Chapter Three

Emma woke with a start. Where was she? Slowly her eyes became used to the darkness. A stub of candle flickered in a holder on the windowsill.

And she was lying down. On a bed. The bed that had been her mama’s and her papa’s. She turned her head into the pillow, now without a pillowcase on it, and caught the scent of the tobacco her papa had smoked, and she was suddenly suffused with gratitude that Reuben Jago had at least left this, even if he had only left it for the next tenant to have somewhere to lay his head.

Hardly daring to look in case she saw something – or someone – she didn’t want to see, Emma peered around the room. But the bed was the only thing in it, apart from the candle in its holder. No remembered dresser with her mother’s tortoiseshell brushes on it, or her scent bottles – not that there was ever very much scent in them. And her papa’s trousers weren’t hanging from the handle of the wardrobe, because that wasn’t there, either. Nor the chair in the corner where she’d sat reading to her mama after yet another miscarriage.

How had she got here? She remembered drinking tea with … with Matthew. Matthew Caunter. Yes, that was what he’d said his name was. But where was he?

Emma pulled herself to a sitting position, then slid from the bed, the floor cold to her stockinged feet. There was a bowl on the floor and a jug of water – neither had been her mother’s. She carried both towards the candle and could just make out that the water was clean enough. How dirty she felt, how soiled. But she would give herself a lick-and-promise-for-a-better-one-tomorrow wash and then slip from the house.

She listened out for Matthew Caunter moving about somewhere but couldn’t hear him. She heard the clank of a chain on the harbour wall; a sound she’d heard many times – a sound that told her it might be the fishing boat with her father on board that had just reached harbour. Except it never would be Guillaume Le Goff ever again.

She tried to judge the time but it was impossible with the candle flickering against a dark sky outside. So she snuffed it; waited for her eyes to become used to a different darkness.

Almost morning. Emma could see the sky lightening on the horizon now. Slowly, and as noiselessly as she could, Emma padded down the wooden stairs that rose up from the right-hand side of the fireplace. To her horror, Matthew Caunter was asleep in a chair. The fire still glowed red in the grate. Had he been there all night? Had he given up the only bed that had bedding on it for her? Emma was certain now that he had and she knew that manners decreed she should thank him. Whether he heard her or not didn’t matter – she would do what her parents would have expected of her.

‘Thank you for looking after me,’ Emma whispered into the silence of the room.

There – that would do. Emma yawned then, her mouth drier than the ash that had fallen from the fire onto the slabs of the hearth. What would she give for a cup of tea.

Tea. Yes, she remembered now. Matthew Caunter had made a pot of tea and poured Emma’s into a cup decorated with brightly coloured birds. The tea had been hot and strong, sweetened with a spoonful of honey. She’d felt warm, drowsy almost. She remembered eating a mouthful or two of scone and then placing her arms on the table and leaning onto them. And then nothing. She must have fallen asleep.

Emma licked her lips at the memory of that tea.

‘Ah, you’re up.’

Emma jumped, startled. Matthew was awake and uncurling his huge form from the chair. He stood up, stretched. He was so tall that as he did so he had to extend his arms out sideways and his head almost reached the ceiling.

‘I am,’ Emma said, ‘and I’m going now. Thank you for looking after me.’

She began to walk towards the door. But Matthew loped after her, grabbed her wrist. ‘Let me go!’

Matthew loosened his grip but didn’t let go. ‘I’m not going to hurt you. I promise. This was your home, you say?’

Emma nodded.

‘I heard a crewman had been lost to the sea. It’s your late father’s old place on the Jago boats that I’m filling, isn’t it?’

‘Yes,’ Emma whispered.

How odd the expression ‘your late father’ sounded. As though he’d forgotten the time and was later getting back than expected, but that he’d be home any moment. Which he wouldn’t be ever again.

‘It’s a cruel life,’ Matthew said. ‘But that’s how tied cottages work. My guess is you haven’t got a ma?’

‘Not any more. Six weeks after I buried my papa, I buried my mama and my brother, Johnnie.’ Emma delivered the information in a voice that she knew sounded dead and flat and without emotion. It was the easiest way. Certainly, she didn’t want this man’s pity.

‘I’m sorry. Truly sorry. But what to do with you?’

‘You can let go of my wrist for a start. I can’t stay here,’ Emma said. She wriggled her wrist, and Matthew released her, took a step away from her. She was less frightened of Matthew now, but only a little. ‘People will talk.’

‘You’ll more than likely find your reputation is already tarnished, I’m afraid.’

Emma drew her breath in sharply. What might he have done to her up there in the bedroom? She felt the blood drain from her face. Her clothes had all been in place, but …

‘I didn’t take advantage of you if that’s what you’re thinking,’ Matthew said.

Emma pressed her lips together and nodded. She hoped and prayed he was telling the truth about that. ‘Thank you,’ she said, ‘for letting me stop. I’ve been ill. I was lodging with a neighbour – Mrs Phipps – but she didn’t feed me very well and I’ve got thin and weak. As you see.’

Emma looked down over her now almost non-existent bosoms – bosoms she’d been pleased had been forming so nicely and rounded before she’d been orphaned and become ill – and could see right down to her feet. How scuffed her mama’s Sunday best shoes had become in so short a time.

‘You certainly look like you need feeding up. But am I right in saying you’re not lodging with the good Mrs Phipps any more?’

‘No. I’d rather die.’

‘A very dramatic answer, if I may say so.’

‘It’s the truth. Mrs Phipps only pretended to take care of me. She appropriated the food the doctor had sent round for me.’

‘So, you haven’t got anywhere to go?’

‘No, but I’ll find somewhere.’

‘Not before you’ve had a cup of tea and a bite to eat. I’ve got bacon.’

‘Bacon?’ Emma said. How long had it been since she’d eaten bacon? On Sundays, if he wasn’t out fishing, her papa had cooked a breakfast of bacon and eggs for the whole family; the one English meal he could see the point of, he’d always said.

‘So, you’ll stop?’

‘Best not,’ Emma said. ‘The longer I’m here the worse my reputation will get no doubt. All it would take would be for Mrs Phipps to know I’m here and I’ll be being talked about over every table between here and Plymouth and up to Exeter.’

‘Oh, I expect I could buy off Mrs Phipps if you just tell me which one she is. There aren’t many women averse to my charms.’

‘That would be your opinion,’ Emma said. Honestly, the audacity of the man. Although she had to admit there was something attractive about him.

‘But not charming you, eh? Well, you know where the door is. Avoid Mrs Phipps at all costs when you go. And close the door behind you or I’ll have every cat in the neighbourhood in here after my bacon, because I, for one, can’t hold off eating a moment longer. It wasn’t the most comfortable night’s sleep I’ve ever had in that chair.’

‘I didn’t ask you to sleep in it,’ Emma said.

‘And my alternative was?’ Matthew laughed heartily, then walked into the kitchen. To follow or not? She heard Matthew bang a pan down heavily on the range. He began to sing as though he didn’t have a care in the world – which he probably didn’t compared with her.

Emma crept towards the kitchen. Maybe just a sniff of cooking bacon would be enough – make her feel less hungry?

But Matthew must have heard her because he turned to Emma and smiled, although he said nothing. He put the bacon on. Took two plates from the rack on the wall that had once housed Emma’s mother’s best Sunday china, but which now held a collection of mismatched plates and bowls. Threw a faggot of wood into the range and raked it to stir the flames, raise the heat. Took two knives and two forks from a wooden box on the draining board. And grinned at Emma. ‘Mr Jago must have assumed I’d have company. There’s two of everything.’

‘I’d rather you didn’t talk about him if you don’t mind.’

‘Ah, yes. He’s a thorn in the flesh to you, no doubt. I’ll try to keep him out of the conversation from now on.’

‘I’m going,’ Emma said, her mouth watering as she watched Matthew turn the bacon, crack four eggs into the pan. Four eggs. Would he eat that many himself if she didn’t stop to share it? ‘You can talk about him as much as you like to anyone else.’

‘Fried bread?’ Matthew said, sawing a thick slice from a loaf.

‘No, thank you. Just the eggs and bacon will be fine.’

Gosh, had she really said that?

Evidently she had because Matthew lifted crispy bacon onto two plates. But just as soon as that bacon and eggs – and maybe a cup of tea – were down her throat she’d be off.

What would be expected of her now? Some small talk? Around her parents’ table there had always been conversation. Matthew was humming something to himself as he pressed a slice of bread into the bacon fat in the pan.

‘Why did you leave Slapton?’ Emma asked.

‘That’s for me to know and you to wonder,’ Matthew told her, spinning round. And he winked.

‘I’d have thought there was plenty of fishing in Slapton,’ Emma said, doing her best to ignore that wink. Her mama had warned her about men with seductive grins and fancy words.

‘Then you think right. But it wasn’t the fishing that forced the issue.’

Matthew wasn’t smiling quite so broadly now.

‘A woman then?’ Emma said, then clapped a hand to her mouth. She’d been thinking the words and somehow they’d slipped out over her tongue as easy as honey off a spoon, when she ought to have bitten them back.

‘I’ve known lots of women, Emma.’ Matthew added two perfectly fried eggs to Emma’s plate. ‘Now get that down you and then you can go and if you’re as bright as I think you are then you’ll know to keep to yourself what’s just been discussed in this kitchen.’

‘Of course,’ Emma said. ‘And I’m sorry for being so outspoken. My papa always said my mouth would hang me.’

‘Did he then?’ Matthew said. The kettle came to the boil and he poured water onto the tea leaves, stirred vigorously. ‘And for the record, I don’t think there’s a lot wrong in speaking your mind. I expect there’s lots you would like to say to me considering I’m in the home that was yours.’

‘It’s not your fault you are,’ Emma said. She sliced angrily at a rasher of bacon. ‘But Mr Jago shouldn’t have sold my parents’ things without telling me. Or burned what he couldn’t sell.’

Matthew’s face darkened. ‘No,’ he said. ‘He shouldn’t have. But there’s not a lot I can do about that now.’

‘All I’ve got left is a book,’ Emma said, willing the tears that puddled her eyes not to fall. ‘And a broken book at that.’

‘How old are you, Emma?’

‘Fifteen. Sixteen come Michaelmas.’

‘Too young to marry at the moment.’

‘Marry?’ Emma thought she was going to explode. Did he really think she would have to marry to get out of her predicament?

‘It’s a great institution – when it works.’

‘It was for my mama and my papa,’ Emma said. ‘I wouldn’t settle for anything less than they had. And I certainly wouldn’t marry for convenience.’

‘Shame,’ Matthew said, the grin back on his face again. ‘I could use a woman around the house. Not that I’m suggesting I marry you. But I do need someone to cook, someone to …’

‘I hope you’re teasing me. But if you’re not then I have to tell you I won’t be that someone,’ Emma said. She crammed food – very inelegantly, she knew – into her mouth and chewed and swallowed quickly until it was all gone. ‘But thank you very much for my breakfast and for looking after me last night. I’ll be on my way now.’

Emma retrieved her shawl from the back of a chair and slung it around her shoulders, knotting it firmly at her waist.

‘Nice to meet you,’ Matthew said. ‘And any time you’re down on your luck, you’ll be welcome to come back. I …’

‘Oh, I couldn’t do that,’ Emma said. ‘It wouldn’t be right. Last night was an … an …’

‘Emergency, Emma. I’m glad I was able to help. But before you go, I’ve got something of yours you might like.’ He strode into the sitting-room and came back with Emma’s book. ‘I’ve mended the spine. The leather’s a different colour, but it’s well stuck down and it will stop the pages from falling out.’

He held out the book towards Emma and she took it, hugged it to her. Her mama had bought her that book, saving a halfpenny a week until she’d had enough to pay for it in Bastin’s. And Matthew had mended it for her.

‘Thank you,’ she said. She regretted being so sharp with him now.

‘My pleasure.’ Matthew placed a hand under Emma’s elbow and guided her towards the front door. ‘And for what it’s worth, you’ll be a fine young woman once your sharp edges are rounded off.’

‘How, how …’ Emma began, all ready to be outraged and sharp with Matthew all over again. Then she laughed. He seemed to know her better than she knew herself.

‘Ah,’ Matthew said, reaching into a box beside the front door, ‘and another thing. You might as well have this. My old landlady must have dropped it in the box as a heavy hint. Fisherman can smell a bit sometimes.’ He laughed and held his nose and Emma couldn’t help but smile.

He handed her a small block of soap. Unused. Pale pink. Emma put it to her nose and it smelled of roses.

‘I haven’t got much use for flowery soaps, Emma. Can you imagine the comments of the rest of the crew if I went on board smelling of roses?’

‘I certainly can.’ Emma laughed. She opened her carpet bag and added the soap to its meagre contents, along with her mended copy of Persuasion.

‘And one thing more,’ Matthew said, smiling at her.

‘Oh, I can’t accept anything else, Mr Caunter. You’ve already given me enough.’

‘Nothing to eat, drink or make yourself pretty with, Emma. But if you can’t find anywhere else, then I could give you the offer of a bed for the night …’

‘I can’t. I …’

But Matthew put a finger to her lips. ‘You might not have other choices. It’ll be hard for a girl as young as you, and on your own.’ His voice was grave and his look stern. ‘But mind you don’t get into bad ways. Some women …’

‘I’m not “some women”. I’m Emma Le Goff.’

Matthew patted her shoulder. ‘There, there, don’t get on your high horse. It can be a long way down coming off.’

Then he opened the door and ushered Emma outside. The sun was up now and it was going to be a warm day, she was sure of it. But what she was going to do and where she was going to go she had no idea. However, there was food in her belly and she’d been shown kindness by a stranger.

‘Good luck,’ Matthew called out as she reached the gate.

Emma turned to wave and then she saw her – Mrs Phipps. And the old harridan was grinning, storing up the picture before her no doubt, ready to embellish it and milk the gossip for all it was worth.

‘Hmm, like mother like daughter,’ Mrs Phipps said.

Emma was doing her best to ignore every single thing Mrs Phipps was saying as they walked side by side towards the harbour. Emma was walking as fast as she possibly could, given she’d been so ill for so long, but Mrs Phipps was keeping pace with her easily enough for such a large woman.

‘What’s that supposed to mean?’

‘Ah, found your voice, have you?’

‘I never lost it. I just asked you a question, Mrs Phipps. What do you mean by the reference to my mother?’

‘Ah, well, when you were in the school, Rachel Le Goff – for all her fancy name – had visitors. After your pa died, that is.’

‘Visitors?’ Her mama had never been one for having the neighbours in for tea and cake and to trade gossip, mainly because she never had much money to spare for such frivolities, but mostly because her mama didn’t say anything bad about anyone, or want to hear it either.

‘That’s what I said.’

‘What sort of visitors? The doctor’s wife used to pass on her son’s outgrown clothes for Johnnie sometimes. Or maybe …’

‘Gentlemen visitors,’ Mrs Phipps said. She had a sneer of a grin on her face, her lips pulled back so that Emma had a full view of a mouthful of rotting teeth. It made her want to retch.

‘The vicar then, or the doctor. I’m well aware both called on my mother after Papa was drowned. Now if that’s all you’ve got to say, I’ll be on my way.’

Emma made to change direction, walk anywhere as long as it was away from Mrs Phipps, but the older woman grabbed at her shawl, pulling it from Emma’s shoulder. ‘It’s not all I’ve got to say. Like I said, it’s a case of like mother like daughter here – you stopping all night with that fisherman up from Slapton.’

‘I didn’t have any choice about where I stopped last night, Mrs Phipps. I must have passed out. Mr Caunter threw a blanket over me and let me sleep. On the chair by the fire.’ Behind her back, Emma crossed her fingers that she wouldn’t go to hell for telling a lie. ‘And no one stopped the night with my mama after Papa died, Mrs Phipps. Ever. Understand?’

‘Not the night, no. But the daytime was a bit different. Came round the back alley and in the gate, brazen as you like, many a time. I could see ’n from the end of my garden, when I was up the you-know-what, doing my business.’

Emma took a moment or two to digest this unsavoury information. Yes, Mrs Phipps’ cottage was on the contour above Shingle Cottage and she could easily see down into the Le Goff garden. But she must have made a special effort to do so because to Emma’s knowledge none of the privies in Cliff Terrace had windows.

‘Who did?’

‘Mr Reuben Jago. And sometimes his son, Carter. Walked up the path bold as brass they did.’

Just the sound of Reuben Jago’s name made Emma’s bile rise – it felt sharp as vinegar in her throat. And Mrs Phipps was suggesting there was something untoward about him calling on her mother, wasn’t she? And Carter Jago, too.

‘I’ve been told my mama was a bit behind with the rent after my papa died,’ Emma said softly. She was almost too ashamed to say the words. But if it would defend her mother’s reputation then she’d say them. ‘I expect Mr Jago called to ask for it, that’s all. And sent his son to ask when he couldn’t call himself.’

‘Oh yes? And how do you think your mama paid it off? Weren’t with pence and pounds, were it? Unless it were the pounds of her body …’

‘You … you … foul-mouthed, bitter old woman,’ Emma yelled. She didn’t care who heard her. ‘And you’re a liar with it.’

She snatched at the catch of her carpet bag and thrust her hand in, searching out the bar of soap Matthew Caunter had just given her. ‘Here, take this. Wash your filthy mouth out.’

She threw it at Mrs Phipps, then turned on her heel and ran. She skirted round people she knew, who averted their eyes when they saw her coming. The heels of her shoes clacked on the cobbles outside the homes of school friends where once she would have been welcome, but now as she passed she saw curtains hastily pulled across and doors closed at her approach. Why? Why? What had she done that was making people turn against her so?

Wasn’t there anyone who would take her in? The vicar? Dr Shaw, perhaps? Just until she could find a job of work and preferably one that provided a bed to sleep in, too.

Her mama had always been adamant that no daughter of hers was going to go into service and that was why she’d been saving for Emma’s teacher-training, taking in sewing jobs to make a bit extra. Pin money, quite literally, her mama had always said, laughing as she said it. But perhaps going into service was going to be Emma’s only way to survive. It would be her last resort, though – there had to be something else she could do. Emma’s head throbbed with thinking about it all, and her calves ached from hurrying faster than her body was ready for yet.

She would call on Dr Shaw. Perhaps he’d have a position for her in his own house. Or in the surgery on the reception desk – yes, that would be a better job. She could learn to do that easily enough, couldn’t she? There was a shortcut – an alley between two inns; it was steep but it would save her a longer walk round and up the hill. Emma slowed her pace and slipped into the alley. It was darker between the high walls but not so dark she couldn’t see the shape of a person lying on the ground. A woman. To turn around and go back and pretend she hadn’t noticed, or to go on and see if the woman was all right?

Emma knew what she had to do. She crept forward, a slow step at a time. She recognised the flame red hair. Sophie Ellison. Sophie had been in the year above Emma at school. Had got in with a bad crowd. But she’d been at the funeral for her mama and Johnnie, and Emma would always be grateful to her for that.

The hem of Sophie’s skirt was pulled up, twisted round, over the top of her thighs. Her legs had a bluish tinge, and Emma shivered looking at them. She leaned down and tried to pull Sophie’s skirt down to cover her legs, give her some decency here in this alley that smelled of stale beer and urine and fish.

Then she crouched down beside the curled form of Sophie. Was she drunk? ‘Sophie?’ Emma said. ‘It’s me, Emma Le Goff. Are you hurt?’ She touched the back of Sophie’s hand. It was cold. Like alabaster.

‘Sophie, speak to me,’ Emma said, frightened now. ‘Please, speak to me.’

And then she noticed the blood – a burgundy pool of it under Sophie’s chest already beginning to congeal – and Emma knew that Sophie was never going to speak to her again because Sophie was dead.

‘’Morning, Seth,’ Mrs Phipps said.

Seth puffed out his cheeks, let the air escape slowly. The last person he wanted to see. She was forever offering him the services of her over-large and probably under-washed body.

‘Good morning, Mrs Phipps.’ Seth made to hurry past. He was on his way to the harbour, but was late – held up by his father asking if he’d come to his senses yet over Emma. In Seth’s opinion he’d never lost his senses. He rubbed his eyes, dry and itchy through lack of sleep, thinking about Emma and how he might help her.

‘Not so fast.’ Mrs Phipps grabbed his forearm. ‘You can spare me a few minutes.’

‘Not for what you’re about to suggest.’

Mrs Phipps cackled. ‘Got to get rid of that ol’ virginity of yours some time. Might as well be with someone who can learn you a thing or two. But that’s not what I’m meaning.’ She leaned in to whisper. ‘Your pa done right throwing Emma Le Goff out of Shingle Cottage. ’Cept from what I saw, she’s got herself back in. Only spent the night there with the new tenant, didn’t she? Looked all cosy on the doorstep they did earlier. Presents and all going in that bag of hers.’

Seth made a tight line of his lips. Anger was boiling in him, making his heart beat faster. He didn’t know which was the worst of the evils – Mrs Phipps for spreading gossip, or Emma for spending the night with his pa’s new crewman, or himself for believing any of it.

‘I hesitate to call you a liar, Mrs Phipps …’

‘I ain’t no liar. Saw her with me own eyes, did’n I? Right little harlot she is.’

‘You’re a right one to be calling anyone a harlot, Mrs Phipps,’ Seth hissed.

‘You’d not be likely to know, would yer? Seeing as you’m not like your brothers and are as pure as the good Lord made yer …’

‘Out of my way,’ Seth said. ‘Or my pa’s boats will miss the tide.’ Then he pushed her hand away from his arm as though it were fire, and turned on his heel and left.

Had his pa been right when he’d said it would be best if Seth forgot all about Emma? Had he? But where else could Emma have gone for the night? Mrs Drew had had no space, and from what he’d heard, she’d been shunned by old friends who believed Rachel Goff had been a suicide. It had been a cold night and Seth shivered, thinking Emma might have fallen asleep from fatigue and hunger under a hedge somewhere and died of the cold.

He hurried on. If he had to keep seeing Emma he’d never be able to stop thinking about her, or be able to avoid hearing all sorts of tales – true or not – about her. His Uncle Silas fished out of Vancouver on the west coast of Canada – it wouldn’t hurt to write and ask if his offer of a job running the shipping office for him still stood, although he’d like to get the truth about what had really happened to his ma and that fall down the cellar steps before he made a firm decision to go.

But he had a feeling even Canada wouldn’t be far enough to forget the lovely Emma.