This Duchess of Mine

  The lane curved to the left and then stopped. “This is it,” he said.

  It was the biggest house in the street, though that wasn’t saying much. And it was definitely in the best repair. Of course, it would be, since it was Elijah’s. There was a large door with a rusty knocker, but Elijah simply pushed it open.

  “I stopped begging them to lock the door years ago,” he said to her.

  “Why don’t they wish to?”

  “If someone really wants to come in, they’ll come regardless of a lock. It’s Spitalfields. So they prefer to channel visitors through the door. It saves on wear and tear. Ah, Knabby, there you are.”

  A small stout man was coming toward them, squinting in the gloom of the hallway. “Yer Grace!” he said happily. “Now this is truly a pleasure. You’re here for the birthday, of course. May I say what an honor it is that you remembered such an event? Cully will be happy, but happy indeed!”

  Jemma could tell that Elijah had no memory of a birthday, but he didn’t say so. Instead he drew her forward and said, “Mr. Knabby, may I present my wife, the duchess?”

  Knabby blinked at her uncertainly. “A duchess,” he said. “A woman!” Then, as if he suddenly remembered the protocol, he bobbed something between a curtsy and a bow.

  “A pleasure,” Jemma said.

  “What a lovely voice,” Knabby said, cocking his head to one side. “Yes, it sounds like a duchess. I shall remember that, indeed I shall. So that is what a duchess sounds like!” He wasn’t squinting due to the dark, Jemma realized. He had a permanent squint.

  Jemma looked up at Elijah. “Knabby has lost his sight,” he told her.

  “I see a bit, I see a bit,” Knabby put in. “Light and shadows, really. Better than many.”

  “I am sorry to hear that,” Jemma said. She knew Elijah had to be involved in a charitable project. It was so like him. But her smile died at the hard look in his eyes.

  “Knabby lost his sight because he worked in our glassblowing factory,” Elijah said, and his voice was flinty.

  Knabby had turned and was making his way briskly along the dark corridor. “Do come along to the birthday!” he called. “Oh my yes, I was a glassblower, m’lady. Is it my lady? Or is there something else I should be a-calling her? Is she a grace as well? Or duchess lady?”

  “You may call me whatever you wish,” Jemma said, picking up her skirts and following him.

  “Do you wish to give me a report, before we go to the birthday party?” Elijah asked Knabby.

  Knabby stopped suddenly, and Jemma almost ran into him. Then he started jabbering so fast she could hardly follow. “Nibble’s wife has been staying with him for a spell, but they do fight something terrible. So I moved them to the back of the house where no one can hear her a-beating on him.”

  “Beating on him?” Jemma said, unable to stop herself.

  Knabby turned his face toward her. “She’s a devilishly strong woman, and if you give her a saucepan, she can make a right rumpus,” he said. “Especially when he’s been in the drink. ’Course, Nibble isn’t easy either. Many’s the time that my hand has itched for a saucepan, if you take my meaning.”

  “How’s Waxy doing?” Elijah asked. “Waxy is a quite elderly gentleman,” he told Jemma. “He must be around sixty now, isn’t he, Knabby?”

  “Well, he has his lung problems. He has those. But his daughter’s been visiting him regular-like, with a couple babes in tow, so he’s right as a flea in a cup of tea.”

  “Has the doctor been coming weekly?”

  Knabby started down the hall again. “A waste of your ready that is, Yer Grace. A waste of the ready. There’s nothing the man can do and we’re all happy. Though he did pull a tooth for Cully the other day.”

  “Cully is well?”

  “Fair to middling. Of course, it’s his birthday today, so he’s in the drink already, though I hate to say it. But that’s Cully.” He stopped just outside a tall door.

  “They’re in the courtyard, enjoying the sun. But I should tell you that the foreman stopped by and we’ll be having a new man with us, any day now. The name is Berket. Can’t say that I remember him very well, but he was beginning when I left, I expect.”

  “There’s room enough?” Elijah asked.

  “More than enough! We’ve got that room from when Lasker left us, a month ago that’s been. And there’s Nicholson’s room open still, and another one too, when Miss Sophisba ain’t choosing to stay there. She’s here today and will be glad to see Yer Grace.”

  “Anything you need, just send a boy to Towse,” Elijah said. He glanced down at Jemma. “Towse is one of my solicitors.”

  “We need nothing,” Knabby said merrily. “We admired them fruits as you sent from yer conservatory, Yer Grace, but to tell the truth, none of the men would eat them. They’re set in their ways, and they’re not adventuresome, if you know what I mean. The children snapped them right up, though.”

  “Who is Miss Sophisba?” Jemma whispered as Knabby opened the door. “And—”

  “You’ll see,” Elijah said, and there was something so grim about his voice that Jemma stopped talking.

  At first sight the small courtyard seemed to be hosting a children’s party, but after a moment Jemma realized that there were more chickens than people, and though both groups were making noise, the three children chasing a puppy were winning the contest.

  “Now look who’s come to celebrate Cully’s birthday,” Knabby announced. “The duke is here, you group of lazy scubblers!”

  The courtyard was dominated by a circle of dilapidated armchairs mostly occupied by men, all of whom turned toward Knabby’s voice. And all of whom, Jemma realized immediately, were blind.

  They were a curious bunch. For one thing, not everyone had chosen to put on clothing. Two men were entirely without trousers; their scrawny white legs stretched out in the weak sun. One of them had a beard so long that it was tucked into the waistband of his apron, which he wore, incongruously, on top of a plaid coat.

  There were two women, one a hard-mouthed matron whom she assumed must be Mrs. Nibble, as she looked precisely like someone who wielded a mean saucepan.

  The other must be Miss Sophisba. She was younger, and while not exactly pretty, she had the air of someone who made an effort. Most of that effort involved lip rouge and improbably golden hair. It appeared to be directed toward attracting male attention, which seemed odd, given that no one could see her except Mrs. Nibble. And Mrs. Nibble was definitely not the sort to enjoy crimson lips and yellow hair.

  One of the half-naked men stood up. “Get up, ye flea-bitten knabblesquabbers,” he bellowed suddenly. “The duke’s here. You should be on yer feet and doing the pretty! It’s my birthday and I’ll have everything in—in—”

  He sat down suddenly. Knabby was definitely right. Cully had been in the drink, and never mind the fact that it was morning.

  “And the duchess is with me,” Elijah said easily. The frown had dropped from his face and he looked as genial as if he had entered a tea party in Kensington. “I’ve brought along my wife, the prettiest duchess in all the kingdom.”

  “I wish we could see that,” the bearded man said, staring into space. “I’ve never seen a real duchess. Though I did see the queen once. She had a fearsome wig, the queen did.” He elbowed Mrs. Nibble. “Is there a wig, one of those tall ones?”

  “She’s wearing a velvet dress,” the older woman told him. She had risen and given a quick bob of a curtsy and then sat back down directly. “She doesn’t have one of those wigs on her head. I think she has her own hair, but with some powder on it, like nobs wear.”

  Elijah had strolled over to wish happy returns of the day to Cully. Then he stopped at the next chair and started a conversation about the riots. Jemma felt she had to do something. She couldn’t just stand about like a fool. So she moved toward the two women. Miss Sophisba promptly jumped to her feet, looking terrified.

  “Are these your children?” Jemma asked. “They’re del
ightful.” Which was not the truth. They were too dirty to give anyone a sensation of delight. But they looked cheerful and well-fed.

  The older woman had lumbered to her feet again. “She don’t have any children.” She jerked her head derisively.

  Miss Sophisba ignored her. “They belong to Knabby’s sister. Or perhaps his niece. At any rate, she’s a cloth-dyer, which is prodigious hard work, and so the children spend the days here. Usually Waxy’s grandchildren come along later in the day, too. His daughter works in the mews, and so she drops them here.”

  “Don’t they go to school?” Jemma asked.

  “Not most of the time,” Miss Sophisba said with a shy smile. “It’s not something most people hold with, here in Spitalfields.”

  “I don’t think there is a school in Spitalfields,” Mrs. Nibble said. “Not in my time, anyhow.”

  “Oh dear,” Jemma said.

  “Those are loverly gloves,” Miss Sophisba said. “I’ve never seen anything like them.”

  “Would you like to try them on?” Jemma asked readily. She ignored Mrs. Nibble’s snort and pulled them off.

  “I couldn’t,” Miss Sophisba gasped. But they slid over her small dirty hands as if they’d been made for her.

  “You may have them,” Jemma said, smiling at her.

  Miss Sophisba paled. “I couldn’t!”

  “No, she couldn’t,” Mrs. Nibble said grimly. “Her husband’d have ’em off her in no more time than it takes to dock a whore.” Suddenly she looked self-conscious. “If you’ll excuse the expression, milady.”

  “I could hide them,” Sophisba said. “An’ just look at them now and then, when I was here, like.”

  “Aren’t you here all the time?” Jemma asked.

  “Only when her husband is thrown in the Clink,” Mrs. Nibble said. “Then she doesn’t have to be on her back, you see, and his dukeship is nice enough to let her stay here.”

  “You keep them for her, Mrs. Nibble,” Jemma said. She let just enough of a duchess tone creep into her voice so that Mrs. Nibble blinked. “Whenever Miss Sophisba is in residence at Cow Cross, she can wear them.”

  Miss Sophisba was stroking the gloves as if they were alive. “I’d be that thankful,” she breathed. “They’re the most beautiful thing I ever saw in my life.”

  “And you shall have this handkerchief for your trouble, Mrs. Nibble,” Jemma said.

  Mrs. Nibble frowned. “I don’t need no bribe to keep them gloves for her. I’m not a person to cast her aside, just ’cause of what she does.”

  Jemma’s handkerchief was woven of Belgian lace and embroidered in the middle with a very elaborate white B, for the Duchy of Beaumont.

  “That’s a B,” Mrs. Nibble said, turning the handkerchief this way and that. “My name is Bertha.”

  “It’s not a bribe,” Jemma said. “It’s a gift.”

  “This place is a gift,” Miss Sophisba said, clutching the gloves. “Does you know that, Miss Duchess?”

  “You don’t call her that,” Mrs. Nibble said. “Mrs. Duchess maybe, or ‘my lady.’”

  A boy ran by, shrieking like a teakettle in a way that signified he wanted to be noticed. And just to make sure he was, he dropped a handful of smallish wooden balls at Jemma’s feet.

  Mrs. Nibble took after him with an enraged howl. Jemma bent down to pick up the boy’s balls, since he was currently being rapped on the head by Mrs. Nibble, though thankfully not with a saucepan.

  “How clever!” she exclaimed, turning it over. There was a human face carved into the ball, a face with a laughing, stubby nose and eyes that seemed to twinkle with amusement. She picked up another, which turned out to have the face of a wicked little demon with pointed ears and sharp chin. A third was a round-faced woman.

  “Pie makes ’em,” Miss Sophisba said. “See, he’s always carving.” She gestured toward a man in the circle. Pie was holding a tiny sharp knife and flicking at a piece of wood. A steady stream of shavings flew out to his left and right.

  “But he can’t see!”

  “He sees with his fingers, he says,” Miss Sophisba explained.

  Jemma walked over to Pie. “These are absolutely wonderful,” she said, dropping one of the balls in his hand so he knew what she meant.

  He grinned. “The wood tells me, that’s all. The wood tells me what’s inside.”

  Elijah appeared at her side. “Pie was a master glassblower.”

  “We all were,” Knobby said cheerfully. “Only the best for the Cacky Street glassblowers. There’s quite a wait list,” he told Jemma.

  “To work in the factory?” she asked.

  “His Grace here won’t take any apprentices, ’cause he says they’re too young to decide about whether to give up their eyesight. But those of us that has already got the skills, well, there’s nowhere else anyone would want to work ’cept for Cacky Street.”

  “Because of this?” she said, looking around.

  “’Course. All paid for, see, and nice to boot. Food we have, and enough to spare over and share about. Wives if we want ’em with us, and if they want to come. It’s always warm, even in the coldest months.”

  Elijah was rocking back and forth slightly on his heels. “It’s the least we could do,” he said, his voice harsh. “We’re responsible for taking your sight.”

  “Oh no ye ain’t,” Pie said unexpectedly. “’Twas the glass that took my sight. All that lovely, beautiful glass, and I wouldn’t have had it another way. See, when you blow, the glass tells you what’s inside,” he said, moving his face in the general direction of Jemma and Elijah. “That’s what the duke here never understands, for all he feels to blame and such. It’s glass that’s our mistress. I thought I’d go mad at first, when I had to stop blowing. Then someone gave me a knife and some wood and I was away. Thought I’d go mad,” he repeated.

  “We have one of Pie’s glass bowls,” Elijah said. “In the drawing room.”

  “Not the green one with the fluted edge? Mr. Pie, that is an exquisite bowl,” Jemma said.

  He beamed. “She called to me and I just brought her out, that’s all. And now she lives in a duke’s home.” His hands kept moving over the block of wood he held in his lap and then he started flicking away at it again with his knife. “Can’t do better than that.”

  “Happy birthday again, Cully,” Elijah said.

  Cully genially waved a bottle in their direction and hiccupped.

  “I gave him a bit of the best today,” Knobby said.

  “Seeing as it’s his birthday. That’s the best gin.”

  Elijah took Jemma’s ungloved hand. “Goodbye, everyone.”

  The men all turned their heads and chorused goodbye; the children ran by screaming. Miss Sophisba waved her gloves shyly, and Mrs. Nibble glared from her chair next to Nibble.

  “They’re blind because of the Cacky Street glassblowing factory,” Jemma said as soon as they were back in the carriage. “Which we own.”

  “There’s something in the glass that ruins the eye,” Elijah said. “The doctor thinks it’s in the smoke. It’s not good for their lungs either. They don’t live very long. We’ve lost two in the last six months.”

  She was silent.

  “You likely think I should close the factory,” Elijah said.

  “No—”

  “If I close the factory,” he interrupted, “it won’t stop people from buying glass. And if I sell the factory, there won’t be anywhere for the workers to go once they’re blinded. The run of them from the other factories end up in the poorhouses.”

  “Elijah…”

  “I thought I might move the house to the country, where there would be air and cleanliness, and I could get a decent woman to live in and cook for them. But they hated that idea. They like living in Spitalfields, with all their old friends dropping by for gossip and a chunk of bread. We feed half the neighborhood.”

  “Elijah…” she repeated.

  “Knabby has a cook shop deliver meals. I probably shouldn’t all
ow Sophisba there but she keeps the men happy—”

  “Elijah!” She touched his cheek and he finally focused on her.

  “Yes?”

  “I think it’s a wonderful house. I think you’ve done exactly the right thing. I have just two suggestions.”

  “You do?” His eyes lightened. “You don’t think I should—”

  “I don’t think you should change anything,” she said firmly. “But perhaps you could hire a young woman to play with the children and even teach them to read.”

  “We could do that easily enough,” he said, looking surprised.

  “And you should fix up some sort of head…piece, with glass in the front, so the blowers don’t get smoke in their eyes.”

  “What?”

  “Pie could carve a sort of helmet, like a soldier’s helmet. And there could be something in front, oh I don’t know what, something. And then some glass, so they could see the glass to blow it, but their eyes would be protected.”

  He stared at her.

  “You could try,” she suggested.

  “Damn,” he said.

  “Elijah! I’ve never heard you swear.” She started laughing.

  “Damn and double damn.” But he said it slowly, thinking.

  “I have a question. What do you mean that Sophisba keeps the men—happy? How exactly does she…”

  Elijah wasn’t listening. “I can see what you’re suggesting. It would need light wood. Or leather. It’ll take thinking.” He looked up. “Sophisba is there only when her husband’s in the Clink. When he’s out, he makes her work the streets. She’s Mrs. Nibble’s daughter, you know.”

  “No!”

  “She has her own room. I don’t believe she actually performs personal services for the men. But she makes them happy.”

  “Because she’s a young woman.”

  “She flirts with them.” He reached out and picked up her hand. “I like your hands without gloves, Jemma. And I love your idea about the helmet. I think we can make that work.”

  “You can figure it out, and then make sure that all the glassblowing factories start using them,” she said, beaming at him.