‘Ten shillings,’ he said.
I gasped. ‘For these? They’re worth far more! I need at least a pound!’
He was unaffected by my outburst; he continued to look at the counter, for whatever I was saying, he’d heard it all before. ‘The less you get, the less it costs you to get them back,’ he said philosophically.
And so I pocketed ten shillings, which was better than nothing, and indeed my purse so chinked with coins that I pulled Lucinda into the better sort of baker’s-shop and told her to choose whatever she fancied. She picked an apricot slice and a doughnut. I bought nothing for myself, but licked the sugar off my fingers once I’d handed her the sweets. I tried to fathom the extent of our debts, so I might know how much I dared spend on tonight’s meal, but I feared the plumb line of my mind might fall short of the true depths of our penury. In and out more slowly now our toes went over the cobbles, dodging the dung and the rotten fruit as we rounded the corner past the Royal Victorian Theatre and into New Cut. I eyed the knife-grinders and tinkers, and the gypsy chair-menders sitting on their wicker-bundles in the rain like roosting fowl, and I wondered at their ability to forge a living out of nothing, and whether it would come to that for me. We picked our way amongst the stalls of shoddy clothes, shoes and hardware, solicited the kindest-looking costermongers, and picked up some stewed eels, a pound of potatoes, half a dozen eggs, some butter and the like.
We returned home with our victuals, which Lucinda unpacked while I set about scraping the empty coal cellar for something to rekindle the fire. But straightways there was a knock at the door, and whoever was there did not wait for me to come and open it, for the door snapped into the room and nearly caught me in the face, and a tall man with grey sunken eyes and a bristly chin set himself to pacing round the parlour sniffing at my furniture like a rangy dog looking for somewhere to spray.
‘Mrs Damage? Weally, a pleasure. It’s you who’ll be owin’ us, then. Wo’ you got?’
‘I beg your pardon? Who are you?’
‘Now I be beggin’ yewer pardon. Skinner’s the name.’
‘Mr Skinner.’ I had heard that name before, but I could not remember where. ‘And you are?’
‘Acquain’ance of yer ’usband’s. We’ve been, ah, workin’ togevver, of sorts. ’E owes me. So you owe me nah.’
‘Why? What’s happened to him?’
‘I’ll let ’im tell ya that. But if ya want ’im back you gotta pay up. So I say agin, wo’ ya got?’ And then I remembered. Skinner was the most feared money-lender south of the river.
‘Have you kidnapped him?’
‘Naaa-ow. Dahn’t be so silly.’
‘I’m not paying you a penny until I speak to Peter.’
‘So ya got some, then?’
‘I’m not saying that.’
‘Well, you better ‘ad. Cos I can waise a bill o’ sale on this place tomowwa,’ he sneered, ‘but fwom what I can see, there ain’t enough tat in ’ere to make it worth the auctioneer’s fees.’
‘What does he owe?’
‘Fifty pahnd plus sixty per cent in’rest.’
‘Fifty! And sixty! He would never have signed to those terms! Why, he could have got a bank loan at seven per cent!’
‘It’s all here, in ’is own ’and. Wanna wead it?’
‘No, I do not. I shall take you to the magistrate.’ I started towards my shawl, gliding cautiously so that the coins in the purse at my waist would make not a chink and betray their presence.
‘Aa-aww, is that how you treat a chawitable man?’
‘Charitable! Why, you, you bully! You’re nothing but a crook, and a brute!’ I wrapped my shawl around my shoulders.
‘No, not me, Miss. I’m a vewitable philanthwopist. Ask anyone up this stweet. Anyone who’s been in any way embawwassed. Like yer old man was. Go on, look, here’s ’is own note of ’and.’
And I scanned the grubby paper he was holding, and read that a bill for fifty pounds was to be discounted, to be taken up quarterly in increments, with increasing interest, and saw the lawyer’s seal, and the terms laid out, and Peter’s signature at the bottom.
‘This is my vocation, miss. I became a money-lender aht o’ the goodness o’ me ’eart. Sammy Skinner, Good Samawi’an, at yewer service. Come nah, I’m a lot prettier than the tallyman who’ll be comin’ in to give ya a good dunnin’ if ya don’t pay me.’
‘Well, I’m sorry to disappoint you, Mr Skinner, but I don’t have any money to give you. You will have to deal with my husband when he returns. You will let him return, I trust? He won’t be able to pay you if he can’t work, so it’s in your best interests to let him go.’