good Lord thought to give me a spare.”
“How’d you lose it?”
“Don’t want to talk about it.”
Julian glances at Wild’s suddenly distorted face, at his body struggling not to double over, and looks away.
The ambient light from the nearby fires illuminates the street. In the glimmer, Julian’s eyes search for Mia. He spots her a few houses down, comforting the old woman who has stopped wailing. His gaze steadies and rests on her. When he blinks, he catches Wild staring at him.
“Who are you?” Wild says. “It’s like you know Folgate from another life.”
“That must be it.” He nudges his new friend. “Heads up,” Julian says quietly. “On my ten.”
From the left, three young guys appear stealthily out of the darkness, heading for the house in front of which Wild and Julian stand. “See, if you hadn’t put out the fire in the damn kitchen, they’d walk right past us,” Julian says to Wild, and louder to the trio, “Move along. You have no business here.”
“And what business do you have here?” one of them says.
Wild shows them his Home Guard badge.
“Step out of the way, cripple,” an intense-looking chap says, approaching them. “You too, old man,” he says to Julian. “You don’t want to get hurt.”
“You don’t want to get hurt,” Julian says.
“Nice one, Jules,” Wild whispers.
“Thanks, Wild.”
The three boys laugh. They taunt Julian. “What are you going to do, swat at us? Point at us with your pointer?”
“He can’t even make a V sign!”
Julian turns his body sideways and kicks the talking bloke straight in the chest. The guy falls backwards. His head hits the bricks. “Move, Wild,” Julian says, and to the attackers, “Go on, you two. I told you, you don’t want to get hurt.”
The two young men menace Julian, both edging to his right, where they assume he is weakest. One guy swings a stick. Julian catches the stick in the crook of his right elbow and chops the guy on the side of the neck with his open left palm. The boy reels, is thrown off balance, and now Julian is armed. He hits the guy once on the forearm and even harder across his shoulder, all secondary but debilitating injuries. He squares off against the remaining youth. “Did you see how gently I tapped your friend’s arm with his own stick?” Julian says. “I could’ve bashed him in the face. And then he’d be dead. But, the night is still young. So what would you like to do? Run? Or fence?”
The dude clearly has learned nothing. He swings. Julian blocks, and kicks him in the knee. Howling, the guy drops to the ground. The entire confrontation has taken no more than twenty seconds.
Wild is overjoyed. “Finch, Dunk!” he yells. “Come here. I can’t fucking believe it! Did you see that?”
“He hit the dirt with such a beautiful thud,” Julian says with a light smile.
Finch and Duncan run over. Finch is not overjoyed. “No reason to knock them out like that,” he says dourly. “The cops will be here soon.”
“And now there’s less for them to do,” says Julian.
“Don’t listen to a word Finch says, Jules,” Duncan says. “That was amazing.”
“You got lucky, that’s all,” Finch says. “You caught them off guard.”
“You’re right, I did,” Julian says agreeably. “Otherwise I wouldn’t stand a chance.” He winks at Wild.
Wild throws his one arm around Julian. “Jules, you’ve been baptized by fire. You’re now officially a member of our Ten Bells Watch. Finch, go get him a Home Guard badge.”
“I can’t get him anything without an ID.”
“Get him an ID, too, Finch, or I’ll beat you with his stick,” Duncan says cheerfully.
Finch points to the groaning men. “What do you propose to do with them?” he says to Julian.
“Get me some rope, Duncan,” Julian says. “More may be coming, and I don’t want to worry about these three.”
“The rope we have is not for tying up delinquents,” Finch says. “The rope is for rescues, for saving lives. In case people are trapped and need to be pulled out.”
“Yes, thank you, Finch,” Julian says. “I know what rescue means. I don’t need a lot. I do need a knife, though.”
Duncan brings him a tangle of rope and a knife.
“No one here knows how to tie a knot,” Finch says. “So I don’t know what good the rope will do you.”
In half a minute, Julian binds all three men’s ankles and wrists with handcuff knots. Grimly Finch looks on, while Duncan and Wild celebrate. “We finally found our third musketeer, Dunk!” Wild says.
“We sure did, Wild.”
“So what was I, then?” says Finch.
“Aww, you’re not a musketeer, Finch,” Wild says. “You’re more like Richelieu.”
Finch ignores the mockery. “I think you made it too tight,” he says to Julian, “their circulation will be cut off.”
“That’ll teach them to loot houses,” Julian says, kicking one of them in the ribs. “Bastards.”
When Mia reappears in the street, Wild and Duncan call her over and interrupting each other tell her what happened, while she listens, twinkling approvingly at Julian. “He did that, did he?” she says. A disgusted Finch storms off.
“Folgate, Julian’s going to show me how to use a knife and a hammer,” Wild says. “And tie a handcuff knot.”
“Okay, let’s pipe down, Wild,” Julian says. “I’m not a magician. You can’t tie knots with one hand.”
“Who says?”
“As you were, boys,” Mia says. “But, Duncan, I need you. That woman is trying to drag a trunk the size of a cupboard out of her house. It’s too heavy for her, and it’s too heavy for me. I tried, but I can’t move it.”
“I’ll help you, Mia,” Julian immediately says, handing the stick to Wild.
“There you go,” Wild says. “Jules will help you, Mia.”
“Shut up, Wild,” she says.
“Yeah,” says Julian. “Shut up, Wild.”
“Folgate, are you sure you don’t want Finch to help you move some heavy furniture?” Wild says, not shutting up—just the opposite.
“Shut
