The Dolocher Page 7
Chapter 7
Mary Sommers was the only known person to have witnessed any of Thomas Olocher’s crimes. Her tearful testimony and her fingering of Olocher as the murderer of her aunt were instrumental in his being sentenced to death. Many thought that it was the fact that she had seen him slash his own legs in frenzy during the attack that had sealed Olocher’s fate. When the trial was over, Olocher gave her a menacing look before he was led away to the Black Dog prison at Newgate. She had felt the same fear she had when trapped in that closet while he butchered her aunt; she was breathless every time she faced him in the courtroom, and even when she thought about him or heard his name mentioned, she could feel the restriction of breath in her lungs and throat. While lying down to sleep, she often imagined that he was on top of her, clutching her throat and using his weight to cave in her chest. When the trial was over, she was thanked for her bravery and testimony and was left to fend for herself.
When she went back to where she had lived with her aunt, the landlord asked if she had any money. She didn’t, and when she told him this, he said that he was very sorry for everything that had happened to her and her aunt, but she was going to have to leave in a week’s time if she could not pay the rent on the room. Mary was devastated, and she spent that whole night crying.
She had never worked before, and she knew how to do nothing of any value. When she asked the landlord what she could do, he simply shrugged and said that she was a clever girl and that she would figure it out. She felt she was a clever enough girl, but that didn’t translate into anything she could think of to do. For two days, she barely left the room she rented, only going out for small bits of food. What little money she had could only go on food for now, and she knew that it was going to run out much sooner rather than later, no matter how little she thought she could get by on without starving.
She finally got the idea to go to the coffee houses, tea houses, and taverns to see if she could do any tidying or cleaning. Though she was pretty and pleasant, she found that these places wereinundated with girls like her looking for work. One tavern said that their woman had become ill and that she could fill the post for the time being, but the hours were late into the evening and the pay was lower than she expected. She accepted, though, knowing that even if she was put out onto the streets, she would need every penny she could make to feed herself.
As she went to look for other work to supplement her meagre income at various butchers, milliners, and other trade businesses, she met Sarah, a friend of her now-deceased aunt. Sarah was able to secure her some work assisting in the market at Temple Bar and also as a street vendor selling potatoes when one of the usual women couldn't make it to work (which it turned out was often). She would have to give half of what she made to the woman whose position she had taken, though. This didn’t seem fair, but she was told that this was the common practice and that if she didn’t like it, she didn’t have to do the work at all, and then she would get nothing.
This was all unreliable work, and by the end of the week, though she had done well to make anything at all, she could not afford to stay where she had lived for as long as she could remember. And so on a cold October morning, she walked the city with her bag over her shoulder and tears in her eyes, not having a notion as to where she was going to stay that night.
After doing this for some time, she found herself down by the river, where she saw the trade ships lined up along the banks and others in midstream waiting to dock. She wondered if she might get on to one of them and get away from this place, get to somewhere she wouldn’t need a roof over her head or clothes to keep her warm, but again the fantasy was short lived. She knew nothing of other places or languages and would be as bad off anywhere as here with no money in her pockets.
As she looked out at the grey light over the river, she was lost in thought of the food and clothes that were probably being loaded and unloaded for transit to England and beyond. She huddled against the walled banks that acted as a buffer against the biting wind that whipped the quays today. It must have been the third time her name was said before she registered someone was addressing her. “Mary, love?”
She tuned to find Sarah peering into her face. “Have you been crying, dear? What’s the matter?” Mary found she couldn’t speak just then, and the tears came again as she fell into the welcoming arms of the older woman’s embrace.
“What is it, Mary?” Sarah asked after giving the girl time to compose herself.
“I was put out of my room today.”
“And you have nowhere else you can go?” asked Sarah. Mary shook her head in sorrow and began to cry again. Sarah soothed her and rubbed her back. “Now, now, little girl. You can’t be crying so much over a small thing like this,” she said.
Mary was shocked, and she stopped crying, pulling back so as to be able to see Sarah’s face. “A little thing!” she almost cried out.
“Look around you, Mary,” Sarah said, gesturing in a circle. “Almost everyone you can see has had nights where there was nowhere to stay. You are lucky to have made it to your age before it happened to you for the first time.”
“What am I supposed to do?” Mary asked. “What do people normally do?”
“You can stay with me for tonight. That will get you started, and then we can try to sort something out for you,” Sarah said, and almost before she was finished speaking, Mary had grabbed her in an embrace, thanking her in the most effusive manner she could.
“Thank you so much. I’ll pay you,” she said.
“Don’t get too excited, Mary, this is only for tonight; there are eight of us living where I do already. You will still have to get something sorted for yourself.”
“Ok,” Mary said, and then she wondered what she could do to sort this for herself. She was going to have to find some people to live with. If Sarah had to live with seven other people, she was going to have to live with at least as many; Sarah made more money than she did, by a long way.
“Spend the day looking for something, love. I’ll meet you back here at seven o’clock, ok?” Sarah said, and she scuttled off towards the unloading ships.