CHAPTER 5
POOR WAYFARING STRANGER
❝ I am a poor wayfaring stranger
I'm travellin' through this world of woe ❞
The moon was high in the sky when Rose stepped foot inside La Vie En Rose that Friday evening. It was an unusually warm night, the stars above the city like powdered silver on a cloak of darkness, and the streets teemed with life as people's chatter and enthusiasm filled the air with another type of oxygen, a feverish energy that would go down in history as the Roaring Twenties.
Ever since the war, it was frenetic to live, it was urgent and necessary to move, so as to never stop, never look back, for looking back and thinking about it was to allow the memories and the pain to settle in again. The only thing that mattered was the now, and it was imperative that the now was lived to its fullest, for people now knew how fragile and fleeting the present was, how easily it could be taken away, like a cloud that passes over the sun on what had promised to be a sunny day.
La Vie En Rose, like many other cafés and clubs in London, took advantage of that relentless will to live, so much that Rose could barely spot a free area inside when she entered it. Her eyes were instantly assaulted by gleaming sequins on exquisite dresses and colorful drinks on eager hands, her ears pleasantly filled by that lingering cocktail of different languages that touched her soul unlike any other thing, because inside that space she could be both French and English, both native and foreigner, and she didn't have to choose between one version of herself and another, she could just be Rose, in all of her different variations, as much as petals in a flower.
Around her people greeted her from every direction and with a calm smile Rose greeted back; but she did not feel that urge to live like they did, that frenzied wish to grab onto even the smallest piece of life before it slipped through their fingers like fine sand in a desert land. Rose never felt the urge to grab onto the clutch of life, for some people were already reserved to the clutch of death and had felt its cold fingers around their neck.
With hurried steps, Rose headed towards the stage where Jules was studying a sheet music over his piano. Behind the stage long red velvet curtains with golden patterns caught the eye of even the most unappreciative of costumers, and the feeling of anticipation, of being part of history embedded itself in the simplest of things in a mist of infinite possibilities.
"Jules, could you do a favor for me, please?" Rose questioned, making the Frenchman raise his head to her with a curious frown. "Ask Angeline to change the song for tonight, will you? I would ask her myself but she'll take it better if it's you asking instead."
Jules stared at her. He didn't question her; Rose's answers had the tendency to raise even more questions.
"Which song?"
"Ask her to sing 'Poor Wayfaring Stranger'. I have a feeling we might have special guests tonight."
"Rose..." Jules let out a sigh, his face a delicate balance between soft eyes and hardened lines. "Which poor former soldier are you trying to break? You know what that song does to men, especially soldiers. And especially with Angeline's voice..."
His eyes darted to the oblivious woman smiling to her sisters some meters away from them and suddenly Rose felt like all those people in her café were no longer there, not even she. It was just Jules and Angeline and the feelings he had been hiding from her for years.
"I swear even silence in her voice sounds beautiful," he completed in a mere murmur. Rose couldn't remember a time where Jules hadn't loved Angeline, and she also couldn't remember one where he had acted upon it.
"Jules... feelings get worse inside of us. They're meant to be let out, otherwise they're not feelings, just spectrums of what they could be. I see it in your eyes. Why would you be afraid of sharing such a beautiful thing?"
His eyes snapped back to his sheet music, like a turtle retreating to its shell. "I don't know what you're..." he sighed again and gave up, his fingers outlining the keys of the piano like they could unlock the safe inside his chest. "Words fail me. Only music doesn't. So I'm waiting for her to listen."
At the same time, she's waiting for you to speak, Rose thought, but didn't voice it. She couldn't assume to know other people's feelings, even those of a sister; it was hard enough discerning her own.
"Tell her about the song change," Rose ended up saying, "but don't tell her..."
"It was you asking, yeah, I know. Are you expecting trouble tonight, with these... special guests?"
"Well, if trouble has a name, it's theirs, so...," Rose smiled, and it was an enigmatic smile, the kind people gave when they weren't sure they'd rather have a yes or a no to their question. "We'll see. For now I—"
Rose never got to finish her sentence; her mouth closed abruptly as the doors of the café swung open and a sea of men swarmed in like castaways to an island, her eyes stumbling upon the leader like the moonlight pouring down the curtains and refusing to go any further. It was as if her mind was incapable of registering any of the others as her eyes took in the tweed suit his body was hidden by, the flat cap on his head, the lazy cigarette between his lips. Even his waistcoat chain seemed to shine more brightly than the others, and yet it was his eyes that rendered her speechless, something Jules had never had the pleasure of witnessing.
"I see," he murmured, "you want us to change the song to make the Peaky Blinders let their guard down. Surely a tactic no one's used before."
But Rose wasn't listening, instead swallowing as she saw his liquid stare scanning the crowd of people, looking for someone and only stopping on her, his eyes narrowing ever so slightly as if in a secret challenge only she would comprehend.
He sure can leave an impression, Rose thought all too bitterly.
Everyone inside the café was staring at the newcomers since their abrupt, cinematic entrance, and yet no one had moved, as if they had all instinctively perceived the shift in the atmosphere, the sudden tension. Thomas Shelby didn't just have the presence to fill an entire room; he had the presence to make everyone in that room turn into his sheep.
If only there weren't already another wolf there, ready to prevent its flock from falling prey to the enemy. Rose started moving even before her feet did, her mind already miles ahead as she walked towards them, and instantly the crowd parted like Moses in the Red Sea to let her pass, and her women, who were scattered around the café, lined up behind her silently but surely until they were one and the same.
Two packs, two wolves, one territory. Hers.
She stopped right in front of him, indifferent but not oblivious to the low whispers his men made when their hungry eyes fell down the ladies' dresses. But Thomas' impossibly blue eyes didn't budge from her, as if his own mind had no space for a presence other than hers.
"Ladies," Thomas cut the taut silence with a courteous nod of his head.
"Gentlemen," Rose saluted, allowing a smile to rest on her crimson lips, a smile that was as much a welcome as it was a warning, "welcome to La Vie En Rose. If you're looking for trouble, you can turn around, we don't have that on the menu."
Thomas took a step forward, hands on his pockets and dry chuckle escaping past his lips as some of the men behind him exchanged surprised glances at that strange, unfamiliar concept that was female audacity.
"No trouble tonight, love. My boys here are just looking for some fun. You serve that 'ere, don't ya?"
"Indeed we do," Rose declared as the Peaky men started to disperse to inside the café, some to the tables, most to the bar. Rose saw Nicolas' head turned in her direction, two question marks in the place where his eyes were. She took her fingers to her earlobe, a sign of 'everything's fine'.
"So this is your place, eh?" Thomas asked, looking around to evaluate the décor. His chiseled face was as readable as a stone, but still Rose tried to dig for some kind of emotion, some hint that would give her a glimpse into the intricate labyrinth he had for a brain.
"Impressed?" Rose tilted her head to the side. "Or is impressed not something you do?"
Thomas chuckled again, taking the cigarette out of his mouth, but before he could say anything Andrea had jumped of her stool at the counter, stomped on every social convention and ran to where they were, a grin on her face as she said one simple word.
"Finn!" She exclaimed, looking at the freckled boy on Thomas' side as the leader's quick eyes observed her, half annoyed, half intrigued. Surely he wasn't used to having a young woman interrupt his plans or approach his boys so easily. "I was starting to think we'd never see each other again!"
"Ah, now I see why you wanted to come 'ere, mate," a stylish guy with a cheeky grin and curly hair said from beside him before Finn had the chance to answer, "she's not pretty, she's bloody hot."
"Shut up, Isaiah," Finn muttered as his cheeks became a slight shade of pink and his eyes silently tried to apologize to Andrea.
"Well, you Brummie boys sure are blunt. I'm Andrea, by the way," she looked over her shoulder, nodding with her chin towards the counter. "That guy over there that's killing you both with his eyes is my brother, and I advise you two to stay away from him unless you want to end this night with less teeth and a few broken bones. Now come on then, you have to help me get my hands on some booze since Raphael is being his usual pain in the arse and refuses to serve me anything that has the slightest drop of alcohol in it."
"You've come to the right men, then," Isaiah smirked. "Finding booze's our specialty."
The three of them disappeared into the crowd in the blink of an eye, and then it was Nicolas heading towards them, standing beside Rose and extending a stern, studied hand to Thomas.
"Nicolas Bardin. You must be Thomas Shelby."
"I am," he nodded, taking his hand from his pocket to give him a quick but firm handshake, and Rose felt like there was something there, in that handshake, a silent tug of war none of them wanted to lose. They were measuring each other in stares, and Rose felt a sudden sense of pride when Nicolas didn't once flinch under Thomas' cold, demeaning glare.
"I suggest you get yourself a drink, Mr. Shelby," Rose announced to cut off the tension. "I have a feeling you'll need it."
***
When Angeline took the stage behind the golden microphone, blonde hair in soft curls gracing her delicate shoulders, Rose felt an expectant smile falling on her lips. Angeline didn't look one bit intimidated by the unexpected clients or their rowdy ways; she didn't care that men were raising their glasses and cheering for her in awfully drunk voices, or that Thomas Shelby, sitting by one of the tables with some of his men, was focusing his piercing gaze solely on her.
She didn't care about anyone's eyes on her except Jules', and Jules was standing beside her, in his piano, easing all her possible troubles with his ocean eyes, and that there, between them, the music, the stage, was their sacred place, one no one could disrupt, not even the Peaky Blinders.
Leaning against the counter, Rose watched as Angeline ignored everyone else and looked at Jules, who gave her a small nod. Ready when you are, and Angeline nodded back, directing her gaze to the crowd as Jules graciously pulled the first timid notes from the piano, his fingers quick and lively but peaceful all the same.
Jules' tranquil art was paving the way for the revolution in Angeline's, and indeed it was only when she started singing that the background noise ended completely, that men placed down their glasses and started listening.
I am a poor wayfaring stranger
I'm travelling through this world of woe
Yet there's no sickness, toil, nor danger
In that bright land to which I go
Angeline's voice was melancholic and haunting and capable of transporting anyone into a different time and place, even a time and place they had never been to. But most of her audience that night were former soldiers, and the story told by the song was one countless of them had lived and relived far too many times.
I'm going there to see my father
I'm going there no more to roam
I'm only going over Jordan
I'm only going over home
In Angeline, notes weren't just notes, they were punches to the feels, cuts to the soul, that night more than ever as the lyrics spoke of a timeless, heart-wrenching feeling that all soldiers carried on their souls.
I know dark clouds will gather 'round me
I know my way is rough and steep
But golden fields lie just before me
Where God's redeem shall ever sleep
There was a different kind of power in those evocative notes, a poignant energy that seeped through the cracks of people's hearts, filled its holes or aggravated them, infused itself in every brain and in every vein until one could no longer say they were the same person they had been before Angeline started singing. Jules was following her tune but letting her voice shine for itself, and God, how Rose wished her sister knew that every one of Jules' notes was for her.
I'm going home to see my mother
And all my loved ones who've gone on
I'm only going over Jordan
I'm only going over home
Rose did not believe in angels, but she did when she listened to Angeline. She looked over to Thomas, to how his back rested carelessly against the chair, to how his chin tilted up to take on Angeline's presence.
He looked like a man whose heart was breaking again. They all did. When Angeline sang, there wasn't a single heart intact in all the world, Rose was sure. Hers was always the first to break.
I'll soon be free from every trial
My body sleeps in the church yard
I'll drop the cross of self denial
And then turn on my great reward
Angeline's voice became softer, the notes in her voice more riveting, in perfect sync with the gentle tune from the piano until it quieted down completely, Jules himself lost in a trance, for he went back to that time as well, to the Flanders fields and the burst of bullets and that impossible yet undying wish to return home.
I'm going there to see my saviour
To sing his prays for ever more
I'm only going over Jordan
I'm only going over home
Then it was just Angeline's voice completely, keeping company to perpetual ghosts, and when she gave out the final notes from deep inside her, the entire café remained silent for one suspended second until it exploded in cheers and bis and praises, and Rose saw Thomas just standing there, an indecipherable expression on his face as he tried to figure out if he had just witnessed another act of war and had willingly walked into another type of battle.
Thomas took the cap from his head and got up, slowly walking towards the counter like a man who'd just woken up from a slumber, and Rose was already there, placing a bottle of absinthe down in front of him.
"I told you you'd need it," she said with a smile as other men rushed to the bar for a refill, for anything that would drown their awakened sorrows.
Thomas' glance passed over her like a shadow, ethereal and weightless and yet palpable, and then he grabbed the bottle, flipped it on his hand and read the label.
La Vie En Rose Absinthe: distilled for the mending of acutely broken hearts.
His eyes went up to hers again and Rose shrugged and pointed to all the clients beside them already being served with the inebriating, mystical drink.
"It's a good business. Angeline breaks hearts and I mend them."
"I see. You made up this label?" He asked, his accent thick as his voice reverberated with the minimum hint of amazement.
"I did, it's our trademark. We've got another one," Rose took another bottle from behind the counter and placed it in front of Thomas, this time a raspberry liqueur that was her second most sold beverage after the absinthe.
"Chambord Liqueur: infused with sugar and herbs for the strengthening of breakable hearts," Thomas read, and there was a ghost of a smile in his tone. "So this is your plan every night? Make your lovely sister over there sing to trouble and destroy men just so you can sell your drinks afterwards?"
"There are far worse methods out there to run a business, don't you think?"
Thomas didn't say anything, instead placing the bottle down and gesturing with his chin towards the violin occupying a central place on the wall.
"You play?"
"Yes, I play. But not tonight."
"Why not?" He reached for the cigarette case on his pocket before taking one out and settling it between his lips in a cavalier manner.
"I don't want to break your heart," Rose said. More than it already is, that is.
"There's nothing left in my heart to break, love."
"You say that because you haven't heard me play. Word around here is my music makes even God cry."
"I don't believe in God," he said simply, taking a drag on his cigarette and slowly blowing the smoke out, his eyes persistent on hers. Rose didn't know it was possible to be talented at smoking until she saw him.
"What do you believe in, then?" She questioned, opening the absinthe bottle and pouring the whitish green liquid into two glasses.
"I believe in power."
"And is it the arms of power that comfort you when you need?"
"No," Thomas answered, the weight on his tone making Rose regret the question immediately. "Those arms are dead."
Rose kept quiet. She didn't have anything to say. Silence was the only type of agreement she could give to a man who had lost that much. So instead she handed him the anise-flavored spirit, but he shook his head and pushed the glass away.
"I'll save it for when I hear you play, then."
"Wise choice," Rose winked at him, making him raise one brow at her. "You're not used to people winking at you, are you? No. Just people blinking at you in fear."
"Why are you not, though?" He queried with a shake of his head. "Blinking in fear?"
"I don't give people what they want, but what they need," Rose stated, bringing the glass of absinthe to her lips and taking a sip, "and you, Mr. Shelby, need someone who isn't afraid of you."
"Is that so?" He challenged, and Rose looked away to fight against the smile that was forcing its way onto her lips. "What do you believe in, Rose?" His question brought her back to him, to those eyes that seemed to speak in so many incomprehensible languages and say so many inexplicable things.
"I believe in people."
His eyebrows raised slightly, skeptically. "Even after the war?"
"Yes, even after the war," Rose felt like the tables were being turned against her, as if now she was the one being transported into another time and place she'd rather keep in the past and never revisit. It was dangerous playing with a man that both knew how to burn and be burned by the fire.
"You were a nurse in the war, Rose, no?"
Rose suppressed a snicker of surprise. Of course he had done his research on her; that's why she had taken precautions. Thomas would only find out exactly what she wanted him to find out.
"Yes, I was," and now the weight was on her voice and Rose wondered if he felt it just like she had felt his, that guilt and pain from the past that people like him and her could not stop, no matter how hard they tried, from leaking into the present.
"So tell me, how many soldiers did you save? How many more died at your hands?"
Rose leaned over the counter ever so slightly with an accusatory shake of her head. "That's not fair, Thomas."
"Name one thing that's fair, Rose."
"That girl over there, next to your brother," Rose nodded her head towards Andrea, who was sitting next to Finn while Isaiah seemed about to attempt a conversation with Audrey and the other girls, "she's fair. And innocent. And I did not appreciate you sending Finn to spy on her so you could get information about me. Whatever this is, leave her out of it."
"What about your sisters? My men seem to be charmed," he was provoking her, and she knew. It was working.
"You stay away from my girls, Thomas, and tell your boys to do the same. Because I assure you, if they don't, it's not my girls that will have their hearts broken, it's your boys. And there's nothing worse than a heartbroken boy with razor blades in his cap, bruises on his ego and that fucking stupid sensation he's got nothing to lose and so can do whatever the hell he wants."
Thomas' lips curled up in a small, almost unnoticeable movement as he chuckled. Even his chuckles seemed devoid of laughter, as if he no longer knew how to feel happiness and had to learn it all over again.
"How is it that whenever I come to be in your presence, I always end up being threatened?"
"How does it feel like, to be on the receiving end of a threat, for once?" Her mouth twisted into a sideways smile that caught the attention of his eyes, and then he looked back at her and the air seemed to freeze around them, the green in her eyes battling his blues, both the one in his eyes and the one in his soul. Maybe that was it, about him. There was as much blue in his eyes as blues in his soul.
"Oh, it's not the first time," he shook his head, cigarette dancing on his lips. "But it is the most pleasurable."
"I'll drink to that!" She raised the glass to him and took another sip, looking at him over the glass as her throat prickled with the intense flavor.
"So you fix hearts with your absinthe. But how about you, love? Have you ever broken a heart?"
Rose swallowed, feeling every nerve on her body being stretched and twisted beyond its acceptable limits. When she spoke, her voice was but a whisper, for her heart was too a spectrum of what it once had been.
"Isn't mine enough? That's where the idea of the labels come from, you know. You see, a nurse learns a lot in a war hospital, but not how to stich her own heart back up when it gets completely ripped off. So I taught myself."
"And did it work?"
"I don't know. Sometimes I feel like it's not even there."
"Well, rather heartless than brainless. But from what I've seen, you're neither."
Rose raised her head to him, their eyes clashing violently. There was something there, between them, something not even the razor blades in his cap would be able to cut.
"Why did you come here tonight, Thomas? First the purse, then Finn... you're spying on me. To what end? What exactly do you want?"
"There's a great many things I want, love," he replied simply, puffing the smoke out from his lips. "Not sure you'd be ready to hear them all."
"You underestimate me, Thomas. Put me to the test and I assure you, you'll be surprised..."
Rose lost track of her words when she noticed a bald, unfamiliar man discreetly entering the café and sitting by one of the corner tables, but she was quick to flick her stare back to Thomas before he could detect any change in her.
"If you'll excuse me," she told him, "I need to touch up my makeup."
***
"So is it true, you were a Sergeant Major in the war?" Andrea eagerly asked Thomas when he made their way towards them and sat next to Finn on one of the chairs. Thomas didn't know what to think of that girl who had so easily entranced his youngest brother; she seemed fragile like a porcelain doll and yet was quick to speak to him as if he was a normal person, and Thomas knew how far he was from that. "Does that mean you also fought or just safely stood behind the lines shouting orders to soldiers who were unlucky enough to be sent to the frontline?"
"Everyone fought in the war," Thomas answered in a dismissive tone, his mind still trapped on his conversation with Rose. He didn't know yet what to make of her, and that was troubling him. Thomas didn't like not knowing. "If not with us, against us."
"Hmm, not everyone," Andrea retorted. "Christopher didn't fight in the war."
"I did, Andrea, I just didn't kill anyone," the dirty-blond replied in a saddened tone while by his side Renée tensed with the direction the conversation was taking. She felt uncomfortable enough being in the presence of Thomas Shelby, let alone having to talk to him about such touchy subjects. But youth was youth; life had not yet imposed filters or tact on them.
"A conscientious objector?" Thomas inquired, his tone teetering between subtle admiration and blunt distaste. "So you let your comrades die?"
"No, I saved quite a lot of them, if you must know. I just couldn't let my conscience die either."
"Well, that's a luxury I can't afford to have."
"I didn't think men like you still had luxuries they couldn't afford to have," Nicolas intervened, jaw tensing as he saw Thomas' eyes travelling to Rose, who was passing nearby to go God knows where.
"Yes, I still have," Thomas ended up saying, stare glued to the back of her dress. Nicolas was under the impression Thomas didn't give the privilege of his stare to a lot of people, that it was somewhat of a luxury people had to fight for to obtain, and the fact he had been staring so easily at Rose for most of the night didn't appease him one bit.
Nicolas was well aware of Rose's red dress and red lips; he was aware of her natural allure and the effect it had on men. It was effortless to her; she was a leader, both in business and in life. She didn't just command people, she commanded their stares and their hearts both of whom got stuck on her so quickly. But it was more than beauty to him, it was the way Rose carried herself, how her shoulders squared and how her eyes knew no fear.
She had as much charm and charisma as wits and morals and looked as stunning in that expensive dress as she did in that simple attire all those years ago in Amiens town square, when she had given the speech that made men decide to follow her all the way to England. Nicolas still remembered her words like it was yesterday, how she had given all of them, lost soldiers of a lost generation, a new direction, something to look forward to, a future to make the present worth living. How she had picked up their broken pieces and put them back together, just like she had done during the war to so many others.
Every man that heard those words would have wanted to follow her, and Thomas Shelby, as different as he was from other men, was no exception. The fact that he was there that night was proof of it. He and Rose could call it business, strategy, spying, whatever they wanted, but Nicolas knew the truth. Rose was leading the dance, and Thomas was following along. And Nicolas wondered if he knew – that he was the one dancing with the devil.
And that to get to Paradise, first men needed to walk through hell. Because that's exactly what Rose, in all her crimson glory, seemed about to unleash.
author's note.
Hey guys, I'm sorry for the long wait on this chapter but I hope it paid off! Please leave your votes and comments, I'd love to know what you think of it :)
This chapter is dedicated to lociloki for being such an amazing person and always supporting this story and because she loves '1917' as well! You should definitely drop her a follow and go check out her stories because her writing is amazing <3
In case you're wondering, the 'Poor Wayfaring Stranger' scene was inspired by the movie '1917' which is an absolutely beautiful movie, and this song in there is so powerful, I hope I made it justice here. I've put a video of the song in this chapter in case you want to listen to it!
Also, the absinthe/chambord labels are of course inspired by Tommy's gin label from season 4, but in this story it will be Rose's label who gives him the idea for his ;)
Lastly, a big thank you for 11k reads on this story!! I have more free time now so updates will be more frequent! I'll see you guys next chapter <3