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keeping out of Fisheye’s way weren’t good. I’d be no use to anyone who needed me then. No use at all.
    And someone
did
need me.
    The door ahead of me was slightly ajar. I gave it a gentle push with my foot. It creaked and swung open. Mrs. Griggs, a neat, plain woman with a gentle face, startled at the noise.
    “Pardon me, Mrs. Griggs …,” I began.
    Then I stopped.
    I stopped for a long, terrible minute, unable to breathe or think or even understand the scene before me. What I saw was this: Mr. Griggs lay in a corner of the small room, resting on a pile of sheets. Well, I don’t suppose you could call it resting. Far from it. For in truth, he looked to be in pure agony.
    I’m sure my mouth was wide open in shock. I thought to close it, and just as I did, Mr. Griggs clutched his belly and started to writhe, back and forth, back and forth, something awful. His blond hair looked almost black with sweat.
    Then there were the sounds he made. From deep in his throat came small, horrible cries of pain. There was a chamber pot nearby. And some extra buckets. But I don’t think he’d had the strength to use them.
    The sheets under the tailor were covered with what looked like water. At first I figured Mrs. Griggs had tried to cool off his fever. But then I saw that it wasn’t water at all, but strange masses of tiny white particles, like rice. Something pricked at the back of my mind.
White particles … white particles
.
    I’d heard something about them before, somewhere. But what?
    “Oh, Eel, lad. You oughtn’t to be here. Didn’t Betsy tell you?” Mrs. Griggs said in a fierce, urgent whisper. “He’s been exploding … the pain … I sent the children downstairs. You go too. Go now.”
    “Mrs. Griggs, do you … do you need anything?”
    She stared at me helplessly, as if I’d spoken in a foreign language.
    “Don’t you understand?” she hissed softly. “There’s nothing you can do.…”
    Her voice trailed off. Mr. Griggs cried out and she rushed over. After that she seemed to forget I was there.
    I swallowed hard. I thought I would throw up, and I might have if I’d stayed any longer. Instead I left. Fast. I backed out of the room and clattered down the stairway without drawing a breath. In a second I was out into the street.
    I stood quivering, taking in great gasps of air that was so sticky it hardly counted as air at all. And there, right across the cobblestones, stood the Lion Brewery.
    I’m lost now
, I thought.
I’ll never get my job back. There’s not even any sense in goin’ back inside. I’ll have to put up with Mr. John dismissing me—and hope he doesn’t have me put in jail as a thief
.
    I shouldn’t be thinking of myself first, I knew, with Mr. Griggs suffering so. Then I remembered what I’d heard about those white particles. That’s what came out of people when they fell sick with the cholera.
    Mr. Griggs had been struck down by the blue death.

CHAPTER FIVE
Urchins on Excursion
    I stood there, frozen with horror, for at least ten minutes.
What next?
Behind me, up in that room, was Mr. Griggs. In front of me was the Lion. And looming up around every corner was the shadow of Fisheye Bill Tyler.
    “Bad air brings trouble,” Abel Cooper had warned. It seemed he was right. But how could so much trouble happen in just a few days?
    I couldn’t do much for Mr. Griggs. And unless I wanted to hide in a London sewer and never come out, I’d have to take my chances that Fisheye might find me. I needed my situation at the Lion (and my four shillings!) back. The only other person who might help me was Dr. John Snow.
    Or would he? Even though I took care of Dr. Snow’sanimals every night when I was done sweeping the tailor shop, I rarely saw the doctor himself. He was either out on a call or attending some important meeting or dinner. I tried to avoid the stern Mrs. Weatherburn, his housekeeper, except when it was time to get paid. Still, it was worth a try.
    It might be the