Its getting domestic, oh and the circus is in town :)
Holmes stayed gone for the rest of the evening.
Gala had wrapped himself in the towels, feeling warm and at home in his skin like he hadn´t in a long time. Something about being clean, really clean was addicting.
Mrs. Hudson had knocked and asked him to leave his clothes so that she could wash them. He had pointed out that this were indeed his only clothes. She said the ´good Doctor´ would find something for him. But Gala has taken his shoes and put his glasses back on. He was only able to trust to a certain point.
But as he tapped, slightly embarrassed, back into the living room he found the Doctor had spread a couple of trousers out for him. Gala had given back the robe he had been too afraid to even try on, in case a deep breath would rupture the seams.
"Mrs. Hudson said she has some shirts from her late husband still in a chest. He must have been a rather heavy man. Perhaps these will fit your shoulders. I fear my ones will only make a good shawl for you.", Gala had smiled hat that. And the Doctor had taken that as an invitation to hand him a pair of pyjama bottoms. Gala had eyed the striped fabric from all angles and had carefully asked:" Won´t they be a little … thin for this weather?"
"They aren´t meant for outside wear. You sleep in them."
First Gala had taken it as a joke. But he soon found out that yes, ´civilised´ people owned clothes only to wear them to bed.
The Doctor had sent him in his bedroom to try some of the pants. They were all too short, but they fit around the waist, and they would do as long as Mrs. Hudson was busy doing whatever with Galas slacks.
The Doctor had offered him another brandy, Gala took it, because he took nearly everything. Finally Gala was semi-dressed, in a pair of grey woolly trousers and high socks that made him look rather
dandy. The shirt he wore was striped and had a collar like seaman wore them. Mrs. Hudson had even found him a vest. The clothes were rather short, and very baggy around his belly, but the shoulders fit, and they were clean.
Gala was pretty sure this was the best cloth he has ever worn. He now had a white handkerchief for Pete's sake.
Watson had got hold of some new laces and Gala and he had sat down by the fire while they cleaned and dried Galas muddy boots.
It felt all so unreal that Gala waited for the barking of a guard that would wake him form his dream. He heard that you had good dreams when you froze to death. Perhaps he had fallen asleep in the glacial cell and this was his last reward.
It made his skin crawl.
To take his mind of this thought he did something he normally never did.
He struck up a conversation:" I heard you served?"
The Doctor stopped in his efforts of scraping at the leather, he looked up, nearly as surprised as Gala.
"I did. In Afghanistan. I was wounded and send home."
"I´m sorry.", said Gala. Not really sure what he was sorry for.
There was a pause. Then: "May I ask you something? You do not have to answer of course."
"Go ahead Doc."
"How old are you?" The Doc was not the first to be puzzled by him. They saw him a few yards away, and would have taken him for a man in his forties. But the years fell of him, the nearer they got.
"Not quite sure. The orphanage gave me a random birthday. About twenty I think."
The Doctor nodded:" What birthday did they give you?"
"St. Antoni´s. For all the things lost.", Gala snorted. They brushed some more.
The Doc wasn't stupid enough to say something like: Have you thought about changing your way?
Instead he said:" Would you let me look at your writs now?"
This bastard was stubborn, you had to give him that.
Gala held out his arm and the doctor immediately took it. He manipulated the hand in one way or the other, it hurt like hell. Sometimes when he would be shoot to all hell and somebody would patch him up, the slow and unhurried pain would give Gala goose bumps. It never happened in a fight, never in the moment of action. If Gala had been a contemplative man he probably would have wondered about this. But Gala had accepted long ago that he was born a savage, with all that came with it. He was pretty sure to remain feral even in the best of circumstances, so he did his best to keep his brutality where it hit people he deemed deserving of it.
When the Doctor send a shiver down his spine Gala did what he did every time the pain got too much to ignore it: He grinned. Enjoying pain was something most people found appalling and it held any well-meaning soul out of the hazardous area.
The Doctor however send him a troubled glance and asked:" Do you want something for the pain?"
That made Gala blink:" What?"
"This is badly bruised. I don't think it´s broken. Can you feel all your finger?"
"Doc, that's not the first time this happened."
"Nevertheless. Can you fell you finger?"
Gala signed:" Yes."
"Bend them please.", Gala clenched his fist with the most shit eating grin he could muster.
The Doctor only nodded:" The other one please."
They repeated the performance.
"This must hurt.", the Doctor declared:" Let me wrap them, then I can give you something."
He smeared a salve on the scraped and swollen skin and wrapped it so gently that Gala was tempted to knock him over.
Watson didn't ask him if it felt better, he simply went to his bag and came back with a brown glass bottle full of powder.
"This will help with the pain. I´ll just go and find some water."
He made his way out of the room and Gala heard him scamper down the stairs.
Gala immediately spread out his new handkerchief and dumped a liberate amount of the powder on it. He checked the level and added a little more before he gave it a good shake to disguise the changed content extend. By the time the Doctor entered with a pitcher and a glass, both powder bottle and Handkerchief had been put back with the outmost care.
The doctor dissolved a teaspoon of the powder in the glass, giving it a misty appearance.
"You can have some again tomorrow morning."
Gala eyed the glass and the doctor took a mouthful before he handed it over.
Watson swallowed and added:" It will only help with the pain. Nothing more."
Reluctantly Gala drank. It tasted foul but he finished it.
"Is he really that good?" asked Gala.
Watson, who had been in the process of repacking his bag looked up:" Who? Holmes?"
Gala nodded:" You know what he is about to drag us into?"
Watsons face softened and he left his bag to come to the fire. He pulled his pantlegs up before he sat down, his underarms resting on his knees, his upper body leaning forward.
"You cannot imagine what I have seen him do. He is nothing short of a magician."
Gala snorted.
"Have you never heard of his cases before?"
"Paper doesn´t blush."
"Do you call me a liar?", asked the Doctor, not without a mischievous sparkle in his eye.
"Our body's will float down the river." Deadpanned Gala.
"My good boy, nothing of the sort will happen."
Gala snorted again.
Watson picked up the half-finished boot and resumed cleaning it. Gala waited for their conversation to continue, but the Doctor kept silent and after a while Gala started working on his boot as well.
Out of the blue the Doctor suddenly said:" We have hunted murderer, and we have been hunted. We were alone in the direst of circumstances and we made it. I would entrust Holmes with my life in a heartbeat. He doesn't look it, but he isn't frivolous with the wellbeing of the people around him."
Gala was not so sure how far this went for convicts, but the Doctor was so enrolled in his speech that Gala couldn't bring it over him to interrupt him.
"It is a sad truth that decency does not always grow in the same way as the privileges that come with powerful positions. And it gets precarious if these powerful men become nearly untouchable. For what you have been imprisoned they would reap a laugh. So, don't make the mistake to believe we would feel the need to stay inside of laws not suitable."
Gala needed sometime to process what the Doctor had said. Finally, he muttered:" You´re prepared to kill?"
The Doctor smiled a little:" I will not take life´s if there is another possibility. But I´m prepared to do anything to shelter the ones not protected by the privileges I have."
Self-righteous Turd, thought Gala. But he said nothing, instead he watched the doctor finish lacing the boot only to snuggle back into his armchair soaking up the warmth the fire provided, apparently carefree.
He even closed his eyes.
This people were nuts.
Gala leaned back himself and let his eyes drift through the room.
A rather extending weapon collection was hung on the opposite wall. Swords, flat in wooden mounts. Their blades a vast array of width and length. All gleaming deadly.
The table by the door crowded with a strange looking glass arrangement. Some bubbling, and one emitted a strange greasy kind of smoke.
Gala met the eyes of Queen Victoria, gawking out of a wooden frame hung next to an immense bookcase. Furthermore, there where three tables, one big, one small, and one apparently used for paperwork. The oddest array of objects was dispersed throughout the whole room. Not really clutter but incongruous - like a moustache on the Queen.
A Slipper was nailed to the frame of the fireplace and Gala could have sworn there where bullet holes in the wall. They went rather nicely with the dark botanical wallpaper. Some keys in a bowl. As silently as he could, Gala heaved himself out of the chair. He simply took the whole key ring. Tonight, it wouldn't be missed, and even if it would, it was much less suspicious if the whole ring was absent. The doctor seemed like the type who would believe he lost them.
Gala made it back to his chair, going so far to feign sleep, and shoved the foot of the doctor.
Watson snored himself awake: "Oh dear, how impolite. You must be exhausted."
What a charming man.
Mrs. Hudson bustled around him all the way down the stairs. Gala followed her cautiously not to step on her skirts.
She led him down the hall and into a small chamber that very clearly had been a pantry only hours ago. There still were some shelves full of preserves.
But there was a small window and a cot, nearly bending under the weight of three blankets and a quilt.
"It´s not much I´m afraid", said Mrs. Hudson:" But it´s warm and you can close the door."
Gala was strangely touched by this. For some reason it hurt like hell as well. It was one thing to be used to the treatment he usually got, but it was something completely different if somebody did right by him. It sparked something and he was afraid that rooms with frozen walls would be that much harder afterwards.
"It´s very nice.", he uttered finally.
"I´ve got nothing to put your clothes into, but I brought you the chair so they won´t lay on the ground.", she kept on explaining, showing him an old and well used wooden chair in the corner of the small room.
He nodded, completely lost for words.
She did seem to be offended by his silence. Simply wished him a good night and left him to it.
Gala waited till the grandfather clock in the hall struck one. The house had been silent, but he couldn´t risk disturbing a nightly reader. Sitting on his cot, his legs rolled in the quilt, his back leaning against the wall, not letting himself sleep, he waited.
Finally, he decided it was time. He wrapped himself in two of the blankets, and eyed the preserves for a moment, before he took two of the jars as well.
Getting out of the house was easy. No squeaking boards no stairs to overcome, he could simply march out the front door. He tried the keys from the warmth of the hall. He had to try all five until he finally found one that matched the door.
He even went so far to lock it behind him. After all, the Doctor and Mrs. Hudson should stay as safe and as sound as they were.
He marvelled at his boots. Watson had smeared them with some kind of polish, making them nearly waterproofed. Gala trudged through the slug, his hearth beating in anticipation.
His march took him through the half of London and about an hour.
The district he ended up in was a misshaped collection of halve decayed houses made from stolen brick and spite. It laid directly at the river and the foul smell of the filth that swashed through the city had crawled in every last nook.
Gala shoved through a small alley that opened up to a surprisingly large square.
Shacks and wagons lined the borders of the ground. All arranged around a big top made of worn and frayed canvas.
It might have been striped once, tonight is was pale. Ropes had been strained, triangular flags, ragged and washed out hung limply in the cold air.
The flaky paint on the wagons told stories of grandeur.
Golden Letters over the entrance of a dirty blue carriage announced: ´Wilbour the Magnificent`.
A black man, on the side of a dirty green shack lifted two weights of 200 pounds. The metal hefts perfectly round on the rods. Underwritten with the word ´Goliath´. Two feet to his left was another man painted on the wood, this one raised a giant scaly lizard. The lizard seemed happy about it. It had its huge mouth opened wide and rows of dirty beige fangs smiled at the world.
Something roared and a voice started a calming murmur.
Gala meandered through the dwellings. Evaded dimly lit hatches.
Someone started coughing. Wheezed and rattled like his bones shook. Perhaps they did.
A cat limped over the path. Stopped and enrolled an abnormally long tail. It raised itself on his hindlegs and jumped. It made it to the top of the waggon with two leaps, chattering it scattered into the night.
Gala knocked on the door of a red wagon. No words on this one. Only disturbing Shadows, long and drawn were smudged at the walls. Some had eyes. Black abysses glancing at the souls dumb enough to come close.
Nothing moved. But the sounds in the direct neighbourhood of the red wagon hushed. A threatening silence took over.
Gala knocked again, with no reaction still.
He made his way to the small window and tapped against the glass.
"Go away, or I´ll curse you.", rasped a dark voice.
"Open up. I brought some shit.", answered Gala.
Commotion could be heard from inside the wagon.
Feet slapping on wooden planks and the door swung open.
A woman, as black as the strongman´s picture, peeked into the darkness:" Are you on the run?"
"´Course not.", growled Gala.
"Jail sentences get shorter by the day.", she mused.
"You're a riot. Let me in."
The woman stepped back and let Gala enter the wagon before she snapped the door close.
She rummaged a little in the murk. Then an oil lamp was lit.
The wagon was meticulous. Shawls were folded in orderly stacks, ratty robes hung in the open, perhaps to dry, dried herbs dangled from the ceiling all in orderly rows. The only thing square was a cat, perched on a shelf hissing at Gala.
The woman herself was nearly as tall as Gala, but thin as a stick. Her hair was braided thigh on her skull, of course in the most precise patterns. She wore a robe of thick bloodred corduroy, that looked warm and remarkable new. Her slender arms were crossed over her chest.
"Before I forget, the monkey is out again. Saw him leaping to freedom over Barneys roof.", began Gala their conversation.
The woman swore, added:" Stay here.", and rushed out.
"If you won´t bite, I won´t bite." Gala informed the cat. It promptly stopped the hissing. Sizing him with dark, clever eyes.
"What? You the last one she cursed?"
It caterwauled.
"Can´t help you there.", he tiptoed his way the only chair and sat down. The temperature inside the wagon was higher than outside but barely, so he kept his blankets around him.
It didn't take long before the woman came back, but long enough for Gala to doze off. He came to with a start.
"Getting soft?", she asked, while poking at the fire in a small stove with what looked like a police club.
"Peonie!", a man called outside.
She went back to the door and stretched forward, holding herself with one hand on the doorframe:" What?"
"What about Berny?"
"What about him?"
"He needs meat."
"You bring the lion. You feed the lion." She answered.
"Peonie.", the voice sounded desperate.
"Let me think. But I don't promise anything.", she closed the door, thought better of it and screamed after the man outside:" Don't you get eaten!"
The answer to that was to faint for Gala.
Peonie had made it inside and a smile brightened her features:" I thought they sacked you?"
"No. Here.", he pushed the preserve jars in her arms.
"You brought me peaches? Where did you get those?"
"Don't ask. How is he?"
Peonies face darkened:" Right to the point, as always?"
He didn't answer so she sighed. She put the jaws to the very disgruntled cat und motioned him to follow her.
They passed a couple of wagons, one with a giant tooth on top of it, one with the outside so scorched that it rubbed soot on Galas blanket.
"Good thing you're here.", she murmured, ducking under one of the tent ropes.
She brought him to very outpost of the wagon circles.
"I tried what I could. Had Henry have a look at him. But… You´ll see.", she pulled him up the wobbly stairs of one of the storage wagons. It was filled with costumes, frills and ruffles, moth-eaten and damp.
"I have him behind the fake wall. Though it would be best if somebody comes looking."
Gala nodded and watched her lift out some of the illusory wall planks. Behind it was even more havoc.
In the middle of the chaos laid a man, a little younger than Gala, his face still too soft, wrapped in what looked like a clown's jacket, twitching in his sleep.
"Have him propped on some stuff so he can´t turn. His back looks bad."
Gala watched the man jerk, lost in the sight.
"Gala.", Peonies voice dragged him back in the here and now.
"Mhm."
"Who is he?" she asked cautious.
"You don't want to know."
"If I keep him I have to know."
"I promise, he´s not dangerous."
"Of course not. Look at him. But whoever did this.", she saw Galas fist clench and didn't finish the sentence.
"Just for a while."
"I won´t send him away like that.", she snarled:" You looked a lot worse when you showed up."
Gala didn't bite, instead he asked:" Can I get water?"
"Water?"
"Just Water."
"You are a strange man.", but she left them to find what he asked for.
The youth in the bed was about five feet tall, his hair was too long to be fashionable and Peonie had braided it to get it out of his face. Gala gingerly sat down next to him. His fingers shook when he reached for his head. The man shuddered but didn't react in any other way.
"Hey, dunce.", Gala had nearly folded himself in half, whispering.
The eyes of the young man flew open. Before Gala could even breath the other one had slung both his arms tightly around his neck.
Carefully Gala cradled the back of the others head, anxious not to touch his back.
"Dunce, its ok."
Gala wanted to say lay back down. You'll hurt yourself, but it felt so nice. Having Dunce so close. His breath on his shoulders. His face, slightly to hot pressed in his neck. Fever. That explained the need for contact. Gala growled and Dunce only held tighter. Idiot. Gala would never understand why Dunce had decided to trust him. Gala knew he was an asshole. Gala wondered how long it would take, till Dunce found out that Gala was only passable by the warped standards he had known till now. But Gala would take what he could until this happen.
"Thought you were in prison?", came the muffled question from his neck.
"Does it feel like I am?", he asked back.
They stayed like that for some time, before Dunce asked: "What are these clothes?"
"I´ve got a job."
"Gala –"
"No not like that."
The door rattled and Peonie announced:" water."
"Right. I brought you something."
He shook some of the powder in the glass Peonie gave him. He stirred it by swinging the glass spilling a little in the process.
"What is that?", asked Peonie, more interested than distrustful.
"It's for the pain. I´ll leave the rest with you. You can give it to him two times a day."
"That won't last.", said Peonie immediately when she saw what was left in the cloth.
"I'll try to get more." growled Gala, he helped Dunce sitting up a little to drink.
Dunce swallowed it without his eyes ever leaving Gala: „Are you staying?"
"As long as I can. But I´ll be back either way. I promise."
That seemed enough for Dunce.
Gala could see the exact moment the medication took over. The feverish young man was no match for the drug, his eyes closing even if he tried to blink them open a couple of times.
"Sleep. I´ll be back. It´s gonna be ok."
"I worry.", murmured Dunce.
"I know.", Gala left a hand on Dunce head until his breathing evened out. When he was sure the other one wouldn't notice the missing touch he took off the blankets he had on his back and carefully wrapped Dunce in them.
"Can you put an oven in here?", he asked Peonie.
"There already is.", she answered offended:" What do you take me for? We have no coal. I burnet some of my wagon railings to make it bearable in here."
"I´ll try to get some."
"Sure, you do." She sounded tired. Tired in a way that had nothing to do with a bad night, but everything with the need to get a whole circus through the winter:" Let him sleep, come on."
She ushered him out, replaced the fake wall.
Gala watched stone faced as Dunce vanished behind the timber. He waited till they were outside and a couple of wagons away before he said:" He will survive." It was a question as much as a necessity.
"He has the best chance we are able to give him.", answered Peonie:" And we are not giving up."
Hopefully you are all doing well, even if the word is being ... what it is at the moment.
I´d be happy to hear from you.