That had been one of Dodger’s very good days because, well, firstly he had done a good deed for the flower girls, earning from one or two of them the likelihood of an occasional kiss and cuddle, as between friends. Secondly, since he had left a gentleman groaning in the alley without even his unmentionables, he had harvested one gold watch, one guinea, a couple of sovereigns, some small change, an ebony walking cane set with silver trimmings, and one pair of the said unmentionables.1 And the bonus in the whole affair was that the man was never, ever likely to get in touch with the peelers. Also, he had forgotten this: there had been the gold tooth which the man had spat at him after the best punch that Dodger had ever laid on anybody. He had actually caught it in the air, much to the applause of the flower girls, making him feel for a while the cock of the heap. He had taken the older flower girls for an oyster supper and it had been the best day a young man could ever have. It was always worth doing a good deed, though that had been before he had rescued Solomon, who wouldn’t have approved of some aspects of the enterprise.
Since Dodger was now practically on his home patch, blackened by smoke though it was, he let his guard down and a hand landed on his shoulder with a grip that was surprising, given that its owner mostly used his strength to push a pen.
‘Well, Mister Dodger! You will be amazed how much I had to spend on the growler to get here so quickly. And, may I say, your sewers have made short work of your suit. Any chance of there being a coffee house around here, do you think?’
Dodger thought not, but did volunteer that one of the nearby meat pie houses might have some of it on the go, adding, ‘Not certain what it will taste like. A bit like, probably very much like, the meat pies, really; I mean, you have to be really hungry, if you see what I mean.’
In the end, he led Charlie to a pub where they could talk without being overheard, and where it was least likely somebody would try to pick Charlie’s pocket. When Dodger went in, he was Dodger in spades. No, come to think about it, not just in spades, but also in clubs, hearts and diamonds as well – a diamond geezer, the friend of everyone in the rookeries. He glad-handed Quince, the landlord, and a few of the other hangers-on of dubious repute with enough fire to send the word to those who had the eyes to see that this mark belonged to Dodger, and nobody else.
On the whole, Charlie was putting a good face on it, but nevertheless, here he was in the rookeries, where even the peelers trod carefully and never, ever went singly. Here was Charlie, as out of place as Dodger had felt himself at first in Parliament. Two different worlds.
London wasn’t all that big when you thought about it: a square mile of mazes, surrounded by even more streets and people and . . . opportunities . . . and outside that a load of suburbs who thought they were London, but they weren’t at all, not really, at least not to Dodger. Oh, sometimes he went outside the square mile – oh, as far as two miles away! – and he took great care to cloak himself with the full cocksureness of geezerdom. Then he could be all friendly with all those people it paid to be friendly with, and geezer would call unto geezer; the geezers of the Outer Wastes, as Dodger called those streets, weren’t exactly friends but you respected their patch in the hope and sureness that they would respect yours. You reached an understanding with looks, assumptions and the occasional exchange of gestures which hardly needed words. But it was all a show, a game . . . and when he was not Dodger, he sometimes wondered who he really was. Dodger, he thought, was a lot stronger than he was.
Now and then, a customer in the pub glanced at Charlie and then looked at Dodger, and instantly thought they understood and looked away. No problem, ’nuff said, guv’nor, right you are.
When it was clear that warfare would not break out, and two pints of porter, for once in clean glasses, what with there being a gentleman here, were put in front of them, Charlie said, ‘Young man, I made great haste to my office after finishing our business with Angela, and what did I find but that my friend Mister Dodger the hero is a very rich man.’ He leaned closer and said, ‘In fact, I have in my pocket, carefully wrapped so that they should not jingle, specie to the tune of fifty sovereigns and what you might now call small change, with the promise of more to come.’
At last Dodger got control of his own mouth, which for a few seconds had totally been beyond him. He managed to whisper, ‘But I ain’t no hero, Charlie.’
Charlie put a finger to his lips and said, ‘Do be careful about protesting; you know who and what you are, and I suppose so do I, although I suspect I am kinder to you than you are to yourself. But right now the good people of London have contributed this money to someone they consider to be a hero. Who are we to deprive them of their hero, especially since it might be that a hero can get things done?’
Dodger glanced around the bar. Nobody was listening and he hissed, ‘And poor old Todd is a villain, right?’
‘Well, now,’ said Charlie. ‘A hero, a man might think, is a man who might protest that the so-called villain is nothing more than a sad, mad man in torment because of what war has done to him, and indeed suggest that Bedlam would be more sensible than the gallows. Who would deny a hero, especially if said hero sprang some of his newfound wealth seeing to it that the poor man had a reasonable time there.’
Dodger thought of Mister Todd in Bedlam, where the poor devil would presumably be locked in somewhere with his demons and with no comforts unless he could afford to pay for them. The thought made Dodger’s flesh crawl, because surely that would be much worse than the gallows in Newgate, especially since they were getting the art of putting the knot in the rope in such a way that the neck was broken instantly, which saved a lot of hanging around for all concerned and meant that people no longer had to rely on their friends swinging on their heels as they danced the hemp fandango. Reportedly, a good pickpocket could get his lunch just by strolling behind people who were intent on making the most of the entertainment. Dodger had himself tried this out once and hadn’t done too badly, but he had been surprised to find himself feeling a little ashamed at using such an occasion for profit and so he had re-distributed the money he had expertly filched to a couple of beggars.
‘No one’s going to listen to me,’ he said now.
‘You undersell yourself, my friend. And you undersell the power of the press. Now close your mouth before something flies into it, and remember, tomorrow morning you must come to see me at the offices of Punch magazine so that Mister Tenniel can make a very droll likeness of you, for our readers would like to see the hero of the day.’
He slapped Dodger on the back – an action he immediately regretted as his hand encountered an especially fruity patch of Dodger’s suit.
‘The coach,’ said Dodger. ‘I heard it again. Nearly caught it too. I’ll find them coves, Charlie. Simplicity will be safe from them.’
‘Well, she’s certainly safe right now at Angela’s.’ Charlie smiled. ‘And I believe I can keep Ben quiet for a day or so whilst I make further enquiries. We make a team, Mister Dodger, a team! The game is on, so let us hope we are on the winning side.’
With that, he left the pub, heading fast for the next wide road that might contain a cab and leaving Dodger standing there with his mouth open and a pocket full of glorious, shiny specie. After a few seconds, the goddesses of reality and self-preservation ganged up on him, and a man holding a fortune raced through Seven Dials and hammered on Solomon’s door.
He gave the special knock, heard the joyful bark of Onan followed by the shuffling of Solomon’s slippers, followed by the rattle of bolts. Dodger knew that at the Tower of London – a place he never wanted to see the inside of – there was a great ceremony of the Yeoman warders, known by some as the Beefeaters, when the place was locked up at nights. But however complicated their ceremony was, it probably wasn’t as careful and meticulous as Solomon opening or closing his door. This was, in fact, now at last open.
‘Oh, Dodger, a little late. Never mind, stew is all the better for a really good simmer . . . Oh dear, what have you done to
Jacob’s very nearly new suit!’
Carefully taking off the jacket, Dodger hung it at the insistence of Solomon on a coat hanger to await further attention before turning round slowly, opening the purse that Charlie had given to him and letting its contents tinkle onto the old man’s work table.
He then stood back and said, ‘I think Jacob would now agree with me that the suit is not really important at the moment. In any case,’ he continued, smiling, ‘everybody knows that a little bit of piss does no harm to a garment whatsoever, so I think some of this specie would make everything as right as rain, what do you say?’ And while the old man’s mouth was still open Dodger went on, ‘I hope you’ve got some room in your strongboxes!’
Then he thought, as Solomon stood there in amazement and said nothing, maybe it would be a very good idea to get his riches somewhere else, as soon as ever possible.
Sometime later, two empty bowls of stew sat on the table alongside a fortune made up of carefully stacked coins, which were ranged in order of denomination from one or two half farthings right up to the guineas and sovereigns. Solomon and Dodger stared at the piles as if expecting them to perform a trick or, possibly more likely, to evaporate and go back to where they came from.
As for Onan, he looked anxiously from one to the other, wondering if he had done something wrong, which to be frank was generally likely to be the case, although on this occasion he was blameless so far.
Solomon listened very carefully to Dodger’s account of what had happened in the barbershop and all that had followed, right up to the dinner invitation from Miss Angela and the reward Charlie had given him in the pub, sometimes raising a finger to ask a particular question but otherwise not making a sound until finally he said, ‘Mmm, it is not your fault if people call you a hero, but it is to your credit that you recognize that if he was a monster then it was other monstrous things which made him so. The iron forged on the anvil cannot be blamed for the hammer, and I believe God will quite understand you took every opportunity to explain the situation to all those who listened. Mmm, don’t I just know that onto the world that is people paint the world that they would like. Therefore they like to see dragons slain, and where there are gaps, public imagination will fill the void. No blame attaches. In the case of the money, one might feel that this is in some way a society trying to feel better. A healing action, which almost as a side-effect makes you a very well-off young man who in my opinion definitely should put most of this money in the bank. You tell me of a lady by the name of Miss Angela Burdett-Coutts; she is indeed extremely rich, having received a very large legacy from her grandfather, and you would be very wise to deal with her family. The people at Mister Coutts’ bank are your men, I think, and therefore I suggest that you put the money with them, where it will be safe and earn interest. A very good nest egg indeed!’
‘Interest? What’s money interested in?’
‘More money,’ said Solomon. ‘Take it from me.’
‘Well, I don’t want people to be very interested in me!’ said Dodger.
The mmm from Solomon was an unusually fruity one, and he said, ‘Not so much interested in you, but very interested in your money. Mmm, you see, it is like this. Supposing one of these newfangled railway gentlemen, let us call him Mister Stephenson, has a design for a wonderful new engine. Being a man interested in mostly bolts and atmospheric pressures, he might not be very well versed in the world of commerce. Mmm, now Mister Coutts and his gentlemen will find for him entrepreneurs – that is you, Dodger, in this case – who might lend him the necessary cash in order to get his good idea to a state of solid reality. Mister Coutts can take the measure of a man as to his trustworthiness and, in short, see to it that your money works for the aforesaid engineer, and also at the same time for you. Of course, they will take advice to ascertain that this gentleman with the shining eyes and grease down his breeches with a definite reek of coal dust about his person is a sound investment, but Mister Coutts and his family are very wealthy people who most certainly didn’t get that way by guessing wrongly. It’s called finance. Trust me; I’m Jewish, we know about these things.’
Solomon was beaming happily, but Dodger said uneasily, ‘This sounds a bit like gambling to me. You can lose money gambling.’
Under the table Onan whined, because nobody was paying him any attention.
‘Indeed you can, but mmm you see, there is gambling, and on the other hand there is gambling. Take poker, for example. Poker is about watching people, and you, young man, are incredibly good at that. You read people’s faces. I don’t know how you do it so well – it’s a gift. So it is in finance; you have to be careful with the people you deal with, and so are Mister Coutts and Co.’
‘You make them sound as if they are on the dodge, like me!’ said Dodger.
Solomon smiled. ‘Mmm, that is a most interesting philosophy, Dodger, but not one that I might suggest too appropriate to mention to the men at Coutts bank. Remember, it’s very hard to stay in business with a bad name, and they certainly stay in business.’ He wrinkled his nose as the odours of the drying jacket managed even to overwhelm Onan’s contribution to the air in the attic.
‘I’m sorry about the shonky suit,’ Dodger managed, but Solomon waved this away with a sound like phooey!
‘Don’t worry about Jacob,’ he said. ‘Jacob would never be angry with a man who has a lot of money to spend. Anyway, horse urine is, as we know, very good for cleaning clothes – a fact not everyone appreciates, though everybody knows it has a smell like good cider, and is very fruity. Now I suggest an early night, once you have finished the washing-up, because tomorrow we will be dining with very important people and I will feel ashamed if people were to say, “Look at that overgrown street urchin, you can see that he has no manners at all.” They will say he might know how to use a knife and fork, but he certainly does not know how to use mmm a fish slice; and they will say to themselves, “I suspect that he slurps when he drinks his soup” – which you, Dodger, if I may say so, do a lot. If people like Mister Disraeli are going to be there, then you must be a gentleman and mmm, it would appear that I have less than one day to turn you into one. Money alone doesn’t do the trick.’
Dodger winced at this, but Solomon plunged on loudly with Old Testament firmness and waggled the finger of rectitude as if at any moment he would throw down the Ten Commandments. Given that the timbers of the property were already creaking and groaning with the weight of multiple families in that one building, this would mean that the building would surely collapse.
Sticking out his beard like an advance guard, Solomon mumbled on, ‘This is a matter of pride, Dodger, which I have and you must acquire. First thing in the morning we will go and visit Mister Coutts, and then see if it is possible to find in London a man who would do the very best haircut and shave for the customer without killing him with a razor. I know just the one.’
Before Dodger could say a word the finger was raised again, seas parted, thunder rolled and the sky darkened, making birds fly frantically for safety. Or at least, that is what happened in the privacy of the attic, and indeed in the mind of Dodger.
Solomon said fiercely, ‘Do not argue with me. This isn’t the sewers. When it comes to finance, and banking, and smartening yourself up, I am a master. With the scars to prove it. I must tell you that just for once in your life I am insisting! This is not the time to argue with your old friend. After all, I wouldn’t tell you how to work the sewers.’
His finger stopped stabbing and joined its family on the hand, and the tide turned back, the dark sky became the peaceful if somewhat dirty glow of evening and the terrible finger of thunder and lightning faded out of Dodger’s imagination as Solomon became rather smaller and said, ‘Now, please take Onan down to do his business and we can shut up shop for the night.’
There was still some light in the sky when Dodger got the dog downstairs. As is the protocol of these things, he let Onan off his leash then looked around as if he had no idea what the dog was ac
tually doing. There were a few lights to be seen, though not too many, candles being the price they were. Just the galaxies of London, the occasional star, or a candle in a window, wasting a part of its tallow on the ungrateful streets. When you saw a candle in a window at this time of night, it meant that some poor wretch had died, or some other poor wretch had been born. Lights were for when the midwife had to be called in, and lights were for a death. If, of course, it was the more heated kind of death – the kind that might make the peelers take an interest – that would be a job for the coroner and would bring forth a second candle.
With that in mind, Dodger called Onan to stop worrying whatever he was worrying and a tiny bell rang in his mind as he realized that in the darkness someone had crept so silently towards him that they now had a knife at his throat.
A voice said very quietly, ‘There is something of considerable importance that you know the whereabouts of, Mister Dodger, and I’m hearing that some people are scared of you on account of everybody knowing, so they say, that you must be quite the lad to have put down Sweeney Todd. But me? I say no, that can’t be true, can it, considering that all a cove needs to do is wait right here and threaten you when you comes out to take the air of a night, waiting for your stinking mutt to make the cobbles even more treacherous for law-abiding folks, such as what I am. Don’t blame yourself, Mister Dodger; routines have been the undoing of many poor buggers, and I heard tell you was clever. Well, there’s none here but you, me and the mutt, and he won’t last long when you’ve told me what I want and I’m done with you. You’ll be just one very short scream in the rookeries, eh. And my employer, Mister Sharp Bob, will be all the happier. That is, Mister Dodger, if you can tell me of the whereabouts of that girl with golden hair; and if you don’t I’ll gut yer anyway.’
Not one muscle had moved anywhere on the body of Dodger, if you didn’t count the sphincter. But as the name Sharp Bob rocketed through his brain, he said, ‘I don’t know you. Thought I knew everyone in all the boroughs. Would you mind telling me who you are, mister? After all, it’s not as though I’ll be able to pass on the information, right?’
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