The Transference Engine (11 page)

Chapter Ten

D
REW DID NOT RETURN in time to attend my salon. He said he'd be gone for a few days. I shouldn't expect word from him yet. He sometimes retreated to his country home for weeks to attend to business or see to his son's education. Friends invited him to house parties for his wit and charm.

So why did I fret about his absence while Lucy tightened my laces to make my old sapphire gown fit properly. The last time I'd dressed for salon Drew had performed this chore. Because Violet had gone missing. She had not returned yet. The chances of finding her or Jane or Toby alive diminished with each passing day.

Enough worrying about things I could not change. I needed to host the intellectual elite and gather information, the two things I did best.

The first guest, much earlier than fashionable, through my door surprised me. “Ish!” I squealed the moment I spied Dr. Chaturvedi standing awkwardly in the doorway to my parlor. I threw my arms around him and held him tightly. He returned my embrace with equal fervor and kissed my chin. He stood half a hand shorter than myself with a slight frame and the vague myopic expression of a man who truly needed spectacles but refused to wear them in public.

“My dear, it is good to see you again,” he whispered in my ear in that lovely singsong accent. “I am most satisfied that you went to such lengths to find me.” His fingers dug into my back fiercely, then released me, and he stepped aside to reveal an even shorter man standing hesitantly behind him.

The newcomer ran a finger around his tight collar while studying the door lintel. He wore little round spectacles with a silvery wire frame that slid down his nose. His tweed coat had seen better days, revealing fraying threads at the lapel edges and sleeve ends. His nose looked raw and damp. I wanted to hand him a clean handkerchief, but had to remind myself that he was a grown man, unlike Mickey.

“Madame Magdala, may I present my colleague Dr. Jeremy Badenough.” Ish bowed slightly, tugging on his companion's sleeve to indicate he should imitate the action.

Ah, scholars! So intent on their studies they had trouble remembering etiquette. I loved them for their brilliant minds and loved them when I taught them what they needed to know about life and they remembered it afterward.

“Jeremy Badenough, you borrowed the book of bad translations,” I said, holding out my fingertips to him.

He clasped my hand, as a man would shake another man's. That intrigued me. He hadn't bothered with the etiquette of greeting a . . . mature woman of casual acquaintance. Instead, he treated me with the respect he'd accord a man he admired and considered an equal.

I liked him immediately.

“It wasn't all bad,” he said, blinking rapidly. I wondered if that was an indication of embarrassment or a need to replace shyness with intellectual zeal.

“Did you learn anything of use?” I gestured them to proceed me into the parlor. Trays of pastries lined the sideboard, wine breathed in its decanter, and a coffee urn simmered over a candle burner, all waiting for my guests to serve themselves.

The men gathered refreshments and settled on the settee while I perched on the wing-backed chair as if on a throne. Ish preferred the cheese and savory delicacies with coffee—I had no tea prepared, which was his preference. Dr. Badenough loaded his plate with sweets and filled his glass to the brim with wine, most of which he drank in one long gulp, then topped off the glass.

“So what nugget of information did you glean from the bad translation of Persian into Latin and then a worse translation into English? I must admit that I had a great deal of difficulty parsing anything sensible from the twisted sentence structure.”

“Actually, the most useful bit was that the Oriental magicians cling fiercely to the notion of cleanliness. They insist their laboratories must be completely whitewashed: walls, floors, and ceilings. Not a single dust mote must enter the equation,” Dr. Badenough said, leaning forward in his enthusiasm until his hopeless cravat nearly dangled in his wine and his spectacles slid farther down his nose.

“Whitewash,” Ish mused. “The lime in the compound has proved effective in preventing certain molds from growing.”

“Did I read somewhere recently that some physicians are expounding the value of washing hands and . . . disinfecting surgeries?” I interjected, trying to remember where I had read that, or overheard a conversation. I knew that farmers, such as my father, frequently whitewashed both interior and exterior walls of a dairy. They said that the brighter atmosphere kept the cows happier and the milk sweeter. But there might be a more scientific explanation behind the old folk wisdom.

“Yes.” Ish leaned forward, nearly dropping his tray. “I have heard of this obscure theory of cleanliness. Some cultures value scrubbed hands and thus suffer fewer contagious illnesses. In Calcutta, for instance . . .”

A knock on the door interrupted us.

I excused myself and rose to open the door at the top of the private stair. “Hold that thought, Ish. We will talk more, later.” My two guests looked to each other and nodded.

Three esteemed, if not well-selling, artists descended upon us along with a sprinkling of minor nobility. Coronation parties and special performances at theaters about town drew many of my usual guests. Well enough, this smaller group suited my mood admirably. And they were all young enough and hungry enough not to complain if my pastries were less than perfect, baked by my new apprentices.

Quickly the conversation turned to the way Vernon St. George used light in his paintings of the Madonna.

Surprisingly, Ish contributed to the sprightly conversation with his scientific observations of the properties of light. He even recommended a chemical wash to layer on top of oils to give the illusion of glowing in dim light.

The technical terminology meant nothing to me.

Dr. Badenough, Jeremy, looked as bewildered as I. When Ish shifted to a straight chair beside a painter and his . . . er . . . model, I took his place on the settee.

“What intrigued you about the book?” I asked, transferring one of my jam scones from my plate to his and topping off his glass of wine. His eyes looked a bit heavy, but his nose had dried in the cozy warmth of my parlor.

“The book?” he asked blearily.

“
An Examination of Necromancy and Soul Preservation After Death in the Magic System of Persia
,” I reminded him, deliberately correcting the title.

He opened his mouth to protest, but I cut him off. “The book you borrowed and returned to my library. Why did you borrow it in the first place?”

“Lord Ruthven requested my analysis of the text.”

“Lord Ruthven.” The fine hairs along my spine stood up straight.

“Yes. He attended school with my older half brother. He took advantage of the family connection. My brother begged me to assist Ruthven so
he
wouldn't have to. Ruthven's always been fascinated with necromancy. I don't know why. Rather repulsive if you ask me. He quotes Lord Byron at length, giving the poet king's melancholy as evidence of a need to study death in all its phases.”

I sighed in relief. Badenough wasn't a practitioner. But Lord Byron reared his ugly head once again.

“Why you?”

“I have studied many obscure religions as part of my ancient language studies, and their inherent magic in foreign realms. He thought there might be spells encrypted in the text and that was why it was so difficult to understand. Once I discerned the Latinate grammar beneath the English and a foreign subtext, I knew there were no true secrets, just bad scholarship.” He bit deeply into the rich cinnamon bun, strewing spiced sugar across his beleaguered cravat. I wanted to brush it clean and launder it for him.

But I needed one more piece of information from him first. “Is Adam Lord Ruthven a practitioner?”

He paused with the remnants of his sweet halfway to his mouth. His mouth twisted in distaste and he set the bun back on his plate, then put it all aside on the end table. “He never said so. My brother was most anxious to prevent him from pressing his cause at the family manor.”

“You believe he does more than study and observe.”

“His fascination with death is untoward. When he visited my brother some twenty years ago—I was but six or seven—he spent nearly the entire two weeks in the parish cemetery or the manor crypt—it's very old, from the days of its original abbey foundations, and not altogether sound. He liked the crypt best. My brother discovered him trying to open one of the tombs and terminated the visit. We believe he made off with the skull of one of our Crusader ancestors. He left under protest, spouting nonsense about the magical powers contained in the bones of a true believer.”

“I will not go to Mass this morning!” Augusta Ada Byron stamped her foot as she screamed at Mrs. Carr, one of Lady Byron's “friends.”

“You have no choice, child. 'Tis the law,” the Fury replied.

“Well, it shouldn't be. The requirement of attending Church of England services weekly outlived its usefulness with the defeat of the Spanish Armada in 1588 and the crushing of invasion plans from Catholic monarchs in Europe.”

“Don't you dare preach to me, young lady!” Mrs. Carr quivered in indignation. If she'd had an ounce of fat on her tall and spare frame, it would surely flap and wave as if a flag in a strong wind. “Constant diligence in faith and repentant prayer are the only defenses against demonic powers. You must go to Mass to have the purity to fight off the minions of yo . . . of the Devil.”

She'd been about to say “your father,” meaning Lord Byron, a demon of a necromancer.

“Religion is nothing more than superstitious nonsense that appeals to the emotional excess of poets and dreamers with nothing better to do with their lives.” Oh, my girl knew the right words to make her mother see her point of view. At the age of twelve she knew how to manipulate and maneuver her mother as well as her tutors. She and I had no need for such histrionics.

But Mrs. Carr had a point. I just had never seen proof that piety could fend off a necromancer.

However, she had no authority in this household to order me, or Miss Ada, to go anywhere or do anything.

But Lady Byron had taken to her bed last night with a slight sniffle. She declared she needed a week of solitude and bland food.

I thought she needed less wine and heavy sweets with her dinner and then more of the same upon retiring for the night. But 'twasn't my place to criticize the woman.

“Miss Ada, please keep your voice down,” I admonished her. I'd dressed soberly for the ritual of walking in the family procession to the tiny chapel between the manor and the village.

“Christianity is little more than death worship designed to control the masses out of fear.”

Mrs. Carr froze.

And so did I. Was organized religion any different from necromancy? Yes, it had to be different. Our priests didn't demand human sacrifice. Now.

The Crusades came to mind.

“Blasphemy,” Mrs. Carr gasped as she waved her handkerchief in front of her face. “Next you will imitate your father by taking a lov . . .”

“She will not!” I stepped between my charge and her erstwhile protector. “Miss Ada is much too logical to consider anything but the most practical and sensible course. I believe her time today will best be spent reading inspirational sermons to her mother.” I grasped Ada's shoulders, turned her around, and marched her up the stairs to her own rooms on the third floor. The Furies had usurped her suite on the second.

“I think I should like to open my father's tomb and study his skull. Do you think, Miss Elise, that it will differ greatly from, say the skull of the gardener who died last year?”

Mrs. Carr staggered into the parlor, commanding tea from the servants.

“You didn't really have to say that,” I whispered to Ada as we retreated upstairs. “It will upset your mother terribly. Not to mention bringing down the wrath of Father Huntley.”