“Hope? Are you…well?” The timid question came from Madame Chambon’s most recent recruit, Faith. There’d been a time when Hope had felt for every newcomer, understanding how events beyond a girl’s control could so quickly force them into such an avenue of no return. Who would choose to be a prostitute if there were even the faintest possibility of a life of moral rectitude?
In the last few months, she’d changed her tune. She’d seen how the girls became hardened, she no less than any of them. Some were role models in the cunning they displayed when reeling a man in, fleecing him in some instances cleverly, though. Madame Chambon didn’t mind provided no crime was ever laid at her door. Some had indeed made fine alliances and set themselves up with a generous, even doting benefactor. Some had invested wisely. A king’s ransom for the ripe years of a young woman’s life enabled her to retire and live as she chose. Few, though, emerged from their life of sin unscathed and most, to tell the truth, died young and in penury.
Hope wondered what the future held for her. A young marquess, a year her junior, was besotted but not yet in possession of his fortune. Otherwise, he’d set her up in a palace, he’d told her.
A more likely bet was Lord Westfall. He was personable enough. Early-forties with an ailing wife. Madam Chambon was encouraging it as it meant a fat severance bonus for her, even though Hope was one of her most popular girls. A bird in the hand was worth two in the bush though, for who knew if Hope might suddenly lose her lustre, or her health, or even her looks.
“Am I well?” She repeated the question Faith had asked her, closing her eyes as she leant against a Corinthian pillar in the dim passageway between the receiving room and the stairs to the upstairs bedrooms. She almost dismissed Faith’s concern with a trite or flippant response that helped keep her distance. It did not do to form confidences. No girl here was entirely trustworthy for survival often depended upon sacrificing someone else. Madame Chambon had spies everywhere, and every potential escapee or undeclared guinea resulted in serious consequences.
In the gloom, Faith’s eyes were luminous. Hope wondered suddenly how she’d come to be here. It was not something she generally asked. The answer was usually a lie anyway.
“I have been better.” She drew out the sentence as if it cost her a great deal; which it did, for her heart was so heavy she wanted to sink to the ground and put her head on the wooden floor and simply dream herself somewhere else.
“You’re not…hurt?”
Very occasionally a girl was physically abused, though not often. In this respect, at least, Madame Chambon was a good protector, though of course she was protecting her assets. An abuser might find himself suffering a range of humiliations the reason for which he’d be left in no doubt. After that, he’d be blackballed.
Hope smiled wanly and put her hand to her heart and the other girl nodded, her expression one of surprising empathy.
“I hoped one’s heart might have hardened so this didn’t happen,” she admitted in little more than a whisper. She couldn’t risk being overheard.
Faith ran her hands the length of her long-line princess dress. She looked very beautiful, her pale skin a striking contrast with her thick auburn hair that was arranged in a complicated series of braids coiled around her head. “I’m told you’ve been here a year.”
“A little longer.”
“You count the days?”
“I do.” Hope made an effort to breathe properly as she drew herself up. “No point in dwelling on what can’t be changed though. If we can’t choose our destiny, we must make the best of it.”
“But is this the best?” Faith clasped her hands in front of her. “Surely…?”
“No fallen woman is ever granted a second chance.” Hope spoke the truth harshly. “I’d take a job as a servant if I could get a character, but my past will always catch up with me, and I wouldn’t know the first thing about blacking a grate. I’d be found out because word travels.” She never poured out what was in her heart, but something in Faith’s sympathetic look of enquiry invited confidences. Now that she’d started, she seemed unable to stop. Bitterly, she went on, “No, there’s nowhere to go and nothing I can do. My name will always be as black as my heart supposedly is. But I had hoped today to be granted a little dignity.”
“Dignity?”
Hope laughed harshly. “Dignity in not being forced to thieve, if only to protect someone I love dearly. There! I’ve just confessed to being a thief. Do you think regret ameliorates the crime? It never did in any court so I don’t expect lenient treatment. Oh God!” She clutched her side and closed her eyes as she sagged against the pillar. Speaking the words made it worse, not better.
“Oh, Hope, you are not in love?” Faith said it as if it were the most dire of circumstances, which of course it was. “You’ve not done this because someone you love asked you to?”
“I don’t love this man!” Hope spoke scornfully. “He’s made me do something against my will in order to protect someone close to me. A family member but…” She thought about it truthfully and then admitted as if only acknowledging it for the first time, “Yes, I am in love with the man I visited this afternoon, and he’s the one I was forced to steal from. If he doesn’t already know, he soon will, and then he’ll feel none of the love he professed for me today.” She stopped suddenly and gave a wan smile. “Too much information, Faith. You should not have asked.”
The other girl gripped Hope’s hand in a quick squeeze and said in a rush, “You don’t know how much it means to me that you make a confidante of me. I have no friends. No one here I trust. I trust you, though. You do not speak behind one’s back; you keep to yourself. I know you didn’t choose to be here. I won’t ask why you are. But you’re the only one who’s been kind to me. Even just a little. If I can ever do anything to help you, I would.”
She said it with such fervour Hope was touched.
But what help could Faith offer her? Hope was doomed. She forced herself to open her eyes if only to offer the other girl a little of what she clearly craved: understanding, if not gratitude.
“You are kind,” she said, her heart so heavy it physically weighed her down. “But now I must rest. And for once…I think I might take something. Madame wanted me to engage with the gentlemen in the drawing room before Lord Westfall visits, but I really think I cannot.”
“It must be hard to see…a gentle
man when you’ve just come from the man you love.” Faith spoke urgently, following Hope a little way along the passage. “Please, Hope…”
Hope turned, staying her words with a gentle finger upon her lips. “Ah, Faith, I hope you get out of this line of work before it’s too late.”
She didn’t want to hear any more. Shaking her head to deter the girl from continuing after her, Hope picked up her skirts and made for the sanctuary of her room.
Lord Westfall would visit her in two hours after he’d been to his club and before he hit the gaming tables. She suspected it was likely he would make her some kind of offer. If she’d not seen Felix again, she’d have accepted. One man was better than many, and it would give her a measure of security she’d never enjoyed.