‘Is that what you think I should do? Fill my diary with the headaches and boils of civil servants, attend to the bellyaches of people of no significance?’ He threw down his cutlery with a loud clatter.
At least I no longer jumped at his little tantrums; I was perpetually braced for them. ‘Isn’t word of mouth a good endorsement?’ I replied. ‘Civil servants or not. The more people you treat, the more chance you have of receiving a recommendation to someone well connected. I’m sure this other work is enticing, but you cannot expect a quick path to success, Thomas. Look at Dr Shivershev: his books are full. I had to mention our relationship from my time at the hospital to get an appointment.’
As soon as the words left my mouth, I knew I had made a terrible mistake. Men do not like their property to show admiration for other owners. I held my breath and froze. When I looked up at him, he was staring straight at me, still as a statue. Without saying anything, he tossed his plate in the air. It landed on my glass, shattering it and covering me in wine and shards of glass. He stood up, pushed back his chair and walked out as if nothing had happened. The man who continually accused me of being oversensitive and melodramatic disappeared up to his precious attic like a spoiled child retreating to his nursery, chased by the ever faithful Mrs Wiggs, flapping her hands to fan his fragile ego.
On the positive, Mrs Wiggs and I had slipped into an unspoken agreement that we would ignore each other. I no longer tripped about the house, second-guessing myself, feeling anxious that I might be inhaling the wrong way. There would be no more lectures on candles or hairbrushes. I had come to the idea that it was perhaps Mrs Wiggs that was the cause of many of our problems. I dreamed of being able to hire a meek, pock-faced girl to replace her. Thomas and I would get along much better without Mrs Wiggs to squeeze between us like a jealous lapdog. If I could get rid of her, then it would truly become my house.
I still felt the outsider under her feet, so to amuse myself and drive Mrs Wiggs mad with frustration at not knowing where I was, I had taken to spending my days in the city, wandering aimlessly, sitting in the British Library, visiting museums and churches, or walking in the parks when the weather was dry. At least this way she couldn’t report back to Thomas that I lounged about the house all day in a laudanum-induced stupor, poisoning him still further with shrewdly selected words that tarnished his impression of me.
*
The papers were now full of the news that the police were hunting a man they called Leather Apron, so it was a relief to learn that my husband was not the Whitechapel murderer after all. For a while it had seemed plausible, especially at night, when I had the most vivid dreams. I took more drops to try and snuff out the visions, but that only made them more surreal. Come daylight it seemed laughable.
Leather Apron was a petty criminal from Whitechapel. He was a well-known bully of prostitutes, and so many local whores had named him freely to the police that everyone was convinced he was the man. He was a Jew of no known trade and rumoured to be so depraved and devoid of human decency that he’d been rejected by his own community. He had also been missing since the night of Polly Nichols’ murder. The police had torn apart more than two hundred houses looking for him. It was true that I didn’t know where Thomas had been on those nights, but how many wives honestly knew where their husbands were of an evening? That was marriage. This was what I had traded my freedom for. I might as well get on with it.
The police complained of the crowds that continued to gather at the murder spots and outside the mortuaries where the bodies had been taken. I decided I would go to Whitechapel myself. I had this feeling that if I knelt on the ground and sniffed the pavement like a bloodhound, I would be able to dismiss the idea once and for all that my husband with the symmetrical whiskers had ever stood there, let alone stuck a knife in a whore and slit her open.
I took the river taxi all the way from Chelsea to Tower Hill, then the omnibus to Aldgate. I started at St Botolph’s, known as ‘the prostitutes’ church’ on account of the constant stream of mangy old trollops who circled it day and night. They sauntered in a slow circuit to avoid being stopped by the police. It was a farcical circus. They pranced openly in their short skirts with their ankles on display, their coloured scarves flowing around them, and their craggy faces smeared with make-up they had made or stolen, which only made them look older and more haggard. They jeered at men, touted for business and conducted entire conversations with each other by shouting to the woman behind or in front, but as long as they kept moving, the police pretended not to notice. I could not imagine what unhygienic horrors lay beneath those skirts; it was a wonder they managed to trap any man for business. Surely only a blind or suicidal drunk would be tempted to part with actual money for their services.
This was the opening act to Whitechapel from the Aldgate end. I walked up Petticoat Lane until it turned into Sandy’s Row and the pavements went narrow and the shops too. Space was so expensive there that all things shrank to fit their means. Everything was stacked on top of something else and every crawl space
