In Which Mike Doesn't Get It
Mike thinks maybe he doesn't quite understand. They're excited, they're talking about it like it's just a day out, even though Nick was almost caught lifting a handful of scarves for resale when cash was short last week, and if he'd been a few seconds slower, it might be him standing in line to make his way up to the block.
Joe's reminding Nick to bring a snack this time, though, because last time he hadn't, and that hadn't been any fun, and Frankie's asking if he can sit on Kevin's shoulders so he can actually see this time, please Kevin, and Kevin's giving them his impatient face, because they're going to be late again, and then they're just going to whine about it.
When they get there, Brendon's actually standing still, instead of circulating the way he usually does in a crowd this size, divesting them of their valuables. When Mike mentions it, Brendon laughs.
"That would be a lark, wouldn't it? Something to brag about, if you could pull it off."
Ryan elbows him and says to Mike, "Don't give him any ideas," and then to Brendon, "I thought you were just here to pay your respects, anyway?"
Brendon nods soberly, flipping a casual salute toward the scaffold and heaving a sigh. "Lightfinger Jill. Best in the biz for a while there. Really, though, she went out well, pockets stuffed a bit too full with silver-plate tableware. Lesson to us all--don't get too greedy."
Then he's grinning all over again. Mike hopes his bafflement isn't showing.
Mike trails along like a lost puppy through the thick crowds. Even though he stays alert like Brendon taught him, no-one tries to go through his pockets.
Brendon sees the way he's holding himself and grins. "Not here, mate. Look." With a jerk of his head, Brendon indicates both the ranks of police, brasses polished, and beyond them, in the stands above the crowd, the gentry. Mike catches sight of a few familiar faces and ducks his head.
When he looks at Brendon again, B looks disappointed, like he failed a test. "Come on, got to stay together in this crowd."
Mike went to a few hangings when he was younger--his mother hadn't wanted him to, which had created even more of an appeal for a bloodthirsty adolescent boy's macabre desire to see death for real for once, up close.
He was never this close before, though, always set back a bit with the rest of the gentry, and now he's among the throng, bearing in closer so that looking at the gallows means looking up, craning his neck at the impossible height of the weatherbeaten wood.
He moves close to Kevin again, and really, he has to ask, soft-voiced and furtive--"But isn't it kind of, I don't know, morbid? Hard to watch?"
Kevin gives him a measured look, replies, "It's actually not a bad way to go, and we're all going to go some time. If you're lucky, if you've got a good knot, it's just the one drop, and then you're gone, you know? Quick. Unlucky to be one of the messy ones, but still a right sight quicker than a wasting disease. Cheaper on the family, too," Kevin reflected, then nudged Mike in the side, "Come on, like you never went to an execution. Don't tell me you're not having any fun."
That's the thing. The excitement of the crowd, the press of people, it's creating an infectious air of excitement, like one of Gerard's miasmas. But this building excitement is crashing hard against the horrible certainty that people are going to die today because they stole bread to feed their families.
"I did," he admitted. "Over there. It...it's different, over there."
Kevin grins wolfishly. "I think a lot of things are different, over there." He squeezes Mike's arm to get his full attention. "Listen, the state pays the funeral, so the body is done well by - well, better than being dumped off the docks, which happens more often than you might think. And, well, as for the family, as soon as you're caught, the family just starts treating you as if you're dead already. The grieving is over, then, so the condemned don't see weeping faces, they see this..." He waved his arm around to capture the party atmosphere that was pressing in against the gallows. "It's not such a bad way to go," he repeated.
Mike stared at him. He'd heard that phrase so often, it was taking on the nature of a mantra. Maybe that was it: they had told themselves this so often, it had become truth, or something that could pass for it in a dim light. "Okay," he said, not wanting to push Kevin. "But for the record, I'd still rather die of old age in my bed."
Kevin touches his arm and says, "And I'm sure you won't have any trouble with that, love," in a bright, brisk voice that maybe stings a bit. Maybe more than a bit.
"You, too," Mike hears himself saying, though he knows it's probably a mistake, "I want that for you, too."
Kevin smiles at him unreadably, but before he can reply, Brendon pipes up, "It's Jill,"
He whistles, loud and carrying, and shouts, "Three cheers for Jill Richardson, prettiest little thief in Cheapside!"
To Mike's surprise, the crowd actually does let out a cheer, and the skinny little waif on the scaffold, who can't be more than fifteen, gives what looks even from this distance to be a rather shaky smile, and sketches a quick bow as she's shoved into place. Brendon whistles again, the girl lets out what sounds like a sob, and--
--Mike will never forget the noise. From the stands, as a teenage boy, he didn't hear, or didn't want to hear it, but this close, he can't help it.
There's the slap of wood hitting wood as the trapdoor opens, and the almost musical twang as the hemp rope pulls taut, and then, almost lost in the noise of the crowd, was the single choking sound as the rope grips the little girl's throat tight, cutting off air. A final, tiny crack as her neck breaks, and an empty puppet is dangling on the end of the string, her bare feet hanging a few feet off the ground.
It's over in the blink of an eye, but Mike knows he'll never, ever forget it. He swallows hard against the rising bile in his throat and turns away.
Behind them, on the stands, the gentry are applauding, looking almost bored as they give the proceedings a patronizing little clap. At least the mobs on the ground were celebrating her life, knew her name. To them up there, she was just another dirty whelp that needed to be put down.
Mike closes his eyes, fist clenched, and tries to get control of himself before he does something monumentally stupid.
After a beat, Nick looks up and says, "So, breakfast?"
"Didn't you eat before you came?" Ryan asks, and Mike's relieved to see he's not the only one looking a bit shaky
Kevin sketches an easy smile and says, "Someone slept a little late today, you remember, Ry, busy night last night--"
"Shut up-" comes from Nick,
"Pretty little barmaid needed Nicky to walk her home and he wasn't back for a good half hour."
Brendon looks back at the dangling corpse, a little blankly, and says, "Yeah. Lets get out of here."
Mike is happy to follow them out, but he suspects he won't be the only one not eating this morning. Strangely, the thought is comforting - despite the bravado, this hurts them deeply.
They know all it takes is one piece of bad luck and any one of them could be dangling from the rope as the sun pushes its way fully over the horizon.