Free The Deadly Fire by Cora Harrison Page B

ground between himself and the man. Perhaps he would stop and examine the clay.
    But Joseph Bishop kept coming. Alfie felt paralysed with fear. This was the man that everyone dreaded. Even the hardened men of St Giles drew aside when he passed them on the street. A collector of dead bodies, a murderer of children: that was Joseph Bishop’s reputation. Alfie had been avoiding him for weeks. Now here he was in this dark and desolate place in the middle of the night, face to face with this man.
    And there was no one else around.
    Why did the police patrol the wide, well-lit streets of Bloomsbury and leave these dark courts unattended?
    Now Alfie could just see Joseph Bishop’s face by the solitary gas lamp above the gate of the burying ground. It was a strange face, quite square with a broken nose twisted to one side, a toothless mouth, grey spiky eyebrows and the deep scars of smallpox pitting the surface of his filthy skin. He took a step nearer to Alfie. His footstep made no sound – had he trodden on the clay? Alfie dared not look down. The man stared at him. There was something strange aboutJoseph Bishop’s eyes. They were a very pale grey and they glittered in the white light of the gas lamp. Alfie stared back at him and felt that he was unable to move away from the uncanny power of those eyes.
    â€˜Got something to show you,’ the rusty voice creaked on. ‘Something you’d like to see. Why don’t you come in here with me? Come on; you know that you would like to see it.’
    â€˜What?’ breathed Alfie. The word seemed to be pulled out from the bottom of his chest. He felt one leg move forward, then moved it back. His leg felt very heavy. Almost as though it were not part of him. ‘What is it?’ he repeated.
    â€˜That would be telling, wouldn’t it?’ There was a sneer in the man’s voice. Once again he held out his hand. ‘Come on,’ he repeated. ‘Got something to show you. Something that sparkles. Something gold. You come and help me to dig it out. You’d like to be rich, wouldn’t you?’
    â€˜Yes,’ breathed Alfie.
    â€˜Treasure, that’s what you can find in these burying places.’
    â€˜Treasure,’ repeated Alfie. It was a strange feeling to have words come from his mouth, almost as though they were spoken by someone else, almost asthough his voice no longer belonged to him.
    â€˜And you’ve got a little blind brother, haven’t you? You’d like him to be rich, too, wouldn’t you?’
    The fog in London could hang around for days, and even weeks, but a strong east wind might suddenly blow in from the river Thames and in minutes the fog would be gone. Something like this was happening now to Alfie’s brain. One minute he was standing there almost paralysed, his eyes held by the strange grey eyes of the man in front of him and the next, the old, sharp-witted Alfie was back.
    It was the mention of Sammy that had done it, he thought afterwards, but now he was just conscious of being himself again. He glanced around him furtively and then looked into the burying ground. There was no grass there, only the slimy earth – but in one corner some strange substance, almost like silver moss, gleamed in the light of the gas lamp and attracted his attention. The railings there were broken by rust – some lay on the ground, but one was still upright, just held by one thread of corroded metal. The rest of the metal looked all right, though, and it still had a spear-shaped top attached to it. It wasn’t a perfect weapon, but it might be enough. Alfie gave it one lightning glance and then turned back to Joseph Bishop.
    Somehow he had to distract the man. Just a moment would do it, he thought. He waited until the man came quite close and then, with a sudden movement, he swung the sack from his back and threw it down between them.
    â€˜You may as well have a look and see what I’ve really