Highgate Rise - Anne Perry [95]
“Mrs. Pitt,” he said very softly. “I know where Mrs. Shaw began, and some of where it led her. If you wish, I will take you.”
Charlotte looked at his bony, agreeable face, and the quiet pain in it, and felt ashamed of her outburst for its noise and self-indulgence.
“Thank you, Mr. Oliphant, I should be very grateful.”
Percival drove them; it was well beyond the area of Highgate and into Upper Holloway. They stopped at a narrow street and alighted from the carriage, once again leaving it to wait. Charlotte looked around. The houses were cheek by jowl, one room upstairs and one down, to judge by the width, but there may have been more at the back beyond view. The doors were all closed and the steps scrubbed and white-stoned. It was not appreciably poorer than the street on which she and Pitt had lived when they were first married.
“Come.” Oliphant set out along the pavement and almost immediately turned in along an alley that Charlotte had not observed before. Here it was dank and a chill draft blew on their faces, carrying the smell of raw sewage and drains.
Charlotte coughed and reached for her handkerchief—even Gracie put her hand up to her face—but they hurried after him till he emerged in a small, dim courtyard and crossed it, warning them to step over the open gutters. At the far side he knocked on a paint-peeled door and waited.
After several minutes it was opened by a girl of fourteen or fifteen with a gray-white face and fair hair greasy with dirt. Her eyes were pink-rimmed and there was a flicker of fear in the defiance with which she spoke.
“Yeah? ’Oo are yer?”
“Is Mrs. Bradley at home?” he asked quietly, opening his coat a fraction to show his clerical collar.
Her face softened in relief. “Yeah, Ma’s in bed. She took poorly again. The doc were ’ere yest’dy an’ ’e give ’er some med’cine, but it don’t do no good.”
“May I come in and see her?” Oliphant requested.
“Yeah, I s’pose. But don’ wake ’er if she’s sleepin’.”
“I won’t,” he promised, and held the door wide for Charlotte and Gracie to enter.
Inside the narrow room was cold. Damp seeped through wallpaper, staining it with mold, and the air had an odor that was sour and clung in the back of the throat. There was no tap or standpipe, and a bucket in the corner covered with a makeshift lid served the purposes of nature. Rickety stairs led upwards through a gap in the ceiling and Oliphant went up first, cautioning Charlotte and Gracie to wait their turn in case the weight of more than one person should collapse them.
Charlotte emerged into a bedroom with two wooden cots, both heaped with blankets. In one lay a woman who at a glance might have been Charlotte’s mother’s age. Her face was gaunt, her skin withered and papery, and her eyes so hollow the bones of her brow seemed almost skull-like.
Then as Charlotte moved closer she saw the fair hair and the skin of her neck above the patched nightshirt, and realized she was probably no more than thirty. There was a handkerchief with blood on it grasped loosely in the thin hand.
The three of them stood in silence for several minutes, staring at the sleeping woman, each racked with silent, impotent pity.
Downstairs again, Charlotte turned to Oliphant and the girl.
“We must do something! Who owns this—this heap of timber? It’s not fit for horses, let alone women to live in. He should be prosecuted. We will begin straightaway. Who collects the rent?”
The girl was as white as flour; her whole body shook.
“Don’t do that, please miss! I beg yer, don’t turn us aht. Me ma’ll die if yer put ’er in the street—and me an’ Alice and Becky’ll ’ave ter go inter the poor ’ouse. Please don’t. We aven’t done mithin’ wrong, honest we ’aven’t. We paid the rent—I swear.”
“I don’t want to put you out.” Charlotte was aghast. “I want to force whoever owns this place to make it fit to live in.”
The girl looked at her with disbelief.
“Wotcher mean? If we makes a fuss ’e’ll ’ave us aht. There’s plenty more as’d be glad ter ’ave it—an’ we’ll ’ave ter go souf into—w’ere it’ll be