Pugg's Portmanteau

by DM Bryan

  Gotobed said nothing, only looked at his stout cudgel as if wondering at its presence in his hand. The mackerel-man, who had been following the exchange with round, wet eyes, vanished into the watery weather. With a little more room under the bookseller’s roof, Prosper sat himself upon the stall’s counter. Reaching under his backside to locate a book, he held it in his hand as if reading, but he watched the merchant carefully.

  “Might I show you my receipt book?” said the printseller. “I am certain you will be satisfied with my manner of accounting for each set, for I am an honest man.” This last came as a sort of plea.

  “I know so, sir,” said Gotobed, tapping his staff against the tip of his shoe. He leaned in over the merchant as the man brought out a leather ledger, filled with closely ruled, spidery lines of ink. Then, the merchant and Gotobed conferred awhile in soft voices, and at the end of this exchange a small bag was slid over the counter. Gotobed dropped the little purse into his coat pocket.

  Seeing him use his pockets so, I went over to him and stood on my toes to whisper in his ear. “Keep your fingers tight about the bag until we come safe home,” said I.

  “What’s that,” said Gotobed, very audibly. “Do you warn me of pickpockets, Mr. Quire?”

  At this, Prosper laughed at this and threw me the book he was pretending to read. I caught it and returned it to the printseller with a scowl. Then, we three stepped back into the rain, even as another row of customers pushed past to squint at the prints.

  The next shop we came to was entirely indoors, and I felt glad of that, but otherwise the scene played itself out with little variation. And the next went the same: Gotobed and his cudgel, a clerk and a ledger, a soft, sliding bag of coins.

  In the last place we visited, the seller paid up like the rest, but he accompanied the chinking of silver with a kind of curtain-lecture. He said our price was too steep and cut into his margins. He would buy again, and happily, but at a lower cost.

  Gotobed frowned at him, and I did not like the look.

  “To tell the truth, gentlemen,” said the printseller, and he lay some stress upon this last word, as though he had some doubts about the matter, “I am astonished at your monopoly on this latest of Mr. Hogarth’s series. Perhaps I shall make inquiries into the nature of your agreement with that honest artist, for he is not so very hard to find, and his view on piracy well-known.”

  I heard this with a kind of creeping coldness, for I had always before me Mr. Hogarth’s Publish’d according to Act of Parliament. I did not care that my own pilfering of watches merited the gallows, but I did not want to disappoint Mr. Hogarth.

  Gotobed had an answer ready. “By all means,” said he, “ask your questions, but remember, you will first need to explain to Mr. Hogarth your own part in the matter.”

  “I have nothing to prove—my name is very well respected,” said the printseller. He was a stout man and handsome in a red-faced way. “I am trusted in this business—who are you again?” Then, he eyed the three of us to show that we were nobodies.

  “My name is as good as any man’s,” said Gotobed.

  “You, sir, are a damned pyrate and that French fop a dirty cat and mice.”

  I saw Gotobed pale, and the angry look on his face settled into something fixed and ugly. Quick as thought, he swung his cudgel, even as Prosper put up his hand to stop him. The oak staff swerved to miss Prosper but in doing so knocked over a stack of unbound tomes. A moment later, we stood on a floor strewn with paper.

  “Get out,” said the bookseller, his face redder than ever. “Get the hell out of my shop before I call the authorities.”

  Gotobed’s expression threatened more violence, but he turned from that place and left, the little bell over the door jingling discordantly.

  As soon as we were out of the shop, I placed myself at Gotobed’s elbow, but Prosper was already on his other side. Prosper said, “You must give him his price. He’s right—we cannot fight back.”

  Gotobed said nothing to this, only walked very quickly, splashing though puddles.

  “Cat and mice?” said I, struggling to keep up. “That fellow curses very stupidly—he is the vastest sort of fool.”

  “Little Quire,” Prosper said. “This is business. Tais-toi.”

  Gotobed bent his head against the rain. “Shut up, both of you,” he said. “Cass, I am aching with cold and have a coat heavy with money. We might at least go where the last can repair the first.”

  And at this, Gotobed strode away, leaving the two of us alone.

  [

  The wet was washing away the day, leeching light from the sky and the glass of windows. In shops and houses, lamps began to glow. We emerged from the mouth of a lane, and then we were in the churchyard of St. Paul’s. All day, the dome had hovered over our shoulder, but like a home-truth, the closer we got, the harder it was to see. Now, it stood in front of us, bulbous and hard, a bowl in the sky. “There,” said Gotobed, and he set off, making for the steps, almost at a run.

  Prosper could keep up, but I fell behind. When I found them again, they had passed through the doors and stood on the chequer floor, candlelight blooming from wrought-iron candelabra, tall as soldiers. I had never been inside St. Paul’s before, and I did not like it now. Incense prickled my nose, and an iciness seeped up through the flags and into my wet soles.

  Gotobed made for a side aisle, where he slid into a pew as if on to an ale-shop bench. Prosper paused and genuflected as he crossed the apse, while I scrambled after. Even before we sat down, Gotobed was pulling handfuls of crowns, nobles, and marks out of his pocket, forming them in glittering piles on the pew beside him. Deftly, he sorted each crown and each shilling, down to the pennies. Then he formed three hoards, explaining how he carefully weighted each to reflect the nature of our contribution. He had a little more than Prosper because he had communicated with the printsellers, and Prosper had a little more than me because engraving was more labour than drawing. With so many coins on view, nobody disputed his reckoning, and we watched him work in silence. When Gotobed was done, he shoved a pile toward each of us, and I held in my hands a full two pounds in ready money.

  I had never had so much as that before, and was quite dazzled. What was I to do with so many shillings and half-crowns? I scarcely knew, but after a little thought, I drew up in my head the following bill.

  L.S.D.

  For a first month’s lodging in a safer house than Mother’s ——— 1 0 0

  For a supper of bread and beer to celebrate the success of our scheme ——— 0 8 0

  A maid-servant attending ——— 0 1 0 0

  Tobacco and a fire ——— 0 7 0

  Having made my calculations, I quickly determined I had, without any effort, already run myself five shillings into debt. Accordingly, I set about keeping my money safe. Holding the coins in a fold in my coat, I rolled down the tops of my stockings and dropped the most valuable inside. Cold as tears, they sank around my ankles, settling against the arches of my feet. They would raise blisters I knew, but they would be safe. The smaller coins, I secreted about myself, in pockets under my breeches and in slits in my coat, for I had a number of hiding places that I used in my trade.

  Gotobed and Prosper watched me, making jokes of the care I took, but I paid them no heed. They had each secured the wealth in a bag tied at the waist and hid beneath coat flaps. It would take me no longer than a blink to snip the cord of each and make away with all their money. But that was an action I would never take. In the time we’d worked together, drawing, engraving, printing our Tom Idle, we had been anything but idle ourselves, and out of that shared effort, we had made something that was more than the sum of six sheets of paper. I could no more betray them, lifting their bags of money than I could—well, I could not betray them. That was all.

  I could see they needed watching over. In particular, I saw Gotobed continue
d in no very wise mood, and the feel of money around his middle would unsteady him further. He needed securing, did Gotobed. Like all poor men, he did not truly believe wealth was his to hold. Tonight, he must give some of it away or lose faith in the man he knew himself to be. Tomorrow, he would be sorry, but tonight he must be unwise.

  On the steps of St. Paul’s, I stopped and looked about me. With the cathedral’s hulk at my back, I had a view of the sky, and the cloud tucked about the city’s ears. Now, as I gazed, a gash appeared overhead, jagged as a knife cut, and through it, I could see a point of light or two. A drover once told me how, in the countryside, the stars show bright as flung silver, but not here—not in London. Nay, in London we are lucky for a celestial glint, a wink, a sly peep. Still, a star is a star and ripe for wishing. I closed my eyes and moved my lips, and the thing was done.

  I was a thief. I worked alone. I had no need of partners. And yet, tonight, I wished to keep my friends safe beside me. I would watch out for them—yes, I would.

  Chapter 15

  The Life and Times of Cass Quire, Gentleman.

  In which Gotobed contemplates how to spend his earnings, and Cass experiences a downturn in his fortunes.

  London, 1746.

  I failed. Of course I did.

  The Sign of the Grapes lay at the end of a narrow passage, so urine-tart it made my eyes water. As we stepped through the door, I was pleased to leave behind the wet night, but no sooner had we entered that low place than I began to wish myself outside again. At least the rain was clean, while the serving-girl who greeted us at the door was not. She smelled of cooking grease and sweat, and she had a blue-green bruise upon her cheek. I eyed her up and down, letting her see my disapproval, but to my surprise she returned my stare and bettered me a sniff. Then, she stuck her pert nose in the air, and I became newly aware of the stink of Smithfield that still perfumed my greatcoat. My hand flew to my head and found the caterpillar scar on my healing ear. We were at a stalemate, the girl and I.

  But she knew Gotobed, and now she expressed herself very glad to see him, fawning over his person in a way that made me sick. Worse, the unhappy fellow played along, showing me a side of him I had not seen before. At Gotobed’s bidding, the girl conducted us up a short flight of stairs and into a smoke-stained chamber. There, she invited us to take our ease, pushing away Gotobed’s inky paws. Freed from his fingers in her skirts, she vanished—upon what mission I dreaded to guess—and we ranged ourselves before a brassy fire of bright-glowing embers.

  I put my feet to the warmth, my clanking stockings beginning to steam. Looking about, I saw at first glance a richly appointed room, but nothing stood up to scrutiny. Many Italian paintings covered the walls, but the gilt frames were only cheaply painted wood, and the fine-seeming landscapes only dashed together with a thick brush. The pair of backless sofas flanking the walls showed many worn patches, and the oak table at the center of the room had lost its sheen. Only a red curtain hanging on one wall held any lustre, and as I looked, I saw its rich folds twitch and part. From behind that disguised doorway came a craven person, both wigless and bald. After bowing and showing us his toothless condition, the man set down a cracked bowl of punch on the table, and made away behind the same curtain.

  From the appearance of the punch, Gotobed made clear he was set on celebration. He lifted his bowl and drank off a bumper to Prosper and me in turn. Next, he made Prosper do the same, and then, nothing would do but that I raise my bowl and propose a toast.

  “To the coin left in the morning,” said I, holding my stemless goblet in the air and sipping a little of the rank concoction. Prosper drank his with the pursed lips of a Frenchman tasting English flip, but Gotobed threw the contents down his throat with such a show of willing that I feared he might swallow his glass.

  “A very good toast, Quire,” he said to me, shaking the red curtain on the wall, and calling for girls.

  Girls came. Three. One apiece. Each was dressed in a silk gown that did not fit, but whether it was the lack of proper petticoats that made them so loose or the meagre proportions of the females, I had no means to ask. The first girl had dark hair and a blue mantua; the second was blond in mustard yellow; and the third was a mousy person wearing green silk too fine for her, or for the shabby chamber in which she stood. With my thief’s eye, I accounted it stolen, for this was the sort of place that kept a good fence busy. The girls set immediately upon Prosper and Gotobed, the one in blue seizing the latter, while the one in yellow smiled slyly at the Frenchman. That left the mousy one for me, but she took one look and began to complain.

  “Oh no,” she said, “I’ll not have the boy. He’ll only cry and then refuse to pay. Look, he’s got no hair on his chin.”

  “Ha—she has you there, Quire,” said Gotobed, settling Blue on

  his lap.

  “Happens I don’t care for her either,” I said as loud as I could.

  “Care has little to do with it,” said Prosper. Mustard sat balanced on his knee, but he did not look pleased.

  My girl stood by the chair where I sat, but she did not approach. “Why don’t you go home to mother,” said she, returning to her theme. “You’re not old enough. And you look damp. Run along now.”

  “I’m as old as you,” which was no more than the truth.

  “It’s different for girls,” said my mousy companion, and she crossed her arms over her invisible chest. I thought of Doll and looked away.

  I turned to Gotobed for help, but there was none to be had from that quarter. The gentleman had grown busy with his hands again, rummaging in the front of Blue’s gown like he’d lost something there. He had a distant look in his eyes that made the small quantity of punch I’d drunk sit less easily in my gut than I liked.

  “Attention, Madame,” said Prosper. Despite Mustard’s arms about his neck, he was still sitting upright at the table, the china punch bowl before him. “He is only a boy, but a boy who is possessed of many, many sous.”

  “You need only feel his stockings to know that,” said Gotobed, a little indistinctly, for his mouth was busy upon Blue’s slightly dirty neck.

  Mouse appeared to look more favourably upon my rights as her beau. At least, she perched herself at my side and poured the party another bumper of drink in our fly-specked bowls.

  Prosper, sitting across from me, resumed grimly sipping, more like an English biftek than a continental gentleman. “I do not like this drink,” he said after several swallows. “It is too … acide. It is lime?” He sniffed at his cup. “No, vinegar, I think.”

  But, he continued swigging with a set, unhappy expression.

  “Ain’t you going to drink your physic then?” said Mouse to me.

  I wanted to object, but could not think of any wording that did not sound petulant, half-grown, unbreeched to my own ear, so I drank my sour dregs.

  “Slow down,” said Mouse.

  Mustard said to Prosper. “ ’Ello monsieur. Comment za va?” and then she took a turn with the long ladle of the punch-bowl.

  “I don’t want any more,” said I, but Mustard ignored me, tipping the ladle until each cup brimmed over with sticky, brown liquid, and rivulets ran down the sides. Little circles of damp formed on the table. We would pay for our refreshment by the bowl, I guessed, and as long as that vessel emptied, the destination of the punch mattered little.

  Mustard caught the ruffles of one sleeve in the spilled liquid, and she daubed at it with an already dirty handkerchief. “We catch it if we mark the good linens,” said she, finding my eyes upon her. “Rumfusian is the devil to lift from so fine a weave as this.”

  “It’s not Rumfusian,” said Mouse.

  “Fuck you,” said Mustard. “The gentlemen know what I mean.”

  Squeals and a short shriek came from Gotobed’s partner, as he bodily lifted and carried her off to one of those backless couches that lay against the wall—how uncomfortably like
beds they were. Sprawled together, Blue and Gotobed began to teasingly slap and tickle each other. Items of clothing fell off, as if by accident. A kerchief and Gotobed’s hat lay already on the ground, and I saw how Prosper’s unhappy eyes flickered over these items, disregarded on the grimy floorboards. He turned to Mustard.

  “Madame,” he said to that lady, “take care with your sleeve. You must not press the liquid into the fabric because you leave des taches. Employ a little salt, if you have any.”

  Mustard looked properly grateful at this advice, but she said she had no salt.

  “None?” said Prosper.

  “Not on me,” said the lady.

  “Hélas,” he said, shrugging.

  “Monsieur,” said Mouse, lowering her eyelashes in Prosper’s direction, “will you tell me what the ladies wear at Paris?”

  “They wear sailor’s slops and wigs of Peruvian camel,” said I, and Mouse stuck out her tongue.

  From the divan, Gotobed lifted his head from Blue’s sprawling bosoms—she was at least well provided in this respect. “Gentlemen, have you never been to a brothel?” said he. “Are you really so ignorant as to suppose you are expected to sit at the table and discuss the mode with the ladies—Christ. Prosper, be a man and touch her bubbies.”

  Prosper mumbled something I didn’t catch.

  “What?” Said Gotobed. “Don’t talk your gibberish to me. Grab the bitch, you French fuck. And as for you, Quire, anyone can see you are still quite a little boy after all. If you sit in the corner with your eyes closed, I’ll buy you a nice syllabub for a treat when I’m done.” And then he looked down at Blue’s blue-veined chest and began nibbling at her, as though she were a piece of stilton.

  I had promised myself to take care of Gotobed—to keep him safe. He was, at this moment, no less my friend than when I stood on the steps of St. Paul’s and named him such, but I cannot own I liked him very much. In truth, I had almost begun to hate him a little.