‘I’m not.’
I gazed up into Billy’s hard green eyes but saw no mockery in them, only cold calculation. ‘Why me?’
He looked away and winked at his followers. ‘Gawd, girl, I’m not askin’ you to marry me nor nuffink! Why not you? You’re as good as many a boy I know . . . and better than some.’
Despite myself, I felt a rush of pleasure to hear this compliment from Billy Shepherd of all people. He was offering me a chance to really belong in Covent Garden, to move from the sidelines where Syd had put me and join in with the boys’ adventures, to be party to the secret signs and passwords of a gang. I was tempted, sorely tempted. If only the offer had come from Syd, who I admired and trusted, and not from his devious rival! I would have to refuse, of course, but . . . I looked round the ring of faces, hard-bitten, tough characters all. What would they do to me when I said no?
‘That’s very decent of you, Billy,’ I began, backing away from him, looking for an escape route, a weak spot in the wall. Perhaps if I ducked under the biggest boy’s legs? ‘But you don’t want a girl like me in your gang.’
He gave me a broad grin and tipped his hat back on his head. He smirked at his boys. ‘See, I’d told you I’d ’ave to woo ’er!’ He turned back to me. ‘You’re wrong, girl. That’s just what I want.’
‘But I’m useless at fighting . . . I’d let you down.’
His grin, if anything, got wider. It was like looking into the jaws of a Nile crocodile waiting to swallow me up. ‘Don’t believe it, Cat. You’re a terror when your blood’s up . . . a real little wildcat with ’er claws out. Anyway, I want other talents in my gang than fightin’. I’ve got Meatpie Matt ’ere to do the punchin’.’ He gestured towards a burly lad not much smaller than Syd but with none of Syd’s blond good looks to recommend him. ‘Nah, I need you for somethink else.’
I had backed as far as I could go without actually bumping into the ferret-featured boy with carrot-red hair on my side of the circle.
‘What’s that?’ I asked, curious despite myself to know what had prompted Billy to make so astonishing an offer. I could see how he might derive a twisted pleasure from taking one of Syd’s friends away from him, but it still seemed a very unlikely proposition.
‘It’s obvious, ain’t it?’ said Billy, rocking on his heels casually, though his eyes were still fixed on me. ‘Brains, Cat, brains. I want you for what you know . . . though, as you’re bein’ so slow on the old uptake, perhaps your reputation for wit and learnin’ is a case of misrepresentation?’ He said the last word proudly as he rarely indulged in words with more than two syllables.
I was flattered. I had not known that I was so highly spoken of in the market. But his praise did not change the essentials of my position: I would have to rely on some of the brains for which I was famed to extricate myself from this circle. But how?
Suddenly, a sooty boy burst through the outer guard into the middle of the circle.
‘There you are, Cat!’ exclaimed Lord Francis. ‘We wondered what had happened to you! I was very perturbed to find that you had not followed us.’
‘Per-what?’ guffawed Billy, grabbing Lord Francis by the lapels of his filthy jacket. ‘’Oo do you think you are, Sootie? A dook or somethink?’
It was an alarmingly accurate guess. I could tell from the look on Lord Francis’s good-natured face that he had only just twigged he had walked in on a dangerous situation. He opened and shut his mouth like a fish landed at Billingsgate, but made no comprehensible sound.
‘Queer fellas you’re making friends with, Cat,’ said Billy, discarding Lord Francis by pushing him to one side into Meatpie Matt. Meatpie threw the peer of the realm to the floor like a ragdoll. ‘That’ll ’ave to stop, you understand? Can’t ’ave a girl in my gang mixin’ with the wrong sort.’
‘Er, Billy,’ I began, my eyes on the crumpled body of Lord Francis.
‘Yeah, Pussycat?’
‘I haven’t actually given you my answer yet.’
Lord Francis started to scramble to his feet. Billy absentmindedly kicked him to the floor again and stood with his hobnailed boot on the neck of the duke’s son.
‘Wot was that you were sayin’?’ he said, his eyes sparkling maliciously. We both knew that if I refused to join him the pressure of his boot would increase.
‘Can I think about your offer?’ I asked lamely, though I knew what his answer was likely to be.
‘Sadly not. For a number of pressin’ reasons,’ he made Lord Francis gasp as he placed more weight on his neck, ‘I need an immediate acceptance.’
My choices were not attractive. Refuse and face the consequences of being the reason why a member of the nobility is kicked to a pulp; accept and find myself under Billy’s leadership. I’d prefer to put my neck under his boot than do that. At least I could try to help Lord Francis, not least because his face was now an unbecoming shade of purple.
‘Billy, really it’s very decent of you . . . but no!’
Even as I spoke, I put my head down and ran full pelt at him, taking him quite by surprise. I charged into his stomach, knocking us both to the floor, in the process achieving my aim of getting him away from Lord Francis. In the confusion that followed, Lord Francis scrambled to his feet and had the sense to run for it. I tried to do the same but found my ankle seized by Billy. I froze. There was no kind Mrs Peters to hide me today.
‘Wot you make of that, Billy?’ laughed Ferret-features. ‘Not a wildcat . . . a miniature bull, that’s wot she is!’