Chapter 6

6

After Lord Richard left,Jane returned to the classroom, expecting it to be completely empty.

She stilled in the doorway as she saw a small figure sitting at a desk. Lily flipped through a book that lay in front of her. Hercules stood from his dog bed and trotted towards Jane with adoring, wet eyes, emitting happy, high-pitched yips, and wagging his tail so intensely that it appeared as though it might detach.

As always, the sight of Hercules cheered her up, and she patted his head enthusiastically, evading his attempts to lick her. “Here’s a good boy,” she said to him. Then she looked at the girl, feeling like she may spook her with a wrong word. “I’m glad you came back, Lily.”

A knock had her turning around as Ruby stuck her head through the doorway. “I saw you run here in distress. Is everything all right, Janie? Can I bring something?” She frowned as she looked over the empty classroom. “Where are all the little ones?”

Ruby was a tall woman in her fifties, with hair still dark, and a slightly wrinkled, puffy face. She was a kind soul and had taken Jane under her wing when, as a sixteen-year-old girl, Jane had been uprooted from her papa’s mansion after his death. Ruby had always felt more like a mother or a nanny than a friend.

“I suspect they have gone home. Thank you, Ruby. There’s not much you can do.” She smiled. “But I appreciate you.”

Ruby nodded and left, and Jane turned her attention to Lily again, nodding to her encouragingly.

“I did like the looks of this book,” Lily said. “And it’s much cleaner and quieter here than in the mill.”

Jane’s heart drummed as she took a careful step closer. “I can imagine it is.”

Of course, she couldn’t do anything to the children to make them stay and learn except for inspire them to want to.

And despite the big setback this morning, she wouldn’t give up. She’d work with the one girl who wanted to be here. Consistency was key, and it needed to start with the one pupil who was here.

Even if part of her wanted to just sit down for a moment and understand what she had just gotten herself into… She was now engaged—at least on the outside. Of course, she would never go through with the wedding, and she was so glad Lord Richard was of the same mind. Thorne would be disappointed in the end, but it would be better for everyone.

Even if he blamed himself for having spoiled her reputation and chances for a good marriage, she was never sorry to be under her brother’s roof. Despite a constant feeling of being out of place, she loved this world where things were hard but straightforward and honest. Thorne and his men protected her and cared for her. She felt appreciated—more than she’d ever felt in Papa’s cold home, enduring his cold presence.

And she felt useful here, in Whitechapel. Back at Eaglestone House, among the fashionable, intricate furniture and timeless paintings, she had always felt so alone.

She never wanted to return to that world where she was only a pitiful bluestocking. Here, she was a teacher, helping children to improve their lives and change their futures for the better. Or she would be, if she could get them to come to her class.

She grinned at Lily, who stared back at her with big eyes. “Well, you’re here, so let’s learn!”

Lily gave her a hesitant look, then a small nod. It broke Jane’s heart to see this girl wearing a dirty frock with patches and tears and a cap that looked more gray than white, with her toes sticking out of holes in her shoes. She’d need to see if she could get her some newer clothes. She couldn’t sew, but she could buy something with the small income her father had left for her.

“All right,” said Jane as she pulled up a second chair to sit next to Lily at her desk. The book was open and there was an illustration of a little boy and girl holding hands and walking somewhere, their faces sad. Jane knew right away it was The History of Little Goody Two-Shoes by Oliver Goldsmith, the book she’d hoped to read with the class later. “How wonderful that you picked a book. Why that one in particular?”

“I do like them pictures, I do,” said Lily.

Jane nodded. Perhaps she was wrong to start teaching the unwilling children with boring letters of the alphabet. Perhaps this was exactly the story children needed to hear, despite the book being quite moralistic. The story was about an orphan brother and sister who rose from bitter poverty through education and good behavior.

“Yes, these are lovely,” said Jane. “Would you like to hear the story?”

Lily nodded.

“Then why don’t I read it to you?”

This was just like with Thorne’s men, Jane knew, as she started reading. In the beginning, she had brought them lunch and sat near them reading her book as she waited for them to finish. After some days, Atticus had asked her what she was reading. In reply, she’d read the page from Robinson Crusoe out loud. It was amazing to see five grown, dangerous men gawk at her, hanging on her every word.

It became a ritual. Every day, she’d bring them lunch and read to them while they ate. Then some of them, including Reuben, had asked her to teach them to read and write, which she did in the evenings.

As much as the men had enjoyed her reading, it had become a necessary time for her, too, filling the aching, devastating loneliness of her days in Whitechapel, where she’d known no one except for her brother and her new maid.

Twenty minutes must have passed when there was an urgent slap of shoes against the muddy ground outside. Hercules jumped to his feet and barked, wriggling his tail weakly. The door swung open, and Peter ran in.

Hercules stopped barking and stuck his nose into the boy’s hands. Hercules knew and loved all the local children.

“Miss Grant!” Peter yelled, panting. “Please, come!” Jane jumped to her feet. “It’s Alfie!”

Jane rushed to the door, her heart drumming. “What happened?” she asked.

She was surprised and gratified that Peter had chosen to come to her despite the class’s earlier desertion.

“He pickpocketed down Barton’s Lane and got caught. The man’s got ’im by the ear and threatens to bring ’im to justice!”

Cold spread through Jane’s limbs.

“Show the way!” she cried.

She ran, following Peter, with Hercules and Lily at her heels. They hurried through the backyard of Elysium and into Petticoat Street with its rows of brick town houses with soot-streaked faces and a busy marketplace in the midst of the large street. Women draped in faded and mended shawls looked for the next bargain, often holding a baby in their arms or with one or two little ones trailing behind. The voices of hawkers rose above the din, advertising everything from fresh fish to used clothing.

Jane turned left with the next intersection and into the net of narrow, twisting alleyways and dilapidated buildings with broken windows and doors hanging crookedly on their hinges. Crumbling brick tenements, their walls stained by the passage of time and the grime of the city, loomed over the shadowy lanes. Laundry hung from lines strung between buildings, flapping like tattered ghosts in the wind, while accumulating refuse stank in the corners.

As Jane hurried forward, street urchins darted out of her way, their dirty, ragged clothes poor protection against the chill in the air. Men, their faces lined with exhaustion and hard labor, trudged through the streets, their worn boots slurping against the dirt-packed mud.

When Jane and the children finally arrived, a small crowd had gathered in a circle on the muddy street. In the middle, a furious, red-faced man in his forties held Alfie by the ear and yelled right into his face as the boy wriggled and yelped in pain.

Jane elbowed her way through the gathered onlookers and, trying to catch her breath through lungs that felt like they were about to burst, said, “Please, sir, let him go!”

The man stopped yelling and turned his red face to her. His bulging eyes were yellowish, with red veins and milky-brown irises.

“He didn’t know what he was doing,” Jane panted. “Please.”

“Oh, he knew precisely what he was doing,” the man growled. “One’s hand does not accidentally slip into someone’s pocket and grab on to a purse.”

The man was dressed poorly, but not as poorly as people who lived in this neighborhood. He wore a simple brown waistcoat that had already seen some years of use, old-fashioned breeches with fading, thinning fabric—signs of rigorous and repetitive washing. He could not easily afford to lose the money Alfie had tried to steal.

Still, she couldn’t let him punish Alfie for the life that he had been born to and a skill he had learned as a means to survive.

“True,” said Jane, “but he was hungry, weren’t you, Alfie?”

“Yes, Miss Grant!” wailed Alfie. “I waaaas!”

Tears filled his big eyes, leaving clear lines down his dirty cheeks. Her stomach twisted for the boy. Only eight years old. She couldn’t let his life be over, especially not when she’d just gotten the opportunity to help him, to turn his life around.

“He’s a pupil at my school,” she said to the man. “He’s learning to read and write and do math so that he doesn’t have to do this. Please, sir, let this one go! Just this once.”

Hercules barked at the man, who scowled at the dog, his lip curling. Jane leaned down and held Hercules by his collar. He wasn’t helping at all. “Sit, Hercules!” she commanded. “Quiet.”

Hercules, clearly tense and unhappy, obeyed, plunking his arse onto the ground, but kept up a low warning growl, baring his teeth.

“If I let the boy go,” said the man angrily, “he will not learn his lesson. Neither will any of the rascals.”

The crowd thickened around them—exhausted, puffy, weathered faces with dark circles under their eyes, broken teeth, and dirty fingernails. Their filthy, ragged clothes may have been passed down to them, already worn thin, or taken off the shoulders of dead men. This was East End London, where people lived in rookeries—crooked houses with broken windows, leaking roofs, and sinking stairwells. It was common for several people to sleep in one bed. Some folks rented beds instead of rooms, and there were several beds in one room. She had even heard of a woman who rented a bed that was already rented to someone else and two strangers had to share it.

The man who’d been robbed looked quite well-off compared to the rest of them, while in reality he must be nothing more than a footman in a merchant’s home.

“I will compensate you personally,” Jane said and took her own purse from under her apron. Thorne wanted her to be safe and always told her to have a purse with her. Money was security, he told her. And he had plenty of it. She held out a pound to the man. A pound equaled half a footman’s monthly wage. “On top of what Alfie tried to steal, which, obviously, you didn’t allow. For your trouble. Please.”

The man’s anger was placated, and he began breathing easier, staring at the pound. He grasped the pound and shoved red-cheeked Alfie, who ran away with Peter, Lily, and the rest of the children right behind him.

“Thank you,” Jane said to the man, who didn’t even acknowledge her as he turned around, pushing her pound into his pocket, and left, his shoes squelching in the mud. The crowd began dissipating, too, and she hurried after the children she could see twenty or so feet down the street, her loyal Hercules running by her side.

She found them as she made her way into a small cul-de-sac, the children gathered around Alfie in a small, protective wall. She gently pushed through them and sank to a crouch before the boy, who was still shaking with sharp child’s sobs as he tried to calm himself down, wiping his eyes with the backs of his hands and leaving dark smudges around his eyes like a mask.

“It’s all right, Alfie,” she said as she looked into his still-terrified eyes. “He’s gone. He won’t do anything. You’re safe.”

His upper lip was wet with snot, and she handed him a handkerchief. He wiped his nose and his eyes, leaving black marks on the fabric. “How’s your ear? Show it to me, please.”

He turned to her, and she narrowed her eyes, studying the red and swollen skin. Hercules yelped and began licking the boy’s ear.

“Come back to school with me,” she said. “I’ll bring a soothing salve I have at home. It’ll be all right.”

Alfie gave a dry sob and sighed out. “Thank you, Miss Grant,” he said in a small voice.

“It’s quite all right.” She smiled and squeezed his thin, bony shoulder. “That’s why you need to come to my school and learn. All of you,” she said as she looked around at their big-eyed, scared faces. “So that you would find honest employment and would not need to steal, pickpocket, and do other things. Can you see that?”

“But I haven’t eaten today,” said Alfie. “And Mother told me to go and get me own food.”

Jane nodded. “I quite understand. Tell you what, all of you, I’ll have Monsieur Beaumont prepare you sandwiches. And from now on, I will bring breakfast and lunch to school for the whole class so that you don’t have to worry about it. If I do that, do you promise you won’t steal again?”

The children gazed at her with big, surprised eyes and nodded.

Jane smiled. “Good. Come along now.”

As she led her small flock of scared but hopeful children back to school, she felt like she had just won a small victory against their past and was more optimistic that education could provide them a better future.

This was yet another confirmation that she needed to get Lord Richard the information he sought and extract herself from this engagement as soon as possible. The longer the engagement continued, the more likely it was she’d be expected to marry the man.

This work was important. She had the power to change lives. And she’d never be able to keep teaching these children as a lord’s wife living in Mayfair.