The Whatnot Read Free Page A

necklace?”
    If Pikey’d had a socket he would have taken the boys’ offer in an instant. A ha’penny could buy him a proper meal, let him sit in the warmth and stink of an inn and eat potatoes and gravy and gray boiled mutton until he burst. But he didn’t have a socket, and the boys wouldn’t like what they saw.
    â€œShove off. Leave me alone.”
    â€œAw, come on, piker. Just a peek? Whada you say, fellas, you think we can see his brains through it? What say I pull off the patch and we get a look-see at his brains, all yellow and squishy inside.”
    The boys murmured their assent, some more readily than others. The gang leader stepped forward, reaching for Pikey’s patch. Pikey braced himself for a fight.
    â€œI said, shove off !” His voice went hard like a proper street rat’s, but he was too short to make it count. The boy in the brass-button coat kept coming.
    Pikey ducked away, ready to run, but two of the boys grabbed his arms and pinned them behind his back.
    â€œYou stay where you’re put at,” one of them whispered, close next to his ear.
    â€œHelp!” Pikey croaked. There were people everywhere. Someone would hear him. Or see. The spot in front of St. Paul’s was one of the busiest in London, even in winter, even with the sky going black overhead. Costermongers shouted from their pushcarts, offering lettuces and cabbages and suspicious-looking roots. Peddlers haggled, servants bought. A red-and-gold striped cider booth stood not ten paces away, with a whole line of people waiting in front of it. They couldn’t all be deaf.
    â€œHelp, thief !” he cried.
    No one even glanced at him.
    â€œStop cryin’ like a little pansy. We only want a quick look. Shut up, I say. Shut up, or you’ll get us all in trouble.” The leader planted a heavy fist in Pikey’s stomach, and his next shout came out in a puff of white breath.
    He hung for a second, gasping, his arms still clamped behind him. He felt the leader’s fingers undoing the string of the eye patch, pulling it off.
    â€œWe only want a quick look—”
    Pikey shut his eyes hard and threw himself back with all his strength. His head thudded against the head of the boy behind him and they both went down, rolling over the cobbles. Pikey landed on the other boy’s stomach with a satisfying squelch and sprang back up, one hand covering the place where the patch had been, the other swinging wildly.
    The leader struggled to his feet and spat. “You little cog splinter. I’ll beat you blue—” He came at Pikey swiftly, the hobnails in his boots snapping against the ground.
    â€œPound ’im!” the boys shouted, jostling, forming a ring. “Pound ’is other eye out!”
    Pikey didn’t have time to think. He flung up both hands to protect himself. . . .
    The boy in the brass-button coat stopped dead in his tracks. The other boys went silent.
    Too late Pikey realized what he had done. The eye where the patch had been was bared for all to see. He felt the cold sliding against it. He knew how it looked, what they all saw—a flat, empty orb, gray as the frozen sky. No pupil. Nothing like a regular blind eye. Only endless, swirling gray.
    For a moment Pikey was looking into two places at once and his brain practically screamed with the effort. London was on one side, cold and dark and swarming with people like so many shadow ants. But on the other side was a different place, a great, dead forest rising out of the snow. He couldn’t hear anything of that world. He still heard London, though. Shouts. The clatter of a gas trolley. The gang leader cursing, backing away.
    â€œFaery-touched,” said the boy in the brass-button coat. “Faery-touched, is this one! ”
    Now people were paying attention. Pikey whirled, saw folks slowing their steps, staring, a veiled woman in black bombazine, one gloved hand clapped over