Sweep

by Jonathan Auxier

  “Almost there,” the voice echoed. “Keep going!”

  Charlie turned another corner and found himself at the edge of the river. Boats floated back and forth across the dark surface. He didn’t know how they stayed on top of the water. “Toby lives by here,” Charlie said. “Do you know Toby?”

  The boy ran to the end of a narrow wooden dock that stuck out over the water. “They’re in there.” He pointed at a small boat that was tied to a pole with a thick rope. “Quickly!”

  Charlie walked on the platform, which groaned under his weight. He reached the boat and hesitated. “I don’t see any children on that boat.”

  “They’re trapped in that little room.” The boy pointed to a green door. “Just go!” He gave Charlie a small push and Charlie stepped down onto the boat. The boat leaned to one side, and dark water sloshed around the edges.

  Charlie steadied himself and told himself to be brave. He walked to the green door and pulled it open. The room inside was empty. “There are no children here,” he said. “Maybe this is the wrong boat?”

  “Nan was right,” the boy said from the dock. He was doing something with the rope. “You really are like a little child.”

  The boy tossed the end of the rope into the water. It landed with a splash. “Wait!” Charlie called, running toward him. But it was too late—the boat had drifted away from the platform. “I have to be at the march!”

  The boy tipped his cap. “I’ll give Cinderella your regards.”

  NAN’S SONG

  Nan felt as though she might suffocate. She was in the middle of the parade—packed so tight she could scarcely move. She craned her neck, trying in vain to see Charlie. But there were just too many people, too many brooms blocking her view.

  Toby was next to her; his emporium clanked against her shoulder as they walked. The street had been strewn with fresh flower petals, but by the time Nan and Toby reached them, they were a mashed sludge that made the stone slippery—even more so with boots. She cursed herself for not going barefoot like everyone else.

  Toby had been the one who pulled Nan away from Pye Corner. She had wanted to keep looking for Charlie, but he reminded her that the only way to keep hidden from Crudd was to stay in the crowd. She strained to see to the front of the parade, which was turning on to King William Street. Shilling-Tom and Whittles were up there somewhere, carrying Newt’s coffin. On either side of the march were men and women and children who had gathered on the sidewalks to cheer the climbers as they approached Eastcheap. But as the procession passed, the onlookers’ faces all turned to confusion. These people had come out expecting celebration and gaiety. And instead they found a sea of filthy, silent children dressed in black rags. Nan could only imagine how they would react to the signs.

  A few people threw coins or coal pies at their feet. Usually the climbers would scramble to pick up whatever they could and offer blessings of luck. But not today. Nan turned the corner and saw the Matchstick looming over the scene. It was a stone column, two hundred feet tall. At the top was a viewing platform packed with men and women, clapping and waving banners. Above them shone a giant golden finial in the shape of a flame.

  The square around the monument was packed with thousands of London’s wealthiest citizens, all wearing bright clothes and parasols and colorful hats, all cheering for the sweeps. Nan scanned the crowd with her eyes. She caught sight of a few master sweeps, who were watching the march with looks of puzzlement. Crudd was out there somewhere—she could feel it.

  She wished she had Charlie.

  Toby nudged her shoulder and nodded toward the corner of Monument Street. A section of the sidewalk had been cordoned off with rope, and wooden stands had been erected for the very wealthiest attendees. Miss Bloom was sitting there, along with a dozen other women. There was a very old gentleman with them, withered and frail. Nan thought it might be Lord Shaftesbury.

  The cheers from the crowd had already begun to die down, replaced by an uncomfortable silence. Those in front had seen the coffin, but they still didn’t seem to understand what it signified. What were these children doing? Why weren’t they celebrating?

  Whittles’s raspy voice broke the silence. “BROOMS DOWN!”

  A hundred of the climbers dropped their brooms, which clattered against the stones. They reached into their coats and removed their signs. They children held them high, facing the crowd that encircled them, forcing them to read the words. Each sign was different. Each sign was true.

  Georgie Hicks

  6 years old

  Chimney Fire

  Eliza “Twigs” Brown

  10 years old

  Fall from Roof

  Philip “Preacher” Wendell

  4 years old

  Consumption

  These were the climbers who had lost their lives on the job. The crowd stared at the names—and at the little wooden box at the front of the procession.

  And then: realization.

  A few understood straightaway. Nan saw a young man place his hands over his mouth in horror. But most reacted differently. They were angry. And not for the right reason.

  She felt a swelling dread in her chest as people began to boo and jeer. “May Day, my eye!” a woman hollered. “I didn’t spend half my week baking pies for this!” More shouts rippled through the crowd. A few people threw coal pies and other food. Nan ducked as people hurled pennies from the top of the Matchstick—they came down on the climbers’ heads like hailstones.

  “It’s not working,” Toby said. “They still don’t care.”

  Nan stared out across the square. Thousands of angry voices filled the air. “So we make them care,” she said.

  Toby looked at her. “What are you talking about?”

  “We have to find a way to make them understand what it’s really like.” Nan drew a breath. She took off her hat and set it on the ground. She stepped on it with one foot, then the other. Toby was right—it was sturdy.

  He caught her arm. “Crudd will see you.”

  “So will they.” Nan’s head rose above the sea of climbers. It was just like singing for work in the market. She could even use the same melody. But she needed new words. What could she possibly say to make them understand?

  At once the words came to her.

  She took a trembling breath, closed her eyes, and sang—

  A little black thing among the snow;

  Crying weep! weep! in notes of woe!

  Where are thy father and mother? Say!—

  They are both gone up to the church to pray.

  As Nan sang, she felt the whole world melt away. One by one, the shouting crowd fell silent—they were listening to her song. She did not have the char to hold, and so she held Toby’s hand.

  And because I am happy, and dance and sing,

  They think they have done me no injury,

  And are gone to praise God and his Priest and King,

  Who make up a heaven of our misery.

  She finished the final lines and opened her eyes. The entire square had gone completely silent. The other climbers were staring at her. Nan looked among their faces—young and old, rich and poor. Many of them had tears in their eyes. All of them, staring at her.

  “It worked,” Toby whispered. “They heard.”

  “Oi!” a man’s voice snarled from the alley. Every head in the square turned to see the sweep named Martin Grimes marching straight toward the climbers. His face was red and full of fury. “What do you ungrateful rats think yer doin’?” He sounded drunk.

  Climbers screamed as the man shoved his way through the crowd. He grabbed Lucky John by the arm and threw the boy to the street. “You dare speak ill about our Sable Fraternity?”

  “P-p-please, sir!” John cried, covering his face.

  “I climbed just like the rest of you, twelve years I did it, and it didn’t kill me none!” The man snatched John’s brush from the ground. “You wanna moan about the work? I’ll give you somethin’ to moan about!”

  T
he crowd gasped as the man brought the brush down on the boy with a thwap.

  There was another rough shout as a different master sweep pushed his way into the crowd, Bill Burke. He snatched a boy’s sign and ripped it to pieces. More sweeps converged on the crowd and assaulted their climbers. This was something usually done behind closed doors, but not today.

  Screams rose from the square as people tried to defend the children. The sweeps—drunk and enraged—attacked anyone who touched them. Whistles rang out, and policemen ran in to break up the brawling. A thousand shouting voices echoed across the square.

  Nan was nearly toppled as the climbers scattered and tried to escape their masters. “Charlie!” she shouted above the roar. “Charlie, we need you!” She spun around and searched for him in the crowd.

  Nan took an elbow to the back of the head and fell to her knees. The crowd was pushing against her, trampling her.

  A firm hand grabbed her arm. She looked up, expecting to see Toby, but instead she saw a different face. It was an unshaven man with a scalded brow and broken nose and missing teeth and sunken eyes.

  “Crudd,” she whimpered.

  The man showed a poisonous smile. “Well, well . . . if it isn’t my favorite climber.”

  SMOKE AND WATER

  “Charlie!”

  Nan’s voice rang from the shore.

  Charlie peered through a cloud of black smoke. “Nan?” He had been running from one end of the boat to the other, trying to find a way back to land. The boat had floated into the middle of the water and was bumping into other boats. Men were yelling at him to “clear the way.”

  “Nan!” He rushed to the edge of the boat, which sloshed to one side. “I’m stuck!” Nervous smoke was billowing from Charlie’s shoulders. The hem of his Green Man costume had caught fire, and now the boat was on fire, too. He knew that the boy had tricked him onto the boat. Tricked him into not doing his right job.

  And now he could hear Nan calling him. She needed help, and he could not help her.

  Charlie stared out toward the buildings along the shore. He saw the golden Matchstick rising up above the rooftops. That was the place Nan had told them they were going to.

  Charlie looked down at the river. It was so dark. It looked very deep. He wondered what would happen to him if he went into the water.

  There was a crashing sound as his boat struck the side of a bigger boat. The men on the bigger boat all shouted things at him, but Charlie couldn’t understand them. Crackling flames had spread all around him, and he couldn’t hear above the roar. He thought his boat might be sinking.

  “Do you know Nan?” he called. “I need to help Nan!”

  He fell back as his boat struck something hard and tipped to one side. There was a snapping sound as one end of his boat broke away and slipped into the black water. He had crashed into a big stone column that was part of a bridge called “London.” Charlie knew about this bridge because he and Nan sang a song about it sometimes.

  Charlie did not hesitate. He jumped from his burning boat and landed on the base of the bridge. The stones were solid and familiar. Charlie was not as fast of a climber as Nan, but he could climb. He pulled himself up the side of the bridge until he was standing on top. His Green Man clothes dangled, smoldering from his shoulders. He could tell people on the bridge were staring at him.

  He thought he heard someone whisper the word “monster.”

  Charlie didn’t care. “Nan!” he shouted, running toward the Matchstick. “I’m coming!”

  LAST CLIMB

  Nan had barely gotten a scream out before Crudd pulled her up by the arm and covered her mouth. He held her close to his face. “Lovely day for a celebration.” He bared his teeth—or what remained of them. “I almost couldn’t find you—until you blessed us all with that song.”

  “You let her go!” a voice cried behind them. Nan craned her neck to see Toby coming toward them—

  Whap! Crudd struck Toby in the face with his fist. The boy fell backward and collapsed to the ground, unconscious.

  “Toby!” Nan tried to twist herself free. “Charlie!”

  Crudd held her fast. “Seems you haven’t any heroes to protect you.” He made a sound of mock concern. “I do wonder where your pet monster could have got to. He gets confused so easily.”

  Nan heard these words and realized what they meant. They were the things she had told Roger in Lambeth. Crudd must have found some way to lure Charlie away. She remembered seeing Charlie back at Pye Corner, talking to a boy she didn’t recognize—Roger. “If you hurt him, I will kill you.”

  Crudd jerked her face close to his. “I believe I will do the killing today.”

  Nan winced at his foul breath. His skin was still pink from his burns; his nose, bulbous and bent.

  Nan threw her head forward—striking him straight in the nose.

  “Aghhhh!” Crudd let go of her and gave an animal snarl.

  Nan sprang to her feet and ran as fast as she was able. She pushed her way through the other climbers—all contending with their own masters—trying to get to safety.

  “Get back here, you filthy brat!” Crudd was right behind her, throwing children out of his path.

  Nan needed to get away from him. She needed a rooftop. But she was caught in the middle of the mob. The only structure close by was—

  The Matchstick.

  She jumped over a fallen climber, racing toward the base of the monument. On one side of the stone plinth was a narrow archway, cordoned off by a small iron gate. Well-dressed onlookers were crowded around the base, pushed there by the swelling chaos around them.

  “Out of my way!” Nan screamed, shoving past people seated beneath a canopy. She vaulted over the gate and scrambled into the monument. The stairs were cut in a spiral. Nan raced up them two at a time. The soles of her boots were slick with mashed flower petals. She felt a throbbing in her leg and realized she must have gashed herself hopping over the gate.

  She kept running up the spiral steps. Her heart pounded in her chest, and her vision was spotty.

  “There’s no escape, Nan Sparrow!” Crudd’s voice bellowed up from below. “It’s up, down, or in the arms of angels!” His footsteps echoed up the stairwell, slow and methodical.

  Nan didn’t need to escape—she only needed to get to a place where Crudd couldn’t reach her. She gripped the iron railing and ran as fast as she could. Nan had climbed steps before, but never this many—hundreds and hundreds of steps that never seemed to end.

  At last she rounded the landing to see a patch of gold—the flame of the Matchstick. She lunged ahead and burst onto the open platform. After climbing so long inside the windowless tower, she was made dizzy by the vastness of the sky. The wind howled around her, confusing her sense of balance. A few men and women who had been watching from the viewing platform cried out in alarm.

  Nan spun around, gasping for breath. She had hoped to find a door she could bar, but there was none.

  “Nan?” Crudd’s voice rang out from below. “How are you liking the view?”

  She ran a circle around the platform. There had to be someplace to hide, someplace Crudd couldn’t reach her. Years ago, the city had built a cage around the area to keep people from jumping over the edge. Nan looked at the top of the cage and saw a gap in the bars. It was narrow, but not as narrow as a flue.

  She heard another cry from the observers as Crudd burst from the stairwell, breathing heavily. “There you are,” he said. “I was afraid you’d flown off.”

  Nan grabbed hold of the railing and hoisted herself onto the ledge. She climbed up the inside of the cage, hand over hand, faster than she had ever climbed anything in her life. She thought of the charity men and the locked wagon and how she had worked her way to freedom. She reached the gap at the top of the cage and pulled herself through.

  Now she was atop the cage with neither rope nor rig. The wind whipped around her. The golden torch above her was blinding against the sun. Nan squinted at the street below. The
entire square seemed to have gone silent. Thousands of faces were all staring up at the Matchstick, staring up at her.

  “Come down, little bird.” It was Crudd. He was standing directly beneath her. “I promise I won’t hurt you . . . more than I have to.”

  “I’m fine up here!” Nan glanced down toward the street again. She could see figures in blue running toward the base of the monument. “Policemen are coming right now.”

  “Then I’d better get on with it.” Crudd pulled off his coat.

  Nan watched in horror as the man climbed up the bars—quickly, expertly. “You forget—I was a climbing boy myself once.” He grabbed hold of the gap and pried it wider, pushing his head through. “I’ll admit, I thought my last climb was behind me. I remember my master well. Mean Seamus Lint—now, he was a brute. It was such a pity when he slipped from that rooftop and left his business to me.”

  Nan tried to inch higher up the sloped stone, but her foot slipped from its purchase. She grabbed hold of a golden tine around the base of the flame. Her legs swung out over the square. Nan could hear screams from the streets below. “You won’t do it!” she shouted, her voice faint against the wind. “Not with all these people watching.”

  “Do you really believe that?” Crudd pulled himself through the gap and crouched beneath her. “These are the same fine people who watch dozens of boys and girls die inside their very own homes without shedding so much as a tear!” He was shouting now, his voice echoing out across the city.

  Nan struggled to keep hold of the flame, but her grip was slipping. She stared down at the street, two hundred feet below. She was searching for someone, anyone who could help her. Where were the police? Where was Toby? Where was Charlie?

  Crudd seemed to know her mind. “You will find no help from below, Nan Sparrow.” He moved closer, his own steps uncertain on the smooth stone. “These people will watch you die, and they will do what they have always done when a climber is lost—nothing.”