A Very Unusual Pursuit Read Online Free

from the hansom cab that had drawn up in front of Birdie’s house. Some people were even hanging out of windows. But it was the cab that intrigued them, not the woman who climbed out of it. She was nothing special (as the old cane-washer across the street loudly observed). In fact, she didn’t look as if she were at all accustomed to using hired vehicles. There was a flustered air about her, and she wasn’t wearing gloves.
    Birdie judged her to be a servant, or a shopgirl, or perhaps some kind of dressmaker. Her frizzy, reddish hair was spilling out from beneath a battered straw hat tipped low over her forehead. She had wrapped herself in a trailing shawl, and her round, freckled face was damp with sweat.
    ‘I’m looking for Mr Alfred Bunce,’ she said, addressing Birdie in a voice that proved, once and for all, that she wasn’t a lady. ‘Does he live in this house?’
    Birdie was delighted. ‘He does!’ she exclaimed. ‘And I’m ’prenticed to him!’
    ‘Then could you ask if he’d spare a moment? I’ve a message to deliver.’
    One of the men in the street shouted that she would do a lot better with him than with a scraggy old mutton-bone like Alfred Bunce. Some of the other men laughed. Birdie told them to stow it, or she would set a bogle upon ’em, and then they’d be sorry.
    ‘Come and meet Mr Bunce,’ she urged their visitor, who was looking more and more anxious.
    ‘Oh, no.’ The woman shook her head. ‘I’ll not go in.’
    ‘He won’t hurt you,’ Birdie said shrewdly.
    But the woman on the doorstep wasn’t reassured. ‘I’m to take him back in the cab, if he’ll come, or give him Miss Edith’s address if he cannot,’ she replied. ‘I’m not to stay on any account. Miss Edith said so.’
    Birdie frowned. ‘Who’s Miss Edith?’
    ‘The lady as sent me. Miss Edith Eames.’
    ‘Has she a bogle?’ asked Birdie, who could think of no other reason why a lady should want to consult Alfred Bunce. But the question seemed to shock her red-headed companion.
    ‘Oh, no !’ the woman exclaimed, turning white.
    ‘Then—’
    ‘I don’t know what she wants him for. But she’ll make it worth his while.’ Backing away from Birdie, her gaze flicking fearfully up and down the busy street, the woman added, ‘I’ll wait here. You tell him. And if he won’t come now, I’ll give you the address.’
    Birdie shrugged. Though mystified, she was happy to be the bearer of such remarkable and unexpected news. A summons! From a lady! Already she could feel many an awestruck gaze upon her.
    For the hundredth time she secretly congratulated herself on being a bogler’s girl; there was so much excitement and variety in a bogler’s life.
    As she turned to fetch Alfred, she was struck by a sudden thought.
    ‘What’s your name?’ she asked their visitor, who was already retreating towards the safety of the cab.
    ‘I’m Mary Meggs,’ came the breathless response. ‘I ain’t Miss Edith’s maid. I work for her aunt, Mrs Heppinstall. But they live in the same house, and never exchange a harsh word. So I must do as Miss Edith bids me – whatever I might think of it.’

4
    MEETING MISS EAMES
    The hansom cab wasn’t really designed for three passengers. Mary said as much when Alfred told her that his apprentice would be coming along too. But Birdie was so small that she managed to squeeze into the cab without much trouble. And Mary was so desperate to get away that she didn’t have the patience to argue with Alfred.
    Birdie couldn’t believe her luck. She had never been in a cab before – and certainly never as far as Bloomsbury. According to Mary, Miss Edith Eames lived just off Great Russell Street. It was a long journey, all the way from the east to the west of London, and Birdie gloried in every inch of it. Sitting up there, behind a clip-clopping black horse, she felt like the Queen of England.
    She knew that she had Sarah Pickles to thank for her good fortune. Alfred had been in two minds