Bendigo
Saturday 8 October
Evie knew her worries were written all over her face when Mrs Kingsley opened the door.
‘You do not look rested, Evie,’ Mrs K chided. ‘What have you been doing?’
For the last three nights since being home, Evie had been sitting in her parlour, or the kitchen, trying desperately not to nod off. She’d bought as many candles as she could afford and sat hour after hour keeping the little wicks alight, her couple of lanterns lit and fuelled, trying to read, to sew a little, to finish some projects started before she’d left on her trek. Her eyes were scratchy and hurt when she blinked.
‘You, my dear girl, cannot afford to let your eyesight suffer. You look like you’ve been working all night. What would you do if you couldn’t work any longer?’ Mrs Kingsley ushered her into the studio, now crowded, happily, with the tools of their trade. Her husband had ordered another bench built that would hold rolls of fabric upright, just like at the drapery. ‘A genius move if I do say so myself,’ he’d said and Mrs Kingsley had raised her eyebrows when relating it to Evie, as if to say, ‘wonder where that idea had come from?’
‘What is it?’ Mrs Kingsley asked her now. ‘Have you had trouble?’
‘No trouble. I just expect it,’ Evie said. Every little noise, every creak of her house, every whisper of a breeze shaking the window in its pane had her heart thumping, ears straining. To her knowledge, nothing had happened; no one had been lurking outside.
‘That’s understandable, but I don’t think Mr Cooper will risk any shenanigans now things are coming to a head. The court date is only a few days away. Keep your chin up, dear.’
Mrs K had stopped insisting that Evie come to stay with them, and Evie now wished she’d accepted the offer. Perhaps it wasn’t only the threat of Edwin Cooper that worried her, perhaps it was all the whispers and giggles that followed her wherever she went.
Ann and Posie visited and, turnabout, ate an evening meal with her that they brought from their kitchens to save her going out. She wasn’t ready to brave the tearooms, she’d told them, not until all this was over. Her two friends had only exchanged a glance at that, and let it be.
‘For the moment,’ Ann had said, with a look in her eye.
Evie had stopped doing a daily shop, which had been her habit, and only bought goods as she needed them. That way at least, while the gossip about her was still plain as the day, she wasn’t subjected to the sniggers as often.
‘Lead a man on, she did, or men, I should say.’
‘Got rid of one quick enough to take up with Mr Cooper.’
‘Fast, that’s what she is.’
‘Pity she’s the best milliner here in town. Where will we go now?’
‘The magistrate will sort her out.’
‘She won’t be around for long with a reputation like that.’
The last was the comment that had her wondering whether she could continue living in Bendigo. She could hear Edwin’s sister’s ringing voice in the vitriol, and although she never saw Jane, she was sure the woman was whispering poisonously in the ear of anyone willing to listen, or unable to get away. To clear her name was Evie’s hope, and even if that occurred, she knew how mud stuck, how rumours never died. Even if her name was cleared, even if from all the efforts by Mr Campbell, Miss Juno and Mr Barrett, she didn’t have to pay Edwin Cooper for the breach of contract, she would have to leave town. She wouldn’t be able to stand it here a moment longer.
Leaving Mrs Kingsley would be difficult, but with a little money saved and perhaps a tenant in the house, she’d be able to start again somewhere else. Right now, it seemed all too hard. Her mind was woolly, her thoughts tangled.
There wasn’t long to go now, but fronting the magistrate was still two nights away, and she was so very tired. Oh, dear God, she was no good at this.