In a small intersection off Thames Street, where Rush Lane hinged into the fine crescent of Chequer Ward, outside the grand Plumber’s Hall (red shield, white chevron, cutting knives chief and soldering iron base), sat London’s one and only fountain. It was a small affair, pitiful by continental standards, but it was round and layered in baroque stone fish spouting from their mouths, topped by a reasonable imitation of Belgium’s Manneken Pis, albeit one who was spouting from an altogether different orifice (the plumber had literally gotten the wrong end of the stick). Isabella loved it all the same. It bore her family name: Morice, carved into the bowl, for this fountain had been the plumbers’ memorial to her late great grandfather.

Isabella sat upon the basin wall, and played her toes back and forth in the water. Such public indecency, not to mention mild contamination of a prized water source, was vaguely thrilling, but Isabella cared little right now for the mores of polite society. Besides, it was getting dark: Plumber’s Hall was closed and few were about at this hour. Certainly no-one was foolish enough to take water from the fountain now that the tide was in.

Thames: from the Sanskrit tamasā meaning ‘darkness,’ an old lesson from her father come to her unbidden. Dark waters: that pretty much summed up her mood right now.

“Sorry I’m late, Issy!”

Isabella turned. Despite herself, she smiled. “Milly! You got my note!”

Milly rushed over and threw off her shawl, embracing the younger woman who she had come to love as something like a sister, but with less friction over who got to use the curling irons. “Course I did! Who else uses stationary edged in gold! Every time you write it’s worth a week’s grocery shopping!”

“I’m so glad you came! I’m sorry to take you away from the Bear–”

“Duck!”

“Right... I just don’t want to be around people right now...”

“Aw, it’s alright – Polly and t’others’ll manage. ’Alf the crowd from the flyting’s still drinking! Reckon we’ll be closing early today! Never a dull! So what’s eatin’ you, Issy?”

“What is it ALWAYS!”

“Ah me! They say ‘blood is thicker than water,’ but I says, ‘ale is thicker than both!’”

“That’s very profound, Milly, thank you.”

“You’re welcome, Issy! And someday soon, God willing, I’ll have worked out what it means, an’ all!”

Isabella pursed. “I’m going to put a stop to it, Milly! They can’t go on like this! It’s going to be the end of one or the other of them, or both!”

“Easier said than done, if you ask me. ‘Never get involved with family,’ that’s my motto. Never ends well. It never ends at all, normally. Look at me and Mi...”

“It’s already done, Milly. Phil’s not going to like it, not one bit! Nor’s my dad, but it’s what’s best!”

Milly’s eyes narrowed. “Issy, what have you done?”

Isabella sighed. “If I tell you... you musn’t tell, Jerry. I don’t want him or Phil to know it was me...”

“But I don’t...”

“Milly, swear to me you won’t tell!”

Crouched behind a handy barrel, Clive and Jerry were eavesdropping, despite having neither eaves nor droppings. Sadly, they were a bit out of earshot, so were limited to lipreading, which neither of them could actually do.

Even from this distance, though, Clive could feel Isabella’s pain. “She looks so sad! I wonder what’s wrong?”

Jerry gave him a nudge. “Hey! Maybe her dad’s died?”

Clive stood angrily, knocking over the barrel. “Jerry!” He marched towards the women seated on the fountain.

“Hey!” Jerry called, “Are we in business or ain’t we?”

Milly and Isabella started, alarmed at the disturbance.

Clive walked boldly up to them, only taking a step back when he realised he’d been a bit too bold and his stomach was touching Isabella’s nose.

“Are you ok?”

The crass simplicity of the question took Isabella off balance; whatever acerbic retort had been brewing died in her throat. “I’ll be fine!” she muttered.

Not quite the answer he was hoping for. But Clive was not going to let such a sophisticated opener go to waste so easily. “You don’t look fine!” he insisted.

Suddenly Milly was all up and in his face. “She said she was fine, ok?”

Jerry made his presence known. “Awright, Issy! Any business?”

Milly and Clive turned on him as one. “Jerry!”

“What?”

Isabella fixed Jerry with a withering stare. “No, Jerry, no-one’s died, no business, and this is none of yours! Or yours!” Clive’s turn to get the evils.

Clive threw up his hands. “Hey, I am just trying to help!”

Isabella scoffed. “Oh really? Who are you anyway? Jerry’s latest adopted stray? The last one ended up being made into some manner of coat, as I recall?”

Clive looked at Jerry. Jerry shrugged: “Justacorps.”

Clive stuck out his hand, narrowly missing Isabella’s right eye. “I’m Clive. Clive Hucklefish.”

Isabella took it gingerly, as if it were roadkill. “Huckledish?”

“Fish!”

“No thanks, I’m vegetarian.”

Clive tried to look sympathetic. “Oh... well, never mind! I am sure they’ll find a cure one day!”

Isabella was staring at him now, trying to remember... “Wait! Weren’t you the one earlier who thought my name was Petunia?”

“Well, I like Petunia! It’s my mother’s name!”

“Well, maybe you should run along back home then? I’m sure, Petunia’s worried sick about you!”

This wasn’t going the way Clive imagined. Not at all: like aiming north and winding up on the moon, which was inexplicably not made of the advertised green cheese. He bridled. “I’ll have you know I left home for good! I’m a man now, out to seek my fame and fortune in London Town. Look – I’ve got stubble growing and everything!”

“You must be very proud. Now leave us alone!”

Jerry sat down on the other side of Isabella to Milly and put a hand about her shoulder. “Oh, what’s wrong Issy? Another row with the old man?” His hand slid down towards the small of her back...

Milly slapped his hand away. “Leave it, Jerry!”

Isabella sighed. “I just wish he would listen to me once in a while! Ever since Mother died he’s just become obsessed with his work and beating that bloody Undertaker! He pays more attention to his druid friends than he does to me now!” A moue. “Maybe I should put on a white hood?”

Clive sat down next to Milly, and then whispered (somewhat ineffectively) across both women to Jerry. “What are druids?”

Jerry whispered back. “Hokey-cokey con-men from out of town. They have a stall down Covent Garden selling their bizarre wares!”

“Ooh! What do they sell?”

“Interestingly shaped stones, mainly.”

“Wow! Golly!”

“Yeah, I once bought a stone from them the shape of my ex-girlfriend’s left ear!”

“Crumbs!”

This content has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

Isabella looked at each of them, askance! “Guys! Weren’t we talking about me! Honestly you’re as bad as my father! One mention of druids and you’re off!”

Clive looked at her guilelessly. “But they’re so interesting…”

Jerry went on, sensing opportunity. “Actually, there was this one time they sold me a magic stone that always returned to the owner...” He slipped a hand groundwards and palmed a pebble from the pavement...

Clive was transfixed. “Getaway!”

“No really! I’ve got it right here!”

Milly looked at Isabella. “Here we go…”

Jerry uncurled his hand, revealing the pebble to Clive’s wondering eyes.

Clive was disappointed. “Is that it?”

Jerry snatched the pebble away. “Alright then, my little doubting Thomas! I’ll bet you half a crown that I can throw this stone away not once, not twice, but three times, and each time it will return to the palm of my hand!”

Clive, recently bankrupt and employed in a job with no salary, could taste the gold already! “Ok! You’re on!”

Isabella rolled her eyes.

Jerry rubbed his hands, “There’s another one born every day!” He threw the stone straight up into the air. It landed back in his hand. “That’s once!”

“Hey, that’s not fair!” said Clive.

“Caveat asinus, Clive!” Jerry tossed the stone again. “Twice...”

Isabella scoffed. “Congratulations, Clive! You walked right into that one!”

Jerry hefted the stone again... “And… a final time!” He tossed. This time, though, the stone went rather higher. There was a squawk, and a flurry of feathers... and what dropped from above was most certainly not a stone.

Jerry looked at the casualty. “…Ah. Yeah… well, that can happen.”

Milly grinned. “Looks like you finally found a customer, Muldoon!” Jerry gave her a look.

Clive rubbed his hands with glee. “I think that was half a crown, Mr. Muldoon?”

Jerry was still looking sadly at the dead bird. “No, it was definitely a pigeon, Clive.”

Isabella sighed. “Oh, give him his money, Jerry!”

Jerry opened his (Clive’s) purse. “Never did have much luck with birds.” He gave Milly a wink. “‘Ere. Half a crown – and spend it wisely this time, will ya?”

Suddenly, Clive saw them again – the hungry eyes from the shadows! Yet, this time, they were in motion... No sooner had the half crown touched Clive’s palm, than something brown, familiarly foul-smelling, and incredibly fast had bounded from the shadows and launched itself well inside his zone of comfort.

A round bowl, wooden (oak, possibly alder), was thrust beneath his nose. Clive was suddenly aware of a pair of large, hopeful eyes, an oddly shaped hat with flaps for the ears, and loose fitting rags apparently tailored from sackcloth.

“Money for the blind, sir?”

“Pardon?”

“Money for the blind, sir!” The beggar – for, even in this low light, that was what this creature clearly was (Clive had worked that out for himself) – nodded helpfully towards a leaden badge upon his shoulder upon which had been stamped a crude approximation of London’s coat (shield of St. George’s cross, sword of St. Paul’s martyrdom in the upper quarter, pair of dragon supporters argent). “City of London, registered solicitor, sir!”

“Solicitor?”

“Indeed, sir. ‘One who solicits.’ But you may also call us by our more common nom de guerre, videlicet, ‘a begg-argh!’” The beggar rattled his bowl again. “Money for the blind, sir!”

Jerry snorted. “Registered solicitor! Used to be those not working were rounded up, whipped and put in the stocks!”

The beggar nodded pleasantly, “Ah, but that was prior to the 1563 Act for the Relief of the Poor under good Queen Bess, gawd bless her soul, with its three rationales for poorhood: them what could work but wouldn’t; them what would work but couldn’t; and them what couldn’t, wouldn’t and frankly shouldn’t.”

Jerry gave the beggar a reasonable approximation of Isabella’s withering look. “And which one are you?”

“None, sir. I am what you might call an ‘Overseer of the Poor.’”

“Meaning?”

“I oversee that everyone pays an appropriate contribution to the poor relief. A kind of tax-collector, if you will; highly motivated; thus... money for the blind, sir!”

Clive may have been foolish, borderline asinine, but he was not entirely clueless. While Jerry had been bandering with the beggar over the legal basis for his profession, Clive had been weighing an abundance of evidence: notably, the wide, clear-visioned eyes of the solicitor before him, not to mention the precision and sheer velocity of the beggar’s most recent entrance. “...Wait a moment! You’re not blind!”

“Oh yeah?” said the beggar. “Raise your hand!” he commanded.

Clive did so, wary of a trick à la le Jerry.

The beggar pointed. “How many fingers are you holding up?”

Clive looked at his fingers. Did one count as a thumb? He decided not. “Five!”

The beggar was triumphant! “Wrong, three!”

Clive gaped: thumb or finger, the beggar plainly had no idea what Clive was showing! “‘Struth, you are blind! Here’s half a crown!”

Clink! Twinkle.

“Cheers, mate! I’m off to get plastered!”

Something was feeling very familiar about all this... With a flash, Clive recalled the incident on the Bridge earlier! “Wait a minute! I remember you!”

The beggar thought about this. “No you don’t!”

“Yes I do!”

“I’m blind! You can’t see me!”

“You were legless last time!”

The beggar looked at Clive anew. He sloped back towards him. “So I was! Well well! If it isn’t the generous young man that gave me half a crown earlier!”

And, all at one, the beggar turned, and whistled back down the alleyway from whence he had come: “Hey, boys! We’ve got ourselves a gold mine up here!” And, just like that, the beggar was no longer alone. Sack-clothed shapes poured from every surviving nook and cranny between the jostling buildings about. Some seemed to be bodily hauling themselves up onto the street from the gutters themselves.

Clive, Milly, Isabella and Jerry backed away against the fountain, but found themselves instantly surrounded.

Jerry looked genuinely worried, “Nice one, Clive! Poor relief, my arse! When I get out of here, I’ll–”

Isabella’s eyes were even wider than usual. “Clive, what have you done?”

Clive cast around, looking for an avenue of escape.

“What are we going to do?” mewled Milly, “We ’aven’t got enough ’alf crowns for all of ’em!”

Seen from above, the beggars were bounding closer in ever-tightening elliptics, the fountain the pupil of an unblinking, avaricious eye. And, as they circled, they importuned:

“Money for the deaf, sir?”

“Money for the destitute?”

Another wiggled his thumbs at them. “Money for the thumbless?”

“Money for the ticklish?”

“Money for the dumb, sir?”

The beggars were close enough to touch now (not that you’d want to), palms and begging bowls agape with unbridled parasitic hunger! The toothsome foursome had mounted the apron of the fountain: to retreat any further would have them in the basin!

Clive’s head swung left and right trying futilely to track them all, “Are these the couldn’ts the wouldn’ts or the shouldn’ts?”

Isabella’s eyes were wild, “I think they’re all three!” Her fingers found a handhold on the manneken at her back, but she swiftly released it when she realised which part of its anatomy she had been holding!

Milly was all spite: “Maybe you could charm them with another of your druid stones, Jerry?”

Jerry threw up his hands! “Don’t look at me! I’m all out of hardware!”

Clive looked at Isabella. She looked horrified... who could save her? Who could save any of them, for that matter?

“Alright! Alright! Leave this to me! Beggars of London!” It took a moment for Clive to realise that it was he that had spoken. He pointed at himself with his thumbs and mouthed, me? But the beggars had stopped their circling. They regarded him with curiosity. Clive drew himself up and addressed them again. “Beggars of London! I have no more money to give you… nor have I any druidic stones with which to charm your simple minds!”

A young beggar child looked downcast. “Awww!”

Clive went on, tall upon the apron and channelling every thespic fibre of his being. “It is true! I gave my last two half crowns to this man–” he stabbed a finger at the first beggar, “–though I doubt very much now whether he is indeed legless or blind…”

The beggars had paused in stunned silence.

And then a young beggar maid sidled up to Clive, laying her floppy-eared hat upon his arm. “You mean to say: you gave away your last worldly possession… to a beggar?”

Clive thought about this. Between the theft of his purse and his simple-witted generosity, he was indeed broke. “Well… yes...”

As one... the beggars gasped.

“Apart from the clothes on my back!” Clive qualified.

Jerry put his lips behind his hand for Milly and Isabella’s benefit. “And I don’t think even a beggar would want those!”

The beggars turned their backs upon our winsome protagonists and began to whisper frantically amongst themselves. Finally, they turned back.

The beggar lord took Clive’s hand. “You have done a very generous thing, Clive Hucklefish!” Clive snatched it back: the man looked hungry.

Isabella was shocked. “Clive! They know your name!”

It was the other beggars’ turn to speak. “We know many things about him!”

“His coming has been foretold!”

Clive: “It has?”

The beggar lord nodded eagerly. “It has! ’Twas said that a strange traveller from Devon would come to London and free the beggars from their abject poverty!”

Clive: “It ’twas?”

The female was next to speak. “He would give his last worldly possession to a beggar...”

Clive: “He t’would?”

The child: “...and lead them all to fame and glory!”

“Oh my!”

The beggar lord nodded. “His name will be Clive!”

Milly jabbed Clive’s arm. “Clive! That’s you!”

The beggars were chanting now, rocking from side to side. “His name will be Clive! His name will be Clive!”

The moon had come out now, yet the clouded sky would consent to but one silver beam. The light fell upon Clive, surrounding him in a glowing nimbus of argent. By this time, he had drawn himself up so much he almost appeared to be floating... transfigured by the mere possibility of greatness... ripe and gaseous with hubris...

The beggar lord raised a hand towards him. “Clive?”

“Yes?”

“You are the ONE, Clive!”

“I am?”

And, with that, the clouds crossed before the moon, the light faded, and the beggars fell about laughing.

The beggar lord shook his head. “No, not really!”

Clive was crestfallen. “Oh... but, how did you know my name?”

“Sewn across your waistcoat! AND your breeches.”

“Oh... yes. Temperance... always losing... Silly me!”

Seeing his expression, the beggar lord took Clive by the shoulder. “But it IS said that a man that gives away his last worldly possession to a beggar, becomes a brother to beggars everywhere...”

Clive nodded, “Oh… great! I think…”

“We may not have much, but one thing we always repay is generosity…”

“…with interest!” added another.

“You see, Clive...” the beggar lord began, “we have a little motto:-

‘Spend a penny, and the penny that you spend...

won’t buy a beggar, it’ll buy a friend!’

Today you scratched our back, Clive, but, one day, it’ll be us scratching yours!”

Clive looked nonplussed. “But I don’t need my back scratching... besides, I am sure Jerry would–”

Jerry silenced him with a look.

The beggar lord grinned around at the other beggars, twirling Clive’s half crown round his fingers, “Ah! They all say that, don’t they lads! What help is a band of simple beggar folk?” The beggars chuckled and shook their heads with sly mirth. But then, the lord leaned close to Clive, nose to nose, almost whispering. “But I’ll wager this here magnificent example of legal tender that, one day very soon... you’ll find out!”

And, with that, as suddenly as they had come, the beggars were gone, and all that remained was the smell, and the echo of a ghosting gasp...

“Remember-member-ember!”

“Spend-pend-end...”

“...a penny-enny—Ouch! That’s my knee!-ee-e...”

The street was empty once more.

Our four friends, now united in survival, exchanged relieved glances. Encounters of the clochardly kind frankly merited but one tonic...

Milly looked about her. “Pub?”