Anne Perry - A Christmas Promise

“We gone too far,” Minnie Maude said. “Angel Alley’s back that way.” She started along the High Street, then suddenly turned into one of the alleys again, and after a further hundred yards or so, she turned into a ramshackle yard with a sign at the entrance.

“I fink this is it,” she said, peering at the letters. But looking at her face all screwed up in uncertainty, Gracie knew perfectly well that she was only guessing.

Minnie Maude took a deep breath and walked in. Gracie followed. She couldn’t let her go in alone.

A lean man with straight black hair came out of one of the sheds.

“There’s nothing ’ere fer kids,” he said with a slight lisp. He waved his hands. “Orff wif yer!”

“Ye’re Jimmy Quick?” Minnie Maude pulled herself up very straight.

“’oo are you, then?” he said, puzzled.

“Minnie Maude Mudway,” she replied. “It were me uncle Alf as yer found in the street.” She hesitated. “An’ this is me friend,” she added.

“Gracie Phipps,” Gracie said.

“We’re lookin’ fer Charlie,” Minnie Maude went on.

Jimmy Quick frowned at them. “I dunno no Charlie.”

“’e’s a donkey,” Gracie explained. Someone needed to talk a little sense. “’e got lost, along wif Uncle Alf’s cart, an’ everyfink wot was in it.” She glanced around the yard and saw three old bicycles whose wheels had missing spokes, several odd boots and shoes, kettles, pieces of china and pottery, some of it so beautiful she stared at it in amazement. There were old fire irons, a poker with a brass handle, ornaments, pots and pans, pieces of carpet, a cabin trunk with no hinges, unwanted books and pictures, all the things a rag and bone man collects, in with the actual rags or bones for glue.

Minnie Maude stood still, ignoring the scattered takings around her, just staring solemnly at Jimmy Quick. “’ow’d yer find ’im, then?”

Jimmy seemed to consider evading the question, then changed his mind. “’e were jus’ lyin’ there in the road,” he said sadly. “Like ’e fell off, ’cept o’ course ’e’d never ’ave done that, if ’e’d bin alive. I’ve seen Alf as tight as a newt, an’ ’e didn’t miss a step, never mind fell. ’e knew ’ow ter wedge ’isself, like, so ’e wouldn’t—not even if ’e were asleep.” He shook his head. “Reckon as ’ow ’e must ’ave just died all of a sudden. Bin took, as it were. Visitation o’ God.”

“No ’e weren’t,” Minnie Maude contradicted him. “If ’e ’ad bin, Charlie’d ’ave brought ’im ’ome. An’ wot were ’e doin’ way out ’ere anyway? This in’t ’is patch.” She sniffed fiercely as if on the edge of tears. “Someone’s done ’im in.”

“Yer talkin’ daft,” Jimmy said dismissively, but his face was very pink. “’oo’d wanter ’urt Alf?” He looked uncomfortable, not quite meeting Minnie Maude’s eyes. Gracie wondered if it was embarrassment because he did not know how to comfort her, or something uglier that he was trying not to say.

Gracie interrupted at last. “It in’t daft,” she told him. “Wot ’appened ter Charlie, an’ the cart? ’e di’n’t go ’ome.”

Now Jimmy Quick was deeply unhappy. “I dunno. Yer sure the cart’s not at yer aunt Bertha’s?” he asked Minnie Maude.

She looked at him witheringly. “Course it in’t. Charlie might get lorst, cos this in’t where ’e usually comes. So why was ’e ’ere? Even if Uncle Alf died an’ fell off, which ’e wouldn’t ’ave, why’d nobody see ’im ’ceptin’ you? An’ ’oo took Charlie an’ the cart?”

Put like that, Gracie had to agree that it didn’t sound right at all. She joined Minnie Maude in staring accusingly at Jimmy Quick.

Jimmy looked down at the ground with even greater unhappiness, and what now most certainly appeared to be guilt. “It were my fault,” he admitted. “I ’ad ter go up ter Artillery Lane an’ see someone, or I’d a bin in real trouble, so I asked Alf ter trade routes wi’ me. ’e’d do mine, an’ I’d do ’is. That way I could be where I ’ad ter, wi’out missin’ an ’ole day. That’s why ’e were ’ere. ’e were a good mate ter me, an’ ’e died doin’ me a favor.”

“’e were on yer round!” Gracie said in sudden realization of all that meant. “So if someone done ’im in, p’raps they meant it ter be you!”

“Nobody’s gonna do me in!” Jimmy said with alarm, but looking at his face, paler now and a little gray around his lips, Gracie knew that the thought was sharp in his mind, and growing sharper with every minute.

She made her own expression as grim as she could, drawing her eyebrows down and tightening her mouth, just as Gran did when she found an immovable stain in someone’s best linen. “But yer jus’ said as ’e were alone cos ’e were doin’ yer a favor,” she pointed out. “If nobody else knew that, they’d a thought as it were you sittin’ in the cart!”

“I dunno,” Jimmy said unhappily.

Gracie did not believe him. Her mind raced over how it could matter, picking up people’s odd pieces of throwaway, or the things they might buy or sell, if they knew where. What did rag and bone men pick up, anyway? If you could pawn it for a few pence, or maybe more, you took it to the shop. She glanced at Minnie Maude, who was standing hunched up, shaking with cold, and now looking defeated.

Gracie lost her temper. “Course yer know!” she shouted at Jimmy. “’e got done in doin’ yer job, cos yer asked ’im ter. An’ now the cart’s gorn and Charlie’s gorn, an’ we’re standin’ ’ere freezin’, an’ yer sayin’ as yer can’t tell us wot ’e died fer!”

“Cos I dunno!” Jimmy said helplessly. He swung his arms in the air. “Come on inside an’ Dora’ll make yer a cup o’ tea.” He led the way across the yard, weaving between bicycles, cart wheels, milk churns without lids, until he came to the back door of his house. He pushed the door wide, invitingly, and they crowded in after him.

Inside the kitchen was a splendid collection of every kind of odd piece of machinery and equipment a scrap yard could acquire. Nothing matched anything else, hardly two pieces of china were from the same set, yet it was all excellent, the most delicate Gracie had ever seen, hand-painted and rimmed in gold. No two saucepans were the same either, or had lids that fitted, but all were handsome enough, even if there was little to put in them besides potatoes, onions, and cabbage, and perhaps a few bones for flavor.

In the far corner stood a magnificent mangle, with odd rollers, one white, one gray; a collection of flatirons, most of them broken; and several lanterns missing either sides or handles. Perhaps the bits and pieces might make two usable ones between them?

Mrs. Quick was standing expectantly by the stove, on which a copper kettle was gleaming in the gaslight, steam whistling out of the spout. She was an ample woman wearing a blue dress patched in a dozen places without thought for matching anything, and she wore a marvelous old velvet cape around her shoulders. It was vivid red, and apart from a burn on one side, appeared as good as new.

“Ah! So you’re Bert Mudway’s girl,” she said to Minnie Maude with satisfaction, then turned to Gracie. “An’ ’oo are you, then? In’t seen yer before.”

“Gracie Phipps, ma’am,” Gracie replied.

“Never ’eard of yer. Still an’ all, I ’spec yer’d like a cup o’ tea. That daft Jimmy kept yer standin’ out there in the cold. Goin’ ter snow, like as not, before the day’s out.”

“They come about Alf,” Jimmy explained.

“Course they ’ave.” She took the kettle off the hob, warmed an enormous white and wine-colored teapot with half a handle, then made the tea, spooning the leaves from a caddy with an Indian woman painted on the front. “Got no milk,” she apologized. “Yer’ll ’ave ter ’ave it straight. Give yer ’alf a spoon of ’oney?”