Highgate Rise - Anne Perry [139]
Charlotte found it hard to hold her tongue. She ached to tell them precisely what she thought of the bishop’s charity.
“Modesty is one of the most attractive of all the virtues,” she said aloud, gritting her teeth. “It seems that she said nothing to you of her work to have the laws changed with regard to the ownership of the very worst of slum properties.”
There was nothing at all in either of their faces that looked like even comprehension, let alone fear.
“Slum properties?” Angeline was utterly confused.
“The ownership of them,” Charlotte continued, her voice sounding dry and very forced. “At present it is almost impossible to discern who is the true owner.”
“Why should anyone wish to know?” Angeline asked. “It seems an extraordinary and purposeless piece of knowledge.”
“Because the conditions are appalling.” Charlotte murmured her answer and tried to make it as gentle as was appropriate to two elderly women who knew nothing of the world beyond their house, the church and a few of the people in the parish. It would be grossly unfair now to blame them for an ignorance which it was far too late for them to remedy. The whole pattern of their lives, which had been set for them by others, had never been questioned or disturbed.
“Of course we know that the poor suffer,” Angeline said with a frown. “But that has always been so, and is surely inevitable. That is the purpose of charity—to relieve suffering as much as we can.”
“A good deal of it could be prevented, if other people did not exercise their greed at the expense of the poor.” Charlotte sought for words they would understand to explain the devastating poverty she had seen. She looked at the total lack of comprehension on their faces. “When people are poor already, they are much more prone to illness, which makes them unable to work, and they become poorer still. They are evicted from decent housing and have to seek whatever they can get.” She was simplifying drastically, but a long explanation of circumstances they had never imagined would only lose their emotion. “Landlords know their plight and offer them room without light or air, without running water or any sanitary facilities—”
“Then why do they take them?” Angeline opened her eyes wide in inquiry. “Perhaps they do not want such things, as we would?”
“They want the best they can get,” Charlotte said simply. “And very often that is merely a place where they can shelter and lie down—and perhaps, if they are lucky, share a stove with others so they can cook.”
“That doesn’t sound too bad,” Celeste replied. “If that is all they can afford.”
Charlotte put forward the one fact she knew would reach the bishop’s daughters.
“Men, women and children all in the same room?” She stared straight into Celeste’s strong, clever face. “With no lavatory but a bucket in the corner—for all of them—and nowhere to change clothes in privacy, or to wash—and no way of sleeping alone?”
Charlotte saw all the horror she could have wished.
“Oh, my dear! You don’t mean that?” Angeline was shocked. “That is—quite uncivilized … and certainly unchristian!”
“Of course it is,” Charlotte agreed. “But they have no alternative, except the street, which would be even worse.”
Celeste looked distressed. It was not beyond her imagination to think of such conditions and feel at least a shadow of their wretchedness, but she was still at a loss to see what purpose could be served by making the owners known.
“The owners cannot make more space,” she said slowly. “Nor solve the problems of poverty. Why should you wish to discover who they are?”
“Because