gIFT fROM tHE cURATE*

Balthazar ate nothing green, olive coloured, lime, emerald or jade green. He had a sore-spot on his lip where the glass tube seared soft tissue, a chemical fusion of Cracker Jack and pus. He drew stickmen with a smudge-stick; alchemy he’d learned from a curate with whooping. Balthazar had one ear, a flat nose and a curlicue birthmark on the wad of his check, just below his eye, the ticking one. He had a three-legged dog without a tail (mange with fleas) and wren’s foot he kept in a thread-box, a gift from the curate.