The Angel of Bishopsgate

Chapter 3-1

Chapter 3

The clattering of children on the stairs woke Tessie sharply from her sleep. After tossing and turning through the night she had knotted herself into a ball, somewhere in the early hours slipping into a restless slumber. By the window, Finn had already fetched water from the courtyard and was splashing his face and drying off.

"Yer didn't wake me," she said, sitting with sudden alertness. He slipped his hand beneath the covers and rubbed her feet.

"I wanted yer to sleep. We've got time."

"I didn't get the cakes in," she chided herself, rubbing her eyes wearily.

"I put them in for yer. Don't worry."

Tessie moved to the table where Finn had set them to cool. "Look at yer. Thank yer,” she teased and rested her chin on his shoulder.

Below them in the courtyard, families were up and busy with their daily routines and preparations. The Joyces mended their sacks along the front stoop and the Campbells loaded wares into their wagon, readying for market. It was a picture of perfect normality in the Old Nichol, though, as she joined Finn at the window spying to see if the privy was free, last night's events tumbled back in a black tangle. Were they being watched even now? Was someone spying up at them from the darker corners and alleys? Her body ached with dread, and in every breath she took, she felt it. Something terrible was going to happen.

The white envelope rested on the mantle, the perfect "A" imprint in the wax glaring at them from all vantage points. She couldn't bear to see it and slid it behind an old dusty treacle tin. The delivery wasn't until tonight and in the meantime they both had things to do. They needed money to pay Mr Page's grocer account, and Black Monday would soon see Mr Lawson climbing the stairs in their tenement for the next month in rent. For once, she was grateful for a busy day of distractions.

Dressing quickly, she gently broke her cakes into squares before packing them into the baskets. When Finn returned she had a more organised air about her. "I thought to walk with yer to the docks," she said as if it were any other morning.

"Are yer sure?" He rubbed the scar on his forehead. "I can walk the markets with yer."

"Yer need to work today, yer know that. Please," she strained. "Let's just get on with it."

Finn took a reluctant breath as Tessie bit at her lip, covering the small gap in her teeth. She knew he was watching the tension brewing inside her and had no wish to stir it.

“I’ll not quarrel with yer.” His warm eyes set on hers and he passed her one of her baskets. “Come on with yer then.”

Turning their backs on the envelope on the mantle, Tessie instinctively snatched up a figurine of St. Brigid hanging from a loop of wool and dropped it into her skirts.

Out in the courtyard, the rain from the previous night had given pause and the cobblestones were coated in a silky layer of mud. The usual activity was heightened with urgency as families readied for the half mile journey to Spitalfields. Those with food and goods were usually gone with the first grey light to set up their stalls with fruit and vegetables, cakes and bread. It was the pieceworkers, squeezing in their last stitch and hammer for another penny, who lingered in a panic making voices harsh with hurry and hunger.

"Did yer know the Rowleys have been smoking their kippers in the privy?" Finn eyed them across the courtyard.

"Aye, did you not?"

"I bought a good five of them kippers last week," he said. "No more, mind yer."

Barrelling towards them was a small boy with a huge cabbage, barely able to hold it in his arms. "That's quite a cabbage, Teddie Baker." She found some cheer as he squeezed past them.

"Yes, mam," he gleamed. "It fell off the market truck."

"Let him through, let him through,” Finn called after him with a chuckle as they stepped out of the Old Nichol.

As they passed through Spitalfields Market, they had no time to linger, though Tessie called out through the mass of candle makers and tailors, soap makers, coopers, carpenters and smiths, all bartering for the best price with cranky buyers and shrewd homemakers. Tessie joined the call of sellers with trays of walnuts, flowers and boiled cockles, and their bellies stirred with the smell of cinnamon cakes, iced buns and apple tarts as they threaded through the crowd, onward to the docks.

"Get yer ginger cake, still warm, fresh from the oven," she called, flashing a smile at the vendors and handing out paper cones filled with the rich cake, slipping the pennies into her skirt pocket. Despite her smile, the urge to check over her shoulder plagued her every move. Were they here watching her now?

Every customer who approached she expected would make another comment to her about the Angel or whisper beneath their breath about the bruise on her cheek, but no one said anything, except Mrs Spicer who hushed, "Are you right, love?" as she bought a paper cone filled to the brim with cake. Tessie gave an emphatic laugh and said she had tripped in the alley and the portly woman had squeezed her arm as she walked away. They weren't asking because they assumed it was Finn, and though it pained her for them to think that of him, she was powerless to correct it.

She kept an eye out for Billy Brittle and the man called Moses, though she had no inkling of what she might do if she saw them, and knew it would probably make matters worse if she did anything except what she'd been told. So she kept her eyes bright and her smile warm as she called out to the East End. "Mr Brown, yer look famished. Don't be shy now!"

If she was being watched she wanted them to know, Tessie O’Shea was not afraid, though she was all the more convincing herself. "Mrs Cooper, take a few pieces for the little ones! Come on now, Paddy Trader, I know that look of hunger in your eyes, though it's not cake yer want," she teased. "Yer are sweet on a girl? Take her some cake, Paddy!”

"You haven't stopped this morning, Tessie," Mr Sykes called across the way.

"I have me a lot of cakes to sell, Mr Sykes. Yer want to take some off me hands?" She smiled back, straining on tippy toes to see him bent over the table he was sanding.

"She makes a good cake, does our Tess.” Finn grinned, striding ahead. "Don't be turning her down now."

"Aye. I'll take two but you best move on. We'll be spending all our wages if you keep that up."

"Oh me cakes are good, Mr Sykes, but they're not worth starving the rest of the week for."

Hurrying to catch up to Finn, they found a lull in pedestrian traffic and a lone pie-seller wheeling his cart. Finn scrounged the few pennies in his pocket for two warm meat pasties with crisp and buttery pastry. It was more extravagant than their usual oatcake or porridge, but when Finn suggested it, she knew it was a gesture of reassurance. Their stride slowed as they ate, savouring the moment. Would this all be resolved by morning?

As the tall gates of the West India Docks came into view, they could hear the fray of men gathered at its entrance. Tessie knew she’d slowed him down and he was later than usual. He would have to fight his way to the front now to better his chances of being selected, and if he was overlooked he would wander the market stalls offering his services as a labourer or a stable hand. Though those jobs never paid as well, and he preferred to be near the water, straining with a team of men to get the job done. Tessie thought he liked its all-consuming nature. It was fast-paced with no time for over-thinking or lamenting one’s life. And something about the excitement of travel and movement kept him returning.

When he had first taken dock work his back had bled through his shirt and she had sat up nights mending the worn fabric across his shoulders. Now she could feel the leathery surface on his back, worn from the heavy hessian sacks of sugar and flour. He was a seasoned worker and many of the foremen recognised him. With any luck, they would show him favour today.

Tessie watched his broad shoulders pushing their way to the front of the crowd. Something in her chest begged her to stay — she wanted to linger and make sure he faired well — but she could not. She turned to the river, inhaling its briny stink as it lapped at the docks. Brown and soupy, heavy with refuse, a dirty foam laced its edges. It was not a pretty river, but it was the pulse of the city. She would follow its winding curve along Lower Thames Street.

She reached Southwark Bridge and cut through Cheapside, selling the rest of her cakes and walking home with the pennies jingling in her skirt. It was late afternoon when she made it home and the light was fading fast. She was exhausted. Laying on the bed she stared across the room at the letter that held her fate. What did it say? she wondered. Who was the man she was supposed to meet? Would she be in danger, or would it be a simple exchange? She fell asleep on the covers, rolling over scenarios over in her head.