Trapped in 1895

Cheryl was cheerful, she had the Saturday off. Mrs. Hill had asked a favour. She had a niece that professed she wanted to be a waitress and would Cheryl give her shift on Saturday so she could try it. Of course, she wouldn’t be paid, but Cheryl didn’t mind. She would have a day off and intended to go shopping with Mary.

She met Mary as she was leaving her house.

“What are you doing here?” Mary asked.

“I’ve got the day off. Let’s go shopping.”

“Shopping! How can you go shopping when women are oppressed all over this country?”

Uh-oh, thought Cheryl, following Mary as she strode purposely towards the park.

“Where are we going?”

“We are going to a suffragette rally?”

Oh no, she thought again, I’ve read about these rallies.

“Oh please Mary. Let’s go shopping. I don’t want to be put in prison and force fed.”

“Force fed. Whoever heard of such a thing? You are a strange girl, Cheryl Brown.′

Cheryl had an ominous feeling she should have worked this Saturday.

As they entered the park, she spotted a crowd at the bandstand and it was occupied by several women. Most were seated, but standing in the front was a young woman dressed in a man’s breeches. Cheryl had been imprisoned in huge bloomers, cotton slips and long dresses long enough to be mildly shocked by this. The lady was speaking, almost shouting, to the crowd.

“Rise up, sisters. Rise up. Overthrow the male oppressors. Free ourselves from the kitchen and the bedroom. Kill them a...”

Before she could continue, two ladies jumped up and pulled her from the bandstand. An elderly lady took her place.

“Ladies,” for the crowd was predominantly ladies, “ladies. We are not suggesting we abandon our roles as wives and mothers or leave our domestic responsibilities. We only ask for our voice to be heard in Parliament. To be given the vote and stand by our men as equals. We do not desire to dominate ...”

She didn’t finish. There was a blast of a whistle and police officers yelling, “Disperse, disperse! Go about your business. Go back to your houses.”

They entered the crowd, pulling women out and pushing them away with loud instructions to go home. A few women were treated roughly and in response a dozen young women, led by the trouser wearing lady lept on the officers, punching and scratching. This forced the policemen to start swinging their truncheons. Mary and Cheryl were looking for a way out when a policeman pushed an old lady to the ground. Mary went to help her and as she knelt, a policeman raised his truncheon to bring it down on her. Cheryl reached out and grabbed the policeman’s arm yelling, ’Don’t” then blacked out as another policeman hit her on the head .

She regained consciousness, murmuring, “Where am I?”

“You’re in the back of a police wagon,” said a rather cultured voice, “be still. You’ll be groggy for a while and you will need all your strength for what’s coming.”

Cheryl groaned and sat up. With a shock, she realised her feet were chained together and another to a bolt on the wagon floor with the others. There were four other women in the wagon. One of whom was trying to hold her bodice together, which had been ripped apart. A little bit of white breast poked out. Cheryl recognised the lady who looked after her.

“You were on the bandstand.”

“Yes. They always make a point of arresting one of the organisers.”

“Has this happened before?”

“Oh yes. Four times.”

“What will happen to me?”

“Well, that depends on the magistrate. Some are, secretly, of course, sympathetic. A small fine. Others just hate women so you would get a month, guest of her majesty.”

“A month, oh god,” muttered Cheryl. She had read about Victorian prisons.

“I’ll lose my job.”

“Your job, who cares about your job?” yelled a little brown haired woman, “I’ll lose my husband. He’ll throw me out of the house if he finds out I’ve been in prison. I’m not even one of your lot. I was just passing by.”

She finished and dissolved into tears. Ignoring her, Cheryl said to the cultured lady, “I’m Miss Brown, Cheryl Brown.”

“Doctor Lisa Mornington. We’ll be together a while. Perhaps we should introduce ourselves.”

The lady with the torn dress said, “Gladys.”

The one in tears said, “Bronwyn.” And the last said, “Marge.”

The wagon pulled into the watch house and a policeman climbed in, unlocking the chains from the bolt. The doctor was first, followed by Cheryl, but when Bronwyn was too slow to respond the policeman said, “Get moving, you miserable excuse for a woman.”

She drew herself up to her full height and said, “How dare you talk to me like that?”

The policeman responded by giving her a huge slap on the face, sending her sprawling. Cheryl held back. She had learned her lesson, but the doctor responded by kneeling beside the woman. The policeman, looking guilty, said, “She’ll be alright. My missus took worse than that. Now get up and move.”

All five women shuffled into the police station in front of the Sergeant.

If an ordinary policeman is scary, the Sergeant was a positive nightmare. He was the size and shape of a gorilla. He had huge shoulders and a flat stomach. Indeed, one could see, even with the uniform on, this was a man of muscle. No flab and fat there. His hands were huge, but the fingers were long. The backs of his hand were covered in thick, curly brown hair which disappeared under the cuffs of his uniform. He wasn’t bald, but his hair had been cut very short. He had a round, white face with tiny, intelligent black eyes and a Manchurian moustache that hung below his chin. The surprising thing, Cheryl noticed, was his lips. They were the sweetest, tastiest lips she had ever seen on a man. She had a sudden, insane desire to kiss them.

“Well, well, Doctor Mornington. Nice to see you again.”

“Nice to see you too, Sergeant.”

The Sergeant didn’t reply but stood up and walked out in front of the ladies.

“I’ve got six murders, twenty-five burglaries and countless assaults and I have to waste my time on women that should be at home pleasuring their husbands.”

“I’m not married, sir,” whimpered Cheryl.

The Sergeant turned to Cheryl and poked her so hard in the chest she fell backwards into the hands of the Constable behind her.

“Well, you bloody well should be. Lock them up with Lousy Lucy. She will show them what it is like not to have a husband. The magistrate can deal with them on Monday.”

“It’s a bit crowded down there Sergeant.”

“What! You want me to lock these women up with the real, mean, vicious, murdering women? I may be heartless but not cruel.”

“Fair enough. Come on, you lot.”

“Excuse me,” said the lady with the torn dress, “can I have something to cover myself with?′

The sergeant looked at the white skin poking out.

“Give her your jacket, Constable. Now beat it.”

Whereupon he whacked Cheryl’s bottom so hard it hurt, even through all the padding. The five dejected women shuffled down the corridor.

Outside the cell, the policeman unlocked the chains from their ankles and opened the door. The stench that emanated from the cell was overpowering.

“You could have emptied the slop bucket,” said the doctor.

“The slop bucket is empty. That’s Lousy Lucy.”

The five women edged into the cell, staring at Lousy Lucy on the only bed in the cell.

“I wouldn’t go sleeping in that bed if I were you,” he said, closing the cell door behind them.

The five women crowded one end of the small cell while Lousy Lucy had the other end.

“Wot are youse looking at?” she asked.

“Are you dead?” asked the doctor. “You certainly smell as though you are.”

“Youse are those women that’s trying to get something from men, aren’t you?”

“Well, yes, in a way,” said the doctor.

“All I get from men are the pox and babies for a few lousy shillings.”

“How many babies have you had?” asked Cheryl.

“I dunno. Five, six maybe. Anyhow I can’t have any more. The last I had to get rid of and it ruined my insides somehow.”

Cheryl looked at the doctor.

“She had an abortion, which went wrong.”

“Oh, you poor woman.”

Lucy stood up and towered over Cheryl.

“Poor bloody woman indeed. I ought to pull your hair out by the roots.”

Cheryl cringed and tried to hide behind the doctor.

“Calm down, Lucy,” said the doctor, “she’s just trying to be nice.”

Lucy went back to her bed. Seconds later everybody was gasping for breath.

As the hours wore on, they all spread out on the floor, well away from Lucy.

“I need a pee,” a little voice said.

“You know where the bucket is, Bronwyn.”

“I can’t pee in that,” she whined.

“It’s a well-known fact,” said the doctor, “if you hold your pee in too long, your bladder will burst and it will come out of your mouth.”

Bronwyn whimpered and crept to the bucket.

“Please don’t look,” she pleaded.

“Don’t worry, we won’t.”

A bored silence descended, broken only by Lucy’s snoring, then a little door opened and a tray was pushed through. Cheryl crawled over and found it contained a loaf of bread, a large chunk of cheese and a pitcher of cold tea.

“Ladies, I... I think this is dinner.”

Lousy Lucy sprang up from her bed, pulled Cheryl away and grabbed the bread and cheese, then leapt back onto the bed.

The doctor stood up, went over to Lucy, and said, “I’m good with a knife. If you don’t give me that bread and cheese, I’ll slice your left tit off.”

Lucy handed the food over and the doctor divided it up. Cheryl took hers, scraped the dirty thumbprint off, and ate it hungrily. Night approached, and each woman took a position on the cold stone floor while Lousy Lucy slept, snoring and farting on the bed.

The group in the cell settled down for the night with the five ladies spread out on the floor. It was very dark in the cell and the only light was moonlight through the tiny cell window. Cheryl had just fallen asleep when she felt her boots wrenched from her feet. She jumped up and through the severe gloom. She could see Lousy Lucy had put the boots on.

“That bitch has stolen my boots,” she yelled, waking up the cell and the surrounding area. She launched herself at Lucy, trying to retrieve the boots while Lucy pulled at her hair and tried to scratch her eyes. The entire police lockup erupted with cries of ‘Kill the bitch’ and others like it. The door burst open and several police came in and broke it up.

“Ok, ok. What’s all the ruckus about?” asked a police sergeant.

“That bitch stole my boots.”

Lucy just sat on the bed, waving her feet and grinning.

“Look, lady. I can make her give you back your boots, but do you really want to put your feet in there after Lousy Lucy has been in them?”

“He’s got a point,” said the Doctor, “I counted three different types of foot fungus on her.”

Cheryl threw her arms up in the air.

“I give up. Keep the damn things.”

“Ok, everybody back to sleep.”

He closed the door, and they were swallowed in darkness once again.

Light slowly filtered into the cell and Cheryl rolled over on the cold stone onto her back and groaned.

“What would you be doing on a Sunday morning?” asked the Doctor, struggling to sit up against the cell wall.

“Going to church, believe it or not.”

“The only time I was in a church, Father O’Connor groped me under my pinafore. He was a creepy old man,” said Lucy, belching and scratching herself.

“They’re all like that,” said Glady, “when I went to church there was a young priest. He didn’t do me, cause he knew what I would do, but he did plenty of others and some were boys too.”

“What happened to him?” asked Cheryl.

“Got promoted to bishop and sent off to Australia. I hope they gave him what for.”

“Wakey, wakey, suffragettes and Lucy. Your lovely breakfast has arrived,” a guard yelled through the inspection window. A tray containing a pile of cold bacon and a dozen cold sausages were all to be washed down with lukewarm tea. Everything looked like it had been made the day before. The Doctor divided it out with a slice of stale bread.

“Disgusting,” said Bronwyn, pushing her share away. “How’s a person supposed to survive on this?”

Lucy gobbled her share and grabbed Bronwyn’s, but Cheryl forced herself to eat hers.

There was a banging on the door, which was a signal to put everything back on the tray, eaten or not, then silence fell in the cell with each woman deep in her own thoughts. Cheryl was wondering what Mary would be doing at this moment when the guard spoke through the inspection window.

“Your souls are about to be saved. The Vicar is here.”

The door opened and a young vicar entered, almost immediately covering his nose.

“Good morning, ladies. Hope all is well.”

“Look around,” said the Doctor, “does it look all is well.”

“Or smell that way,” said Gladys.

“Ah, yes. The load falls heavily on the suffragette seeking only what is her right.”

“I keep telling everyone that I’m not a bloody suffragette. I was just passing by,” complained Bronwyn.

“And I’m just a bloody whore,” joined in Lucy. Cheryl kept her mouth shut.

“Quite, but I’m sure you all share the common cause of all women.”

“What and is it to get laid,” said Lucy.

She was immediately shouted down by the others.

“If you give me the names of your husbands, I will contact them and let them know you’re well. Now, let us pray.”

When it came to Cheryl’s turn she asked him to contact the Vicar Clerk.

Monday finally approached, and a policeman entered the cell, carefully stepping over the sleeping women and poked Cheryl in the side.

“You. Wake up.”

Cheryl stirred awake and stared at the policeman, wondering what fresh nineteenth century hell she was going to be subjected to now.

“You’re going up before the beak,” said the constable.

The ankle chains were put around her legs and two constables half carried her to the dock. She looked helplessly around her. People were moving around as if they had something important to do but ignoring her. Presently everyone stood as an old man in a wig sat in a big seat. He stared malevolently at Cheryl.

“Is this the impertinent woman that attacks honest constables in the execution of their duty?”

Cheryl couldn’t stop herself.

“I didn’t attack anyone,” she said. “I just stopped a policeman from hitting my friend.”

“So,” he said, “You prevented a policeman from carrying out his duty.”

“Well,” conceded Cheryl, “I suppose I did.”

“Two weeks in Newgate.”

“What?” shouted Cheryl, impulsively. “That’s ridiculous. I don’t deserve two weeks.”

“You’re right. Two months it is, take her to the cells.”

Cheryl’s legs buckled beneath her as two policemen dragged her to the cell and tossed her in beside Lousy Lucy.

“Back again, hey. All your friends have gone, their husbands turned up and took them.”

Cheryl was too miserable to care and crouched in the corner of the cell, crying.

Cheryl sat on the cell floor dejected and depressed while Lousy Lucy picked through her hair, swallowing lice with disgusting sounds of pleasure. All night she had kept asking Cheryl to let her pick through her hair and she eventually gave in.

“You sure have plump lice,” said Lucy

“What’s it like being a whore?” asked Cheryl, desperate to say something.

“Sometimes it’s good, most times it’s bad.”

“Don’t you make a lot of money?”

“Ah, darl. Aren’t you innocent? Look at me. Does it look like I do? Ugly Dan barely gives me enough to be alive.”

“Why do you stay with him?”

“I had a friend once. She tried to escape. They found three pieces of her and never found the head.”

“Don’t want to be insulting, but why would a man want to be with you?”

Lucy shrugged.

“I provide special services.”

Luckily, Lucy didn’t have the chance to elaborate when the cell door opened and a policeman dragged a woman in. She slumped onto Lucy’s bed.

“Hoy,” shouted Lucy, “that’s my bed.”

The woman dissolved into tears and slid onto the floor, sobbing.

Lucy shuffled over to her, resisting the temptation to look for lice, and put her arms around her.

“I... I’m sorry,” she mumbled.

“What did yer do to get in here?” asked Lucy.

“I... I killed my husband. I put a knife through his heart.”

Cheryl moved away.

“Wow. Impressive,” said Lucy.

“Why did you do it? Was he violent to you?”

“Not to me, but he attacked my lover. He would have killed him, but I killed him first,” she said, almost gleefully.

“You realise you will hang for that?” said Lousy Lucy. The woman sobbed. Lucy hugged the woman, then began to search for lice.

“What’s your name?”

“Minervah.”

Darkness descended on the cell, and all three women fell asleep.

Once more, the door slammed open in the morning and a policeman shoved a very large woman into the cell.

“Oh shit,” said Lucy.

“Well well, Lousy Lucy. Fancy meeting you here.”

“Look, Marge, I had to leave quick.”

“And left me with your two-month-old baby.”

“You said you wanted children.”

“Our children,” she yelled and gripped Lucy around the throat. The other two grabbed whatever they could and tried to free Lucy. In desperation, Cheryl picked up the slop bucket and hit her on the head. She collapsed just as a constable slid open the inspection hatch and shouted, “Everything ok here.”

Cheryl yelled back, “Yes”

They gathered around the unconscious woman.

“Alright Lucy, spill it, or I will let her loose on you,” said Cheryl.

Lucy slunk back.

“I had a baby when I was with Marge. We were lovers. She wasn’t the slightest bit jealous when I told her I was pregnant. I had money saved. We can go away and live together and bring up the baby, she said. It sounded good. I had two babies already and I have no idea what happened to them. To bring up my child with a woman I loved was unbelievable.”

“What happened?”

“Ugly Dan is what happened. Either I came back or he would kill the child. And he would have.”

“Did you tell Marge any of this?”

“No. I just got out as fast as I could. But I wish I knew what happened to my daughter.”

“She’s safe. I found her a nice foster family. She goes to school and church, something we never did,” said Marge, regaining consciousness.

Lucy sat down and put Marge’s head in her lap.

“I’m so sorry. Marge, will you forgive me?”

They spent the rest of the night, laughing and giggling on the bed while Cheryl sat on the floor with Minerva’s head in her lap, idly picking at her scalp.

They came to collect Minerva early in the morning, then pushed in a teenager yelling and screaming obscenities at the police officer who just ignored her. The door slammed shut, and the girl sank to the floor.

“Be careful where you sit, luv,” said Marge, “Somebody spilled the slop bucket over there.”

She jumped up, swearing and wiping her rear.

“Har, har, har, that was a good one, Marge.”

“Nobody spilled any bucket, miss,” said Cheryl, “they are just a couple of lying bitches.”

“Here, watch who you are calling a liar,” said Marge, rising to her feet, moving towards Cheryl, but the teenage girl moved between them.

“Hit her and I’ll rip every bit of hair from your head and wipe your arse with it.”

The teenager was smaller than Marge, but the intensity of the threat stopped her and she returned to the bed, glowering at the pair. Then the girl started coughing intensely, covering her mouth with her hand. Cheryl jumped up to hold her, but the girl pushed her away. The violent coughing stopped, and the girl lowered her blood covered hand. She wiped it on her dress.

“What’s your name?” asked Cheryl

“Janet.” said the girl, sinking to the floor, “what are you in here for?”

Cheryl related the entire story.

“Newgate, eh? Never been there but I hear it’s quite hellish.”

“What about you?”

“Stole two apples. I was starving.I was that busy eating them apples I didn’t see them creep up on me.”

“Are you an orphan?”

The girl laughed.

“I’m the daughter of a parish priest and my mother is a schoolteacher. My father raped me when I was fourteen and got me pregnant. My mother wouldn’t believe it was my father. She flew into a rage, beat me and called me an evil slut. My father threw me out, declaring I was no longer his daughter but an evil, lying demon. I lived in the streets and had a miscarriage. Just as well, it was hideously deformed.”

“You poor girl,” said Cheryl, “how did you survive?”

“Like we all do. Stealing, selling ourselves, begging, searching through garbage cans. You will too, just watch.”

She burst into more violent coughing as Cheryl contemplated just such a future.

“You’re not well,” said Cheryl, putting her arms around the girl”

“The cough is getting worse. Least in here I’m out of the cold.”

“How old are you?”

“Seventeen.”

The other two sat up and Lucy said, “I’ve seen people cough like that. They don’t live for long. ’ere, come up here and lie on the bed.”

She kicked Marge off and Cheryl helped the girl on to the bed.

“Thanks Lucy. That was kind of you,” said Cheryl.

Throughout the night Janet had sporadic, awful coughing fits. Cheryl tore a strip from her dress to use to wipe her face.

“How is she?” asked Lucy.

“It’s hard to tell. I can barely see her in this darkness, but I think she is coughing a lot of blood. Shouldn’t we call the guard?”

“Not this time of night. They couldn’t care less about us and would be in a bad mood. Likely to do more damage than good. Call them in the morning.”

Daylight crept in through the little window once more. Cheryl had fallen asleep wiping the blood from Janet’s mouth, her head resting on her arm beside Janet.

“Hoy, move bitch.”

Cheryl felt a foot in her ribs.

“I want to use the slop bucket,” said Marge.

Chery lifted the bucket and put it in the far corner and went back to Janet. Lucy joined her and tried to give her a drink of water.

“Have you ever been with a dying person?” asked Lucy.

“No,” answered Cheryl.

“I’ve been with lots. I don’t think this girl is going to last the day.”

Cheryl went to the cell door and yelled for the guard.

“What do you want?”

“The girl is dying. She needs a doctor.”

“A doctor. You’ve got to be kidding. Give me a yell when she’s dead and I’ll clear the body out.”

Cheryl was stunned.

“I told you,” said Lucy, “all we can do is make her comfortable.”

Lucy sat down beside Janet and wiped her forehead.

“I had a little sister. Would have been about the same age as this one. Dad wanted her to join the game as well as me. I had already laid with many men.”

“How old were you?”

“Sixteen when I started, but I was twenty when he wanted my sister to join me. She was seventeen.”

“What happened to her?”

Janet started coughing again and Lucy held the blood-soaked rag over her mouth then fed her some water.

“She ran away and dad caught her. He beat her, hit her on the head. It took her one hour to die, and I held her for that hour. She died in my arms.”

“What happened to your father?”

“They hung him two months later and then I was on my own.”

Lucy returned to wiping the blood trickling from Janet’s mouth when Janet turned to look at her.

“You’re a kind person, Lucy. I hope you find happiness some day,” said Janet.

She closed her eyes and didn’t speak again. Janet passed away in the afternoon and they didn’t come to collect her body until the next morning.

All three women lay huddled in the corner furthest from the dead Janet.

“I can’t sleep with a dead body next to me,” complained Marge. Cheryl had to agree. She was never at ease near sick people, let alone dead ones, and in the twenty-first century she was sure prisons wouldn’t leave a dead body lying around. She was beginning to wonder if she would survive in this century.

When daylight arrived, some men came in with a body bag and collected Janet.

“What will happen to her?” said Janet.

“Probably end up on someone’s dissecting table. Bodies like this one collect a handsome price.”

“He’s kidding, isn’t he?” she asked Lucy.

“Don’t be so shocked. Good business, supplying dead bodies to the universities. Wouldn’t mind getting in to it myself.”

Lucy jumped onto the bloodstained bed.

“Now I’ve got my bed back.”

There were just three in the cell now with Cheryl sleeping on the stone floor. She lay there listening to the other two snoring in unison on the bed while she wondered how she was going to survive Newgate. She stared at the pair on the bed. They were wrapped in each other’s arms. She was almost jealous. The door burst open and two constables marched in.

“You,” he shouted, pointing at the couple, “get up.”

Lucy was about to jump up but Margie said, “Stay there, luv. It’s me their after.”

Margi stood up and the two constables fastened chains all over her.

“Come on,” said the constable, yanking on the neck chain, and they marched out. Lucy didn’t move, and the door slammed behind them.

“I’m sorry, Lucy.”

Lucy swore and rolled over. Silence settled on the cell, but was soon disrupted by the inspection window being thrown open.

“Vicar coming in,” a guard announced and the Vicar Clerk walked in. Cheryl jumped up and went to hug him only to be thrown back against the wall by a guard.

“Touch him again and I’ll cave your skull in,” said the guard.

“Please Vicar, you’ve got to help me.”

“I would if I could, Miss Brown. If you were just a protestor, you would be free by now, but you assaulted a policeman.”

“But he was about to hit Mary. You know Mary, your cousin.”

“Yes, Yes. Look, we can get you out of here if you pay the prosecutor’s costs.”

“What would that be?”

“I’ve tried my best, but they want five hundred pounds.”

Her heart sank. There was no way she could raise that, and she knew the Professor couldn’t.

“The Professor is trying to find someone who will advance him the money.”

She decided.

“No, tell him to stop and concentrate on...”

She stopped in time.

“...what he has to do? I will do my time in Newgate.”

“Again, I’m sorry,” said the vicar and left.

Chery was in the cell with Lousy Lucy, waiting to be taken to Newgate. She was thoroughly depressed now and wondering how she ended up in a cell in the nineteenth century.

“Come over here, luv,” said Lucy, grinning evilly.

She got up and sat down beside Lucy, who started stroking her hair. Cheryl was used to this by now, but this time she was a bit uneasy.

“It’s a good way of getting rid of lice,” she said and plucked something from Cheryl’s scalp then swallowed it. Cheryl went to get up but Lucy, with surprising strength, pushed Cheryl down again and proceeded to groom her hair, occasionally plucking things from it.

“You have nice hair,” said Lucy.

“Thank you,” she responded.

She carefully parted the hair on Cheryl’s scalp then declared, “Got one.”

Cheryl was horrified, but didn’t move as Lucy’s fingers flitted across her scalp. It was oddly comforting.

“Everybody’s got lice,” she said. “I’ve even got them in my love bush.”

Cheryl refused to even think about that.

“Is it bad in prison?”

“Ooohhh, yes luv. The bad ones get you and do things.”

“What things?”

“I’d rather not say.”

“Will you be with me?” she asked timidly.

“Not me. I’ll be out tomorrow.”

Cheryl jerked up.

“But why? You got three months in the same prison I have.”

“Yes, but my pimp has paid my prosecutors’ costs. Do you have somebody to pay yours?”

Cheryl’s morale hit a new low when the cell door opened, and a policeman entered.

“Alright, Lucy, you can go. Your pimp is here”

Cheryl looked up in wonder as Ugly Dan entered.

“Well, my goodness, look who’s here.”

Cheryl cringed even more. Ugly Dan turned to the policeman, passed him a parcel and said, “I’ll buy her out too.”

“Get out of here,” said the policeman and Cheryl staggered up, heading for the door as Ugly Dan grinned and said, “You owe me three hundred quid”.

Cheryl was escorted out of the police station and stood in the pavement without the slightest idea where she was. She approached a man strolling along the footpath.

“Excuse me, sir.” she said.

“Get away from me, you filthy harlot,” he thundered and hurried off.

With dismay, Cheryl realised she was just that, except for the harlot bit. She was filthy. For the last nine days, she had slept on a filthy cell floor with no change of clothes and not even a wash and she could smell herself. She wandered along the footpath, desperately trying to recognize something and her feet felt numb with the cold. She looked at her feet. She used to be very proud of them and kept them manicured and painted, regularly. Now the nails were growing out of her toes and the dirt reached up to her ankles.

She was desperate and shivering. If she could get enough money, maybe she could get an omnibus. She decided she would have to hit bottom and beg.

“Please, sir. Could you spare a penny?”

She was ignored, spat at, insulted. propositioned. She was also hungry. She got very little to eat in the police cell and found herself searching the bins behind a restaurant, but was driven off when a couple of rats attacked her. Night approached and a desperate, dejected Cheryl slumped to the ground in a closed shop entrance. At least the snow would not fall on top of her while she lay there waiting to die. Her eyes were closing when a voice cried, “Gran, gran. Please don’t die.”

She forced herself awake to find, at the back of the entrance, a young girl hugging a pile of clothing. She staggered up and approached her. An old woman’s head appeared above the pile and the girl looked up.

“My gran is dead,” she said, her face set in a mask, “help me take her clothes off.”

“But why?”

“She’s dead and we’re not. We will freeze when we fall asleep, unless we have these clothes to keep us warm.”

Cheryl wondered if she could sink any lower as she stripped the clothes off an old, dead woman. They left her underwear on, if you could call it that. Cheryl and the girl wrapped the filthy, louse ridden clothes around themselves. Cheryl immediately felt warmer.

“What’s your name?” asked Cheryl.

“Maggie, I don’t know the last one.”

“I’m Cheryl. I just came out of the police cells.”

“Terrible places. I’m so tired,” said the girl and cuddled into Cheryl under all the clothes. They may have been filthy, louse ridden rags, but they were thick and warm.

They emerged from the pile of clothes at dawn and looked at the old woman, curled up in the foetal position in her underwear. She was frozen solid.

“What will we do with her?” said Cheryl.

“Can’t do nothing. The council will collect her. Come on, we need to get something to eat.”

They walked past a bakery and the smell of freshly baked bread drifted out.

“Do you know how to faint?”

“What do you mean?”

“Gran was good at it. You faint, I make a lot of noise. They all come out to help and I nick the food. Gran and I did it all the time.”

Cheryl was desperately hungry, so she staged a faint, moaning loudly, swaying, then sinking to the ground. Maggie started crying for help and people streamed out of the bakery around Cheryl. Maggie slipped in and pinched two loaves of bread and slipped out, but she was seen.

“The little bitch has stolen some bread.”

Maggie took off like a racehorse, but two men pulled Cheryl to her feet and accused her of being an accomplice. She broke down, pleading and begging to be let go.

“You’re going to jail, harlot. It’s a crime to steal bread.”

She was about to faint when a familiar voice said, “Let that woman go, sir.”

The Profesor bounded out of a carriage followed by Harry.

“Who are you?”

“Professor Schmidt and this young woman’s guardian. What has happened?”

“She has stolen two loaves of bread.”

“Then I shall pay you for four if you let her go and don’t involve the police.”

“Six.”

“Done.”

Harry helped an almost unconscious Cheryl into the coach and they returned to the professor’s house. Mrs. Cole rushed out to meet them and Cheryl fell into her arms.

“Oh Mrs. Cole, Mrs Cole. I thought I was going to die.”

“You smell as if you have, dear. Let’s get you into the kitchen and into a bath.”

Cheryl was about to go upstairs and remove her clothes, but Mrs. Cole stopped her.

“You’re not tramping through my house like a travelling garbage dump. You will strip off here and put this robe on while I stoke up the coppers’ fire then sit on that stool.”

Cheryl complied while Mrs. Cole got her lice kit out.

“This is going to take a while, but it will give time for the water to heat up.”

An hour and a half later, as Cheryl was subjected to a large number of ‘Oohs’ and ‘Aaahs’ she was declared lice free.

“Wha... What about my love bush?” stammered Cheryl.

“Have you been doing anything you shouldn’t have been doing, if you know what I mean?”

Cheryl did.

“No, I haven’t had the chance.”

“Then you’ll be ok. Get in the bath.”