Poesy Swift
We were only eight hours out of Batavia on our way to Singapore when one of the crew collapsed. I was playing chasey with the little girls and we all saw him fall. He was one of the coal-shovelling men who stoked the engines. He came staggering onto the deck and collapsed right in front of us so that Daisy nearly tripped over his body. She let out a squeal. The man was black and sooty with coal dust, sweat was running in rivulets across his face and he was twitching, almost like Yada when she fitted. Dr Whitehead came running and Miss Thrupp hurried us away from the man.
Half an hour later, there was a meeting of all the passengers in the dining hall. Dr Whitehead announced that the stoker who had collapsed had died of cholera. Miss Thrupp and Eloise both gasped and clutched their babies, and all the girls began to talk at once. Mr Arthur had to stand on a chair and shout at the top of his voice to make us quiet down.
‘There is no need to panic, ladies. I presume none of you have been mingling with the crew. This man would have caught the disease because he stayed ashore in Batavia while we returned safely to the ship. But I want everyone to stay in their cabins until Dr Whitehead gives the all-clear. We will suspend rehearsals until such time as the good doctor deems it appropriate for us to mingle again.’
As soon as the announcements were made, Miss Thrupp burst into tears and ran from the dining hall. Mr Arthur turned his face up to the ceiling and sighed.
‘Eloise,’ he called. ‘Please go and assist Miss Thrupp. She hasn’t had much sleep, it seems.’
‘And who, may I ask, has?’ said Eloise. Her baby was only a month older than Timmy Thrupp. She handed Bertie to Eliza and stood with her hands on her hips, facing Mr Arthur. ‘Can’t you see, Arthur? She’s frightened. But she’s not the only one with a baby, or a cross to bear. You can’t keep all these kiddies locked up all the way to Singapore.’
‘I don’t want to lock them up,’ he said, exasperated. ‘But they can’t mingle with the crew or any other passengers. God knows what will happen if one of them comes down with cholera.’
We were given a list of instructions. We must keep ourselves clean, wash our hands, drink only tea, avoid the passengers who weren’t in the troupe and keep to our cabins until we were notified by Eloise or Miss Thrupp that we could go to the dining hall.
Tilly and Valentine hooked arms and went off to their cabin in a hurry. I looked across at Lizzie and felt my heart sink. I knew she hated being shut up in the cabin. She was always going up on deck in the evening to watch the sea, or sending me out so that she could have time to herself.
In our cabin, the air was like warm soup. I pushed at the porthole, but even with the window open I felt as though I could hardly breathe. Eliza lay on her bunk with a wet flannel over her eyes.
‘Has this ever happened before, when you were touring?’ I asked.
‘People have got sick before. In Manila, Tempe got some tropical sort of fever and I had to take her part. But we were never quarantined. I’m glad I’m with you, Poesy. Imagine if we were stuck in a four-berth cabin with Ruby and that lot.’
‘Don’t you like Ruby?’
‘Do you?’
I didn’t answer because I wasn’t sure how I felt about Ruby. She was one of the prettiest girls in the troupe – no one could compete with her honey curls and dimples – and she had been kind to me. Once, during a rehearsal, she offered to help me with some dance steps. Mr Arthur had been rather wry about it, saying it would have been nice if she could show the same courtesy to her little sisters, but I’m sure she helped them too occasionally.
It wasn’t Ruby that worried me but her two best friends, Tempe and Clarissa. All three girls were seventeen but Tempe was their leader. When she looked down her nose at me I felt uncomfortable inside my own skin, and even if she smiled at me, my teeth were set on edge as if I’d eaten something too sugary.
As for Clarissa, there was nothing sweet in her – she was like something sharp and pickled that left a dry, startled taste in your mouth.
It was odd that I should have been thinking about them at that moment. I was thinking about Clarissa in particular when there was a knock on the door and there she was, as if I’d conjured her.
‘Come and visit us, Poesy,’ she said, taking my hand and drawing me out into the hall. ‘You must be lonely all by yourself.’
‘I’m not by myself,’ I said. ‘Lizzie’s here.’
Clarissa didn’t say anything but she raised one eyebrow and pulled the cabin door shut, leaving Lizzie to her rest.
She kept a firm grasp of my wrist as she led me down the hall to the big cabin that the older girls shared. I tried to twist my arm free but she kept a resolute grip.
‘I’m rescuing you, you stupid creature,’ she said, shoving me through the door of her cabin.
Tempe and Ruby were sitting on a bunk, looking flushed and frowsy in the equatorial air, their bare feet making a row of twenty neat pink toes. They’d stripped down to their petticoats and were taking turns fanning each other with little Chinese paper fans. Clarissa made me sit on a chair opposite them, as if I was on trial. Then she peeled off her outer clothes as well and lay down on the empty bunk above them.
‘We need two things from you, Poesy,’ said Tempe. ‘We need you to tell us what Eliza and Mr. P were doing on deck together late last night. And we need you to be our agent and do a little bit of snooping for us.’
‘What do you mean?’ I asked warily.
‘First question, please,’ said Tempe. She pulled her petticoat up higher and then leant forward, putting her pretty face close to mine. ‘What happened last night?’
‘I don’t know what you’re talking about. Lizzie always goes for a walk on deck in the evenings.’
‘Surely you’re not such a dunderhead that you didn’t notice Eliza was missing for hours,’ said Clarissa.
‘She wasn’t missing. She was with Lionel. He saw her back to our cabin.’
‘Not Mr Arthur?’
‘If she was with Mr Arthur, she was with Lionel as well.’
The jury looked at each other knowingly, as hideous as three witches.
‘Do you think she’s in love with him?’ asked Tempe.
‘With Lionel?’ I asked, incredulous. ‘She pities him, that’s all.’
There was something lumpy about poor Lionel. Lumpy and clumpy and a little bit sad. It didn’t seem possible that anyone should fall in love with him, least of all Lizzie.
‘No, silly. Mr Arthur, of course!’ said Clarissa.
‘No!’ I shouted. ‘How can you be so beastly, Clarissa! Lizzie’s not like you. She’s good and kind and pure of heart.’
‘Hush, hush,’ said Tempe. ‘We didn’t know you and Eliza had become quite so thick. We thought you were Tilly’s little friend.’
‘I’m Tilly’s friend too. But I’m not a sneaking hound,’ I shouted.
Fighting back tears, I dashed out into the corridor, away from their awful insinuations, away from the horrible inquisition, away from their nasty secrets and dirty lies.