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Sooty Wart
Christmas Eve
December 24, 1843
“Flesh and Blood?” Poking his finger into Johnson’s chest,
shoving it in and out for emphasis, the man roared, “Like
your own flesh and blood!”
Johnson attempted to back away, but couldn’t, and
bumped into the chair, knocking it over, then, tripping on
it, he toppled over backward falling on his back with his
legs straddling the fallen chair.
Leaning over the table, the stranger pointed at Johnson.
Johnson tried to scuttle backwards, but there was no place
to go but the fireplace.
“The boy is not like your flesh and blood, is he?” Reaching
to him, entwining his hand in Johnson’s shirt, the stranger
dragged him upward. “Is he?”
Jerked to his feet, pulled over the table, his face scant
inches from the stranger’s, frightened when the stranger
was silent, now beyond terror, Johnson flinched with each
assertive word.
“You took the boy to be your slave for a pound!” Pulling
Johnson even closer. “For a quid owing on back rent
when his poor mother died.” His voice rising, “When his
mother died!” He shook Johnson. “No , the boy is not like
your own flesh and blood at all!”
“You’re the devil!” His uneven voice rising in hysteria, “I
knew it!” Pulling back, “Ain’t’j’ya?” Using whatever strength
he had, Johnson attempted to back out of the stranger’s
grasp, and away from the again faceless face. “‘ow’d ya know
that?” Pressing his hands against the edge of the table,
straining backwards. “‘ow’j’ya know ‘e sold him to me for a
quid?” Pulling, straining backwards, his shirt was yanked
from the stranger’s gloved hand and the reverse momentum
propelled him into the fireplace where a…? coincidental,
spurt of flame instantly goaded him forward again,
confirming Johnson’s fear that the stranger was, indeed,
the devil.
“No,” the stranger said softly. “I am not the devil.”
“Yeah, ya gotta be, ‘cause even if Archie or the lady or
Marcos did send ya, ‘ow’d they know I got ‘im for a quid?”
“When you drink, you talk.”
Yeah, Johnson thought a moment. That’s the truth. He
wanted to believe—at that moment more than anything—
that the dark figure standing in front of him was nothing
more then flesh and blood, and, yes, maybe he did say
something to someone at sometime about the bargain he’d
made for the boy.
Pulling the chair to the table, the stranger sat down.
Seeing this… this humanistic gesture, and also, being
able to somewhat see the stranger’s somewhat familiar face
again, breathing a sigh of relief, reaching backward, righting
his chair, Johnson sat also.
Sitting on opposite sides of the table, the stranger and
Johnson silently regarded each other.
Speaking softly, “Tell me, Johnson,” the stranger asked,
“how much longer will it be, do you think, until the boy is
too big to fit into a flue?”
Johnson shrugged his shoulders because this thought had
often occurred to him, too.
“How much longer, do you think, until the amendment
passes, making the likes of you, and what you force onto
children, unlawful?”
“More’the’likely,” Johnson answerd, “they’ll never do
such a thing ‘cause them’s in Parliament got chimneys, too,
an’ they know’s sometimes the only way to clean ‘em’s to
send the likes of ‘im…” jerking his thumb towards
Zachariah’s dark pallet, “into ‘em.”
“Yes, Johnson,” conceding the point, “that may very well
be true .” the stranger said sadly.
Johnson calmed because, admitting to be wrong, the
stranger did appear to be human after all, and sitting as
they were, across from each other as though in a bargaining
session, did, indeed, appear to be humanistic.
“How much longer will it be, do you think,” the stranger
asked bluntly, “till the lad has sooty wart?”
Swallowing loudly, Johnson looked down at his hands.
Sooty wart!
This above all else—sooty wart, cancer of the scrotum,
mankind’s first known cancer—was the predominant horror
among the chimney sweep trade, and was something often
thought of, but rarely spoken of...
©November 17, 2012 / Mark M. Lichterman
