Cold Stone and Ivy (29 page)

Slowly, the odd rings on the locket began to spin. Very slowly at first, around the glass ball in the centre, and she could see the occasional spark thrown off from their orbit. She had never wound the thing, had never used a key to keep the tiny gears moving. It was as if they worked of their own accord.

They saw their mother in a bloody bed, her heart in their father’s hand.

She began to shake. She had to leave, that was all she knew. She had to leave this godforsaken place. She blew out the candles and headed once again through the pews in near darkness. She pushed open the door, breathed in the cold night air, grateful that the mare was still there and very much alive.

He was a member of the Ghost Club, you know. A ghost hunter. Drove him mad.

As all light and movement from the locket died away, she tucked it into her waistcoat and leaned on the door of the church, waiting for her own heartbeat to return to normal. She feared it never would.

Rue made a rumbling noise and Ivy looked up. Far off on the road, heading away from the Hall toward Over Milling, was a grey horse and rider, and she knew without a doubt that the Mad Lord of Lasingstoke was back.

She waited until he was quite a long way off before mounting up the little bay mare and following.

“OH, BUGGER,” GROANED
Penny as she waited in the dark. Her trap had been set for hours and still, not a trace of von Freud, Durand, or Dunn, her three suspects. Her horse, Marlborough, nickered softly, and she stroked his long nose. “Just a little longer, Marley, I’m sure of it.”

And when she felt herself about to nod off, she spied a masked man riding toward the Castle on a steel-grey horse. She couldn’t see much, nor make out whether he was entirely human, so she slipped from the shadows cast by the wall to follow.

Of Trained Horses, Screwsmanship,
and a Disconcerting Situation

THE ROAD WAS
dirt for the majority of the ride and he was grateful. Cobbles and stone were hard on a horse’s feet, even with iron shoes. Dirt and grass were far more forgiving.

It was after ten and the streets were, for the most part, dark but street lamps burned at intersections and along high-end avenues. Where Sebastien was going was affluent. There was money in Milnethorpe now.

Up until recently, the town of Milnethorpe had been precisely that—a town. But in the last decade since the explosion in demand for steamcars, factories had sprung up like mushrooms on a decaying tree trunk. In the moonlight, he could see smoke from the stacks that skirted the town and lights from factories that never slept. Shifts worked round the clock to make the cogs and gears for the car companies. Both Imperial Steam and Bentley United had plants here.

Down Coggins Road and a left at Dorchester. These were fine houses now, with even finer farther along, and the road had become one of cobbles, not dirt. Hooves made a clopping sound on the stone. There were many steamcars puffing along the streets, but there were a few horse-drawn coaches as well, so a man on horseback was not a sore thumb. There were no pubs in this neighbourhood; coffee shops were all the rage, where good British gentlemen went to read the news, argue politics, discuss rumours of wars, and smoke. He spied one on a corner, where steamcars and carriages were parked alongside hitched horses. It was perfect.

He dismounted, led Gus up to a post, and raised a finger.

“Stay.”

He pulled the address from his coat pocket.

1011-A West Pinchon Street.

Quietly, he moved to the window, cast a quick glance inside. Men, smoke, cards, coffee. Stacks of newspapers and broadsheets and bulletins. These gentlemen loved their issues. He was about to leave when he did a double-take—Easterton Fredrick Crumb. The villain in question, dressed entirely in black, drinking coffee and being consoled by a veritable stable of gents.

Such a normal sight. Such an abominable man.

The glass at the window began to frost.

“No,” he growled. “Not yet.”

And he set off down the walk on Dorchester. He had only gone three blocks and had not met another soul on the street. Of course he wouldn’t. At this hour, all respectable folk were settled down for the night. With Crumb in the coffee house, it would serve him well, but his wife presented another matter entirely. He hated frightening women. They were by far the fairer sex but they killed too, as often and savagely as men.

He was being followed.

He had known it for a while. The rider on the dark horse had not known to keep to the grass to muffle the sound of the hooves. He did not know to follow at inconsistent distances or to remove the bowler and exchange it for another hat by way of disguise. And when he’d dismounted, he’d tied his nag at the same shop. No, this was an inexperienced thief, most likely hoping to roll him for his coin or his coat.

He could see the turn for Pinchon Street and the grove of trees that served as a boulevard. It cast very dark shadows across the already dark street. Perfect for cover. He continued to walk straight into that blackness, then ducked into the mews between the houses and pulled the pistol to wait.

Step, step, step, step.

A light step. Not a big man by any means. Step, step, step, step. He could hear it grow louder and just as the fellow was about to pass by, he lunged out of the mews, snagged the man’s arm, and forced it up between the shoulder blades. Without slowing, he swung the man face-first into the brick of the wall and brought the pistol up to the back of the head.

Cocked the hammer and leaned in close.

“Why are you following me, sir? Answer me true, or I’ll shoot your head off.”

“I’m sorry, sir. So, so sorry . . .”

It was a woman’s voice. Most unexpected.

“Miss Savage?”

“Yes, sir. Please don’t shoot my head off!”

He stepped back, lowered the pistol, utterly confounded.

“Miss Savage, what? Why?”

“May I turn around, sir?”

“Of course, woman! Turn, turn.”

Slowly, she did and he could make out her face in the darkness, strands of her dark hair escaping from under the bowler. He stepped back again, and yet again. Peacoat, breeches, riding boots, derby. She had entirely passed for a young man.

Except for the fact that her breasts were glowing.

“I . . . I saw you riding,” she moaned. “I was so very curious. Everything has been so strange, with you and Seventh and the sisters Helmsly-Wimpoll. And I know it was wrong . . .”

She looked about to cry.

“Wrong?” he snapped. “It was bloody dangerous! I could have shot you just now!”

“I know,” she wailed. “I’m so sorry . . .”

And suddenly, the tears began to spill. She bit her lip and turned away, hugging her ribs. He waited a moment, confounded even more. Her glowing breasts were a puzzle, but now, a strange voice was beginning to whisper in his ear. He didn’t understand any of it. It was like something he should know, a scrap of memory from childhood, but he needed to push it from his mind. He had one thing and one thing alone to do tonight.

“Listen,” he said. “Things are about to get a little sketchy. I need you to stay here. Do you understand, Miss Savage? Ivy? Please, will you stay here?”

She sniffed some more before turning around. Her eyes were wet and shining like an ocean, and she tried to smile. Dash it all if his knees didn’t suddenly feel weak.

“No, sir,” she sniffed. “I’ll not stay here. I’m coming with you.”

“No, Miss Savage, you most certainly are not.”

“Yes, I am. And if you refuse, I’ll . . .” She looked around the mews. Sniffed. “I’ll . . .” She looked back at him, raised her chin. “I’ll scream.”

She was serious, he could tell, but it was difficult to look anywhere but her breasts. The whispers were becoming a voice inside his head. It was a puzzle.

He held up one finger. “If you come, you will say nothing. You will do nothing. Do you understand?”

“Yes, I most certainly do.”

“And when I say, ‘look away,’ you will look away. Understood?”

“I will most certainly look away.”

“Right.” And without any further discussion, he grabbed her wrist and dragged her out of the mews and back out into the street.

“ALEXANDER DUNN, I
apprehend you, sir, in the name of the Crown!”

She pulled the mask from the rogue’s face and let out a startled yelp.

It was none other than Alexandre Gavriel St. Jacques Lord Durand. They were one and the same man.

“That is a lovely pearl necklace you are wearing, Penny,” he said.

He smiled, raised his pistol, and that was the last Penny remembered for some time.

THEY STARED UP
the steps of 1011-A West Pinchon Street.

A gaslight lit the front door and stair. He had released her wrist earlier when she had complained that his grip was causing her discomfort, and he cursed his weakness. Rupert had been right. Women were a complicated, messy business. Better to stay disentangled. This one was like a bloody thornbush, always catching on things and drawing blood.

And the damned voices were singing a very old song in his head.

“What are we waiting for?” she whispered. She smelled good, like rose hips and fine leather. A most unusual mix.

“The frost,” he whispered back.

“Ah,” she said and thankfully said nothing more.

There was no frost. There was no cold. It was confounding. Perhaps the woman had thrown them off. Perhaps the singing was a problem. Perhaps there was more that he needed to do.

He turned to her and raised a finger.

“Stay,” he said and proceeded up the steps to rap on the doorknocker. He could feel her warmth on his back. Disobedient she was. Like Tag. Disobedient and needy.

There was no cold, only the singing of a very old song. He rapped again. Nothing. No answer. No cold. He reached for the knob. Locked. Turned back to the woman.

“Look away.”

To her credit, she did. He fished from his pocket a file and pick, bent low, and set to work.

“Oh look! The Mad Lord de Lacey is a regular screwsman!”

“Louder please,” he muttered. “I don’t think they heard you back in Milling.”

“You are truly Alexander Dunn, sir, Penny’s favourite jewel thief. Do you have a clockwork heart?”

“Please shut up.”

There was a click and he straightened, turned the knob with his hand. The door opened with a very loud creak, and he cursed the bane of rusty hinges.

She leaned into him.

“Louder please,” she purred. “I don’t think they heard you back in Milling.”

He began revisiting his decision not to shoot her.

The house was empty. It was well-furnished and comfortable, and he thanked God once again that there were no automatons. It was an older home, with low ceilings and plank floors. Imitation Turkish rugs were everywhere.

“What are we looking for?” she asked in a whisper that could not hide her grin. Damned creature thought this was a game.

“Henbane,” he answered. “He’s poisoned his mother- and sister-in-law. I need to prove it.”

“Are you a police detective, sir?

“If I were, I wouldn’t need to be skulking around in the dark, now would I? Hush, I need to ask.”

“Ask who? There’s no one home.”

Yes, seriously revisiting his decision not to shoot her.

He closed his eyes, turned his palms to the ceiling, and the cold descended like a blanket over the room.

He could feel them, their voices like whispers in the night, needed to sift them out to find the ones who wanted him here. But the singing was a distraction. It was most definitely coming from the woman, but not
from
her and it didn’t belong here on this street in Milnethorpe. It was the same voice that had summoned him from the chapel on the day the airships had arrived. It was like an echo of something he should know, something from a lifetime ago, from a lifetime, from his childhood . . .

The voice of angels . . .

“Oh,” he heard Ivy say and slowly he turned to look at her.

For the first time since he’d met her, there was a shadow flickering in and around Miss Ivy Savage.

“What the devil . . .?”

She frowned, reached under her collar, and pulled it out to dangle it from her fingers. It was spinning quietly, flashing light in all directions.

He approached her. “Where in heaven or on earth did you get that?”

“Christien gave it to me . . .”

He raised his hands toward the locket. It began to move at the end of the chain as if pulled by some great magnet, whirring and humming like clockwork. He cupped it in his palms, not touching it but keeping it taut at the end of its chain by some unseen force.

“What are you doing, sir?”

The voice of angels . . .