“Lily” by Rose Tremain
Fans of Rose Tremain have been blessed by two books from her in close succession. “Lily” carries a dedication to the Consultant Surgeon who she says saved her life; we her admiring readers are also grateful. [“Islands of Mercy” was published in 2020 and is also reviewed in my recommendations].
“Lily – A Tale of Revenge” is the story of a child who, in 1850, as a baby was left by park gates luckily to be discovered and saved by a young policeman who carries the newly born to the London Foundling Hospital.
Sam Trench the policeman never forgets the baby he saved and when she eventually reaches her teenage years and is old enough to venture out into the streets of Victorian London is a frequent watchful fellow worshipper at the local church. Indeed during her years of incarceration within the Hospital he often asked after her well-being.
Lily Mortimer, her second name being that of her benefactor who sponsored her initial adoption through infancy. She was sent, for her first six years, to live an idyllic life in the Suffolk countryside. However the law states that at that age she must be returned to the Hospital where she suffers cruelty and hardship in a strict authoritarian regime. Lily never forgets her benefactor who she met once as a child when she visited her at Rookery Farm, where she is bought up by Nellie and Perkin Buck alongside their own three sons. It is her early years on the farm, and surrounding countryside that gives her the strength and will power to survive years of cruelty at the hands of Nurse Maud, who calls her Miss Disobedience.
Her life at the farm is in such contrast to the existence she suffers in the Hospital, even though a brief escapade with a friend Bridget breaks the monotony. All of this is viewed in hindsight as Lily, now working as a wig-maker for an interesting character called Belle, openly declares herself to be a murderer and is fearful that her life-saving policeman Sam Trench will uncover the truth.
As ever with Rose Tremain it is the authoritative reality of her historical settings that enhance her fiction. The reader feels Victorian London, the authenticity of the street scenes and the harsh reality within the walls of the Hospital.
Lily, despite her admission of homicide, is a good, but troubled person. She has become a valued worker for Belle, and the support cast involved within the confines of the walls of the wig-making workroom, and Belle’s life add another dimension to Lily’s early life and her reflections of her childhood, and how she commits her crime.
This is a very readable account of a tragic life, but surely a record of how many children suffered in Victorian London.
