Bruce Alexander - Person or Persons Unknown

And with that he rubbed his left elbow into my ribs.

“He will then shift his position if he can, and you hit him hard with the other elbow. And when I say hard, I mean snap it back with your whole shoulder. Practice it at night. You can make it so you don’t have to think about it. It’ll just come, so it will.”

“Yes, sir, I’ll practice it.”

“Good lad. Now, if that don’t get you loose, you’ve got your heels. Try for his shins, and that can be very damagin’, it can, but you’ve a better shot at his feet. Bring down your heel with all the force you can — not on his toes, for that gives less pain, but on the flat part of his foot. Try to break all them little bones in there, and if you do, he’ll not be able to put weight on that foot. He’ll be off balance, and you should be able to twist loose. You can let go now, Jeremy.”

And so I did, glancing by chance at Bunkins. He was staring in awed concentration.

”Don’t think because I’ve told you about these one at a time, that’s how you should go at it. You must do them all at once — bite, elbows in the ribs, heel down on his foot. You must make him think he’s got hold of the very devil hisself.”

“Mr. Perkins, sir?”

“Yes, Jimmie Bunkins, what have you to say?”

“A question, sir: What if the cull’s got a knife?”

“A very sensible question it is, for them who attack from behind often has them, for it is a coward’s weapon. One thing I will say, first of all, about knives is that most who have them don’t know how to use them. But to your question, if attacked from behind with a knife, you’ll either be stabbed in the back, in which situation all you can do is hope it didn’t hit your vitals, get turned around, and meet him head on. It ain’t well known, but Constable Brede took a knife in the back, got loose, and subdued the villain with his club. With the knife still in his back, he marched him to Bow Street, then went to a surgeon to have the thing taken out.”

Wide-eyed, Bunkins and I exchanged looks without comment.

“Then there’s them who would cut your throat. But to do that your man’s got to get at it. So the first rule: tuck in your chin. Next: bite like hell, hit with the elbows, and try to break his foot. Do whatever you can to get loose and face him.”

“But he’s still got his knife, ain’t he?” put in Bunkins. “What can you do if you ain’t got one, too?”

“The best defense against a knife ain’t another knife but a good club and a pair of nimble feet. We’ll go into that later, but just now I must wash up and dress for duty. Jim-mie Bunkins, you’re welcome to come along whenever you like at this hour.”

On the day of the dinner planned for Mr. Goldsmith and Mr. Donnelly, we trudged a good way across London, Annie Oakum and I, to Smithfield Market to purchase meat for the occasion. We two, and Lady Fielding as well, had looked forward to the occasion as one sure to rouse Sir John from his lethargic silence. And so a great feast had been planned. A great feast demands a great piece of meat, and Mr. Tolliver being yet mysteriously absent from Cov-ent Garden, we had no choice but to make the journey to Smithfield.

Annie and I had become great chums. Though she did not deign to discuss it, her heart belonged still to Lady Fielding’s son by her earlier marriage, Tom Durham. For near a month after Tom sailed as a midshipman on the H.M.S. Leviathan, she moped about, neglecting all but her grand cooking. In that she did ever take pride. Gradually, her good spirits returned, in spite of the fact that in the year that he had been away there had been no letter to her. He wrote often to his mother, twice to Sir John, and once even to me. To give him the benefit of the doubt, since Annie was illiterate, he may have supposed there was no point in writing her a personal letter which would have to be read to her impersonally by another. He did include little personal messages to her in his letters to us — tell Annie this, tell Annie that — about the exotic foods he had eaten in Egypt or Greece, or some other distant land. Nevertheless, I knew that she longed for some direct communication from him she held so dear. Yet as he became more distant, she and I grew closer as chums and confidants. She became for me what I had never before had nor known: she became for me a sister.

So it was only natural that sometime on that long walk to the Smithfield Market I should open my heart to her and tell her of Mariah. I told her all: how I had first glimpsed her as an acrobat when first I came to London; how, when her family returned to Italy, she had been seduced into staying and then sold into prostitution; how she had then been returned to Jackie Carver and turned out onto the streets; and finally, that he had offered to “sell” her to me for ten guineas.

Telling the tale complete took near a mile. Annie had listened carefully saying not a word, only throwing me a glance now and then on two occasions when, choking back a sob, I found that for a moment I could not continue. Finally, hearing no more from me, she rightly assumed I had concluded. Then did she face me square.

“Jeremy,” said she, “tell me true. Do you love her?”

“I believe I feel for her exactly as you feel for Tom. Is that not love?”

She looked away; her face took on a most serious cast. After a moment’s hesitation, she spoke: “I ain’t sure of that.”

Of a sudden, our nostrils were assaulted by the foul, bloody smell of the Smithfield Market, wherein animals of every size and description were slaughtered, butchered, and sold. There could be no doubt that we were close, and there, just ahead on Gilt-Spur Street, lay the entrance to the market.

“We’ve a job to do here,” said she to me then. “Let me think on what you told me while we’re about it. We’ll talk on it more on our return. Will that suit you?”

“As you wish, Annie.”

I took her to the stall where I had lately been buying for the household in Mr. Tolliver’s absence. There I was recognized and greeted. But Annie made it clear to the butcher that it was she who had to be pleased that day. She asked to see what he had of beef for roasting. He showed her, and as he did, he extolled the tenderness and taste of the meat. Pouting out her lower lip, she examined it skeptically and asked the price of it. When he put it at five shillings, she pulled back and gave him a hard look.

“We’ll search round a bit more,” said she. “Come along, Jeremy.”

As we left, the butcher threw me a hurt look. But in no wise did I attempt to contradict or persuade her. She was indeed the cook and was to be put to the test that night. The decision would be hers.

“That was quite a large piece,” said I, thinking that incontestable.

“More than we need,” said she, “nor was it fresh-butchered.”

Annie proved hard to please. We spent the better part of an hour wandering through the market, looking at the offerings of one and another, until at last we came to a stall hard by one of the slaughtering tents from which a great stink arose. Because of the stink, there were not so many customers about; and when Annie inquired after beef for roasting, the butcher waved his hand at the sides of beef hanging behind him. He invited her back to take a look, just as Mr. Tolliver might have done. They came to an immediate agreement on the size and cut but haggled a bit on the price; both seemed to enjoy it. At last they agreed on a price, which was five shillings for a chunk about the same size as had been offered to her by the first butcher. I wondered at that. And when, as we were leaving (I, with a good ten pounds of wrapped meat and bone under my arm), I called it to her attention, she gave me the same sharp look I had seen her level at the butchers we had visited.