Mind the Gap

Page 7

"Cars?" Harry asked.
Jazz nodded. "The Uncles were there, but there'd never been so many visiting at once and I knew something was wrong. Mum brought me up paranoid, made sure if things took a turn I'd suspect it right off, and I did. I went up the al-ley that runs behind the house..."
She left out any mention of ghosts or whispers, fearful that they'd think her mad or doubt every word if she started up talking about phantoms. By the time she finished re-counting the hours leading up to their discovery of her, like Goldilocks in Baby Bear's bed, Jazz felt exhaustion begin-ning to claim her again. Her tears flowed freely while she spoke, and several times she had to pause simply to catch her breath. The sympathy on Harry Fowler's face and the empa-thy shining in the eyes of the urchins were the greatest gifts she had ever received.
Jazz never would have imagined herself crying so openly in front of anyone, let alone a roomful of strangers. But she could still smell her mother's blood. Her life had new rules, now and forevermore.
When she fell silent, no one spoke for a moment. Harry reached out as though to lay a comforting hand on her shoul-der but hesitated. Then he cupped the back of her head and looked into her eyes. Had anyone else done such a thing, Jazz would have slapped the hand away.
"You're well hid, Jazz girl. Well hid. So you've done as your dear mother asked," he said, his gaze intense. After a moment, he withdrew his hand but continued to stare at her.
"You can keep running if you like," Harry went on. "No one will try to stop you. We'll give you a bit of food, let you keep a torch, even an extra set of batteries. But know that you're not alone down here, and I'm not talking about us. There are old empty stations all through the Underground, and shelters like this one as well, and other places besides.
The whole city's got a warren under it, and a wonder it doesn't collapse right down into the earth.
Sometimes I think the old tunnels are growing, spreading like the roots of some invisible tree.
"Point is, others have retreated down here over the years. Some come and go. Mostly they're hiding, like you, or don't trust anyone up above, like me. They aren't all as hospitable as the United Kingdom, I'm sorry to say. There are lots that are homeless as well, not hiding so much as fallen through the cracks.
You'll see them in your rambles underground. And there may be other things down here, wild dogs and the like. Pets lost to the tunnels.
"So I say this: go if you like, and Godspeed. Stay if you like, and welcome. But if you stay, you've got to contribute, just like the rest."
Jazz glanced at the hard ground at the center of the cir-cle. "By contribute, you mean steal."
Harry laughed at that, the sound a harsh, barking cough. "Steal from them topside? Surviving isn't thieving, Jazz girl. We're scavengers, so we are, living off the corpse of a decaying society. If we pick a pocket or snatch a purse, or forage for food or supplies, they don't miss it. Not really. We're invisible down here, girl, just as we like it. It's a world of monsters up there.
"There are the rich and the poor, and the poor must stick together. If we don't, the rich will pick our bones."
Even without the encouragement on the faces around the circle, Jazz felt the truth of Harry's words.
The world above had taken her mother, or at least turned a blind eye while killers spilled her blood. Rich men who followed the rules. The world had shaken her off like a dog shakes off fleas.
Her mother had told her to hide, but Jazz understood the deeper meaning of the word, communicated over the course of years. Mum had wanted her to survive, above all else.
"I might not stay forever, or even for very long," she warned.
Harry only smiled. He clapped his hands and stood up.
"I'm famished. Let's have a nibble, eh? Then we'll see if Jazz girl's got the knack."
****
Half the cast was crowded into the green room while a quar-tet of volunteer mothers applied the final touches of the stage makeup. Mrs. Snelling darted her head back and studied Jazz, then put down the brush —done with blush, apparently. Unsatisfied, she picked up the coal pencil and darkened the lines around her eyes. At last she smiled, sat back, and nodded.
"Gorgeous, love. You're ready for your close-up."
Jazz thanked her and hurried out of the room. In full costume, she had to reach down and gather up the bustle of her dress to squeeze through the crowded space. Making a point, Tom Rolston gestured broadly and clipped the edge of her bonnet. Had Jazz not flinched away from him, he might have dislodged the hat, pins and all.
"Oi! Watch it, y'lummox!" she said.
Rolston laughed and rolled his eyes. "Sounds more like Eliza than Mrs. Higgins."
Jazz explored her hair and bonnet to make sure all was still in place, then shot him a dark look.
"Lucky boy. I won't have to kill you today, apparently."
"What a glorious death it would be, though," he said, waggling his eyebrows suggestively.
Smiling, Jazz exited the green room. Though her role in My Fair Lady was that of a lady, the entire cast had taken to imitating the rough, cockney speech of Eliza Doolittle back-stage. Sometimes a well-placed guv'nor could reduce the whole stage to fits and giggles.
She rushed down the half dozen stairs to the door lead-ing out into the auditorium. The hinges squeaked when she opened it, and she made a mental note to remind the direc-tor —the English teacher, Mr. Morris—to have someone take care of it before the first performance tomorrow night.
Today was the dress rehearsal. They were all in full cos-tume and makeup for the first time. Though Jazz was a slender girl, her costume cinched her waist so tightly that she felt it might rip at any moment.
The girl who'd been handling costumes promised to let it out tonight, and Jazz hoped she remembered, or there was the real possibility she'd pass out onstage.
The door squeaked shut behind her and Jazz glanced up onto the stage, where the hands were moving sets around with only a modicum of thunder. Then she glanced out over the auditorium. Most of the five hundred or so seats were empty. The director and the school's principal sat with half a dozen teachers, patiently waiting for the dress rehearsal to begin. Twenty or thirty parents had come as well, along with a handful of kids who were the younger siblings of members of the cast.
Jazz felt a moment of crashing disappointment when she did not see her mum. Then her gaze flickered to the back of the auditorium and the figure standing just inside the doors, and her smile returned.
She hurried up the central aisle and presented herself to her mother, spinning once to show off her dress and then curtsying like a lady.
"What do you think?"
Her mother smiled nervously. "You look lovely, Jazz. I could do without all that makeup —"
"It's stage makeup, Mum. You've got to wear it or the audience won't be able to see the expression on your face."
"Well, you do look lovely. Hardly a girl at all anymore. A young lady."
Jazz basked a moment in the compliment, but then she saw that her mother's attention had wandered, gaze darting around to take in the auditorium, the doors at either side of the stage, and the nearer corners of the room.
"What is it?" Jazz asked, seeing her mother's brows knit.
Her mum nodded toward the stage. "And you'll be up there, will you? The entire time?"
"Hardly," Jazz replied. "My part's not very big. It's not as if I'm playing Eliza."
"Yes, but when you are on, you won't be out in the audi-ence at all?"
"Of course not."
"That'll have to do, I suppose. Can't be too careful, sweetheart."
Jazz stared. Her mother had always been paranoid, and she suspected it had to do with the suddenness of her father's death. Jazz tried to assuage her fears whenever possible, but sometimes she couldn't bite her tongue.
"Honestly, Mum. What's going to happen? It isn't as if someone in the audience is going to try to hurt or rob me in the middle of the show."
Her mother's thin smile seemed to pain her. She gave a shake of her head. "No, of course not, love.
Still, you can never be too careful. Never know what's out there looking to do us harm, do we? Just look after yourself."
But the following evening, and at all three performances that weekend, whenever Jazz spotted her in the audience, her mum was standing at the rear of the auditorium, not watching the show but instead studying the audience and the shadowy corners of the room, always on guard.
But that was her mother. Always on guard. She never seemed to know precisely what or who might pose a threat, so she mistrusted everything and everyone.
Jazz never participated in another play after that. She could find no joy in it.
Chapter Five
a pocket or two
Holborn station stood at the juncture of High Holborn Street and Kingsway, the foot traffic a mixture of hurried Londoners, business travelers, and enough casual tourists to warrant a map vendor on the curb outside the station's en-trance. The facade of the building looked more like an old theater marquee than a Tube station, but the red circle and blue band that marked the Underground gave it away.
On a pleasantly warm day —a workday, though she'd lost track of which one—Jazz stood near the magazine stand across the street from the station and pretended to talk into a disposable mobile. The phone had been fetched from the garbage in Tottenham Court Road station after having been discarded there and made a useful prop. Jazz had never seri-ously entertained thoughts of becoming an actress, but her few excursions onto the stage had come effortlessly. She'd been born to pretend.
"Can you believe it, Sally?" she asked into the inert mo-bile. "And he sent flowers the next day. He's got no shame. I've half a mind to —"
She felt a tug behind her, on the hem of her skirt. Then Cadge whipped the back of her skirt up high, revealing her lavender thong and far more of her than she would have liked. A breeze fluttered the skirt, and then she forced it down, covering herself again and dropping the phone in the process. The mobile cracked when it struck the pavement. She spun on him.
"You cheeky little bugger!"
Cadge laughed merrily, his cheeks flushed with excite-ment and embarrassment. Though older, he looked no more than twelve.
"Nice arse, love. Let's have a look at the rest!" he cried. A man at the newsstand shot him an angry glare. He'd just bought a magazine and now stuffed his wallet back into the inside pocket of his suit coat.
"Here, now!" the man said. "There's no call for that."
"Bloody right," Jazz snarled, and she started toward Cadge.
"Oh, tough bird, are we?" Cadge said. "Come on, give us a show."
"Right!" the man in the gray business suit said, catching hold of Cadge's arm. "That's enough. Leave off now. Get out of here."
Jazz didn't hesitate. The man had gotten an eyeful of her backside, and she knew she looked good.
The skirt and blouse had come from the dress-up closet Harry Fowler's United Kingdom had filched over time. Hattie had helped her choose the clothes and Faith had done her hair. Harry'd even managed enough hot water so that she could shave her legs. No one looking at her would have guessed that she'd been living in the Underground for an entire month.
Yes, she'd gotten the bloke's attention. Now the business suit had to be her knight in shining armor.
Couldn't resist a pretty girl.
"I'll have you, you little shit!" Jazz said, and she lunged for Cadge.
Businessman put himself between them —or at least later on he'd think he'd done that out of chivalry. Really, Jazz made sure to catch the man between herself and Cadge. She cursed and damned him and his relations and ancestors go-ing back several generations. Cadge kept laughing, egging her on.
"Jesus, girl!" the man said, now alarmed to be stuck be-tween them. "Get off."
As the businessman struggled to keep hold of Cadge and to prevent her from clawing the boy's eyes out, Jazz put to use everything Harry and the United Kingdom had taught her over the past few weeks. The fabric of his coat whis-pered as her fingers slid against it.
Finally she darted around him, spit at Cadge, shouted a final curse at him, and walked away.
"Someone's got to pay for that phone," she told Cadge. "You'd better hope you don't see me again!"
Jazz marched across the street and into Holborn station. She didn't bother thanking the man. Time was of the essence now. She descended the stairs and felt the comfort of being enclosed again. It had been good to go aboveground again, but she'd felt eyes on her everywhere, the breeze whispered about her, and buildings stared down like sentinels.
Jazz went through the turnstile and took the escalator down. Leela waited for her on the platform.
The sign above them declared the next train to be two minutes away. Jazz and Leela stood near each other for a moment, neither ac-knowledging the other. The Indian girl had downplayed her looks to be less conspicuous, which had to be difficult for someone with such natural beauty. But Leela managed it. Her right arm was looped through the handles of a big bag that seemed half purse and half briefcase, something she'd snatched earlier in the day.
Stevie and Bill emerged onto the platform. From their smiles, Jazz presumed they'd also had a successful day aboveground. The train arrived and all four of them stepped on through different doors.
At Tottenham Court Road station, Jazz got off. The other three would travel up to the next station.
"Mind the gap," a voice warned.
Jazz let out a long breath of relief as the doors closed and the train pulled away. She went to a bench and picked up a discarded copy of that morning's Times. A few minutes later, Cadge darted onto the platform.
Grinning, she got up.
"Right, give me the news. How'd I do?" she asked as Cadge approached.
"Perfect," he said, clapping softly. "Like you were born to it."
She felt herself swelling with pride, and it took her by surprise. Jazz had been reluctant at first. Of all the things she had one day imagined she might become, thief had never been on the list. But Harry and his tribe — your tribe too now —had persuaded her otherwise. Topsiders were all about money and merchandise. They lived for the illusion of suc-cess. And the rich bastards, the ones with more than they needed—if their wallets were a bit lighter at the end of the day, most of them would barely feel it. That's why it was so damn easy to steal from them, to pick their pockets or con them on the street. They were hardly aware of what they carried, because they could afford to lose it.