CHAPTER XIV
THE LORD MAYOR’S SHOW
The day approached for the Lord Mayor’s Show. Marco determined that Brigitta should see it; and my pretty Italian mamma determined that I should see it too, so out we went early to get a good place, Marco leaving the organ at home, up in one corner, as he said the Lord Mayor would be sure to have plenty of music without his help, and they should find the organ very troublesome to themselves, and other people too, in a great crowd. We arrived in Cheapside about eight o’clock. On the way we had turned up a little alley, where a man kept an early breakfast stall, and had two pints of hot coffee and two thick slices of bread and butter; and when these were eaten, Marco bought two more, which he wrapped up in a large cabbage-leaf, and put into his pocket. He said they were sure to get hungry with waiting in the street.
Well, as I said, we got into Cheapside before eight o’clock. It was a foggy morning, and wet and muddy under foot. But still there were a great many people going backwards and forwards, and all looking very busy and anxious. We first chose a spot near Bow church; but very soon a number of tall people came and stood in front of us, so that we could not see through them, nor over their heads. Marco said to one of the tallest of the men, ‘I wish you would be so kind as to move a little, sir; we cannot see over your head.’ ‘Oh,’ said the unkind man, ‘suppose you find another place.’ ‘And so let us,’ said Brigitta, ‘for we can see nothing here through these tall bodies. Come, Marco.’ We accordingly walked on.
We had only gone a few paces when Marco said he recollected there had been a fire in Cheapside only a few days ago on the opposite side of the way, and as there could not have been time to build a new house, or even pull down the old one, we might perhaps get up into the ruins somewhere. He was quite right. There stood the black shell of the house, with some wooden planks in front of all the lower windows. The crowd was now fast collecting. We ran across, and pushing aside one of the planks, in we got,—scrambled over a great quantity of rubbish, and black bricks and beams, and smoke and dirt, and broken things,—and with great difficulty Marco climbed up the remains of a broken staircase to see if it could be safely attempted. ‘Now, Brigitta,’ said he, when he was up on a broad beam running close underneath the first-floor windows, ‘now, Brigitta, it’s all safe, come up.’
‘But how shall I get the poppet up?’ said Brigitta.
‘Oh,’ said Marco, ‘make haste, for I see more people getting in by the windows, and you will lose your place. Throw her up to me! Make haste!’
I trembled from head to foot. But before I had time to think more about my fears, the little girl pitched me up in the air, and in the cleverest way possible Marco caught me in his two hands. Then up got Brigitta, and the first thing she did was to station me between two broken bricks at the side of the window, so that I could look down from this height upon the whole of the Lord Mayor’s Show as it passed in the street beneath. We had an excellent place at the middle window of the ruined case of the burned house.
We had not been here a minute before a crowd of people got in through the planks below, several of which were broken down, and in they came rushing, and tried to clamber up to the windows. However, we three kept our good places.
And now came peppering down a shower of rain, and then another shower of rain stronger than the first, and then there came another shower of rain that lasted an hour; and then there was a thick yellow fog for another hour, and then the rain ceased, and the fog began to clear away; and when the fog was gone, suddenly the sun came out, and shone very brightly.
‘Now,’ said Marco, ‘let us eat our other slices of bread and butter.’ This they did with great pleasure; the sun shining like gold upon the butter all the time.