Dodger Page 0,104
little friends, he found ledgers and a series of little books. They had a complicated look about them, and manuscripts and scrolls with red wax on them, which always looked expensive. He recognized the crest on some of the documents, he surely did.
As he stood in this busy, important room, he thought, I wish I could do something, so that they would know. And then knew what he would do. I’ll let them know who it had been, he told himself, because, well, I could have brought the place down in flames. After all, all those oil lamps around? All those curtains? All those stairs and all those people sleeping up there? He was so angry but, in the warm darkness of the room, what he was not – whatever else he had been – was a murderer. I shall make them pay in my own way, he decided, and at that moment all of them were saved from a fiery death, if they only had known it, and were only living because Dodger, silent in this sleeping world, allowed them to.
Put like that, it made him feel a little better. Padding away silently, he thought, I’ve always said I wasn’t a hero, and I ain’t, but if I’ve ever been a hero, then as sure as Sunday I’m a hero now, because I’ve stopped an embassy full of people being burned alive.
And so at last, not long before the first crack of dawn, he was down and outside and into the mews by the side of the embassy. He knew there would be ostlers and grooms hanging about here any minute soon but nevertheless, moving even more stealthily, he found the coach house, and yes, there was a coach there with a foreign crest painted on the side. Dodger carefully knelt down beside it and felt around near the wheels. Close to one wheel it seemed that a length of metal had been thrown up on one occasion and got stuck, scraping on the rim of the wheel. Dodger tried to pull it free, but without any success until a very useful little crowbar caused it to spring out, and Dodger caught it in the air whereupon he straightened up, went to the coat of arms on the coach and scratched, as deeply as he could inscribe them, the words: MR PUNCH.
Then, with his face dark and his purpose iron-clad, he walked from loose box to loose box, driving the occupants into an adjacent mews and carefully shutting the gate behind them, because everybody knew that horses were so stupid that if there was a fire they would rush into their stables because that’s where they thought they would be safe, a habit that showed you why horses didn’t rule the world. They wandered about aimlessly while Dodger struck up a light and dropped it into a large bale of hay and then walked in earnest down the nearest alleyway with the virtuous feeling of having done something right, by virtue of not doing something wrong. He jogged his way towards the river, where the crackling of wood and the shouting of humans grew louder in the distance behind him.
Of course, Solomon shook him awake not long after the usual time, with the certain allowance for the fact that Solomon himself had slept in somewhat, after that wonderful meal. Solomon had also decided to let Dodger sleep on, and meanwhile had taken a look at the contents of Dodger’s useful bag, because he wouldn’t have been Solomon if he wasn’t inquisitive. So that when Dodger did in fact find himself shaken awake, and he came round the curtain, he saw a beaming Solomon sitting at the table with the jewellery in one neat pile on a velvet cloth and some of the books and ledgers beside it.
‘Mmm, Dodger, I do not know for certain what you think you were doing last night, but I think I can perceive, because as you know Solomon does himself have a certain wisdom of his own, that you thought you had a score to settle with somebody. Though you know that I do not mmm tolerate thievery of any kind, I’ve had a word with God and he agrees with me that in the circumstances you might have wanted to set fire to the place.’
Dodger looked embarrassed for a moment and then said, ‘Actually, Sol, I did torch the stables, because the bloody coach was in there.’
Solomon’s brow wrinkled in distress. ‘Mmm, I