We Leave Together, стр. 18

“I’ll show you, but the leaders are already gone. It’s just a bunch of kids with crowns and whistles. I don’t think they’re even running pinks anymore, on account of their source got rolled,” said Jona. “You know our boy Bially?”

“What about him?” said Calipari. He folded his arms.

“Bially was running his pinks to Turco,” said Jona. Jona moved a finger in the air like connecting all the dots. “Turco was running the pinks to all the mudskipper boys. The mudskippers call themselves Three Kings and they start marking turf because they’re dumb kids and they start blowing whistles and smacking folks around, acting tough.”

Calipari cocked his head. “You found Turco, then?”

“Turco’s rolled,” said Jona, “Turco’s been dead weeks. Heard it from my best, he’s dead and rolled, and I believe her. Turco was too pink to hide this good, and you know it. He’s rolled. The other fellow running is out, too, on account of the kids getting stupid. Anyway, he’s so pink he’s cheese-for-brains any day now if we just wait him out. The only one left is probably cheese-for-brains, too, but he’s still down with the ragpickers. He makes the scrap crowns for the kids and they keep his pipe full, and he’s nothing to nobody, and not a mudskipper knows up from down anymore. This last king got no tongue, no ears, no nose. Everybody calls him Dog.”

“Dog?” said Calipari, “I know a fellow name of Dog. Heard about him, anyhow. Big fellow, and a real rowdy tough. Been working muscle at the red doors since before I was a scrivener.”

Jona lowered his voice. He leaned forward. “There’s nothing anymore, but a bunch of ragpickers, Nic,” he said, “We’re busting it trying for these kids and there’s nothing. We can mousetrap ’em, but the only ones that come back to the center want a crown. The ones that got crowns don’t come back to the center, so we can’t mousetrap anybody worth taking.”

Nicola hadn’t uncrossed his arms. “Show me,” he said.

Jona stood up. He brushed off the salt that had gotten on his uniform from the scrivener’s desk. “Tell your fellows that there’s nothing there,” he said, “Give ’em Dog. Maybe they ease off, and give the kids time to fade.”

Nicola reached behind his desk to put away his quill. He reached for weaponry. “Jona, show me,” he said, “Let’s go.” Calipari pointed at the scrivener whose desk Jona had been sitting on. “Hey new kid, you too. Grab a bat. You know how to swing a bat, new kid? They teach you that where you come from?”

***

Jona led Calipari around the side of the brewery to the scrap forge where one metal tub was marked with ash and flecks of bronze. Dirty smoke crept out of the tub into the skyline.

Nicola told the new kid to touch the side.

The new kid—Jona didn’t remember the kid’s name—had a thin black moustache and small eyes set deep in his skull. He probably couldn’t grow a full beard, yet. He looked foolish with the moustache. He reached out a glove to the side of the metal can.

He pulled his finger away, and shook it. “It’s hot, Sergeant,” he said.

Nicola laughed. “Of course it’s hot,” he said, “Didn’t you see the smoke? Don’t be an idiot. If I tell you to do something stupid, don’t do it. You’re no soldier anymore. I need all my boys to stay alive. There’s no medals in the Pens. There’s king’s work, there’s funerals, and there’s fun in between and there’s nothing else.”

Jona snorted. “He was a soldier?”

Nicola shrugged. “See how he ain’t answering your question because you directed it at me and we’re both higher rank? The kid’s got lots to learn about the Pens before he can walkabout with you tossers.”

Jona thumbed at the door. “Maybe the soldier’ll be rough with a bat like a rolling pin. Our boy Dog’s in there.”

“You ever talk to Dog?” said Nicola.

Jona squinted. “I don’t think so.”

“You think he’s dumb?”

Jona shrugged. “If he was smart, he wouldn’t have lost his tongue, and that was before he was a pinker. I don’t know how dumb he is now.”

Inside the brewery, Calipari and Jona and the new private looked in the slanting light that slipped through the cracks in the ruined walls. A boy cooked a rat over a small fire. Dog was asleep, like a pile of rotten meat and mud that breathed. He looked like death. He looked like misery. He looked like the trash and the boys huddled against the giant had all become one, stinking entity of filth. Dog’s face smiled in his sleep. He was dreaming of something that made his nightmare face smile.

A boy apart from the sleepers, cooking his supper, didn’t look up from his rat. “I ain’t sharing with you, king’s man,” he said, “I caught it. Catch your own rat.”

“We’re looking for the Three Kings,” said Calipari, “You running with the Three Kings?”

“You’re in the wrong place, king’s man.”

Jona leaned against the wall. “You don’t mind if we sit here,” said Jona, “and see who shows up?”

The boy looked at his rat like nothing else in the room was real. “Dog won’t like to wake up with you here unless you bring him something. I won’t share my rat.”

Nicola crossed his legs and sat down on the ground, next to that boy. “I ain’t here about rats,” said Nicola, “I’m looking for kings. Let’s say I wanted to get me a crown like you tough boys around the Pens.”

The boy chortled with a deep voice, like a man. “You want a crown, king’s man?” he said, a boy again, “You’re lying.”

“I’m not lying,” said Nicola, “this lady I been on with has herself a son. He’s growing up tough, like you mudskippers out here in the Pens. He wants a crown. How do I get one?”

“You’re a king’s man,” said the boy. “Take one. That’s what you