The Boxer and the Blacksmith

by Edie Cay

  “You can call me Jack About Town. It’s really just one long first name.” The boy grinned, revealing a missing tooth. Os hadn’t remembered the missing tooth last time. But would he have noticed? “No need for formality.”

  “I got good news and bad news,” the boy continued. “And I’ll charge a pound for each, if you please.”

  Os blew air out his mouth, as if this price was a hardship. And for all he knew, it would be a fiction coming out of his mouth. Two pounds could be the best money he ever spent, or it was so worthless he might as well have fed the coins to the chickens. “You said half as a deposit, the other half at delivery.”

  Jack About Town nodded, his fingers drumming an indecipherable rhythm on the bar. “I did, I did, that’s true. That’s my usual business. This were anything but usual.”

  “But it sounds like you found out some bit of news,” Os said. The implication of both good news and bad news was massive. It meant there was something. This boy had found something out, which was more than what Os now knew.

  “Well, then how about I’ll charge you a pound up front now, and I tell you bits, and then you put the other pound on the bar here where I can see it, and when I tell you the rest, I get that.”

  For some reason, the boy’s bargaining made him want to smile. “Right then,” Os said, digging deep for his true purse, pulling out two pound coins. One he slid to the boy, who picked it up with delicate fingers and tucked it away deep into his waistcoat, and the other he placed on the bar, far out of reach. The boy’s eyes stared at it, as if willing it closer.

  “Right,” the boy said, finally tearing his eyes from the money and putting his attention on Os. Much to Os’s annoyance, the boy then took the opportunity to buy a pint for himself. As if he couldn’t have done that when he arrived.

  It took every bit of Os’s patience to wait until the boy had wetted his throat and began.

  “Right,” Os said, trying to prompt him.

  “Fine stuff,” the boy said, grimacing. “Now, like I have said afore, I don’t go for people-finding normally. It wasn’t the same contacts that I have spent my years cultivating, as you may imagine.”

  Os almost snorted. This boy couldn’t be more than fourteen. He didn’t even show the beginnings of stubble on his chin.

  “But, I had a bit of luck, a few friends, and some excellent conversations, accounting for the fact that I was looking for someone’s long-lost mother.” Another swig of beer. Os could have choked him. The boy’s accent was bollocks, and his theatrics were bollocks. “Yer mum, if it is indeed the same woman, which I believe she is, was never owned by any man. Not by Chitley, not by no one. Free. Always free.”

  “I’ve since heard that from another source.” Os took a swig of his own. Even though it was the second time he’d heard such news, it made his heart gallop.

  “Well. If my aunt had bollocks and all that, still had to get that information myself.” Another swig. The boy must be parched. “Right, and here is the best part, in my humble opinion. Turns out, yer mum was quite the beauty. Real beauty, not just dressed up in youth or a nice frock. Proper pretty. So, you know what that means.” The boy eyed Os.

  “She was in a brothel?” Os asked, annoyed. That wasn’t good news—it must be the bad news. It was like a gut punch. What would Bess call it? A belly-go-firster?

  “No!” the boy cried, clearly distressed. “Means a rich man married her, ya pig-widgeon!”

  The news landed hard, in a good way. Os had to sit with it for a minute. His mother had been a free woman and married a wealthy man. Was he the son of the wealthy man, or a different man? No matter, enough of him. Jack’s story meant she had safety, a full belly. Pretty clothes, likely, and servants to do the labor of a household. Would she have continued to sew after that? Did she wonder about him, sitting at those fine dinners? Did she have other children? Is that why had she not come for him?

  “Is she still living?” Os asked. There was a place inside of him, small and childlike, that cried for her. Screamed for her. Needed her more than food or water or air. He pushed down the little boy, gentled him, told him to wait.

  “That—is the second half. I need that other pound, please.”

  Os would have handed over his own shoes if that was what was required. Instead, he slid the coin down to the lad, who pocketed it just as swiftly as the first.

  “Now. The good bit. You know, I did rather enjoy this job, I want to say that first. I can tell already that your mind is churning, and you’ll have a hard time hearing me.” The boy took a scrap of paper from his pocket and put it on the table. “Your faith was right, sir. Your mother is alive and is in London. This, my good sir, is where she lives.”

  The boy slid the paper over, grinning wide.

  It took every bit of strength of will to not break down. She was here. She was close. His mother, this piece of his past, the link of himself to the rest of the world. His belonging.

  Os picked up the paper with shaking hands. No. 59 New Cavendish Street. It was in the new developments in Marylebone. She was close. So close. “What’s the bad news?”

  “Ah, two bits of bad news, sad to say. First, this woman never had the surname of Worley. Took me a bit of finding, but I believe that this Thomasina is yer mum. So, if yer name is Worley and her name ain’t, well…” The boy shrugged. “World ain’t perfect.”

  So maybe Os was illegitimate somehow? That didn’t feel right, either. But what would he have known, being so young? “What’s the second bit of bad news?”

  “Second, cook says yer mum’s moving soon. Out to the country someplace. If you want to catch her, you’d better go soon.”

  Os stared at the paper. No, it had to be wrong. It had to be. The name scrawled at the top was wrong. “You’ve got the wrong paper.” He turned it so the boy could see. “That’s not her name.”

  “Oh, right. You don’t know. She married a land man, a developer. Proper Englishman, he’s the man responsible for a good bit of shoveling. She’s Mrs. John Franklin now.”

  Mrs. John Franklin. Married to a white Englishman. Living in Marylebone. He had an answer. And she wasn’t far.

  16

  “He’s been in again, asking after her,” Tony said to Bess, all the while staring at Violet.

  Miz Penny wrung her hands. There was still a crowd in the pub, still men flocking in and out, some for a single drink, others committing more coin to their inebriation.

  “Surprised he can walk already,” Bess said, shrugging her shoulders, hoping the muscles weren’t going to seize up. She wasn’t ready to be done for the night. The fight was in a week. She had already decided to not go in for the Friday night mill, trying to keep focused on Bridget Kelly. But her shoulders were quivering. She’d need to be careful.

  “He’s got himself a few other fellows,” Tony said. “Careful with that chit.”

  Bess gave him a look that was meant to quell any of his concerns. She wasn’t sure if it worked. “Who can protect her better than me?”

  Miz Penny shook her head. “But dearie, you are just—”

  “Just one person,” Tony took up. “Safety in numbers is your best bet. Go on to that smug of yers. I doubt they’d look for you in there.”

  Bess snorted. “Well, that bit o’ news hasn’t reached you yet. I ain’t attached to no man.”

  Tony folded his arms and narrowed his eyes. “Who ended it?”

  “Who do you think?” She didn’t like this conversation. “Not that it is any of yer business anyway.”

  “I think you told that very nice, respectable blacksmith that you weren’t the loving type.”

  Bess walked back to the small bag suspended at shoulder height. It was head-high for most, but not her. She should adjust it, move it to where it was comfortable, but she didn’t feel like it. What she felt like was ending this yammering. “Why would I do something fool like that? Respectable man like that?”

  “Because I think he liked you. I saw the way he looked at you. Like you we
re the missing button on his favorite shirt.”

  “What the bloody hell does that even mean, Tony?” Bess tossed half-hearted jabs at the bag, building up speed, but the joy of the exercise was sapped.

  “That he loves you, you daft girl,” Tony exploded.

  “Bit past that, now, ain’t we?”

  “The ‘girl’ part or the ‘he loves you’ part?” Miz Penny asked.

  “Quiet,” Bess thundered at her.

  “You apologize to her,” Tony yelled back.

  “Don’t you tell me anything, you bloody fool!” Bess roared.

  “Somebody’s got to, because you’re running your own life and the life of that little girl right into the pisser!”

  “Do not tell me how to love Violet!” Bess screamed. She hadn’t felt this fire for years now, the fury down even into the roots of her hair, the beds of her fingernails. Instead of finishing her work, or even pulling up the sleeves of her dress, she scooped up the sleeping Violet and shouldered past Tony.

  “Don’t walk away from me, you pig-headed Amazon!” Tony yelled at her as she made her way through the pub.

  Bess fumed as she tramped back over to Mrs. Martin’s. First Os and now Tony. “And they call women the over-emotional ones,” she muttered. Both men, in her humble opinion, were talking out of turn. She was doing her damnedest to care for Violet, to protect her, for what else could she do? And it didn’t take any bit of imagination to know that Os would prefer the pretty Miss Manchester to her own self. That was just common sense. Better now than later, when deeper feelings might have hatched of their own accord.

  She pounded up the steps to Mrs. Martin’s and would have kicked in the door if Mrs. Martin hadn’t opened it for her. Violet chose then to wake up, squirming in her arms, nearly knocking her over.

  “Dear God above, I thought it was Boney’s army coming for us at last, for all the racket yer making!” Mrs. Martin admonished them.

  The black mood that hung about Bess like a shroud billowed out around her. Violet squirmed again, now inside the house, and Bess set her down.

  “Didn’t think that girl was small enough to be carried still,” Mrs. Martin commented.

  “I’m strong enough for it,” Bess snapped. “Sick of people assuming I ain’t.”

  “I said nothing of the sort. Now wipe that bit of sour off yer face. Why don’t you go wash upstairs and set yourself to rights. Violet will help me with dinner.”

  Bess grumbled but obeyed. The ewer on the bureau was full, thanks to Mrs. Martin. No doubt it was more for her nose than for Bess’s comfort, but it didn’t matter. She poured some in the basin and took a cloth to herself. As she was pulling her sleeves up from where they were tied about her waist, she heard a knock on the front door.

  Mrs. Martin’s distinctive voice carried up the stairs and into Bess’s room, the words not so clear but the tenor of her emotions always readily readable. Uncertain greetings, a stranger. Politeness. No defensiveness, so likely not a man. Bess relaxed. Just a regular caller.

  She took a moment to stare into the mirror. To look at what was so easily abandoned. What Violet’s future might be. The wide-set eyes of mud brown, the thin, fragile hair the pale color of gutter rain. And then the things that she’d inflicted upon herself. The round, shiny ears from the years of mills. The broken nose that never quite set right.

  The idea that Os would take a genuine interest in her was laughable. A respectable tradesman wouldn’t actually woo a woman fighter. Of all the names she’d been called in her life, it was maybe his endearments that hurt the most. Far more than any of the sweet poetics from that honourable. She’d believed Os when he called her love.

  Mrs. Martin’s voice raised to a panic. Bess abandoned her self-loathing exercise and thundered down the stairs in time to see a dirty-looking woman in the doorway, pulling on Violet’s arm.

  “I’m the girl’s mother. I got rights!” the woman yelled. Her face was pink with exertion, or possibly with drink.

  Violet was screaming indistinctly, holding onto Mrs. Martin with the other arm.

  “Oi, now! What’s this?” Bess demanded, edging herself around Mrs. Martin to stand between Violet and the woman.

  “Dat’s my daughter, and yer keeping her from me,” the woman said.

  She looked familiar. Like one of the local girls from the gin swills, but Bess didn’t know which one. They kept to themselves, generally. “I think I know yer face,” Bess said.

  The woman startled, letting go of Violet.

  “If the men are here, Mrs. Martin, now is the time to get them,” Bess said, never letting her eyes off of the woman claiming to be Violet’s mother. Something else was afoot, and Bess would be damned if Violet was harmed.

  “Come on, girl, let’s get you inside,” Mrs. Martin said to Violet, her voice shaking.

  “But—” Violet protested. “I stay with you. That’s the rule.”

  “Go now, Duckie. This is important. I need you safe.”

  “She’s safest with her own mother,” the woman said, canting her hip out, as if the gesture were some sort of moral point.

  “As far as I know, Violet’s mother is dead. So if you’re dead right now, it’s only polite to let me know.” Bess folded her arms. She was on the top step, the high ground. It would be hard for the woman to charge in past her.

  “Come now,” Mrs. Martin whispered, and she and Violet shuffled inside, the door closing behind them.

  “I ain’t dead, as you can plainly see,” the woman said. “Tell you what, why don’t we go somewhere, I’ll treat you to a spot of ale, we’ll talk it over.”

  The whole thing smelled like bad fish. But if Violet was safe inside with Mr. Crawford and Mr. Gregory, then getting this woman away from there was the best idea.

  “Aw right,” Bess agreed. “Let me grab my kerchief and cap.”

  “No need,” the woman said quickly. “I—er—I—there’s—”

  Out of the darkness behind her stepped Violet’s father. “Oi, enough now of the dramatics,” he said.

  More shadows materialized. He had four men with him. Big men. Men she recognized for doing the low sort of work that strong men do. They weren’t the blokes who had been in the pub with him the other week. Those had been friends, readily available for a dram or a pint. But these men were different. They showed up for mills, no technique but plenty of stamina. Her heart slowed in anticipation of a bout.

  She knew this would end poorly. But if she could somehow make Violet safe, she would do it.

  “I’ll be having my daughter, now,” Mr. Jeffers said.

  “Not on yer life,” Bess said.

  “Or p’haps not on yours, you mean.” His eyes narrowed. She could make out bruising on his face from their last encounter. His nose still swollen and bent. She’d roughed him up good. But Tony was right, this was a time for safety in numbers, and she didn’t have the numbers—he did.

  “Leave off. Go on for a pint at the Pig and Thistle. Tell Tony to put it on my tab,” she said. There was hope that these men were simple to bribe. A few shifted their weight from foot to foot. She couldn’t tell if it was in anticipation or due to guilt. They knew who she was. Everyone in this neighborhood knew. Just like they all knew Jeffers. It was impossible to live in Paddington and not know them both. But these men were choosing sides. They were choosing to sacrifice a girl child for a bit of coin. They were choosing a man, not realizing that it meant Violet’s life.

  But no one moved. Jeffers said, “They believe in the proper order of things. A man looks after his child, not letting some degenerate take her, filling her head wif nonsense.”

  “As opposed to what? Filling her head with the backside of yer hand?” Bess countered. Not good odds for her. Depended on many things. She could have taken one with no issue. Two, possibly. Three? Not without a beating in return. But four, plus Jeffers?

  “Which is my right as her father. Corrections build character.” Jeffers took another step forward. “But it’s well known yo
u are in need of some correction.”

  “Oh, you tried already, Jeffers. Or does your nose not smart anymore? I can break it again as a reminder, if you like.”

  “I’m taking my daughter home tonight, and it’ll just be the cream on top to show you your place.”

  Bess had been in many fights—proper mills, street fights, friendly spats. The mention of Violet leaving sent a coldness through her she’d never experienced before. The frisson of fear was new and unexpected. Because there was a good chance she wouldn’t succeed. It was very likely that five men could take her off her perch, that they would snatch Violet out of the protective arms of Mrs. Martin in her cozy parlor, and there was nothing she could do about it.

  “Gentlemen, if you would be so kind as to remove the obstacle in front of us.” Jeffers spoke like a big man, more than he’d ever been.

  They came for her. Up the steep front steps, Bess was able to kick the first two men back down without too much trouble. But when one brandished a cudgel—one of her preferred weapons—she knew this evening would not go in her favor.

  One of them grabbed her leg as she tried to kick him back down, yanking on her, causing her to land on her arse. The thud was loud, and it seemed to shake the house. They dragged her down the stairs as she scrambled for purchase. She needed to stand. She needed to shed the cold fear in order to regain her advantage.

  The door flew open and Bess looked up, hoping to see the other boarders—but it was Violet, her face showing terror.

  “Run, Violet!” Bess screamed at her. “Run!”

  The girl looked rooted to the spot. Bess turned her attention to the direction of the fist that landed on her face. Standing, she threw elbows in every direction to gain time so she could get her bearings.

  “Run!” she screamed again, hoping the girl would remember her instructions, all those classes with the girls. That you only fight so you can get away.