Read The Damnation Affair Online
Authors: Lilith Saintcrow
The Damnation Affair (3 page)
The regular card game upstairs at the Lucky Star was usually blessedly monosyllabic, except when there was news of a surpassingly interesting nature.
It was just Gabe’s luck that the schoolteacher’s arrival was extra-wondrous. It had replaced Jed Hatbush’s fence as the preferred topic of gossip, at least.
Stooped Dr. Howard, in his dusty black, dealt with flicks of his long knobbed fingers. “Little Tommy Hammis, the snot, charmed the chickens into the boardinghouse. And set that damn dog loose.”
Paul Turnbull, silent owner of the Star, smoothed his oily moustache with one finger. He was a heavy man, stolid in his chair, but quick enough in a saloon fight. And he dealt with Tilson, who ran the girls and handled the day-to-day operations of the Star, well enough. At least, he kept Tils mostly in line, and that was a blessing. “Wish I’d seen Letitia Granger’s face at that.”
It was a sight
, Gabe silently agreed, scooping up his cards. Not a bad hand. The whiskey burned the back of his throat, and he tried to forget the dazed loar the dazok in Miss Barrowe’s eyes. Big dark eyes, and surprisingly soft once you got past that prim proper barrier of hers. She probably thought they were a bunch of heathens out here, and she wasn’t far wrong.
Russell Overton, the town’s official chartermage, scooped up his cards with a grimace. Dapper in his favorite dark waistcoat, dark-curled and coffee-skinned, when he was sitting down you didn’t notice he was bandy-legged and had a stiff way about him. You could, however,
always
tell he was aching for a fight, like most short men. “That woman could sour milk. So, what’s she like, Gabe?”
“Granger? Still sour.” He picked up his own cards, his charing-charm cool against his throat. The schoolmarm’s was a confection of lacy silver and crystal; his own was a small brass disc with the orphanage’s charter-symbol stamped on the back. There couldn’t be a better illustration of just how much she didn’t belong here.
Stop thinking about it. It won’t do any good.
Dark eyes. Brown curls. Not like blonde, blue-eyed Emily.
Stop it.
“Not Granger, you buffoon.” Russ chomped the end of his cigar as if it had personally offended him. Smoke hazed between the lamps. “The schoolmarm. From Boston, yes?”
“Far as I know.” Gabe’s mouth was dry. He took another jolt of whiskey, eyed the cards. The room was close and warm, the saloon pounding away underneath them with rollicking piano music and a surfroar of male voices. Every once in a while a sharp feminine exclamation, as the saloon frails and the dancing girls went about their business. It was, Gabe reflected, almost like a steamboat making its way upriver. The noise made it seem like the place was rocking.
“You’re asking Gabe? You should know it’s like pullin’ nails.” The doctor showed a slice of yellowed teeth as he examined his cards. “She
is
from Boston. Highly recommended, according to Edna Bricketts. Why a miss consented to come here, only God knows. She’s a little thing too; I couldn’t see much in the melee. Seemed a bit prim.”
I am so very sorry
, she had kept saying.
I don’t wish to put you to trouble, Mr. Gabriel.
After nearly fainting, for God’s sake. He was willing to bet it was a combination of hunger and nerves; someone should hold her down and feed her something fattening. Little and birdlike. And she acted like a pregnant Chinee girl was no great shakes, offering her hand to Li Ang and murmuring
How do you do
just as she had to him.
He laid his offerings down. “Two.”
For a few minutes, each of them focused on the game. Doc took the round. “Well, I heard Joss Barker’s already sayin’ he’s in love with her. So’s Eb Kendall. Two.”
“His wife won’t like that. Two and a half.”
“His wife don’t like nothin’. Three, and call.”
“You’d feel the same way, married to Eb. Look at this, two Dominions and a Pearl.”
Gabe laid his cards down. He took the round, with the remaining Dominions, two Espada, and a Diamond. There was a good-natured round of cussing before he accepted the greasy cards and began to shuffle. “Who else?”
There was a brief silence. Maybe they didn’t understand. So he added a few more words. “Barker, Kendall. Who else?”
More silence. He glanced up as his fingers sorted through the winnings, blinking a little, and Doc hurriedly looked away. Turnbull’s mouth was open slightly; he shut it with a snap and became suddenly very interested in his own pile of seed corn.
“Nobody,” Doc finally said. “You know how Barker is. Mouth two sizes too big for the rest of him.”
Well, that’s true.
He searched for something else to say, a thing thao. a thint might paper over the uncomfortable silence. “Last thing we need is some damn thing else happening to scare away the schoolmarm. Had a hard enough time finding one as it is, what with recent events.”
Meaning the boy, and the claim in the hills, the cursed gold, and the incursions. Since closing the claim, though, the rash of walking dead had gone down quite a bit. Even if some damn fool sooner or later would be tempted by the rich veins lurking under the claim’s black mouth. Or the bars, each stamped with that queer symbol, just waiting for the unwary to carry them home.
Another uncomfortable silence.
“Well, then.” Doc watched Gabe’s hands as the cards slid neatly into their appointed places, no motion wasted. “Bad mancy, to talk about women at a card game.”
“Aw, Hell,” Russ piped up. “What else we got to talk about? Whiskey and donkeyfucking, and claims up in the hills.”
“Not to mention undead. How’s the charter holding, there, Russ?” Turnbull grinned, and Gabe sighed internally as the chartermage and the saloon owner glared at each other over the cards.
“Charter’s holding up fine.” For once, Russ heroically restrained himself. It was probably too good to last. “No howlings from the hills that I can tell. Gabe?”
And from there it was all cards and business. But Gabe caught the doctor looking at him speculatively, especially as the night got later and Paul and Russ started sniping at each other again. The night ended as it always did—Paul a little behind, Russ a little ahead, Doc and Gabe largely breaking even.
And the saloon below them rollicking on.
I
t was such a welcome sensation to sink into a bed; Cat almost squeezed her eyes further shut, rolled over, and dove back into sleep. But sunlight gilded the window, and she heard a queer tuneless humming floating somewhere in the house.
I am here.
Where was Robbie? Had he seen her, in yesterday’s comedy of errors? It wasn’t like him not to join in a joke. She’d half-expected the banner to be
his
idea, of course. How it would have warmed his heart. If anyone loved a prank, ’twas Robert Barrowe-Browne.
Cat pried one eye open, wincing as her body protested even such a simple movement. The humming was actually quite pleasant, and she deduced it must be the Chinoise girl. Her charing was blessedly cool, and she rolled over, blinking at the plastered ceiling and stretching gingerly.
All things considered, she was quite well. Merely hungry enough to do shockingly unladylike damage to a platter of breakfast, and sore clear through.
The larger bedroom was at the end of a tiny hallway; the smaller was tucked to the side and held a low corncrib and some few bits of fabric draped on the walls to provide a bit of cheer. Cat made a mental note to find at least a
chair
for the poor girl, and made her way downstairs on slippered feet. The slippers had been set neatly by her bedside, and yesterday’s gown hung to air on a press, charmed neatly enough that no dust or feathers clung to its folds.
Which was a most welcome surprise.
Her nightgown made a low sweet sound as she tiptoed along the back hall, following the humming to its source. Which was, as she had suspected, the kitchen.
The Chinoise, her slim back betraying little of the proud belly in front, was humming as she scrubbed, elbow-deep in suds, at something. The kitchen, bright and airy, was full of a wondrous scent. Thererl. was a stripped-pine table, two chairs, a steaming kettle, and a washtub to the side. The stove, its heat enclosed in an envelope-charm, spun a fresh globe of golden glow aside; the globe, drifting through the kitchen, bumbled merrily out the open top half of a door leading to a porch and a short breezeway. It bobbed along, the mancy on it crackling, and would eventually rise into the sky, safely dissipating away from anything flammable. ’Twas an elegant bit of work, and a relief. At least the house would not burn down around them.
It was a great relief that charterstones and charings would make mancy work reliably even if one was not properly native-born. The great influx of those from other countries seeking a better life, or merely drudgery in a new environ, could practice such mancy as was native to them within charterstone’s bounds. After the Provinces War, the discovery of gold in certain wasted places and the determination to bring the railroad to every corner of the New World had brought all manner of folk to these shores.
It was even quite
quite
to have an exotic as a servant, preferably indentured. The Barrowe-Brownes had not, preferring solid German and French maids, but often her father had spoke of perhaps engaging a Lascar as a manservant, merely to give her mother the vapours.
The Chinoise girl raised a dripping hand, and soap bubbles drifted free into the breezy kitchen. It was a simple charm, meant to amuse, and Cat answered before she could help herself. Her own fingers tingled, and the mancy slid free—light glinting between the bubbles, striking rainbows glittering-sharp as diamonds.
Cat’s Practicality was in light; Robbie’s had been…well,
otherwise
. Light was a very acceptable Practicality in a young lady, indeed, and the Chinoise girl’s Practicality was plain as the bubbles drifted on the swirls and eddies of clear air. For a moment the two charm-streams intermingled, light and water a happy marriage—not like air and fire, or fire and water, though true fire Practicalities were rare, and a good thing too. Metal and earth Practicalities were common, and wood was eminently respectable for a gentleman but
not
a young lady. A stone Practicality was considered rather boorish, for it meant one could pass paste jewels for real; a mechanical one was almost as bad as being in trade. New Practicalities shaped themselves as Science and mancy moved forward.
Soon, there might even be Disciplines, as in Englene and the Continent.
The bubbles popped, the rainbows drained away, and Cat found herself facing a pale, heavily pregnant Chinoise girl in a dun frock, who refused to quite meet her nominal employer’s gaze.
In short order there was breakfast on the table—Cat gave it to be understood that she wished to eat here instead of in the postage-stamp parlour, and perhaps the girl looked relieved? With a modicum of gesturing and facial expressions, Cat asked if the girl had eaten breakfast yet; receiving a small shake of the sleek dark head, she marched to the cupboard with what she fancied was great determination, fetched a second plate and cup of thick, durable earthcraft, and set it down on the small table as well.
In any event, Cat tucked in with a will, and there was even strong fragrant tea.
Their first breakfast passed in companionable silence, and the Chinoise girl looked rather less pale and peaked by the end of it. Cat settled back with a cup of tea—the cup was actually porcelain, and painted with blue flowers, very fine save for its lack of matching saucer—while the girl collected the dishes and returned to her washing.
So far the morning had proven very satisfactory indeed. The breeze was fresh and smelled of sage, fragrant tea and bacon aromas filled the kitchen, and Cat was beginning to feel almost
quite
again when a shadow fell across the back step.
The Chinoise girl whirled, inhaling sharply. Her little hand flashed out, grabbed a knife that looked more fit for repelling pirate boarders than cooking, and hissed something in her native tongue. Cat let out a pale shriek and started, almost dropping her cup, and Jack Gabriel peered over the half-door, reaching up to his hatbrim. His hazel eyes were bright and wide, and he ducked a glowing ball of heat drawn from the stove.
“For God’s sake, Li Ang, put that away. Figgered I’d—well, hello, ma’am. Pleased to see you looking better.”
Heat raced furiously up Cat’s cheeks. “
Sir!
I am not even
dressed!
Were you never taught to knock before entering a house?”
“I did. Don’t reckon you heard me.” He took this in, and actually, of all things,
smiled
. “That thing you’re wearing could qualify as a winding-sheet, miss.
Avert
,” he muttered, right away, flicking his hat to brush away bad mancy or ill-luck. “Beg pardon, ma’am. I’ll wait in the parlour.”
Cat, her heart pounding, swallowed a most unladylike urge to shrill like a harridan. Her mother would know exactly what to say to this man to cut him to size. “Very well,” she managed stiffly. “Perhaps you would care for a cup of tea, while I arrange myself.”
He shrugged, leaning lazily on the half-door. Li Ang had gone back to washing, and Cat suddenly noticed the girl’s ankles were swollen. Definitely a chair, and some provision must be made for the baby as well.
“I prefer coffee, but thank you kindly. I’ll wait.”
“I was unaware I had an engagement today,” she floundered.
“Thought you might like to see the schoolhouse. But I can understand if you’d rather rest, ma’am. Yesterday was prob’ly enough to turn a lady’s nerves to ribbons.”
What a gruesome image. Thank you, sir.
“I am made of sterner stuff than most, sir.” Why was she possessed of the sudden feeling that she was coming off very badly in this conversation? “Good morning.”
“Morning.” He didn’t say another word as she retreated, crimson-cheeked and acutely aware she was practically
barefoot
. Her bare ankles were brazenly revealed. And she was in a
nightgown
, of all things, in the kitchen with a servant.
And the day had been going so well.
* * *