Read Online The Newgate Jig by Ann Featherstone - Free Book Online Page A

never beautiful, were
striking. A man might look twice at her, though if they stared, she was not
above giving them a terrific tongue-lashing.
    'Her past,' Titus
Strong once said to me, 'is still her present. She was a circus child and as
wild as a feral cat when I found her and brought her to God. But though He has
multiplied her affection and tenderness, He has not yet seen fit to curb her
tongue.'
    'Bob,' she said to me
with a smile, and then took her husband's hand in hers. 'Now then, my dear,
what's all this? Lucy again?' She turned to me. 'I tell him: Lucy will be found
when she wants to be found, and not before. You must let her be, and not pester
Bob to go out looking for her.'
    When I first worked in
the city, feeling that I should oblige my old friend, I went out and searched
for Lucy Strong, who had run away from home to follow an actor. This fellow
had, of course, ruined her and deserted her almost immediately, and she was
ashamed to return to her parents. That was the tale Strong told himself, and
who was I to dispute it? I diligently tracked the streets in search of her.
Knowing that her lover was an actor, I visited the back door of every theatre,
high and low, and scoured the taverns and publics which actors visited, but it
was like seeking a pearl in a hailstorm. Had she changed her name? Or joined
the profession? That was possible, but made her no easier
to find. Eventually, though it pained me to see her father's desperate
conviction that Lucy would be found, I was ever more convinced that she was
lost, sunk so low that she felt her shame was intolerable. And I think Mrs
Strong was of the same opinion, though she would not break her husband's heart
by saying so. But I have seen her shake her head and bite her lip as he spoke
of his hope of finding Lucy.
    In
the chill of that winter morning, in the midst of cabbages and kale, I
realized I had much to be grateful for: my good friends, Will and Trim, Mr
Abrahams, a kind employer, and Mr Carrier too, perhaps. A clean room in a tidy
neighbourhood and a life which, strangely, suited me. Bar the unpleasantness
of the past few days, it was mostly peaceful, and if I could keep this calm and
ordered way of being, it was a life I could be happy with. My needs are few, I
live simply enough so I can afford to put a little money by. I save a penny
here, sixpence there. Sometimes a shilling. And not for my old age! A year ago,
in this very kitchen with his wife frying bacon in a pan on the fire, Titus
Strong put a proposition to me.
    'Now
then, Bob, we know each other pretty well now. How many years is it since you
came here, broken-down and weary?'
    A
long time ago, I thought. Ten years? Who knows? Time flies apace. But once
there was a pale young fellow, with no money and no heart. And along came Titus
Strong, with an arm swelled up like a balloon (it had turned septic), and a
shilling in his pocket for a man to drive a cartful of cabbages to a city
market and back. He gave me that shilling and a hearty dinner and, when I
returned, a bed for the night in the tool-shed. The following morning, he gave
me another sixpence and a slice of bread and bacon, and reminded me that
honesty towards my fellow man would bring its own reward. And to be sure and
visit him if I ever strayed that way again. Which I did and have done ever
since.
    'He
talked about you all the next day and for weeks after,' said Mrs Strong. 'He
said, as soon as he saw you, he knew you wouldn't make off with his cart and
horse and a load of cabbages. Mind you, his judgement is not always up to
Solomon's,' she continued. 'There have been them who have led him a right
dance. What about the lad who robbed you of every spade and shovel, hoe and
trowel, you owned?'
    Strong
laughed. 'Aye, and the wheelbarrow to carry them away with!'
    The
fire crackled and the bacon spat in the pan. We sat for a long time, until Mrs
Strong clicked her tongue impatiently.
    'Well,
Mr Strong? Are you going to keep Bob waiting here