Fallen Grace - Mary Hooper [53]
Grace nodded. That had been her first thought: that ‘Mrs Smith’ had found out that she’d got a regular job and was going to try and blackmail her about the baby.
‘But I thank you for telling me, and hope that we meet again under happier circumstances,’ Grace said, and she brushed her veiled cheek against the other woman’s and went to board the train.
In the middle of that night – or at four in the morning, to be precise – Grace woke from a deep sleep to find Jane at the window of their room, looking out into the darkness.
‘What’s the matter?’ she asked sleepily.
‘Something . . . but I don’t know what,’ answered Jane in a nervous whisper. ‘The bells have been tolling for an hour or more – can’t you hear them? And I can see people in the street.’
Grace, realising that she too could hear bells, sat up in bed. It was a monotonous, heavy tolling, and not just from their local church, but also from what sounded like a score of others. ‘Have you ever heard bells like this before?’
Jane shook her head. ‘Perhaps it’s war,’ she said anxiously. ‘Or a terrible fire.’
‘Do go and ask someone!’ Grace urged her. ‘Find out who else is awake.’
But Jane was too scared, so Grace lit a candle, wrapped a blanket around herself against the bitter cold and went out on to the landing. She found two of the seamstresses there, talking excitedly to a mason down in the yard.
‘What is it?’ Grace asked. ‘Why are all the bells ringing?’
‘We don’t know!’ said one of the girls.
‘We’ve sent Wilf into the street to find out,’ said the other.
As they waited, from the direction of the reception rooms came the sudden clanging of another bell – the handbell that Mr or Mrs Unwin sometimes used to summon the servants for church, or to announce something noteworthy. Grace went back into her bedroom to tell Jane that she should make haste and come downstairs.
In a front reception room one gas light had been lit, its glimmer causing a tall marble angel to throw a soft, wavering shadow right across one wall. Mr George Unwin waited there, fully dressed and frowning, arrived from Kensington and eager to tell his workers the news.
After calling for silence, he said, ‘No doubt you’ll all be wondering what’s happening.’ There were voices of assent and he went on, ‘It is my sad duty to tell you that the Prince Consort, the husband of our dear queen, died last night.’
There was a collective intake of breath from those in the room and one or two of the girls began crying. Grace thought of that handsome, ardent face she’d seen at the carriage window, and then about the epitaphs she’d read on the tombstones only the day before. They had spoken truly: Death was waiting in line for everyone, and was no respecter of one’s station in life.
‘I didn’t know he was ill, sir!’ someone called.
‘What about the queen? It will kill her.’
Mr Unwin said, ‘I need hardly tell you what a blow this is to the country. A national disaster.’
There came murmurs of agreement, several sobs.
‘However . . .’ Mr Unwin stopped, coughed. ‘While this is doubtless a tragedy for all of us, some may, er . . .’ He paused, wondering how to put it. ‘Some may find it more of a tragedy than others. And some – though of course every bit as devastated as everyone else – may not be . . . quite . . .’
He gave up the effort of trying to tell them in the most decent way possible that he and Mrs Unwin had already discussed the matter and thought that Prince Albert’s death would signal a renaissance in the mourning industry, for surely the whole nation would want to wear black.
‘The thoughts of everyone are with our beloved queen,’ he finished devoutly.
x
It was, Grace observed two days later, most extraordinary: the whole world seemed to have turned black overnight. Shops, omnibuses, hackney carriages, trains, trees, horses, restaurants and houses had all become draped in yards of bombazine or crêpe. Dogs wore black collars, cats had black bows and babies had their long white gowns trimmed with black grosgrain. It was as if people