It Happened One Midnight (PG8) (26 page)

Blood singing with the first triumph, Jonathan made for the stairs.

T
HE DIN WAS
extraordinary; the movement dizzied, then mesmerized, then stunned. The air was choked with dust and the smell of oiled machinery. Dozens if not hundreds of children, and men and women, too, moved like buzzing bees among long row upon row of huge spinning frames. The spindles were a rotating blur as the wheeled frames advanced toward each other on great iron tracks and drew back again, as if in the throes of a perpetual reel. And in this way cotton became yarn, and yarn became weaving material, and thusly everyone in England would have their tablecloths and sheets and underclothes.

How had he come to this? How had he become a man who sang “Baa, Baa, Black Sheep” at the command of a little girl and was now about to steal a child from the din of a cotton mill? The answer was “Tommy.”

Jonathan held his breath as one of the children darted forward and quickly knotted the pieces of thread broken under the strain of the stretching and twisting. Stunningly deft work. One moment of miscalculation and he’d be crushed beneath the wheels or between the moving frames.

The child had bright red hair.

Jonathan was unnoticed as of yet by the workers, many of whom looked away from their work at their peril.

But the boy glanced up, saw him, and bolted for him, darting like a hummingbird in flight among the machinery and other laborers.

He planted his hands on his hips. “You be Mr. Friend? Sent by Tommy?”

“Charlie!” a man bellowed from the opposite end of the row.

“Aye, Charlie. We must go now. Quickly.” Jonathan seized him by the hand and hauled him back the way he’d come.

They were halfway down the first flight of stairs when they heard another faint: “
Charlie!
”

“Here, guv.” Charlie led him toward a long passage, at the end of which was a narrow wooden door. The one that allegedly led out to the river.

Jonathan lunged for the knob. Bloody
hell
. The bloody thing was locked.

“Stand back, Charlie.”

Jonathan inhaled, and then drew back his foot and threw his entire weight into a kick.

It splintered in the frame with a crash, and they both jumped away with a wince. Jonathan pushed it. It gave.

Charlie gave a delighted hoot.

Jonathan surveyed the destruction with grim satisfaction.“ And now we run.”

T
HE EXPANSE OF
grassland and shrubbery between them and the mill seemed to stretch and grow and unfurl like the Atlantic Ocean itself. The boy was quick but his legs were short, and he took four or five steps to Jonathan’s every one. And then Charlie halted and yanked his hand away.

Which is when Jonathan saw raw abrasions on both of the little boy’s wrists.

In very nearly the same place as those scars of Tommy’s.

His stomach flipped unpleasantly with a dark suspicion.

“I needs to take a piss. Now.” Charlie planted his hands on his hips and squinted up at Jonathan. He was about four feet tall and feisty and rude as a fighting cock.

Oh . . . Christ. Jonathan swiveled his head around. “Well, all right then. Do you see a likely bush? We need to hurry, Charlie.”

Charlie pointed to a ragged hawthorn near the river. Jonathan turned his back.

The boy unfastened his trousers and turned, aiming for the shrub.

“Charlie . . . how did you get those wounds on your wrists?”

“They chained me up, di’nt they? Bracelets round me ankles and wrists.”

Jonathan’s stomach clenched. He tried to keep his voice casual. “Do they chain everyone?”

“Just the ones what run,” Charlie said offhandedly. “I got out the gate quick like, when it was open to a farmer’s cart, got as far as the road before they caught me. Legs too short.” He looked down with grim resignation. “They’ll be longer than yours when I’m grown. I’ll be taller than you by far. Drained!” he announced at last, whirled, buttoning his trousers.

“Excellent. Can you run, Charlie? Would you like me to carry you?”

“Carry! I’ve legs, don’t I?” Nick said scornfully. “I’m no’ a baby, ye daft cove. I’ll walk on me own. And you smell!”

“
You
smell,” Jonathan said.

Well, he wasn’t proud of it. It was a reflex.

Charlie snorted at that. “You smell
worse
.”

Jonathan knew from experience this sort of disagreement could go on forever.

“It’s a shame you want to walk, Charlie. I might have given you a ride on my back . . . like a horse.”

Charlie turned to him, his eyes huge and disbelieving. Then he turned away again, and shook his head to and fro.

“Bedlam,” he muttered, throwing his arms outward as if to an invisible audience, shooting Jonathan a sidelong look. “Ye belong in with the loobies. Like a horse! A grown man run like an
’orse,
” He snorted. “I’ve ’eard it all, now, I ’ave.”

Jonathan shrugged.

They walked on. Charlie took about four steps to Jonathan’s one. He counted now. He couldn’t tell what was louder—his heartbeat or his footsteps.

“Ye’d . . . gallop, like?” Charlie said with studied casualness.

“I’d gallop.”

“And I can kick you? And shout ‘Hi-
ya!
Ya!
Ya!
’ ”

“No. You may not shout or whoop at all. And if you kick me, I’ll buck you off immediately.”

But his palms had begun to sweat when Charlie conceded grandly, “Very well. Mayhap I’ll give it a go.”

Jonathan dropped to a crouch. “Loop your arms
loosely
around my neck. I’ll hold beneath your knees. NOW!”

Amazingly, the child did as told, too surprised to do anything else, probably.

And Jonathan took off at a run.

Charlie predictably whooped.

“I SAID NO WHOOPING.”

Good God, he sounded like his father.

He ran like a racehorse spooked by a hornet with a smelly, delighted, and terrified little boy clinging to his back, and soon the carriage and—oh, sweet merciful Mary—Tommy, too, came into view. Tommy, who was hopping up and down anxiously, as if to encourage them to go faster.

But when she saw them she burst into laughter.

He nearly snarled at her, but he spun about and tipped Charlie into the carriage, seized Tommy by the waist and lifted her up before she could squeak a protest, then he flung himself back against the seat.

One fist pound to the ceiling and the driver emerged from the stand of trees, and they were rolling onto the road again.

And it was Jonathan who whooped.

Chapter 20

“
T
OMMY!
”
C
HARLIE FELL INTO
her arms, and she buried her face in his dirty hair.

And the moment Jonathan saw the expression on their faces he realized he would likely have happily stolen the crown jewels for her.

That
was a terrifying thought.

And when Tommy at last released him, Charlie had flung himself backward on the plump seat and immediately began swinging his legs extravagantly. He kicked Jonathan in the boot.

He eyed Charlie balefully.

Which only made Charlie grin, and of course, do it again.

“If you kick me again, Charlie, I shall not hesitate to kick you back.”

Charlie paused in the leg-swinging for a moment, his eyes wide and fascinated and fixed on Jonathan’s face. “I shall not ’esitate to kick you back,” he imitated cheekily.

Jonathan closed his eyes and slowly, slowly banged the back of his head against the seat. Thrice.

“I wouldn’t leave your eyes closed for very long, if I were you. They get up to things,” Tommy said.

He opened them. Fixed her with a stare so controlled and expressionless she fought a smile.

“It’s a short ride back to London,” she reassured him. “I know a song to pass the time. ‘Baa, Baa, Black Sheep . . .’ ”

“Would you like me to kick you?” he asked mildly.

She beamed at him.

He turned his attention to the boy again. Charlie was still regarding him unblinkingly, with some fascination, and a trifle shyly now.

“Will ye say that again, wot ye just said?”

“I shall not hesitate to kick you back? Because I won’t.”

Charlie mouthed the words to himself. It was funny watching someone shape his elegant crisp consonants and round vowels, that distinctively upper-crust British he spoke that must sound practically like Norwegian or Chinese to this little boy.

Charlie tried it again.

“Very good!” Jonathan approved firmly.

The boy tried not to squirm with pleasure. “Will ye teach me to speak fancy like?”

“Like a gentleman, you mean?”

“Sure,” Charlie said indifferently. As if to say, “If
that’s
what you want to call it.” But the little boy was no longer trying to suppress his avidity. His sharp elfin eyes were taking in Jonathan’s clothes, not tallying their cost the way a thief would, but with the dawning of hero worship, and comparing them, no doubt. To his own.

“There’s quite a bit to being a gentleman, Master Charlemagne.” He shot a warning look at Tommy, in case she wanted to chime in with her droll opinion of just what that “quite a bit” constituted.

Instead of kicking Jonathan, Charlie began drumming his heels rhythmically against the seat. Each kick vibrated like a blow struck directly to Jonathan’s temples.

Jonathan leveled his head up and fixed him with his very best quelling stare.

The heel drumming stopped immediately. Charlie’s eyes were wide and uncertain, and he was frozen as a hare before a fox.

“Thank you, Master Charlemagne,” Jonathan said sternly. “As our first lesson, I should tell you that gentlemen do not drum their heels against seats. And gentlemen always say thank you, even when the thank you in question regards the cessation of torture. And the drumming of a certainty was bothering the other passengers in this carriage.”

Charlie probably had no idea what any of that meant, but he caught the gist, because he grinned infectiously. “All right, guv.”

Jonathan sighed. “It’s Mr. Friend, to you, Charlie.”

But Charlie didn’t do any more thumping. Luckily, what he did was doze off seconds later, feet shoved up against the wall of the coach, head pushed against Tommy’s thigh.

She gently tucked her shawl around him and left one arm resting across his shoulder.

“That’s quite a frightening look you’ve got in your arsenal, Mr. Redmond,” Tommy congratulated in a lowered voice. “I think it grayed a few of my hairs.”

Jonathan shook his head to and fro. “They’re bloody exhausting. It’s always ‘don’t!’ and ‘stop that!’ and ‘be quiet!’ or ‘speak up!’ . . . they’re
completely
anarchic creatures.
Animals
make infinitely more sense.”

“Children?”

“What else!”

Oh, how Violet would laugh and laugh at him.

But then he looked at one of Charlie’s skinny raw legs poking out from beneath the shawl, and his gut clutched. Yes, he would steal him again.

There was a quiet, during which their nerves relaxed into the shapes they normally took when they weren’t stretched beyond recognition. Tommy gazed out the window, probably mostly sightlessly. Dozing Jonathan admired the warm pearl glow the sun gave to her complexion, and that kitten point of her chin, and the achingly soft slope of her cheek.

He’d been trying to decide whether to ask the question that haunted him. But he had no choice. It was an anguish in him. He needed to know.

“He has scars on his ankles and wrists like yours.”

Her spine stiffened almost imperceptibly. “Does he?” She said it absently. She continued gazing with apparent disinterest out the window.

He was afraid to ask the question. But it had momentum now.

“Were you shackled at a mill, Tommy? Were you sold by the workhouse at Bethnal Green to a mill?”

She slowly turned to him. Held his gaze for a moment, as if to steady him. And said very carefully and expressionlessly, “Yes.”

He was silent. Suddenly he couldn’t hear over a high-pitched whine in his ears. He supposed it was the sound of every cell in his body screaming in protest at the image of a little redheaded girl chained round the ankles.

Had she been beaten?

His stomach heaved.

Her wrists and ankles even today were so narrow and fragile looking. With their shining rings of scars, faint now. But they would always, always be there. He tried not to look at them now. He tried not to swallow.

He breathed in, for it was all he could do.

“Why is it so important for you to know?” she asked into his silence. Her voice was calm.

“Because you didn’t want me to know.”

He said it before he could think about what it meant.
Because I want to know you
.

It was too late. Deeper and deeper in. He was beset by a peculiar sort of gravity when it came to her. The more he tried to resist, the more entangled he found himself, and the less he minded the entanglement.

“And that wasn’t because I walk about crippled by the trauma of it, or because I’m ashamed, or because it’s so indescribably difficult to talk about. It’s because of the look on your face now. They don’t shackle boys who go to Eton now, do they?