Mr. Stitch (9 page)

“Miss Feathersmith.”

“Nora, please,” the young lady responded, lazily. She took a long drag on a cigarette or cigar that smelled of tobacco and dreamsnake venom.

“And you must call me Emilia,” said Emilia Vie-Gorgon. “We are, I think, going to be great friends. You know my cousin, don’t you?”

“Valentine.” Skinner replied.

“Oh, he’s a charmer,” Nora put in. “And such lovely hair…”

“Generally,” Skinner replied, a little stiffly, “I find him to be rather irritating. Is he..is that…why…how you know me, I mean?”

Nora chuckled faintly, and Emilia was silent. That silence was profound in a way that Skinner had never heard from another person before. Ordinarily, she could make out the character of a silence—a thoughtful hesitation, an embarrassed lack of a response. From Emilia, she gleaned nothing: it was as though the young woman had vanished off of the face of the earth, hid herself deep in the aethyr while she contemplated a correct response.

“No,” when her voice came, after that strange, total silence, it was softly shocking. “We have another friend in common, actually, one who thinks very highly of your abilities.”

“Hm. Perhaps you should have him talk to the Emperor.”

“Yes. Perhaps.” Emilia replied. Was that the hint of a smile behind her voice? A barb? There was no getting past the wall of smooth confidence that sheltered her private feelings. Emilia Vie-Gorgon was the kind of woman that could lie to her mother with the calm, casual certainty that ordinary people used to remark on the color of the sky. “Ah, the show begins!”

If it was a tradition to be silent during a play, it was apparently a privilege of box seats to offer commentary. Emilia and Nora snickered furiously from the opening—a simpering detonation of music from Corimander’s last symphony—through each and every scene.

“Oh, this is lovely. Can she walk? Maybe they should get someone to carry her onstage.”

“That’s it, love. Say the words
louder
. That’ll improve them.”

“Oh, he can’t help it, Emmy—he’s sad. Sad people say things LOUDLY.”

“Yes, and so do ANGRY PEOPLE. And so do HAPPY PEOPLE.”

The commentary greatly improved on the play—
Alas, My Love—
which was, in Skinner’s estimation, utter tripe. A new play by the now thoroughly-defamed Bertram Sitwell,
Alas, My Love
was modeled after the old pastoral-royal comedies of the 17
^th
century, where every shepherd turned out to be a king in disguise. They were all an oblique reference to the ascendance of Owen I Gorgon as the first Emperor of Trowth after the interregnum, and meant to legitimize the Gorgon-Vies’ claim to the imperial line. The Gorgon-Vies spent a great deal of time attempting to legitimize their claims to the imperial line, and usually in as thoroughly a ham-handed fashion.

“Oh, he’s gone up on his lines.”

“Well, can you blame him? I’ve only had to hear it once, and I’m already trying to forget it.”

“There’s the cue card boy. Oh, look, he’s lovely! They should just have him play the role.”

“Certainly, he couldn’t be worse, unless he turns out to be a deaf-mute.”

“Not at all; I should think not having to hear the script would be a categorical improvement. Miss Skinner?”

Skinner had been sitting, quietly amused, though not comfortable enough to participate. She perked up when Emilia addressed her. “Elizabeth, please. And, yes, I imagine there are innumerable ailments that might be alleviated with a precipitously silenced performance.”

Nora Feathersmith giggled enthusiastically, and Emilia certainly sounded like she could be smiling.

“We shannot be,” the lead actor proclaimed during the pause, “together this day. Fate shall keep us all away, as does the winter stray the mourning dove, we are alone, alas, my love.”

And then, mercifully, it was intermission. The intermission revealed another privilege of the box seats, which was complimentary, catered dinner. Quiet, discreet gentlemen—Skinner pegged them as typical theater ushers, conscripted perhaps, or else rewarded, with the task—brought in trays of warm food: spiced meats, soft bread, deliciously sweet fruits. Someone left a decanter of wine on a small tray at Skinner’s side, and she carefully located a glass.

The wine was superb, rich in flavor, but smooth as water. It was like drinking spring sunshine on her face. She sipped at it carefully, though. Intoxication was more than a little dangerous to a knocker, who required great focus to keep their senses under control.

“I take it, Elizabeth, that you aren’t enjoying the play,” Emilia said, after they’d had a few moments to set to their meal.

Skinner swallowed a bit of lusciously soft bread. “I am quite enjoying the
experience
, certainly. I will admit that I’ve heard better work from Mr. Sitwell.”

There was another one of those vacant, absolute silences from Emilia. “Yes,” she said, after a moment. “He has rather gone downhill, hasn’t he. What was his first one…?”

“
The Bone-Collector’s Daughter
,” Nora put in. Skinner could hear her lick crumbs from her lips. “That was an interesting one. He’d probably have been hanged if he’d put it up in Canth, of course. And it surely never would have played here.”

“No,” agreed Emilia, “but then, someone who desires to keep you quiet is the surest sign that you’ve something important to say, isn’t it? Wouldn’t you agree, Elizabeth?”

There was something strange about all this, and Skinner suddenly felt like an animal wandering about in a forest full of traps. Pits and snares all around her, disguised beneath the impeccable camouflage of polite conversation. “I…suppose.”

“Of course it is,” said Emilia, quietly. “If you want to say only what everyone would
like
you to say, then it hardly needs to be said at all. Maybe that’s why we’re drawn to it. The forbidden ideas, I mean.”

Forbidden
. Skinner felt a knot in her stomach.
Is she talking about the Sciences? Surely…surely not. They don’t expect me to participate in heresy…

“Oh, but Miss Elizabeth knows all about things forbidden,” Emilia said lightly. “Yes?”

“I think that, perhaps, I ought to leave,” Skinner said, as she stood. “I doubt very much you’ll find me amenable to…what I suspect you have in mind.”

“Oh, dear, do sit down. I assure you that you will be amenable to the idea. I know, because I am certain you’ve
already
been a part of it.”

“I…what?”

“Please. Sit.”

Skinner did, and wracked her brain. What could Emilia mean? Had someone been implicating her in heresy?

“You know, Mr. Sitwell hasn’t been very popular since his first play. His later works seem to lack a certain…
something
.”

Oh.
Skinner realized at once.
That
. “Yes. Gratitude, perhaps?”

“Gratitude, that’s lovely. Did you know, Nora,” Emilia said to her friend, “that a selection of the
Bone-Collector’s Daughter
was published in
The Observer
fully a month before the play opened?”

“Why,” said Nora Feathersmith, with obviously feigned surprise, “I had no idea!”

“It’s true! And in it, he credited a collaborator, who must remain nameless…oh, why was that? I can’t remember the exact words…”

“For propriety’s sake,” Skinner responded. “Which was a load of horse… well, nonsense. Sitwell had been looking to dump his…collaborator… ever since they’d started working together. Probably because he felt she threatened him and his over-blown ego.”

“She?” Nora Feathersmith asked. “That seems a little peculiar. Woman aren’t permitted to write for the stage. Even during the war, they never let us do
that
.”

“Did I say ‘she’?” Skinner replied. “Must have been a slip of the tongue.”

“Oh, come now,” Emilia put in. “This is a private booth. I assure you, there is no one to overhear us. Nora, did you know, I found out who Mr. Sitwell’s nameless collaborator was?”

“Really!” There was that feigned surprise again, and Skinner realized she was well and truly snared. “Who was it?”

“Why, a woman working for the Royal Coroners by the name of Elizabeth Skinner.”

“My goodness!” Nora said. “Is it true, Elizabeth? Did you help him write
The Bone-Collector’s Daughter
?”

For most of her life, Skinner had felt herself a woman with a calm disposition, not given to flights of aggravation, or suffering from an excess of pride or choler. If she had seethed inwardly when the Committee on Moral Responsibility had taken her job, she had displayed outwards nothing but good grace. If she was furious at Edelred Gorgon-Ennering-Crabtree for forcing her to abandon Beckett in that slaughterhouse, she had presented a face as cold as a marble statue.

And yet. Perhaps she’d never discussed something so close to her heart. Perhaps her tongue was loosened by the wine. Whatever the case, she found herself unable to restrain the bitterness in her voice. “Help? Help
him
write it? You seem to have Mr. Sitwell confused with someone with talent.
I
wrote that play, and Bertram struggled to drag down every word. If I hadn’t needed him to see it produced, I’d have kicked him to the curb after he crossed out a single line. The man can’t string ten words together to order
breakfast
, and can’t so much as touch a sentence without turning it to gibberish. Word and fuck, half of
this
play,” she gestured towards the stage, where the inanely innocuous
Alas, My Love
had recommenced, “is plagiarized from Henri Montcour’s 1787 version. All he’s done is translate it badly from the Sarein and then cram it with his own personal brand of prattling nursery rhymes.”

There was silence for a moment, and the lead actor’s voice reached them in the box. “The king dost keep a revel here tonight, we shallst run first, or else take flight!”

Emilia Vie-Gorgon and Nora Feathersmith at once broke into helpless laughter. Skinner compressed her lips to a thin line, and then felt herself compelled to join them. It took several minutes and an entire carafe of wine before they were able to regain control of themselves. Their hysterics were of such a fortitude that the poor actors, still valiantly trying to maintain the seriousness of the scene, were obliged to stop and start from the top no fewer than three times.

“Ah,” Emilia sighed, “Nora, I do believe we’ve found the person that we’re looking for. What do you think, Elizabeth?”

“I’m sure I have no idea what you mean.”

“Goodness, you’re right,” Emilia said, as she filled Skinner’s wineglass. “I’ve gotten ahead of myself. We’d like you to write a play.”

“Yes?” Skinner said, gulping down some more wine. “Any play, or a particular one?”

Nora laughed again. “We’ve one in mind, actually.”

“Do you know,” Emilia asked, “
Theocles
?”

“Oh my,” Skinner whispered. “You are a pair of wicked young ladies.”
Theocles
was a 15
^th
century poem about the second Emperor of the continent—Theocles the Tall, who had assassinated Agon Diethes and usurped the throne. He’d presided over a particularly oppressive regime, and had begun a foolish, ill-advised war with Thranc. His martial failures had led to the Second Reconciliation of the Powers, which had broken the Empire into its component parts and seen Theocles deposed and executed.