“No, he sends them to the Old Bailey for trial. Then they are sent to Newgate — or to Tyburn.” Would she understand such a distinction?
“Mmmm. Tyburn!” She grabbed her throat, closed her eyes, and stuck out her tongue. “I go there once to watch them hang. Never again! It’s ‘orrible.”
“I’m sure it is. I’ve never been.”
Then an awkward moment. My mind went utterly blank as I looked upon her. Her hair shone lustrous black in the afternoon sun. Her eyes were near as dark. They seemed to narrow a bit. Was it suspicion, or was she merely reassessing?
“I was mean to you before. I am sorry.”
She did seem sorry, it was true, though she offered no explanation for her conduct. I wanted to ask the identity of the fellow she had sent to block my way. I wanted to ask why she had done so. But I asked neither. I simply nodded, as if to say that I accepted her apology.
“There is something I wished to ask you.”
She smiled most pretty. “And what you wish to ask?”
“I’ve had the feeling since first I set eyes upon you that I had met you before — and in a sense I believe I did. Tell me, when you were younger, did you work with a trouf›e of tumblers … acrobats?”
”Saltimbancos? Acrobati? Si! — yes, they were my brothers and my father. They… they go back to Italy.”
“And they left you here?” The very idea seemed quite monstrous to me. They had, in effect, orphaned the girl, one of their own blood.
Yet as I thought these dark thoughts, her face underwent a sad and remarkable change. It seemed to crumple before my very eyes. She turned away, but I saw that she was weeping. It quite broke my heart to see her so. I dug into my pocket and found the kerchief Annie had washed for me. I pressed it into Mariah’s hand. It took a minute or two of dabbing and blowing, but she managed at last to gain control of herself.
“No, not so,” she said. “I was to blame. I was ver’ foolish. I said I would not go to Italy. I would stay in England. They said I must do what they say — but the night before they left I ran away and hid with those I thought were my friends.” Then she added most bitteriy, “They prove’ to be false friend.”
“When was this?” I asked. “When did all this happen?”
“A month pas’.”
“And you have been on the streets ever since?”
“No, first I was in a house — you understand? I escape’. Even this is better.” Then, of a sudden, she pulled away and forced a smile. “But we talk about this after, yes?”
“After?”
“What a beautiful coat this is!” She fingered the material tenderly. “That Sir John, he mus’ pay you well for you to have such a coat. But I tell you, because I like you and because you remember me from before, I give you a good price — two shillings only. Come. I have a place near. We go, eh?”
“No,” said I firmly. “As I told you, I have a letter to deliver lo the Lord Chief Justice.”
“Ah, yes, the famous letter.” Which was said a bit ironic. “You do that after, eh?”
“No, I must go.” But, reaching deep into one of the capacious pockets of the coat, I pulled out a shilling and put it in her palm. “Take this for your time. Perhaps we can talk again?”
She took the shilling greedily and tucked it in her bodice between her dainty bubs. Ah, how I envied that shilling!
“For a shilling we talk anytime — no, I make a joke, eh? Yes, we talk. I like you. And next time you come with me, yes?”
“Goodbye.”
“Goodbye, and thank you. Grazia! Molte grazieT’
Difficult as it was to pull myself from her, I hastened away, joining the multitude on Drury Lane, swimming against the tide of humanity, pressing on to Hart Street, which would lead me straight into Bloomsbury Square. It was not far. I had not dallied long. And I was sure I had made up for some minutes lost by my great hurry to get there.
When, however, I reached my destination, I saw that I had dallied too long, or perhaps not hurried quite fast enough, for what should I see but a coach-and-four pulling away from his door, unmistakably that of William Murray, the Earl of Mansfield, the Lord Chief Justice. I watched it go, standing there on the walk, as if wishing might bring it back. At last I saw it disappear down Great Russell Street, and I turned to the door and banged upon it with the heavy, hand-shaped knocker. It was near a minute before the butler arrived in full livery. As I had grown taller he seemed a less imposing figure. Nevertheless, his chill manner would have turned back a regiment of foot.
“I have a letter to the Lord Chief Justice from Sir John Fielding,” said I, brandishing it as a constable might wave a warrant.
“He has just departed.” The butler put out his hand to accept the letter.
“I have instructions to put it in his hands direct and wait for a reply.”
“He may not be back for quite some time.”
“Nevertheless.”
“So be it then.” He began to ease the door shut.
“Uh… may I wait inside?” I asked, damning him for a black-hearted villain, for making me beg. “Perhaps on that bench in the vestibule?”
He turned and looked at it, then looked back at me — looked very closely, in fact, scrutinizing me from top to bottom.
Then said he: “Certainly.”
Stepping aside he held the door wide for me as I entered and took my place on the bench. Though it was padded, it had no back. In truth, it was not wonderfully comfortable, yet it was ever so much better than standing like some vagrant outside the door.
“Thank you,” said I to the butler, ever mindful of my manners.
“Don’t mention it,” said he, closing the door.
Then, turning his back on me, he started away, stopped, and turned to look again.
“Young man,” said he, “that is a very handsome coat.”
I could scarce believe my own ears. I stammered and stuttered and barely managed to call out my thanks before he disappeared down the hall. In the two years I had been trotting between Bow Street and Bloomsbury Square I had not known the butler to unbend previously — not once, not in the slightest. This must indeed be a considerable coat to awaken admiration in one by nature so cold.
It had so raised me in Marieih’s estimation that she had doubled her price. Ah yes, of course, as I sat there alone and prepared myself for a long wait, my thoughts fled swiftly back to her. I called up the image of her as we had talked but minutes before in the doorway. There was beauty in that face of hers, to be sure, but there was true emotion, life, and good humor as well. Were all Italian girls so? No, I was convinced that of all in the world she was unique. So is it when one is young.
As best I could, I summoned up a much dimmer memory of her from two years past. On a Sunday afternoon I had stood in a crowd assembled in the piazza and watched a troupe of acrobats and tumblers performing quite impossible feats. Most impressive of all was the small black-haired girl who climbed to the top of a human pyramid, posed triumphantly for a long moment as the crowd applauded, then dove headlong to the mats far below. She had tumbled, bounced to her feet, then been applauded even more enthusiastically. Pence and tuppence pieces were thrown down by the crowd in appreciation. Scrambling about, she gathered them up, and when she passed near me, I tossed her a shilling, one of three I had left in my pocket. She saw from whence it came, fixed me with her dark eyes and kissed the coin with her sweet lips. Then she called her thanks to me in a strange tongue, perhaps the very same phrase she had used some minutes ago when we had parted, the one that sounded a bit like “moldy grass.” Ah, how that touched me! Even more was I moved by her gesture of blessing my gift with a kiss, and most of all by the look in her eyes; with it she recognized me, in spite of my young years, as a person of consequence. For weeks afterwards I returned to Covent Garden on Sundays, hoping to see her again and make her acquaintance — all to no avail. I later learned that such performers move constantly from fair to fair and town to town. There could be no telling where they might be.