There was a slight pause, then Harriet felt Christopher place his hand on her knee and give it a gentle squeeze. ‘And we be here together,’ he whispered.
Harriet shifted uncomfortably and tensed her leg beneath his fingers. He was a lovely boy, but that was the problem—he was just a boy. She drew her legs to one side so that his hand slid off and nudged the blanket from her shoulders. ‘I best be getting back,’ she said.
‘But you’ve just got here,’ Christopher complained.
‘I know…’ Harriet began, as she made her way to the yawning mouth of the boat.
Christopher’s silence made it clear to Harriet that she had offended him and so she emitted a pathetic half-laugh. ‘Blame me, one of these days if I don’t get caught!’
‘I only be meaning to say that it’s good—me and you up here, like this—that were all,’ Christopher said awkwardly.
Harriet’s pleasant, reassuring smile towards him was stolen by the darkness between them. As she carefully considered her reply, a sound from lower down the hill drew her attention. She caught a snippet of someone’s voice on the turn of the wind. Her heart began to thump. Had something happened to Keziah or Ann? Had her parents discovered her clandestine getaways?
‘Hattie-’ Christopher began, but Harriet silenced him.
‘Someone be calling something,’ she whispered.
The low groan of relaxing wood told her that Christopher had risen from the bench; she could feel his presence behind her. The pair listened in silence. And there it was again. It was a girl’s voice. Not Keziah’s, though. Nor Ann’s. Then the word appeared again, stitched onto the edge of the breeze.
‘Christopher!’ the voice yelled.
‘It be my neighbour, Lottie,’ Christopher realised. ‘She don’t sound good.’
‘Let’s be going,’ Harriet said, leading the way back down the rock, minding her path as best the light would permit.
‘Christopher—I’ve been looking all over for you—it be your mother—she’s catched hurt,’ Lottie exclaimed breathlessly when they reached her.
‘What’s gone on?’ Christopher demanded.
‘Fell off her horse—smashed her leg into bits,’ Lottie cried. ‘It’s just plain awful; she be wailing like a goose.’
‘Lead the way,’ Christopher instructed.
The three of them sped through the darkness at a gallop, as the sounds and smells from the Priory Ground burgeoned around them. They raced through the labyrinth of shady narrow passageways that cut between cottages and yards, instinctively navigating around the foul rivers of effluence.
As they neared Christopher’s house, the entangled noises emanating from the Black Horse merged with the deathly shrieks of Widow Elphick. Finally, they turned the corner beside Mr Ranger’s blacksmith’s shop and were confronted by a wall of shawls and Garrick coats. Widow Elphick’s squawks were immediately met with the low murmur of soothing compassion from those who surrounded her.
‘Mother!’ Christopher yelled.
The wall of coats miraculously parted as grave, concerned faces, hauntingly lit by the reed lights in their owners’ clenched hands, looked in his direction.
Christopher fell to his mother’s side, as another anguished yelp rose painfully into the night sky. Harriet saw a man in a bottle-green coat and long black boots—presumably the surgeon—on his knees beside her tying a tourniquet around her upper thigh. She had just glimpsed the grotesque sight of an open case bearing unimaginable tools and instruments, that looked like they should be hanging in Mr Ranger’s forge, when the babbling circle around Widow Elphick drew tighter; Harriet was forced to take a step backwards and could no longer see anything other than the tall stove-pipe hat of the gentleman in front.
Balancing herself on tiptoes, Harriet watched as Christopher was jostled clear and the brawny fishermen Mr Cooper, Mr Mann and Mr Piper stepped in to hold down the poor Widow Elphick.
Harriet thrust her hands over her eyes as the surgeon picked up a gleaming knife and sliced into Widow Elphick’s exposed thigh.
The crowd suddenly gasped, several turned their heads and some even covered their ears at the incredible howl emitted by the stricken woman.
When the crying subsided for an instant, Harriet took one more look and immediately wished that she hadn’t; she just caught the moment when the surgeon picked up his ebony-handled steel saw and began hacking through Widow Elphick’s thighbone. Harriet shut her eyes and covered her ears, wondering if anyone within a twenty-mile radius hadn’t heard the desperate yelps and cries. She had seen and heard enough; she hurried from the gruesome scene, taking the longer route back home so as to carry herself out of earshot as quickly as possible.
As soon as the Black Horse came into view Harriet knew that she was in trouble. The gin palace was all but empty and what few customers had remained loitered outside, animatedly discussing the fate of Widow Elphick. Amid the crowd was her own mother, tightly pulling ten-year-old Ann into the folds of her dress. Harriet could see that Ann was sobbing. She could also see that her mother was furious.
‘Fegs! Where have you been, girl? I’ll be blamed, you was supposed to be looking after your sisters,’ her mother bawled. ‘I be a-needing to be with my poor friend!’
Harriet had to think fast. If she confessed to having sneaked out she would be in no end of trouble for leaving her sisters by themselves. ‘Sorry, Ma. I be a-hearing a God-forsaken cry and went to see the cause of the bother,’ she began, ‘and I be finding poor Widow Elphick in a terrible state, so I be fetching Christopher.’
Harriet watched her mother scurry along the alley to be with Widow Elphick; their long-lasting friendship had been cemented in their childhood and Widow Elphick’s very presence here was down to her mother.
‘We was scared, Hattie,’ Ann said quietly. ‘There were an horrible noise.’
‘It be alright,’ she reassured
