by J. Thorn
They let me go once they had dragged me through a gap in the huts and hauled me into a half stone, half wooden shed. I looked around at my captors. Two old men and a young woman, maybe in her late twenties, all dressed in layer upon layer of dirty rags and scrap clothing.
I pulled my legs in close, ready to run if I had to.
"Are you trying to get yourself killed, young man?"
It was the woman who spoke. Her voice was soft, warm even, and the look she gave me reminded me more of a cross but amused mother than a stranger.
"No. I’m sorry." I wasn’t sure what I was making excuses for.
"That building," she said, pointing behind me, "is a safe house for contraband, owned by The Breakers." She looked at me like she was expecting me to react in some way, like I should have known what she was talking about.
"I’m sorry. I didn’t know," I replied, lowering my head. At the same time I was looking for the nearest exit.
"No point saying sorry to us," she continued. "It’s not us that will kill you if you’re found in there."
A door opened in the darkness opposite me, spewing in the light from one of the many fires that I had seen out of the window. The old man who had hurried me out of the house stepped inside the shed to join us, nodding to the others.
"All clear," he said. "No one about."
The woman turned back to me.
"You are very lucky, child. Now go," she said, indicating the still open door.
As I got up and headed towards the door, still nervous of the people around me, she called out.
"There is food over the way. Look for the big man with a huge beard over near the arches. Don’t worry, he is friendly enough."
So it was that I stepped out into the main street of The Running Ground for the first time, and to say that place changed my life would be an understatement. Ever since my narrow escape at The Warehouse I had been living day to day, struggling just to find something to eat. But here, amongst some of the strangest and most destitute folks I’d ever met, was a haven of sorts.
There must have been a thousand people living in that slum when I arrived. To this day I don’t know how long it had been there, but I heard one old tramp say once that he had been one of the first, and that had been before the turn of the century, before I was born. Huddled in makeshift huts, some of them even two or three stories high, were people from all over, and every walk of life. Don’t even ask how those things stayed standing.
It didn’t take me long to find the food. I just followed the smell of cooking.
The Chef, as they called him, was an Indian man, and he was one of the tallest men I have ever seen in my life. I think he was seven feet tall at the least, probably taller. I never did learn his real name, only that he had come to England with his parents when he was a child, brought by a family who owned a lot of land in his home country. His parents had died when he was even younger than I was.
He took one look at me and filled a metal bowl full of some hot stew from the barrel that he was cooking it in, tore off a chunk of dry, stale bread from a box next to it and handed it to me, pointing at a bench nearby where some other children were sitting, eating. I didn’t ask what the stew was, didn’t much care. It was hot and it filled me up. The bread was like eating a rock, but I didn’t complain. I was so hungry, and no one bothered me as I sat there, quietly stuffing my face as fast as I could.
When I finished the stew I took the plate back over to The Chef and asked him where I cleaned them. He just smiled, took the bowl, filled it up a second time, and handed it back to me. I must have looked quite comical standing there with my jaw nearly bouncing off the floor, because he just laughed.
"When your done, you wash in the barrel," he said, in between his laughter. He pointed at another barrel that was propped up against the arch wall a few feet away.
There were a lot of strange folk living on The Running Ground, but amongst them were a lot of good people too. Apart from the odd few, most of them stuck together, sharing everything they got their hands on, which was mostly scavenged from bins, run-down houses, or scrap yards.
It turned out that most of the food that kept everybody alive was stolen from all over London, or pulled out of market bins. There were a lot of mouths to feed, and anyone who was good at taking stuff without been seen soon found themselves pretty high up the pecking order.
I fitted in almost immediately. I was small, quiet, and fast. Within a week I was friendly with a lot of the folks who lived in that dingy slum. All I wanted most of the time was a full belly and some place to sleep. The first I could do myself, but somewhere safe to sleep meant I had to get things for other people.
It was easy enough to grab something when the owner of a market stall or a shop wasn't looking, but soon they would start to wondert why you were hanging around, and most of them had been robbed enough times by street rats like me that they just sent you on your way even before you got near. I learned to do things a different way.
There were some busy streets in London, and if you were small you could disappear into the crowd and be barely noticed, so long as you didn't stink too badly. That certainly made a difference. So here is what I would do. Once in amongst the crowd you just start walking along, up and down the street, changing direction every now and then to stay with the flow of folks, and you would keep your hands busy. Into this pocket there, or this bag over here. Most of the time those pockets would be empty, or you would put your hand into a bag and come out with nothing useful, but if you carried on, eventually you would swipe something good. I had watches, purses, lockets, a whole lot of keys, jewellery. The list was endless.
I was an extraordinary pickpocket.
Did I ever get caught? Well of course I did, but if you are fast, like I was, you just kept walking when the shout went up, and you dropped whatever it was that you had just taken. You never, ever, ever kept everything you had taken that day on you. Oh no, because when you got caught you had to be carrying nothing, and of course you had just dropped whatever it was that you took, so when folks started looking around, it usually turned up and whoever was shouting about thieves looked stupid themselves.
I used to stash my finds somewhere nearby, somewhere out of the way and hidden, like a hole between some bricks, in an alleyway, anywhere that wasn't going to be disturbed, that I could go to without being watched.
There were at least a dozen shops hidden away in back streets that would take whatever you stole and hand you a few coins. I knew every time I sold something that It was worth a lot more than what I had just been given, but it didn't matter, those few coins bought me the food from the shops that I might have stolen from at one time.
I never sold my knife.
It was always tucked into its little holder, hanging off my belt under my jacket.
I used to keep hold of some of my "finds" and take them back as gifts to folks I liked on the Running Ground, or I'd hand out a few coins. That bought me a bed in nearly every shack in the place, but mostly I slept at the back of Chef's place.
One very hot day in 1912, about four years after I first started living at the Running Ground, some policemen came by. They were looking for someone, someone who it seemed had been poking around in the buildings that ran along near the street, like the one that I had snuck into to sleep in.
They roughed up a few people, and even gave Chef some grief, but in truth, nobody knew who it had been. One of the old boys said he had seen a bunch of young men, street folk, hanging around the front a week or so before, said they hadn't been back since. He gave the policemen a description of them as best he could, before they beat the crap out of him anyway, and threatened him with the Breaker's Alley. Then they went on their way.
I never did like the police, at least not those ones. I'm sure that lots of policemen were doing their job and were good people, but those ones, they were as bad a bunch of men as could be. Evil I would say.
After they had gone I sat near the old boy they had harassed.
"What did that man mean by the Breaker’s Alley?" I asked.
He turned and frowned at me, like I was intruding somewhere I shouldn’t have been, but then his expression softened.
"It's just what they call it," he said, "though that isn’t the name on the street sign."
"Then why do they call it that if it’s not the name of the street?" I asked.
He just looked at me solemnly and told me that it was where people got broken.
"What do you mean they get broken?" I asked.
"Just trust me son, you don’t want to find yourself in the Breaker’s Alley at the wrong time. Don’t want to find yourself in there at any time really. Some things are best not seen."
"So what’s the street really called?" I asked.
"Hemley, I think," he said, "Hemley Alley."
"Strange name for a street." I said.
"Tis indeed," said the old man, with a half-hearted smile.
I was going to ask more, but I could tell that I was irritating him. The policemen had scared him, scared them all pretty badly, and I thought he just wanted to be left alone to his whiskey.
About two weeks after that I discovered for myself what the Breaker's Alley was. I didn't mean to, and I never ended up there on purpose.
As I said before, I was a great pickpocket, and it hadn't gone unnoticed amongst the Running Ground folks. Unfortunately, it seemed that the same bunch of thugs that had broken into the store houses and stolen from the Breakers had also spotted me going into a pawn shop, just down the street. I would guess that they had been watching me as well, without me noticing them until it was too late.
I was making my way home when they jumped me. I left the same shop one evening, just as it was getting dark, and turned into the alleyway at the back.
There were five of them, none of them as fast as me, but they were strong, and they had me surrounded.
"What you got there lad?" said one of them. He was shorter than the rest, and had a mouth full of missing or rotten teeth. He smiled at me and I could tell there was no friendliness in that smile.
"Nothing," I said, trying to judge the gaps between them, see if I could make a run for it.
"Oh, I don't think you've got nothing," he said, "I think you've got a pocket there full of coins, and I think you're going to hand it to me."
He stepped forward and grabbed me by the shoulder, pushing me against a wall, pinning me. He went through my pockets but couldn't find anything. He stopped smiling at me, and didn't notice as my hand slipped to my belt, my knife out of its holder.
"Where are they son?" he asked, through gritted teeth. "You best hand them over now or I'm going to smash you up."
He reached forward again, grabbing me by both shoulders and pushing hard.
It was only the second time I had used the knife. I'd taken it out a couple of times since that night at The Warehouse, but I'd never actually had to use it on anyone since then. I don't think he even noticed the blade jab up into his arm, not for a few seconds. It was as far as I could reach with my shoulders pinned. Then he started screaming, and blood was pouring out of his arm and going everywhere. He let go of me and stumbled back, just enough for me to dart by him and run for the gap between two of his thugs. The first of them was too distracted by all the blood spurting out of RottenTooth's arm, but the second one made a grab for me. One hand shot out towards me and snatched the back of my jacket. It didn't stop me running. I lashed out at his hand, and then just kept on going, glancing back quickly as he also started screaming.
I'd cut off four of the fingers on his hand.
I ran and ran, as fast as I could, through the alleyways that I thought would lead me to the Running Ground, and they followed me, I could hear them not far behind me, and I could hear the bellowing yells. I was normally good at disappearing into these alleyways, but somehow I just couldn't shake them. They knew this place as well as I did.
Then I turned a corner, and ran headlong into two men blocking the way. They grabbed me and threw me to the floor. I hit the ground hard, stunned, opened my eyes and looked down the alleyway. Behind me I could hear RottenTooth's gang come round the corner and soon there was shouting, but I wasn't paying attention to that. It was nothing to the horror that I saw before me.
There were at least a dozen men in the alleyway, most of them moving past me quickly, joining in the fight that was going on behind me. Just a few feet away, was a body. I didn't recognise her, but I knew by the way she was dressed that she was a street prostitute, now lying dead in a pool of blood that was gradually spreading. Behind her was just one man who was holding onto a girl I recognised.
She was tied up and gagged, but I could still see her eyes. It was the girl from The Warehouse, the one who I had dreamed about for so many nights after.
Next to the man was another prostitute, and she was standing against the wall holding her head. I could see she was bleeding from a cut over her eye.
She was looking around, dazed, but then something happened, I think maybe she got her senses back for a moment, and saw that only one man was between her and escape. She launched herself at him, kicking him and punching him. The girl fell over as the man struggled with both of them, but then he reached to his waist and pulled out a gun.
The noise was so loud that it left my ears ringing, but I knew I didn't have time to wait. I had to react now.
I ran forward, my knife still in my hand. The prostitute hadn't even hit the ground when I rushed forward and stuck the blade straight into the man's throat. I don't think he even saw me coming.
I stumbled as he fell backwards, dropping his gun and hitting the ground, gargling. I hissed at the girl to run. She was gagged and tied by the hands, but her feet were still free, so we took off up that alleyway as fast as we could, only stopping when neither of us could run another yard. We collapsed in the doorway of a boarded-up building. I had no idea where we were, but it was dark and there was no one around.
I helped her take the gag off, and removed the ropes from her hands. We sat there, breathing heavily, both too shocked to say a word.
"I'm Reg," I said, when I finally got my breath back.
"I'm Marie," she said, looking at me through those huge, stunning, frightened eyes.
She was the same age as me except for a couple of days. She told me all about how she had been bought by the owner of a brothel in London's East End. She was still too young to ply that trade, and had not been the most cooperative girl that the owner had bought from The Warehouse. Fortunately the man's wife had taken a shine to her, and set her to work in the kitchen and the wash room. The owner, a man called Norton, had insisted that there were customers that would have paid a lot of money to spend time with Marie, but his wife had insisted and he eventually gave in.
That night she had been heading over to the brothel, taking some clean sheets and clothes over for some of the girls, when the Breakers had caught them.
"They were going to kill us," she said, "and I don't know why."
Marie knew the name of the town just outside of London that she had come from, even gave me a detailed account of how she had been snatched one day. It was a place called Gravesend. I said I had to go back to the Running Ground and tell Chef what had happened, but then I would help her get home.
Chef listened quietly while I told him all about what had happened, everything from how I'd got caught by RottenTooth and then ran into the Breakers by accident.
"You hide up here, and stay quiet," he said, and then went off to have a word around, to find out what was happening.
He came back about an hour later and told me to get my things together fast. It seemed that one of the Breakers had recognised me, and now they were looking for me and Marie.
"You have to go," he said. "The man you stabbed, well, he is dead, and he was their leader, and they are out for blood. They will find you if they come here, and kill you both. They are looking now, and it will not be long before they come here. "
"But the
y'll hurt folks when they come here." I said.
Chef smiled and ruffled my hair.
"You don't worry too much about us. You get yourself away now."
I bit back the tears as I quickly said my goodbyes to folks. Then Chef walked us to the edge of the Running Ground and shook my hand as he said goodbye.
"We will see each other again Reggie boy, we will. I have a good feeling about that," he said, hugging me so hard I could barely breathe.
"I hope so," I replied.
It took us a week to get to Gravesend. Not that it was far, but neither of us knew how to get there and I was too wary to ask anyone we passed for directions, just in case the Breakers were somehow trailing us. The last thing I wanted was to get Marie back home, only to have them turn up.
It was a week that I will always remember fondly. We spent most of our days travelling around the south of London, looking for street signs that might help us. At night we would sometimes find an abandoned building and break in, other times we just slept under a bridge or in a dark corner in some alleyway. Two young kids wrapped up in rags could disappear quite easily in all the litter and junk that was piled up in the alleyways.
It was a beautiful sunny day when we eventually walked into Gravesend and found the street that Marie used to live on. Along the street, right outside the house that she had lived in was the same horse-drawn cart that her father had owned back when she was taken.
We stood holding each other tight for a long while before I eventually pulled away and told her to go. It was nice that she was reluctant to do so, but I could see that her eyes were sparkling with joy as she said goodbye and ran up the street.
"I won't forget you ever, Reggie," she said, before she ran to the house.
"I won't forget you either," I said quietly. I don't think she heard me.
She stopped at the gate and looked back, waved, and ran to the front door. A moment later and I heard cries of joy coming from inside the house. I smiled, turned away, and started walking back towards London.
