Mother’s absence continued for several months. Meanwhile, the rest of the family were left in a house which was comparatively grand. Polly proudly boasted “we had a piano and everything”. The piano was a vital piece of furniture for the social aspirant, creating instantly the illusion of a middle-class household. By the 1890s, it was also widely accessible, available for lease or hire purchase, in most cities:
FOR HIRE, a PIANOFORTE Terms 1s per week – Address BBM Daily Press Office.
Western Daily Press, Saturday 21 June 1884
But the house and its furnishings had been affordable only for as long as mother had filled it with pregnant, fee-paying young women. Now mother was in hiding and all the ladies had gone. So when Father lost his job again, in the early summer of 1891, the family had no hope of paying the quarterly rent.
Polly claimed she was left to deal with their landlord, who began to threaten eviction. The Dyers’ was clearly a matriarchal household: despite mother’s absence, it was not Father whom Polly consulted about the financial shortfall. Mother’s instructions were that she was to raise the rent money by selling the piano. Obediently, Polly approached a gentleman who inspected the piano and thereafter agreed to pay £10 for its purchase – good news for Polly, whom mother had told to settle for nothing less. Polly handed over the piano and used the proceeds to pay the rent.
Polly insisted she had been unaware that the piano was never theirs to sell. It had been secured by a hire-purchase agreement, and, once its owner discovered it had been sold by Polly to a third party, he raised a summons for her arrest. Days after the sale, Polly was met at the gate of the house by a gentleman caller, who she claimed said to her, “Miss Polly, I am astonished to have for you what I have in my pocket,” at which point he served her with the summons. The solicitor’s overly familiar tone, as recalled in adulthood by Polly, seems unlikely. She claimed that he addressed her by her pet name, rather than her surname. Polly also claimed that the solicitor expressed a degree of shock at having to serve her with a court summons, as if he had met her before and knew her to be of good moral standing. It is an unconvincing account. Nevertheless, wary of mother’s threats not to reveal her whereabouts to Father, Polly duly faced the magistrate alone.
The magistrate condemned Polly’s wickedness and she was held in remand, the magistrate refusing to release her until £10 bail was met – the very sum they had needed in the first instance for the quarterly rent. The demand for bail drew Father into the crisis. Having known nothing about the intended sale of the piano, he borrowed the £10 bail money in order to secure Polly’s release.
The affair forced mother out of hiding. She calmly assured Polly all would be well. Curiously, she approached the “good and steady young fellow” with whom Polly was at that time “walking out”. Mother had learned of the young railway guard’s £9 in savings, and persuaded him to part with it for Polly’s sake. This sum, along with an IOU for the balance, she handed to the purchaser of the piano; the instrument was thereafter returned to its rightful owner, effectively settling the matter out of court. All charges against Mary Ann Dyer were subsequently dropped.
The legal crisis over, the Dyers were nevertheless left without an income and in debt to the tune of £19: £10 which Father borrowed for Mary Ann’s bail money and £9 which mother had negotiated from the young railway guard. It seemed inevitable that mother should set up in the baby business again.
Another house move: this time to Fillwood Road, just a few streets away. Here, Polly said, mother took in “an awful lot of ladies and a great many babies. I recollect there being seven ladies in the house at one time.” The Dyers were soon solvent again. Mother adopted another child, a little girl named Lily, for a very handsome £30.
The Dyers did not remain long in Fillwood Road. In the early autumn of 1891 they moved again, this time to Glenworth House in nearby Eastville. The address may have changed but, as Polly recalled, “it was the same thing over again. The ladies came and had babies, and there was hardly a month passed without the doctor and the undertaker being in the place, for there were several funerals. I can remember two in one week.”
Countless, nameless infants. Coming into the world and slipping out of it again, so that no one would know.
The governess and her husband had not given up. Buoyed by the intervention of the police, they had continued to pursue Dyer. Finally, in late October 1891, more than twelve months since the birth of their child, they knocked on the door of Glenworth House. At their side was a police officer.