Chapter 20: Busy and Safe Days

“Hey, Old Bullet, I heard you had a son?”

“Get lost.”

“Old Bullet has a son!”

“Really?”

“Hey! Old Bullet has a son, but not his own!”

“Really?”

“Old Bullet is raising someone else’s child. They say his lover had the baby with another man—”

Roland sat nearby, a piece of half-baked, dark bread clenched between his teeth, his legs straddling a crutch, listening to Mr. Collins grumble and curse.

He could sense that the neighbors who had come by bore no real malice.

More than teasing, their eyes often lingered on him. A man with a little girl had just bought a small thistle; his daughter was missing two teeth and kept staring at Roland.

“So, this is really yours…”

Old Collins reluctantly wrapped the herbs in oiled paper and tossed it to the man at the counter. “My brother’s son.”

“I heard he was sent by… those clergymen?” a woman wearing heavy makeup and a shrill voice interjected. “There won’t be any contagion, right…”

The old man glanced at Roland, saw his expression was normal, then bared his teeth in a grim smile and replied coldly, “Yeah, I’m quite familiar with those priests. Mary, you can go on with whatever you were going to say. Maybe in a couple of days, that lady might come and see you, give you a hug or something.”

The woman named Mary quickly covered her mouth.

Laughter erupted among the crowd.

Alright, it wasn’t entirely free of malice.

Someone carrying an oilcloth sack entered, dumping freshly picked flowers and herbs from the early morning. Two men bickered and pulled at each other, moving aside to haggle over prices.

Roland noticed the man who had just bought the small thistle walking over with his daughter.

“Old Bullet is tough on the outside but soft at heart. You’ll get used to life here, little one of the Collins family.” His hair was sparse, but he had a full brown beard covering his chin. His eyes were gray, and his rolled-up sleeves revealed two thick forearms.

Roughly twice as thick as Roland’s fingers combined.

He carried a strong, pungent scent of leather mixed with some kind of medicinal tincture.

A bear of a man.

“Old Bullet? That’s your nickname, Uncle?”

Roland saw the man pull up a stool beside him and shift his posture to face him.

Nearby, boys poked their heads out, shouting, “Read it all together! Faster! Hahahaha—” before getting a sharp tap on the back of the head from an annoyed parent.

“Pru… Pru—”

He saw the gray-eyed man’s daughter start laughing too.

“Alright, I get it.”

“I’m William Cordoni. I’ve lived here for over twenty years. This is Alice.” He spoke gently to Roland, nudging his daughter forward.

The girl shyly shuffled a few steps closer and carefully touched Roland’s hand back.

Roland smiled and gently took her hand in return.

“Hello, little Alice,” he said.

“…Hello, Roland.”

“You must be very pretty, right?”

Little Alice beamed, ignoring the two missing teeth. “You’re pretty too, Roland!”

“Me?”

“Yes! You’re the most handsome boy I’ve ever seen!”

The child’s straightforward praise caught Roland off guard.

“Thank you. I believe you’re a beautiful girl too.”

The other children nearby started teasing.

“That little brat’s got a silver tongue. If you ask me, he ought to work in the theater.”

Pru Collins seemed to have finished his business, dusting off his hands as he came out of the back room, pressing his palms on his hips. “These little rascals, worse than you, will show you around. After work tonight, go out with them for a bit.”

He crouched down and pinched Alice’s cheek.

“Let me see if my little princess is better.”

“Giggle, giggle…”

William Cordoni glanced at Roland. “I think Roland suits you well. The theater’s not for people like us.”

He was a shoemaker.

Raising a chronically ill daughter alone.

Though business hadn’t been good lately.

“Now it’s all big factories,” William said with a helpless expression. Seeing his daughter laugh happily, his eyes softened. “I just hope Alice grows up healthy, unlike her mother…”

Alice’s mother had been even sicker and passed away early.

“I’ve thought about it too, but if I go to the factory, who will take care of them…”

Old Collins held little Alice, showing his yellowed teeth in a grin. “Don’t worry, just go about your business…” Noticing Alice’s expectant look, he swallowed and corrected himself, “…Alice can come eat here every day.”

“She doesn’t even eat as much as a cat.”

William picked up a medicine pouch and stood from his chair, patting his old friend on the shoulder.

“If you can’t talk much, you must be a universally liked person.”

Pru Collins shot back, “If you didn’t come buy medicine here, you wouldn’t have so much trouble.”

The two men clearly had a good relationship.

Roland thought so too, just as Alice came running over, grabbing his hand and shaking it.

“Goodbye, Brother Roland! Please come play with me more!”

“I will, little princess.” He exchanged the nickname with a smile and gently pinched her cheek.

In short, life in the East End was like this.

Neither good nor bad.

Prosperity and wealth were words never spoken here, distant and unknown.

Including Pru Collins’ medicine shop, most buildings were held up by rusted metal branches, gray plaster, and old bricks. Rotten wood patched holes in the walls from inside, clotheslines stretched across to neighboring houses.

Windows were cracked and never repaired. The sky above was gray; the ground below was black with filth.

Most people here didn’t own clocks, so lighting a candle was an event. Sometimes they’d fall asleep huddled close, saving the cost of candles or gas lamps.

Roland thought this place was quite good.

Really good.

At least better than the poorhouse, better than lying on cold, hard boards all night listening to rats gnawing.

Every day he worked with the chatty uncle measuring herbs, sorting them.

Grinding or soaking them in water.

Some were singed with fire, others mixed and mashed, their juices dripping into small bottles.

It wasn’t easy work, but it was safe.

The neighborhood children often came to play with Roland after work—though he was no longer a child himself, his frail frame made the kids at ease with him.

They got along surprisingly well.

A few clever boys discovered that walking the streets with Roland attracted many curious glances, like heroes from stories.

Their vanity quickly helped Roland become familiar with the street, this district.

The East End.

Alice was still sickly pale.

Roland, on the other hand, had gained a bit of color, his strength growing from grinding herbs daily.

Enid hadn’t appeared in a long time; perhaps she was leading another raid against some cultists?

In the quiet monotony that almost made him forget the days—which he rather liked—one day, something marvelous happened.

“I’m telling you, Charlotte moves!”

This was no idle chatter.

Mysterious Rick Rich was the leader among the children—he had inherited his parents’ traits and boasted a ‘brainy head,’ though having inherited it too early made him look top-heavy.

His father was a bartender; his mother worked as a laundress in the West End. Rick himself worked in a shoe polish factory.

All in all, he was generous among the kids, which helped him become their leader.

At least, he was far more generous than Alice and the others.

“It really moved!”

At that moment, Big Head climbed onto the tall stool in the medicine shop, while the uncle was busy at night with the cabinets, and whispered mysteriously to Roland and the other children.

The so-called Charlotte was a tiny ceramic figurine, no bigger than a palm.