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cold got ’im.”
    Minnie Maude shook her head. “ ’E were done in. Somebody ’it ’im.”
    â€œGarn!” the boy said with disbelief. “Why’d anyone do that?”
    â€œCos ’e knowed summink,” Gracie said rapidly. “Mebbe ’e see’d summink as ’e weren’t meant ter.”
    The boy’s eyes widened. “Then yer shouldn’t go lookin’, or mebbe yer’ll know it, too! In’t yer got no more sense?”
    â€œÂ â€™E weren’t yer uncle,” Gracie responded, liking the sound of it, as if Alf had been hers. It gave her a kind of warmth inside. Then she thought of drawing the sweeper into it a bit more personally. “Wot’s yer name?”
    â€œMonday,” he replied.
    â€œMonday?” Minnie Maude said, and stared at him.
    His face tightened a bit, as if the wind were colder. “I started on a Monday,” he explained.
    She shrugged. “I dunno when I started. Mebbe I in’t really started yet?”
    â€œYeah yer ’ave,” Gracie said quickly. “Yer gonna find Charlie. That’s a good way ter start.” She turned back to Monday. “When were Alf ’ere, an’ where’d ’e go? We gotta find out. An’ tell us again, but do it clear, cos we don’ know this patch. It was Jimmy Quick’s, not Uncle Alf’s.”
    Monday screwed up his face. “ ’E went that way, which weren’t the way Jimmy Quick goes. I see’d ’im go right down there, then ’e turned the corner, that way.” He jerked his hand leftward. “An’ I dunno where ’e went after that.”
    â€œThat’s the wrong way,” Minnie Maude said, puzzled. “I remembered it.” She recited the streets as Jimmy Quick had told them, ticking them off on her fingers.
    â€œWell that’s the way ’e went.” Monday was firm.
    They thanked him and set off in the direction he had pointed.
    â€œWere ’e lorst?” Minnie Maude said when they were on the far side and well out of the traffic.
    â€œI dunno,” Gracie admitted. Her mind was racing, imagining all kinds of things. This was later in the route. He couldn’t have done all the little alleys to the west so soon. Why had he been going the wrong way? Had somebody been after him already? No, that didn’t make any sense.
    â€œWe gotta find somebody else ter ask,” she said aloud. “ ’Oo else would a seen ’im?”
    Minnie Maude thought about it for some time before she answered. They walked another hundred yards along Cannon Street, but no one could help.
    â€œNobody seen ’im,” Minnie Maude said, fighting tears. “We in’t never gonna find Charlie.”
    â€œYeah, we are,” Gracie said with more conviction than she felt. “Mebbe we should ask afterCharlie, not Uncle Alf? Most people push their own barrows, or got ’orses.”
    Minnie Maude brightened. “Yeah. Ye’re right.” She squared her shoulders and lengthened her stride, marching across the icy cobbles toward a thin man with a lantern jaw who was busy mending a broken window, replacing the small pane of glass, smiling as he worked, as if he knew a secret joke.
    â€œMister?” Minnie Maude jogged his elbow to attract his attention.
    He looked at her, still smiling.
    Gracie caught up and glanced at the window. The old pane he had removed had a neat hole in it, round as the moon.
    â€œWot’s yer name?” Minnie Maude asked.
    â€œThey call me Paper John. Why?”
    â€œYer bin ’ere afore?” Minnie Maude watched him intently. “Like three days ago, mebbe? I’m lookin’ fer where me uncle Alf were. ’E ’ad a cart, but wif a donkey, not an ’orse.”
    â€œWhy?” The man was still smiling. “Yer lorst ’im?”
    â€œI lorst Charlie, ’e’s the donkey,” Minnie