The Trial of Elizabeth Cree Read Online Free Page B

shadowed her as she walked towardsthe lodging house for seamen at the corner of Globe Lane. You see how I had studied the streets? I had purchased Murray’s
New Plan of London
, and had plotted all my exits and entrances. There she stood and a few moments later some laboring man, still with the brick dust upon his clothes, came up and whispered to her. She said something in return, and it was all quick motion after that: she led him down Globe Lane towards a ruined house. She had his dust on her when they came out into the light again.
    I waited until he had left her, and then made my approach. “Why, little chicken, you must have performed a nice bit of business to become so dusty.”
    She laughed, and I could smell the gin upon her breath. Even now her organs were being pickled, as if they were in a surgeon’s jar. “It’s all one to me,” she said. “Have you any money?”
    “Look.” I brought out a shining coin. “But consider me. Am I a gentleman? Can you expect me to lie upon the street? I need a good bed and four walls.”
    She laughed again. “Well then, gentleman, you must stop at the Bladebone.”
    “Where is your bladebone?”
    “We need gin, sir. More gin, if you want to be pleased with me.”
    It was a public saloon off Wick Street, and looked to be a den of the vilest sort filled with the refuse of London. I would have enjoyed the reek of it, as a plain man—I would have raised my arms, and joined the general uproar against heaven—but, as an artist, I demurred. I could not be seen before my first great work. She noticed that I hesitated, and seemed to smile. “I can tell you are a gentleman, and there is no need to accompany me. I was born here. I know my way well enough.” She took some coins from me and returned a few minutes later with a chamber pot filled with gin. “It is clean,” she said, “quite clean. We neveruse it for that. We have the streets, don’t we?” She led me into a nearby court, no bigger than a pocket handkerchief; she staggered as she began to climb the worm-eaten stairs, and some of the gin spilled over the side of the pot. Someone was singing in one of the rooms which we passed, and I knew the words of the old music-hall ditty as well as if I had written them myself:
    When nobody was looking
,
    I took my virgin mild
,
    It must have been her cooking
,
    Because I got rather wild
.
    Then all was silence as we climbed up to the topmost story, and entered a room which seemed to be no more than a den or hut. There was a soiled mattress upon the floor, while on the walls she had pasted photographs of Walter Butt, George Byron and other idols of the stage. Everything smelled of stale drink, and a torn sheet had been carelessly draped across a tiny window. So this was to be my green room or, rather, my red room. This was to mark my entrance upon the stage of the world. She had taken a dirty cup and dipped it into the chamber pot, swallowing the gin all at once. I was concerned that she might miss the fun but I knew well enough that she wished to be free of this sad world, in one way or another. Who was I to forestall her, or persuade her otherwise? I made no move but watched her take another cup of gin. Then, as she lay down upon the bed, I leaned over her and began to brush the dirt and brick dust from her dress. She had almost passed out with the drink, but she managed to clutch my arm as I touched her. “What do you intend to do with me now, sir?” She still lay upon the bed quite dazed, and it occurred to me that she suspected my game and offered herself willingly to my knife. There are those poor souls who, on hearing of an outbreak of cholera, have hastened to thedistrict in the hope of being infected with the disease. Was that her way? Then it would be a crime to leave her in suspense, would it not?
    I did not want a drop of her blood upon my clothes and so I took off my ulster, jacket, waistcoat and trousers; hanging upon the back of her door was a faded coat,