Steadfast by Mercedes Lackey Read Free Book Online Page B

Suzie urged her up a narrow
     stair, past two landings, and unlocked a door on the third.
    Maybe Suzie thought her room was cramped for space, but by the standards of someone
     who had lived most of her life in a caravan it was impossibly spacious. There were
     two narrow little beds, a wardrobe, a tiny dressing table, a chest at the foot of
     each bed, and one at the window. One of the beds was covered in odds and ends; Suzie
     cleared it swiftly and dropped Katie’s bundle on it, then hurried her downstairs again.
    This time they followed the passage to the back where there was a room containing
     a single enormous table with women and girls crammed all around it and a woman presiding
     at the end—
    A woman that, had Katie not been circus folk, would have caused her to stare and stare,
     because she had a beard that would have done any man proud, and every inch of skin
     that could be seen was heavily tattooed.
    The company was chattering at the tops of its lungs. Suzie had to shout to be heard
     over them. “Mrs. Baird! This is Katie! She’s taking my place at the Palace! She’ll
     be having my room in a week or so!”
    The bearded visage nodded. “That’s all right then!” Mrs. Baird shouted back. “Four
     shillings six a week! Breakfast and supper, and we have supper late, after closing!
     We’ll settle up in the morning!”
    “See, I told you, all settled,” said Suzie, who nudged at the end girl on the bench
     nearest her, who obligingly squeezed over enough to give them both room. There were
     plates in a stack at their end of the table, and cutlery and cups. Suzie passed what
     was needed to Katie, took some for herself, then dished out soup from a big tureen
     in the center of the table while someone passed Katie a basket of thickly-sliced brown
     bread and a dish of butter. Someone else filled a mug of tea and handed it to her.
    After that, Katie didn’t think of anything except the food in front of her. No one
     seemed to be counting how many slices of bread she took, nor how many times anyone
     refilled her bowl of soup. Not that she was greedy, nor that she stuffed herself,
     but it was lovely to be able to eat your fill when you were hungry, and leave the
     table feeling sated.
    Girls left the table and more girls replaced them. Katie watched and saw that it was
     the done thing to take your dirty dishes with you. She and Suzie took theirs and left
     them with a cheerful little red-faced maid in an apron three times too big for her
     who was washing away with all her might.
    “This way,” Suzie said, tugging at her when she turned to go back to the front of
     the house and the stairs. “You’ll want to wash up every night when you come home.
     You can’t get all the greasepaint off at the theater, and Mrs. Baird likes her linens
     to be nice.”
    And sure enough, Suzie pulled her to the room of Katie’s dreams, a room with a row
     of deep washbasins, and three big bathtubs along one wall, all fed by pipes like Katie
     had seen in the loo in the train. Without being prompted, Katie stripped herself almost
     half nude and gave herself a good wash in one of the basins, while Suzie did the same.
    “Usually I take the time to go upstairs, put on a dressing gown, and come down here
     for a
good
wash-up,” Suzie said, as they went in single file up the stair. “But it’s awfully
     late and you look knackered.”
    “I am, a bit,” Katie confessed. “It was a long day, and I didn’t think I’d see a job
     at the end of it.” She gazed in wonder at the two pound notes in clutched in her hand.
    “I’ll show you where to get a decent bite at lunch, not that nasty, greasy pub food.
     Breakfast here is always the same, oatmeal and toast and fruit.” Suzie sighed dramatically.
     “Mrs. Baird is Scottish, you see, and you cannot convince her that breakfast should
     be anything else.” She opened the door. “Have you a nightgown?”
    Katie blushed. “That’s almost all I have besides my