“You ‘eard ‘bout this tentacle monster?” Charlie asked.
“No,” Magpie said, though her tone indicated her uncertainty. She hadn’t heard anything about a tentacle monster; her uncertainty was that it was even real. This could be like Selfridges buying stolen stuff back, or a few other times Charlie had spouted complete nonsense with utterly believable confidence. Or it could be like the time Charlie had told her some women liked women the way men liked women, which she had known was nonsense, until she realised it wasn’t, and some women did like women that way.
The problem was, Charlie always made these statements in complete confidence, and there was no way to tell if it was a ridiculous statement or another lesbian explanation.
“You ‘aven’t ‘eard? Seriously, it’s all anyone’s been talkin’ ‘bout for months. Alright, so, there’s this tentacle monster, see? It prowls the city at night, and it grabs folk. Now, mostly, those folk run wi’ gangs, but av’ ‘eard of it takin’ babies ‘n’ grannies ‘n’, one time, a goat.”
“What was a goat doin’ in the city?” Magpie asked instantly, leaning towards the Charlie is talking shit again side of the spectrum.
“I don’t fuckin’ know, do I? Anyway, not the point. Point is, tentacle monster. Comes out the dark and grabs folk, yeah? And it’s all, y’know, rumours. Someone’s cousin’s frien’ or somethin’. Very ‘ard to find anyone who actually knows anythin’, but at the same time, everyone is talkin’ ‘bout it. So, there must be somethin’ to all these rumours, right?”
Magpie reckoned the something behind all the rumours was probably opium, but she waved Charlie on anyway.
“Then last night, the tentacle monster went after the Boys. Right out in the middle of the street, musta been fifty of them there. They all saw it. They all ‘eard it speak, and it’s a woman.”
“A woman tentacle monster?”
“Yeah. Anyway, it faced off against the Boys to protect the Sabs, so I’m thinkin’ more sumant magical spirit than monster, since monsters ain’t real.”
Magical summoned spirit things were definitely real. Supposedly. Magpie had never encountered one; not only were the spirits rare, but the sorcerers powerful enough to summon them were rare. Yet there were enough actual stories, not rumours, of them that they were probably real. Everyone had heard of what happened to Milan. “’ow would the Sabs sumant a spirit?”
“Dunno,” Charlie said. “But get this, right, it can talk. It’s intelligent. Maybe it’s a demon or somethin’. Anyway, it spoke to Wal, ‘n’ then the Boys ran away. ‘e says it was a curse or somethin’, yeah, but it made ‘im beg for his life after just, y’know, a conversation. It was like psychic warfare.”
“Psychological warfare,” Kitty’s voice came from the front of the car. “And you should stop now. We’re almost there.”
Almost there. Almost at one of the Sabini strongholds, one of the parts of the city they guarded the most strongly. Almost about to confront one of the strongest gangs in the city. What was Magpie doing here? Well, that was easy. She was making sure Maria Hill didn’t come for her eyes. What was she doing with the Forty Elephants? That was easy, too.
What were the Forty Elephants doing here? That was the real question.
It had seemed so simple back at home when Kitty laid out her plan. The Sabinis had been attacked and were reeling afterwards. They had less manpower, less protection, confusion in their leadership, and were relying on their reputation to protect them. Kitty had scented weakness and this was what she’d come up with.
Magpie had been buoyed up by the excitement of others.
She hadn’t expected to be so scared.
“You know your roles?” Kitty asked.
They were in the second of three cars. They’d pull into the street, and jump out. Charlie was in a bruiser role for this. She was the smash part of the operation. Magpie had the grab part, and a large bag sat on her lap. She was to grab as much as she could as quickly as she could.
Kitty didn’t usually plan smash and grabs from what Magpie understood, but the Forty Elephants also didn’t usually steal from the heart of Sabini territory.
“Magpie,” Kitty said, “you know your role?”
“Fill my gladstone,” Magpie said.
“Don’t fill your bag completely, Magpie. Gold is a lot heavier than you imagine. Just fill it enough that you can still lift it.”
“I ‘ear ye.”
Lillian, the driver, pulled the car in beside the curb. Kitty and Charlie jumped out immediately. “Magpie, move your ass,” Kitty yelled.
Magpie threw the door open and leapt out into the street. The noise enveloped her like a storm. So much shouting. Italian. English. She could hear Maria Hill, out of the first car, already on top of a Sabini she’d taken to the ground. She could hear the girls around her whooping in excitement. Charlie was smashing windows, knees, anything that could be smashed. Kitty was yelling the countdown, they had forty seconds.
Forty.
Magpie was standing by the car, clutching the bag to her chest.
“Move it, Magpie,” Kitty yelled.
Magpie jumped. She ran into the building in front of her, Charlie moving alongside her as protection. She had a large piece of wood, and she was brandishing it like a sword. She’d have made a good pirate. Unless she got seasick or something.
The shop… workshop? It didn’t have a counter for selling, but it had long tables and benches, and smelled of metal, charcoal, and beeswax. There were what looked like tools on the table, and men in dark aprons pressed up against the wall as Charlie threatened them with her bar of wood.
Thirty seconds.
Magpie went to the table and started dumping gold into her bag. Little nuggets of precious metal. Chains. A tray of rings, each with a space for a stone but no stone in them. A little box full of… were those diamonds? She froze for a moment when she opened the box and then dumped the diamonds in her bag.
A box filled with fancy watches.
Silver wire. Gold wire. Precious stones she didn’t recognise. Tools that might be expensive. What might be someone’s lunch. She didn’t have time to sort out what was important and what wasn’t. She had…
Twenty seconds.
One of the men grabbed her bag. She didn’t let go, but she wasn’t strong enough to get it back. She was screaming in his face and her vision was blurry. He wouldn’t give in and she couldn’t leave without it and the Forty Elephants were going to leave her behind and then she’d die. She didn’t want to die. She didn’t want to be left behind.
Then the man took a wooden bar to the face and she had the bag and everything was perfect, except there was blood on her dress, but that was okay.
“Fuckin’ move it,” Charlie yelled in her ear.
Five seconds.
She was back in the street, lugging the bag, which was stupidly heavy. It was surprisingly bright. Had it always been so sunny out here? Was it that dark in the workshop? The bag was really heavy. She half collapsed into the car with it and they were driving away.
Minus five seconds.
She really didn’t need the countdown any more. They were gone. Everyone was laughing. Everyone was happy. She hadn’t been left behind.
“Yer like a pirate,” she told a grinning Charlie.
Charlie grinned wider and grabbed her face and kissed her. Magpie froze and Charlie pulled back. “Sorry.”
She was sorry because Magpie had frozen? She thought Magpie didn’t like it. Did Magpie like it? She was fairly certain women shouldn’t kiss women, but she was also fairly certain women shouldn’t rob gold workshops protected by Italian gangsters in the middle of the day and the kiss had been… nice? Charlie’s lips were soft and her breath was spicy.
Magpie had never been kissed before.
It was… did she like it? Did she like Charlie?
She loved Charlie, Charlie was her best friend, but did she actually like Charlie?
Charlie looked upset. It wasn’t a good look for her pirate. She should be fearless, daring, talking absolute shit about goat-stealing tentacle monsters. She shouldn’t be looking like she’d just found a copper reading her diary.
It was Magpie’s fault, she’d taken too long to say something. Do something. She had to fix this.
“I don’t think the tentacle monster really ‘alf-inched a goat,” she said, and died a little inside.
Charlie just stared at her, then her composure broke and she guffawed, and Magpie was laughing, too, and Kitty was screaming in joy, and the Forty Elephants had just robbed Hatton Gardens.
Everything was good, for now.
Later on, she’d have to think about kissing, and clean the blood off her dress, and make sure her pirate was okay.
But that was later, and right now she had a gladstone full of gold and some guy’s lunch on her lap.
Previous Chapter: Chapter Thirty-nine
Next Chapter: Chapter Forty-one
Editor’s Note
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
From: The London Eye Editorial Board
Subject: Language
Date: June 18, 1922
Confused? You might need The Hildy Johnson Cockney Slang Dictionary. It explains all the flapper slang in this, and other, chapters.
Author’s Note
There is a queerguide to accompany this chapter. It goes in-depth into the most important thing that just happened.
No spoilers though, I wouldn’t do that to you.
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