The Half Killed

Chapter Three

Mrs. Selwyn knocks on my bedroom door, three sharp raps followed by a pause the length of a breath before my privacy is snatched away from me.

"There's a man to see you, Miss Hawes." Her thin voice never fails to create an image of her larynx pinched between finger and thumb as she fills out her consonants. "Is this going to become a regular occurrence? I'll not have men running up and down these stairs all day and all night. Wear out all my carpets before the end of the year."

She blinks, tilts her head to one side until I think her cap might finally succumb to the pull of gravity, but the shapeless lump of fabric clings fast to her greasy curls, and ultimately, my eyes are drawn downward to the scrawny grey feline arching its back against Mrs. Selwyn's heels.

"Did he give his name?" I ask, and return this morning's bit of sewing to my lap. Only the edge of a handkerchief today—my last handkerchief—a repair to a small tear before the whole thing unravels to a mass of tangled thread in my hands.

Her dusty eyebrows pinch together. If the man gave a name, the information has already dribbled out of her ear during the arduous trip up the stairs. Nothing less than the flash of a coin would be capable of retrieving it at this point.

"He..." And here, her eyes narrow, suspicion deepening the wrinkles in her brow. "He says he knows you."

"Knows me?" I keep my breathing steady, even counting the seconds between one inhalation and the next.

"That's what he said, Miss. But, no." She catches herself, her gaze far away as she relives the conversation that must have transpired only moments before. "He said he knows of you."

And with the simple addition of a preposition, I'm back to grasping for needle and thread, tilting my work towards the light that filters through the window, my nose held in the air as if I've a pair of wire-rimmed spectacles perched on top of it.

"Is it away with him then? Because I'll be charging an extra shilling to your rent if you're going to start with bringing in visitors." The way she pronounces the last word, tainting it with enough revulsion to make me question the level of debate that even now must be underway inside her head. For which sort of immorality is worse in her estimation? Dabbling in the black arts, or welcoming gentlemen callers in the brash light of a Tuesday morning?

I glance up at her, but as my eyes leave my work, the needle pricks my skin, causing my next words to come out with more of an edge than I'd originally intended.

"No visitors, Mrs. Selwyn. From here on out, if someone calls for me, I would be much obliged if you could tell them I no longer reside here."

She sniffs, one corner of her mouth curling upward with the movement. Quickly, she wipes her hand across her nose before drying her moistened fingers on the back of her skirt. "Oh, of course, Miss. How silly of me to think you'd wish to be bothered, sittin' up here all day, every day." Her head lowers deferentially. "I'll be sending him on his way." One side of her mouth still quirked, she turns and walks out of the room, shutting the door behind her.

I must admit, I feel ashamed for having spoken so sharply. And when I hear her renewed tread on the stairs less than a minute later, I'm already rehearsing the beginnings of an apology under my breath. Better not to forget I paid her only yesterday for two weeks' rent, long overdue. And, what is even more important, that my tenure here depends entirely on keeping myself in her favour. However much of it there is to go around.

I look up, prepared for Mrs. Selwyn's knock. One, two, three, raps in all before I call out to her, my voice carrying a heavy enough note of contrition to be heard through the door and into the hall.