by Candace Camp
“I was just telling the duchess that she should go upstairs to rest after such an ordeal,” Emmeline said. It amused Thisbe that her mother and grandmother went out of their way to avoid using the other’s given name.
“Nonsense. I’m not of an age yet where I must take a nap in the afternoon. Too much sleep dulls the brain, you know.” The dowager duchess turned and marched into the formal drawing room, which was rarely used by the duke and his family.
Emmeline sighed as she turned to her daughter. “I am glad you arrived. Everyone else is out. Well, Bellard is here, but he bolted up the backstairs the moment he heard Cornelia’s voice. And I have my suspicions that Smeggars was lying when he told us Henry had gone to his club.”
They followed the dowager duchess into the drawing room. She was sitting in a chair beside the massive fireplace. “It’s freezing in here.”
“We don’t usually keep a fire in this room, as we rarely use it,” Emmeline replied. “But Smeggars had them set it when you arrived. It should be much warmer soon.”
“But where do you receive guests? Don’t tell me you still insist on that hideous red monstrosity.”
“I prefer the sultan room, yes.”
Cornelia sniffed her disapproval and surveyed the room. “This is such a stately reception room. I have always been quite fond of it. You could not find such workmanship as this today.” She gestured toward the ornately carved walnut mantel and paneling that framed the fireplace. “I used to come here to speak to Henry’s ancestor.” She smiled fondly at the portrait of a dour-looking man in seventeenth-century clothing.
“Old Eldric?” Thisbe’s voice rose in disbelief. “But he’s been dead two hundred years.”
“Really, Thisbe, mind your manners,” her grandmother scolded. “You shouldn’t speak of your ancestors in such an impertinent way. Eldric was the first Duke of Broughton, after all.”
“I’m sorry, Grandmother. I was just, um, surprised that you talked to him.” Thisbe didn’t know why her grandmother’s peculiar beliefs still astonished her. “I thought it was only those close to you who...communicated with you.”
“Of course, I speak most to my dear Alastair. And my mother visits me often. But they are not the only ones. The shades reach out to me in many places. They know when one has the Gift as I do. Olivia, as well.” She tilted her head, studying Thisbe. “They tell me you may have the Gift as well, at least a bit of it.”
This was a new one. Thisbe had heard her grandmother boast about her “gift” for Thisbe’s entire life. It had given her goose bumps and even nightmares when she was young. Especially that eerie time when Cornelia said she saw their puppy’s death, a month before he strayed onto the road and was killed by a passing wagon. The dowager duchess’s pronouncements no longer gave Thisbe the shivers, but her announcement that Thisbe possessed the same talent was vaguely disturbing. “You always said Olivia had it, not me.”
“I didn’t think so, either.” The dowager duchess shrugged. “But Mother assures me that it’s there—all the women of our line possess it. Although I find it hard to believe that it exists in Kyria. She takes after you, no doubt.” Cornelia looked at Emmeline.
“No doubt.” The duchess smiled serenely.
Perhaps it wouldn’t be so bad for Desmond to meet the dowager duchess, after all. He was used to his mentor, who believed in ghosts. He might even want to study the duchess. Thisbe suppressed a smile at the thought.
“Where is Kyria?” Cornelia looked around the room as if she might be hiding somewhere. “We need to talk about her debut.”
“Reed took the other girls to the museum. He’s been promising Olivia to do so for some time.”
“Kyria went to the British Museum?” Thisbe’s eyebrows lifted. “But she dislikes the museum—she says it makes her feel smothered.”
“Only the Egyptian and Fertile Crescent sections. It’s the mummies, I think. Reed assured her that she wouldn’t have to go into that part of it. She wanted to see the ancient jewelry. Also, she suspected Kenneth Duncan was going to call on her today.”
“Kyria does have an eye for jewelry,” Thisbe’s grandmother acknowledged. “She’s like me that way. I have always been known for my taste in accessories. When I was a young girl, they didn’t wear much adornment, you know, just a cameo or maybe a strand of pearls. Thank heavens that period passed. Well, it doesn’t matter. It’s Thisbe I’m really concerned about.”
“Me? Grandmother, I assure you, I am perfectly fine. You needn’t worry about me.”
“But I do. You need to take a Season.”
“I don’t need a Season.” This was an old discussion; Thisbe thought her grandmother had finally dropped the notion. “I don’t want one.”
“Nonsense. Every girl needs a Season. How else are you to find a husband?”
“Perhaps I’ll meet him at a lecture,” Thisbe said with a smile.
“A scholar?” Cornelia asked in horror. “No, no, I mean someone suitable. Someone of your own station. A Moreland must be careful about marrying properly.” She directed a significant look at Emmeline.
Thisbe jumped in quickly. “Anyway, I’m far too old to come out. I’m twenty-three.”
“That is precisely what I mean,” Cornelia said triumphantly. “You are reaching a desperate age. Soon you’ll be regarded as a spinster.”
Emmeline rose. “Why don’t we all have a glass of sherry?”
Fortunately the subject was dropped after that, and it was not long before the rest of the family began to trickle in, allowing Thisbe to drop the burden of conversation with her grandmother. She moved to give her father her spot beside his mother, ignoring the wounded look he sent her, and soon she was able to slip quietly out the door.
There was no escaping supper and family conversation afterward. Even Uncle Bellard made an appearance, greeting the dowager duchess before scurrying to take a chair at the farthest end of the table, his sense of duty satisfied. Though they normally did not follow the standard practice of the men of the family sharing a postdinner glass of brandy, the duke happily reinstated the custom whenever his mother visited. They could only linger so long, though, before they, too, had to join the women in the grim formal drawing room.
Thisbe’s mind drifted as the conversation flowed around her. She looked up at the portrait of the first duke. When Thisbe was younger, she assumed that the dowager duchess told her tales of communicating with the dead simply to draw attention to herself. The practice was also handy for couching her advice as coming from someone else. But when Thisbe was fourteen, she had walked past her grandmother’s room one afternoon and seen the woman conversing with the air.
The memory of it made her shiver even now. It had been both shocking and eerie, and Thisbe realized that the dowager duchess really believed she could speak with the dead. Perhaps she needn’t worry about scaring off Desmond with her father’s title. More likely, he would flee because of her peculiar family.
Later, as she lay in bed, trying to sleep, her mind went back to that scene years ago with her grandmother. She recalled the woman’s attentive, even smiling, face. That smile was what had been most chilling. Thisbe had locked her door that night...though she had no idea why she thought a locked door would protect her from ghosts.
In all other ways, Cornelia was normal. Dictatorial and critical, but still much like many others. It made the bizarre statements she dropped into conversation now and then all the more eerie. She treated it so casually, as if conversing with spirits was a common thing. Maybe her grandmother really was mad...
* * *
SHE WAS HOT, so very hot. The heat enclosed her, pressing on her like a weight. Why was she here? What was happening? She heard the crackle of fire all around her. Heavy dark smoke billowed up, choking her.
She must get out. She must find him, save him.
In the distance she heard screams, horrible soun
ds of unending agony. That time would come for her as well, she knew. Closer, there were shouts and jeers, the rumble of conversation in the crowd. She could feel their hatred, sense their excitement. They wanted the spectacle of her death.
“Help me. My child. Help me. Please.”
The crackle grew louder, the air so hot it seared her lungs. The kindling was blazing now, the fire catching the larger, heavier logs. She tried to pull away from the flames, but she could not move. Frantically, she twisted and turned to no avail.
Something was lashed around her waist, tying her firmly to the hard post behind her. Sobbing, she tore at the heavy rope, clawing and pulling in desperation. Her wrists were bound as well, making it more difficult to gain any purchase on the thick, rough fiber.
Raising her face to the heavens, she screamed, “Release me...!”
* * *
THISBE JOLTED AWAKE. Her heart was racing, her stomach knotted in terror. She was soaked in sweat. The memory of smoke and fire was so vivid, so frightening, that she slipped out of bed and eased open the door into the hallway to look for signs of fire. Nothing glowed anywhere. There was no smell of smoke. It was only a nightmare.
A most peculiar nightmare. There had been none of the running or falling or the frantic sense of being late that occupied most of her nightmares. It had been all fire and fear. Why had she dreamed of fire? There was no fire in the house, no smell of smoke. The room was chilly. Thisbe had a healthy fear of fire, but not an abnormally strong one. And nothing that happened today had anything to do with a fire.
More specifically, why had she dreamed of being burned at the stake, for surely that was what she had envisioned—bound to a post, fire all around her? The danger in her dreams was usually nebulous, even unknown. But this had been vivid and detailed to an unusual extent.
It was easy to see why she had pleaded for help. But why had she said, “My child?” Thisbe didn’t have a child and nor did anyone close to her. Even more disturbing, the voice she’d heard had not been her own.
It was almost as if she’d been dreaming someone else’s nightmare.
That thought sent a little shiver through her. Thisbe realized how cold she was, standing here in only her cotton nightgown. She hurried back to get into bed, rubbing her arms. She flinched at the little dart of pain in her fingertips. Frowning, she lit the candle at her bedside and looked down at her hands. Her nails were ragged, one of them torn, and the ends of her fingers were red and raw.
Just as if she had been clawing at a rough rope.
* * *
DESMOND PEERED INTO one of the eyepieces of the contraption in front of him. Well, that idea hadn’t worked. He raised his head and considered the problem, idly making designs on the paper before him. He was amazingly lacking in disappointment, considering that his most recent attempt to build a spectrographic instrument had failed. But it was hard to feel anything but good; he would see Thisbe on Sunday. He smiled to himself.
Meeting her at the reading room was less than ideal. Of course, they could take a stroll together afterward and talk, but he would miss that hour of sitting beside her, keenly aware of her presence. It also felt somehow furtive, as if they were setting up a tryst, which he supposed they were, with the difference that they would be in public view, instead of hiding in private.
He wished like the devil that he could meet her in private. It was wonderful to walk with her and talk and laugh—he thought he’d never laughed, or even smiled, as much in his life as he had with her. But he wanted quite desperately to touch her arm or hold her hand, even if it was encased in her glove. He wanted most of all to hold her. To feel her body in his arms, to drink in the scent of her. To kiss her.
Desmond shifted on his stool. It was foolish to think about that. He knew nothing would come of this romance in the end; he should enjoy the moment, take what he had and not think about what he wanted and the obstacles that lay between him and that future. In truth, it boiled down to one obstacle: he was a man with no prospects.
He sighed and tossed aside the pencil, the thought that had been nagging at him all day returning: Why had Thisbe wanted to meet him at the museum? Why had she not suggested he call on her? Why had she never allowed him to escort her all the way to her home?
Her reasons had been logical—he needed to go to work, it was cold and he wasn’t wearing a coat, and so on. But he couldn’t help but think that she didn’t want him to know where she lived.
Desmond could think of several reasons why that was so, none of them in his favor. The most lowering one was that she was ashamed of him. The most gut piercing was the idea that she was married. In between lay strict fathers who didn’t allow her to have men call on her or embarrassment about where she lived or of someone in her family. Unfortunately, the ones in the middle were the least likely. A strict father would not let his daughter go off to lectures on her own, much less spend the entire afternoon there. She obviously loved her family and talked about them with affection. And she dressed too well to be living in a hovel.
The obvious reason was that she didn’t want her family to see Desmond. Even the laxest of fathers wouldn’t be pleased to have his daughter courted by a man with no prospects, and as a scholar he would be singularly unimpressed by a man who hadn’t attended Oxford, as he and her brothers had. Even worse, Desmond had not managed to stay the course at any university.
There was a polished quality about Thisbe—and presumably her entire family—that Desmond knew he did not have. However good his grammar, however little of his Dorset accent remained, his speech did not have that certain tone that bespoke refinement. His clothes were cheaply made, his hair shaggy. His background was... Well, there was nothing there to be proud about, really, other than that he had managed to leave it behind.
He was the sort of man who lost his gloves, who forgot his coat even though the temperature was freezing, who never noticed the time and was often late, who could talk for hours on a subject that put everyone else to sleep. He would never make enough money to support a family, and what money he had he was apt to spend on his research or a book. In short, he was not a man one wanted to introduce to one’s parents.
Well. He’d certainly managed to punch a hole in the balloon of his happiness. Desmond turned back to his nonfunctioning instrument. He would probably have to take the whole thing apart.
At that moment, the door to the laboratory was flung open, letting in a blast of winter air, and Carson came in, a grin on his face. “I have news. You’ll like this, Professor Gordon.”
“I will?” Gordon stood up from his table, pushing up his spectacles. “Have you discovered something?”
“I have indeed.” Now that he had their attention, Carson sauntered over to his table and set down his hat, a cat-that-ate-the-canary look on his face. “I have learned that the Dowager Duchess of Broughton is in town.”
CHAPTER SEVEN
DESMOND’S JAW DROPPED, and Gordon surged toward the man. Everyone began to throw out questions.
“Are you certain?”
“When?”
“How do you know?”
“Have you seen her? Have you seen it?”
“Have you talked to her?”
Carson threw up his hands in mock surrender. “Wait. Wait. One at a time.”
“Quiet.” Professor Gordon cast a stern look around at the young men. “Let the man speak.” He turned back to Carson. “Tell us.”
“To answer your questions—she arrived just yesterday. Apparently she’s the sort whose movements attract immediate attention. And, no, I haven’t seen her. I hardly move in the same circles as duchesses. I heard my mother and her friends gossiping about it this afternoon, so I eavesdropped. Apparently she’s something of a harridan. One of the women said the duchess is mad as a hatter—the whole family is.” He paused, then added significantly, “And another woman remarked, ‘They say she claims to speak to he
r dead husband.’”
“Are you serious?” Desmond leaned forward.
“I thought that would get everyone’s attention.”
“You think she knows what the Eye is? That she actually uses it?” Gordon asked in astonishment.
“I’ve no idea, sir. But it sounded suspiciously like that.”
“It’s a stroke of luck that she’s in town,” Desmond said. “You can call on her, sir, ask her directly.”
The older man shook his head. “No. She won’t see me, I’m sure.” He plopped down on his high stool, his expression falling into dejection. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a folded sheet of paper. “I had a reply to my letter. From her man of business. She didn’t even deign to write me herself. He says, and I quote, ‘The Duchess is not interested in selling or lending any of her possessions. I must request that you not write her on this subject again.’” Gordon stuck the letter back in his pocket, his face stony. “The bloody arrogant woman. The advancement of knowledge means nothing to her.”
“That’s the toffs for you,” Benjamin commented. “The aristocracy cares for nothing but themselves.”
“Seems to me it’s time for my suggestion,” Carson asserted.
“To steal it?” Desmond asked derisively.
“It’s not stealing. We established that it was almost certainly stolen from Anne Ballew. If it belongs to anyone, it would be her descendants.”
“And no one knows who those are,” Gordon said. “So, really, it should belong to the world at large, to science and history. We could use it, unlike her, who wants to keep it hidden away.”
“That excuse could be used by any thief—I need that money and he’s rich,” Desmond protested. “Besides, if Carson’s gossip is accurate, she apparently does use it.”
“But it has no real monetary value,” another of the students reasoned. “Annie Blue wasn’t wealthy. I doubt it was made of anything expensive.”
