Slammerkin - Emma Donoghue [48]
Mary couldn't believe how cold the air was tonight; it lit up the inside of her mouth like a bunch of spearmint. It didn't make her cough, though; her lungs were strong again. Grit fell in her eyes; she covered them, then bared them again, peering round her hand. Colours she'd never seen, had no words for, were lavished on the hard sky. She couldn't imagine how this magic was done, how the air exploded without killing the watchers, how the stars were made to come out all at once in every colour of the rainbow.
At the base of the Tower, men bared to the waist ran up with tapers, sweating in the cold, then dashed to a safe distance. 'Last year one of them run the wrong way, and stumbled on a rocket,' commented an old man to his neighbour, just in front of Mary.
'I remember,' the woman said in satisfaction. 'I heard there was a hole burnt clear through him!'
Silver lights plummeted and faces appeared again all round Mary, hundreds and thousands of them, thick-set like primroses all over Tower Hill. No one was looking back at her; their eyes were all on the extravagant lights. In the crowd she saw a child with his face to the sky, his mouth an O of wonder. Then she noticed his small hand picking the pocket of the gentleman beside him, and she laughed out loud. It felt like the first time she'd laughed all winter.
The white fog of smoke rolled over the crowd and the bodies surged backwards. The woman in front of Mary stood on her foot; Mary shoved her away. Burning ash landed on wigs and bonnets; screams went up. People pressed against Mary from all sides, squeezing the breath out of her. She won herself a space with her elbows.
The smoke sank. Was that the last of it? 'More,' bawled the crowd. A silence; that plaintive sound of something whizzing up into the sky, and every mouth in the city seemed to hold its breath. Then a crack like a gun, and the darkness split again. Rockets exploded like blood jetting from a dozen cuts. A Roman candle spat out stars. Mary's neck was stiff from watching the world turned upside down. She could almost believe those preachers who claimed earthquakes were a sign of God's wrath. How could the Mighty Master not be irked by such a stealing of his thunder?
When the show was finally over and the sky cleared, the crowd began to stretch and thin. Mary stumbled; she couldn't feel her frozen legs. She was seized from behind by an old fellow with one arm. 'Sound of war, that is,' he boasted fearfully in her ear.
'As if you'd remember!' said Mary, not unkindly.
She picked out a small coin from the sewing wages the Matron had given her, and bought a cup of hot gin from a barrow-woman to warm up her insides; its harsh perfume mixed with the smoke on her tongue. If she kept moving she'd be all right. She spent another few pence on a small pot of rouge and applied it to her mouth and cheekbones. Glancing in a shop window, she saw her reflection, her old familiar red-lipped harlot's face.
Rounding the corner to Billingsgate she crashed into a man with his waistcoat hanging from one shoulder and his shirt billowing. 'Give's a kiss for luck then.' He wrapped himself round her like a flag.
She thrust him away.
'Can't say no tonight, m'dear.' He breathed pure brandy in her face. 'Nobody can't say no on New Year's.'
His mouth was warm and liquid. Mary let him dip his tongue in for a minute before she pulled loose and walked on. She tripped over a stick that was still smoking. It shocked her to recognise it as a firework; all that glory come down to a blackened skewer. How much all this had to cost! They might as well toss banknotes on a fire, like leaves at the end of summer.
Such a hard icy night she'd picked to make her grand exit from the Magdalen. Still, Mary had no regrets. She walked