Everyone knows the story. Mary had a little lamb. One day, she went up the same hill Jack and Jill were so fond of, and there was some kind of disagreement. At the time, no one really knew what went on up there, other than three people went up that hill, but only two came back down again.
This is the story of that fateful day, as told to Humpty Dumpty, Jack's best friend, who confided in the Grand Old Duke of York, chief of police (with a force of 10,000 officers) just before he took his own life by jumping from a wall.
What started as a day like any other, ended with tragedy. Jack, a loner from the wrong side of the tracks, had a long history of trouble, and a police file the length of Pinnochio's nose. Jill was a young and impressionable grade A student who lived a quiet, unassuming life in the expensive Little Star area of town.
Looking for some excitement into her life, Jill and her friends snuck out one night to head to the bright lights of the London Bridge area, the part of town where men are men and sheep are nervous. Along side the 'Pat-a-Cake' bakeries and the famous Miss Muffet's Curds & Whey restaurant, London Bridge had a seedier side, being split between two mafia legends, George "Georgie" Porgie, and "Simple" Simon Pieman. Don't be fooled by the nickname, there was nothing simple about this crime overlord.
Jack had been a low level associate of Georgie for some time, and made a decent living smuggling vinegar and brown paper. whilst Mary occasionally worked for Simon, sometimes moving illicit wool, sometimes, when times were hard, Simon would pimp her out. It wasn't a good life, but it was all Mary knew.
Mary and Jack had known each other since they were thrown together in the tumult which followed the brutal assassination of 'Cock' Robin, who ruled the London Bridge underworld with an iron claw. Everyone knew that the assassin was that shady figure known only as 'Sparrow', but no one knew anything about him. Immediately after the assassination, GoD York announced a curfew and his men started kettleing the crowd into zones, for their own 'protection'. It was in one of these zones that Jack first met Mary. They had seen each other around but never spoke until that day. the chemistry between them was instant, and they had so much in common, both came from broken homes, both had seen the seedy underbelly of London Bridge.
For the next few weeks, Jack and Mary were inseparable. living the life of grifters, making money any way they knew how. The good times ended though, with the rise of the new crime lords, all eager to get their hands on what was left of Robin's empire. Nature abhors a vacuum they say, crime certainly does. Before long the streets of London Bridge were awash with blood. Crime was rampant, GoD York's forces were stretched to, and then past, their limits, so when two factions started to grow as they either assimilated or annihilated the opposition, the police started to turn a blind eye. Sadly for Jack and Mary their families aligned themselves with the opposite factions. In a dramatic twist of irony, worthy of Shakespeare himself (who incidentally never signed his name Shakespeare, despite there being 6 copies of his signature, no two of which spelled his name the same) Jack was a Capulet whilst Mary was a Monatgue. As their families got drawn deeper and deeper into the underworld, Jack and Mary's relationship, which by then had already started to unravel strained to breaking point.
It is said that the day of their parting was marked by ominous portents. In the meadow, Bo Peep, a shepherdess found that her sheep had vanished, Ma Hubbard's body was found on that day, starved to death, whilst the police found themselves investigating an infanticide. Someone had placed an unnamed child in a cradle upon the bough of a tree. The weather that day, was stormy, causing the cradle to start to rock in the tree, and it was this motion, coupled with the razor sharp blade which had been put on the cradle's feet to secure it into the tree, combined to cause a structural failure of the bough. Gravity did the rest.
As time passed, the new crime lords more or less carved up the city between them. Each wanted to get their paws on the other half, but after the savagery of the free for all following Robin's murder, both were content to replenish their forces. For now.
Jack was a born smuggler, and before long Georgie was in control of 80% of the vinegar which hit the streets, selling for up to a sixpence a time. Georgie was a cruel drug baron though, not content with charging a sixpence for the hit, he liked to humiliate the poor addled junkies, and made them sing for it. Eventually, he worked out a way to refine the vinegar even more, and called the new poison 'rye'. Before long the underclass of London Bridge rang to the sound of junkies singing their song of sixpence, to leave with their pockets foll of rye.
Mary never really got over Jack, and grew more and more bitter. Eventually she formed a relationship of sorts with George "Goosey" Gander, which came an an abrupt end following Gander's brutal slaying of an old man who, the court heard, annoyed Gander by refusing to say his prayers. Mark found herself alone once again.
Jill had the misfortune to bump into Jack that night as she and her friends wandered around London Bridge, wide eyed and agog at a part of the world they didn't even know existed. Speaking later, Jill's best friend Mary Contrary remarked "It was like being in another country. There were people drinking, filth everywhere, people passed out in doorways, everywhere you looked there seemed to be some sort of fight, we just weren't prepared for this". Jill was a beautiful girl, and with her clean clothes and youthful glow, she stood out more than Jack Horner's plum encrusted thumb. Mary said that she, Jill and the rest of their group were the focus of a lot of attention.
Jack could be charming when he wanted to be, and soon set his charms in motion on Jill, who had been brought up in such a sterile environment, she was easy prey for Jack. It wasn't too long before Jill started making more and more secret trips to London Bridge, spending more and more time with Jack. One day, Jill realised that she had missed her period. All of a sudden, her regular bouts of sickness in the morning made sense. Jill was panicked and ran to Mary's house. The two best friends talked it over. Despite Mary trying to dissuade her, Jill went to London Bridge to tell Jack the news. Jack wasn't expecting to see Jill in the daytime, but agreed to go up Duke of York hill, where Jill gave him the news. Jack didn't know what to think. In his confusion he didn't see a shadowy shape in the undergrowth.
Jill wasn't the first girl Jack had taken up the hill (in more ways than one), and following the incarceration of Goosey, Mary decided to go up there, to try and cast her mind back to happier times. When she got there, she saw Jack with Jill and flew into a murderous rage. She bided her time, knowing full well that Jack was of the habit of getting himself a pail of water when he was near the natural spring which gurgled at the top of the hill. When his back was turned, Mary sprang out of her hiding place, and struck Jill a merciless blow across the head with the sawn-off shepherd's staff she carried for protection. Jack heard the sound and turned to see the woman he loved, who was going to be the mother of his child lying motionless. Demented with grief and rage, Jack sprung at Mary and the two fought like wild beasts. Jack said after that it was accidental, and that he wasn't sure who was holding it, but somehow the sawn-of staff went off, hitting Mary first in the throat. then over her head. As she fell, Jack ran back to his lover, unaware that he too had been hit by the staff. As he picked up Jill and tried to carry her down the hill again, he lost his footing, having become more and more woozy. Dropping Jill, he fell to his knees and rolled down the hill, with Jill tumbling soon after.
Some time later, the couple were found by William "Wee Willie" Winkie, and were rushed to hospital Against all odds, both lived, and to the utter amazement of the doctors, Jill kept the baby. She had to tell her family now, after all, her and Jack's story was going to be all over the papers. To her immense surprise, her father accepted it, and with just a mild rebuke offered Jack a job with his construction company. Jack turned out to be a gifted architect, and designed and build some of the finest houses in the land, indeed, many people were proud to say that the lived in a house that Jack built.
GoD York's policemen were marched up to the top of the hill to recover Mary's body, but when they got there, it was nowhere to be seen, so they marched down again. York insisted on a full search, so split his forces and concentrated on the ridge which was about half way up the hill. What happened to Mary? No one ever knew. Years passed and the story of Mary went into folklore. Some said that there was an old woman who lived just outside the city limits in a house which was a very odd shape, children calling it "the shoe", and the same some further said that she had marks on her which looked like the kind of scars you'd get from being too close to a sawn-off staff. Was it Mary? Well... that would be telling
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