AN: As promised, the start of the Harry and Ellis stories, from when Harry was still alive.
This story takes place in the late-seventeenth, early-eighteenth century, and began as a bit of fun experimentation, so it is rather less seriously historical than it might ought to be. One thing that was a serious effort, though, was to try to imagine what an Irish Traveller speaking period a cant/shelta/Gammon (mostly to an English audience, so with only a little Gaelic) might sound like. That means: 1) there’s a lot of slur-esque words in use, only occasionally meant in slur-ish ways; and 2) a lot speech written in dialect. Writing accents in dialect can be a way of signalling prejudice or demeaning certain characters or peoples, but in this piece I mean for it to signal Ellis is part of a unique culture, distinct from the dominant culture, and to recognize those linguistic traditions as on equal footing with ‘proper’ language. Kind of like how treating Scots as a dialect instead of its own language or language family can be seen as demeaning Scottish heritage. It would seem to me to do more of disservice to pretend that a character raised speaking two (three, I guess, if you count cant) different languages from the dominant language would sound or speak exactly like those characters raised in England speaking only English. And again, even in that, there are important markers of class in dialects of English that, when ignored, rather imply that the RP or ‘proper’ English (which Harry does not speak) is the ‘right’ kind of English to speak, and disguise a whole bunch of complicated social relations. So this long note is to say -
if you don’t like reading dialect, you will hate the fuck out of these stories, but I did it on purpose, so maybe you’re better off just skipping it.
For the rest of you, you can use this site to look things up when the language gets confusing (the whole site has some neat resources): https://www.pascalbonenfant.com/18c/cant/search.php
Also, these are still old stories, so maybe I would change things to be clearer/more accurate, but that’s not happening right now. Enjoy:
Ellis
“Darling!,” said Lord Fiskweight, as the they heard the driver shout, and the carriage shake. Across from him, the Lady Annabell quivered, the deep confusion on her face gradually growing to mirror his fear, like a fair reflection pool. Hastily he amended his fear with manly bravery.
“Should there be any roguery, my lady, show no fear,” he cautioned through trembling lips.
The carriage kept rolling, but only barely at the pleasant jaunting pace it had before. They could hear in the very hoofbeats of the horses a trepidation that seemed attuned to their own.
“Oh, Roger,” said she, using his familiar name in her distress, clinging closer to him than even that one inadvertent time her soft, gloved hand touched his thigh because of a pothole, “Do you really think—?”
But there was no mistaking the noise now. Shouts to halt came like roars from ragged throats on the road, and the coachman’s answer was to snap the whip urgently.
They were being tried by bandits, the roguish highwaymen who of late had grown so populous and daring. The Lady’s heart fluttered in her chest, the Lord’s somewhere about the stomach.
“Do not be frightened, my love,” said Lord Fiskweight, grasping her trembling hands and actually touching his knee to hers, as danger made everyone familiar, “Stay fast and they shall not harm you.”
“Oh, but Roger,” she began, but he silenced her with a manly-but-comforting hand on her lips, which tasted of the powder in his hair and the inside of his ear over the linen of the gloves.
“Remember- as a lady it is not your prowess nor your beauty that shall intimidate a desperate rogue, but rather that which they fear and envy the most, for they shall never have it.”
She batted her large eyes in a vaguely confounded way, like concussed doe, which he found irresistibly attractive, “What’s that?”
He could hardly keep his lips from hers- “Dignity.”
But then the report of the pistol cracked like the birch bough on Eton Fridays, and he remembered himself.
Steeled for the worst, in the carriage they waited, watching as the dust settled.
***
“‘Swounds, Harry, ya plugged him straight, boyo!”
“Shite, shite, shite, shite,” Harry muttered to himself, stowing his empty and holding the pistol he hadn’t fired to his forehead. “Ah, God, Ellis, is ‘e piked?”
Ellis snorted laughter through his nose, making the rag hiding the lower part of his face flutter. He passed around the other side while Harry got hold of the shying horses. “‘Course he piked, ya meer cony, the bloody prancers ran ‘im over.”
“Ah, shite, shite, shite, shite, shite,” Harry continued his muttering, half-pacing as far as the horse would let him, his own mask fluttering back and forth like a wagging beard as he did so. “That’s why I don’ like ta foot-pad, Ellis- killin’s gonna get us both stretched. Why’d he fall -fore-ward, he should’ve fallen -back-ward, they always fall -back-ward...the force of the bullet should’ve done it, anyway...”
“Well, let’s no’ be delicate about it, chum,” Ellis was giggling at the state of affairs as he crouched down to start the looting.
“Oh, fine, fuck an’ laugh about it, you bloody paddy, but I don’ wan’ no killin’ on me soul,” Harry snapped.
“What soul?” Ellis snorted, “The one what likes bein’ stuffed by th’ long-pole, madge?”
“Shut yer goddamn potato trap, Ellis-.”
“My long-pole, very long and very pole, so’s don’ ya think I’m yelpin’ or nothin’...”
“So help me, Ellis, you marry your gnashers or I’ll make you sing an O be joyful,” Ellis laughed harder, and Harry had to clarify, “An’ it won’ be th’ one you like ta crow!”
“Easy, Easy, my nug, ye’ve set yet flea in my ear. No need to act a damme-boy...” Ellis paused and Harry knew no good could come of it, “... but it’s yer Irish temper comin’ out, I say.”
“We aren’t having this conversation again, Ellis. We’ve got culls to bite. And I am not Irish.”
“Ye sound Irish,” Ellis muttered.
“From bein’ so long around your constant mang so long, bog-trotter. Now stow it.”
“Ye got Irish eyes,” Ellis said, and blessed himself by ducking, as he knew Harry was armed only with a pistol; he’d have to mind pretty sharp to avoid a plug.
“Which’ll aim fer you next. Now we’re transactin’ business.” Lucky for Ellis, though this luck was a bit of his own making, Harry didn’t like to muck about when on the job.
Ellis got about his looting, while Harry drew the horse’s head in front of his chest, its body guarding his.
“Alright- out of the carriage, the both of you,” Harry shouted. He wasn’t worried... too worried. You never really knew when some old veteran was going to stumble out shooting, but they’d practiced this a few times already.
“Hey judge,” came Ellis’ voice, as always with the tone of his laugh under it clear enough for a stranger to hear, “next time hold yer dag a bit higher, would you? I‘s like ye got ‘im straight in th’ panter; I got me fams damn covered in claret. ‘Swell enough ta get me nazie.”
Harry shot him an annoyed glare, but Ellis’ bark of laughter made the cully’s foot shake up on the step out of the box, so reluctantly Harry gave up his disapproval. He re-set his loaded pistol, settling further behind the body of the horse.
The cull that stepped out of the carriage surely looked the part- Harry wasn’t exactly up to date on the current fashion (for anything except quietly liberating its gold lace and hooking the occasional wig), but if he’d had any more flourishes and interlocking lacing to his buttons, they’d hardly be undone without a key. Apparently Ellis really did have as good an eye as he said. Harry’d never seen a fancier looking buzzard in his life. “Sirs, I will cooperate, and give you what you wish, on the condition that you guarantee no ransacking of the carriage. I’m sure I’ll give over enough wealth to satisfy you.”
Ellis laughed merrily again, standing up. He did have a bit of blood on him. Harry’d seen men run over carriages before, though it was mostly the fate of children, whose smaller bodies less left less out of which to make a mess. Still, he imagined being shot hadn’t helped making it less bloody awful. If anyone, though, he could trust Ellis to still loot something rich out of the guts. “That’s you thinkin’ there’s enough balsom in th’ world ta keep us.”
Ellis shook his head at this silly notion and the cull paled. Harry was still watching, firm, invisible frown set upon his face, but it was Ellis’ show anyway. He made a better figure of it, being the actual rogue, whereas Harry was only learning. Not that he’d admit it for anyone to hear. Harry certainly didn’t cut half a nice a figure saying it, still having the petite limbs and height of his lingering boyhood. That conspired with his persistently pale skin to make him more ethereal than threatening, as Ellis loved to tease- it’s what hard started this whole Irish debate. Ellis had the dusky skin of the family, and the tongue of an Irishman, and even - without the mask - the face of a rogue. He could look cross at folks and have them emptying their pockets. Which is part of why he was so rarely cross, Harry thought.
Raising a pistol, and his bloody sleeves, Ellis nodded to the cull. “You do as yer told, an’ keep square, maybe you kin brush and leave safe at rug radder t’en gone ta peg-trantums.”
They could both see this set their mark’s knees to shaking, but they both knew that, like the driver’s fall, he could shake either way. Sometimes even the unlikeliest men were driven by fear into bravery...
“I...” there was a tense pause, where the cull’s delicate brow worked, “... I literally have no idea what you’ve just said.”
Harry heaved a deep sigh, and Ellis grinned at him. Harry shuffled his feet though his pistol stayed steady on. “Alright, you mang, and I’ll bounce; what else ya brung for?”
“The implication of the discourse is that you should immediately part with all valuables, and we shall do as we will, while you pay us no mind on pain of death,” Harry intoned in his best threatening voice. He didn’t think it sounded as good as what Ellis had said.
The cull didn’t seem to, either. He stood straighter, frowning haughtily at Harry, “You may have recognized me for a gentleman, and unlike yourselves, may take me at my word- I shall provide you with all the valuables you wish.”
“Is that not fine gammon?” Ellis chuckled. Harry could tell he was getting bored. It was the advantage of the two-man lay that while Harry amused, Ellis could bite. They made a fine team, with Harry’s fancy-talk and Ellis’ sheer bloody ruthlessness.
Harry made a show of drawing back the cock on his pistol, “A thing of which we can easily make certain while you bleed out, my young gentleman. I am not interested in negotiating the point.”
Having the cock back on the pistol meant the damn thing could go off at any second, and while Harry had no fear of firing, there was no reason to deserve the noose any more than he already did. The damn thing was so poorly built it was just as like to shook itself or blow up in his hand. Fear or not, he kept his pistol well aimed. He’d rather not put a bullet through anyone accidentally, but if he did, it was going to count.
“You speak as if you have some education, sirrah,” the cull glowered at Harry, trying to put the burn of fire into his eyes. It was a hard wood to light, what with them being all soggy and full of fear, “And so I appeal to that part of your mind which at some part must have been sharp. Though given to a rouge, a man’s word is his word, and incontrovertible proof of—.”
At this point a sharp scream cam to them, along with a shout. Tumbling out of the cull’s side of the carriage came a pile of linens, variously pocked with limbs, while Harry could see Ellis rolling out the other side like a startled fox.
“Odds plut! keep awake, friend, he’s packin’ buntlings!”
“Oh, Roger!” shouted the bundle, which their cull was now desperately trying to put back upright.
“Jaysus’ stabbed upon th’ cross, if tha’s all ya wanted, tib, I’d’ve done it for ya,” Ellis was laughing again, and both the cull and the woman squeaked and started to scramble together when the carriage rocked as he hopped on the opposite edge, leering at them through the window.
“Oh, Roger, save me!”
“Now, look here, scoundrel,” the cull began, his voice shaky, as he tried, rather feeble, to impose himself between the girl and Ellis, “you come but one step closer, and I—.”
They never got to know, as the butt of Harry’s pistol interrupted the young man’s jaw with a crunch. When that didn’t knock him down, Harry tossed it to his other hand and laid a fist into his stomach, throwing him to the ground with a kick. The girl squealed, but quickly grew silent when he flipped the pistol in his grip again and put it to her temple. Two-man lay. One amusing, and the other working.
“Now, look. It’s very simple. Give us all your valuables, and our business is finished.”
Ellis, rifling through the things in the carriage, stuck his head out of the window, chuckling, “Ah, don’ bully a frigate ‘s well-rigged as that, there Harry.”
She looked nervously to Ellis, then back to Harry, attempting some kind of ingratiating smile. Harry returned the pistol to full cock.
She quailed, but the sound of the pistol only elicited another amused little chuckle from Ellis. “Don’ try it; if’n he plays with ye, you’ll be th’ first mort ta fix ‘is tools.”
“Stow it, Ellis!” Harry hissed, throwing him the dirtiest look a man has ever ignored completely.
The girl, confusion painted on her face between the beauty-marks, glanced from Harry to Ellis and back again. After a moment’s hard silence, she spoke very softly, “I... I don’t understand what he said if that’ll ease—,” but it didn’t work. Harry turned back to her looking all the more furious, and poked the pistol to her head more insistently.
“You stow it as well,” Harry said. “Both of you stow it. I’m so tired of jaw right now I could shoot either of you.”
“Don’ be too afeared o’ him, deary,” Ellis said, barely able to hold the grin from his face as he poked it out the window, “He’s just a ‘buckeen’, is all.”
Harry would’ve glared at him again, but it was his practice not to take his eyes off of people he’d a pistol to, just incase they got brave on them (even if they wore skirts).
“Madam, your jewelry,” he poked the pistol harder into her temple, shaking her curls about her face.
“Ye’d best open yer wattles to ‘is broganier, love,” Now Ellis couldn’t hold in his chuckling, “He’s a rum miller, that ‘un.”
“Do as I say,” Harry said, hoping she didn’t notice his face growing red on the bits where she could see. She began to unclasp her jewely, shaky hands inept at the task.
“Now, don’ ye bully th’ tib, Harry...” Ellis said, eliciting a hidden, sullen frown from Harry. He cast a sly glance from the window, “Ye’ll be showin’ yer Irish temper.”
“Oh, I am not Irish!” Harry hissed, but Ellis only laughed.
“Rather a Bristol Man, den, boyo, ‘cause ya got some teague in ya somewhere that ain’ just mynabs. An’ what skrip have ye ta show ‘t?”
“I’ve my fist, paddy, now clap shut yer gan,” Harry shouted, all pretense of high-flown accent gone.
Though Harry’s frown deepened, this seemed only to drive Ellis to deeper amusement. He paused at his task, and after a moment’s thought, turned to the window again.
“Why don’ we query th’ girl, then, if ya won’ believe me.”
“We shall do no such thing, Ellis, or damn your eyes, I’ll dum-found you.”
“Demm my eyes, you say?” Ellis opened the door of the carriage, stuffing coins into his pockets before he hopped down. “Dum-found me, boyo?”
Harry shifted his feet, as if he’d rather shuffled further away as Ellis approached. Ellis’ tone had traveled from amused to threateningly quiet, to suddenly sweet and gentle, “Them dimber green glaziers o’ yers got me dum-founded every way, you know.”
Much to the girl’s surprise, what bits of Harry’s face she could see went bright red, brows coming together in a consternation that seemed separate from the anger of before.
“Stow the ginger whids, Ellis, or ye’ll ‘ave us nabbed.”
“See!” Ellis threw his hands up, grinning, “Ye’ve got an Irish clack, even!”
Harry’s brows now came together in a definite scowl, “That’s your fault, paddy, and none other. An’ I don’ have no damned bloody green eyes.”
“Well, then, what color are they, boyo?”
This took Harry by surprise. His pistol shifted.
“Hazel,” he said, though it seemed more a question than an answer. Truth was Harry’d hardly seen a mirror for longer than it took to pry it off the wall. Maybe he had hazel eyes.
Ellis shook his head sadly. Placing a hand on the girl’s shoulder (she jumped as if struck) he said, “Now, mang it flat, tib- them glaziers look -hazel- to you?”
“I,” she said, looking nervously at the barrel of steel.
“I...” she continued, looking at the dusky face of the gypsy whose sincerity leered a little bit with-over familiarity.
“I...” she said, taking a deep breath and having a swallow and looking at the cold set of eyes fixed on hers, ferociousness seeming held in only by the rag that concealed his face.
Ellis squeezed her shoulder, “Don’ let that dag at yer knob sway yer response. I’ll handle ‘im wit’ th’ switch if’n he don’ act proper.”
He winked at Harry, who in a fit of peevishness, took the cock down and re-set it loudly before fixing his eyes back on the woman.
“Oh, ‘s just ‘im tryin’ ta bounce ya, love. He’ll plug ya somewhere else than yer rum munnz.”
“I would say in my most honest opinion...” she hesitated, as now both of them were staring at her with such intensity she feared she might faint straight away, “... in my absolute honest opinion, that... that...” She looked desperately to Harry, who seemed to be boring a hole through her head, “Oh, lord have mercy upon me- well, they’re green.”
“HA!” Ellis’ laugh went off well enough like a gunshot that the woman screamed and ducked. Harry was forced to take his pistol back to re-set it upon her, shifting uncomfortably while Ellis gloated at him.
“That doesn’t make me Irish,” Harry mumbled, “It’s not logically consistent...”
“Oh, my dear,” Ellis moved close, which action, though Harry seemed inclined to resist, couldn’t pull him any father away lest his aim be off in case the mort bolted. Hands going up to either side of Harry’s jaw, Ellis held him still, looking down at what parts of that sweet red face could be seen. He spoke softly, “them rum glaziers are green as Erin herself, an’ twice as fair. I’d rather troll abou’ them as be ship’d home to vagrant Ireland wit’ all me regulars an’ made of oak.”
Harry seemed paralyzed, or, if not paralyzed, at least captive, for though the mask moved as if he mumbled, no words could be heard, and his most assuredly green eyes stared up through their lashes at Ellis, so close and so merry, that he could hardly be fought.
In the seemingly long moment in which the two highwaymen stared at one another, Lord Fiskweight began to stir, his pathetic mewlings seeming to awaken Ellis as reluctantly from his revery as Harry had been to enter into it.
“Right. We’ve bit th’ blow, less you wan’ tha’ fancy caster, eh Harry?”
With the utmost unwillingness, Harry stopped looking at Ellis to glance at the Lord Fiskweight on the ground. “No, so equipt I’d look a cods-head. Never get any rest from th’ family.”
Chuckling, and with Harry’s watchful eyes on the two on the ground, Ellis put arms around him and kissed the top of his head, “It’d be a fine rig ta have fer yer becomin’ a beau-trap... leavin’ th’ recruitin’ service... no more sharp ogle an’ ready dag, millin’ them ya don’ wan’ ta...”
“No,” Harry said, “We’re all to be trucked, any how. It’s a good lay. I’ll stay yet.”
“Bene,” said Ellis, hugging Harry to him with a wide smile, which he pressed to the top of Harry’s head in a gesture far more expressive than a kiss. “Bene.”
The two highwaymen then departed, leaving Lord Fiskweight grumbling on the ground, while the Lady stared after, quite sure that the romance was meant to go some other way than the way it had, though not quite sure what that way was.
Lord Fiskweight righted himself, hand trying to staunch the blood leaking from his face, “Do you know, that rather hurt.”
Lady Annabell brought her wide eyes around to his, filled with incomprehension.
“I wouldn’t suppose,” Lord Fiskweight went on, “That a woman could hit so hard, but it must be so.”
Lady Annabell blinked at him.
“Well,” he said, eyebrows crunching together like the sound of the footpads steps retreating over the dirt, “What else could it be, but a man and woman pair of rogues, kissing one another as they did? And I’ll certainly not call the other feminine.”
Lady Annabell interrupted her blink by keeping her eyes closed, like one with a slight headache.
“Well, that’ll make a fine story for the papers,” said Lord Fiskweight.
Lady Annabell chose not to respond, but rather, to stare down the highway and contemplate how life and the papers differed.