Poor Girls by Clare Whitfield

Author:Clare Whitfield
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781837930845
Publisher: Head of Zeus

CHAPTER THIRTY

EFFIE HAD BEEN ARRESTED IN THE STATION, WAITING for the next tube to Waterloo. The Two Anns had found out after schlepping to the police station on the sniff for information, where the desk sergeant told them Effie was about to leap onto a carriage as a policeman grabbed her and led her out in handcuffs, spitting and cursing. She had been booked in under the name Effie Deets, avoiding her birth name of Ethel Mary Castle. One she despised that also came with a record. Miss Deets was to be kept on remand in Holloway until her day in west London assizes, where she would be judged by a magistrate. Now Effie needed a defence, and that meant telling Queen Alice Diamond. Lil didn’t take the news particularly well either.

‘Fuck! Alice will go mad! Half of us weren’t there, you two should never have been in that district. It wasn’t on our rota! What were you thinking?’ shouted Lily. ‘We must tell Chrissie first.’

‘It might have been my fault. I’d convinced Effie to the meeting with the maid on condition we went hoisting one more time. She was in an odd mood; I shouldn’t have agreed to the last job.’

‘Nell, this was Effie’s doing. She’s always been rogue when in a sulk. When she gets herself upset, she lashes out and to hell with the consequences, for her or anyone else. I love her to pieces, Nell, but sometimes I could wring her scrawny neck.’ Lily was steaming. Charlie had yet to be told, but Nell was worried about Effie.

Being arrested was Nell’s perfect hellscape. That day she had come as close to being arrested as she ever wanted to, ever. It could have been her languishing in a cell right now at the station. It very nearly had been. She was beside herself fretting for Effie.

‘What can we do?’ she asked Lily. ‘Poor Effie! I can’t bear to think what’s she’s going through right now.’

‘Let me tell you something about Ethel Castle, Nell,’ said Lil, sitting down in the kitchen and pointing to the other chair so Nell would join her. ‘That girl will always land on her feet. Please do not worry about Effie. She may seem fragile, but she has a knack of always coming out smelling of roses, trust me! I know her. She is like a sister to me, but you can love your little sister and be a little frightened by her at the same time. Right now, we need to tell Chrissie and hope to God she volunteers to tell Alice for us. The sooner the better.’ Lily huffed. ‘I suppose it should be me…’

‘I’ll do it,’ said Nell. ‘I was with her, and you weren’t, so that’s not fair.’ She perked up with an idea. ‘What if I raised the idea with Chrissie about other work, without mentioning the hotel exactly? See what she says.’

Lily balked, then to Nell’s horror burst out hysterically laughing, only to turn very grave when she’d calmed down with a sigh.

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