Hetty Feather Read online

  'Please, oh, please buy my flowers,' I begged, but I could have been a sparrow cheeping for all the attention I attracted. Then a plain lady in charcoal grey paused nearby. She watched while Sissy and I accosted each passing gentleman. I wondered why she was lingering. Did she want a nosegay to brighten her severe outfit? I smiled in her direction.

  'Would you care to buy a posy, ma'am?' I asked.

  She shook her head and I drooped a little more.

  'Are you a regular flower-seller, child? I do not recollect seeing you here before.' She was looking at me strangely. 'What are you doing here?'

  'She's with me, missus. She's all right,' said Sissy protectively.

  'She looks a little tired,' said the lady.

  'I am, ma'am,' I said. 'If you buy some flowers, we will be able to buy a bite to eat. We have had no breakfast today, nor dinner.'

  'Are you both very hungry?' she said. 'I have an idea. Perhaps you would like to accompany me to a nearby teashop?'

  My heart jumped. A teashop! Oh, how I longed for a cup of tea and a bite to eat! But Sissy was looking dubious.

  'We ain't got the wherewithal to go in no teashop,' she said.

  'I will happily pay for you,' said the lady.

  'Oh, Sissy, please, do say yes!' I begged.

  She still seemed reluctant. 'What's the catch, eh?' she asked.

  The lady smiled. 'Yes, you're right, Sissy, there is a catch. I would like to ask you a few questions.'

  'What about?' Sissy looked alarmed. 'Look, missus, we bought our flowers fair and square from Covent Garden Market. I've got a regular pitch. We don't get no hassle from no one, not even the police. We're totally honest and respectable. We never go off with no gentlemen.'

  'I'm sure you're right. I'm not here on any official business, I promise you. I'll be frank. I'm a writer. My books are published by the Religious Tract Society. They are stories of street children very much like you.'

  'What's your name then?'

  'Sarah Smith.'

  Sissy looked at me. 'You read books, Hetty. Have you ever heard of her?'

  The only children's writers I knew of were Mr Andersen and the two Mr Grimms. I'd had no idea that ladies could write storybooks. I looked at Sarah Smith with great interest. She was staring back at me.

  'So you can read, Hetty?' she said. 'Who taught you?'

  Ah. I had to be a little careful now. I could not breathe a word about the hospital or she'd act like Madame Adeline, and want to take me straight back.

  'My brother Jem taught me, ma'am,' I said, truthfully enough.

  'And where is he now?'

  'I lost him long ago,' I said sadly.

  'So what is your name, child?'

  'Hetty Feather, ma'am.'

  She nodded as if she approved of my name. 'Then do please come with me, Hetty. And you too, Sissy. I simply wish to ask you a few questions to use as background for a new story of mine. I'm thinking of calling it A Penny for a Posy. Do you like the title? It will be all about little flower-sellers like you.'

  'Could you put us in your story, ma'am?' I asked excitedly. 'Could you use our names? Oh, I should so like to be in a real storybook.'

  'I don't want my name in no storybook,' said Sissy.

  She made it clear she was only accompanying me on sufferance. We made our way out to the busy thoroughfare of Regent Street. I thought we would go to a humble teashop full of working folk, but Miss Smith made for the door of a grand restaurant, all great glass windows and gilt decoration.

  'We can't go in there. We'll get chased away,' said Sissy. 'It's much too grand for the likes of us.'

  Certainly the waiter at the door was looking us up and down and glaring. Sissy was neat enough in her print dress, but her hair was straggly and she wore men's boots with their soles flapping. I looked even worse by now, my hair a-tangle, my brown dress dirty and crumpled, my bare feet filthy.

  'We are too shabby, miss,' I said.

  'Nonsense,' said Miss Smith, taking our hands. She led us into the restaurant, giving the waiter haughty directions. 'We would like a table for three, please. Could we have the menu brought straight away? My companions are very hungry.'

  The waiter bowed reluctantly and ushered us to a table right in the corner. He held the chair out for Miss Smith and then hesitated. Miss Smith coughed reprovingly. The waiter sat Sissy and me down too, though he grimaced, as if he'd been asked to seat two monkeys at the zoo.

  He made a particular to-do over Sissy's flower basket, trying to take it from her. Sissy hung onto it determinedly.

  'I'll put these in the cloakroom for you, miss,' he said.

  'No, you don't! I want them where I can see them. Anyone could help themselves in the cloakroom,' said Sissy.

  'Yes, that basket will be fine at our feet, under the table. The flowers smell heavenly,' said Miss Smith.

  The waiter did as he was told, though he raised his eyebrows and sighed. Sissy jutted her chin out and glared back at him, but she was biting her lip and fiddling with a lock of her lank hair. She stared at the gleaming knives and forks on the white tablecloth before us, clearly unused to copious cutlery.

  The waiter handed us three large menus. Sissy stared at hers, blinking rapidly.

  'What would you like?' said Miss Smith. 'You can have anything on the menu. What's your favourite food, Sissy?'

  Sissy shrugged her shoulders, seeming ungracious because she simply did not know what to say. I glanced down the long list of items, utterly astonished at the choice. I'd had no idea you could select whatever you wanted in a restaurant. I would have liked to linger over my choices, picturing each dish, but I knew I had to help Sissy as tactfully as possible. The words on the menu were just elegant squiggles to her.

  'If you please, I would like the steak-and-kidney pudding,' I said. 'Would you like that too, Sissy?'

  Sissy nodded dumbly.

  Miss Smith summoned the waiter back and ordered two meat puddings for us, and a little fish for herself. Then she poured us a glass of water each from a crystal carafe. Sissy and I drank thirstily while Miss Smith sipped. She started asking Sissy questions, perhaps trying to put her at her ease.

  'How long have you been selling flowers, Sissy?'

  'Since I was little.'

  'And what do you do in winter, when fresh flowers are in short supply?'

  'Sell oranges.'

  'Is your mother a flower-seller too?'

  'No, miss, she sewed stuff.'

  'What sort of a seamstress was she?'

  'I dunno.'

  'And what about your father?'

  Sissy sniffed, not bothering to reply. Miss Smith persisted gently, but Sissy's answers became more and more monosyllabic.

  Then our dinners arrived and all our attention was taken by the steak-and-kidney pudding, a great soft suet mound stuffed with choice meat and oozing with gravy. There were potatoes too, and carrots and peas, a big plateful.

  I waited cautiously in case Miss Smith wanted to say grace, but Sissy simply sat, stunned.

  'You may begin, girls,' said Miss Smith.

  I picked up my knife and fork and Sissy copied me, though she held the knife in her left hand and the fork in her right. I did not like to tell her in case I embarrassed her. She struggled with her cutlery but still managed to eat with gusto. I was surprised to see the inroads she'd made on her pudding almost immediately. Then I realized she'd transferred half of it to the napkin on her lap. I guessed she wanted to take it home for Lil. I hoped it wouldn't ooze gravy too soggily.

  'Now, Hetty, it's your turn to sing for your supper,' said Miss Smith. 'Tell me about your life. How did you come to be a flower-seller? What did you do before that? Start right from the beginning.'

  Sissy looked anxious, but I smiled serenely. I felt Miss Smith had been short-changed by Sissy, who hadn't provided her with any telling details for her Penny for a Posy story. I decided to do my best. I could not tell the truth of course, and relate my own story. I could picture a much more colourfu