Free Alexander Graham Bell: Master of Sound #7 by Ann Hood

the windows, too, and behind some of them a warm, soft light glowed. That light made Felix even sadder. Inside were families, families waking up and eating toast and laughing together. Families unaware of how precious mornings were in their quiet, cozy houses.
    He moved to open the gate of the first house, just to get started, to push away his sadness.
    But Johnny clasped his big hand over Felix’s.
    “We go up through the cellar, mate,” he said. “They don’t want the likes of us traipsing through their drawing rooms and parlors, do they?”
    He didn’t wait for an answer. Instead he tugged Felix away from the gate and down an alley stinking of trash and rotting things. Felix saw a long, skinny tail disappear in the garbage and forced himself to look up, straight ahead.
    Behind the house was a small, neat yard with a little garden. Johnny and Felix walked through it to the cellar bulkhead. There Johnny paused.
    “It’s a little scary the first time,” he said. “I started as a climbing boy, before I had me growth spurt andgot so big. And Mr. Pippin? The bloke who gave us our assignment this morning? ’e was me boss.” He lowered his voice. “’e lit
fires
beneath me to get me moving, ’e did. I still got scars on the soles of me feet from the blisters. And me only six years old at the time. Me mum just dead. Me ’eart broken.”
    “Fires?” Felix said, confused.
    Johnny nodded. “I vowed that if I lived, and if I ever got me a climbing boy, I wouldn’t do
that
, no sir.”
    “Okay,” Felix said slowly. He was missing something, of that he was certain. But what?

    “It’s not too bad,” Amelia said to Maisie.
    They were in a place called Convent Garden, an enormous place that sold every kind of food imaginable. Amelia and Maisie were there to get oranges. “We’ll sell them in the West End,” Amelia had told Maisie after breakfast. “We’ll make a few pence. You’ll see.”
    But first they had to come here and buy the oranges.
    “Just got to get past the costermongers,” Amelia said, weaving her way through hundreds of men buying fish to sell.
    Maisie put her hand over her nose and mouth again and concentrated on staying close to Amelia, whose red hair made her easy to follow. She had freckles, too—more than Maisie had seen on any one person. Small and skinny with creases of dirt in her neck, Amelia couldn’t be more than eight or nine years old. But when Maisie had asked her how old she was, the girl had just looked surprised. “Well, I have no idea!” she’d said brightly.
    At breakfast, as Maisie sat sullenly eating the disgusting oatmeal they’d slopped into her bowl, Amelia had offered to take her with her to sell oranges on the street. “Better than breaking rocks,” Amelia had added. That was when Maisie thought she saw Felix. Or at least the top of what looked like his head.
Maybe it had been a mirage
, she thought now as the sight of a stall of oranges finally came into view. It had been just a flash of hair that looked like his. Maybe she’d even seen the outline of his glasses. Or maybe she’d just imagined it.
    “They like oranges in the West End,” Amelia explained to Maisie as she handed a coin to the vendor.
    “Give me nice ones,” she told the vendor as he placed six oranges in her basket.
    Amelia lifted one to her nose and inhaled.
    “I love the smell,” she said, her eyes closed. “Wonder what they taste like.”
    “They’re good,” Maisie said, hungry.
    Amelia opened her eyes. “You’ve had one?”
    Maisie nodded.
    “Were you fancy before you entered the parish?” Amelia asked.
    Maisie thought of Elm Medona and her pink pouf. She thought of the apartment on Bethune Street and all the Chinese dinners they’d eaten there.
    “Yes,” she said finally and sadly. “I was.”
    “Pity,” Amelia said as they began to walk through Convent Garden and back to the street.
    Suddenly, the smell of fresh-baked pies greeted Maisie. She took a big, deep breath,