experienced girls. She would feed them well, check their health and cleanliness, and not take all the money they earned. That seemed to be the perfect compromise.
She had never, and would never, offer a child to anyone. Men had often asked her to find them one, but she had always showed such men the door, making them quite aware what she thought of such sick practices.
Now that Belle was missing and maybe on the verge of being molested by a brute, she realized how stupid she’d been not to have foreseen something like this. How could she have imagined she could keep Belle safe when she lived in a brothel?
‘You were right, I should’ve sent her away to a boarding school,’ Annie said, her voice cracking with emotion. ‘It was stupid to keep her here with me.’
Annie knew exactly why she hadn’t sent Belle away. It was because she was the one good thing in her life, in truth her only reason for living. She had felt that by keeping her close she could prevent any harm ever coming to her daughter.
She looked at Mog with tear-filled eyes. ‘Even if this hadn’t happened, sooner or later she would’ve become aware what was going on.’
‘Stop blaming yourself and start thinking who we can get to help us.’ Mog took no pleasure in being right about sending Belle away. Besides, although she’d pushed for it, she had felt nothing but relief when Annie refused to do it. Belle was so precious to her that even a day without her was too long.
‘What’s the name of that man that was sweet on Millie? The youngish one with the red cheeks. Wasn’t he some kind of investigator?’
Annie frowned. ‘Noah Bayliss! I think you’re right. Millie said he wrote for a newspaper too. But how will we find