Swansong At Foxwell’s

Thanks to Kitty, the Foxwells were ready for their first highsociety event!

KITTY ran until it seemed someone had taken a rasp to her throat. Will’s voice had chased her along the front, past the penny lick stands and the donkeys.

Even as she reached the cobbles of Blind Lane, Will’s cries seemed to follow her.

A tug in her chest made her cheeks colour, but she pushed the feeling away.

She was Kitty King – she wouldn’t be made low by a naive girl.

She was so caught up thinking about Will, she hardly noticed that her feet led her, skipping the loose kerbs of Cook’s Row, to the clogged gutter outside Chaffey’s butcher shop.

This was the neighbourhood she’d grown up in, the streets she’d begged on.

The Slops.

When she reached the Three Lions Pub, her pace had slowed, her breathing returning to normal.

The pub sign squeaked as it swayed in the wind.

That pavement had been her first stage, the place she’d sung for coppers until her mother boxed her ears and dragged her home.

She started the climb uphill.

By the time she reached the family cottage, it seemed a pair of hands encircled her throat.

There was the old mangle, its frame rusting, its rollers green from too many winters in the rain.

Her courage suddenly failed, exhaustion sweeping over her.

She could turn, run back to the theatre, take off Will’s dress and sleep until it was time to go on stage.

Dread crashed over her like winter waves.

How could she risk everything she’d worked so hard for, for the sake of one painful meeting?

One step, two, and she was rapping on the door.

The breath felt trapped inside her chest.

No noises from within. It had been a long time. Perhaps they’d moved.

The latch clicked, door opening to reveal a woman.

It was like looking in a mirror, though the woman staring at her from the cottage was thinner than Kitty, her face flushed from the steam from the copper.

With a pang, Kitty saw the extra silver hairs, the wrinkles around the eyes that Kitty herself was years away from developing.

One twin shouldn’t age so much faster than the other.

“Florence,” Kitty said, trying to smile.

Her sister’s expression remained unchanged.

“You better come in,” was all she said as she took a step back.

Kitty stepped inside. Their childhood home had been her world up until the age of sixteen, but it seemed to shrink a little each time she returned.

The windows, the hearth, the mantel with its picture frames and embroidered hanging, were all smaller than she remembered.

Perhaps one day the whole cottage would wink out of existence.

The room was hot and stuffy, a fire burning high despite the summer heat.

“I’ve no tea,” Florence said, stepping past her. “Not until I’m paid for this lot.”

She gestured to the ceiling, to clothes airers heavy with linen.

“You can sit if you can find a spot.”

Every surface was draped with bed sheets and shirts. An ironing table filled the space close to the fire.

Perhaps it would be safer to stand.

“You’ll forgive me if I work while you say whatever you’ve come to say.”

“How do you know I’ve come to say anything?” Kitty said.

Florence tugged a cloth from her shoulder and grasped an iron from the rack over the hearth. She spat on the plate, watching the liquid fizz on the metal.

“Why else would you be here?”

Florence pressed the iron to a shirt, the smell of hot cotton filling the air.

Typical Florence. Always keen to show Kitty how selfish she was.

“Where are the children?” Kitty said.

Florence exchanged the cooled iron for a hot one.

“Grace is out back tending the copper. Mary, Helen and Ruth are down at the harbour. They’ve joined the gutters now.”

Kitty tried to imagine her bubble-haired nieces slicing open bream, turbot and bass, tugging the guts loose with their tiny fingers.

“Shouldn’t they be at school?”

“Would you have us starve? We’ve no man to provide for us. Unlike some. ”

The words stung and Kitty felt herself wince.

“You always were hard. Just like Mother.”

“If I’m like our mother, then you take after Father.”

That was the problem with family, they knew exactly how to hurt.

“I was sorry to hear about Walter,” Kitty said. “Tuberculosis is an evil.”

It was Florence’s turn to wince, though she recovered quickly.

“My message found you, then?”

Kitty had been on the continent when her brother-in-law Walter died.

Italy, France, Germany: beautiful towns, wonderful sights.

Things she’d never have seen if she’d become a fish gutter like her nieces.

“I was away,” Kitty said. “The telegram didn’t reach me until I’d returned to England and by then it was almost two weeks old. It didn’t seem worthwhile –” The iron slammed down so hard it made her jump.

“Wasn’t worthwhile writing? Or coming to pay respects? Did you think I’d have mourned him out of my heart in fourteen days?” “I didn’t mean –” “Oh, you never mean, do you? Kitty King, the Dorset Linnet. No-one who sings like that could cause a lick of harm.

“Well, I know different, don’t I?”

“Not this still! Walter chose you, didn’t he?”

There had been a time, before Kitty left, that Walter smiled too warmly, tipped his hat too keenly.

But she’d left and Florence stayed and Walter had found it easy to slip from admiring one sister to chasing her mirror image.

Besides, they’d seemed happy enough, from what she’d heard.

A latch rattled and the back door opened, a pair of worried eyes appearing in the crack.

“You hurt, Ma? Did you burn yourself again?”

Florence turned to the wall, pressing the back of her hand to her cheek.

“Get back to work, Gracie, there’s a good girl.”

The child stole one last curious look at Kitty before disappearing.

When Florence turned back, her cheeks were more flushed than ever, her eyes glassy.

“If only we’d looked different, you and I,” she muttered.

“I might have been certain it was me he wanted, that he wasn’t making do with a cut-price Kitty King.” She dabbed her cheeks with her cloth.

“Tell me what it is you’re after and leave us in peace.”

The heat had grown under Kitty’s too-large bodice, the wool scratchy, smelling of Will, of the sea.

It was always the same when she came home, that feeling of being dragged down, dragged back.

Florence wouldn’t be happy unless Kitty stood barefoot and ragged, singing outside the pub.

If life had chosen to raise her up and keep Florence in her place, Kitty wouldn’t climb down in the mud just to keep her company. Time to say her piece. “The man I wrote to you about a while back, Richard – we’re to be married,” she said.

The blood drained from Florence’s cheeks, but Kitty pressed on.

“He loves me, truly loves me, I think. But he doesn’t know . . .”

For the first time,

Dread crashed over her like winter waves

Florence looked amused. “You’ve not told him.” Fear enveloped Kitty, setting her shivering despite the heat.

“He knows I come from the Slops. I couldn’t hide that.

“His family worked their way up from being coal miners, so there’s no judgement about that.

“But I’ve not said a word about Tom. Or about Father.”

Florence settled her hands on her hips.

“You think your sweetheart would throw you over if he knew?”

“I . . . I don’t know.” Florence made a sound somewhere between a laugh and a cough.

“So you thought I’d tell?” Did she? Her sister was poor enough, especially with Walter gone.

There might be some newspaper man who would pay for the story.

A fresh iron was in Florence’s hand.

“I’ll not make trouble for you.”

Relief washed over Kitty. “Thank you, Flo. You know, when I’m married, I’ll have an allowance –”

“I said I won’t cause trouble. There’s still some who might.” Florence sighed.

“What were you thinking, coming back?”

Kitty recalled her sister’s embrace when they were small girls.

How warm, how comforting it felt. Things were simpler then.

“Why can’t we do our lives over?” Florence shrugged. “Would we make a better fist of things?”

Before she knew it, Kitty had her arms around Florence. For a moment they stood.

Then they staggered apart, brushing their clothes straight, avoiding each other’s eye.

“Now, go on with you,” Florence said, dabbing her face again.

Kitty made for the door. “But take some advice, sister,” Florence said.

“Start your married life without secrets. Nothing stays hidden for ever.”

The evening air felt cold after the heat of the little cottage and Kitty was glad to be able to run, to shake the smell of laundry and the Slops from her nose and hair.

Back at the house, she let herself in with the key Charlie had given her.

She was tired, sticky with salt spray and grime.

She wanted to wash and change, to find peace.

But as she reached the bottom of the stairs, the parlour door creaked open.

It was Will, changed back into her own clothes.

“Where did you go?” The pain in the girl’s voice was hard to hear.

“I had to be alone.” Kitty moved to take her hand, but Will flinched away.

“I know I’m not good enough to be your friend,” Will said. “But it was cruel of you to pretend.”

With that, she slammed the parlour door.

Slowly, Kitty dragged her aching body upstairs. As she reached the landing another door opened and Barney stepped out.

Kitty held up her hand before he could speak.

“I know, Barney,” she said. “But save it for later. I’m too tired for a lecture.”

He watched her slip into her room and close the door against the world.

“You look like you’ve lost a shilling and found a farthing,” Ann said, handing Will a plate. “What’s got into you?”

Will hadn’t told Ann about Kitty deserting her. The humiliation of it burned her cheeks.

But no matter how hurt she was, she didn’t want Ann to think any less of Kitty than she did already. Ann poured the tea. “Have you seen Fred lately?”

“Fred Chessell?” Will said. “Well, of course, Fred Chessell.”

“Not since we argued that day on the sands.”

She and Fred were friends, and now he was working at the Premier they were unlikely to be anything more.

“I’m not fretting over him, if that’s what you’re thinking.”

“No, ’course not.” Ann sipped her tea. “It’ll come good in the end, you’ll see. No reason in worrying.”

“Everyone worries over something.”

Ann’s eyebrows rose. “What’ve you to worry over? You’ve a roof over your head, haven’t you? Food? Clothes on your back? Oh, this was left for you.”

She took a slip of paper from her apron pocket and put it on the table.

Will recognised Kitty’s writing.

“When you see Her Majesty,” Ann continued, her expression turning sour, “can you remind her I’m a housekeeper and not a postman?”

The note asked Will to be at the theatre an hour earlier than usual, though it didn’t say why.

She thought of not going, of saying she didn’t get the note. But it was no good.

Ann disliked Kitty, but she hated liars more.

Will couldn’t bear the thought of being caught lying, and how angry Ann would be.

Will would go as asked but she was determined to speak as little as possible.

The sea front was busy with visitors, families sitting in deckchairs, listening to the brass band playing.

She passed the wall where she and Fred had eaten periwinkles, where she’d jumped to the sands and run away, Fred’s calls ringing in her ears as hers must have rung in Kitty’s.

Finally, Will reached the familiar door of Foxwell’s Music Hall, its plaster wreaths and swags turned shabby by the wind.

She slipped through the turnstile. The theatre was a different place without the audience.

It smelled stale, the air thick with the smell of pipe smoke and the shellfish smuggled in by bystanders.

It was a smell she’d known all her life, linked to music and excitement.

It never failed to make her pulse quicken.

The gas jets were turned high, as if the walls had been peeled away to let in the sun.

Some of the stagehands were sweeping the auditorium floor, setting up tables and chairs for the evening performance.

A piano was playing, the sound echoing strangely in the empty hall.

On stage was Kitty, her hair loose, hands on her hips as she rehearsed her opening song.

As her voice soared, filling the air, the activity stopped.

The stagehands stood captivated; dancers drifted in from the wings, from the box office and the dressingrooms.

Will stopped by one of the columns supporting the balcony, transfixed.

When the song came to an end, everyone clapped, the men whistling, Kitty laughing, blowing kisses.

Slowly, Will walked to the stage, half hoping not to be seen.

But the lights were too bright to hide and Kitty’s eyes fixed on her. “Will. Come up.”

For a moment, everyone turned to look at her.

Reluctantly, she walked up the steps at the side of the stage.

Kitty bustled to take her hand.

“I’m so sorry about yesterday, Will, dear,” she said in a low voice.

“I had to see my family and . . .” A look crossed her face. “It’s difficult.”

For a moment, she looked just like any other girl from the Slops – worn down, worried – and Will felt her heart soften. Kitty squeezed her hand. “I thought of the perfect way to make it up to you.” She released Will and walked to the edge of the stage.

“Danny, do you have that sheet?”

She took a sheet of music from the piano player and handed it to Will.

“You know this one, don’t you?”

The words jumped off the page, stirring the tune to Will’s throat.

“‘The Boy In The Gallery’? Everyone knows it.”

“Well,” Kitty said, gesturing to the hall. “Let’s see if they can hear you at the back.”

She laid a comforting hand on Will’s arm.

“Come on. You wanted my advice. I need to see what I have to work with.”

The paper rustled, trembling in Will’s hand.

All the years she’d worked at the theatre, all the hours she’d swept and cleaned and taken tickets, always singing to herself, watching every show, learning every tune.

She’d never stood there on the stage, the limelight burning, the jets whistling.

Her stomach seemed to shiver and roll, pitching like a boat on a spring tide.

Danny had been Foxwell’s piano player since Will was a little girl.

She’d sung along with him more times than she could count as she was sweeping up.

Now, Will felt awkward with him, thinking she detected a glint of derision behind his kind eyes.

But Kitty King was offering to teach her.

Though Will’s palms were sweating and her pulse beat uncomfortably hard in her throat, she raised the sheet music, nodded to Danny and began to sing.

Her voice felt too small, a breeze blowing through her throat when it should have been a gale. But Kitty was smiling, and when Will glanced at Danny, he

was peering over his glasses.

The more she saw the encouraging faces, the stronger her voice became.

She let the sound reverberate through her chest, felt the power of it running through her with a pulse of excitement.

She was doing what she’d always dreamed of, singing on stage, Kitty King beside her, the theatre ringing with her voice.

Finally, the song came to an end, the piano vibrating to silence.

For a moment, she’d been caught by the melody, by the words, by the dream of a man she cared for sitting in the gallery.

Reality shook her back to the stage. A cough rang out from the back of the hall. A giggle followed it.

She looked down at the well-lit auditorium, to the stage hands and dancers who’d stopped to watch.

In the dazzle of the lights, all she could see was eyes.

“That was quite a thing.” Kitty’s smile was strained, the furrow between her eyes deeper than ever.

Will’s heart seemed to jump into her throat, her stomach falling and falling, never stopping.

“It was bad, wasn’t it?” All this time, all the dreams she’d had, and she couldn’t sing?

“Oh, no, no,” Kitty said hastily. “It wasn’t bad. Not bad at all.”

“It was lovely, pet,” Danny called, taking a cigarette stub from behind his ear and lighting it.

But Kitty’s smile had dropped completely. “Then what?” Will said. Kitty paused.

“It’s only, well . . . You don’t smile when you sing.” “I’m not sure what I do.” Will had never considered her face before, only the feeling of the notes, the purity of the melody and how light it made her feel.

“Well, it’s something you must work on. The crowd wants to see an agreeable young thing on the stage.

“The men want to imagine themselves as your sweetheart in the balcony.” Kitty’s hands rested on her hips again.

“They won’t want to if you can’t smile.”

“Very expressive performance, I thought,” Danny muttered. “Hit every note perfect.”

Kitty scowled.

“It’s not about hitting the notes perfect. It’s about winning the crowd.”

“And not pulling a face like a slapped kipper!” a voice echoed from the back of the hall. A dancer.

Danny stood up, trying to see who’d shouted.

“Keep your opinions to yourself.” He smiled at Will. “Don’t you worry, love. What do they know?”

But they did know. They were the girls who saw every turn, every show.

They came on nights off, went to the other theatres to see who was playing, to comment on the quality of the music and of the voices.

If they hated her, then the audiences would, too.

“This was a mistake.” Will felt as if she’d been dropped in hot water, scalded from ankle to ear. “I’m sorry, Kitty. Danny.”

How foolish she’d been to think she could stand up there and be like Kitty.

Her instinct was to run and hide.

But Will was a Foxwell. This was her theatre.

She had to walk back in there tonight, the next night and every one for the rest of her life.

She would not cry. She would not run. She would stare them down, every one of them.

The gaslights burned her eyes, the smell of smoke and shellfish turning her stomach as never before.

But she made it down the steps to the auditorium to walk through the hall, past the gawking stagehands and the sniggering dancers.

Only when she was out on the street did she allow the tears to fall.

She knew one thing. Everything had been better before Fred left.

The Winter Gardens shone like a chandelier in the night, every column and doorway shimmering with electric lamps.

Charlie helped Kitty down the steps of the carriage. She slipped elegantly to the pavement.

“So gracious of you to invite us, Kitty,” he said.

It was the most important night in the town’s calendar – the Lord Mayor’s Ball.

Charlie had never been invited before.

He’d only been invited this time because Kitty insisted, but it was a start.

“Dad. Can I have a hand down?” Will stood, hunched in the door of the carriage, one foot twisted at an awkward angle on the step.

He offered her his arm, her weight a sudden shock after Kitty’s tiny frame.

“I don’t understand why we had to hire a cab,” Will muttered.

“It’s only a ten-minute walk from home.”

“We couldn’t very well march along the front in our gowns,” Kitty said, taking Charlie’s arm again.

“It would ruin your hair, Wilhelmina, and you have it looking so lovely.”

Will’s smile looked unnatural, as if it hurt. “Thank you.” Charlie didn’t understand women.

He’d expected Kitty’s invitation to delight his daughter, but she’d done little but complain since the announcement.

She’d shown scant gratitude to Kitty. Anyone might think she didn’t want to go to the most respectable event of the town’s social calendar.

Whatever had upset her would surely be forgotten once they were inside.

“Miss Wilhelmina,” Barney Budge said, affecting a low bow.

“Would you give me the honour of taking my arm?”

Will made a noise somewhere between a giggle and a snort and took Barney’s arm.

Charlie would have to watch that one.

What was the point of bringing Will out to such an event if she spent all evening with a manservant? Kitty squeezed his arm. “Don’t fret. I shall keep Barney entertained,” she whispered to him.

What a wonderful soul Kitty was.

“Now, Mr Foxwell,” she said, smiling widely. “Shall we go in?”

He nodded and they turned towards the door.

A small crowd had gathered, all eyes on Kitty, and as they took their first steps, a ripple of applause ran through the crowd.

Charlie’s chest swelled, his chin raised high, and he walked through the gathering, nodding at the smiling faces.

Tonight would be the best evening of their lives.

The Winter Gardens looked more wonderful than he could have imagined, the walls draped with foliage, every table stacked high with peaches, grapes, even pineapples.

He recognised many of the faces, though he’d never been so close to the business owners, the dignitaries from the town council and their wives.

A string quartet played in one corner.

“Wonderful!” Kitty exclaimed as they pushed towards a space set aside for dancing.

“Wilhelmina, would you mind if I borrow your escort?”

A slight flutter of her lids that might have been a wink and Kitty and Barney Budge were gliding around the floor.

“Dad! They’re serving champagne.” Will tugged his sleeve like a child.

“Wilhelmina!” Charlie had to stop from slapping her hand away. “Only common people use the word ‘dad’. Call me Father.”

She gave him a long, cold look that so resembled the ones Ann had been giving him that he had to remind himself they weren’t mother and daughter.

“And no, you may not have any wine,” he said. “It’ll go to your head.”

Her face fell and he regretted his sharp tone.

But Will was already walking away, pushing past the people as if they were a crowd of normal folk, not respectable at all.

So much for his chances of finding Will a husband.

For half an hour or more he paced the Gardens, trying to enjoy the glittering

glassware, the music.

He even tried a glass of the champagne, though he found himself yearning for a cup of tea.

What was wrong with him? This was the night he could begin to move within society, but the room was too warm, the voices too loud and sharp.

Strange how those things never bothered him at the theatre.

Then he saw, just a few feet away, a silver-haired man he recognised.

The mayor himself, Joshua Scadden, was talking to a smaller man, his face hidden, whose hair was dark and heavily oiled.

This might be his chance, his one and only chance to speak to the mayor.

Would it be seemly to offer the man free entrance to the theatre?

Perhaps not. But then, what was more acceptable than one man of business entertaining another?

He could close the balcony, hold it aside just for the mayor and his family.

Did Scadden have a son of marriageable age?

He shook his head as if to clear it. Introductions first. The rest would follow.

He pulled himself up tall, tugged his waistcoat straight and pushed through the throng.

Scadden was listening intently to the man with the oily hair, so Charlie skirted round the side, waiting for a gap in the conversation.

When the pause came, he stepped forward.

The smaller man turned. “Ah, Foxwell,” Gregory Gillespie, owner of the Premier Theatre, said.

“Joshua, this is Mr Foxwell, the man I was telling you about.”

The air rushed from Charlie’s chest. Gregory Gillespie was on first-name terms with the mayor.

Scadden shot Charlie a curious look, giving his hand a perfunctory shake.

“Foxwell runs, well . . .” Gillespie chuckled. “You know where.”

“Ah, yes,” the mayor remarked.

“Charlie,” Gillespie went on, eyes glittering, “you’ll be interested in this. I was just telling Joshua about the improvements to the Premier.”

“Improvements? You’ve only been open six months!”

“We must always give the public new marvels.”

“Quite. Er, so what improvements are these?”

Gillespie traced a shape in the air with his hands. “Electric light.” “Electric light?” “Fully electric,” Gillespie emphasised. “Gas lighting is so old-fashioned, don’t you think? Smelly, dangerous, gloomy. Only fit for the lower sort.”

Somehow, the evening had slipped away from Charlie, shattering around him like broken glass.

He realised he’d been silent for a while. He must say something intelligent.

“What of the cost, Gillespie? Surely, such expense –”

Both men laughed. “Forgive me, Foxwell,” Gillespie said, “I was only saying to Joshua how well the Premier is doing.

“There’s a deal of profit to be squeezed from this little town. If you have the intellect and the vision.”

He flashed Charlie a smile that was all steel and ice.

Gillespie and the mayor began to laugh again, a sound too hard to be joyful.

Charlie made his excuses and hurried away.

Later, on the carriage ride home, Kitty and Barney laughed together, recounting the people they’d spoken to, the stories they’d heard.

All the while, Will stared out of the window, silent and withdrawn. She looked so alone it made Charlie’s heart ache.

The evening had not been a success, but he was determined to find his Will a husband at any cost, and soon.

To be continued.