The Clockwork Three (28 page)

Hannah sat, her back straight, her rump almost immediately uncomfortable. Frederick took a seat near her, and adjusted the legs of his trousers several times.

“He is doing quite we —” Hannah stopped herself. She heard Madame Pomeroy’s voice in her head:
No more lies, Hannah
. She drew herself up. “Actually, sir, he is doing poorly. The doctor nearly had to amputate his leg.”

Mister Twine stood across from them, his hand on the back of a nearby chair. “I am so sorry to hear that. But you say ‘nearly’ … I take it something or someone intervened?”

“Yes,” Hannah said. “With medicine, and the help of friends.”

“Friends are a precious commodity. At times I think perhaps I should acquire some.” He stared off into a corner of the room.

Hannah cleared her throat. “Sir, if you will permit me, I must tell you about my situation.”

Mister Twine’s eyes glittered beneath his eyebrows. They were the eyes of a much younger man. “Before you go on, you should know that Miss Wool was here yesterday.”

“I know,” Hannah said.

“And yet you came,” Mister Twine said.

Hannah stood up straighter. “I had to try.”

“So you did. I take it the medicine was expensive?”

“It would have been.”

“The diamond necklace was supposed to cover the cost, isn’t that right?”

Hannah refused to look away. “That’s right.”

“A noble purpose by ignoble means.” Mister Twine nodded his head. “I do understand something about that. You know why Miss Wool was here? You read the will as well?”

“I did.”

“And in the process discovered secrets I’d managed to keep hidden for a very long time. But you are your father’s daughter. I knew the risks when I took you on.”

“And I appreciate the work you have given me, sir. You kept my family off the street.”

“Perhaps I should have done more.” Mister Twine gripped the chair. “But I refuse to give what has not been earned.”

Hannah leaned forward. “Sir, since you know why I’m here, you probably know what I came to ask you.”

“Yes. But you will do so on my terms. First, I am going to tell you a story, and then I will ask
you
some questions. After that, you may ask of me what you will.”

Hannah felt impatient, but did not want to anger him. “I will listen.”

Mister Twine nodded. “The history I am about to relate goes back a long way into the past. You know about our city’s founders. Gilbert and McCauley were two sides of the same company, and they split the land in half, a seam right down the middle marking the boundary between civilization and the wild. Both the park and the city were born out of fear. Fear of what would happen if we conquered the land, and fear of what it would mean if we didn’t.

“With the passing generations, McCauley’s line ended while the Gilberts thrived. Their ambition and bravery dripped down through the years, from father to son, until collected and concentrated in two brothers. Anton and Archer Gilbert, as different as the wind and the mountain.

“Anton was a man after my own heart. He wanted to build. To shape. To enact. He created the Opera House and the hotel. He carved roads and brought industry into our city. His brother was of a different mind completely, and I daresay he was insane. Archer traveled the world, adventuring and plundering. He discovered new lands, new peoples, and explored lost cities, sending the fruits of his exploits back to his brother’s city. The Archer Museum was built to house his massive collection of artifacts.

“The brothers fought continuously when they were together, so it was fortunate that Archer was seldom at home. But one day he returned and
learned that the legacy McCauley had left behind to maintain the park was about to run out, and that Anton planned to strip the park bare and build over it to expand his vision for the city.

“Now, when Archer heard about this, he became outraged. You see, in all his travels through the crumbling ruins of fallen civilizations, he had picked up this notion that mankind is insignificant. That nothing we create will last. That we will all turn to dust. And it is only in nature that we find constancy and immortality. As I said, he was insane. But he had money. Archer spat in his brother’s face, turned all of his wealth over to the legacy of McCauley Park, and wandered off into the woods to live the life of a hermit.”

McCauley and Archer Gilbert. The land had enchanted them both. Well, Hannah had been inside the park, and she knew of its allure.

“And now,” Mister Twine said. “We come to someone whose name you already know.”

“Mister Stroop,” Frederick said.

“Precisely. I remember the day he checked in to the hotel. If I had known then the trouble that man would cause for me, I would have turned him away. But I didn’t and he stayed until the day he died. Hours he spent up there in that suite with his telescope, going slowly mad. I knew that Archer’s legacy was running out, and I had my own plans for the park. But then Stroop called me to witness his new will. I had to stand there and watch as he signed away my ambitions, turning all his wealth over to McCauley’s folly. Stroop entrusted me, as his executor, to see his wishes done.”

“But you didn’t,” Frederick said. “Pullman said the legacy is running out.”

Hannah narrowed her eyes at Mister Twine. “You stole his money?”

“Stole?” The old man’s eyes flared, and his cheeks puffed up ruddy as a rooster’s cowl. “Stole you say? How dare you! I am no thief! I have not touched a single cent of that money for my own use and I never planned to.”

“But you kept it from going to the park,” Hannah said.

“I prevented a terrible mistake,” Mister Twine said. “When that legacy runs out I will be able to see Anton Gilbert’s dreams fulfilled. My dreams. If the city does not grow, it will die, don’t you see?” Then he turned to Hannah. “Unless …”

“Unless what?” Hannah asked.

“I am now going to ask you a question. If you want it, I will give you the money, all of Mister Stroop’s treasure. In return, you will be required to keep silent and let the park pass into my hands.”

“Or?” Frederick asked.

“Or, you leave the money with me, and I will honor Mister Stroop’s will.”

Frederick snorted.

“Why would you do that?” Hannah asked.

Mister Twine sighed. “Because it is the right thing, after all. I had planned on giving the treasure to a charity. But I would not object to your taking possession of it, which would relieve me of the need to exercise my own conscience, something I’ve successfully avoided for some time now. Do you understand the choice before you?”

Hannah nodded. But she did not want to make it. If she took the money, her family would be saved. They would have a home, a real home, and a doctor for her father all the time. They would have food, and clothes, and her mother would be able to laugh again. Hannah would
be able to go back to school. Mister Stroop’s treasure could be hers, for her family, but at what cost?

The park would be destroyed. No more trees, no more Mirabel, no more cabin by the pond for Alice. No more flowers, no more herbs for Alice to study to make her medicine, the medicine Hannah had given her father. Without the park, the doctor would have taken her father’s leg. And without McCauley, there would have been no park. Without Archer Gilbert, there would have been no park. Without the legacy of either man, her father might have died.

The park was dark and dangerous, but also beautiful and life-giving. What would the city be without it, its green shadow, its other side? Both were necessary. Mister Stroop had seen that through his telescope. The park
was
his treasure. The park was a treasure that belonged to the whole city, a treasure of life. And Hannah had already found it.

“I want you to follow Mister Stroop’s wishes,” she said. “For the legacy of McCauley Park.”

Mister Twine fixed her with a stare that she could only meet for a moment before looking away. He lowered his voice to a drone. “Very well.”

“Hannah,” Frederick said. “Are you sure about this?”

Hannah nodded once.

“What about your family?”

“I don’t know,” Hannah whispered. She had no plan, no idea what she would do. But perhaps if she pleaded, Mister Twine would give her old job back. “Sir?” she said. “Can I ask you something now?”

Mister Twine held up a finger, pointed at the ceiling. “There is something else you should know. Yesterday, I told Miss Wool the selfsame
story that I have just told you, and presented her with the same choice.” He brought his finger down. “I did not like her answer. So, I fired her.”

Had Hannah heard that correctly? “You fired Miss Wool?”

“Yes. Miss Wool no longer works for the Gilbert Hotel.”

It was as though someone had suddenly taken away a pain that Hannah had grimly accepted and grown used to. She shook her head, feeling lighter.

“I have a final question for you,” Mister Twine said.

Hannah blinked and waited.

“Would you accept Miss Wool’s position at the hotel?”

Again, she wondered if she had heard him correctly. “What?”

“It is true that you are quite young for the position, but also quite capable. And I see that you have integrity, a quality I prize in others.”

Hannah stammered, searching for something gracious or thankful to say, but ended up breathing out a simple yes.

“Good. Be at my hotel office tomorrow morning at eight o’clock and we shall discuss your new responsibilities. As well as your raise.”

“My raise?”

“Of course.”

She felt Frederick take her hand and squeeze it. Tears clouded her eyes, but she welcomed them. “Thank you, Mister Twine.”

He grinned. “I think I understand the desperate circumstances that led you to steal Madame Pomeroy’s necklace. While it was certainly wrong of you, I have seen for myself the material your character is made of. We shall let the matter lie, and I shall see to the police.”

“Thank you,” Hannah said again. She rose to her feet.

“I don’t mean to offend you,” Mister Twine said. “But as the new chief of maids you will need to work on your appearance.” He gestured toward her as though flicking dirt from something in front of him.

Hannah looked down at her shabby dress.

“Here.” Mister Twine reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out a small leather folio. “Buy yourself some new dresses before tomorrow.” He handed her a small wad of money. “You have earned this.”

Hannah clutched the money to her breast. “I don’t know what to say.”

“In that case, you may go.”

Hannah nodded and turned to leave, but remembered herself and dropped into the worst curtsy she had ever performed. Then she stumbled toward the door, and would have fallen had Frederick not been there to catch her. As she reached the far side of the room, she had a thought and turned back to Mister Twine.

“Sir?”

“Yes?”

“What about Mister Grumholdt?”

Mister Twine chuckled, a high huffing sound like a small bellows. “Every man needs a blunt instrument for the rough work, my dear. Something reliable in its own way. Don’t worry about Hans. I only ask that the passageways remain a secret between us and your father. Agreed?”

“Of course, Mister Twine,” Hannah said. “Have a good day, sir.”

“You do the same. And give your family my regards.”

“I will,” Hannah said.

She and Frederick left the drawing room, then the dusty entryway, and descended the brick path outside. Hannah took one last look at the
city from this height, the view of it that Mister Twine saw every day, before heading back down into the streets.

“I think I’d like to go see Madame Pomeroy,” she said. “But before I do, I think it’s your turn.”

They waited in the lobby of the Orchard Street Hospital. The tang of antiseptic alcohol sharpened the air in Hannah’s nose. But another odor brooded beneath it like a layer of dark silt along a river bottom. The iron smell of blood.

Frederick stared at his knees, which were bouncing like steam-driven pistons. Twice Hannah had tried to settle him with a gentle touch, but that had only calmed his agitation for a moment and she had given up.

“Where is this nurse?” he asked. “We’ve been waiting for —”

“It hasn’t even been ten minutes,” Hannah said. “She’ll come.”

But it felt like it had been longer to her as well. For a hospital, the lobby seemed quite lifeless. The only decoration was a rough-hewn cross, hanging on the wall opposite their chairs like a crack in the sterile whitewash.

Frederick’s legs stopped. He leaned toward her. “I’m glad you’re here with me.”

“Me too,” Hannah said. “I’m glad you came with me to Mister Twine’s.”

“Me too.”

Hannah smoothed her hand over the wooden arm of the chair. “What’s going to happen with your apprenticeship?”

“I don’t know.”

“Are you still going to try and build your own clockwork head?”

Frederick laughed. “No. Not even if I thought I could.”

“I think you could.”

Frederick gave a modest nod, acknowledging without agreeing. “Whatever I do, Master Branch will be there to help me.”

“You’re lucky to have him.”

“Yes,” he said. “I am.”

At that moment a woman entered the lobby wearing a nurse’s bonnet, and a bleached white apron over a sky blue dress. She was short, and walked with the waddle and bobbing head of a duck. She smiled and approached them. Frederick stood up to greet her, and she stopped.

“Why, you look just like her,” she said, staring at him. “They told me Maggie’s boy was here asking after her, and sure enough. Here you are.”

“Are you the nurse that took care of my mother?” Frederick asked.

She nodded, and came the rest of the way till she stood in front of him with her hands folded in front of her apron. “For most of her time here. We became friends.”

“She died here,” Frederick said bluntly, but with a fragile certainty, as if he hoped to be told differently and knew he would not.

The nurse nodded. “Not long after she came. She was a wonderful woman, your mother. She used to go from bed to bed, comforting the other patients when she had the strength. She’d sit with them for hours and sing to them till there wasn’t a dry eye on the ward. People used to stop in the street outside the window.”