by Livi Michael
‘Where are the others?’ I say.
Queenie says nothing, but Pigeon says, ‘They've gone to join Bailey.’
After I left them in the tunnels there was a big row. Some of them wanted to go straight to Bailey but Queenie wasn't having it, and the rest of them said that'd be just swapping one bad codger for another and, anyroad, Bailey might just hand them over to Weeks. So the ones who wanted to go left and the rest found this cellar, where they slept last night on the wooden boxes piled round the walls.
‘We don't want a codger no more,’ Half-moon says. ‘Everything we take's ours.’
Sounds good to me. ‘So are we all here then?’ I say.
‘Eight,’ says Queenie.
‘Nine now,’ I say, pointing to my chest, and Queenie shoots me a look. ‘I'm with you,’ I say. ‘I want to join.’
‘I've told you before,’ says Queenie. ‘We don't want you.’ But the others chip in.
‘Let him!’
‘He rescued Bonnet, didn't he?’
‘He saved us from Weeks.’
‘We need more numbers.’
Even in the dark I can feel Queenie looking at me. There's a long pause then she says, ‘Anyone who joins the Little Angels has to do a special task for the gang.’
‘I just did,’ I say, and the others agree.
‘They have to have our mark cut into them.’ She flashes her arm in front of me but it's too dark to see.
I lick my lips but my tongue's dry from all the running. ‘Suits me,’ I say.
‘And they have to be loyal forever to the gang – to share their takings and help their brothers and sisters of the gang and to fight all other gangs and anyone else who harms us, in the name of the Little Angels.’
‘Suits me,’ I say again, and it's like an oath.
Digger gets his knife out. I can hear rats squeaking up above.
‘You'll need a name,’ says Queenie, and I'm about to say I've got one, when the rest of them join in, making suggestions.
‘Slingshot.’
‘Pig-boy.’
‘Dodger.’
‘Dodger,’ I say firmly. I'm not being called Pig-boy.
Digger takes my wrist and leads me towards the weak light from the tiny window. I don't see what he's carving because I shut my eyes until he's finished, but it takes forever. My eyes sting and my knees start to tremble, but I'm not crying because I never do. I'm still made up at my own cleverness and success, so I can stand the pain. When he stops he cuts his own arm and joins his blood to mine and holds my arm up.
‘The new Angel, Dodger!’ he says.
And they all cry, ‘Dodger!’
‘You're one of us now,’ Pigeon says.
I hold my arm up to the light and I can just make out, through the blood, the shape of angels' wings. I stare round at them all and manage a grin. I'm up to my toes in water in a leaking cellar where the rats run, but for the first time ever it feels like home. The start of my new life.
‘Right,’ I say. ‘What'll we eat?’
4
Gang
First day with the gang I have to learn my way around the streets of Manchester. And there's a lot of them. We all go together, running through a maze of alleys and courts. They show me around; I teach them to use the sling.
We hide round a corner of Market Street and I send a volley of stones over towards a meat-pie stall. Pie man comes running and Pigeon and Ors'n'cart nick enough pies for us all. Then we climb on to a shed roof up Back Piccadilly and sit eating them, and a police officer comes chasing a thief. We crouch down low and I fire stones at him so that he runs this way and that. Then back to the fish market near the burial ground and Digger uses the sling while Half-moon snatches a bag of oysters.
Course, they all want one of their own then, and we tear strips off our clothing to make them, and go and practise on Mad Pat, who stamps and shakes his fist at the spire.
‘Angels from hell!’ he shrieks, finally cowering behind one of the gravestones.
All day we work the crowds and alleys till we make our way back to the cellar, to count our booty.
We've got apples from the apple market, boots from a shoemaker's stall, a woman's purse nicked by Queenie and, best of all, a flagon of gin. We uncork this and pass it round, drinking a toast.
‘Here's to staying away from Bailey!’ Queenie says.
‘Here's to me!’ I say, wiping my lips, for after all, I've shown them all a new weapon.
Queenie pulls it off me. ‘We drink to the gang,’ she says. And she hands the boots to Pickings, who's barefoot, though I could do with a new pair.
Who died and made you queen, Queenie? I'm thinking, but Digger takes it next.
‘To freedom,’ he says, and we all drink to that. Then we act out some of the things we've seen, the policeman running round in circles, and Mad Pat shaking his fist at the spire. Finally we lie down on the wooden crates.
It's hard to sleep with all the noise of the town. Hard enough to sleep on wooden crates standing in a pool of water anyway, but there are drunks singing, a fight breaking out somewhere, a fire bell ringing and further along the river a babby crying on and on, and through it all the noise of the river slapping and sucking at its banks.
There's an hour or two when even the town sleeps and the streets are empty except for the last drunk staggering home and roaring out his drinking song. Tramps curl their chilly limbs in doorways. Even in April the snowflakes fall and melt as soon as they touch the mud. A thick yellowish mist hides the stars and the few streetlamps left lit look like the eyes of a sick man. In the crowded cellars people sleep piled on to one another; their breathing hoarse and bubbling like thick water.
Then, though the light doesn't change, as if there's been some signal, the bustling of the streets begins. Market carts and wagons roll slowly along. The knocker-up comes banging on doors, and the first factory bells ring. Women wrapped in shawls and men with heavy clogs trudge towards the factories; women carrying baskets on their heads parade to market. The apple market and the fish market are thronged with wagons and the pavement strewn with vegetables. Sheep and pigs are driven through the streets to Smithydoor market. There are boys fighting, pie men calling out their wares and donkeys braying. Maids with milk jugs open the doors as the milk cart passes. Soon there's all the noise of bakers' shops and pawnbrokers and booksellers opening, and men carrying briefcases make their way to the exchange. Beadles and aldermen ride by in rich carriages, small office boys in big hats run along in pairs. The baked-potato man sets up his tin stove and the kidney-pie man his stall. All day long the streets get greasy and the muffin boy rings his bell.
There's a hundred factories in Manchester, rearing above the other buildings like giant beasts, roaring, belching and grinding their many teeth, hungry for cotton. Bales of cotton arrive on the river for spinning and dyeing, and in hundreds of back street workshops seamstresses sew the cotton into shirts and sheets and aprons and tablecloths, workmen's trousers and a thousand other things. Everywhere there's the whirring and buzzing of machines turning raw cotton into something else. A black smoke covers the whole town and through it the sun is a pale smudge. And the noise! The crunch and grind of machinery, the ringing of factory bells, the pumping of pistons, the whistle of steam, the noise of houses and shops being torn down and streets widened, the cries of street sellers, the thunder of clogs and boots…
This Manchester's a rare fine place
For trade and other suchlike movements
What town can keep up such a race
As ours has done for prime improvements?
But for those few weeks in the spring and summer, the streets were ours. We ran through them like rats, thieving, begging and always bringing our takings back to the cellar by the river. Picking pockets, of course, which was how Pickings had got his name, him being the best. And scavenging down the sewers. It were amazing what you picked up there – rings and bracelets, coins.
I had my pick of the office boys. There we
re one who always ran behind the others, and never had a mate. I'd see him every morning running up Shude Hill, hanging on to his hat, which were nearly as big as the rest of him. He couldn't go too fast, on account of the hat and him being too pudgy. So I'd catch up with him, going barely faster than a walk…
‘How're you doing,’ I say, very polite. ‘Where are you going in such a rush?’
He carries on huffing and puffing, looking neither to the right nor left.
‘Let me help you with them parcels,’ I say, taking them off him easily enough.
‘Give them back!’
‘Only trying to help,’ I tell him, opening one, but there's only books inside, with numbers in, not pictures.
‘I need them!’ And his face gets all red and puckery.
‘Now don't you take on,’ I tell him. ‘You can have your parcel back – but what'll you give me for it?’
‘Nothing!’ says he, so I catch him by the ear and he twists and squawks. Then because he's trying to kick me, quick as wink I turn him upside down and shake until the coins fall out, and a wodge of bread with some ham tucked inside. Then I set him on his feet again, thank him kindly and give him his parcel, taking his hat in return…
Thing is, all the time I knew him, he never learned to go a different way, which were just stupid, if you ask me. Or even start off early. He'd see me coming and go pale and red by turns, but carry on chuffing desperately up the hill. One time, when he had no money, I took his trousers which were better than mine. That's how I got the look I came to be known by – I was the Dodger in the big hat and corduroy breeches.
I wasn't the leader, of course, but with me the Little Angels went further and did more than they'd ever done before. I remembered the upturned carriages I'd seen with the fair and we'd go along London Road and Oxford Street, leaving stones for the wheels to run up against. Then, when the carriages fell I'd run up and offer help and in all the confusion of skirts and crumpled limbs, Pickings and Half-moon'd get away with a fair few silk purses. Or Pigeon'd carry Lookout, the little lad with the lame legs, to beg from a pastry stall, and while they were being driven off Digger'd be round the back nicking pies.
Then there was coshing. Queenie and Bonnet had worked this one before, where a gent, looking as fine and dandy as you'd like, ‘ud follow a young girl into the darker courts and the rest of us'd be waiting there with sticks. Bam, splat! And thanks for the pocket watch, kind sir, and the wallet.
There were other gangs, the Toads of Toad Lane, the Rooks of Deansgate and the Shude Hill Mob. All of them bigger than we were, in size and numbers. And if they caught you, they'd take all your day's earnings off you, and more besides – for they'd send a tracker out following you till you'd earned even more for them. And if you were really unlucky, they'd sling you off Hanging Bridge when they'd finished with you. So, of course, you had to avoid the gangs as best you could.
Except on Sundays. On Sundays the whole of Manchester ground to a halt. The factories lay like big beasts panting in the sun, and only the occasional carriage carrying toffs'd roll slowly along Oxford Street towards the fields. There was nowhere for the poor to go outside of work except the gin shops. So Sundays we made our own entertainment. Soon as the bells rang for the end of church, the gangs'd come out, all fired up with gin, and run riot through the empty streets. It was warfare the Toads charging at the Shambles and the Shude Hill Mob pitching into the Rooks with iron bars and bottles. Up Clock Alley and Cock Gates, Toad Lane and Old Millgate the battle'd rage; men, women and children pouring out of the courts and ginnels to shout them on. Once or twice they'd get carried away and pour up Market Street, smashing all the windows, and only then did the police appear, looking very ginger about it, and if it got too bad they'd ride them down with horses. But mainly the ones who went near made themselves comfortable in a gin shop and watched.
We'd watch too, not joining in. Queenie never let us, though I argued with her about that. There were few enough of us as it was, she said, without losing any more. And she had a point – for when it was all over there were always bodies left unmoving in the rubble. If they carried on long enough, she said, we'd soon be the biggest gang. So we'd climb up steps on to the high railings or low rooftops and cheer for whoever it was we wanted to win that week. Sometimes I really wanted to join in with all the fists flying and broken glass. But we had to watch from a safe distance.
Because we had to hide from so many people – police, Mother Sprike and the gangs – I came up with the idea of us going out in pairs, one of us always looking out for the other. Queenie and Bonnet went around together, Digger and Ors'n'art or Pickings, Pigeon with Lookout, and Half-moon always stuck by me. Seems like he felt there was a special bond, ever since I chased him all the way from Ancoats. At first I looked out for him while I learned the tricks of the trade, but I soon got better and faster than he was, and he was a good lookout, in spite of only having one eye. We got to be the best team, bringing home the most brass. He never stopped asking questions in his funny, rasping voice.
‘Why are we going this way?’
‘What are they fighting about?’
‘Why am I always lookout?’
‘Where'll we go next, Dodger?’
‘Can I have a go?’
It was just like being followed around by Annie, with more noise. Still I got used to him, and it wasn't a good idea to travel alone.
The main people we had to look out for were Weeks and Bailey. And they were always around. You'd catch glimpses of Weeks in the crowds or in a gin shop. Weeks was a short, thick-built man with blue stubble on his chin and a stained overcoat that he never took off. And he was never without his minders – two charmers called Catcher and Carver. Bailey was much bigger, almost a giant, with red hair and tattoos. We saw much less of him because he had so many people working for him he had no need to go out – he just sat in his den off Deansgate. And, of course, there were three or four of Queenie's angels who now worked for him, and knew all about us. And about me and my sling, and the shot that felled Weeks in Angel Meadow. Queenie didn't know if they'd spill on us or not. But Pigeon ran right into one of them one day – a stringy lad called Tippings on account of him being found in Tippings Court. He was running off Market Street into Swan Yard carrying half a brick in his hand. He was brought up short by the sight of Pigeon carrying Lookout and for a moment she thought he'd set up a yell. But then his eyes glazed over and he ran past just as if he'd never seen her, and not a word was exchanged. So Pigeon said we probably could trust them.
‘Trust no one,’ Queenie said, which was Queenie's motto and religion all rolled into one. That and, ‘Ask me no questions and I'll tell you no lies.’
Queenie was a bit older than me, by my reckoning, and a bit taller, but not much. I don't know how she came by her name but I do know she ruled the gang with a rod of iron, and it's hard to say how. Except that you didn't mess with Queenie. If you argued with her over anything she'd look at you with those crescent-moon eyes and say, ‘Because I say so,’ quiet like, and that was the end of it. And she was clever, Queenie, in the sense of picking the right person to scam – sauntering into a shop looking almost respectable and getting a conversation going, and coming out with not only the goods but the money she'd started with and extra, having fooled the shopkeeper into giving her more change. She never lost her cool, which made her seem older than she was, I reckon. Certainly plenty of men followed her down Long Millgate – where we had 'em.
That first week or two I had plenty of run-ins with Queenie – about where we were going that day for instance, and who with. I couldn't see how it was that a girl ruled the gang – my gang, as I came to think of it. Both Digger and Pickings were bigger than she was and most of us had days when we brought home more booty.
It came to a head one night when we were sharing out our spoils and doing our own entertainment – acting out the scrapes we'd got in that day. Pigeon imitated the posh woman she'd begged off and followed down the road, nose held high, tr
ain sweeping down the pavement.
‘Be off with you, you dirty little girl. I'll report you to the police.’
‘Oh, ma'am,’ (simpering), ‘you'd never report a orphan? With a crippled brother? And a father in the asylum? Dribbling and drooling into his bowl?’ And the woman had hurried away so fast she'd fallen over her own skirts.
Then Pickings showed how he'd stood in front of a vegetable barrow, juggling the fruit so that most of it ended up in his own pockets, until the man caught on and chased him all up Withy Grove. Great fun.
Queenie sat watching with half a smile on her face, while the rest of us laughed. She never went so far as a laugh, her eyes only relaxed a bit into a heavy-lidded smile.
I laughed, watching her all the while, then I said, ‘Seems to me we could use a better name.’ No one said anything to this, so I added, ‘The Little Angels – that's a girl's name, innit?’ I looked round for support. Digger and Pickings were smiling, but they hid their smiles from Queenie.
‘It's our name,’ she said.
‘Yes, but we're not in Angel Meadow no more.’
‘He's right, Queenie,’ said Half-moon, but stopped under Queenie's glare.
A rat ran over the beams of wood above. ‘We could call usselves the River Rats,’ I said, glancing up. ‘Like the Toads, or the Rooks.’
‘I'm not changing the name,’ she said.
‘Well – you can keep it,’ I told her. ‘The rest of us could be known as the River Rats.’
She said nothing to this and everything went quiet, so I laughed to ease the strain. Then that night, after I'd fallen asleep dreaming about my gang, the River Rats, I woke up choking…
Queenie has me by the throat – two fingers under the jaw – and I can hardly move or breathe. I lie there spluttering and she says, ‘Who runs this gang?’ very low. I splutter something and she jerks my head back sharp. ‘Who?’ she hisses.
‘You do,’ I manage to gurgle.
‘Can't hear you.’
‘And I – can't – breathe,’ I choke out, kicking feebly. Her grip on my throat tightens and orange stars swim in front of me.
