The Wild Ones by C. Alexander London Read Free Book Online Page B

Better your uncle were a paper tickler than an historian. They live longer.”
    â€œWhat is a paper tickler?”
    â€œDon’t you learn anything out in the Big Sky? Paper tickler’s a card cheat. They tickle the paper cards to make ’em jump.”
    â€œOh . . . right.” Kit thought about his uncle. If he was also in danger, then Kit had better find him fast. He couldn’t stand here in an abandoned shop learning new lingo all night. “So, where do we look for him?”
    â€œNormally, I’d say we just ask the Blacktail brothers, because they don’t miss a trick around here, but we can’tgo back to them. My guess is they’re still snarling mad and best avoided.”
    â€œWhy should they be mad?
They’re
the ones who cheated
me.
”
    â€œBut
you’re
the one who let himself get cheated,” Eeni said. “Better be more careful in the future.”
    â€œIsn’t anybody down here honest?” Kit wondered.
    â€œSure.” Eeni patted Kit on the back. “You are!”
    Kit frowned.
    â€œListen, Kit,” she told him. “Honest fellas around here learn quick to keep quiet. Many an honest fella has disappeared into the sewers for talking too much. Everybody who comes here’s got a secret. They’re either running from someplace or running to someplace or stuck right in this alley with no place else to go. This is home for folks who ain’t got a home anyplace else. The Flealess in those buildings all around, they want to get rid of all of us and take the alley for themselves. They terrorize us every chance they get. So the Rabid Rascals help out . . . for a price. Most of them are runaway house pets themselves, and the ones that ain’t—the Blacktail brothers and the like—well, they’re clever and mean and dangerous too. Folks pay the Rascals for protection, and the Rascals keep the Flealess away. Folks who don’t pay, or who make the Rascals mad, well . . .” She gestured at the torn-up shop around them. “Bad things happen to ’em.”
    â€œWhy are you telling me all this?”
    Eeni picked at the frayed seal on her vest. “Just to tell you that folks here ain’t all liars; they’re just . . . circumspect.”
    â€œCircum-what?”
    â€œSpect. Circumspect,” Eeni told him. “Means that they don’t take risks when they don’t have to.”
    â€œSo you aren’t like other folks down here, then?” said Kit. “Taking a risk to help me out. You aren’t so
circumspect
at all.”
    â€œMe?” Eeni shrugged. “I’m just a sucker for an honest fella. Howl to snap.”
    â€œHowl to snap,” Kit repeated, but he felt, of a sudden, circumspect himself, even as he followed Eeni up into the moonlight. “If we can’t ask the Blacktail brothers about Uncle Rik, who are we going to ask?”
    Eeni called back over her shoulder as she made her way from the small shop. “Why, we’re going to ask the Brood, of course!”

Chapter
Nine
    THE BROOD
    KIT and Eeni popped from beneath a shed just down the narrow lane from where the Blacktail brothers were still at their work, luring in whatever gapers they could find. Their voices carried through the night.
    Quick of eye and quick
of paw,
bet some se
eds and win ’em all 
. . .
    Kit glanced nervously in their direction, but Eeni beckoned him with her little hand. “Don’t mind about them for now.” She led Kit behind the chicken coop, where a brood of chickens were clucking their nightly gossip.
    â€œI hear that church mouse minister takes a thimbleful of cheese ale daily,” one of the chickens clucked.
    â€œI hear it’s more like two thimbles!” another squawked.
    The largest of all the chickens, a big lady sitting on a hearty number of eggs, sang a little tune to the others.
“A thimbl
e of