A Very Peculiar Plague Read Free

have fallen foul of one?’
    ‘She went down to fetch the sherry, sir, and now she’s gone.’ Mabel was dabbing at her flushed face with a handkerchief. Beads of sweat were forming on her upper lip. ‘Could we not open the door, Mr Bunce? Else I’ll faint from the heat.’
    Obediently Alfred lifted the door-latch. Jem tried to push the window open a little further, but found it too stiff. Then Alfred said, in his low, rumbling voice, ‘I don’t bogle no more. Did Jem not tell you? I’ve no ’prentice, see.’
    ‘ I could be your ’prentice,’ Jem quickly cut in. And when Alfred fixed him with a morose look, he added, ‘I’m quick on me feet, ain’t I? Quicker’n Birdie, for all that I can’t sing like her. Why, I spent the day dodging hansom cabs on Commercial Road, and never once took a tumble. I’d make a prize bogler’s boy!’
    Alfred’s gaze shifted to the broomstick in Jem’s hand. ‘I doubt Mr Leach would agree with you,’ he growled. And Jem flushed.
    ‘I ain’t working for that grocer no more.’
    ‘Oh, aye?’ Alfred seemed to be waiting for an explanation. And though Jem didn’t want to give one – not with Mabel in the room, listening to every word he said – there was something about Alfred’s weighty silence that forced him to speak.
    ‘I ate some cheese off the shop floor, and when Mrs Leach beat me for it, I called her an old cat,’ he admitted. ‘That’s why Mr Leach let me go – on account of his wife. She never did like me. “Once a thief, allus a thief” is what she used to say. But I never prigged a thing, save for that morsel o’ cheese. And it were picked off the floor like kitchen scraps!’
    Alfred sighed as Jem scowled. The barmaid watched them both curiously, still patting her face with her handkerchief. A cross-draught was now blowing through the room, making Alfred’s strips of paper dance and spin.
    ‘I’d as soon have you beg as sweep a crossing,’ Alfred said at last, still glumly eyeing the broom. ‘Where do you lodge now? You ain’t on the street?’
    ‘No,’ said Jem. To change the subject, he quickly added, ‘Miss Mabel didn’t tell you, but there’s a cove as runs a penny gaff on Whitechapel Road, and he claims he has Birdie inside, taming bogles and such.’
    Alfred’s jaw dropped. He sat down suddenly.
    ‘I took one look and thought, “Well, that ain’t true,” Jem went on, pleased to see the impact he’d made. ‘I’ll wager Birdie can’t stray as far as her own front door, nowadays, let alone set foot in Whitechapel Road.’
    ‘But – but Birdie ain’t singing in no penny gaff!’ Alfred spluttered. ‘Birdie’s being schooled in Bloomsbury! Miss Eames says she could sing opera, one day!’
    ‘I thought as much.’ Jem flashed a smug look at the barmaid. ‘Lubbock’s a dirty liar. Didn’t I tell you?’
    ‘Miss Eames ain’t going to like this,’ said Alfred, shaking his head in consternation. ‘She’ll not like this at all . . .’
    He trailed off, biting his lip, his pipe in one hand and his tobacco pouch in the other. Mabel watched him for a moment. At last she cleared her throat and said, ‘Uh – Mr Bunce?’
    ‘No.’ Alfred spoke brusquely. ‘No, lass, I cannot. I told you, I ain’t a bogler no more.’ He gestured vaguely at the strips of paper drying above him, as if to prove his point. But Mabel wasn’t impressed. Her dark brows snapped together.
    ‘Mr Bunce,’ she protested, ‘my employer is hiring a new pot-boy as we speak. Would you condemn the lad to a fate like Florry’s?’
    Alfred didn’t answer. He was stuffing tobacco into his pipe, carefully avoiding her eye as he did so.
    ‘I’m afraid for him – indeed I am. He’s a big lad, but no more’n twelve years old. And I cannot always be chasing him about.’ Mabel had a very strong voice when she chose to raise it. Jem suspected that she had strengthened her lungs by shouting orders across a noisy taproom, and grinned to himself when he