Lucy Ashford - The Major and the Pickpocket

Hal frowned. ‘The ungrateful rogue! Well, of course I’ll lend you something, Marcus. Who knows? Tonight at the Angel your luck might change for the better!’

‘I certainly hope so,’ replied Marcus with feeling. But his bleak eyes did not echo that smile. And Hal, who had been intending to ask Marcus if he had seen Philippa yet, decided that perhaps now was not the best time to broach that rather tricky subject.

The street trickster whom Marcus was cursing so roundly was meanwhile twisting and turning knowingly through the assortment of narrow alleyways behind Maiden Lane before finally sidling into the shadows of an empty doorway and listening hard.

Nothing. No pursuers. No Charleys. With a sigh of relief the young thief sauntered off northwards whistling The Bold Ploughboy’, cap pulled down low over forehead, hands thrust deep into shabby greatcoat; because, although it had stopped raining, the February night was still damp and cold. One hand encountered a leather wallet, and those bright green eyes were troubled, just for a moment, at the memory of its owner; then the youngster strolled onwards. Doubtless the dark-haired swell was rich enough not to miss it over-much.

Carefully avoiding the clusters of hard-drinking men who gathered around Bob Derry’s Cider Cellar, the pickpocket, now munching on an apple filched earlier from a fruit stall, chose a secret way through the warren of courtyards that lay behind Drury Lane; then at last came to a halt, gazing up to where a flickering lantern illuminated a faded inn sign. This was the Blue Bell tavern: a pretty name for a low-life inn run by a steel-tongued landlady called Moll. Frowning briefly at the thought of Moll, the youth straightened his shabby coat and marched through the crowded, smoky taproom to push open a small side door into a private parlour, occupied only by a group of men clustered intently round a card game. The sudden draught from the door made the tallow candles flicker. Three of the players leapt to their feet, their hands clutching their cards. Then the fourth one, a gangly young fellow with rather startling tufts of red hair, grinned broadly. ‘No cause for alarm, lads! It’s just our Tassie, bin up to her usual tricks, no doubt.’

The men sat down again. Tassie closed the door with a deft kick, pulled off her cap and threw it defiantly on the table as her long golden hair tumbled around her shoulders. ‘What do you mean, ‘tis only me?’ she challenged. ‘Haven’t you missed me, all of you?’ No reply. Sighing a little, she let her keen eyes rove over the well-worn cards splayed out on the table. ‘Fie, Georgie Jay, if ‘tis whist you’re playing, then I hope you remembered to keep the guard on your pictures, as I told you last night!’

Then the girl sat among the men, quite at ease, as the sturdily built, black-haired man in his thirties whom she’d addressed as Georgie Jay, looked frowning at his cards. ‘God’s blood, but you’re right, Tassie,’ he said.

‘Course she’s right,’ said the red-haired lad, still gazing admiringly at the newcomer. ‘There’s no one to beat our Tassie at cards.’

‘Or dice,’ grinned Georgie Jay. He patted the girl’s shoulder and turned back to the game.

The girl let her fair brow pucker a little. ‘Weren’t you—worried about me, Georgie?’

‘Why, lass? Should we have been?’

She shrugged. ‘Not really. I helped the cups-and-sixpence man up on the Strand.’

‘Old Peg-leg? Did you make much?’

‘Didn’t get the chance. We were chased off by the Charleys.’

‘Good job you can run fast, then.’

‘Indeed.’ Tassie stretched out her legs in their over-large boots and leaned back in her chair, her hands in her pockets, secretly a little upset that they weren’t more troubled by her encounter with the Watch. She decided to say nothing about the dark-haired man and his wallet, though at one time she’d have told Georgie Jay everything, for he was the undisputed leader of this motley crew of travellers, and had been like a father to her ever since he’d found her eight years ago, alone on a country lane. ‘We work when we can,’ he’d told her, ‘and when we can’t—for times are hard for poor folks like us—why, then, we take a little from those who have enough and to spare!’ Yes, Georgie Jay had been her saviour and protector, and she would always be grateful to him. But things had changed. Oh, how they had changed.

Moll, the buxom landlady, had just come into the room to see what was going on, Then she spotted Tassie, and scowled. ‘Our Tassie’s had a run-in with the Watch, Moll!’ Georgie Jay told her.

‘Lord’s sake,’ said Moll, ‘what a fuss you all do make of that girl. ‘Tain’t natural, a grown lass like her trailing round with you all.’

Tassie met Moll’s glare with stony dislike, and began to get to her feet, but Georgie reached out to forestall her. ‘Tassie’s one of us, Moll. Bring the girl some food, will you? You know she’ll be ready for her supper.’

Tassie was; but she fought down the hunger pangs gnawing at her ribs. ‘My thanks, but I’m not hungry.’ Most certainly not for anything Moll dished out.

She picked up her cap, ready to leave; but just at that moment Georgie Jay exclaimed, ‘Tassie! Now, what in the name of wonder is that?’ He was pointing at the ugly bruising on her wrist, where the Watch man had grabbed her.

‘It’s nothing. Nothing at all.’ She stepped quickly back, shaking down her sleeve.

‘So you were in danger! Look, Tass, perhaps it really is time you stopped all your trickery out on the streets…’

‘Oh, fiddlesticks, Georgie,’ she said airily, ‘you all have close shaves with the Watch every now and then, don’t you? Tonight was no different!’

But Georgie Jay was sighing as he gazed at Tassie’s defiant face beneath her tumbling curls that glowed a fierce gold in the flickering candlelight. ‘You’re a lass, Tassie,’ he said regretfully. ‘It’s as simple as that. Things just can’t go on the same. Why, you’re nigh as tall as young Lem! How old are you now—fifteen, sixteen?’

Tassie shrugged her shoulders, guessing now was not the best of times to tell him she was seventeen. ‘How should I know how old I am? Do you really think anyone used to celebrate my birthday?’ No, indeed. Painful memories flashed through her mind. The big old house where she’d spent her early childhood. The long days spent locked in her room, learning her letters or struggling over hateful stitching with frozen fingers. The endless fear of punishment. She’d run because she felt that nothing, anywhere, could be worse.

She realised now that she’d been more than lucky to be found by good-hearted Georgie Jay, who still lived by the honourable code of the travelling folk, and insisted that his followers did the same. He’d stoutly declared that Tassie had a place with them for ever; but even he, it seemed, was now having his doubts. And so, perhaps, was she.

‘All the same,’ he was saying now, ‘we need to have a talk, lass.’

Tassie gazed at him steadily. ‘Are you trying to tell me that you don’t want me with you any more?’

Georgie Jay looked unhappy. ‘We’ve been doin’ a bit of thinkin’ and Moll’s got a grand idea that might suit you just fine!’

Tassie’s eyes flashed warningly as she looked at the older woman. ‘Oh, has she now?’

‘Moll’s got a brother,’ Georgie pressed on. ‘He and his wife, they’ve got a small farm—Kent way, isn’t it, Moll?—and they could do with some help around the place—’

Tassie turned on Moll incredulously. ‘You think that I’d go as a servant to your brother? The one you were going on about the other night, saying he was a miserable skinflint and a tyrant?’

Moll coloured and looked angry. ‘There’s a good opportunity for you there, young madam, and don’t you scoff at it!’

‘I’ll scoff at it all right,’ Tassie breathed. ‘You’d better think again, Moll, if you want to find your brother a—a cheap skivvy.’ And, holding her head high, she marched to the door that led to the stairs, and closed it with a resounding bang behind her.

Once in the inner hallway, though, Tassie stopped, fighting to control the emotions that were now shaking her body. Despite her words of bold defiance, there was a huge lump in her throat, and her heart ached sorely. She’d known for some time that things couldn’t go on as they were. But if Georgie Jay and his comrades didn’t want her, she had no one. No one.

She heard them all getting up. One by one the others—Lemuel, Billy, and kind old Matt who played the fiddle at country fairs, who’d all been her friends for years—traipsed out through the other door to the taproom to have their meal, until only Moll and Georgie were left in there. Tassie bit her lip. Moll and Georgie. Usually Georgie Jay and his friends kept pretty much on the move, taking rooms at various inns or lodging houses depending on the work they found. But this winter they’d spent all of the last two months at the Blue Bell—because Georgie Jay had taken to sharing landlady Moll’s room, and Moll’s bed. And now Tassie could tell by the sound of clacking little heels on the flagstones that Moll had moved towards the jar of gin that she kept for herself on a high shelf near the door. Georgie Jay must have followed her; he was saying, in a low voice so that Tassie could only just hear, ‘I did warn you she wouldn’t like the idea, Moll.’

‘Such a fuss about a silly girl,’ Moll snapped back. Tassie heard the rattle of gin jar against beaker; and could just picture Moll drinking it down in one greedy swallow. ‘All right, then. I’ll not interfere! But you’ll have to think of somethin’ for her, Georgie Jay. Sakes alive, you must have seen the way men are starting to look at her! Lemuel worships the ground she walks on, and that big simpleton Billy watches her all the time. She’s becomin’ a real pretty piece, and there’ll be trouble soon if you don’t look out…’

Tassie could stand to hear no more. Horrified to find that her eyes were smarting with tears, she almost ran up the rickety staircase to her tiny attic room, where she was greeted by the loud squawking of a brightly coloured parrot gazing at her from its perch by the window. Georgie Jay had bought Edward for her seven years ago in Dorchester market, and now she angrily dashed away her tears with the back of her hand and stroked the bird’s beautifully-crested head, whispering, ‘How can Georgie Jay be so taken in by that—that strumpet, Edward? Moll’s fat, and she paints her face, and she pickles herself in gin!’

Edward cocked his beady eye at her. ‘Who’s a pretty girl, then?’ Tassie almost smiled. But she couldn’t ignore the fact that what Moll had said was right. Tassie couldn’t go on pretending to be what she was not for much longer. ‘If only I were a boy!’ she went on in anguish, jumping up to pace the little room while at the same time trying to resist the temptation to chew her fingernails, something she always did when she was distressed. Edward just put his head on one side, his bright eyes blinking, and crunched steadily on the remains of a crust. Tassie drew a deep breath, then flung her big coat on the bed.

Soon after she had joined Georgie Jay’s band, she’d taken to dressing like a lad because it was easier, and when her breasts had started to swell she’d worn loose shirts buttoned to the neck and hoped no one would notice. When her monthly courses began, a kindly serving girl at the farm where they were working came to her rescue and gave her some strips of linen to use, and into the bargain gave her an earthy lecture on how men were fiery creatures, and likely to be aroused beyond reason by the presence of a young, pretty maid. So Tassie tied up her bright golden hair with a piece of twine and pushed it under a cap; as she grew she continued to dress in loose breeches and boots and a rough cambric jacket several sizes too big for her that concealed her swelling curves; and season after season she tramped the dusty roads in the cheery company of Georgie Jay and his band, never complaining of weariness, always hoping that things would remain the same, because in truth she had no other life to turn to.