Back Alley Brawls
Sally
New London, East End 1900
Following the sound of screams into the dark, narrow alleys of New London’s East Side was a good way to get robbed, killed, or both, but Sally could not help herself. She knew better; life on the street was a merciless teacher. But the piteous cries pulled at her as if an invisible string was tied round her heart, and someone was tugging on it.
She should have kept her head down and continued home, should have celebrated her first honest pay by spoiling herself and Sam with fresh bread. They could have gone to bed with full bellies for once.
Instead, she crept toward the cries echoing off the stone buildings along New Market Street with a small iron bar clutched in one hand for protection.
Damsels in distress were an irresistible lure to naïve do-gooders; something the children of New London’s streets took advantage of whenever possible. Sally used the damsel con more than once when she and Sam were close to starving. But there were more dangerous things than half-wild urchins roaming the streets after dark.
Sally knew it, but she snuck into the alley, anyway.
It was dark and stank of rotten food and other less appealing things. She breathed through her mouth, slinking through the shadows like a wraith until she caught sight of the source of the screams. The moon wasn’t full yet, but it was high enough to peek between the narrow buildings and illuminate a distressing scene.
Sally forgot about bread, about her brother, about the pennies in her pocket and making it home safely, and charged into the alley with furious ringing in her ears.
The girl was small, perhaps twelve years old, but she fought valiantly against the two men who were trying to gag and bind her. Her pale blonde hair shone even in the near blackness as she kicked and scratched her attackers. But it was a losing battle. They were thin, as were most who made their living on the streets, but the men were still twice her height and weight, and strong as old leather.
Sally was not strong enough to beat or stop them. She told herself to run, but the strange, irresistible pull made her step into the alley.
Against her better sense, she shouted, “Oi! Piss off and let her be!”
All three combatants stilled as the men turned hard, dark eyes toward her. “What’ve you got to say about it, eh? You want a beatin’?”
Sally dimly realized the danger she was in, but she also recognized the face of the victim. It was Virginia, the girl who folded sheets two stations down from Sally. She was small and frail, and seeing her at the mercy of those men made Sally too furious to flee. She knew how it felt to be attacked by bigger, stronger opponents, and no one ever stood up for her.
“If you don’t let her go, I’ll make you!” Sally shouted, raising the iron bar.
“Yeah?” one man said as he left the struggling girl to his partner. “Let’s see you try it, then, skivvy. Maybe we’ll give you some of what we got for ol’ puss, here.”
Sally had lived on the streets long enough to know that being defensive only meant you didn’t get the chance to hit back, so she did not wait for the man to advance or take up a superior position. She charged him, swinging the pipe as she screamed every swear word her father had ever shouted. The man was so shocked by her onslaught that she connected a few times, gashing him across the cheek and backing him toward his partner. But he hadn’t survived this long by being weak.
He caught her arm, snatched the pipe out of her hand, and slapped her hard enough to blur her vision and make her ears ring. Then he sunk his fist deep into her gut, driving the breath from her lungs and dropping her to the dirty cobbles.
“If you keep squallin’, I’ll crack your stupid skull on those paving stones and let the rats eat whatever comes out.”
His speech was followed by a kick. Sally rolled with the impact to stop the kick from breaking any ribs—something else she learned on the receiving end of her father's anger—and ended up in a puddle on the lee side of a stack of crates.
“Don’t break her, Harry,” the other man said. “We can get two for the price of one.”
Harry advanced, clutching the iron bar and wiping the blood off his cheek with the back of his hand. “Nah, I want fair play for this scar I’m going to ‘ave. I’ll split her face open real quick like, and then we’ll be gone.”
Sally had to get to her feet, ignore the dizziness and the burning pain in her stomach, and get up. A scar would be the least of her worries if Harry caught her, but all she managed was a wobbly scrabble backward and a few painful breaths. She was going to die, and she wouldn’t even have saved Virginia.
And Sam would be alone and hungry.
A clear voice cut the stagnant air of the alley like the peal of church bells. “And the valkyrie descended upon them with thunder and great fury to separate the living from the glorious dead!”
A sharp crack lit the alley in green flame and filled it with smoke, followed by a bitter stench that swamped the mildew stink. A shadowy silhouette emerged from the dark, lit by the fire in its hands.
“And those who dare her wrath by falling in cowardice,” the figure intoned, “forfeit Valhalla and find themselves in the dark and lonely halls of Hel.”
“Witch!” Harry’s companion shouted.
In the sickly light, Harry’s expression changed from rage to terror. He dropped the iron bar and bolted toward his companion, shouting, “Run, Will!”
The green fire sputtered and died, leaving the alley dark and drowned in smoke, echoing with the cries of the stolen girl.
Sally couldn’t stand without falling over, but she managed to lunge forward and wrap her fingers around the iron bar Harry left on the cobbles.
“I got a weapon,” she said, but her voice was unsteady. “Don’t come no closer!”
“Any closer,” the voice corrected.
Sally blinked back a wave of dizziness. “What?”
“Any closer, not ‘no closer.’ That is a double negative, my girl, and while I enjoy talking nonsense as much as the next woman, I much prefer to save it for afternoon tea. A dark alley at night is no place for nonsense.”
None of that made sense to Sally, but the smoke was dissipating as she peered through the darkness, using the crates to steady herself. If it was a witch, she didn’t want to be on the ground with no options.
One moment a dark figure stood wreathed in smoke, and the next a lady in a walking dress emerged with an umbrella in her hand and a strangely shaped hat perched atop her head. Or were there two ladies?
“Poor darling, you are a sight, aren’t you? Are you hurt badly?”
Despite the sharp bolts of pain throbbing behind her eyes, Sally said, “I’m fine, thanks.”
“Don’t you lie prettily?” The lady said as she stepped over the alley garbage the way one might step over a tree root on a country path. “Your lip is bleeding and you’ve the beginning of what will be a beautiful black eye. In fact”—she leaned toward Sally and split again into two people—“you may have a concussion.”
Sally tried to focus through the dark and the pounding in her head, but the world tilted. She caught her balance on the crate so she didn’t tip off the side of it.
“Oops,” the lady said, catching Sally before she toppled over. “There, there, my dear. Come along, let’s get you cleaned up.”
Sally meant to object, but everything spun around the way it did when she and Sam raised their arms, looked at the sky, and spun like tops until they couldn’t stand up anymore.
The lady kept talking but Sally was floating and tilting and spinning like her father after a trip to the pub. She tried to say something about Virginia, felt the breeze on her face, heard the clop of horse’s hooves.
Someone shook her.
Everything went quiet and dark.
***
The scent of beeswax, lavender, tea, and something bitter pulled Sally from the dark. Those were not the smells of home. The soft blanket, the crackling fire, and the musical humming were also alien. Where was the traffic, the stomping of the upstairs neighbor, and her scratchy wool blanket? She opened her eyes, then squeezed them shut against the headache pulsing in time with her heartbeat. A single glimpse of the room proved she was not in her cot by the little coal stove.
“I cannot see why you needed to bring her here, in any case,” a woman’s voice said in a low thrum that reminded Sally of buzzing bees.
“Because no one else can would for her as skillfully as you, Mrs. Chapman.”
A snort. “You merely like to vex me, my lady. As if I don’t have enough to do here trying to keep you out of trouble.”
“And a wonderful job you do of it, too. Now, where is that book?”
“Which book, my lady?” That was a man’s voice, calm and collected.
“The book on dwarven artifice, what was it called? By Hardfist the Elder?”
“I believe you shelved it next to A Treatise on Elven Literature in the Seventeenth Century, my lady.”
“So I did, well played Mr. Yates. Where would I be without you?”
Sally used the moment of silence to clear her throat.
“Are you coming round, my girl?” a feminine voice said.
Hands at Sally’s shoulders helped raise her and prop pillows at her back. She opened her eyes a slit to see the same strange hat worn by the woman in the alley, the one who made green fire in her hands.
Sally clutched the blanket to her chest and whispered, “Are you a witch?”
Brown eyes crinkled in a smile. “Indeed, not.”
The woman turned her face so the steady light of the dwarven lamps illuminated her features. She was younger than Sally would have guessed, somewhere in her late twenties. She wasn’t particularly pretty but had an engaging expression, clear skin a bit darker than Sally’s own, and big brown eyes surrounded by thick lashes.
“Would I look like this if I were a witch? Do you see any warts, any wrinkles? Wait, don’t answer. I do not think I want to hear what you may say. Rest assured, my dear, I am no witch.”
“Then, how did you make the fire?”
“Why chemistry, of course. In fact—” She turned toward a butler standing with his hands clasped in front of him. “Mr. Yates, will you remind me to lessen the sugar in that recipe by a quarter? The fire was everything I’d hoped for but resulted in far too much smoke. No! Wait. The smoke might come in quite handy in the right circumstances. I shall simply do both.”
“Very good, my lady. However, was it wise to test such a recipe whilst in danger?”
The lady snorted. Actually snorted. Sally had dipped her fingers into the pockets of many wealthy people and she’d never heard a lady make such a noise.
“Danger, Yates? Indeed, not. I had my umbrella, after all, should worse have come to worst.”
Sally closed her eyes again and pressed the heels of both hands against her temples. She was in the home of a lady. Had been rescued by a lady who made fire in her hands but was not a witch. And Sam was home by himself, likely wondering where his sister was. She needed to get out of there.
“Mrs. Chapman,” the lady said, “do you happen to have the tea ready? I believe our guest is still suffering the effects of her run-in with the seedier side of New London.”
Mrs. Chapman, who looked like a vulture in a dress, gestured at the tea service she was preparing with the flick of a bony wrist. “It would have been finished much sooner if you would give me leave to pluck that pest of yours so he could not fly up and get into my spices and herbs. A few cut feathers is exactly what the beast needs.”
An amused croak came from the far side of the room. An enormous raven was perched on top of one of the many bookshelves. It turned its black head, tilted one eye at the thin woman, and said in a masculine voice, “He’s a pretty bird.”
The older woman pointed at him like a witch laying down a curse. “I will have you one day, Aristotle. See if I don’t.”
“While we wait for that titanic clash,” the lady said, “perhaps the tea?”
Mrs. Chapman’s dark brows lowered over her beaklike nose in a scowl that said she’d rather be doing anything but serving tea so late at night, but she carried the tray to the small side table near Sally and the lady. The older woman did not want her here. She did not belong in a place like this. Around people like these. Women who don’t know their place come to grief, her mother had always said.
“Do you take sugar and cream?” the lady asked.
“Ah… I’ve never… that is, if you don’t mind, my lady, I’m most grateful for all you’ve done, but I’d be happy to see myself home.”
The lady dismissed Sally’s offer with a flick of her fingers. “Indeed, I do mind. A rescuer has got some rights, after all. And I’d like to ask you a few questions before you go. But first.” She scooped a couple of spoonfuls of sugar into a delicate little cup and stirred it while pouring cream. How could someone make simple motions look so graceful?
There was no way to refuse the tea without insulting the woman, so Sally took the cup. The porcelain was thin and warm in her hands, with flowers painted in blue all around the outside. She’d never held anything so lovely. Even so, she waited until the lady had taken a sip of her own tea, poured from the same pot, before she drank. It was sweet and rich, with a hint of bitterness and something else that went straight to her head.
“Just a bit of brandy,” the lady said. “To help the medicine go down.”
“Medicine?”
“Our Mrs. Chapman is gifted with healing herbs. I’d wager she’ll have your headache in hand in no time.”
“What you call gifted, I call hard-earned skill,” Mrs. Chapman groused.
“Quite so. Very well then, my dear. May I ask your name?”
Before she thought better of hiding her identity, Sally found herself saying, “Sally, my lady.”
The woman smiled and Sally smiled back, but she did not trust this strange, well-bred lady who showed up in dark alleys to rescue poor girls. But there was such kindness and good nature in her eyes. It was impossible not to at least begin to like her. Or was that the brandy?
“I’m glad to have met you, Sally. My name is Gwenevere St. James, but you may call me Gwen.”
“Oh, I can’t do that, my lady.”
“Of course, you can. I’ve heard proof of your tongue and teeth functioning quite well. In fact, I plan to use some of your curses the next time I need to take someone down a peg.”
Sally blushed. It was one thing to swear at a cutthroat trying to kidnap a helpless girl, and quite another to scream them in front of a lady.
“Where did you learn such words? They were some of the most impressive imprecations I’ve ever heard.”
“My father worked on the docks.”
“Ah,” Lady Gwen said with a smile. “That profession certainly does introduce one to the more colorful side of language.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“And how is your head, now?”
“A bit better.”
“I’m glad to hear it. Are you hungry? Would you like a sandwich before we begin?”
At the word sandwich, the raven leaped from the bookcase and sailed down to the edge of the chaise behind Sally’s head. She jerked out of the way, making a spike of pain shoot through her ribcage, and glared at the bird. He hopped to the edge of the cushion nearest the tea and stared at the small sandwiches with a bead-black eye.
“Sandwich,” he croaked.
Lady Gwen made a clucking sound and shooed the bird backward, but the raven side-stepped her hand and pushed forward to nuzzle Sally’s cheek with his beak. She froze, not wanting to startle him, not with his sharp beak so close to her ear. He tilted his head as if examining her, then looked at Lady Gwen and said, “Feed us, woman.”
She chuckled and reached for the plate. “Aristotle, how rude. Allow the guest to choose a sandwich before you shove your feathered face in, and do stop being so bossy. Mrs. Chapman, do we happen to have any marmalade?”
“How you can eat marmalade on everything will never cease to amaze,” Mrs. Chapman said, pulling a small jar from her apron pocket. “You will make yourself sick with it, one day, mark me.”
Aristotle cawed and hopped back and forth impatiently. Lady Gwen chose a sandwich, offered the tray to Sally, then allowed the bird to pluck his meal neatly from the pile. Once he had secured his prize, the bird flew off to enjoy the meal on the head of a carved bust sitting near the window.
The sandwich was as good as the tea had been, and Sally wondered if a few bruises were not a worthy price to pay to be warm and well-fed.
After they’d eaten, Lady Gwen surreptitiously dipped her finger into the little pot and stuck it in her mouth as she set the tea things aside. “Do you feel able to answer some questions for me?”
The ease Sally had begun to feel toward the pleasant woman with the kind brown eyes stuttered as suspicion clawed back into her mind. She glanced from the staid Mr. Yates by the door to Mrs. Chapman, who loomed over them like a vulture looking for something, or someone, to consume. As warm and comfortable as she was, Sally wasn’t safe. No matter how nice these people seemed, they would be quick to turn on her if she gave them a reason. That’s what wealthy people did. So she’d be careful and make herself useful until she could escape.
“As best as I can, ma’am.”
“That is all anyone can hope to do. Your insight may help us sort out this affair.”
“Sort out, ma’am?”
“Indeed.”
“What’s to sort out? It was just a kidnapping.”
Lady Gwen rolled her eyes. “And what is the world coming to when we can dismiss abduction so easily? No, that’s not a question you can answer, my dear. What I mean is this: there was more happening in the alley than a couple of street toughs looking to earn a few dollars or… well, never mind about that. There were several strange things you may not have noticed that I would very much like answers to. Can you tell me how you came to be in the alley after you left the laundry?”
“I—how did you know I worked at the laundry? My lady,” she added the honorific when she recovered from her surprise.
“I can smell the solvents on you, there are leftover soap flakes caked to your shoe, and your hands have new blisters in places that suggest working a dolly. You appear to be of an age to enter service, so it seemed a logical conclusion.”
Sally considered her hands. The new blisters on her palms stared back at her like pairs of red-rimmed eyes. Her own powers of observation weren’t lacking. Sally knew where people kept their valuables, who was worth stealing from, and who was too suspicious or dangerous to risk an encounter with. She could tell someone’s profession by their clothes and the way they moved. She earned those skills over four years of scratching out a living on the street, but she’d never suspected someone in the upper class might use the same tricks on her. If that were the case, Lady Gwen might be able to tell if Sally lied. So, she recounted her experience honestly, from the time she left the laundry late and tired with a few pennies in her pocket, to the time she lost consciousness.
“When you entered the alley,” Lady Gwen said, “did you notice anything on the ground or the walls?”
“Only the rubbish and the water.”
“And the man who attacked you, was anything strange about him?”
Sally frowned. He’d been of average height, thin but strong, and he’d stunk of body odor and stale tobacco. But the same was true of a thousand men. “No, ma’am.”
Lady Gwen stood and pulled her hat from her head, revealing thick brown curls the color of bitter chocolate. “So, you entered the alley upon hearing the cries of the poor girl we could not save?”
“Virginia,” Sally put in, sadly.
“Virginia? You knew her?”
“Only that she began work a few days before me, and her name was Virginia. She was quiet.”
“Was that the reason you put yourself in such danger, because you were friends?”
Sally blushed. “I only know of her from work. But I knew I should have left well enough alone. I’ve seen more than one robbery use a damsel in distress to lure people in.” She didn’t say she’d taken part in those robberies. Best to leave that part out of her tale. “But when I heard her cry it felt like something was pulling me forward and I couldn’t stop myself, though I knew better.”
“Have you ever felt such a sensation before?”
“Sensation?”
“The pull you felt to help, the one you couldn’t stop.”
“No, ma’am.” Her instincts for self-preservation were stronger than that. Usually.
“Can you fetch me the book we spoke of, Mr. Yates?”
Mr. Yates crossed the room to the bookcase on silent feet. His face was calm and pleasant, but he moved like the kind of man Sally would avoid on the street, and his indifferent eyes missed nothing.
“Thank you for telling me your tale, Sally. I believe, if I can follow the clues left me, we might be able to save the girl. Or, at the very least, track down who kidnapped her and stop them.”
Sally’s stomach sank into her shoes. “We?”
Lady Gwen turned to her with bright eyes as Mr. Yates handed over the large tome. When she smiled, a dimple appeared in her right cheek, just below the small mole high on her cheekbone.
“You’re coming to work for me, of course. Aristotle likes you and he is an excellent judge of character.”
“Work for you, my lady?”
“Of course. Unless you’d rather stay in the laundry.”
Sally clenched her fists, and the blisters on her palms stung.
