Den of Thieves (6 page)

He missed the irony. ‘Glad you like it. I'm havin' the place done over by London's top craftsmen. Every room has a theme.'

I noticed that he over-pronounced his haitches. So, he was taking elocution lessons too, was he?

‘What's the subject of this one then? Bedlam?
All you need are a few lunatics in white gowns and the picture would be complete.'

He grinned. His teeth were as bad as ever. ‘Nah, I've got you for that, Cat, ain't I?' he quipped, slipping back into his old manner of speaking.

‘You're right, Billy. I was mad to come.'

‘You 'ad no choice.' His manner stiffened; he sat up, scattering cherry stones on the white rug at his feet. We were getting down to business at last.

‘What was it to be if I hadn't come? A knife in the ribs or a trip down the Thames?'

‘Would I do that to you, Cat?' he asked with feigned innocence, hands spread wide. ‘Me, a respectable man of property?'

‘Respectable, my a**e. You're about as honest as Molly Everymans from the Jolly Boatman.'

‘Watch it, Cat. My patience with you 'as its limits.'

He was riled: a point to me then.

I put the black silk bag containing my lock of hair on the table. ‘As I infuriate you so badly, Billy, why not finish it between us? Tell me what you want. I'll do it if I can, then we'll call it quits. You
leave me alone and I promise never to lay my eyes on your ugly mug again.'

‘I'm glad to see you're a girl that keeps 'er word, Cat. I 'alf expected you to make some excuse about promises extorted unfairly. I 'ad you in a bind that night, didn't I?' He chuckled at the memory.

‘When you've stopped congratulating yourself on your low cunning, Billy, perhaps you'll get to the point?' I scratched at the upholstery, feeling the stuff split under my nails. He'd been cheated by his supplier if he thought he was getting the finest.

‘All right, Kitten –'

‘Don't call me Kitten.'

‘Kitten, I want you to get me something.'

‘What exactly?' I didn't like this – I didn't like this at all.

‘I've got everything a man could want, but I've found that recently I've developed the tastes of a con-a-sewer.'

How appropriate. He meant connoisseur, of course.

He rose from the couch and beckoned me to
follow him. ‘Come and see my collection.' Seeing him on his feet for the first time, I noticed that he loomed over me these days. Leading me to a door in the wall beside the over-large mantelpiece, he took out a key and unlocked it. I hesitated: the room he had revealed was dark; I suspected a trap.

‘Don't worry, Cat, it's not what you think,' he laughed.

‘What do I think?' I tried to keep my voice steady.

He leant over a candelabra standing ready on a table and lit it with a taper. ‘You think I'm like some wicked Italian count in one of Mrs Radcliffe's books, waiting to lock up the heroine in a dungeon.'

‘Congratulations, Billy! You've learnt to read at long last. I hadn't realized you had such feminine tastes.'

‘I was just pitchin' my conversation to your level, as a gentleman should.'

His repartee had improved. I wouldn't be surprised if he was taking lessons in that too, to
pass himself off as a gent in any society stupid enough to give him houseroom.

‘
Generosus nascitur non fit
,'
*
I quipped, knowing full well he wouldn't understand.

‘Don't come over all clever with me, Cat. Just because you spent a couple of weeks in breeches learnin' fancy languages, don't mean you can outwit me.'

‘Course not, Billy,' I said with a great show of humility. ‘What, I, a poor little ignorant maid, dare to rival the great, the learned William Shepherd?'

‘You know wot, Cat?' he retorted, his accent on the slide. ‘I wish I'd 'ad the beatin' of you when you were at that school. I 'ear you were quite the favourite punchbag for a while there. 'Ad I known, I'd've enrolled and whipped some of that cheek out of you.'

‘You're a true gentleman, Billy, do you know that? One would never guess you were raised in the gutter and made your way through thieving and thuggery.'

I truly was insane. Here I was in his house, with his servants waiting on his call, and I was insulting him as freely as ever. But Billy had had enough. ‘Shut yer mouth and get in there.' He gave me a shove in the small of the back.

I gasped. I had stumbled into Aladdin's cave. It wasn't a dungeon but a display cabinet for Billy's collection of –

‘Jools, Cat, that's wot I like. See a bit of work that catches me eye and I 'as to 'ave it.'

The shelves were laden with cameos set with pearls, ruby-encrusted snuffboxes, diamond tiepins. A sapphire necklace was spreadeagled on a red velvet cushion, just begging for a fine white neck to wear it. An emerald ring glistened in an ebony box like a winking eye.

‘Where did you pinch all these from?' I asked, aghast.

‘Pinch? You think I stole these, do you, Cat?' He leant against the door, blocking my exit.

‘Course I do.'

‘I won't deny that some came to me strangely cheap from irregular sources, but I buy them
above board, all fair and square.'

I raised an eyebrow.

He grinned. ‘Well, perhaps I don't ask enough questions, but I never stole none of these, I swear, your worship.' He saw where my eyes were resting. ‘Try it on.'

Before I could refuse, he put the sapphire necklace around my throat and held up a mirror so I could inspect it. It was the most beautiful thing I had ever seen, though the stones felt cold against my skin. I shivered.

‘Look, it suits you, Cat. You were born to wear fine stuff, anyone can see that. Your father must 'ave 'ad blue blood, even if your mother was a harlot.'

I pulled it off my neck, feeling sullied that I'd half fallen for the lure of all these garish treasures.

‘Easy with that!' Billy chided, taking the necklace from me and laying it reverently back on its pillow.

‘So, you've got a lot of rocks, Billy. What's that to do with me?'

He rubbed his chin, gazing around him like a
painter trying to decide where next to place his brush. ‘It's a fine collection, I grant you, but I feel it lacks something.'

‘What?'

‘I want the Crown jewels.'

‘Oh yeah, pull the other one, it's got bells on,' I laughed hollowly.

‘Nah, I'm deadly serious, Cat. I want you to get me the Crown jewels. I'm a reasonable man – I don't ask for all of 'em, just something to put in that space . . . there!' He pointed to a gap in the middle shelf occupied by an empty cushion.

‘You are joking?'

He shook his head. ‘You gave your word, Cat. You said you'd do anything to 'elp your African friend.'

I gulped. He was purposely setting me an impossible task. He had to have a reason.

‘Isn't there something else I could do?'

‘I like collectin', Cat: jewels, money, people . . .'

‘You really should get out more, Billy –'

‘If you don't get me wot I want, you'll 'ave to take its place.' He placed the lock of hair on the cushion.

‘You're a sick man, Billy, very sick.' My knees were trembling. I wasn't sure if he meant he wanted a bit of me carved off and put up there like a fetish belonging to some savage tribe of Captain Cook's, or whether he meant he wanted me as a permanent guest in his house. A possession. Knowing Billy, both were possible and I didn't want to find out the answer.

He just smiled.

I looked down at my skirts. I'd forgotten to keep the raspberry stain hidden – the blot taunted me, reminding me of my failings. ‘All right, damn you! I'll get you your Crown jewel even if I have to rob the king myself. How long do I have?'

Billy picked up the candelabra. ‘'Ow long do you think you'll need before you decide?'

He meant before I decided if I was going to join his little collection.

‘Oh, I don't know,' I said irritably, hating him for this. He loved humiliating me. ‘Till the end of the summer, I s'pose.'

‘Fair enough. Your cushion will be waitin' by
my fireside for the autumn then, Kitten.'

‘Don't call me Kitten.'

He ushered me out and pulled the bell cord. ‘You know, I always wanted a pet,' he said in a conversational tone. ‘Somethink to come 'ome to.'

‘Something to kick when you get angry, you mean.'

‘That too.' His hand darted out and stroked my hair before I had time to duck. ‘Looks better now it's grown again. You're turnin' out all right after all.'

‘Shame the same can't be said for you,' I said quickly, batting his hand away.

He gave me a superior smile. ‘Well, I don't need looks, do I? Not when I've got power. But you, what else 'ave you got to fall back on now they're closin' the theatre?'

‘Brains, Billy, brains, as you once told me. Keep the cushion; I'm taking no place at yours or anyone's fireside any time soon.'

The butler appeared at the door to show me out. I paused on the threshold.

‘Oh, and Billy?'

He was locking the door to his strongroom again. ‘Yeah, cherub?'

‘I'd sack the elocution teacher if I were you. It's pissing in the wind to think you can learn to speak properly.'

With that, I made a fast exit and showed myself out on to the street.

I set off in a mad dash across town to prevent Syd and Pedro bringing the rest of the Butcher's Boys to my rescue. Having started the day with a relatively creditable appearance, I was ending it in a crumpled mess, stained with raspberry and besmirched with dust. But the deepest soil on me was the feeling I had carried away from Billy's white room – that wouldn't wash off. He had an unhealthy obsession about me. I had the impression that getting me as part of his kingdom had come to represent the final proof that he had conquered the world. While I still existed, rude and irreverent, he would always feel his lowly origins dragging him down. If I failed to fulfil my part of the bargain, as seemed all too likely, I would have
been proved as fallible as all his other minions, someone he could control. To him I'd be part of his menagerie of tame bullies and thieves.

‘Never,' I swore to myself as I turned into the alley leading to the back of the shop. ‘I'll leave London before I let that happen to me. Exile must be better than being enslaved to Billy.'

‘Bloody 'ell, Cat, you 'ad us that worried!' shouted Syd as I burst into the yard.

Pedro threw aside the cudgel he had been holding and gave me a hug. ‘Are you all right?' he asked. ‘He didn't harm you?'

‘No. It was like I told you – he just wanted to swap insults.'

The boys relaxed their warlike stances. Syd grinned. ‘I bet you gave 'im what for, eh, Cat?'

‘Yeah, I think I came out on top.' For now, at any rate.

I proceeded to entertain them with an edited version of my call on Billy, leaving out all reference to our deal. They were highly amused to hear about his attempts to pass himself off as a gentleman.

‘I don't know who 'e thinks 'e's foolin',' marvelled Nick, Syd's second-in-command. ‘Billy's as refined as horse-dung.'

Jo the Card bowed before me and produced a posy of flowers from up his sleeve. ‘To our Cat, Insulter Extraordinaire to the Prince of Darkness.'

I smiled, though this felt too near the knuckle to be truly funny. ‘Thanks, Jo, but I'll relinquish the position to anyone who wants it. It's not my idea of fun to spend the day with the Boil.'

‘I'll take it over,' growled Syd. ‘And before 'e 'as a chance to open 'is gob, I'll shove 'is teeth down the back of 'is throat.'

‘Well, you'd be doing him a favour – it's either you or the tooth-puller from what I saw. Gilded dung, that's what he is. Rotten to the core.'

‘Right then,' said Syd, pushing up his sleeves. ‘As there's no call now to rescue Cat, I think we all deserve a pint. Let's go to the Jolly Boatman.'

His boys all rose eagerly and filed out into the alley, laughing and whistling in anticipation of a good night out. Hoping no one had noticed, I started to follow.

‘Nah, not you, Cat,' said Syd gently, hooking me by the arm as he spotted me trying to blend in with the crowd. ‘You know the Boatman is no place for a respectable girl. I'll walk you 'ome.'

I too was feeling thirsty after a long hot day. Surely just a very little drink of something would do no harm? Why did I always have to miss out on the fun? ‘But Syd, if I stick with you, I'd be all right,' I protested.

‘Nah, Kitten.'

‘Why not? Have you got a girlfriend waiting for you or something? Are you too embarrassed to be seen with me in your company?'

He shook his head. ‘Leave it. Let's not argue now. I'm off soon – I don't want to part from you with a quarrel.'

I subsided. Perhaps Nick wouldn't be so strict about not letting girls join the gang while Syd was away? Maybe I'd only have to wait a few days?

Syd patted my wrist. ‘I've asked Nick to keep an eye on you while I'm gone – to make sure you don't do anythink stupid.'

What was Syd now? A mind-reader?

‘No, Syd, I won't.'

‘Stay out of trouble, won't you?'

‘I'll try.'

‘And when trouble finds you out – ' I laughed: he knew me too well to think I'd have a problem-free summer ‘ – don't forget that any of me boys are sworn to protect you. You can call on any of 'em, night or day.'

‘Stop fussing, you old woman, you,' I chided.

We had arrived at the back door to the theatre. Syd squeezed my hand once and let it go.

‘Goodbye, Cat.'

‘Goodbye, Syd.' I felt strangely bereft, realizing that the straw-haired giant before me, my most faithful friend, was leaving me for the first time ever. So much was changing. Unbidden, a tear broke free and escaped down my cheek.