Anne Perry - A Christmas Promise

It was on the edge of Gracie’s tongue to say to Bertha that she’d sold Charlie, and why couldn’t she just be honest enough to tell Minnie Maude so. Then at least she wouldn’t be worrying about him being lost and hungry, wandering around in the sleet, wet and maybe frightened.

The outside door opened again, and Stan appeared. He looked at Minnie Maude, then at Gracie. “Wot yer doin’ back ’ere again?” he said sharply.

“She’s ’elpin’ me look fer Charlie,” Minnie Maude told him.

“She’s jus’ goin’,” Bertha interrupted soothingly. Her face was pinched, her eyes steady on Stan. “She were only ’elpin’.”

“Well, yer shouldn’t bother folks,” Stan told Minnie Maude. “Yer looked. ’e ain’t around. Now do like yer told.”

“’e’s lorst,” Minnie Maude persisted.

“Donkeys don’t get lorst,” Stan said, and shook his head. “’e’s bin doin’ these streets fer years. ’e’ll come ’ome, or mebbe somebody took ’im. Which is stealin’, an’ if I find the bastard, I’ll make ’im pay. But that’s my business. It in’t yers. Now go and do yer chores, girl.” He looked at Gracie. “An’ you do yers, an’ all. Yer must ’ave summink ter do better ’n wanderin’ round the streets lookin’ fer some damn donkey!”

“But ’e’s lorst!” Minnie Maude protested again, standing her ground even though she must have been able to see as well as Gracie could that Stan was angry. “’e weren’t wi’ Uncle Alf’s—”

“Don’t talk nonsense!” Bertha snapped at her, putting the knife down and raising her hand as if she would slap Minnie Maude around the ears if she did not keep quiet. But it was not anger Gracie could see in her eyes. Gracie was suddenly, in that instant, quite sure that it was fear. She lifted her foot and gave Minnie Maude a sharp kick on the ankle.

Minnie Maude gasped and turned sharply.

“I’m lost an’ all,” Gracie said. “An’ yer aunt Bertha’s right, I got chores, too. Can yer show me which way I gotta go? If yer please?”

Shoulders slumped again, wiping her face with her sleeve to hide the tears, Minnie Maude led the way out the back door, past Charlie’s empty stable, and into the street.

“Yer right,” Gracie said when they were beyond where Bertha or Stan could hear them. “There’s summink wrong, but yer uncle Stan don’t like yer pokin’ inter it, an’ I think yer aunt Bertha’s scared o’ summink.”

“She’s scared of ’im,” Minnie Maude said with a shrug. “’e’s got a nasty temper, an’ Alf in’t ’ere no more ter keep ’im in ’and, like. Wot are we gonna do?”

“Yer gonna do yer chores, like I am,” Gracie replied firmly.

Minnie Maude’s mouth pulled tight to stop her lips from trembling. She searched Gracie’s face, hope fading in her. She took a shaky breath.

“I gotta think!” Gracie said desperately. “I… I in’t givin’ up.” She felt hot and cold at once with the rashness of what she had just said. Instantly she wished to take it back, and it was too late. “In’t no sense till we think,” she said again.

“Yeah,” Minnie Maude agreed. She forced a rather wobbly smile. “I’ll go do me chores.” And she turned and walked away, heading into the rain.

Gracie went to help Mr. Wiggins, as she did every other day, running errands and cleaning out the one room in which he lived, scrubbing, doing laundry, and making sure he had groceries. He paid her sixpence at the end of each week, which was today. Sometimes he even made it ninepence, if he was feeling really generous.

“Wot’s the matter wif yer, then?” he asked as she came into the room from outside, closing the rickety door behind her. She went straight to the corner where the broom and the scrubbing brush and pail were kept. “Got a face on yer like a burst boot, girl,” he went on. “In’t like you.”

“Sorry, Mr. Wiggins. I got a friend in trouble.” She glanced at him briefly with something like a smile, then picked up the broom and started to sweep. Her hands were so cold she could hardly hold the wooden shaft firmly enough.

“’ave a cup o’ tea,” he suggested.

“I in’t got time. I gotta clean this up.”

“Yer ’ere ter please me or yerself, girl?”

She stared at him. “I’m ’ere ter clean the floor an’ fetch yer tea an’ bread an’ taters.”

“Ye’re ’ere ter do as I tell yer,” he contradicted.

“Yer want the floor cleaned or not?”

“I wan’ a cup o’ tea. Can you tell me why yer look like yer lost sixpence an’ found nothin’? Put the kettle on like I said.”

She hesitated.

“’nother threepence?” he offered.

She couldn’t help smiling at him. He was old and crotchety sometimes, but she knew that most of that came from being lonely, and not wanting anyone to know that it hurt him.

“I don’ need threepence,” she lied. “I’ll get a cup o’ tea. I’m fair froze any’ow.” Obediently she went to the small fire he kept going in a black potbellied stove, and pulled the kettle over. “Yer got any milk, then?” she asked.

“Course I ’ave,” he said indignantly. “Usual place. Wot’s the matter wif yer, Gracie?”

She made the tea, wondering whether it would be worse to use up what she knew was the last of his milk, and leave him without any, or not to use it, and insult his hospitality. She knew with her gran the humiliation would have stung more, so she used it.

“’s good,” she said, sitting opposite him and sipping it gingerly.

“So wot’s goin’ on, then?” he asked.

She told him about Alf dying and falling off the cart, and Charlie getting lost, and how she didn’t know what to do to help Minnie Maude.

He thought in silence for several minutes while they both finished their tea. “I dunno neither,” he said at last.

“Well, fanks fer the tea,” she said, conquering a very foolish sense of disappointment. What had she expected, anyway? She stood up ready to go back to the sweeping and scrubbing.

“But yer could go and ask Mr. Balthasar.” He put his mug down on the scarred tabletop. “’e’s about the cleverest feller I ever ’eard of.” He tapped his head with one arthritic finger. “Wise, ’e is. Knows all kinds o’ things. Mebbe ’e di’n’t know if Alf fell off the cart afore ’e were dead, or after, but if anyone can find a donkey wot’s lost—or stole—it’d be ’im.”

“Would ’e?” Gracie said with sudden hope.

Mr. Wiggins nodded, smiling.

She had a moment’s deep doubt. Mr. Wiggins was old and a bit daft. Maybe he just wanted to help, which didn’t mean he could. Still, she had no better idea herself. “I’ll go an’ see ’im,” she promised. “Where is ’e?”

S he found the shop of Mr. Balthasar on Whitechapel Road just about where Mr. Wiggins had said it would be, which surprised her. He had seemed to be too vague for her to trust his judgment. But the moment she stepped inside the dark, narrow doorway, she thought it was much less good an idea than Mr. Wiggins had implied. There was no one to be seen in the extraordinary interior, but objects of one sort or another seemed to fill every shelf from floor to ceiling, and be suspended by ropes, threads, and chains from above so that she was afraid to move in case she dislodged something and brought it all crashing down on herself.

There seemed to be an inordinate number of shoes, or perhaps they would more properly be called slippers. She couldn’t imagine anyone going outside in the wet street in such things. They were made of cloth, of soft leather, even of velvet, and they were stitched with all sorts of patterns like nothing she had ever seen before. Some had silly curling toes that would make anybody fall over in two steps. But they were beautiful!