Prologue
Manchester, England
August 1843
Viola Brodure could not scoff in the face of Death.
But then, she struggled to speak in her actual Life, so the realization was hardly a surprise.
The destitute woman seated before her, however, scoffed and spoke with ease.
“I hope I die with grace,” Martha chuckled breathlessly, rocking her sick babe in her arms. “Heaven knows I have a dreadful lot to atone for.” She spared a glance for Viola as if anticipating words of comfort.
Viola’s tongue froze, anxiety and asthma tightening her breathing and choking off any reply.
“Hopefully death shall not visit you anytime soon, Martha,” Mrs. Eloise Carpenter, Viola’s cousin, soothed before the silence stretched too thin.
Today, Viola and Eloise had ventured into the heart of the ironically named ‘Angel Meadow’ slum of Manchester, wishing to further Eloise’s charity work.
“Aye, we’re no’ dead yet.” Martha touched her babe’s fevered cheek. “’Tis a fine line around here between life and death. And we walk that line like Mr. Fredericks from downstairs after a bottle of gin—none-too-straight with mounds of off-key singing.”
Again, she glanced at Viola. Again, anticipating a reaction. A smile. A chuckle.Something.
But the caustic coal smoke combined with Viola’s asthmatic lungs and shy nervousness, ensuring her lips remained shut.
Granted, the dingy sleeping mat on the floor and solitary table piled with dirty crockery already spoke volumes. Despite the forced cheerfulness of Martha’s words, Death hovered in the corners and lurked outside the flat’s rickety door.
Giving Viola a tight, understanding look, Eloise turned back to the baby in Martha’s arms, pressing a hand to his forehead.
Shame flushed Viola’s skin, which only served to bind her chest tighter and stuff her mouth full of cotton.
Oof.
Her asthma and anxiety were a vicious cycle.
Just speak, she pleaded with her brain.Simply open your mouth.
If she were sitting at a desk, the words would flow easily from her pen.
But even then, mere words felt hollow in the face of Martha’s suffering, a woman whose husband had abandoned her and theirfivechildren—children who crouched around their mother and stared at Viola with sunken eyes. Their mean circumstances were a far cry from Viola’s own at the vicar’s manse in Westacre, the rural Wiltshire village where she lived with her father.
Viola’s visit with Cousin Eloise was to have been an uneventful one—a relaxing holiday enjoying the social whirl of Manchester. But Eloise was passionate about addressing the ills of the Poor Laws. And so, instead of making morning calls and attending garden luncheons, Viola trailed her cousin through crumbling tenements and rookeries. Two of Eloise’s sturdiest grooms accompanied them, ensuring their safety.
Before this week, Viola had understood that abject poverty existed. That at times, people had to make difficult choices to survive.
But nothing could have truly prepared her for the harsh reality of Angel Meadows—rats feasting on the body of a dead man, a woman screaming in agony as a man beat her, rag-clad children who snatched chunks of bread from Viola’s hand with skeletal fingers.
The touted Poor Law Amendment of 1834 had failed them all.
“More must be done, Cousin,”Eloise had said just that morning.“Consider using your voice to advocate for true change. Your readers will listen, just as Mr. Dickens’s do. I am sure of it.”
As if picking up the thread of Viola’s thoughts, Martha smiled tentatively at her. “I cannot wait to tell my neighbors that the famous Miss Brodure visited me today.”
Viola’s breath hitched, her fingers knotting. Every eye in the room turned to her. Watching. Waiting.
She implored herself to say something—a simple phrase like,Martha, I admire how you confront your struggles with such grace.
Instead, she stood motionless, a frozen rabbit of a person.
