Page 142 of If Looks Could Kill
“It’s in my eye,” bellows Zeke.
Not the entire contents. Apparently, I have more.
Another round decorates Rosie. Zeke backhands my face and sends me sprawling back upon the vomit-drizzled bed.
I’m going to pay for this.
“Get those clothes off her, Zeke,” Rosie orders, “and get her into the peach outfit. Now.”
“I ain’t touchin’ her,” Zeke says sullenly. “Probably give me typhus.”
Rosie fumes, and I feel a moment’s small satisfaction. But not for long.
“Mack,” Rosie shouts. “Get in here and see to Little Miss Priss.”
If you don’t, they’ll beat you and dress you in it themselves. You don’t want that.
Tabitha. Put the outfit on. Don’t let them do it to you.
“I’ll do it myself,” I tell them desperately. “Give me two minutes, and I’ll put it on.”
They give me two minutes.
I put it on.
Pearl—The Girl in the Window(Early Morning, Tuesday, December 4, 1888)
“Hold on tighter, Miss Girl,” Freddie calls over his shoulder to Pearl. “Don’t give up. Hospital’s just up ahead. End of the next block.”
She hasn’t the heart, nor the strength, to tell him that there’s nothing the hospital can do for her now. Her time is up.
The bike stops abruptly, and Pearl’s face collides with the scratchy wool of Freddie’s jacket.
“What’s the matter?” Oscar’s winded voice calls from behind. “What’s going on?”
Pearl peers around Freddie’s back to see a commotion snarling up the road ahead. An overturned omnibus lies in ruins, blocking the street. Someone tends to an injured driver, and a handful of men try to calm four frightened horses. A pair of police officers route traffic away from the block, pushing them a block uptown.
Pearl watches in a haze. How odd, that all this should happen at such a late hour.
“Can’t we just bike through?” Freddie calls to the cops. “We got an injured lady here.”
“Just one block around, son,” the officer calls back. “Won’t take long.”
“Jack the Ripper got her!” Dick shouts.
This does not improve their credibility with the officer. “Move it along, chums.”
Freddie pushes off hard and pumps furiously to start his extra-weighted bicycle crawling forward as he turns up the avenue.
“And get yourselves to bed!” the cop yells after them.
“Hold on,” Freddie yells. Pearl tightens her grip to keep from being flung off the bike while her grubby Galahad negotiates a tight corner onto the next street up.
She leans her cheek against Freddie’s back. She doesn’t care what it looks like. His wool-clad back is warmer than city air. His moving muscles are life, and that’s worth holding on to.
She glances up at the darkened windows of New Yorkers who aren’t about to die, who simply sleep through a peaceful night.
In one house, light gleams through fringed red curtains framing a bay window. In the center of the tableau stands an almost-naked girl, cringing with shame. Someone shoves her, and she stumbles closer to the glass.
