Waxwork

MONDAY, 18th JUNE

Just after seven, the postman came.

Berry was shaving.

‘Two,’ his wife called up. ‘From London.’

‘Put ’em on t’shelf, then.’

‘Aren’t you going to open them?’

‘In good time, woman. I’m busy just now.’

When he came downstairs his eggs and bacon were ready. Nothing ever came between Berry and breakfast. While he was eating, his wife took the letters off the shelf, had another look at the handwriting and placed them on the table by his plate.

One he saw at a glance was from the Sheriff of London. He had got to know the brown envelope with the crest on the flap. There was no reason to open it yet. It was a job, and he knew which one.

The other interested him more. A white envelope. Copperplate. Since taking up his present office he had received a fair number of letters, most of them from crack-pots. He had learned to recognise them by the way they addressed the envelope-James Berry, Hangman, Yorkshire- something after that style, and spelt wrong as often as not. It was a wonder they reached him. The Post Office did a grand job. He burned them mostly.

‘Do I get tea this morning, or not?’

As soon as his wife went into the scullery, he opened the white envelope. It was from Madame Tussaud’s. He had never been so surprised in his life. The letter he had spent most of last week putting together was still in his pocket. He felt to make sure. Took it out and checked the writing on the envelope. He had decided not to post it until the Newgate job was confirmed. He put it back. He would not need to send it now.

They wanted to make a waxwork of him.

‘No doubt you are aware,’ their letter stated, ‘that your predecessor in the office of executioner, the late Mr Marwood, permitted us the privilege of modelling his portrait from life on more than one occasion. The figure was an object of unfailing interest to our patrons, among whom we have been honoured to welcome the members of our own Royal Family and the Sovereigns and Rulers of many nations of the world. We would deem it a privilege if you would consent to sit for us and permit us to include your likeness in the Exhibition.

‘Should you contemplate a visit to London in the weeks to come, we would be honoured to arrange for you to visit the Exhibition. If you should consent to sit for your portrait, an appointment could be made at any time convenient to yourself. Be assured that in the presentation of its exhibits Madame Tussaud’s has ever observed the highest standards of good taste.’

That was clear from their letter. Beautifully turned phrases. Not a hint that old Marwood was down in the Chamber of Horrors with Burke and Hare and Charlie Peace and the wickedest villains in the annals of crime. Not that Berry objected to that. When you had put the straps on a few and seen them off, it was no disgrace to stand beside them in a waxwork show. From what he remembered of his only visit to Tussaud’s they stood the murderers in rows in a representation of the dock. Marwood’s figure was quite separate, facing them, his pinioning-strap at the ready. An object of unfailing interest to our patrons.

Before his wife came back with the tea he slipped his letter out of sight, behind the frame containing his murderers in the front room. It was the one place where she would never look.

He went back to finish breakfast. The brown envelope from the Sheriff of London was still there on the table. In the excitement he had clean forgotten it.

‘Look alive, Cromer!’

Prison Officer Bell watched as the condemned woman removed the handkerchief from her eyes and turned her head. The fine hair strewn across the grey calico sheet shimmered with the movement.

‘You have to see the governor. Nine sharp.’

‘The governor has asked to see me?’ She made it sound like an invitation to dinner.

‘Isn’t that what I said? On your feet, now. I want you washed, dressed and fed, your cell scrubbed and your bedding tidied first.’

Without another word the prisoner obeyed. To Bell’s way of thinking, it was unnatural, the way she acted, as if she was indifferent to Newgate. It was impossible to dredge up sympathy for her. She had not shed a tear since the day she came in, nor looked to the wardresses for comfort. Bell could be generous with comfort if it was appreciated. She could talk anyone round to a happier frame of mind. There was no call for comfort from this one.

The wardresses had discussed it in their room. Hawkins had said it was good breeding, that a lady was trained to bottle up her feelings. To that, Bell had said she always understood ladies were taught to make conversation. ‘Not to the likes of us,’ Hawkins had replied. That had rankled with Bell. What business had a common murderess acting as if she was superior to them? Cromer was a cold-blooded killer and the story that her victim had been blackmailing her made no difference. It made it worse, in Bell’s view, for what was the cause of the blackmail? Lewd photographs. ‘If that’s a lady,’ she told Hawkins, ‘show me a whore.’

At a quarter to nine they escorted her through the ill-lit passages to the governor’s room. They stood by the door waiting for the bell of St Sepulchre to strike the hour.

In spite of herself, Bell started whispering words of comfort. ‘The governor ain’t such a hard man really. We’ve seen a lot of him, Hawkins and me. He’s one of Nature’s gentlemen.’

‘A trump,’ Hawkins concurred.

They need not have troubled. Cromer gave no sign that she had heard one word. Yet she was not completely oblivious to what was going on. At the first stroke of nine, she gave a small shudder of tension.

Hawkins knocked.

In greeting the prisoner, the governor called her Mrs Cromer. ‘You may step forward.’

He had a piece of paper in his hand.

‘You are sleeping better now, I hope?’ he said. ‘How long is it that you have been in Newgate?’

In a clear voice she answered, ‘Ten days since the trial, sir.’

‘Ten days,’ he repeated absently. He looked down at the paper. ‘I asked to see you because I have received a communication concerning you.’

Bell noticed the prisoner’s hands clench suddenly.

The governor continued, ‘You will remember that when I spoke to you in this room on your first day here I cautioned you to reconcile yourself to the sentence of the law. You have tried to follow that advice, I trust?’

‘Yes, sir.’ There was a note of expectation in her voice, as if she could not wait for him to come to the point.

‘This is from the Sheriff of the City of London. It is the warrant for your execution. It will take place a week from today at eight in the morning.’

How gently spoken, Bell thought. He might have been telling her he had tickets for the Lyceum.

The prisoner stood numbly. For an instant Bell thought she was going to sway.

‘Do you wish to sit down?’ the governor asked her.

A shake of the head.

‘It is simply a stage in the legal procedure,’ he went on. ‘So far as you are concerned, it will mean that you return now to a different part of the prison, a different cell. The same officers will be in attendance. You may exercise when you wish, accompanied by them. And you may receive visitors in the cell-your husband, and your solicitor, if you wish. The regulations forbid you from receiving any form of gift from them, or from physical contact. Do you understand?’

She was standing still with her eyes closed.

‘Did you hear what I said, Mrs Cromer?’

She nodded.

‘I shall continue to visit you each day and you may speak to me or the chaplain if anything troubles you. I urge you again to commend your soul to the Almighty. He receives those who repent their sins.’ He signalled to the wardresses.

They stepped forward, gripped her firmly by the arms and guided her out.

As they walked, Bell was tempted to tell the prisoner that if she had been willing to confide in those who knew about prison routine, they could have spared her some of the pain of that experience, but she checked herself. Words would be wasted on this one. Better to see what difference the condemned cell made to Mrs Miriam Cromer.

‘Upstairs here.’

They mounted one of Newgate’s iron staircases, Bell leading to unlock the door of the condemned block. ‘This way, your ladyship. If you take a look through here’-they had stopped by a window too narrow even to be fitted with bars-‘you can see the exercise yard.’

The prisoner glanced down at a small, cobbled square in deep shadow.

‘That’s yours. Exclusive,’ Bell told her. ‘We’re supposed to take you down there for a constitutional any time you feel inclined. It ain’t Hyde Park exactly, but it’s a place to go, ain’t it?’

The prisoner looked away.

‘Don’t you like it?’ Bell asked. ‘I suppose you can’t wait to see your new home. Come on, then.’

They passed two open cell doors and entered the next.

It was limewashed and lit by a gaslamp covered with a bright tin shade. There was a table with three wooden stools ranged round it. To the right was a narrow iron bedstead with a flock mattress and blankets folded on top. On a shelf built across one corner were a copper basin, some eating utensils and a Bible. A tap protruded from the corner opposite. Under it was the latrine-bucket.

Hawkins closed the door. The sound echoed through the building.

The wardresses watched the prisoner, waiting for a reaction. Sometimes they screamed so much that the doctor had to be called to them.

‘This is larger than the other cell.’

‘It needs to be, for three and a visitor sometimes,’ said Bell, pulling out a stool for herself. ‘We still have to watch you by turns, two at a time, day and night. It’s no different in the c.c., you know.’

‘What is that-c.c.?’

Hawkins chose that moment to make one of her rare utterances. ‘Do you play cards, Cromer? We’re allowed to play cards with you. Bell and me know just about all the three-handed games you ever heard of. Nap, rummy, poker, cribbage. Cards is a wonderful way of passing the time.’

‘No thank you.’ The prisoner turned to Bell. ‘You didn’t answer my question, miss.’

Damned impertinence! When she said it, that ‘miss’ never sounded like a term of respect. Bell took a pack of playing cards from her pocket and shuffled them. ‘If you really want to know, it’s the name we give the cell. “C” for cell, follow me? The first “c” could stand for cards, couldn’t it? But seeing as you don’t feel disposed to play cards, how would you care for a game of draughts instead? Then we can call it the d.c. What about that, eh?’ She rocked with laughter.