“No,” I said, even as I looked down at myself and saw what they saw. My hands were red with blood, clutching the bloodstained murder weapon. My clothes were also smeared with Katerina’s blood. I looked every bit the murderess. “She’d been stabbed before I got here. I found her. The murderer ran away. I tried to save her.”
The older constable lunged, wrenched the knife from my hands, and twisted my arm behind my back. I cried out in protest and pain.
“This is a mistake!” I wailed as he marched me down the stairs. “I’m innocent!”
He laughed. “That’s what they all say.”
The constables took me to a dingy local police station and locked me in a small room. During an endless night, police officials interrogated me, badgered me, threatened me, and ordered me to confess. I grew so exhausted that I felt tempted to comply, if only they would stop. But I managed to continue proclaiming my innocence. After a while, they left me alone. I thanked God for the silver lining in the cloud: When I’d given them my name, they hadn’t recognized it. They didn’t know that Charlotte Bronte was Currer Bell, the famous authoress. I shuddered to think of what would have happened if they did. “Currer Bell arrested for murder!” the headlines of every newspaper would read. “Is Currer Bell the Whitechapel Ripper?”
Near dawn, a Roman Catholic priest came to me. He brought a blanket to cover my bloodstained clothes, and he invited me to talk. Although I was raised to distrust Romans and I wondered if he’d been sent by the police to extract an admission of guilt from me, I was thankful for his company. His was the only kind face I’d seen since I’d been arrested, and when I told him what had happened at Katerina’s house, he said he believed me.
“Have you a friend who might help you?” he asked.
“Yes. His name is George Smith. He lives at Number 76 Gloucester Terrace.”
“I’ll go to him and tell him what’s happened,” the priest promised.
In the morning, the police put me in a prison van-a long, covered carriage drawn by black horses. My fellow passengers were seven ladies of the street. Our ankles were chained to prevent us from escaping. As we rode through London, they sang obscene songs and yelled bawdy invitations to men we passed. I was so mortified that I wanted to die.
How I regretted going to see Katerina! I was glad to have the information she’d provided, but what a price I’d paid! I was too upset to determine whether it could exonerate Slade, and I wondered whether it would do me any good now.
We arrived at Newgate Prison, a massive brick edifice near the Old Bailey. Fear sickened me, for I had heard tales of how evil a place it was, filled with depraved, dangerous criminals. Its reputation attracted gawkers, who were gathered outside. They jeered at us while we clambered out of the van, hobbled by our chains. My companions jeered back, but I hung my head, as ashamed as if I were guilty.
Two guards led us through the gate, to a courtyard surrounded by high walls with barred windows. The guards removed our chains and handed us over to three female warders, who ordered us to strip naked. Disrobing in front of strangers of my own sex was enough of an affront to my modesty, but I could see men leering from the windows. Although glad to shed my bloodstained clothes, I wept from embarrassment.
The warders confiscated my pocketbook and some knives carried by the other prisoners. They made us line up at a water pump and wash ourselves. We had to share towels; there weren’t enough to go around. My skin crawled as I wondered what vermin I was picking up from the other prisoners. The warders gave us uniforms to wear-blue gowns, blue-and-white-checked aprons, and white muslin caps. After we dressed, they led us inside the jail.
Galleries of cells rose three stories high, to a glass roof. They stank of privies. My throat closed up, my stomach turned, and I tried not to breathe. All around me echoed the deafening chatter and noise of hundreds of women who milled about a large room below the galleries. As we were brought into their midst, the inmates stared at us. Some were mere girls; others tough, hardened crones. Many called out lewd greetings or insults. The warders herded everyone into a line for breakfast. When I got to the front, I received a piece of bread and a bowl of gruel. The food was meager in portion, grayish and sour. Outrage rose up through my misery. I was a law-abiding citizen, a bestselling authoress. I didn’t deserve to be treated thus!
But railing at my fate would do me no good; I must endure until rescue came. Walking to the tables where the women sat on benches to eat, I saw a vacant place. I started to set my food on the table, but one of the women said, “That place’s taken.” When I tried other tables, the women said, “You can’t sit there.” They were subjecting me to the sort of treatment that bullies at school inflicted on new girls. Soon I was the only person without a seat. I stood alone in the middle of the room, holding my food, all eyes on me.
“Sit here.” The woman who’d spoken patted the place next to her on the bench. She had a dumpy figure and the face of a prizefighter who’d lost too many matches. Her nose looked as if it had been broken and healed crookedly. Her eyes were shrewd in a broad face marked by a hint of a mustache.
I was afraid of her, but I sat. “Thank you,” I said politely.
The women smirked and repeated my words, mimicking my accent. With my first utterance I’d established myself as a member of a different class, an outsider.
“My name’s Poll,” said the prizefighter. “What’s yours?”
“Charlotte,” I said.
“If you aren’t going to eat your food, Charlotte, I’ll take it,” said a young blonde girl who sat on Poll’s other side. She would have been pretty if not for the permanent sneer that twisted her mouth. Her hand shot across Poll to snatch my bread.
Poll slapped her and said, “Not now, Maisie.” She seemed to be the leader of this set of women. “What’re you in for?” Poll asked me.
“I haven’t done anything wrong,” I said. “I really shouldn’t be here.”
The group hooted with laughter. “Neither have we,” Poll said, “but here we are, and so are you. Now, what’re you in for?”
“Murder,” I reluctantly admitted.
“Really?” Maisie said. She and the other women stared at me in respectful awe.
A scowl turned Poll’s face even more menacing. “You ain’t no murderess. I am.” Her hand thumped her ample breast. “I knifed that son-of-a-bitch slave driver who beat me when I was workin’ in the poorhouse. After I’m tried and convicted, I’ll hang.” She apparently enjoyed special status in the prison because she’d committed the most violent, serious crime, and she didn’t want someone else overtaking her. “You’re lyin’.”
“Who’d you kill?” Maisie asked me.
“A Russian actress named Katerina was stabbed to death,” I said, “but I didn’t-”
“You’re havin’ one on us,” Poll said, her ugly face turning crimson with rage. “You never killed no one.”
How I wished the police were as convinced of my innocence as she was! “That’s what I’m trying to tell you.”
“I’ll teach you to play jokes on me!” Poll hauled back her fist. I lurched sideways, dodged the blow, and toppled off the bench. Poll lunged after me and bumped another inmate, a woman with wild red hair and a stevedore’s build, who happened to walk past at that moment.
“Hey! Watch what yer doin’!” The other woman shoved Poll.
They began to fight. Suddenly, all the pent-up energy in the prison was let loose. I watched with amazement as women jumped up from the tables. They egged on Poll and her opponent. Fights broke out among them. They slapped and kicked and clawed and screamed; they hurled bowls. Gruel splattered me as I crawled, frantically seeking safety. Male warders plunged into the chaos, yanking combatants apart. Soon they had restored order. As they dragged Poll away, she pointed at me and yelled, “She started it!”
A warder grabbed me. “It wasn’t my fault,” I protested.