Lady of Devices Read online

  “I c’n tot them up pretty quick,” one of the Mopsies said with pride. “Faster’n you, Jake.”

  In answer, he swatted her with the back of his bandaged hand. In the resulting uproar, Snouts grabbed him and pushed him out into the front room. “I’ve ’ad about enough of you!” he shouted. “Go do summat useful and don’t lemme see you back ’ere afore dark.” Jake’s broken boots pounded furiously on the street, disappearing into the hubbub dockside. “Stupid cove.” Snouts went to the back door and looked out, though there was nothing there but tangled weeds and broken rocks, and the river wall six feet away.

  Claire opened Rosie’s cage and took her out, sliding one hand under her feet and passing her arm about her so she would not fall off. Rosie settled onto her hand, and Claire felt her feet relax.

  Ah. She had gained the hen’s trust. Now she would not run away to become food for who knew what kind of four- or two-legged predator. She deposited the bird gently on the ground outside, where Rosie immediately began divesting the property of its insect life.

  “She’ll run off,” Jake said.

  “She will not. We have fed her, you see, and provided a hunting ground. She has no reason to run. Mr. McTavish, would you have pawned the ring this morning if we had not decided to use it?”

  “Aye.”

  “Thank you for not doing so. At least this way we have a chance of getting it back.”

  “Means summat to ya, does it?”

  “It was my great-grandmother’s. The emerald came from the crown of an Indian prince. Or so family legend has it, at least. I should hate to lose something that has come so far and been with us so long.”

  Rosie pounced on a beetle with energy.

  “I’ll do me best,” Jake said, his voice gruff as he watched the bird. “Ent often a lady trusts me with ’er family hairlooms.”

  Claire smiled at him. “Good luck, Mr. McTavish. You’d best be off now.”

  “What’ll you do?”

  “I shall run the Mopsies through their four times tables once again, and then I must find a way to let my friends know I have not been kidnapped or pushed in the river.”

  “You won’t tell ’em of us? Or cut an’ run?”

  “Of course not. We have an agreement, and it is not yet fulfilled. I shall be here when you return triumphant, you may depend upon it.”

  She had gained Rosie’s trust with a cob of corn and some bread. It would take a prince’s emerald to gain the trust of Snouts McTavish and his gang. But it was a price she was willing to pay if it meant getting her life back again. What shape that life would take was a mystery at the moment. But surely the good Lord could not expect her to waste the talents He had given her by going meekly down to Cornwall to become the wife of some husky lad whose idea of literature was the local cattle prices.

  “I’m ’ungry,” one of the Mopsies announced. “We’ll be back.”

  And before Claire could grab them and remind them that stealing was a crime, she and Tigg had vanished out the front. The remaining Mopsie sat upon the river wall and glared from her to Rosie in a way that told Claire exactly where her suspicions lay.

  “I meant what I said, you know,” Claire informed the child. “No harm shall come to Rosie whilst she is in my care. She has given me her trust, so she will not run away. Nor do you need to stand guard over her.”

  The child blinked at her. “Wot’s ’at?”

  “Say, ‘I beg your pardon’.”

  “I beg yer pardon, wot’s ’at?”

  Claire sighed. “Once a bird gives you her trust, she regards you as a member of her flock. If I were you, I should endeavor to gain Rosie’s trust as well. One cannot have too many members in one’s flock.”

  “I brought ’er a corn even when Jake would’ve et it.”

  “Next time you shall give it to her from your own hand, so that she realizes you are also worthy of her trust.”

  The child eyed her. “Yer a strange mort.”

  “Why should you say that?”

  “Most people just eat chickens and don’t care wot they fink.”

  “Yes, well, no one is eating Rosie. She has a duty to perform and we shall enable her to do it. Just as you do. What is twice three?”

  “I dunno.”

  “Yes, you do. If I have three cobs of corn and you have three cobs, how many do we have to give to Rosie altogether?”

  The wheels ground into motion. “Six. But she’d be sick for sure if she et ’em all at oncet.”

  “She would indeed. However, if she ate only one, how many would be left?”

  “Five.”

  “One for each day of the week. A very satisfactory arrangement for Rosie, I should say, wouldn’t you?”

  “If Snouts wins ’at poker game, we could ’ave ’em.”

  “Let us hope he does, then. Would you do me the honor of telling me your name?”

  The child gazed at her sideways while she studied Rosie, who had found a patch of bare dirt and was busy digging a dust bath. “I’m a Mopsie.”

  “But you must have a Christian name.”

  “I dunno.”

  “You don’t know your name?” Here was a sad situation. Chickens were worthy of names but little girls with sticky fingers were not?

  “I gots a name, I just dunno as I should tell you. Snouts said not if the coppers was to ask.”

  “I am not a copper. And if we are to be members of Rosie’s flock, it is only fitting that we address each other correctly.”

  She mulled this over. “I’m Maggie. Short for Margaret, but ’at takes too long to say.”

  Claire leaned over and offered her hand, and bemused, Maggie shook it. “A pleasure, Miss Maggie. And your sister?”

  “She’s Lizzie. Elizabeth.”

  With a smile, Claire said, “My middle name is Elizabeth. I was named for my grandmother, who was reckoned a great beauty in her day. My mother, as you see, was an optimist.”

  “Lizzie’s a beauty,” Maggie said defensively, as if her sister was not to be outdone by any other Elizabeth in the country, alive or not.

  “She is indeed. She has very striking blue eyes. I hope she has forgiven me for spanking her last night.”

  “Nope.”

  “She did kick me first, and may I say, it was completely unwarranted. I hope her heart may soften toward me in time, if we are to be flock mates as well.”

  Maggie fell silent, watching Rosie fling dirt over herself with great abandon. Then she said, “Why’s she making ’erself all dirty?”

  “She is having a bath. The dirt suffocates any bugs and leaves her feeling shiny and clean when she shakes it out.”

  “’Ow’s a fine lady like you know so much about hens, then?”

  “Polgarth the poultryman taught me when I was as old as you. He was wise in the ways of birds. We have the finest flock in the parish, and every bird in it trusts him with her life.”

  “They’re flock mates, then.”

  “They are indeed.”

  Maggie glanced at her. “Jake don’t trust you. Ent he a flock mate?”

  Claire hesitated. “In some cases it takes time. And I don’t think offering a corn cob to him is going to do the trick.”

  To her surprise, Maggie smiled widely, dimples winking in her dirty cheeks. “’E likes corn. Try it.”

  Claire smiled too, more at the unexpected companionship in the child’s gap-toothed grin than at the image of Jake taking anything from her otherwise than by force or stealth. “I think the price of his trust is substantially higher than corn. I’d have to offer him my pearl necklace at the least.”

  “’Ere, then.” Maggie reached under her combinations and pulled out the double strand of St. Ives pearls. Claire stared at them, pale against the girl’s grubby hand.

  “Take ’em.” Maggie tossed them over, and Claire caught them more by reflex than aim.

  “I don’t understand. I haven’t shown you any chemical formulas yet.”

  “Jake’d just take ’em in the
night and pawn ’em if he knew I had ’em. That’s why Snouts didn’t tell ’im. But we’re flock mates, and Jake’s afraid of you.”

  Claire hardly knew which astonishing fact to address first. “Tha—thank you, Maggie. It’s very … commendable of you to return them unasked.” She fastened them round her neck and pushed them beneath the collar of her blouse. “Jake does not strike me as being afraid of anyone.”

  “’E’s afraid of you. He talks a hard streak, but I know. Otherwise he’d’ve knifed you straight out.”

  “Would he?” Claire sat down rather suddenly on the filthy back step. “I must consider myself fortunate, then.” Perhaps it would be best to change the subject. “I must go and send a tube,” she said. “Mr. McTavish will not be back for some time yet. Would you like to come with me?”

  Maggie shook her head. “Rosie and me will stay behind.” Rosie shook out her feathers in a cloud of dust and stalked over to recline upon the ground next to Claire’s dusty kid half-boots.

  “You might take the opportunity to clean her cage and find some fresh bedding, then,” Claire suggested. “Since she has performed her ablutions, she may wish to lay an egg.”

  At the prospect of the imminent arrival of food, Maggie hopped off the wall and went to get the cage. Upon the ground, Rosie blinked in slow contentment. One creature, at least, was perfectly happy in this moment. Claire went in and put on her hat and blue merino jacket, wished fruitlessly for a mirror, and set off.

  Chapter 20

  She had never realized with such painful clarity how much she had taken even a shilling for granted. Without such a simple thing, she could not in good conscience take the Underground again to Victoria Station. She could not pay to have a tube sent from the Post Office, so she was forced to consider returning home. But Belgravia was a long walk from the docks.

  Claire set her teeth. Snouts would return victorious. They would get the ingredients they needed for the gaseous devices. They would retrieve the landau tonight, and she would not have to walk anywhere henceforth. But in the meantime, she had miles to go, she was ravenously hungry, and her strictures against stealing were beginning to seem foolish.

  No wonder Maggie wanted to stay behind to ensure the safety of the egg.

  Claire felt dangerously out of place as she pushed and dodged her way along the streets. The markets might be closing up for the day, but the desperate crowds jostled her, men looked at her askance, and bands of thin, ragged children tugged at her skirts, begging. Little did they know she was as penniless and homeless as they. In fact, the only difference between them was that she possessed an education and a clean waist, and they did not. Her boot heel slipped in a mash of rotten fruit, and she fetched up against the side of a cart, whose owner shouted at her. Blushing, furious at her circumstances, she stumbled away and hurried up the street as fast as she was able, clutching her hat.

  Half an hour’s sweating walk brought her back to the Embankment, and the sweep of another hour saw her at last in the quieter confines of Mayfair, where at least the air she breathed was free of stink and the invective of angry stall-keepers. Of course, she looked as though she had been dragged through a row of market stalls willy-nilly. Her skirt was stained in two places, her half-boots were filthy, and her navy straw hat had been knocked askew so many times she was sure her hair looked like a mares’ nest.

  Wilton Crescent. Thank You, Lord. If she could only reach—

  She stopped on the pavement as though she had run into a sheet of glass.

  Broken windows. Charred walls. In the middle of the street, a huge black smear littered with coals of burned wood told her that Peony had been chillingly correct in her predictions. But what of Gorse and Mrs. Morven? Where had they gone? And was there anything left within?

  She picked her way up the sidewalk. There was no hope of restoring the herringbone pattern of the brick—it had been crushed and broken beyond repair. The front door swung open with a creak that told her it had withstood severe strain, but would never lock again. The front hall was utterly empty. The drawing room a shambles—the velvet drapes pulled down and stolen, their rings kicked into the corners, all the furniture gone. The music room ... Claire gulped and steeled herself. Her harp had gone down to Cornwall on the dray, so at least she would not have the heartbreak of looking at its ruin. Then she blinked. The piano was still here. She touched a key. Its weight must have defeated the mob—and they must have forgotten to bring axes along to demolish it inside. But it stood in a room that was empty save for the broken glass on the parquet floor.

  “Mrs. Morven?” she called on the stairs to the kitchen. “Gorse? Are you here?”

  Silence answered her—the most profound she had ever heard in the house.

  The kitchen had, of course, been looted of everything Mrs. Morven had so carefully inventoried. A few pots remained, sundry bits of cutlery, even a basket. But she had to admit this was more than they had in her current bolt-hole, where the sole cooking implements were a spirit lamp, a cast-iron fry-pan, and a dented copper pot, all lifted from various refuse heaps after having been tossed as unusable.

  An idea whisked through her brain like a rat disturbed in a dark room. This was still her home—and even in its broken state it was better shelter than the slant-roofed squat. Could she bring Snouts and his gang here until the terms of her bargain were fulfilled?

  She climbed the stairs, noting that several of the oak spindles in the banister had been kicked out, likely to serve as kindling for the bonfire outside. The bedrooms had been looted, too, and most of the linens carried away. But for a miracle, the mattress remained on her bed, askew in its mahogany frame. The combination of the four-poster’s weight and the pitch of the staircase had probably saved it. And look, the linens in the closet, set discreetly into the wall, were still here. But the books had been tumbled from the bookcase and scattered from one end of the third floor to the other. Half of them appeared to have been used for kindling as well.

  With a sigh, her heart like a boat-anchor in her chest, she proceeded to the fourth floor. For a miracle, nothing seemed to have been broken or even disturbed. They had not reached this far. A busy buzzing sound caught her attention, and she pushed open the door to what had been Silvie’s room. The last mother’s helper paddled busily at the dhurrie as though nothing were amiss.

  Claire sat suddenly on a ladder-back chair while the tears welled uncontrollably in her eyes. The mother’s helper was almost the only thing remaining from her old life. To see it going about its business as though Silvie would come running in at any moment to fetch some skin salve for Lady St. Ives was so ridiculous and comical and pathetic that Claire could not help it.

  “What am I going to do?” she asked it when the paroxysm of grief had passed. Her chest jerking with a dry sob, she palmed the tears from her cheeks like a child. “What will become of us all?”

  The mother’s helper bumped against the iron leg of the bedstead, turned left, and buzzed beneath it, intent upon its duty. It had no answers for her. She must come up with them herself.

  First things first. Was there still a sheet of paper in the house? And a tube?

  The answer to the first was no. Not one, unless she counted the end-papers of the books on the floor. But three tubes waited in the vacuum chamber, thank goodness. The first was a letter from the butler at Wellesley House, welcoming Gorse to the staff and stating that his duties would begin on the twenty-first of June.

  Claire had lost track of her life so thoroughly that she could not for the life of her think what the date might be. She opened the next tube. A bill from Madame du Barry for her evening dresses. With a snort, she laid it aside. The back would do nicely for her purposes, and the good lady was going to have to sing for her dresses. The third tube contained a single card with—how very strange—Andrew Malvern’s name and address on the front. She turned it over. The word concerned was written on the back in what appeared to be charcoal in an almost unintelligible scrawl. She had seen Mr. Malvern’s
square, legible hand on some of the documents on his desk, and unless he had deteriorated substantially in the last several days, this was not his writing.

  Singular. And puzzling. Concerned. Hm. She was no concern of his. He would do better to turn his energies to his choice of business partner.

  She slipped the card into her glove and began searching the kitchen. At length, rammed at the back of a drawer, she found a stub of pencil. Her mother would find it an even greater puzzle to receive a letter written on the back of a bill, but desperate times required desperate measures, and the escritoire was probably in Exeter by now.

  Dear Mama,

  I hope this finds you and my brother well. You should be seeing the arrival of the dray with the small items of furniture and plate shortly. It left Saturday. We are having a little difficulty selling Carrick House but I expect Mr. Arundel will continue to do his best.

  I have taken a position as governess to six children, ranging in age from fourteen to four, including twin girls. They have no shortage of intelligence and we are presently engaged in learning our numbers. For this reason I will not be joining you and my brother for some few weeks. My position is not permanent, but it is necessary at present.

  Your loving daughter,

  Claire

  She spun the letters and numbers on the tube to form the code for Gwynn Place, and watched the vacuum system suck it away to the Victoria switching station, where it would begin the series of relays down to Cornwall. So, for at least a few weeks, her mother would believe her to be safe and would be unlikely to dispatch a bobby to escort her to Victoria Station and ensure that she boarded the Dutchman.

  Claire climbed the stairs and found an endpaper lying on the hall runner that would do nicely for Emilie.

  My dear friend,

  I am sorry I could not stay to converse with you last night, but twilight was falling and I needed to reach my aunts Beaton without delay. You will be happy to know I have taken a position as a governess. It offers more independence than I expected and I am presently engaged in the study of mathematics with my six charges.