H C Turk, page 53
So bored I became that I nearly espoused the contest of needlework. Grandly satisfying herself by being too much of a servant for this family, Elsie walked through her chores as though a witch through a forest. Unlike the latter type of human, however, Elsie in any empty interval would settle with metal shard and thread to manufacture doilies and other flat constructions that the mistress was sure to insist she well loved draped all over her home. Soon I observed, however, that part of this activity was stabbing oneself occasionally in the finger-and was this not as bad as shaving? What tortuous metallic challenge of the sinning world would I next discover enamored them: eating coins? Fornicating with wood stoves?
So bored I became as to look forward to Eric's daily return so that we could torment each other with jest. But all my felicity was ruined the day I looked through the front window to see Eric on the street with his arms about another woman. Eric was embracing her absolutely, in a manner not allowed with me, and with equal intensity they were weeping, weeping and fruitlessly attempting to converse. Perhaps their failed speaking was not due to tears, but sourced from their foreignness; for were they not different types of persons, as though sinner and witch? Finally Eric with gentility pressed the woman away, and with tears she departed, Eric turning to the steps and waiting, waiting until his face was dry before moving up to his tenement; for tears were not allowed with his wife as they were with his mother.
Poorly he concealed his distress, but I made no notice, attempting to respond to him normally. No explanation was given by die husband nor questions asked by the missus. And we retired that evening with none of that man smell from Eric and no penetration, for the first day in our wedded life Eric not making love with me, not even in his dreams.
"Surely, madam, you are neither so wealthy nor unkind as to refrain from granting this minor request."
"But I cannot contemplate why a lady such as yours would be seeing herself upon a rough and common wagon as mine."
"As heretofore provided in explanation, I have need of conveyance; yet despite my apparent social position, mine is a state of financial stress. Therefore, I offer you this coin to allow me to ride with you on your return journey from London."
"But, ma'am, I am taking to my farm these bad fish behind to help in growing things, and they are smelling now and will be doing it worse. And to ride beside me on this coarse seat of wood you might rip your fine dress, or worse, be seen by your social friends or minister."
"Enough discussion," I told this woman near ugly enough to be a witch, though none of their smell had she, and witches are never fat, as was she, extremely, in that they do not eat to excess, nor smoke, as did she, extremely. "Are we a pair of politicians going at each others' ears with inconsequential and repetitious words of scant content?" And up I clambered beside her. "Or are we but womenfolk about our affairs, you returning to your home, and I to Gravesbury Reach? The latter we are, and here is my coin and my words of thanks for your conveyance." Then, after pressing the money into her palm, I settled beside her, staring firmly ahead as though we were under way. With a tremendous sigh as though releasing all the pressure from the fat within her, this woman with word and
gentle strap encouraged her elder horse to proceed.
As though animals, we went without speaking, the driver soon proving herself accurate in assessing my position. After a length of Hollet Street and a turn at Missingmile Avenue, we passed a person who well stared at me, for there was Theodosia rendered static by my sight. Though with that wide opening of her mouth she seemed fit for extensive speaking, the servant had no verbal response, as though weakened by the sight of an angel, barely managing to lift her hand toward me as I waved and heartily smiled.
And a fine ride it was, up in the air and open to all sensations, the rich smell of decaying fish following along as though a friendly pet traipsing after master. As though never before in London, I gained an unusual awareness of the society about me, understanding that these lovers and those businessmen all had families of their own, and when not on the streets, they were in their homes as though alternate worlds. Even the drunkards living in shrubs had families, though surely lost. Although proceeding out of the city, I had no feeling of quitting, for how could I forsake these families when one was mine? My intent was no more than respite, for I was on a morning's vacation. But abandoning London remained my true desire: not the physical means, but the emotional logistics.
"I am now to desert you here, miss?" the large woman confronted me. "All that is here is nothing. No persons pass near here except to pass by. And how is it you will be returning?"
"Being rationally adult, I shall accept the responsibility for myself, though you can scarcely imagine the honor I gain by your positing yourself as my mother. Be off, then, woman, and pray you may find good use for my pence. . . . And I pray that despite my unkind and needless remark about my own beloved mother, you will accept the truth of my appreciation for your transport and your kindly concern."
Then I was alone. An increasingly fine state I was gaining, though the woman's ending apprehension had nearly destroyed my prayerful pride in having survived another bridge. How strong I had felt to be so high and exposed on naught but a plank above the river yet pass over with no panic, no death. True, for those minutes I had scarcely breathed, feeling that too great an intake of air would disrupt our travel and spill me into the water, which I did not view, though I smelled it, did not feel though it touched me everywhere. What a religious accomplishment the crossing was, and for minutes thereafter I could only praise the greatest Lord and God for allowing me to live through another river.
Not so intense was the smell of sinners here, though across the Thames some massed construction was barely seen, between us a distance I cherished; for although not the same substance as that beyond Lucansbludge, it was more enrichening than the materialistic air above the Rathel's roof. Cleaner was the river here, lightly rippled by a breeze. Every swell I viewed, those beyond smaller as their distance from the observer increased, though each ripple seemed immediate, the separation of their quiet lives not removal, but a connection via God's glorious substance of space. Some activity I could sense far beyond, plumes of smoke from sinners, boat on the Thames, but none was strong in my experience. Behind, too ensconced on a sinners' roadway to be as wild as I, wagons passed as the woman said, gone without coming near. These as well I ignored until one approached to bring fee Lady Rathel.
She formed her own space, instructing the coachman to move away, this distance to segregate the greater society of London from Rathel's particular life. The mistress then approached her daughter, a murderous witch not evil enough for the demon lady.
"You have come for a swim, then, madam," I spoke, "or might I hope you've dreams of drowning yourself?"
No reply had the Rathel for my smiled greeting, remaining calm as her norm. Then I saw her as never before, measuring the woman as though only now fully able to discern sinners. How remarkably young she appeared for all her living, but was her life not mainly of arrangements for other people to live and die? How handsome was this lady, even in her middle life, the short lives of sinners come and gone like a cut witch's tit. Well could I understand how she had drawn men to herself-wealthy Franklin, vivid Edward-for despite all their feigned, Godly spiritualism, were sinners not a people to send body after body, passion after lust? How mundane for so well souled a race.
"Why is he not dead?" the social lady asked. "Why have you not proven yourself the witch I know you? Why does the bastard live?"
"Oh, and Mistress Amanda, never have I heard you curse. Lie, yes, and here again is your favorite trait; for the tremendous hatred you have is from Eric's legality, the very feet that from your baby slot he did not and could not issue."
"Much have you learned of my life, meddling witch."
"Bless your compliment, dear mother. As for lives, importantly I have learned of mine. Never would I have done so except for your machinations that forced my education. Therein I learned of witches, and through experience, the white one. Learn I did how Satan kills through them, and also how any man might survive." 01
"Not forever will this bastard avoid your sex. Kill him, witch, and depart from London. Sleep with him and be done with us all."
"Oh, but lady, sleeping kills no one. Not even your wretched soul could supply nightmares intense enough to kill. What you mean is another obscenity: You mean 'fuck.' But, mistress, this man is my husband and well we mate and often. Extraordinarily often, so I understand, compared to common women. But this woman is not common. She is the witch and the white witch to draw men to her cunt and consume them. But this joy you've expected for years I now deny you. Eric is drawn to my sex better than any man, for I allow and encourage his coupling in that the fine person is thereby pleased. But I have learned how the husband can avoid the deadly baby slot. Instead, the target allowed is the anus. Yes, Amanda, a man is perfectly safe fucking any witch within her arse's hole, and therein does Eric gain great ecstasy from me. Every night, often, and often in a dead sleep. So accomplished am I at saving my husband that even when he sticks his prick you would love on your mantel against the wrong entry, he finds a closed hole he may not enter. Then to the rear does he march, and well up into my arse I take him, allowing his stick to wallow until his baby seed is accelerated far within me. So much of his seed I accept that it becomes my own fluid. To absorb his sperm makes me smile, mistress, if only because I can now spit his semen at you." And, yes, I spat at the Rathel's feet, though languidly, as though she were scarcely worth the effort.
At once she leapt toward me with a fury never seen, worse than during that clock beating, because then her abdities were tempered by drink, but here she was all hatred. But my front she faced now, so upon reaching out to strike me dead, the lady met my fingers. Both my palms I thrust to her cheeks and jaws, knocking Rathel to her backside. From this position, the startled sinner looked up to me as I commented on her situation.
"I suggest, lady, that you not assault a British citizen, lest Queen Anne herself spit in your direction."
"You Satanic bitch!" Rathel shouted, appearing less than the lady for sitting on her virgin arse in the dirt. "I wdl have you be what you are. You will kill the Eric bastard or your perverted arse shall be the soot beneath my mantel. Kill the bastard or I'll prove you the witch. I shall prove that you murdered Bitford to gain transport out of London, and murdered Cameron because he discovered your identity. I wdl have you burned without beheading, bitch, so that long you will suffer, more than you ever dreamed, more than your mother."
Being a lady, I replied mildly whde straightening my cuffs, "Of course you shall, dear mistress, as soon as you teach Lord Naylor to become so complete a fool that he will overlook your pimping deaths. Wherever a man died by my body, you were the cause. Aware of your expertise in witches, all of London will believe that you ever understood me the kdler. So tell your tale, Amanda, and you will die in more pieces than I. Until you choose your own suicide, become accustomed to Eric's happy life." And I stepped away with a smile, gesturing for the distant driver to return his charge to her home, to her dedicated hell.
Thirty-three
Days later, the Rathel attacked. Through the window I viewed two men with grave visages clomping up the stairs, one with fingers on his jerkin and a thumb lodged in his belt, the other leaning on a scabbard with his elbow as though the knife were a walking stick supporting his upper body. More descriptive of these males than their extremities was their attire, those jerkins and peaked hats signifying the magistrate's constables.
Elsie at her needlework well heard the sound of feet, but preferred in her uncertainty to "wait for the additional noise erf rapping. Like the dog, I could not wait passively. As Randolph set to his barking, I set to the door, opening the poor barrier to our home before it was violated.
"Might you have an exalted morning, gentlemen," I greeted the pair upon opening the door with their rapping hands hanging startled in the air. After the males tipped their hats and nodded, the scabbard leaner spoke.
"And well we might, mistress, with God's grace and your cooperation."
"Gracious you are to align me with Lord God as though we functioned together instead of I in His servitude as is the truth of my life."
"Very well, ma'am, and thank you for church this morning, but our business is the magistrate Sir Jacob Naylor, as we are his men, and come we did to inquire of the Eric Denton."
"A person currently at his employ, as you are, a person also my spouse, as you are not. Therefore, might your business with the Eric Denton be told his humble wife?"
"The concern placed before Magistrate Naylor is by one
Lady Amanda Rathel, that the Eric Denton has made himself indebted to this person and does now refuse to pay her in return what is due. Therefore, might we ask you his place of employ in that there we speak with him of things?"
"And if in distress from indebtedness my memory is so poorly returned as to negate my awareness of his profession, do I thereby incur your doubt?"
"No, missus, not doubt we achieve from you, but suspicion. And for incurring your humor shall we provide you with the true consideration your husband's debt deserves." And with a hat tip and head nod, the men quit my stairs.
The first consideration, however, was distress from Miss Elsie.
"Oh, and Miss-Mistress-Alba, am I not believing what I hear, for how is it the lady herself is invoking such a turn? Is her business going so bad that she's rendered poor and in need of every pence for survival?"
"As I have ever told you, miss, the problem is Eric's survival, for Rathel now comprehends that the man shall continue living. Therefore, she seeks to expel her wrath from failure as last she did upon my head. Perhaps that damage you have forgotten, Elsie. I have not."
"Oh, and Alba, what next is occurring with this funding? Are prison cells not made for paupers?"
"No, miss, made for paupers are special prisons with great spaces folk can mill about within. Cells like stone boxes are for witches and murderous women, but not for dogs and servants. These pets simply wander to the next house in the neighborhood."
"And are we waiting, now, for the master to return before great worry?"
"In fact, miss, have you not begun this response without him?"
But we had little waiting for any emotion, for soon to our abode came a pair of men last seen toting our belongings, now climbing our steps with new strength and a pair of constables met only hours before.
"And we come with paper, Mrs. Denton, as writ by Queen Anne's man the magistrate Sir Jacob Naylor and signed by he, upon which certain items are described and an order of us to be taking them as unpaid for."
At once I moved aside, waving for the sinners to enter, for Td not be taken away instead of furniture due to my interference. Randolph bounced about the males' feet as though to aid them, so only Elsie was left to wail.
"Oh, Lord Jesus! To be taking a miss's dowry is most grievous and ungodly!" And damned if she did not step between the carrying men to block their path, clinging to the armoire as though varnish. But since no prisons existed for servants, but yea for folk denying constables their duty, I pulled her away from the traffic of men and furniture through the flat, then spoke with the woman.
Guiding the weeping miss to her chamber, I offered, "Ah, Elsie, what a fine opportunity we now have to move into the wilds as I have ever desired. How easy shall your life become when your only caretaking is for the one small cave and its single room."
Such a commotion transpired from Elsie that no ending could I achieve. Therefore, I left her with Randolph, and observed the pillaging of my (my?) home.
Outside the master's chamber, the two men of transport fiercely whispered while glimpsing within, attempting not to look toward the constables some distance removed. The carrying pair examined a paper, and here the witch could read their thoughts. They well recalled those weeks past and the recuperation required from manipulating that oaken tree in the guise of a sleeping instrument. Therefore, when the constables approached them to ask whether that bed were a piece written as to be taken, the transporters as though stuck with a pin or a pious revelation perked up to commence a denial while lowering the paper and stepping away from the room, down the stairs with them all.
The bed's salvation scarcely helped Miss Elsie settle into our lately threadbare flat. Painfully she wondered of Eric's knowledge of this predicament, wondered how he would react to see this barrenness. With outstretched arms, she longingly looked about at the space between our walls. Soon, however, we learned of Eric's exact response; for another pair of men we heard talking and walking up our affronted stairs, and one of them was the master.
Only this famdy person entered. The second male'completed pleading his position, then returned to his jewelry store; for of this shop was he proprietor, and of the entire budding owner. During his ending speech, he begged for Eric's understanding, for his bankers were insistent upon having his own debts called immediately due if the debtor above were not made to vacate the premises paid for with funds not his own.
A dreary master entered his former household to describe the family's new position.
"So generous is our manager that he shall allow our scant possessions to remain in the flat until tomorrow noon. So insistent were the bankers, however, that our bodies must be vacated by dark, for the constables at evening wdl come to clear the place of any persons remaining."
"We live on the street, then," I affirmed, "for a person of my wdderness knowledge can well teach her famdy to survive the pavements."
"No, missus, we do not," Eric sighed. "For at least one day, we shall present ourselves at my grandfather's house and allow him to aid us as well he would love."
