Noir by Jacqueline Garlick Read Free Book Online Page B

pad toward me. Something jingles in a hand. Whoever it is strides up to my bars and stops, silent and trembling. The jingling object picks up speed.
    “Who are you?” I snap, unnerved by the silence, my heart a thrumming ball of nervous fire in my chest. “Why are you here?”
    Folds of cloth crinkle as whoever it is bends and drops something flat and metal to the stone floor with a spine-nipping clank. A small, exasperated breath escapes me when I realize it’s food. The hearty waft of greased potatoes drifts up through the bars, causing me to salivate.
    “Yer last supper, sir,” a small voice says. It sounds like a boy. “I’m afraid the Jack Ketch ’as requested yer services, first light tomorrow.” The voice falls.
    “What day is this?” I push closer to the bars.
    “Saturday, sir.”
    My heart sinks. “But I thought there were no dippings on Sundays?”
    “There aren’t, sir.” The boy hesitates. “But the Jack Ketch ain’t got ’angin’ in mind for yuh—”
    “Yes, I know.” I stop him short of the gruesome details. I’d rather be surprised. Tarred and feathered. Drawn and quartered. Whatever it is, I don’t want to know until it’s upon me. It’ll be easier to face it that way.
    Besides, I’m still holding out hope that Eyelet will show.
    Somehow.
    “I’m afraid it’s mostly potatoes, but I did score yuh a chunk o’ sausage.” The boy slides the tray of food toward me through a narrow slip at the base of my pen’s bars. The bottom of the pan chafes slowly over the gritty stone.
    “Thank you for that,” I say and bend at the waist, lapping up a mouthful of potatoes like a dog, swallowing them slowly, knowing that if I eat too fast they’ll just come back up. “Who are you, anyway?” I say in between mouthfuls.
    “Sebastian.” The boy crosses his legs to sit. “Sebastian Jacobs.”
    “You live round these parts?”
    “No.” He hesitates. “I’m from Gears.”
    “How did you end up here, then?”
    “I’m in for thievin’, sir.” The boy sounds ashamed. His chin scratches the collar of his shirt. “I stole kippers from a smoking barrel on the outskirts of town.” He goes on. “But I ’ad to. We was starvin’. Me and me family, we were. Slipped under the fence from Gears and got caught on a wire on me way back.”
    “You’re a labourer’s son, then?”
    “No, sir. I ain’t got no father.” His voice drops again.
    There’s a sadness to it that is all too familiar. It sits heavy in my throat. “So, because of that, they make you serve the food as punishment, is that it?”
    “Yes, sir. They says I’m too young to stay in a cell with the others, so they house me in a cage in the kitchen and make me their scullery slave. It’s not so bad, though.” His voice perks up. “I get more freedoms than the rest of the prisoners. I serves the slop twice daily, both breakfast and dinner to all the inmates, and run errands for the guards and the churchman, and the Ruler. That way I gets to sneak about a bit. But if I’s caught sneaking, they beats me, so I needs to be very careful.”
    “By churchman, do you mean the Clergy?”
    “Yes, sir. He’s in on everything goes on about ’ere. The jug’s sat right next door to the parish. Sometimes they make me clean the manse for him. And do other things.” His voice drops again and I sense his head does, too. Queasiness rises in me.
    The boy’s stomach growls. Loudly.
    “Do they ever feed you?”
    “Sometimes,” the boy admits slowly.
    “When’s the last time you’ve eaten?” I swallow another mouthful of potatoes.
    “’Bout four days back.”
    “Here.” I shove the tray back in his direction with my nose. “Take this.”
    “But, sir—”
    “Go on. Eat it. It’ll just be wasted on me at this point.”
    The boy hesitates. “Yer sure?”
    “Positive.”
    “Thank yuh, sir!” The boy snaps the pan to his mouth and lays into the potatoes. “Thank yuh so much!”
    “You’re welcome.” I lean back from