Burning Bright (11 page)

After fetching the tankard where she'd left it by the wall in Astley's field, Maggie ran to the Pineapple at the end of Hercules Buildings, Jem at her side. As they were about to go in, he looked around, and to his surprise spied his sister, pressed against the hedge across the road and stepping from one foot to the other. “Maisie!” he cried.

Maisie started. “Oh! Ar'ernoon, Jem, Maggie.”

“What you doin' here, Miss Piddle?” Maggie demanded as they crossed over to her. “Weren't you goin' to say hallo?”

“I'm—” Maisie broke off as the door to the Pineapple opened and Charlie Butterfield stepped out. Her bright face fell.

“Damn,” Maggie muttered as Charlie caught sight of them and wandered over. He scowled when he recognized Jem. “What you hangin' about for, country boy?”

Maggie stepped between them. “We're just gettin' Mam some beer. Jem, would you go in and get it for me? Tell 'em it's for the Butterfields and Pa'll pay for it at the end of the week.” Maggie preferred to keep Jem and Charlie separate if she could; they'd hated each other from the start.

Jem hesitated—he didn't much like going into London pubs on his own—but he knew why Maggie was asking him. Grabbing the tankard, he ran across to the Pineapple and disappeared inside.

When he was gone Charlie turned his attention to Maisie, taking in her guileless face, her silly frilled cap, her slim form and small breasts pushed up by her stays. “Who's this, then?” he said. “An't you goin' to introduce us?”

Maisie smiled a Piddle Valley smile. “I'm Maisie—Margaret, like Maggie. I'm Jem's sister. Are you Maggie's brother? You two look just alike, except that one be dark and t'other fair.”

Charlie smiled at her in a way that Maggie didn't trust. She could see him guzzling Maisie's innocence. “What you doin' in the street, Maisie?” he said. “You waitin' for me?”

Maisie giggled. “How could I do that when I ne'er saw you before? No, I be waiting—for someone else.”

Her words seemed to make the pub door open, and John Astley stepped out, accompanied by a girl who made costumes for the circus. They were laughing, and his hand was giving her a little push in the small of her back. Without looking at the trio, they turned and walked down a path that skirted the Pineapple and led back to the Astley stables. Maggie knew there was an empty stall at the end where he often brought his women.

“Oh!” Maisie gulped, and stepped into the street to follow them.

Maggie took hold of her elbow. “No, Miss Piddle.”

“Why not?” Maisie seemed to ask this innocently as she tried to pull her elbow free. Maggie glanced at Charlie, who raised his eyebrows.

“C'mon, now, Maisie. They'll be busy and won't want you hangin' about.”

“He must be showing her his horse, don't you think?” Maisie said.

Charlie snorted. “Showin' her summat, that's sure.”

“Best leave it,” Maggie advised. “You don't want to be spyin' on him—he wouldn't like that.”

Maisie turned her large blue eyes on Maggie. “I hadn't thought of that. D'you think he'd be angry with me?”

“Yes, he would. You go home, now.” Maggie gave Maisie a little push. After a moment Maisie started up Hercules Buildings. “Nice to meet you,” she called to Charlie over her shoulder.

Charlie chuckled. “Good Lord a day, where'd you find her?”

“Leave her be, Charlie.”

He was still watching Maisie, but flicked his eyes at his sister. “What makes you think I'm goin' to do summat to her, Miss Cut-Throat?”

Maggie froze. He had never called her that before. She tried not to show her panic, keeping her eyes fixed on his face, taking in the bristles on his chin and the beginnings of a skimpy blond moustache. He was her brother, though, and knew her well, catching the flash in her eyes and the sudden stillness of her breathing.

“Oh, don't worry.” He smiled his dubious smile. “Your secret's safe with me. Fact is, I didn't think you had it in you.”

Jem appeared at the pub door and started over, walking carefully so that he wouldn't jog the full tankard. He frowned when he saw Maggie's tense, miserable face. “What's the matter?” He turned on Charlie. “What'd you do to her?”

“You goin' home now?” Charlie said, ignoring Jem.

Maggie frowned. “What d'you care?”

“Mam and Pa have a little surprise for you, is all.” In one movement he grabbed the tankard from Jem and pulled a long drink from it, emptying a third before he thrust it back and ran off, laughter floating behind him.

When Maggie returned, Bet Butterfield was by the fire, dumping fistfuls of chopped potatoes into a pot of water. Charlie was already at the table, his long legs spread in front of him. “Chop up the onions, would you, duck,” Bet Butterfield said, taking the tankard from Maggie without comment on its late arrival or the missing beer. “You cry less'n me.”

“Charlie don't cry at all,” Maggie retorted. Charlie did not take the hint, but continued to lounge at the table. Maggie glared at him as she began to peel the onions. Bet Butterfield cut some of the fat off the meat and dropped it into a frying pan to heat. Then she stood over her daughter, watching her work.

“Not rings,” she said. “Slivers.”

Maggie paused, the knife biting into half an onion. “Stop it, Mam. You said onions make you cry, so go 'way.”

“How can I go 'way when you an't chopping 'em right?”

“What difference does it make how I chop 'em? Rings or slivers, they taste the same. Onions is onions.”

“Here, I'll do it.” Bet Butterfield grabbed at the knife. Maggie held on to it.

Charlie looked up from his contemplation of nothing and watched mother and daughter grapple with the knife. “Careful, Mam,” he drawled. “Maggie's handy with a knife, an't you, Maggie?”

Maggie let go. “Shut it, Charlie!”

Bet Butterfield glanced from one to the other of her children. “What you talkin' about?”

“Nothing, Mam,” they answered in unison.

Bet Butterfield waited, but neither said anything more, though Charlie smirked at the fire. Their mother began chopping the onions just as she had done the ironing—automatically, methodi-cally, repeating an act so familiar that she didn't have to waste any thought on it.

“Mam, the fat's smokin',” Maggie announced.

“Put the meat in, then,” Bet Butterfield ordered. “Don't let it burn. Your pa don't like it burnt.”

“I'm not going to burn it.”

Maggie burnt it. She did not like cooking any more than ironing. Bet Butterfield finished chopping the onions, scooped them up and dropped them into the pan before grabbing the spoon from her daughter. “Maggie!” she cried when she turned the meat and saw the black marks.

Charlie chuckled.

“What'd she do this time?” Dick Butterfield spoke from the doorway. Bet Butterfield flipped the meat back over and stirred the onions vigorously. “Nothing, nothing—she's just gettin' back to the ironing, an't you, duck?”

“Mind you don't scorch it,” Dick Butterfield commented. “What? What?” he added as Charlie began to laugh and Maggie kicked at her brother's legs. “Listen, girl, you need to treat your family with a little more respect. Now, help your mother.” He hooked a stool with his foot and pulled it under him as he sat down, a movement he had perfected from years of pub stool sitting.

Maggie scowled, but pulled the iron from the fire and went back to the pile of sheets. She could feel her father's eyes on her as she ran the iron back and forth, and for once she concentrated on smoothing the cloth systematically rather than haphazardly.

It was rare for all four Butterfields to be in the same room together. By the nature of their different work, Dick and Bet were often out at odd times, and Charlie and Maggie had grown up dipping in and out of the house as they liked, eating from pie shops or taverns or street sellers. The kitchen felt small with them all there, especially with Charlie's legs taking up so much space.

“So, Mags,” Dick Butterfield said suddenly, “Charlie tells us you was out with the Kellaway boy when you was meant to be gettin' beer for your mam.”

Maggie glowered at Charlie, who smiled.

“You spend all your time runnin' round with Dorset boys,” her father continued, “while your mam an' me is out workin' to put food in your mouth. It's time you started to earn your keep.”

“I don't see Charlie working,” Maggie muttered into her ironing.

“What's that?” Charlie growled.

“Charlie don't work,” Maggie repeated more loudly. “He's years older'n me and you're not sendin' him out to work.”

Dick Butterfield had been batting a piece of coal back and forth on the table, and Bet Butterfield was holding the pan over the pot and pushing the meat and onions in to join the potatoes. Both paused what they were doing and stared at Maggie. “What you mean, gal? Course he works—he works with me!” Dick Butterfield protested, genuinely puzzled.

“I meant that you never had him apprenticed, to a trade.”

Charlie had been looking smug, but now he stopped smiling.

“He
is
apprenticed, to
me
,” Dick Butterfield said quickly, with a glance at his son. “And he's learned plenty about buying and selling, han't you, boy?”

It was a sore point with Charlie. They'd not had the fee needed to have him apprenticed at thirteen, for Dick Butterfield had been in prison then. He'd done two years for trying to pass off pewter as silver, and by the time he'd come out and recovered his busi-ness, Charlie was a fifteen-year-old boor who slept till noon and spoke in grunts. The few tradesmen who might have been prepared to take on an older boy spent just a minute in his company and made their excuses. Dick Butterfield was only able to call in one favor, and Charlie lasted all of two days at a blacksmith's before he burnt a horse while playing with a hot poker. The horse dispatched him for the blacksmith by kicking him unconscious; he bore the scar through one eyebrow from that blow.

“It an't Charlie we're talkin' about here, anyway,” Dick Butterfield declared. “It's you. Now, your mam says it's no good you doin' the laundry with her, as you haven't got the knack of it, have you? So I've asked about, and got you a place with a friend of mine in Southwark, makes rope. You start tomorrow morning at six. Best get a good night's sleep tonight.”

“Rope!” Maggie cried. “Please, Pa, not that!” She was thinking of a woman she'd seen in a pub once whose hands were rubbed raw from the scratchy hemp she had to handle all day.

“Surprise,” Charlie mouthed at her.

“Bastard!” Maggie mouthed back.

“No arguments, gal,” Dick Butterfield said. “It's time you grew up.”

“Mags, run next door and ask 'em for some turnips,” Bet Butterfield ordered, trying to defuse the growing anger in the room. “Tell 'em I'll get some more down the market tomorrow.”

Maggie banged the iron into the coals and turned to go. If she'd simply gone out, got the turnips, and come back, the moment might have passed. But as she went toward the door, Charlie stretched out a foot to trip her, and Maggie sprawled forward, banging her shins on the table and knocking Dick Butterfield's arm so that the piece of coal he'd been playing with flew from his hands and dropped into the stew. “Damn, Mags, what you doing?” he shouted.

Even then the situation could have been repaired if only her mother had scolded Charlie for tripping her up. Instead Bet Butterfield cried, “What's the matter with you, you clumsy clod! You tryin' to ruin my stew? Can't you do anything right?”

Maggie staggered up from the floor to come face-to-face with Charlie's sneer. The sight made something in her snap, and she spat in her brother's face. He jumped up with a roar, his chair flung backward. As Maggie hopped across the room to the door, she shouted over her shoulder, “Fuck you, the lot of you! You can take your turnips and shove 'em straight up your arse!”

Charlie chased her out of the house and down the street, bellowing “Bitch!” all the way, and would have caught her but for a coach rumbling along Bastille Row that she darted in front of and that he was forced to stop for. This gave her the crucial seconds she needed to get him off of her heels, race across Mead Row, and dive down an alley that ran along the backs of gardens and came out eventually across from the Dog and Duck. Maggie knew every hidey-hole and alley in the area much better than her brother. When she looked back, Charlie was no longer following her. He was the sort of boy who never bothered to chase someone unless he was sure he could catch them, for he hated being seen to lose.

Maggie hid behind the Dog and Duck for a while, listening to the noise inside the pub and watching out for her brother. When she felt sure that he was no longer looking for her, she crept out and began to make her way through the streets in a wide semicircle around Bastille Row. It was quiet now; people were at home eating, or in the pub. Street sellers had packed up their wares and gone; the whores were just beginning to emerge.

Eventually Maggie ended up at the river by Lambeth Palace. She sat on the bank for a long time, watching the boats going up and down in the early evening sunlight. She could hear, up along the river, the distinct sounds of Astley's Circus—music and laughter and occasional cheers. Her heart was still pounding and she was still grinding her teeth. “Damned rope,” she muttered. “Piss on that.”

Though she was hungry, and she would need somewhere to sleep, she didn't dare go home to face her parents and Charlie, and rope. Maggie shivered, though it was a balmy evening yet. She was used to spending time away from the house, but she'd never slept anywhere else. Perhaps Jem will let me sleep at his house, she thought. She couldn't think of another plan, and so she leapt up and ran along Church Street past Lambeth Green to Hercules Buildings. It was only when she was standing in the road across from Miss Pelham's house that Maggie faltered. No one was standing in the windows of the Kellaways' rooms, though they were propped open. She could call out or throw a pebble up to get someone's attention, but she didn't. She just stood and looked, hoping that Jem or Maisie would make it easy by spotting her and beckoning for her to come up.

After a few minutes of standing and feeling foolish, she stepped into the road again. It was getting dark now. Maggie walked down the alley between two Hercules Buildings houses that led to Astley's field. Across it was her parents' garden, where she could see a faint light through the gap in the fence. They would have eaten the stew by now. She wondered if her mother had saved any for her. Her father might have slipped to the pub to bring back more beer and perhaps an old paper or two that he would be reading out to Bet and Charlie, if Charlie hadn't already gone to the pub himself. Perhaps the neighbors had popped around and they were catching up on the local gossip or talking about how difficult daughters could be. One of their neighbors played the fiddle—perhaps he'd brought it with him and Dick Butterfield had drunk enough beer to sing “Morgan Rattler,” his favorite bawdy song. Maggie strained her ears, but couldn't hear any music. She wanted to go back, but only if she could slip in and sit with her family and not have a fuss made, and not have to say sorry, and take the beating she knew waited for her, and go the next morning and make rope for the rest of her life. That was not going to happen, and so she had to stand and watch from afar.

Her gaze fell then on the wall at the end of the Blakes' garden just to her left. She contemplated it, gauging how high it was, and what was behind it, and whether or not climbing over it was what she wanted to do.

Not far from the wall was a wheelbarrow one of Astley's nieces had been using in the kitchen garden. Maggie looked around. For once the yard was deserted, though there were figures moving about inside Hercules Hall—servants preparing a late supper for their master. She hesitated, then ran in a crouch over to the barrow and pushed it to the end of the wall, wincing at the squeak the wheel made. Then, when she was sure no one was watching, she climbed onto the barrow, pulled herself to the top of the wall, and jumped down into the darkness.