Shadow Conspiracy (13 page)

His smile was small, almost bashful. “Because I very rarely have the chance to indulge my personal curiosity.”

“But why that particular subject?”

“Because, Lady Lovelace, the person from whom that automatic valet fled in Scotland was my brother.”

He bowed once more, his glass-blue eyes shimmering bright. She closed the door behind him and listened while his feet passed over her nightingale floor without triggering one of the loose boards.

VII

Three more days passed before Ada could contrive sufficient excuse to allow her to visit Lady Melbourne. Three days of signing papers, writing letters, and issuing orders. Three days of listening to her men of business explain that they did not wish to be indelicate, but this was a marvellous opportunity. The abduction of Mr. Babbage had shown that the government and the police needed to increase the investment in the automatic sciences, and the firm of Babbage & Lovelace was uniquely qualified to answer the national need, provided she would appoint a temporary director, in Mr. Babbage’s...absence.

Ada
knew what she was supposed to do. Mother and the Furies, with William’s support, had made it all plain. She was to keep on. The proper men would find Mr. Babbage, if he was to be found at all. If not, another partner would be taken on, or the business would be sold. That would be even better. That would leave a fortune for William to be in charge of, and she could retire to her parlour and do charitable works, possibly even found a school. Activities proper to a titled lady.

Ada
demurred and delayed and finally locked herself in the workroom, where she did nothing but look up at the green curtain covering the wall where her father’s portrait had been. It was too much. She needed to act, and to understand. She needed to know why her father was being resurrected at the same time Mr. Babbage had been taken.

As Ada expected, she was admitted to the Prime Minister’s private residence as soon as she presented her card. Lady Melbourne sat alone in a well-appointed blue and green parlour. When Ada entered the room, that lady stretched out both hands.

“Ada, my dear! This is most unexpected! How are you, poor, dear child?” She gripped Ada’s hands as if her strength could convey sincerity.

“I am perfectly well, thank you, Lady Melbourne.”

“Of course, of course.” She laid one dry hand on Ada’s cheek. Ada had to work not to shake her off. “Anyone can tell by looking at you how well you will bear up under your trials. Such strength. So very like your father.”

Which was not an assessment of Lord Byron that Ada had ever heard before.

“I have often longed to be able to speak with you about your dear father, you know,” Lady Melbourne went on as she settled back in her plush chair and motioned Ada to the green sofa. “I even wrote you once or twice. I do not expect you ever received my letters?”

“I did not.”

“As I thought.
She
sought to separate you from all knowledge, all memory...” Lady Melbourne’s face spasmed in anger.

“It is about my father I’ve come, Lady Melbourne,” said Ada quickly.

Lady Melbourne’s smile was all sunshine, but the gleam in her eye was cold triumph. “I knew it! Oh, Ada!” Again Lady Melbourne seized her hand. “You want to bring him back, don’t you?”

“I am not precisely sure what you mean,” said Ada, extricating herself gently but firmly.

“You want to fully acknowledge that you are his heir, his living legacy.” The triumph was gone from Lady Melbourne, replaced by something almost ethereal. “You wish to be reunited with him, as a portion of his greatness.”

Lord help us, she’s been listening to the ghost-gossipers.
Not a week went by without someone attempting to proclaim that her father’s shade still lingered on Earth, and that he had a message for Ada. “I wish to know, Lady Melbourne, if you are the one who has been sending me pages from my father’s memoirs.” Ada found no polite way to introduce the subject gradually, and so determined to be direct.

Lady Melbourne blanched. “You’ve been receiving...?”

“Journal pages, Lady Melbourne. Indisputably in my father’s hand. Most of them concern his summer in Switzerland in 1816. The first after he...left...England.”

Lady Melbourne stood abruptly and moved to the fireplace. She leaned there, staring at her reflection in the gilt-framed mirror. Ada watched her mouth move. She watched the aging beauty say over and over,
They survive. They survive!

“Do they...is it suspected this paper of your father’s has something to do with Mr. Babbage’s disappearance?” enquired Lady Melbourne aloud.

“Everything is suspected at this time. But, I confess, I do not see how the two could be related.” Ada tilted her head a little. “Do you, Lady Melbourne?”

“I? Not I,” She waved her hand toward the door. “I am locked in my rooms, not to be let out if it can be avoided. I’m sure I am permitted to know nothing.”

Which is an interesting turn of phrase.

Lady Melbourne turned toward Ada again. Her colour was very high and her breath came short. Ada drew back a little, expecting that lady to reach for her salts or to swoon, and she found she had no wish to witness such a scene.

“It was not I, Ada, who sent these papers. Although, had your father left any instruction for me to entrust his journal to you, I would have carried it out faithfully.”

Ada
mustered a smile and got to her feet. “I am sorry I cannot stay, Lady Melbourne. I have another engagement.”

 She took Lady Melbourne’s hand in farewell. That lady’s eyes glowed as radiant as a new bride’s, as she rang the bell for the servant to show Ada out. Ada left the parlour too unnerved to look back.

“Ada.” Mother set down her teacup. “I’m so glad that you place such confidence in the officers of the law that you feel perfectly free to go on as if nothing had happened to Mr. Babbage.”

Mother’s parlour had been very carefully arranged. She always sat in the exact centre of her gold-upholstered sofa so that she was the first thing one saw upon entry. The Furies sat on either side of her in smaller chairs, never altering their accustomed positions.

The overall effect was of walking into a queen’s formal court.

Ada
had not wanted to come here. She had wanted to go to her studio and think, but Mrs. Carr had been waiting in the foyer with a summons when she returned, and Ada knew from long experience if she put the encounter off it would only grow worse.

Ada
folded her hands and reminded herself that she was no longer a child. “I was confident I could not be harmed on the short drive to the Prime Minister’s residence.”

For one of the few times in her life, Ada saw her mother startled. “You called on the Prime Minister?”

“Lord Melbourne was not at home. I spoke with Lady Melbourne.”

With a startling amount of inner satisfaction, Ada watched her mother flush from paper white to beet red.

Ada felt her mouth settle into a hard line, and she once again heard Mr. Worth say,
Your mother’s feelings for your father were...complex
.

And Mother could have commanded a servant to take the portrait at any time. Or she could have done it herself. She could have an entire store of her husband’s papers, unknown to any. Lady Byron had long ago perfected the art of keeping her own counsel.

“Years ago, I forbade you to speak to that woman.”

“I have not forgotten.”

“But you disobeyed me?”

“It would seem so.” The Furies murmured their distress, but Ada remained utterly still. Her mother had insisted she learn to be so; had, in fact, made her lie on a board in absolute stillness a half-hour at a time every day as a child. “I wished to ask her about some papers I have received.”

“What papers?” demanded Lady Byron.

“Papers that appear to belong to my father.”

For a moment Ada thought her mother might actually faint.

So, apparently, did Mrs. Carr and Mrs. Doyle, both of whom started to their feet before Lady Byron shot them a quelling glance.

“You will bring these papers to me at once.”

“I cannot. Mr. Worth has removed them all.”

Lady Byron’s hands trembled.
Perfect stillness, Mother. It is not so simple, is it?

“And did...that woman send these papers?”

“She said she did not. Did you?”

“Why on earth would I do such a thing?”

“I don’t know. Where my father is concerned you have done many unusual things. The portrait, for instance.”

But mention of the painting elicited no further reaction. Lady Byron stared at her, gimlet-eyed, searching for the object or subject where her next words could do their worst. This time, though, Ada found she was able to stand that fierce, righteous gaze. Her mother’s disapproval was nothing compared to the reality of Mr. Babbage’s disappearance, of the threat that her world, her work, might be stripped away.

“I had credited you with a more logical mind, Ada,” said Lady Byron at last. “But I see that sentiment has blinded you to duty. All I have done, I have done to preserve my freedom, and yours.”

Mine?
Ada’s brows shot up.
You would have controlled the beating of my heart if you could.

“Perhaps you wish you were like his bastard, Allegra, abandoned to die in a convent. Or perhaps you wish you were like his half-sister’s child, the product of so much fierce and unnatural love.”

Shock sent an involuntary tremor through her. Mother had never once spoken of those other children to Ada’s face. “You have no idea, foolish girl, how you must fight, how I must fight, against the curse of him. He returns again and again, seeking to strip all away and leave behind nothing but what gratifies his selfish, mindless need for continuance. From this I have done my best to shield you. Perhaps this was my mistake. Perhaps I should have made you face it, fight it for yourself.” She frowned, but Ada knew she did not see the room before her, not any more. “Perhaps then you would have understood the nature of the war.” She closed her eyes. “You may leave, Ada. I must think.”

Ada
chose to ignore the nature of the dismissal. She curtsied and withdrew. Safe in her workroom, she sat down to pen a letter to Mr. Worth.

But it was Lord Melbourne who arrived first.

VIII

The Prime Minister was pacing up and down in the grand salon when Ada entered. They made the proper greetings and Ada sent for refreshments. Mother and William arrived, only to be summarily dismissed by Lord Melbourne. Ada thought her mother would spit nails right there.

“Is there any news of Mr. Babbage?” asked Ada as soon as the salon door closed.

“None that I am aware of,” said Lord Melbourne, sitting on the edge of a wing-backed chair. “What I want to discuss, Lady Lovelace, is your visit to my wife.”

Ada
hesitated, but Lord Melbourne went on. “It is beyond me, my lady, with all your responsibilities at this crucial, unsettled time, why you would choose to trouble Lady Melbourne.”

“I’m sure I did not mean to trouble her.”

“Do not pretend to me,” whispered Lord Melbourne harshly. “You come to my home, you drag up the past and create agitation and dismay. Is it entertaining to you, Lady Lovelace? Do you enjoy the spectacle?”

Anger poured in waves from the Prime Minister’s frame, and his sharp chin trembled.