Free The Ladder Dancer by Roz Southey

tempting idea, but I knew it would solve nothing. The girl would find me again. Best to deal with her now. Seagulls squawked and darted at the piles of fish entrails, pecked pieces away, dropped them under attack, flew back for more. Women screeched with laughter. Fish flapped silver and pink on to ever increasing piles. A few more respectable women were already out shopping, haggling over choice specimens. The rain eased; drops splattered off the Fishmarket roof on to the cobbles of the Key. And then the girl was back, with an ancient battered fiddle in her hand and a bow so threadbare it looked unusable.
    Without a word, she launched into a jig.
    The fiddle was appallingly out of tune; the bow scraped and squealed. Her hold on the neck of the instrument was bad and if she played for long in that posture she’d end up with permanent pain in her back. But her speed of playing was amazing and she had the joy of the dance in her fingers. The fisher-women started singing along with her (though the words they used weren’t the respectable ones); children danced with excitement.
    Kate threw herself into the playing. She couldn’t stand still; she jerked about as if she wanted to join in the dance and when she finished, she flung up the bow and screeched in delight, as out of breath as if she’d run a race. And I suddenly thought of what I must do to make her into a violinist fit to play in a concert band: slow her down, keep her still, take that energy out of her fingers and make them controlled and disciplined and polite. I’d have to turn her into a violinist like any other. Even if the Directors allowed a woman to play in the band and not a word of gossip passed any old maid’s lips, I couldn’t do it. I didn’t want to do it. It would ruin her.
    ‘Well?’ she asked, face glowing.
    ‘No,’ I said.
    I went home to breakfast, hurrying through the drizzle before it turned into another downpour. In the breakfast room, Esther, coffee dish in hand, was browsing through a London newspaper that had evidently arrived from a correspondent. I loved the way her face lit up when she saw me; I bent to set a kiss on her cheek, trailed my fingers across her bare neck and saw her shiver with pleasure.
    ‘Breakfast, Charles!’ she said in a mock condemnatory tone.
    I was ravenous. Getting up early always does that to me and seeing Nightingale wolfing down his victuals had only made the matter worse. I tucked into kidneys and eggs and bread. The room was warm and cosy as thin drops of rain sprinkled the window. I told Esther about Nightingale; looking back, the encounter had its humorous side, and I even brought myself to tell her about Nightingale’s reaction to my coat.
    She gave me a severe look. ‘I told you so, Charles.’
    I loved her honesty. ‘I did order two new coats yesterday,’ I reminded her.
    ‘But no breeches.’
    I scowled. ‘Very well. I’ll go and order breeches.’
    ‘Today?’
    ‘As soon as possible,’ I temporized. ‘I’ve promised Heron a violin lesson.’ She frowned; I said, ‘You know I don’t particularly care about clothes.’
    ‘I had noticed,’ she said. ‘It is because you have never been able to afford to do anything about the matter.’ She forestalled me as I started to speak. ‘However, I am grateful for small mercies, Charles. If you allow me to buy you a few handkerchiefs and shirts, oh, and a new pair of shoes, I shall be content. And a pair of boots.’ She looked thoughtful. ‘Though that greatcoat of yours is rather threadbare. And that hat!’
    I looked at her; she giggled. I had now of course been privileged to see Esther’s wardrobe and was horrified by its extent; what she was asking me to do was very little by comparison, but it still appalled me. All that money!
    ‘Will you be teaching Heron’s son this morning as well?’ she asked brightly.
    This was plainly an attempt to pass on to more congenial subjects. I expiated at length on the musical defects of Heron’s