The Giant

by Jonathan Mary-Todd

  In the seat next to Luc, Mr. Chilton squinted and tried to peer inside the spout of the coffeepot. As he lifted the pot for another cup, the coffee poured slowly, like mud. Chilton rubbed one of his temples with his free hand.

  “This…wretched…sludge,” he said. “Mrs. Maxwell seeks me dead, Luc. I’m sure of it now. What else explains this vile brew? I’ll open this pot to find a rodent carcass, you’ll see! That woman … I come to breakfast expecting sweet relief, and what do I find? My stomach, under attack!”

  “You’re welcome to make your own coffee, Mr. Chilton,” Mrs. Maxwell said, clearing the empty biscuit tray and leaving the table with another round of sausages.

  “Hah! You’d like that, I’m sure,” Chilton said. “To pay you for room, board, and breakfast, then do half the work ourselves. I’ll leave the coffee making to you, Edna, thank you very much. Randall Chilton’s dollar goes as far as it can, not a hair shorter.”

  “About that dollar …”

  “Very soon! Coming very soon. On that you have my word. A change of fortunes is coming our way, Mrs. Maxwell, you’ll see! Big things coming for me and the boy.”

  “I’ll be overjoyed, I’m sure,” Mrs. Maxwell said. “You and he have until the nineteenth for your rent.”

  “Of course, of course.”

  Once Mrs. Maxwell returned to the kitchen, Mr. Chilton cut into a sausage and continued to tell Luc about the ache in his head.

  “Too much of a good thing, Luc. Heed these words. It can be quite dangerous indeed.”

  Through a mouthful of sausage, he asked Luc if Luc would mind lending a hand.

  “I’m serious about our change in fortunes,” Chilton said as Luc kneaded the back of his neck. “I can see it from here. This Mr. Hardt—I hope you were giving him your full attention last night. He’s a man with much wisdom to share. Take it from one who knows.”

  A stream of grease dribbled down his chin. “Imagine, Luc. You and that animal sharing a bill all down the mid-Atlantic! Or this chance to invest Hardt mentioned …” He tapped the butt of his fork against the table. “That? That’s the knock of opportunity, my boy.”

  When Mr. Chilton’s head felt better, Luc excused himself from breakfast. He wrapped the last sausage in a cloth napkin as he left, in case any dogs were outside. Some days, Mr. Chilton would take him around, and they would try to find odd jobs for a person of Luc’s size to do. But that day, Mr. Chilton said he felt too tired to do anything. Luc stepped outside the flophouse and walked toward Fourteenth Street. He left a trail of sausage for the dogs of the Bowery along the way.

  Union Square was crowded that afternoon. Luc let some men on horses pass and then crossed into the park. Usually children ran around the statue in the center, but that day most of them stood huddled in one place. Luc peered over their heads to see three men in strange clothes and white makeup.

  One of the men juggled a set of balls in the air. Another held a stick up to his face and then spat out fire. The children around him gasped and jumped back. The third man held his hands out as if he were caught inside a small room.

  Luc didn’t like watching the third man. He tried to watch the juggler, but his thoughts turned to Mr. Hardt’s kangaroos.

  Luc wasn’t happy when he had to fight, but Mr. Chilton was right. It was something he was good at. And Quebec was worse than Manhattan. It was colder, and Luc had worked all day there, and the other men there had not been as friendly as Mr. Chilton.

  Genghis seemed good at fighting too. And maybe Australia had been a worse place for Genghis and the smaller kangaroo. Luc couldn’t say for sure. He didn’t know anything about Australia.

  What happened to Genghis if he lost a fight? Luc didn’t know the answer to that either. He had never lost a fight himself, although he was sure Mr. Chilton would be angry if he did. And Mr. Hardt seemed a lot like Mr. Chilton. Luc was glad Mr. Chilton didn’t keep a friend like Ian the trainer around.

  Parents of the children watching the men in white makeup had formed a second ring around the performers. Some of them looked at Luc with worry.

  On the way back to the flophouse, Luc saw that the sausage bits were gone, but he also saw a man in a butcher’s smock chasing dogs away as two other men carried cuts of meat into his shop. The dogs must have still been hungry.

  Before Luc went back to his room, he walked around the back of Mrs. Maxwell’s, checking to see if Ian was around. Ian was not.

  Luc stepped slowly toward the kangaroo cages. He told himself that he could only stay for a minute—he knew the trainer would stop by the cages again soon. But he did not stay even that long. As Luc approached, he woke up Genghis, who had been sleeping at the back of his cage. The kangaroo rattled at his bar again, sending Luc running down the street.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Luc’s fight with Boston John had been faster than his fight with Killpatrick the week before. First fight of the night. Afterward, Chilton complained to Oakley that Luc was an earner, a big earner, but half the usuals at the Wood-rat weren’t likely to show up for another hour, and that he was beginning to have real concerns about the way these nights were booked.

  Luc looked around for a stool that would support him, then brought it to a table in one of the club’s small corners. He’d have to move the table to get out again, but this way, fewer men would spill their drinks or poke him with their elbows on their way to the bar.

  From his out-of-the-way spot, Luc didn’t hear the squeal of the kangaroo cart until Ian dragged Genghis inside. Mr. Hardt followed him and took his hat off to the few men who dotted the club floor.

  “Thomas!” Mr. Chilton called out.

  “Good evening, my friend, good evening!” Hardt replied. He walked past the fighter’s circle, toward Lew Mayflower at the bar. “Mr. Mayflower. Has talk of Genghis’s debut last week whet your boxers’ appetites? Any takers tonight?”

  “The Irishman,” Mayflower said. “Killpatrick.”

  Luc hadn’t noticed Killpatrick come in either. He sat in another corner, cloaked in shadow.

  In the past week, men at the Woodrat had been whispering about Killpatrick—that losing to Luc had made him feel small, had made a cruel man crueler. At the mention of his name, he left his seat and marched toward Mr. Hardt and Mr. Mayflower. He stopped only to leave an empty mug on the counter and then continued to the circle. He struck the air once, twice, then yanked the towel off his neck. It landed a few feet from Luc’s table.

  “Looks like he’s ready, Hardt,” Mayflower said.

  Mr. Chilton clapped his hands. “Ooh, what a bout this is!”

  Hardt motioned for Ian to prepare the kangaroo.

  The fighters stood at opposite sides of the circle, Genghis jittering wildly, as Oakley rang the bell. Luc gripped the tabletop until his fingers began to warp the damp wood.

  The Irishman ground his knuckles in his palm, and the kangaroo hopped toward him. The animal jabbed its paws forward, but the hits didn’t land, and Killpatrick was too wide, too tall to hold in place. It tried again, insistent, and the hits did not connect. Outside the circle, Mr. Hardt clenched the handle of the animal’s cart.

  The first time Killpatrick swung, he caught Genghis on the side of his snout. The kangaroo hopped to the side with a yelp. Killpatrick bared his teeth, grinning.

  After the first punch, Luc had stopped watching. He stared at the wrinkles in the table instead, listening to the shuffling of the fighters’ feet. And then he felt Killpatrick’s eyes on him. At least that’s how he would remember it. The Irishman glared at him and turned back to the animal, driving a left cross into its neck.

  The kangaroo fell to the floor. It gurgled through the ten count. Oakley rang the bell again.

  Luc rose up, bumping the tabletop, and Mr. Chilton rushed over to demand that he stay put. Ian and Mr. Hardt dragged the limp animal toward its cage, Hardt leaving a trail of threats and curses.

  “That Irish barbarian!” Mr. Chilton shouted, a few steps behind Mr. Hardt and Ian the trainer. “
A character like that should be barred from the Woodrat! I think I’ll take it up with Mr. Mayflower myself, in fact …”

  Luc stepped behind Mr. Chilton, peeking over the man’s head to see the kangaroo cart that Hardt and Ian were wheeling down the avenue.

  They stopped when they reached the back of the flophouse, Mr. Hardt and Mr. Chilton both panting. Mr. Hardt had lost his hat along the way, and he patted his head absently. Luc stayed back, waiting for the red to leave the men’s faces.

  “My livelihood! Gone!” Hardt said. He kicked one of the bars of the joey’s cage. “What is Mayflower going to do about that?”

  Mr. Chilton raised a finger as if to speak but then stayed quiet.

  “All of my plans …” Hardt continued. He scanned the building next to the cages, then turned to Chilton, speaking in a lower voice. “This Mrs. Maxwell … is she very strict about late payments?”

  Chilton shook his head.

  “Well, there’s that at least,” Hardt said. “A moment to regroup.”

  Luc watched as Ian ran his hand along Genghis’s neck. The kangaroo’s moan had settled into something like a pained, steady purr.

  Hardt called over to him, “Well, all right, out with it, Ian. I don’t suppose there’s any chance it’ll fight again?”

  Ian told him there was not.

  “I suppose we’ll have to do the honorable thing then, yes? Put old Genghis out of his misery?”

  Ian agreed. Luc put a hand to his face as Ian unsheathed his blade.

  “Not in front of me, Ian! I don’t want to see it!” Hardt said. He pointed to Luc and Mr. Chilton. “Good lord, we’re among people … Though do see that it’s done soon. The dogs’ll be out in force tomorrow if we don’t get the thing away from here …”

  Ian began to pull Genghis’s cart away, down the street and into the black of early morning. As Mr. Hardt and Mr. Chilton began to talk further about ways to avoid Mrs. Maxwell, Luc slunk toward the cage that held the smaller kangaroo. This one didn’t clatter at its bars—just looked back at Luc as he looked in. Luc wanted to say something to it about the other animal, but wasn’t sure, in French or English, if he’d be understood.

  To Luc’s surprise, Mr. Hardt stepped next to him, although he continued speaking to Chilton: “The little one’s got real potential, I think. A scrapper in the making. What with Genghis gone now, I’ll have to talk to Ian about how soon until it can start to train.”

  CHAPTER SIX

  Luc had spilled coffee over his hands at breakfast and could not eat his biscuits. As Molly arrived to mop up the mess, Luc retreated to his quarters. The coffee he’d been able to drink stirred uneasily in his stomach.

  Mr. Chilton had left early that morning, complaining of bad sleep and explaining to Luc that if any creditors came around, Luc should tell them Mr. Chilton had moved to a different address. Luc had not seen Mr. Hardt or Ian at breakfast. He had been glad of that, at least.

  Luc’s room felt smaller than usual as he walked back and forth across the wood floor. Occasionally he would stop at the one window and stick his head through, but the men and women outside would not hold Luc’s attention.

  One day in Quebec, when Luc was chopping wood, a few of the others dragged a man into camp. The man had been hunting for furs when snow began to fall, covering some of the traps he’d set. Soon the man stepped into one of them. The older men brought him indoors before he could bleed out, but it took five of them together to pry the trap loose.

  Genghis’s fight the night before worked like a trap on Luc. Each thought of it was painful, but he could not shake the memory. He had felt the drain throughout the morning, and he felt it in his room.

  Luc didn’t know how fast a joey grew. Neither did Mr. Hardt, he remembered. If Luc knew how to read, he would have tried to read about it. If the younger kangaroo were to box someday, Luc knew it would meet another man like Killpatrick.

  Luc did not think the joey should have to fight. One kangaroo was enough. One was too many, Luc thought.

  Luc had fed dogs and birds for a long time now, and he believed he could care for a joey. Mr. Chilton might not even be angry if Luc waited long enough to tell him. Mr. Hardt traveled the world, and he was likely to leave again sometime. Luc could tell Mr. Chilton after that. He closed the door to his room and started down the stairs, taking them one step at a time.

  Luc looked down at the animal like he had the night before. Once again, the kangaroo looked back. Luc wondered if it recognized him. The kangaroo’s black eyes wouldn’t say.

  Luc yanked once at the cage’s lock, and the kangaroo scampered backward at the clang. The alley was empty, but Luc still began to worry. He could break the lock with time, though not without a lot of noise.

  Luc started to sweat, glancing down the alleyway again.

  Maybe he could try another way. He wedged his fingers between two bars and pulled each bar away from the other. He wasn’t sure afterward if the bars had moved or not. He tried again and his hands began to throb. The bars had started to leave imprints in his palms, and maybe later there’d be bruises.

  On the third try, Luc heard the cage’s metal groan—not from where he pulled, but near the crossbar at the top. At the joints where the bars met the ceiling of the cage, rust covered the iron like ivy.

  Luc could reach the top without stretching. He grabbed two of the bars in each large hand, pressed a boot against the cage, and pulled.

  The kangaroo flinched at Luc’s deep grunts, and Luc slowed his breaths, failing to stay quiet. With a ping, two bars came loose, then two more. Luc laid them on the ground and crouched down to see the joey.

  The animal took a few hops in Luc’s direction, then backed away. Luc set his throbbing palms on the floor of the cage. It approached him once more, sniffing the hands, testing him. Luc let it be for a moment. When the kangaroo came even closer, Luc grabbed it up, unprepared for the flailing. He tucked the animal underneath his shirt as it scratched at his belly and tried to push off. He held the kangaroo against his chest until it settled. Then he stumbled, damp with sweat, out of the alley.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  The kangaroo thumped its tail whenever Luc came too close. It had already bitten at his fingers when he put it down in the corner. Luc wondered if Mrs. Maxwell would be upset about the scratches on the floor and thought about moving his bed to hide them.

  Maybe the animal was scared by the sudden change, Luc thought. A lot had happened in the last few weeks. He sat down in the room’s opposite corner and just watched it for a while. Once Luc had gone long enough without approaching the kangaroo, it began to look at him less anxiously, as if he were a large tree in the middle of a plain. Something unusual, but no cause for concern.

  Sometime after the sun had signaled midday, the animal let loose some droppings near the foot of Luc’s sink. Luc had not thought about this. He knew he would have to clean up the mess but he decided he didn’t have to yet.

  The kangaroo settled in a cool spot on the floor, away from the light of the window, and began to lick at its forearms. Luc felt thirsty. The joey might be thirsty too. Luc held his eyes on the animal to make sure it wouldn’t follow him out, then stepped into the hallway and closed his door.

  Mrs. Maxwell’s kitchen was empty when Luc peeked inside. He found a dish for water and some stale biscuits on the counter. Did a kangaroo eat biscuits? Luc thought it would.

  He began to feel tired as he moved back up the stairs—he got like this with no breakfast—and balancing the dish and the biscuit tray made his hands throb again. He tucked his head before the low hallway ceiling. When he looked up again, Mr. Chilton was standing by the door to his room.

  “Afternoon, my boy! Feeling peckish, I see.”

  Luc shrugged, trying to keep the biscuits on the tray.

  Mr. Chilton reached for a biscuit, then winced after his first bite and put it back. “Any of those debt collectors stop by while I was out?”

  Luc told him no.

  “That’s a reli
ef, anyway,” Chilton said. “Perhaps they’ve moved on, bigger fish. It’s only right—we’re hard-working people after all, just trying for a good day’s … Is something the matter, Luc?”

  As Luc shook his head, he and Chilton heard a thump from underneath the doorway.

  “What on earth was that?” Chilton asked.

  Luc shrugged again.

  “Do you have anything to tell me, Luc?”

  The two of them heard another thump. Mr. Chilton moved a pair of fingers down the length of his moustache. “Open that door, Luc.”

  Luc shook his head.

  “Open it.”

  Luc turned the handle slowly. Mr. Chilton began patting himself down with a handkerchief.

  “Now you’ve done it,” Chilton said. “You’ve really done it.”

  Luc kept the dish and biscuits in hand and refused to meet Chilton’s eyes.

  “What are we going to do about this, Luc? Mr. Hardt will be furious. Small chance he’ll agree to a partnership now. This was an opportunity … ! Oh, I’m feeling faint.”

  Chilton forced himself within Luc’s line of sight. “What did you think, you oaf? That you could keep it?”

  Luc’s eyes pleaded for that very thing. In the corner, the joey continued to lick at its wrists.

  Chilton sighed. “Now, I suppose if Mr. Hardt were to never, never discover what has happened to his kangaroo, there’s no way he could hold us accountable …”

  Luc looked to Mr. Chilton and smiled. Chilton set a hand on Luc’s shirtsleeve.

  “But you have to keep that creature right here. Do you understand, Luc? No taking it outside, no playing about. If word gets to Thomas, we’re both in a lot of trouble. Do you see?”

  Luc nodded yes.

  “Good,” said Chilton. “Very good. I’m counting on you now to be discreet.”

  Chilton gave the kangaroo a final glance, put his handkerchief away, and stepped back toward the door. As he started to leave, he whispered, “You keep the animal right here, Luc. Do you promise?”