Shadowsea

by Peter Bunzl

  They gave muted grunts in response.

  “Don’t everyone cheer at once!” Selena snapped, upset. “What on earth have you been up to? Why does everyone look so glum?”

  “Nothing,” Robert, Lily and Caddy said together, practically in unison.

  Each of them pasted on a smile, but beneath the surface, their hearts were still heavy with the implication of their meeting with Dane and all they had discovered.

  “Well,” Selena said, huffily. “You lot may have more important things on your mind, but I for one think this news deserves some type of celebration.”

  Half an hour later, in the hotel’s Tea Lounge, Selena had ordered high tea and chocolate fondant cakes for everyone in their party.

  The rest of the room was packed with hotel guests, sat around at various tables, enjoying the teatime selection of scones, beautifully glazed petit fours and perfectly cut sandwiches.

  As they waited for their tea to arrive, Papa and Selena chatted quietly over the considerable pile of embassy paperwork Selena was required to fill in. Lily, Robert and Caddy played a game of rummy. It helped to keep their brains busy and distract them from the ghastly revelations of the last hour. Malkin wasn’t with them. He’d decided to stay in the suite this time, pleading a rest, and claiming he didn’t want them getting him in any more trouble.

  While Robert and Caddy dealt a new hand, Lily thought about everything that had happened earlier. She’d been stunned by Caddy’s visions, but she didn’t doubt that what Robert’s sister had seen in her trance was true.

  Lily realized something else: both Dane and she herself had died and been brought back by science, only to discover they’d lost someone. And they’d both tried to block what had happened to them from their minds. Lily was sure that was why she’d instinctively felt that connection to Dane when she’d first met him.

  But it was Caddy’s shocking revelation that Dane was going to wake the dead at twelve o’clock on New Year’s Eve that worried at her more than anything. It came and went in nauseous waves that she could do nothing about, pestering her like an unscratchable itch.

  If Caddy was right, then something horrifying was due to happen in two days’ time. Lily wondered if they should finally tell Papa and Selena what had been going on. She’d have to pick the right moment so as not to scare them half out of their wits with what she and the others had found out.

  “After we collect Selena and Caddy’s stamped permit tomorrow,” Papa was saying, “we should go to the Grand Central Depot and get train tickets for our onward journey on the third of January.”

  “Good idea,” Selena chirruped. “We want to beat the holiday rush and the station might be closed on New Year’s Eve.” She laid aside her forms as a pile of delicious-looking cakes arrived on a three-tier cake stand. The stand was packed with scones, pastries and buns. The waiter put a large silver teapot down on a doily beside it. “Why, this all looks simply marvellous!” Selena said, handing around the cups and plates. “I don’t think I’ve ever had such a tea!”

  Lily picked up a gorgeously glazed pastry. It should’ve tasted delicious, but when she tried it, the disquieting unease that was shored up inside her dried each bite until it felt like she was eating cardboard.

  “I don’t know why everyone’s behaving like it’s a funeral,” Selena said, tucking into a chocolate éclair. “It’s good news! Caddy and I will be coming on to Boston with you!”

  “And to Harvard,” Papa added. “In fact,” he said, smiling at Robert, “your mother and sister are going to be joining us for the rest of our stay!”

  For Robert’s sake, Lily was glad to hear that Selena and Caddy were coming with them to Boston. But she couldn’t shake her worries about Dane and the fact that, whether he had spoken to them or not, by now Matilda Milksop and Miss Buckle would both know that she, Robert, Caddy and Malkin had been in their suite.

  She scanned the room for the professor and spotted her just at that moment entering the Tea Lounge through the far door. As usual she had her wooden case clasped in her hand, but in her other angry fist she gripped her set of keys.

  Lily and Robert watched her warily.

  The professor gave them a grim little nod, as if to say, I’m coming for you. Then she marched over and plonked the keys down in the centre of their white tablecloth.

  “Your kids were in my suite earlier. I found these where they shouldn’t have been.”

  “What the devil?” Papa cried.

  “You heard me,” Professor Milksop snapped. “They broke in.”

  Lily, Robert and Caddy tensed in the knowledge that the news of their antics in room one hundred were about to revealed.

  Only, not quite yet. For, just then, a loud scream in the hallway interrupted everything.

  Miss Aleilia Child burst through the double doors on the near side of the room, her arms flung up in the air in alarm.

  “My necklace!” she screamed, now clutching at her neck. “The Milksop mechanical’s just stolen my diamond necklace!”

  Whatever Matilda Milksop had been about to say to Papa and Selena about their children breaking into her room, it was swept aside by the chaos of Miss Child’s accusation and the arrival of the police ten minutes later.

  The chief inspector’s name was George Tedesko, which he announced to the whole Tea Lounge. He wore a formal coat covered in brass buttons and badges. And when he removed his cap, Lily saw that he was a rather elderly man, with short white hair that receded over his temples and a salt and pepper beard that was cut square across his chin in a blunt line. His eyes were sparkling blue and had, she thought, a serious and attentive quality behind their gaze.

  “No one’s leaving till we’re done speaking with you,” the inspector said to everyone. “Seems a mechanical named Miss Buckle is responsible for the theft of a very valuable diamond necklace belonging to Miss Child here. Since then, this mechanical’s vanished from the hotel.” He paused to let that sink in. “Now, in a moment, my assistant, Lieutenant Drumpf, will come round and take names to find out what you know about these things. Those we don’t talk with tonight can expect us to call at your room for an interview in the morning.”

  Lily watched Matilda Milksop. She’d snatched up her keys and sloped off to the nearest free table. She seemed flustered by the sudden arrival of the police, and kept glancing at the wooden case that was still handcuffed to her wrist. Lily wondered if she’d put Miss Buckle up to the robbery. Maybe that’s why she’d burst into the Tea Lounge and made such a scene at their table in the first place – as a distraction and alibi for herself.

  She peeped over at Miss Aleilia Child, who was seated on a daybed in the corner of the room, being fanned with a menu by one of the waiting staff and talking loudly in an operatic voice to Lieutenant Drumpf, a short, pug-faced man in a plainer uniform, about her ordeal.

  “I can’t believe it! I’ve never been robbed before – and by a mechanical, of all people. I thought they weren’t supposed to do that sort of thing. I tried to talk her out of it, but she was frighteningly strong, and since she’s not my mechanical, I couldn’t stop her. She even apologized to me as she took the diamond! Called me Ma’am and everything, as if she was put up to the whole deal and it was distasteful to her… As if it weren’t her fault!” She paused and took a breath, like she was singing. “In my opinion, someone else put that mechanical up to it. Most likely her mistress, Professor Milksop. She asked me if the Ouroboros Diamond was for sale only this morning. And, I just remembered…when we first met, two years ago – at some sorta singing event I did for the Shadowsea Corporation – she showed a great interest in my diamond necklace.”

  That was the newspaper article Miss Child was referring to! Lily leaned in close. She was so busy eavesdropping, she almost forgot to check what the inspector was up to. She searched the room for him and saw he was making his way across the lounge, interviewing each table of guests in turn. Many of them seemed quite incensed at his interruption of their afternoon tea, but no one c
aused a scene.

  Lily imagined being spoken to by the police was an intimidating prospect for the bulk of them, but not for her and Robert. They’d met a lot of police officers in their time. Earlier that summer, on the case of Jack Door, it had been Chief Inspector Fisk of Scotland Yard, and then in Paris in the autumn, Commandant Oiseau of the French police had interviewed them in regard to the criminal activities of the owners of the Skycircus.

  So Lily was perfectly prepared to answer anything put to them by the New York Police Department and to give her opinion on who she thought the person behind the diamond robbery really was. She felt she knew enough to suggest that, in all likelihood, as Miss Child had just hypothesized, it was Professor Milksop who had put Miss Buckle up to the robbery. Even though there was no way Lily could prove it outright, she was sure the professor needed the diamond to make her Ouroboros machine work again.

  Lily decided she would also take the opportunity to tell the police what she had learned about Matilda Milksop’s actions on the Shadowsea from Caddy’s vision, despite her promise to Dane to do nothing of the sort. It would back up her story of why the woman had asked her mechanical to steal the diamond. Things were moving fast now, and it would be best to let the police know all they had learned to stop anything else from happening. Papa and Selena would be shocked to hear what Lily, Robert and Caddy had been up to, but Lily had been planning to tell them sooner or later anyway.

  Eventually, the inspector approached them.

  “Am I correct in assuming you are the Hartman and Townsend families, in room ninety-nine?” he asked, looking at the hotel guestbook in his hand.

  “Yes,” Papa said, answering for everyone.

  “What do you know about this mechanical Miss Buckle and her theft of the Ouroboros Diamond?”

  “Nothing that I’m aware of,” Papa said. “If the mechanical did it, then I don’t see what it has to do with us.”

  “Mechanicals have no free will,” the inspector said. “Someone must’ve put her up to it.”

  “What about her owner, Professor Milksop?” Selena said, butting in, before Lily had the chance to suggest it herself.

  “We’re looking into that.” The inspector glanced over at where Professor Milksop was sat. “But, until we’ve gathered more evidence, we have to consider a range of possibilities. Now, where were you at the time of the theft?” he asked.

  “In here having tea, of course,” Selena said.

  “We all were.” Papa swept his hand around the rest of them. He was being politeness itself, but Lily could detect a slight bristle in his voice. This was how he spoke when he was cross. “Are you suggesting that we’re suspects?”

  “I’m not suggesting anything,” Inspector Tedesko replied gruffly. “Merely making enquiries.”

  “Only about the robbery?” Robert asked. “Or anything suspicious?”

  “Anything suspicious,” the inspector said. “We’ll decide if it’s relevant to the robbery.”

  “Then we do know something,” Lily said. “It’s about Professor Matilda Milksop. She was using Miss Buckle to keep her nephew Dane prisoner in their room.”

  “Oh, come now, Lily,” Papa said. “That’s not true. We’ve seen her nephew. He came down to dinner the other night. He’s just ill.” He smiled reassuringly at the inspector. “My daughter has a rather overactive imagination, Sir, fuelled by an abundance of penny dreadfuls.”

  “It is true,” Lily snapped. “Dane said so.” She pulled Dane’s note from her pocket and showed it to Papa and the inspector.

  “This seems more of a prank than anything else,” the inspector said when he’d finished reading the message. “Nothing for us to concern ourselves with.”

  “It has everything for you to concern yourself with,” Lily said. “Please, just speak with Professor Milksop about it.”

  The inspector beckoned over his assistant. “Fetch Matilda Milksop, will you.” Then he looked around at the various empty pots of tea and coffee and the half-eaten cakes at each table. “Oh, and, Lieutenant Drumpf, while you’re at it, can you ask the staff to fetch me a cup of coffee, and maybe one of those little chocolate-finger puff-cakes? They look rather tasty, and seems like there’s plenty to go round.”

  Lily watched, relieved, as Lieutenant Drumpf brought Dane’s aunt to their table, before wandering off once again to see about the inspector’s cake and coffee.

  “These kids say you’re keeping your nephew against his will. And that Miss Buckle was his jailer,” the inspector said to her. “That true?”

  “My nephew’s ill,” Professor Milksop said. “Needs his bed rest. That’s why he stays in our suite. And yeah, Buckle’s his nurse. She’s always behaved appropriately in that capacity. Far as I’m aware, that’s not a crime, and she ain’t never done anything criminal before…that I know of,” she added, staring hard at Lily, Robert and Caddy. “These kids, Inspector, they don’t know zip about me, or my family! They just took it upon themselves to spy on us.”

  “You’re lying,” Robert said. “You are keeping your nephew prisoner. And Miss Buckle was helping you, before she ran off with the diamond. Dane told us so.”

  Matilda Milksop snorted. “Why in tarnation would I keep my nephew prisoner?”

  “So he won’t tell anyone you were reanimating mice and you killed his parents and him and everyone else on the Shadowsea Base in the process,” Robert said, all in a rush.

  “And so he won’t tell anyone that you brought him back to life too,” Lily said.

  “Or that on New Year’s Eve he’ll wake the dead himself,” Caddy added.

  “Mice! Murder! Waking the dead!” Professor Milksop snapped. “In all my days, I ain’t never heard such garbage. Anything else you’d like to try and pin on me? Nope?” She didn’t wait for an answer. “Trash, is what it is! I’ve done nothing wrong.”

  “It’s not trash,” Robert said, “Caddy saw your crimes in a vision. She saw everything that happened on the Shadowsea Submarine Base before you left it. And now she’s seen what will happen in the future as well.”

  Papa and Selena were listening, aghast. It was plain they barely knew what to make of these revelations. They were coming so thick and fast that Lily could see they were having trouble taking them in. The inspector too. They needed the inspector to believe them more than anyone!

  “What do you mean she ‘saw’ it in a vision?” he asked sceptically.

  “I’m a medium,” Caddy explained, handing the inspector one of her cards.

  “You’ve had these visions before, have you?” the inspector said after reading it.

  “All the time,” Caddy said.

  “But she has occasionally been wrong about a few of them in the past,” John said.

  Caddy frowned at her mother.

  “Although not recently,” Selena added, taking her daughter’s hand.

  “Well, we don’t want to go around accusing people of crimes on the strength of a vision,” the inspector said doubtfully. “That seems rather rash.”

  “But they already did,” Professor Milksop butted in.

  “We saw Dane today,” Lily protested. “He confirmed everything we’ve just said…at least the bits he could remember.”

  “There you go, you see?” Matilda Milksop said. “These kids’ve spent the entire afternoon putting crazy ideas in my nephew’s head.”

  “How’d you speak with the boy if he’s in bed and no one can visit with him?” the inspector asked Lily and the others, ignoring Matilda’s interruptions.

  “She broke into our suite, that’s how,” Professor Milksop said.

  “That the truth?” the inspector asked.

  “I…” Lily hesitated, flummoxed for once.

  “Course it is,” Matilda Milksop said, waving the keys around. “They took these from where I’d left them on the sideboard.”

  “Lily…?” Papa asked.

  “We knocked and no one answered,” Lily mumbled, turning red. “So we picked the lock, found her keys and…
”

  Papa’s eyes went wide with alarm. “Lock-picking again, Lily?”

  “That’s not the important part,” Lily insisted. “The important part is what Caddy saw when we spoke to Dane and what Dane said she’s done…” She pointed at Professor Milksop.

  “What you’ve done, you mean,” Professor Milksop said. “That’s probably why they broke in in the first place, not only to turn my nephew against me, but also to mess with Buckle’s cogs and programming and suggest this robbery to her. I saw the Hartman girl looking at that diamond the other day. It’s like I told you, Inspector, these kids are crooks, spies and robbers. If anyone here’s mixed up in this diamond robbery, it’s them.”

  “How dare you accuse my children of such things!” Selena said, standing up from her seat so she was face-to-face with Matilda Milksop.

  The other guests in the lounge stared in alarm at this quickly escalating ruckus.

  “And mine too,” Papa added, joining Selena on her feet. “They may be a tad wild around the edges, but they are not crooks…or spies. And it was your mechanical who committed the robbery, Professor. If you ask me, you’re making things up now to cover for yourself…”

  “Making things up!” Professor Milksop snapped. “How about the bunch of trashy lies your kids just told about me?”

  “ENOUGH!” The inspector put a hand between the grown-ups to keep them apart.

  He would have barged his way between them, but at that moment one of the waiting staff arrived with his cup of coffee and éclair.

  “Now…” He took a sip of coffee and a bite of cake before putting them both down carefully on the table. “I don’t have time to stand around here and listen to you folks rubbing each other up the wrong way all night, I have an actual crime to solve. In my humble opinion, it’d be better if you settled your differences calmly, amongst yourselves.”