The Wizard of London (22 page)

Mem’sab
sniffed. “It is a men’s club in fancy dress,” she said
dismissively. “It is even headquartered in his club. They admit no women,
thus halving their available resources, and few commoners, thus further
depriving themselves of power. And they admit none who are not white British at
all. If I were to revive a Master’s Circle I would do so in the country, where
one could find Earth Masters, and I would scour the countryside for Masters and
Mages of both sexes. While I was at it, I would see to it that foreigners were
welcome, because there is foreign magic in England now, like it or not, and it
would be much wiser to have the weapons to counter the misuse of it in hand
before there is need for them.
That
would be effective. And it’s
not to the point, except insofar as it was the Master’s Circle who
discovered who was responsible, but only
after
Bea’s husband
confined the Earth Creature for them.”

Nan
made notes in her head.
Master’s Circle. David Alderscroft
.
Mem’sab might dismiss both, but at least they had found out something.
That counted as a partial success at least, which was more than Sahib and
Mem’sab had. Nan got a feeling there was something about this Alderscroft
fellow that Mem’sab didn’t like—

The
moment she thought that, from his perch on her shoulder, Neville rubbed his
big, warm beak against her cheek to get her attention. She closed her eyes and
consciously relaxed.

The
image she got from him was set in bird terms, of course, and seemed to be a
mate squabble, two females competing over the same male. Ravens were
monogamous, keeping to one mate their whole life barring accident, so such
things were comprehensible to a raven. Neville was much better at picking up
feelings and the images called up by those feelings, than Nan was. And now,
with much practice, he was better at projecting them to Nan.

So
Mem’sab and some other skirt got into it over this Alderscroft
…
Another quick rub of Neville’s beak, and the impression that the winning
rival was much older than the younger “bird” confirmed that.
Must’ve
been way before Mem’sab went to India, an’ met Sahib. Cor. That
’splains a lot
. No young woman in Nan’s circle was ever
graceful in romantic defeat.

Well,
now, that was interesting. So Mem’sab was probably going to dismiss this
Alderscroft fellow right out of hand, which in Nan’s estimation was a
mistake. All the signs were pointing at an Elemental Master being the one who
wanted Sarah gone. It just made sense to go to the Elemental Masters about it,
preferably the fellow on top—but it appeared that the fellow on top was
someone Mem’sab wanted to see only the back of.

“We
have, thanks to your lady friends, protection against all four Elemental magics
on the girls, and on the school,” Sahib pointed out. “Nothing is
going to get past those without at least giving up some warning.”

“Which
still leaves perfectly ordinary attacks as a possibility, leaving aside the
fact that my friends are not the most powerful Elemental Masters in
London,” she replied, with a stubborn tone to her voice. “I am not
convinced that this is over by any means.”

“Nor
I,” Selim put in, as Nan kept her breathing as still as she could in
order to catch every word. “I am far more convinced there is something
about young Sarah’s powers that is a threat to someone in this city. I do
not anticipate that unknown person would lightly give up his attempt to rid
himself of that threat.”

“I
agree with Selim,” said Karamjit firmly.

Me,
too
! thought Nan.

“Time—”
began Agansing.

“Are
you willing to wait to see what time will bring, when realistically speaking,
it could bring a threat from an unexpected quarter?” Mem’sab
demanded. Nan could picture her whirling and fixing Agansing with a gimlet
stare.

“But
running off blindly serves no purpose either.” Agansing was silent for a
moment. “The wise warrior examines all possibilities. We have a
possibility before us. And we have many possible responses to it. We can hunt
down the one who is responsible and confront him. We could ignore this, and
hope that the threat will fade or go away. We could move the school. Once
removed from London, perhaps the unknown assailant will conclude the children
are no longer a threat.”

“Retreat?”
Karamjit sounded aghast. “Never!”

“If
we were all warriors here—but we are not. These are children,”
Selim said reluctantly. “They can hardly defend themselves, and they are
not old enough to be required to do so.”

“Moving
from our stronghold into unknown territory would be a grave error,”
Karamjit growled. “We have a fortified home here. It will take very long
before a new place is as well suited.”

“Moving
at all is out of the question,” Mem’sab replied flatly. “In
the first place, all of our available monies are sunk into this building and
its grounds. And in the second, even if someone were to offer us as good or
better a place elsewhere, we haven’t the money to make such a move. There
are resources we can draw on to help educate the children that we cannot find
elsewhere. And in the third place, although this is a relatively trivial
concern, outside of London there are no places where most of the foodstuffs you
all favor can be easily obtained.”

“Ah,”
said Selim. There was a note to his voice that made Nan smile.
Trust a
feller to think of his stomach
, she thought wryly.
An’ trust
Mem’sab’t‘ think he’d think of it
.

Nan
distinctly heard Sahib stifle a chuckle, so she wasn’t the only one with
that particular thought.

“I
see no reason to leave permanently,” Sahib said firmly. “However,
an interesting offer has come my way, by way of a holiday for the school. The
gentleman who actually owned that cursed property wishes to offer the use of
his country home near Windsor to the school for a summer retreat. It seems, my
dear, that you know him peripherally as he is in some of the saner occult
circles. He is going to France for next month. It is not that far from London,
but the property includes a small home farm as well as a pond and plenty of
parkland to romp in. He feels very much responsible for what happened, and
wishes to make some sort of amends.” He paused. “This would remove
the children from London and potential harm temporarily, and perhaps that would
be enough. If the perpetrator sees the school standing empty, he might believe
we had gone.”

“Only
a month, you say?” Mem’sab replied dubiously, as Nan held her
breath. She had never been outside of London in her life. And London in June
could be stiflingly hot. The country was something she had only read about; the
wildest place she had ever been were the overgrown parts of the school garden.

“Possibly
more, if the situation works to everyone’s advantage; a summer holiday
would be good for all concerned. Everything needed could be brought down in a
couple of cartloads,” Sahib said coaxingly. “It would be very good
for the children. No lessons, fresh air, country food. Think how they would
blossom.”

“And
let them run wild for a month?” Mem’sab countered. “In
someone else’s home? I am not sure I would care to take responsibility
for that.”

“There’s
a nursery,” Sahib replied. “A proper nursery, big enough to hold
all the infants and toddlers twice over. The place is a vast barn, from what he
tells me. He has autumn shooting parties for up to fifty there, but
there’s no fishing, no adult amusements, and he’s a bachelor.
Outside of hunting season and some lazing about in summer, he never uses the
place. He says it would be a good thing for the house and the servants to have
someone there to look after over the summer.”

A
house that big an’ ’e never uses it? Cor
! Nan thought with raw
envy.
Must be nice to be rich
!

Strange
how her vision of “rich” had changed. Not that long ago, she had
thought Mem’sab and Sahib were “rich”—and of course, by
the standards of poverty in Whitechapel, they were. But now she was privy to
the economies of running a school, the compromises Mem’sab had to make,
had seen both Mem’sab and Sahib consulting over the bills and working out
what could and could not be done. Nothing here was ever wasted, not a stitch of
fabric, not a bit of space, not a scrap of food. It might be given away in
charity, but it was never wasted.

“And
how would his servants feel about an army of children descending?”
Mem’sab countered. “I have no wish to suffer the vagaries of a
staff full of resentful servants, and neither will our own people. And as to
our own people, I also do not wish to subject them to the rudeness and
prejudice of those who are not prepared to welcome them as equals and superiors.”

“He
says he believes there will be no problem.” Sahib paused. “But I
see your point. Let me explore this further; I’ll even visit the place
with Selim and we will sound out the servants. But if there is no
problem?”

Mem’sab
sighed. It sounded reluctant. “Then I agree, it would be a good idea. But
there will be
half
holidays only. I do not want the children to get
out of the habit of the discipline of lessons.”

***

It
took every bit of “discipline” in Nan’s body to keep quiet
about the promised treat. For one thing, she didn’t want to disappoint
anyone if it turned out not to come to pass. She’d had far too many
disappointments of her own, things her mother promised in the euphoria of gin
that never happened, or promises that sounded enticing that turned out to be
traps set by unscrupulous adults eager to take advantage of a child. For
another, if she revealed it, they’d
know
she had a listening
post, and then there would go the source of information.

So
she kept her lips firmly shut, and went on with life as usual. Not that it was
unpleasant! Far from it. There were a great many “school treats” in
these summer months, as she came to learn. There were trips by omnibus to the
zoo, to the many parks, to the British Museum. There were Sunday School treats
for parish children, not only for churches in
their
parish, but for
others nearby, that Mem’sab, with her clever ways, managed to get them
all invited to. Sahib somehow contrived a boat ride on two canal barges, one
going upriver, and another back down for the return trip, that took them
through Camden Lock; a fascinating thing for Nan and even more fascinating for
the boys.

Many
of these occasions involved ice creams, a treat Nan had never before
encountered, which left her wondering what possible reward could be in heaven
if Earth was able to provide ice creams.

Well…
perhaps if heaven included ice creams for breakfast, luncheon, tea, and
dinner…

Neville
and Grey came along on these excursions, of course. One of the problems of
taking Grey had been completely negated by the presence of Neville; there was
not a bird in the sky that would dream of attacking Grey with the enormous
raven flying escort, nor was anyone likely to try stealing the parrot with
Neville flashing a wicked eye and nasty beak nearby. Only once was there any
trouble, when a bully of a lad at Hyde Park tried to make a grab at Grey.
Neville dove down out of a nearby tree and made a slashing stab at his
clutching hand, coming so close to actually connecting that neither the
boy’s governess nor the now-hysterical boy himself could be convinced he
hadn’t until the intact fingers were displayed for the policeman who
intervened. By then, Neville had wisely taken himself back up into the tree
again, so there was nothing to prove that the raven even belonged to anyone in
the school party but hearsay witnesses.

“Sounds
to me like you been aggravatin’ all the birds hereabouts,” the
bobby said, having had just about enough of both boy and governess by then.
“If I was you, I’d go hop over to the Museum. Birds are all stuffed
there. You can’t aggravate ‘em, they can’t harm you.”

While
Nan hadn’t completely forgotten the conversation, she had just about
convinced herself that the summer could hold no better joys than this continuing
series of excursions, when one night, Mem’sab called for silence just
before dinner was served.

Since
these wildly infrequent occasions always meant some grand surprise—she
always saved bad news for morning assembly—she got instant quiet.

“A
very kind gentleman has offered the school the use of his country home for the
month of June,” she said, and quelled the uprising before it started with
a single look. “There will be rules; this is
not
our home, and
we will take as much care of the things in it as we would the things in the
museum, Tommy.”

Tommy,
who had very nearly caused an incident over his desire to drop into an enormous
jar at the British Museum and leap out again, like the thieves in Ali Baba,
hung his head. Nan stifled a grin.

“You
will treat his servants with respect, as you treat your teachers and my helpers
here at the school,” she continued. “You will obey them when they
ask you to do something or refrain from doing something, you will refer to them
as ‘Miss,’ ‘Mrs.’ and ‘Mr.’ and you will
not play the Little Sahib and Missy Sahib with them. If you are good, there
will be half holidays in the week, and Saturday and Sunday will be full
holidays. If you are not, we will pack up and return here.”

The
silence remained unbroken, but the children exchanged looks of delight. Even
Grey mantled her wings and pinned her eyes, though Neville contrived to look
bored.

“Tomorrow
will be free of lessons as you pack up your belongings for the month,”
Mem’sab continued. “And the day after tomorrow, we will all take
the train to Highleigh Court.”

Only
now did she smile, as whispers began. She said nothing more, though, merely sat
down as the signal for serving to begin. All the children ate together except
for the few in the nursery, at four big tables arranged down the dining room.
One teacher sat at each table, while Mem’sab, Sahib, and the other
teachers sat at a fifth table.