Suzanne Robinson Read Online Free Page A

and her son Newton, Lord Freshwell, had done to recover their relative after that Prim couldn’t guess.
    Whatever it was, it would have been discreet. Lady Freshwell had a horror of scandal, especially now that Newton was being considered for a place in the queen’s household. To become a member of such an exalted community was the lodestar of Newton’s existence. It was the primary reason he and his mother entertained so much—currying favor took a great deal of effort. And it was expensive. Prim wished him success, for Newton was an irritating, pompous little whiner whose presence she wouldn’t miss if he were to spend months at court.
    Prim brought her mending closer to see it more clearly. Then she realized the light was fading. Setting the garment aside, she said, “It’s time I was off if we’re to have fish pie for our supper.”
    She went to the corner of the room near the window. There, a patched curtain had been suspended from an old rope to form a partition. Behind it slept Betty Kettle in the only bed the family possessed. Betty wasn’t much older than Prim, but the births of so many children, combined with backbreaking labor as a charwoman, had taken her health.
    Having ascertained that Betty’s childbirth fever hadn’t returned, Prim donned her cloak. Before she picked up her basket, she assured herself that her treasure was still safe in its secret pocket in the lining of the cloak. She felt for the shape of the book. It wasn’t much bigger than her hand, but it was worth more than the sum of all her other possessions, at least, toPrim. Satisfied that the book was safe, she set out for Billingsgate fish market.
    She could have purchased fish pies from a vendor in Whitechapel, but the street hawkers were known to use inferior, sometimes spoiled ingredients. It was safer to go to the huge dock market where a friend of Betty’s gave the family an excellent price. As darkness fell, she joined the teeming crowds that moved ceaselessly along London’s streets. The city had spewed the human contents of workhouses, banks, parks, squares, taverns, and shops. The din of countless horses, wagons, carts, omnibuses, and trains rose up to meet her along with the noise of street vendors and urchins.
    When she reached Billingsgate, the crowds thinned a bit, but the smell of mountains of fish pervaded everything. She could hear the cries of the sellers: “Five brill and one turbot. Have the lot for a pound! Look here, look here! Here’s your fine Yarmouth bloaters! Who’s the buyer? Who’s the buyer?”
    A vast shed rose up before her, and as she entered it, she beheld long tables piled with shining carcasses: pale-bellied turbot on strings, lobsters, baskets full of herring with glittering scales. She was jostled by men bearing heavy hampers and women with cod strung from their aprons.
    Prim looked for Betty’s friend, who sold cod and wore a green apron. She threaded her way among the stalls, baskets, and hampers, nearly running into a man with ginger hair who suddenly appeared in her path. He dodged aside quickly, and Prim glimpsed a green apron beyond a table crawling with lobsters. She was rounding the table when a thin, cold hand clampedon her wrist and spun her around. The ginger-haired man stood there grinning at her.
    “Hallo, missy, now you just come with old Badger.”
    Prim froze and stared at Badger, whose pale complexion resembled the belly of a turbot. He tugged at her wrist. Prim dropped her basket.
    “Release me, sir.” Surreptitiously she stretched out her free hand while glaring at Badger.
    “Not a chance, missy. You’re worth too much. Now come along.”
    To her horror, Badger looked over his shoulder and raised his voice over the cries of the market. “Got her, Nightshade, neat as a new candle.”
    A man emerged from a crowd at a nearby stall, his clean black suit a contrast to the rough wool-and-leather-clad fish hawkers. Prim’s eyes grew rounder than the fish staring up at her as