Crow Boy by Philip Caveney Read Free Book Online

to get moving, so he followed the lanky red-headed lad towards the door through which he had first entered the kitchen. Behind him, he heard Missie Grierson giving orders again.
    â€˜Right, you lot, that’s enough standing around for one day, get to work! Morag, put down that basket, stop gawping like a fish out of water and start peeling those tatties. I don’t know about you lot, but I am starving!’
    Her words were the last thing he heard as the door closed behind him and he followed the boy called Cameron along the entrance hall and up a dark and rickety staircase.

Five

    Cameron led Tom up seven flights of stairs. At each landing, the stairs angled back on themselves to rise to the next floor and it was apparent that other people were living up on these levels. Tom could hear the sounds of conversation coming from open doorways and, on one level, he caught the smell of pipe tobacco. On the fourth floor, a fat man in a long, curly wig came out of a doorway and nodded to Cameron.
    â€˜You, boy,’ he said. ‘I need the services of a pot clenger.’
    â€˜Very good, Mr Selkirk. I’ll be right on to it in a moment,’ Cameron assured him. ‘I just have to show Tom his sleeping quarters first.’
    The man studied Tom for a moment. ‘New boy, eh?’ he said.
    Tom nodded.
    â€˜Well, make sure you work hard and keep your fingers out of other folks’ belongings and you and I will get along fine.’ He smiled and strolled back along the landing. Cameron led the way upwards again.
    Tom gave Cameron a quizzical look.
    â€˜Who’s he?’ he asked.
    â€˜Just one of the neighbours,’ said Cameron, as though it was of no importance.
    â€˜And what did he mean, he needs a pot . . .?’
    â€˜ Clenger . He means he wants me to empty his chamber pot.’
    Tom stared at him. ‘And you . . . you don’t mind doing that?’ he asked, horrified.
    â€˜Mind it? Of course not. He’ll pay me a penny for my trouble.’ Cameron nodded towards the next flight of stairs. ‘We sleep up top,’ he said.
    Eventually they came to a small, dingy room under the cobweb-festooned eaves of the house. It was empty, save for a rough-looking bed. Tom gazed at it doubtfully. The bedding looked grubby and verminous, not what he was used to at all – but, he told himself, at least there weren’t any Hibernian posters blu-tacked onto the rough-plastered walls.
    â€˜That’s where you’ll sleep,’ said Cameron. His accent was thicker and more impenetrable than Morag’s. He had a long thin face and bright blue eyes. Scatterings of brown freckles were smeared across the bridge of his nose.
    â€˜You don’t snore, do you?’ he asked.
    â€˜I don’t think so,’ said Tom.
    â€˜Good. Wee Davey used to snore something terrible. I’d lie there some nights thinking I’d never get to sleep.’
    â€˜Is that why you killed him?’ It had been meant as a joke but Cameron didn’t seem to see the funny side of it.
    â€˜I never killed nobody,’ he protested. ‘And don’t you go saying that I did!’
    â€˜Hey, chill,’ Tom advised him. ‘It was just a joke.’
    â€˜A joke, is it? I don’t think it’s very funny.’
    â€˜Er . . . all right, sorry.’ Tom looked hopefully around the room. ‘So . . . where’s your bed?’ he asked.
    Cameron pointed. ‘There,’ he said.
    Tom stared for a moment. ‘But . . . you just said that one’s mine.’
    Cameron rolled his eyes. ‘Aye, that’s where we both sleep. Why d’you think I asked if you snore?’
    Tom was horrified. ‘We sleep in the same bed? But I counted three of you down in the kitchen . . .’
    â€˜The girls have their own room,’ said Cameron, looking appalled. ‘We sleep up here.’
    â€˜Well, I don’t much care for that idea,’ said Tom.