The Great Trouble

The epigraph to Part 1 cites an 1851 text by Henry Mayhew, defining “mudlarks” as a group of tattered, poorly clothed people who scramble among barges and wharfs.

1854

Monday, August 28

Eel, a 13-year-old orphan in Victorian London, cites this day as the beginning of “the Great Trouble” (10), though he admits that he knows the day for a different reason; it is the day that an unnamed man (who is later revealed to be Eel’s stepfather, Fisheye Bill Tyler) has discovered that Eel is not dead.

Eel explores the banks of the Thames in the early morning. A mudlark named “Thumbless Jake” is also scavenging nearby. Jake attempts to steal something shiny that Eel pulls from the river, claiming that Eel has infringed on his territory. Eel eventually gives in and tosses the item to Jake, who tells him that “Fisheye Bill Tyler” is seeking Eel to get “what belongs to ’im by rights” (13). Eel tells Jake to report, if asked, that Eel has drowned in the Thames. Eel worries that Fisheye knows his secret. (It is later revealed that Eel is paying for his younger brother, Henry, to stay at a boardinghouse).