And at that rate he could send for Esther in a few weeks. Then he and his twin would be free of slavery. His heart leaped at the prospect.

He had written to Esther as soon as he had settled at Dermot’s place, and she had replied. His escape was the talk of the glen, she said. Some of the young hewers were trying to get up a petition to the English Parliament protesting against slavery in the mines. And Annie had married Jimmy Lee. Mack felt a pang of regret about Annie. He would never again roll in the heather with her. But Jimmy Lee was a good man. Perhaps the petition would be the beginning of a change; perhaps the children of Jimmy and Annie would be free.

The last of the coal was shoveled into sacks and stacked on a barge, to be rowed to the shore and stored in a coal yard. Mack stretched his aching back and shouldered his shovel. Up on deck the cold air hit him like a blast, and he put on his shirt and the fur cloak Lizzie Hallim had given him. The coal heavers rode to shore with the last of the sacks, then walked to the Sun to get their wages.

The Sun was a rough place used by seamen and stevedores. Its earth floor was muddy, the benches and tables were battered and stained, and the smoky fire gave little heat. The landlord, Sidney Lennox, was a gambler, and there was always a game of some kind going on: cards, dice, or a complicated contest with a marked board and counters. The only good thing about the place was Black Mary, the African cook, who used shellfish and cheap cuts of meat to make spicy, hearty stews the customers loved.

Mack and Dermot were the first to arrive. They found Peg sitting in the bar with her legs crossed underneath her, smoking Virginia tobacco in a clay pipe. She lived at the Sun, sleeping on the floor in a corner of the bar. Lennox was a receiver as well as an undertaker, and Peg sold him the things she stole. When she saw Mack she spat into the fire and said cheerfully: “What ho, Jock—rescued any more maidens?”

“Not today.” He grinned.

Black Mary put her smiling face around the kitchen door. “Oxtail soup, boys?” She had a Low Countries accent: people said she had once been the slave of a Dutch sea captain.

“No more than a couple of barrelfuls for me, please,” Mack replied.

She smiled. “Hungry, eh? Been working hard?”

“Just taking a little exercise to give us an appetite,” said Dermot.

Mack had no money to pay for his supper, but Lennox gave all the coal heavers credit against their earnings. After tonight, Mack resolved, he would pay cash on the nail for everything: he did not want to get into debt.

He sat beside Peg. “How’s business?” he said facetiously.

She took his question seriously. “Me and Cora tumbled a rich old gent this afternoon so we’re having the evening off.”

Mack found it odd to be friends with a thief. He knew what drove her to it: she had no alternative but starvation. All the same something in him, some residue of his mother’s attitudes, made him disapprove.

Peg was small and frail, with a bony frame and pretty blue eyes, but she had the callous air of a hardened criminal, and that was how people treated her. Mack suspected that her tough exterior was protective coloring: below the surface there was probably just a frightened little girl who had no one in the world to take care of her.

Black Mary brought him soup with oysters floating in it, a slab of bread and a tankard of dark beer, and he fell on it like a wolf.

The other coal heavers drifted in. There was no sign of Lennox, which was unusual: he was normally playing cards or dice with his customers. Mack wished he would hurry up. Mack was impatient to find out how much money he had made this week. He guessed Lennox was keeping the men waiting for their wages so they would spend more at the bar.

Cora came in after an hour or so. She looked as striking as ever, in a mustard-colored outfit with black trimmings. All the men greeted her, but to Mack’s surprise she came and sat with him. “I hear you had a profitable afternoon,” he said.

“Easy money,” she said. “A man old enough to know better.”

“You’d better tell me how you do it, so I don’t fall victim to someone like you.”

She gave him a flirtatious look. “You’ll never have to pay girls, Mack, I can promise you that”

“Tell me anyway—I’m curious.”

“The simplest way is to pick up a wealthy drunk, get him amorous, take him down a dark alley then run off with his money.”

“Is that what you did today?”

“No, this was better. We found an empty house and bribed the caretaker. I played the role of a bored housewife—Peg was my maid. We took him to the house, pretending I lived there. I got his clothes off and got him into bed, then Peg came rushing in to say my husband was back unexpectedly.”

Peg laughed. “Poor old geezer, you should have seen his face, he was terrified. He hid in the wardrobe!”

“And we left, with his wallet, his watch and all his clothes.”

“He’s probably still in that wardrobe!” said Peg, and they both went off into gales of laughter.

The coal heavers’ wives began to appear, many of them with babies in their arms and children clinging to their skirts. Some had the spirit and beauty of youth, but others looked weary and underfed, the beaten wives of violent and drunken men. Mack guessed they were all here in the hope of getting hold of some of the wages before all the money was drunk, gambled or stolen by whores. Bridget Riley came in with her five children and sat with Dermot and Mack.

Lennox finally showed up at midnight.

He carried a leather sack full of coins and a pair of pistols, presumably to protect him from robbery. The coal heavers, most of whom were drunk by this time, cheered him like a conquering hero when he came in, and Mack felt a momentary contempt toward his workmates: why did they show gratitude for what was no more than their due?

Lennox was a surly man of about thirty, wearing knee boots and a flannel waistcoat with no shirt. He was fit and muscular from carrying heavy kegs of beer and spirits. There was a cruel twist to his mouth. He had a distinctive odor, a sweet smell like rotting fruit. Mack noticed Peg flinch involuntarily as he went by: she was scared of the man.

Lennox pulled a table into a corner and put the sack down and the pistols next to it. The men and women crowded around, pushing and shoving, as if afraid Lennox would run out of cash before their turn came. Mack hung back: it was beneath his dignity to scramble for the wages he had earned.

He heard the harsh voice of Lennox raised over the hubbub. “Each man has earned a pound and eleven pence this week, before bar bills.”

Mack was not sure he had heard right. They had unloaded two ships, some fifteen hundred score, or thirty thousand sacks of coal, giving each man a gross income of about six pounds. How could it have been reduced to little more than a pound each?

There was a groan of disappointment from the men, but none of them questioned the figure. As Lennox began to count out individual payments, Mack said: “Just a minute. How do you work that out?”

Lennox looked up with an angry scowl. “You’ve unloaded one thousand four hundred and forty-five score, which gives each man six pounds and fivepence gross. Deduct fifteen shillings a day for drink—”

“What?” Mack interrupted. “Fifteen shillings a day?” That was three-quarters of their earnings!

Dermot Riley muttered his agreement. “Damned robbery, it is.” He did not say it very loudly, but there were murmurs of agreement from some of the other men and women.

“My commission is sixteen pence per man per ship,” Lennox went on. “There’s another sixteen pence for the captain’s tip, six pence per day for rent of a shovel—”

“Rent of a shovel?” Mack exploded.

“You’re new here and you don’t know the rules, McAsh,” Lennox grated. “Why don’t you shut your damned mouth and let me get on with it, or no one will get paid.”