Chapter Two

Mrs Venner straightened the tablecloth and slowly stood upright, her back cracking loudly as she moved. Elsie inspected her appearance in the mirror above the fireplace, nervously tucking strands of dark hair behind her ear before deciding it was prettier the way it was before and brushing them back across her cheeks.

"Get on with you now Elsie, that silverware won't polish itself!" her mother uttered sharply. Elsie scowled and dropped her eyes back to the table, picking up a spoon and rubbing it briskly against her apron. "Dr Magnus will be back soon from the station with Miss Helen, you don't want her to think we've let the house go to the dogs without her now do you?"

"No mother," she replied absently, her heart thrumming wildly in anticipation, dropping the spoon loudly onto the walnut table before reaching for another. Mrs Venner ambled stiffly out of the room and returned a few minutes later, a tray of crockery rattling loudly in her wrinkled hands.

The clatter of horseshoes on cobbled stone sounded through the open window and Elsie turned her head abruptly towards it. "They're here mother! They're here!" she exclaimed excitedly and her mother embraced her joyfully. The pair hurried to the door where Michael stood, nervously adjusting his tie. Mrs Venner paused and tucked Else's hair behind her ears, her daughter sighing in displeasure for a moment until Michael opened the door and together they stepped out into the afternoon sun.

Outside her father climbed down from his seat at the front of the coach and adjusted his hat on his head before moving forward to open the door. Dr Magnus exited the carriage and turned back to help his companion out and Elsie's breath hitched in anticipation. From the step she could see the stack of cases and boxes tied to the top of the carriage, chewing her lip in the hope that there might be perhaps something for her inside one of them. The thought was forgotten at the flash of blonde hair in the doorway of the carriage and Elsie felt her heart in mouth as Helen stepped out. She was so elegant and beautiful, her audience stood awestruck as she approached. Mrs Venner sniffed and dabbed at the corner of her eye with her shawl.

"Hello Mrs Venner," Helen said with a gentle smile.

"Oh my child," she rasped tearfully and embraced her tightly. Helen squeezed her back fondly.

"Miss Helen," Michael said gravely, kissing her gloved hand melodramatically. Helen chuckled loudly and punched him on the arm. He blushed furiously and grinned like an idiot.

"Elsie," Helen said softly, the tenderest of smiles spreading across her face as she turned towards the young woman before her. Elsie heaved a breath and gaped at her mutely for a moment before Helen pulled her close.

"I kept all your letters, every one," Else babbled into her ear as they embraced and Helen's smile grew even wider.

Gregory ushered them all inside and Mrs Venner dragged an almost catatonic Elsie down the hall as Michael helped his father with Helen's luggage. Elsie cursed loudly at the kettle as it stubbornly refused to boil while her mother delicately arranged tiny sandwiches on a fine plate with her stiff, aged fingers.

"Give them China tea if you're so impatient my love," her mother scolded as Elsie angrily jabbed at the coals under the stove. She exhaled a long, calming breath as she tipped the leaves into the teapot and poured the water in with shaking hands.

A short while later and she stood anxiously beside the tea trolley, twisting her apron in her hands as her mother poured two cups for the Doctor and his daughter. Helen took it from her graciously and the old woman smiled before shuffling back to stand beside her daughter.

"Come now, what's all this," Helen asked meekly as she took in the sight before her, the servants standing so primly in their impeccable starched clothes.

"Well mam, it's only proper, seeing as you're such a fine lady now," Mrs Venner began to explain but Helen tutted and reached out her hand.

"Oh balderdash and piffle!" she exclaimed, pulling the old woman down on the couch beside her. "Aren't we all like family?" The old woman gushed and clutched at Helen's hand, her face screwing up. Gregory chuckled mildly and before long they were all seated around sharing tea as Helen began to regale them with tales of her travels. Elsie's thigh pressed close against her as she spoke, the young woman gazing at her profile transfixed. She sipped at her tea and swallowed back a grimace. Elsie loathed this strange, scented muck, preferring a stouter, black tea with milk and sugar but as she watched Helen in all her elegance and refinement, she resolved to develop a taste for it.

Before Helen had gone away, she'd promised to write to Elsie every day. Her letters had in fact been much less frequent, sometimes there would be months between them but when they came Elsie clutched them against her breast and hurried away to read them in private. Over and over she would read them till the pages went brown at the edges and the ink began to fade. She kept them safely in a shoe box under her bed, the bed they'd often shared as girls.

Elsie lay there now, staring up at the ceiling, tears pricking at her eyes. Since her return Helen had talked incessantly about a Miss Walburga, a woman surgeon of whom she had made the acquaintance in Vienna and Helen was now in her company in the drawing room downstairs. The loathesome woman had arrived and Helen had spent the entire time fawning over her. Elsie's heart sank as the pair of them chattered away in a strange mix of English and German, casually bandying about French and Italian phrases. Elsie had never felt more plain and frumpy than she had in the drawing room this evening.

"Never mind my love," her mother had comforted as Elsie had aggressively stacked the dishes in the scullery. "However much we might love her, she's a different sort to you and I but she'll always be your friend."

"She don't want friends like me now that she's a lady," Elsie groused. "Talking all posh like that, who does she think she is?" Mrs Venner sighed loudly. "You'd think the sun shone out of that woman's arse the way she's being going on about her. The hag."

"Why don't you go and get changed love?" her mother asked gently, placing her hand atop her daughter's, stilling her movements. "I'll see to Miss Helen and her friend." Elsie chewed on her lower lip and nodded tearfully before turning out of the room.

Helen was so cold and different these days she mused, staring at her reflection in the mirror as she unpinned her hair. She combed it through slowly with the elegant ivory handled brush Helen had brought her from Paris, holding it her hand and staring at it for a long moment. Her gaze flicked across the dressing table before her, over the chipped comb, the mother of pearl pin box. They were really quite lovely, given to her out of kindness but cast-offs just the same. As she stared at them now, she felt a welling up of hate for them and everything they represented.

Elsie's face screwed up and hurled the brush angrily across the room. It clunked satisfyingly into the door but it still wasn't enough to stem the tide of rage that surged within her. Viciously she brushed her arm across the dressing table, sending the comb and the pin box crashing to the floor. She kicked at them and the pin box spun across the floorboards and smacked into the iron bedstead, the lid toppling off and smashing into pieces.

"Oh no!" she sobbed and ran across, dropping to her knees and picking up the pieces, clumsy fingers trying to wedge them back together ineffectually. They slipped between her hands, clattering loudly to the floor and Elsie buried her face in her hands and wept and wept.

"Are you sore with me Elsie?" Helen asked a few days later. Elsie didn't reply, merely continued to brush Helen's long hair aggressively, staring at the back of her head with her jaw clenched. Helen winced under her indelicate ministrations. "Elsie!"

"Keep still, will you! How am I supposed to get these tangles out if you keep moving?" Elsie snapped. Helen turned abruptly and grabbed at her wrist.

"If you'd stop going at me like you were rubbing down a horse!" she retorted angrily. Elsie smacked the brush down onto the dressing table and flounced across the room towards the wardrobe, yanking it open and rifling through the contents angrily. "What is the matter with you?"

"Mother says it will be fresh out so you'd better wear the the woollen underthings," Elsie told the back of the wardrobe. Helen's shoulder slumped and she turned on her stool to watch as the maid rummaged through her clothes.

"You know the wool makes me itch," Helen said flatly, rubbing her palms up and down her thighs,

"Well you'll just have to suffer it won't you or catch your death, it makes no difference to me," Elsie snapped, pulling a long skirt out and turning to lay it across the bed.

"Elsie what's wrong?" Helen asked gently.

"Why ever should there be anything wrong Miss?" she replied primly, stepping across the room and opening a drawer to pull out a petticoat and slamming it shut.

"ELSIE!" Helen snapped. The girl froze and met her mistress' wide blue stare. Helen sighed and slowly rose from her seat, her velvet dressing gown trailing along the carpet behind her as she stepped closer. "Elsie please, tell me what's wrong?" Helen held her gently by the shoulders. Elsie screwed her face up, fighting back the tears that sprang up. "Oh my dear, whatever is it?" Helen pulled her close and Elsie buried her face in her neck as she sobbed.

"You don't care for me anymore Miss," she sniffed. "You don't even see me half the time. Sometimes I feel like you look right through me, like I wasn't even there!"

"Oh now," Helen cried, holding her tight. "Elsie, please, stop these tears." Elsie pulled back and sniffed deeply, exhaling a shuddering breath.

"I'm sorry Miss," she said, wiping her eyes on her hand.

"What happened to Helen?" Helen asked gently and Elsie shook her head. "Elsie really!"

"Mother says it's not proper, that we should you call you Miss now, since your such a fine lady." Helen winced and twisted her head away.

"That's nonsense. Aren't I just the same Helen as I always was?" she exclaimed.

"Quite honestly no Miss, you aint!"

"Elsie!" Helen gaped at her.

"Since you come back, you're never here. It's worse than it was before you went away. You're always out, at the hospital or talking with some society type!"

"Oh Elsie," Helen said in a pleading tone.

"No, don't you take that tone wi' me!" she cried, shoving her away. "You promised me you'd write to me every day. I lived for those letters, stuck 'ere scrubbing old men's underpants and darning bloody socks in the kitchen wi' Ma. You 'ave everyfin and I'm happy for you, really I am, I just wish you'd pay me some heed once in a while. You said we was like sisters!"

Helen felt like she'd been punched in the gut. She staggered back and sank heavily onto the stool behind her, shaking her head.

"Oh Elsie I'm sorry, I'm so sorry. I never thought...I..." she stammered. Elsie sniffed and rubbed her eyes on her apron. Helen stared at her dumbstruck for a long minute until the tension became so thick you could almost cut it with a knife. Elsie stared at the floor, the utter impropriety of her outburst gradually sinking in. She turned away shamefaced and took a few shaky breaths.

"Elsie," Helen said softly as the young woman began to straighten the clothes out on the bed, sucking her lip in nervously. "Elsie," Helen repeated but when the maid did not respond she walked briskly over and clasped her by the shoulders. "ELSIE!" she said firmly. The young woman raised her head slowly and met her soft gaze. "I'm so sorry. Let me make it up to you? I'll cancel my engagements today and we'll...I don't know...we'll do something, we'll go somewhere."

Elsie softened a little in her embrace and her lips curled up in a smile. "Where would we go?"

"I don't know, anywhere. The east end. We'll go out, eat some eels or something, watch a burlesque."

Elsie laughed heartily and Helen beamed as she gazed into the young woman's brilliant green eyes.

"Alright," she whispered softly, another helpless victim of the Magnus charm.

Although Helen had made the effort to dress down, it was impossible for Elsie not to feel utterly shabby as they sat side by side on the train. The finest clothes she possessed were Helen's cast-offs, lovingly altered by her mother in the parlour so they'd fit her skinny frame. Helen was tall and voluptuous, possessing an hour glass figure for all she did to hide it behind demure, scholarly outfits. At this moment however Elsie could think of nothing else but Helen's brilliant smile and sparkling eyes as they talked.

They ambled arm in arm along the bustling embankment, the brisk wind up the river making the air seem less smoggy than usual. They stopped and bought hot candied peanuts from a vendor on the waterfront and then spent the next half hour flicking them onto the muddy bank below, confessing to one another that they smelled far more appealing than they really were and that neither particularly cared for them anyway. As they wandered east through the city, dark rain clouds rolled in and the pair sought shelter in a fairly respectable looking teashop, bundling into the corner side by side. They argued somewhat heatedly when the time came to pay, Elsie bristling at Helen's casual attitude. The playful banter turned sour and they walked in a tense silence through the rain until they reached the station.

"I feel like I'm not really a person," Elsie confessed in a voice so sad that Helen's heart sank. "When you buy me things, or when you give me your old dresses." The rain sleeted into the pavement as the stood just inside the terminus and Helen watched the water gather into the gutter and stream away down the drain. "I know you're only trying to be kind but I...I feel like...Oh I don't know how I feel."

Helen smiled wanly and gripped the young woman's damp shoulder tenderly, gazing intently at her face. "I only want to take care of you all." Elsie nodded, staring into the middle distance beyond Helen's arm.

"Pa says I should get married, have my own home. But I don't really want that. What kind of home could I have? Work in the blacking factory or some other hole, pay rent on some grotty tenament and have a babe every year."

"That will never be your future, Elsie. I'd never allow it. If you wanted to get married, we'd see you right, Father and I." Elsie stared into her earnest face and smiled.

"Though you know," she sniffed, a droplet of water running down her nose "If there was ever a time for you to throw your money about now's it." Helen grinned back, puzzled. "Let's get a cab." Helen chuckled and they linked arms, making their way out into the rain.

They pressed close together in back of the carriage, damp and chilly. Elsie rested her head on Helen's shoulder and sighed contentedly as they raced through the dusk towards the house. Inside, Mrs Venner made a huge fuss at their bedraggled state, ordering them sharply upstairs to strip out of their wet things. Helen dragged Elsie to her room on the premise that she had a bigger bath, intent on sharing as they had been wont to do since childhood and Elsie did not complain when Helen wrapped her in her own, warm gown. Mrs Venner struggled up the stairs with hot water and tutted and sighed as she gathered up their damp clothes and left them unpinning each other's hair in Helen's private bathroom.

They sat with their knees pressed together in the steaming water and Elsie let her eyes fall shut as Helen gently massaged her scalp. Her limbs squeaked against the enamel as she shifted to pour water from a jug over Elsie's head and when she opened her eyes she was greeted by the sight of Helen's round breast. Elsie felt that unusual feeling she had often felt around Helen, this time intensified a hundredfold. Helen smiled down at her as she poured, the soapy water slaking across Elsie's face and forcing her to blink and look away.

Later they sat on Helen's bed, brushing out each other's hair. Helen traced her fingertips across Elsie's face, listing off the muscles as she went.

"Orbicularis Oris, Anguli Oris," she intoned as she moved across Elsie's lips. "Sternohyoid, Sternocleiomastoid." Helen smiled broadly at Elsie's giggle as her fingers tickled her neck. "Trapezius, Deltoid, Brachii, Pronator..."

"You are clever," Elsie sighed, leaning close. Helen's eyes crinkled at the corners as she continued downward across her forearm to the palm of her hand.

"I'm going to be doctor, Elsie. You'll see. They all tell me I'm crazy but I know better. There are women doctors, just as good as the men, some better I'd say." Elsie smiled indulgently, her expression morphing from amused to concerned at the look on Helen's face.

"What is it?" she asked gently. Helen met her eyes.

"What you said earlier, about not feeling like a real person. I do understand you know." Elsie nodded and Helen continued. "They won't accept me into University, not to study medicine anyway."

"Because you're a lady." Helen pursed her lips and shrugged.

"I want to be a real person, Elsie. Like you said. That's why I'm doing this. If I was a surgeon.." she inhaled deeply and leant closer. "I could take care of you, of everyone. I wouldn't have to get married and be beholden to anyone else. You understand me don't you Elsie?"

Elsie gripped her hand tightly. "I do."

A/N: In those days, burlesque was just a variety show or an 'opera' (though not in the high art sense). It was not a strip show and it wouldn't be unrealistic for people like Elsie and Helen to go to see such a performance.