On top of her rents, she could charge tuppence a week more for her laundry services, and when she was of a mind to be dry, the money kept her and her son, Dorian, in luxuries like meat, cheese, and sometimes milk.
No wonder the lucky bugger was so tall and broad when they’d only dipped their toes into their teen years.
So long as Mrs. Blackwell kept her broken teeth—courtesy of Dorian’s missing father— behind her lips, she was still a handsome woman. Her night-hued hair remained free of grey, and curled from beneath her cap in the steam of her laundry. She’d clutched Cutter to her breasts from time to time in a fit of sodden sadness or effervescent good spirits, and he’d be lying if he said he didn’t enjoy it. He enjoyed it twice when he got to rib Dorian about it until his best mate blushed and boxed him one.
“I’m going to marry your mum,” he’d taunt before dancing away. “Then I’ll raise ya proper.”
“Sod off,” Dorian would reply irritably.
“Don’t worry, I won’t make you call me Da.”
“I’ll call you worse than that, you poxy cock.”
At the thought of future scuffs, Cutter directed a half-grin at her, the one he knew made his cheek dimple, and he hefted what little sparkle he had left into his eyes. It was the first time he’d felt close to warm all day.
“Hullo,” he greeted. “Did Caroline breakfast here?”
“I ain’t seen her, Cutter,” Jane greeted with a noticeable slur and a lack of any T’s whatsoever.
He reached for the back of his neck and rubbed once again, even though little needles of gooseflesh stabbed at every inch of his skin by now.
“Dorian about?” he asked.
“In the kitchen fleecing doxies out of their hard-won earnings wif his dice last I checked.” She swiped at her forehead with the back of her wrist and wrinkled her nose at him. “I’ve a mind to boil your wee arse in my pot next, ya noxious goblin. I can smell you from here.”
Cutter’s testing sniff of his own person was interrupted by a strong arm around his neck as he was pulled in for a grapple choke that might have resembled a boisterous hug if one was feeling generous.
“Oi! I think you smell awright.” Dorian’s voice seemed to deepen by the day, though Cutter’s had changed over a year ago, much to Blackwell’s competitive consternation. “I’ve heard there’s a dead body or some such washed up at Hangman’s Dock.” His mate’s dark eyes gleamed with a greedy sort of mischief. “Wot say we go and work the crowd?”
Working the crowd was their language for relieving the distracted onlookers of their watches, coin, and pocketbooks.
“Maybe later.” Cutter rubbed at his chest as the dread that had dogged at him now bared its teeth and struck, wrenching at his heart with an icy pain.
Pain meant weakness. And one never showed weakness here, not even in the presence of those he knew the best. He always covered his pain with humor if not indifference.
“Your mum just offered to bathe me.” Cutter waggled suggestive brows and summoned a cheeky smile from lord-knew-where. “Now toddle off, son.”
A hot rag hit him square in the face, eliciting a very unmanly squeak of surprise.
“Wash your face, you little deviant, and then both of you make yourselves scarce, I’ve work to do!” Jane’s bellow was softened with a wink, and Cutter gave himself a half-hearted scrub before he tossed the soiled rag back to the laundry pile and threw Jane another smile.
This she returned with a curse and a shake of her head.
He’d felt this strange sort of veneration for her since the first time Dorian had brought him and Caroline around. She’d allowed them to curl up in the kitchens and sleep like dogs by the stove in the winter and eat whatever crusts they’d helped clean from the tables. The next morning she’d sent them to Wapping High Street with strong warm tea in their bellies and a few pointers on how to beg.
“You’re two golden-haired angels, inn’t ya?” She’d tugged their noses fondly. “You’ll empty more pockets than a naughty peep show, eyes that big and blue. ’Specially you, darlin’.” She’d pinched at shy Caroline’s pale cheeks and tugged at her golden ringlets.
And so they had. For years, Cutter and Caroline worked the streets of London, his sister drawing upon the kindness of those who would stop to offer a coin, while he learned to divest them