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crowd.
    This caper brought in a pleasing sum, wigs and hats
fetched good prices, but inevitably the time came when I
could no longer fit into the bread basket. Ma suggested
that I be sold to a chimney sweep. My skinny frame more
than suited the narrow, angled chimneys. By then I was
beginning to understand that when my parents looked at me
with their glassy eyes, they saw not a son and heir but a
convenient source of income to support their gin habit. The
life of a chimney sweep was harsh and short and I was
supremely grateful when Pa decided I could earn more for
them if I learned to pick pockets. Thus, with the minimum
of training (spurred on by his belt), I was sent out on to the
streets on the understanding that I was not to return without
at least six shillings a day for the tavern.
    I had little trouble earning this, and any extra I kept for
myself. I seemed to have a natural bent for such work: myfingers were nimble, my tread light and my expression
innocent. Sometimes I was a little careless and my victim
would feel my fingers in their pocket, but I had only to hold
their gaze for a moment to convince them that it was not I
who had filched their purse or wallet. If I looked at Ma that
way she used to cuff me around the side of the head and
hiss, ‘Don’t look at me with those saucer eyes. It don’t work
on your old ma.’
    But, you know, I think it did and that was precisely why
she got so angry.
    She could cuff me only if she caught me and most days
I avoided her and Pa like the plague. When I had earned
enough, usually by noon, and needed to warm up I went to
Mr Jellico’s. I couldn’t go home even if I wanted to for Ma
and Pa had rented out the room during the day to night
workers on the river.
    It wasn’t such a bad life, not at first, and I didn’t know
any other way. I had heard you were supposed to love your
parents, but I don’t think that is what I felt for them. Some
kind of loyalty perhaps, a blood tie, but not love. But once
their desire for gin consumed them, my life became unbearable.
It didn’t matter how much they had, they wanted
more. Eventually, whatever I brought home wasn’t enough.I suppose that’s when they came up with their fiendish plan.
I should have known they were up to something. They had
started smiling at me.
    I shivered when I recalled the desperate chase of the previous
night. I could still feel Pa’s hand on my shoulder and
Ma’s screeching voice rang in my head. And then there was
Barton Gumbroot’s glinting instrument of torture. I
couldn’t bear to think of it. How strange that I was so far
away from it all now.
    Joe was still snoring so I took the opportunity to examine
the goods in the shop window. The jewellery was bright
and pretty, the hurricane lamp was polished and looked in
working order. The timepieces were wound and ticking.
Without a second thought I put two in my pocket, but
almost immediately a sharp tap on the window made me
jump. Polly was right outside. She waved and I wondered
how long she had been there watching me. I went out to
see her. The snow was packed down where the crowd had
been earlier and she stood carefully on its icy surface.
    ‘It’s quiet today,’ I said.
    ‘Same as usual,’ she replied.
    It was mid-morning and my ears listened out for the
clashing cries of street sellers shouting their wares, thetravelling musicians with their fiddles, the ballad singers,
the clatter of cattle hooves on the cobbles on the way to the
slaughterhouse, the hissing of the knife grinder’s wheel,
the rows and fights that broke out on every street corner.
But this was not the City and Pagus Parvus was almost
silent. I heard a laugh or two and the blacksmith’s hammer
but little else.
    ‘Do you want to come in?’
    ‘Can I see the frog?’ she asked.
    The frog was watching us when we went in. She really
was a marvellous creature, her skin bright and glistening
like a damp rock. There was no sound from the back room
so I carefully lifted the lid and