The Apple. Michel Faber
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had put a great deal of thought into how she might renege on her promise without suffering unpleasant consequences.
She considered spending Thursday entirely indoors, ironing her clothes, mending the seam in her camisole, and generally giving her body a rest. But there was no telling what the Rat Man might do if frustrated in this fashion. He might look for her every day afterwards.
She considered brazening it out, telling him she’d had second thoughts, and showing him a middle finger neatly clipped. If he got angry, she could simply call for assistance, couldn’t she? London was crawling with policemen lately, as well as do-gooders of all kinds. Surely one of them would come to her rescue? ‘This man is making indecent propositions to me,’ she could plead. But perhaps this was not a very wise idea after all. She was known by sight to several local policemen. If there was a complaint against her from a gentleman (however ugly or scarred he might be), they would cheerfully throw her in prison.
She considered murdering the Rat Man, just to remove him from her life. But she had to admit that this seemed an excessive response to her fear of embarrassment, more the sort of response one might expect from a man than a woman. Also, she had no means of killing anyone, not even a knife. Was she supposed to strangle Mr Heaton in the street? The whole notion was daft, and she didn’t know why she’d even thought of it, other than the thrill it offered.
She considered fleeing altogether, plying her trade in a different part of the city. Lord Jesus, one little nail grown half an inch, and here she was, planning to wrench herself away from St Giles just as she was getting the hang of it! But this, too, was mere fantasy. Her preferred lodgings were with Mrs Porter in Queen Street and there was a nice public house near the Broad Street junction where she had a growing reputation as a clean girl with not a mark on her. Also there was Dickie’s Chophouse in Seven Dials, where she could eat as much as she wanted, within reason, as long as she never spoke a word to Mr Dickie’s wife.
No, she must keep her appointment with the Rat Man.
Thursday came, and Clara rendezvoused with Mr Heaton in the usual place. Without further discussion, she fell into step with him as he limped briskly along Dudley Street. He was dressed in a voluminous, knee-length overcoat which made him look like an impresario. A down-at-heel impresario, perhaps: the coat was slightly moth-eaten. For the first time it occurred to Clara that her benefactor might not be especially wealthy. Could he ill afford the money he’d been giving her? She felt a twinge of conscience, and dealt with it the only way she knew.
‘I want my ten shillings now,’ she said.
He handed them to her even as they walked. As if he’d been expecting this moment and had the coins already enclosed in his palm.
How would they get to Southwark, she wondered? It must be quite far from here, as none of her prostitute friends knew of it. Did the Rat Man mean to take her on an exhausting march, or would they board an omnibus together, like husband and wife? She didn’t like the idea of hordes of strangers presuming that there must be an intimate relationship between herself and the Rat Man; she wished she’d fobbed him off with a simple fuck six weeks ago, instead of getting herself mixed up in this malarkey.
‘Is it far?’ she said.
His arm jerked into the air, and she flinched in fear of being struck, but he was only hailing a cab.
‘The Traveller’s Rest, Southwark,’ he said.
‘Very good, sir,’ said the cabbie. ‘Going for the special keg they keeps downstairs, are you sir?’
‘Indeed.’
‘I’m partial to a bit of that meself, sir. Very tasty.’
Clara and Mr Heaton climbed into the cabin. Mr Heaton seemed not at all surprised that the cabbie knew the reputation of The Traveller’s Rest. For a moment, Clara caught a glimpse of a London which was vastly richer in attractions than she and her cronies had any notion of, and which other folk made it their business to explore. It was not a picture she had any desire to see. Indeed, the Rat Man seemed to specialise in showing her glimpses of things she would prefer to remain ignorant of.
‘How will I get home when it’s over?’
The Rat Man smiled sadly. ‘I trust we’ll both agree when it’s over.’
‘But you don’t live where I live.’
‘I’ll take you home first.’
Clara nodded, unconvinced. If she’d learned anything since her fall into prostitution, it was not to rely on the courtesy and generosity of others. The cab seemed to be travelling a very long way, and every clack of the horse’s hooves on the cobbles emphasised that she was farther and farther from the streets she knew. The ten shillings stowed in the pocket of her dress would do her no good if she was robbed and left for dead in a dark unfamiliar neighbourhood. To prevent that happening, she was now under pressure to remain on good terms with the Rat Man, to please him or at least not quarrel with him. She didn’t know if it was possible for them to spend a whole afternoon together, especially one involving rats and dogs, without quarrelling.
‘I hope we have understood each other about the nail,’ he said, his face turned away from her in the shadowy cabin.
‘The nail, sir?’
‘You mustn’t be gentle with it, you understand? You must push it as deep inside as your finger will go.’
‘I’ll do me best, sir.’
‘You needn’t worry about hurting me.’
‘I won’t, sir.’
‘And don’t pull it out until …’ He turned even more sharply away from her, as though he had just spotted someone of his acquaintance passing by in the street. ‘Until it’s over.’
‘How can I be sure of that, sir?’
He turned to face her then. His mouth was set hard. The scarred flesh on his face was pale, while his cheeks were flushed and mottled.
‘The last rat will be dead,’ he said.
The Traveller’s Rest was on the other side of the world. The cab had to cross the Thames to get there, past Waterloo, where Clara had been once or twice with her mistress, and then farther still. The pub itself, when they finally reached it, hardly seemed to warrant the length of the journey. It impressed Clara as a low sort of establishment, the kind where shiftless men drank with serious intent. The atmosphere was brewed thick with pipe smoke and alcohol fumes, and the regulars hunched low as if to take the occasional breath of oxygen from somewhere under the tables. A patch of floor where the floorboards had rotted away was crudely mended with planks of a different colour, the jagged edges covered over with tar. The fireplace was choked with ash and amber embers. Several of the gaslights were turned off or had ceased to function, and the scarcity of glass in the room meant that it wholly lacked the mirrored conviviality of the pubs Clara frequented. Instead, dark brown wood stole the light and refused to give it back.
‘I don’t like it here,’ she whispered to her companion.
‘This isn’t what we’ve come for,’ he whispered back. ‘What we’ve come for is downstairs.’
Clara couldn’t see any stairs. She craned her head around a pillar, and saw only more half-sozzled men staring back at her from their drinking stations. She had expected a bright, theatrical-looking banner hung up to generate excitement about the impending rat fight, but there was nothing of the sort. Indeed there was scant decoration on the walls – just a few curling handbills advertising recently bygone entertainments in more salubrious-sounding establishments than The Traveller’s Rest. There was also a hand-lettered notice saying ‘BEWARE OF SODS’.
Mr Heaton walked up to the publican. They nodded at each other without a word, shook hands … or perhaps a coin was being passed from one man to the other. Then the publican, Mr Heaton and Clara passed through the room to the very rear, where the publican pulled open a trap-door in the floor. A flight of stairs was revealed, illuminated by a light of unclear origin. The tobacco