For the Love of Horace, Cht 1.
Aug. 6th, 2017 11:33 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
gillyflowers“Bleedin’ ‘ell!”
Toby groaned and rubbed his eyes as the clattering from the shop front continued.
“Mum?” he called, his voice croaky with sleep. “ ‘S it time already?”
“I’m gonna murder the little blighter,” was the only reply he got.
Sighing, Toby turned over on the narrow cot Nellie had set up for him in a corner of her cluttered living room. He shut his eyes tightly against the early morning sun and pressed his face to the wall, but it was too late. Between Nellie’s banging and the sun peeking through the dirt-streaked windows, he was awake for the morning.
Scrambling to pull his legs through his trousers as he hopped across the room, Toby stopped in shock as he peered through the door. Pots and pans were strewn across the shop in haphazard piles. Bowls were overturned. Slop dripped from the top of counter to the dirty paving stones below with a ‘glop’.
“What’s ‘appened?” he called. When nobody answered, he stepped hesitantly into the room. “Mum?” he called again, peering at each side of the room. Again, there was no immediate answer, and Toby, increasingly worried that a burglar had somehow managed to capture Nellie, cried again, “Mum?”
This time, his shouts were rewarded with a string of curse words and a loud thump as Nellie hit her head on the top of the cupboard her upper body was currently inserted in. Slowly retreating, her hand came to her head as she stood upright.
“What is it, Toby lad?” she asked absently, ruffling the boy’s hair as she rubbed the growing lump on her forehead.
“I were beginning to think you’d been kidnapped by a bunch of thieves,” Toby began, before hugging Nellie tightly. “I’m that glad you ain’t, mum.” Nellie, despite the pain from her bang, had to smile at Toby’s imagination.
“My, boy, you do think some things. What would a band of thieves want with an old woman like me?” she chuckled. “No –“ and that was that. Nellie’s attention had shifted back from Toby to what had caused her to make such a mess.
“It’s Horace.” She dropped her voice to a whisper, and bent so her breath tickled Toby’s ear. He, with great difficulty, stopped himself from rolling his eyes. He didn’t want to upset Nellie.
“He’s back.” The corner of Nellie’s eye twitched. “I saw ‘im yesterday, bold as brass on that chair over there –“ she gestured at one of the many overturned chairs in the cluttered shop. “I’ve gotta get him out.”
Toby sighed. It seemed impossible that Nellie should care about being rid of one measly rat so much when the whole place was over run with spiders and mice and cockroaches and God only knew what else.
“I’ve gotta get ‘im out,” Nellie muttered again, releasing her tight grip from Toby’s shoulders. Toby only nodded as she began her search once more. He began to stack the pots and pans back into the cupboard in stoic silence.
It bothered him, sometimes. He loved Nellie, but her frantic outbursts like this left him worried. It made him more worried too – he half glanced at the ceiling, as if he could see straight through the mouldy plaster and wood to the tall, gaunt man who haunted his nightmares above him. It made Toby worried to see how she softened around him, how he routinely ignored her.
They worked in comfortable silence for a minute, though the mess never seemed to shrink as Nellie pulled more and more jumbles of crockery onto the floor in her hunt for the rat. That was shattered as Nellie shrieked and stumbled back from the cupboard, promptly tripping over a pile of mouldering pie bowls on the floor behind her. Toby turned in time to see her land, with a crash, on the floor, her skirts flying and her holey stockings askew and falling down. The bowls shattered beneath her weight, sending shards scattering across the kitchen.
“It’s… he’s…” She raised a trembling hand to the cupboard. “Horace!” she gasped. Toby hurried forward, but even as he did, a slow, deliberate creak of floorboards above their heads was heard.
“Bleedin’ ‘ell –“ Mrs Lovett gasped. “’is breakfast.” Still on the floor, she looked at the table nearest the door, on which stood about the cleanest objects in the entire room: a fine silver tray, a pewter goblet filled with some foul smelling liquid and a breakfast of what Toby guessed to be scrambled eggs and kippers.
“Be a love –“ she glanced back at Toby. “Take it to’im. Tell ‘im I’m sorry for waking him so early, only it were Horace payin’ me a little visit.”
“But mum –“ Toby hurried to offer Nellie his hand, nd drag her up from the floor.
“Now, Toby,” Nellie shushed his protests as she dusted down her dress and prinked at her bird’s nest hair. “Just take it to ‘im. He’s a good man, given ‘alf the chance.” And a great deal better than herself, Nellie thought grimly. Toby, realizing that it was best not to argue, realizing that it was pointless telling Nellie that Todd, each morning , scraped the congealing concoction Nellie had made for him into his slop bucket, took the tray and excused himself from the room.
Outside, his journey to the stairs at the side of the shop was stopped with the call of, “Boy!” It was an unfamiliar voice, and Toby heaved a sigh of relief. Nellie was a bit mad, and Todd was terrifyingly stoic, but anything was better than Pirelli’s care.
“Yeah?” He called back to the man. The man was short, bald and dressed in a delivery-man’s uniform. Not the type, really, to need a shave. “The pie shop ain’t open yet,” Toby added. “Mum’s just baking ‘em. Come back in an hour.”
“Nah – listen,” The man beckoned Toby closer.
“Everything alright, lad? I ‘eard screaming – that were your mum, weren’t it? And something about ‘Orace? Who’s that, then?”
Toby couldn’t hide his grin. “Aye, she’s nuts, my mum. Keeps thinking she’s seen old Horace, but I keep telling her ‘e sent ‘imself to Jesus in them sewers long ago. There ain’t nothing, but she won’t be told.”
The man clapped Toby on the shoulder, his mouth hanging open in slight astonishment. What the kid said made little sense, but one thing was for certain. Nellie Lovett had finally come off her rocker.”
Sucking the sweet that the man had given him, Toby trudged up the stairs to Todd’s rooms. Timidly, he knocked gently on the door.
“Come in,” The gruff voice said.
“Mr T., I brought you a bit o’ breakfast. Shall I set it down –“ Toby’s eyes swept the sparse room, and settled on the trunk in the corner. He slid the tray onto it, before focusing on the barber, who was sat in his chair, running his finger over the blade of his razor.
“It’s eggs and kipper, Sir,” he began to babble. “Very nice, Sir, and a bit of grog with it. Do you want it now, or shall I…” His voice faded as Todd held up a hand to silence Toby.
“You’re getting her bad habits, boy, talking nineteen to the dozen.” It wasn’t aggressive, but rather an observation. Silently, the barber strode past Toby to inspect the food on the tray. His nose wrinkled slightly at the sight and, as had become routine, he scraped it into his chamber pot. Infernal woman couldn’t even cook, he grimaced.
When he was done, he glanced over at Toby, who was watching him carefully. “Take it down to her and say nothing,” he said, carelessly. It wasn’t that he wanted to spare the woman’s feelings, he thought to himself, as Toby scampered to grab the tray and disappear, it was that he couldn’t be doing with the whining and the checking up, and the apologies that would most certainly follow. Yes, the woman had her uses as a landlady, and as a murderous accomplice, but, Sweeney thought, business should remain just that. Business. And preferably with a silent partner.
Just as Toby closed the door behind him, Todd spoke again.
“What was the noise before? Did she scream?”
Toby hesitated. Freedom, away from the menacing air that Todd exuded, was so close. But perhaps it was a sign, even a glimmer of hope, that he was fonder of Nellie than he let on. So Toby turned back, for the sake of the baker downstairs.
“She thought she saw Horace again,” he explained.
Todd, for his part, rolled his eyes. Bloody woman had had the whole of Fleet Street up at dawn over an imaginary rat.
“Tell Mrs. Lovett…” he spoke slowly. “Tell ‘er… the screams were completely unnecessary and overly dramatic. Tell her it isn’t a theatre.”
Toby nodded as Todd stepped back, and closed the door between them.
Downstairs, the lad had to fight through the crowds of customers outside the shop. It wasn’t usually this busy this early, Toby thought, as he squeezed his way through. As he saw the door to the shop though, he realized why the crowd was so large: the closed sign remained on the door, and Nellie was still throwing pans and ladles about in her hunt for the rat. The crowd, mostly laborers on their way to the docks for the day, was peering through the windowpanes to watch Nellie on her search, laughing and jeering at each new expletive that fell from her lips.
By the time Toby had fought his way to the door, and warned Nellie of the audience, it was too late.
Suddenly, the crowd fell silent and fell back from the shop. A sharp rap echoed around the untidy kitchen.
“We’re closed,” Nellie shouted. “Sorry, love.”
The knock came again.
“Bleedin’ ‘ell,” Nellie muttered beneath her breath. She once again patted at her dress and adjusted the scrap of lace at her bust line. Flour left chalky handprints on the black material and turned Nellie’s vibrant red hair a dull brownish-grey. Shaking her head, Nellie opened the door.
“I told yer, love –“ that was as much as she managed to utter before her impatient protest turned to a surprised squawk of indignation as her left hand was seized and she was yanked from the doorway.
“Get your bleedin’ hand off me!” Toby heard Nellie shout, and he ran to the doorway, dodging over the crockery on the floor. When he reached the door, his eyes widened at the sight before him. It appeared to Toby that giants held Nellie fast between them, meaty hands enveloping her bony wrists. Though Toby could see her struggling between the men, he could also see that she stood no chance of breaking free from their grip.
“What are you doing?” Toby shouted.
“Bleedin’ oafs!” Nellie twisted hard, and stomped on one of her captor’s feet as hard as she could. She was rewarded with a sharp slap to her face, which quite took her breath away and left a red handprint across her usually pale cheek.
“Nellie Lovett?” A shorter man, thin and dirty, in rumpled clothes and a leather apron stepped forward from the crowd, who were still lingering to watch the spectacle.
Nellie stopped moving and narrowed her eyes as she appraised the man.
“You ain’t the beaks,” she scoffed.
“No,” the man agreed, with a rotten leer. “No, I am Mr. Fogg, of Fogg’s Asylum for the insane. Doubtless many of you have heard of me?”
Some of the crowd nodded their agreement, and a low muttering began of the tales of the patients who found themselves in Fogg’s care.
Nellie herself didn’t answer directly. “You ain’t got no business ‘ere, Fogg.” She spat at the man. The echo as one of her guard’s hands made contact with her cheek made the crowd draw their breath and focus, once more, on Nellie and Fogg.
Seeing that the petite woman was at least momentarily stunned into silence, Fogg once again cleared his throat.
“We’ve been summoned by someone concerned about your behaviour, my dear. But don’t worry, we’re going to look after you now.”
He closed the distance between himself and Nellie. Much taller than her, he stooped a little to better finger a lock of her curly red hair that fell near her face.
“We’ll soon stop you seeing these imaginary people, my sweet.”
“imaginary people?” Toby spoke up, taking the attention from Mrs Lovett, who was still struggling to free her hands, and, as Fogg ran his finger over her sore cheek, trying to bite it. “She don’t see imaginary people, Sir.”
Fogg laughed. “And how many of you,” he addressed the crowd, “have seen this woman looking for an imaginary man in her cupboards.
The crowd began to laugh their agreement as a fierce blush spread across her chest.
“That were a rat! She was looking for a rat!” Toby shouted his protests, but over the roar of the crowd, his pleas went unheard. The men holding Nellie began to drag her towards a dark carriage, and to force her up the steps. Her cries of protest were drowned by the jeers of the crowd. Toby tried to run after her, to catch Fogg by the arm, but he was held back by the man he had spoken to earlier that morning. Instead, all he could do was scream, “Mum!” as Nellie was driven away.
As the crowd dissipated, and Toby was released, he climbed the stairs two at a time. Without any regard for knocking, he barreled through Todd’s door.
“Mr. Todd, Sir,” he gasped. “They’ve taken her. They’ve taken Mrs. Lovett! We have to save her!”
Toby groaned and rubbed his eyes as the clattering from the shop front continued.
“Mum?” he called, his voice croaky with sleep. “ ‘S it time already?”
“I’m gonna murder the little blighter,” was the only reply he got.
Sighing, Toby turned over on the narrow cot Nellie had set up for him in a corner of her cluttered living room. He shut his eyes tightly against the early morning sun and pressed his face to the wall, but it was too late. Between Nellie’s banging and the sun peeking through the dirt-streaked windows, he was awake for the morning.
Scrambling to pull his legs through his trousers as he hopped across the room, Toby stopped in shock as he peered through the door. Pots and pans were strewn across the shop in haphazard piles. Bowls were overturned. Slop dripped from the top of counter to the dirty paving stones below with a ‘glop’.
“What’s ‘appened?” he called. When nobody answered, he stepped hesitantly into the room. “Mum?” he called again, peering at each side of the room. Again, there was no immediate answer, and Toby, increasingly worried that a burglar had somehow managed to capture Nellie, cried again, “Mum?”
This time, his shouts were rewarded with a string of curse words and a loud thump as Nellie hit her head on the top of the cupboard her upper body was currently inserted in. Slowly retreating, her hand came to her head as she stood upright.
“What is it, Toby lad?” she asked absently, ruffling the boy’s hair as she rubbed the growing lump on her forehead.
“I were beginning to think you’d been kidnapped by a bunch of thieves,” Toby began, before hugging Nellie tightly. “I’m that glad you ain’t, mum.” Nellie, despite the pain from her bang, had to smile at Toby’s imagination.
“My, boy, you do think some things. What would a band of thieves want with an old woman like me?” she chuckled. “No –“ and that was that. Nellie’s attention had shifted back from Toby to what had caused her to make such a mess.
“It’s Horace.” She dropped her voice to a whisper, and bent so her breath tickled Toby’s ear. He, with great difficulty, stopped himself from rolling his eyes. He didn’t want to upset Nellie.
“He’s back.” The corner of Nellie’s eye twitched. “I saw ‘im yesterday, bold as brass on that chair over there –“ she gestured at one of the many overturned chairs in the cluttered shop. “I’ve gotta get him out.”
Toby sighed. It seemed impossible that Nellie should care about being rid of one measly rat so much when the whole place was over run with spiders and mice and cockroaches and God only knew what else.
“I’ve gotta get ‘im out,” Nellie muttered again, releasing her tight grip from Toby’s shoulders. Toby only nodded as she began her search once more. He began to stack the pots and pans back into the cupboard in stoic silence.
It bothered him, sometimes. He loved Nellie, but her frantic outbursts like this left him worried. It made him more worried too – he half glanced at the ceiling, as if he could see straight through the mouldy plaster and wood to the tall, gaunt man who haunted his nightmares above him. It made Toby worried to see how she softened around him, how he routinely ignored her.
They worked in comfortable silence for a minute, though the mess never seemed to shrink as Nellie pulled more and more jumbles of crockery onto the floor in her hunt for the rat. That was shattered as Nellie shrieked and stumbled back from the cupboard, promptly tripping over a pile of mouldering pie bowls on the floor behind her. Toby turned in time to see her land, with a crash, on the floor, her skirts flying and her holey stockings askew and falling down. The bowls shattered beneath her weight, sending shards scattering across the kitchen.
“It’s… he’s…” She raised a trembling hand to the cupboard. “Horace!” she gasped. Toby hurried forward, but even as he did, a slow, deliberate creak of floorboards above their heads was heard.
“Bleedin’ ‘ell –“ Mrs Lovett gasped. “’is breakfast.” Still on the floor, she looked at the table nearest the door, on which stood about the cleanest objects in the entire room: a fine silver tray, a pewter goblet filled with some foul smelling liquid and a breakfast of what Toby guessed to be scrambled eggs and kippers.
“Be a love –“ she glanced back at Toby. “Take it to’im. Tell ‘im I’m sorry for waking him so early, only it were Horace payin’ me a little visit.”
“But mum –“ Toby hurried to offer Nellie his hand, nd drag her up from the floor.
“Now, Toby,” Nellie shushed his protests as she dusted down her dress and prinked at her bird’s nest hair. “Just take it to ‘im. He’s a good man, given ‘alf the chance.” And a great deal better than herself, Nellie thought grimly. Toby, realizing that it was best not to argue, realizing that it was pointless telling Nellie that Todd, each morning , scraped the congealing concoction Nellie had made for him into his slop bucket, took the tray and excused himself from the room.
Outside, his journey to the stairs at the side of the shop was stopped with the call of, “Boy!” It was an unfamiliar voice, and Toby heaved a sigh of relief. Nellie was a bit mad, and Todd was terrifyingly stoic, but anything was better than Pirelli’s care.
“Yeah?” He called back to the man. The man was short, bald and dressed in a delivery-man’s uniform. Not the type, really, to need a shave. “The pie shop ain’t open yet,” Toby added. “Mum’s just baking ‘em. Come back in an hour.”
“Nah – listen,” The man beckoned Toby closer.
“Everything alright, lad? I ‘eard screaming – that were your mum, weren’t it? And something about ‘Orace? Who’s that, then?”
Toby couldn’t hide his grin. “Aye, she’s nuts, my mum. Keeps thinking she’s seen old Horace, but I keep telling her ‘e sent ‘imself to Jesus in them sewers long ago. There ain’t nothing, but she won’t be told.”
The man clapped Toby on the shoulder, his mouth hanging open in slight astonishment. What the kid said made little sense, but one thing was for certain. Nellie Lovett had finally come off her rocker.”
Sucking the sweet that the man had given him, Toby trudged up the stairs to Todd’s rooms. Timidly, he knocked gently on the door.
“Come in,” The gruff voice said.
“Mr T., I brought you a bit o’ breakfast. Shall I set it down –“ Toby’s eyes swept the sparse room, and settled on the trunk in the corner. He slid the tray onto it, before focusing on the barber, who was sat in his chair, running his finger over the blade of his razor.
“It’s eggs and kipper, Sir,” he began to babble. “Very nice, Sir, and a bit of grog with it. Do you want it now, or shall I…” His voice faded as Todd held up a hand to silence Toby.
“You’re getting her bad habits, boy, talking nineteen to the dozen.” It wasn’t aggressive, but rather an observation. Silently, the barber strode past Toby to inspect the food on the tray. His nose wrinkled slightly at the sight and, as had become routine, he scraped it into his chamber pot. Infernal woman couldn’t even cook, he grimaced.
When he was done, he glanced over at Toby, who was watching him carefully. “Take it down to her and say nothing,” he said, carelessly. It wasn’t that he wanted to spare the woman’s feelings, he thought to himself, as Toby scampered to grab the tray and disappear, it was that he couldn’t be doing with the whining and the checking up, and the apologies that would most certainly follow. Yes, the woman had her uses as a landlady, and as a murderous accomplice, but, Sweeney thought, business should remain just that. Business. And preferably with a silent partner.
Just as Toby closed the door behind him, Todd spoke again.
“What was the noise before? Did she scream?”
Toby hesitated. Freedom, away from the menacing air that Todd exuded, was so close. But perhaps it was a sign, even a glimmer of hope, that he was fonder of Nellie than he let on. So Toby turned back, for the sake of the baker downstairs.
“She thought she saw Horace again,” he explained.
Todd, for his part, rolled his eyes. Bloody woman had had the whole of Fleet Street up at dawn over an imaginary rat.
“Tell Mrs. Lovett…” he spoke slowly. “Tell ‘er… the screams were completely unnecessary and overly dramatic. Tell her it isn’t a theatre.”
Toby nodded as Todd stepped back, and closed the door between them.
Downstairs, the lad had to fight through the crowds of customers outside the shop. It wasn’t usually this busy this early, Toby thought, as he squeezed his way through. As he saw the door to the shop though, he realized why the crowd was so large: the closed sign remained on the door, and Nellie was still throwing pans and ladles about in her hunt for the rat. The crowd, mostly laborers on their way to the docks for the day, was peering through the windowpanes to watch Nellie on her search, laughing and jeering at each new expletive that fell from her lips.
By the time Toby had fought his way to the door, and warned Nellie of the audience, it was too late.
Suddenly, the crowd fell silent and fell back from the shop. A sharp rap echoed around the untidy kitchen.
“We’re closed,” Nellie shouted. “Sorry, love.”
The knock came again.
“Bleedin’ ‘ell,” Nellie muttered beneath her breath. She once again patted at her dress and adjusted the scrap of lace at her bust line. Flour left chalky handprints on the black material and turned Nellie’s vibrant red hair a dull brownish-grey. Shaking her head, Nellie opened the door.
“I told yer, love –“ that was as much as she managed to utter before her impatient protest turned to a surprised squawk of indignation as her left hand was seized and she was yanked from the doorway.
“Get your bleedin’ hand off me!” Toby heard Nellie shout, and he ran to the doorway, dodging over the crockery on the floor. When he reached the door, his eyes widened at the sight before him. It appeared to Toby that giants held Nellie fast between them, meaty hands enveloping her bony wrists. Though Toby could see her struggling between the men, he could also see that she stood no chance of breaking free from their grip.
“What are you doing?” Toby shouted.
“Bleedin’ oafs!” Nellie twisted hard, and stomped on one of her captor’s feet as hard as she could. She was rewarded with a sharp slap to her face, which quite took her breath away and left a red handprint across her usually pale cheek.
“Nellie Lovett?” A shorter man, thin and dirty, in rumpled clothes and a leather apron stepped forward from the crowd, who were still lingering to watch the spectacle.
Nellie stopped moving and narrowed her eyes as she appraised the man.
“You ain’t the beaks,” she scoffed.
“No,” the man agreed, with a rotten leer. “No, I am Mr. Fogg, of Fogg’s Asylum for the insane. Doubtless many of you have heard of me?”
Some of the crowd nodded their agreement, and a low muttering began of the tales of the patients who found themselves in Fogg’s care.
Nellie herself didn’t answer directly. “You ain’t got no business ‘ere, Fogg.” She spat at the man. The echo as one of her guard’s hands made contact with her cheek made the crowd draw their breath and focus, once more, on Nellie and Fogg.
Seeing that the petite woman was at least momentarily stunned into silence, Fogg once again cleared his throat.
“We’ve been summoned by someone concerned about your behaviour, my dear. But don’t worry, we’re going to look after you now.”
He closed the distance between himself and Nellie. Much taller than her, he stooped a little to better finger a lock of her curly red hair that fell near her face.
“We’ll soon stop you seeing these imaginary people, my sweet.”
“imaginary people?” Toby spoke up, taking the attention from Mrs Lovett, who was still struggling to free her hands, and, as Fogg ran his finger over her sore cheek, trying to bite it. “She don’t see imaginary people, Sir.”
Fogg laughed. “And how many of you,” he addressed the crowd, “have seen this woman looking for an imaginary man in her cupboards.
The crowd began to laugh their agreement as a fierce blush spread across her chest.
“That were a rat! She was looking for a rat!” Toby shouted his protests, but over the roar of the crowd, his pleas went unheard. The men holding Nellie began to drag her towards a dark carriage, and to force her up the steps. Her cries of protest were drowned by the jeers of the crowd. Toby tried to run after her, to catch Fogg by the arm, but he was held back by the man he had spoken to earlier that morning. Instead, all he could do was scream, “Mum!” as Nellie was driven away.
As the crowd dissipated, and Toby was released, he climbed the stairs two at a time. Without any regard for knocking, he barreled through Todd’s door.
“Mr. Todd, Sir,” he gasped. “They’ve taken her. They’ve taken Mrs. Lovett! We have to save her!”
