I hesitate.
“Eve?”
Well, all right. He hasn’t specified when or where or for exactly how long. I can put him off. “Okay,” I say. “We’ll do it.”
BACK IN Cat’s Hollow the following evening, Morven seems unusually restless, taking up her knitting and setting it down again with a sigh. She picks up the red plastic View-Master I gave her for Christmas and starts flipping through the stack of paper disks with a definite sense of purpose. She chooses one, drops it in the slot, and holds the viewfinder up to her face. “Hrmmm.”
I look up from the Colette novel I’m only half-reading. “What are you up to?”
“I thought perhaps if I …” She pulls the disk out of the slot, turns it round, reinserts it, and looks into it again. “Ah! Here we go.”
“What are you looking at? Let me see that.” She hands me the View-Master, and when I raise it to my eyes I see our brother-in-law sitting on the sofa in his office opposite his secretary.
“I figured I could make it work backward if I just flipped the slide.”
“Brilliant, Morven! Now maybe we can get to the bottom of this. I don’t suppose we could make the pictures move?”
“You tell me—you’re the one who fixed it in the first place.”
“Hmm.” I murmur a few words, tap the plastic two times, and suddenly I can hear their long-ago conversation, their voices small and tinny. Eagerly I raise the View-Master to my eyes.
Henry’s law degree in a mahogany frame hangs on the wall above a large fishbowl, in which two goldfish are sucking face above a little ceramic castle. I can’t see the window, but I can hear the hustle and bustle of downtown Blackabbey. All the lights are on. It’s too late; they shouldn’t still be at work. Oh, but they’re not working.
They’re such a cliché, the pair of them: the silly little minx looking for someone to take the place of her father, and the middle-aged man too flattered to resist her attentions. As I watch this scene I keep shaking my head at the magnitude of Henry’s stupidity. I’m hard-pressed to understand the attraction; she’s too thin, too birdlike, and there’s an eagerness and a hunger in her manner that by rights should repel him. She can’t hold a candle to Helena, not in a thousand lifetimes.
“I can’t help feeling as if I’ve ruined you for all other men,” Henry is saying. I roll my eyes.
“There are no other men, Henry.”
“There will be.”
“There’s only you.”
“Oh, Belva. You shouldn’t talk that way.”
“Why not?”
“You know why not. I have a family. I have a wife.”
Belva scowls as he mentions my sister. “You’re afraid of her. I know you are.”
“Afraid? Of Helena?” In Henry’s look of genuine surprise I can see the signs of illness—he looks so pallid, so worn out.
Belva nods, her thin lips pursed in defiance.
“This has nothing to do with Helena.” He pauses, then says almost ruefully, “Helena is perfect.”
“She’d like you to think so, wouldn’t she?”
Good Lord, what did Henry see in this pathetic girl? I glance at the fishbowl and notice something in the doorway of the little ceramic castle that definitely should not be there: an eyeball the size of a marble.
Henry shakes his head. “She knows, Belva. She knows everything—and yet she’s willing to forgive me.” He regards her with a look of tender sadness.
What he’s about to say is already written on his face, and Belva reads it as plainly as I can. Her look of horrified panic is priceless. “No—Henry—”
“You’ll be all right, Belva. I’ll find you another position in town, with better hours. I promise.”
Here it comes: she’s turned on the tears. “I like working late,” she sobs.
He pats her on the knee, a gesture of awkward affection. “You like it a little too much.”
“No!”
“This is what’s best for you, don’t you see? The sooner we end this, the sooner you’ll find a man who can offer you everything I can’t.”
“No, Henry!” She launches herself into him, throws her arms around his neck. “You have no idea all that I’ve lost, just to be near you.”
He holds her at arm’s length and scrutinizes her face. “What do you mean by that?”
“It doesn’t matter. I love you, Henry. I love you more than she ever could.”
And so what little resolve Henry possessed melts away in the blink of an eye—just like a man!—and as they embrace I decide I’ve seen quite enough of this.
I lower the toy from my eyes. “Did you hear all that?”
Morven nods grimly. “I’m just glad I didn’t have to see it. Poor Helena!”
“There is something you should see, though.” I hand her the View-Master. “Look at what’s inside the fishbowl.”
“It looks like an eyeball. It’s … watching them.”
“Exactly. I bet you anything Helena put it there. I saw it in the grimoire when I was flipping through it—”
“No!” Morven drops the View-Master so she can clamp her hands on her ears. “Don’t tell me!”
“How to use fish eyes to spy on somebody,” I shout, so she can hear me through her hands.
Morven lowers her hands. “But I don’t see the harm in that—anybody would do the same in her position.”
“Yes, but she told us she never used the book. Why would Helena lie to us?”
“Maybe it’s a coincidence. Maybe she found out about that trick some other way.”
I lift a brow as she hands me back the View-Master. “I’m going to advance to the next slide, all right?”
“It’ll likely take you backward,” Morven replies.
“Maybe that’s just what we want.” I press the orange tab a few times to advance the images, and then I see a much younger Helena chopping carrots and myself seated at the table talking to her as she works. “I’m in the kitchen with Helena. Looks to be about 1950.” I tap on the plastic to set the scene in motion.
Helena pulls a codfish out of a greasy paper wrapper and leaves it on the counter to stare at the Eve of 1950 with its big googly eyes. “I don’t like that fish,” says young Eve.
Now Helena is busy flaying a giant parsnip. “Oh, are you staying for dinner now?”
“It’s looking at me.”
With an exaggerated sigh Helena drops the fish on the cutting board, draws a cleaver out of the knife block, and decapitates said codfish with an oddly triumphant flourish. Then she guts the fish, scoops the innards into a bowl with her bare hand, and sets the bowl on the floor for the tabby cat.
“Why do you have to do all that the long way? If I were you I’d be on the couch right now listening to The Armchair Detective.”
“Henry might see.”
“Tosh. It’s three o’clock in the afternoon!”
The tabby cat sashays into the kitchen and briefly rubs itself against Eve’s bare legs before heading for the goodie bowl on the floor.
“He hasn’t been feeling well lately. I’ve been asking him to take an afternoon off.”
“Hah! Henry will never take an afternoon off.”
“I know,” Helena says darkly as the Eve of 1950 watches her pry the googly eyes out of the fish head with a teaspoon and drop them in a lowball glass on the counter. Plink, plink.
“Ick. What did you do that for?” (Meanwhile old Eve is thinking, Fish eyes, eh? Sometimes a two-bit spellbook is worth more than you paid for it.)
Helena turns away from the counter, mucky teaspoon in hand. “Why don’t you go sit on the couch and listen to the radio?”
“I could chop something,” Eve replies, suddenly eager to be helpful.
“No, thank you,” Helena says crisply. “It’s done now.” And as my sister turns back to the counter in her spotless gingham-check apron, the Eve of 1950 rises from her chair and leaves the kitchen with a look of mild affront.
Meanwhile, the Eve of today has just caught
sight of something she had failed to notice at the time: the open canister of decaf Maxwell House on the counter by Helena’s elbow. I gasp, and Morven grabs the View-Master and holds it up to the light.
“Do you see what I see?”
“Yes, Evelyn, I see it,” she sighs.
“It was just like I said. She was harvesting those fish eyes. There they are, in the glass. And what about the coffee can?”
“You always did like a cup in the afternoon from time to time,” Morven points out as she hands me back the little red toy.
“You know I don’t drink decaf. I’m going to click to the next scene, all right?”
We’re back in the kitchen at Harbinger House. Helena is sitting at the table opposite a man I immediately recognize as Belva’s father, Julius Mettle—as slight and birdlike as his daughter, with that weight-of-the-world air about him. He always seemed like a decent enough chap, but I can tell even before I tap the plastic that he’s there to make some trouble.
As always, Helena is playing the perfect hostess. “Would you like a slice of cake, Dr. Mettle? I just made it this morning.”
“No, thank you, Mrs. Harbinger.”
“Tea?”
“No, thank you. This is not a social call, Mrs. Harbinger. I had better make that clear straightaway.”
“Oh?”
“I have come to discuss a matter that has troubled me greatly. It concerns my daughter, Belva. She has recently taken up with a group of wayward girls, who have encouraged her in behaviors I find completely inappropriate.”
“I’m sorry to hear that,” my sister replies, leaving the rest unsaid: But what does your unfortunate situation have to do with me?
“I have found things in her room, horrible things no young lady should ever have in her possession. Dead things in boxes—frogs, spiders. Strange pieces of jewelry. Occult symbols in the margins of her school notebooks.”
Helena is listening with a patient attitude and raises her eyebrows when Mettle indicates that he expects her to respond. “Well—that is certainly strange. Have you considered taking her to a specialist?”
“I was rather expecting that you could provide some insight into the situation, Mrs. Harbinger.”
“Me?”
“I am given to understand that you are Blackabbey’s foremost practitioner of witchcraft.”
“Dr. Mettle, I understand you are upset, but I can assure you that I do not keep dead vermin in my house.”
“And what of the rest of it? You are a witch, are you not?”
“Have you spoken to your daughter? Has she implicated me in any way?”
“She refuses to say.”
“Then what gave you to think I have anything at all to do with your daughter’s activities?”
“I won’t stand for this!” he cries. “You can’t sit here and tell me you have no idea the influence you have over these girls!”
“Influence?” Helena lets out an incredulous little laugh. “I have never conversed or corresponded with your daughter. And seeing as my daughters have all left the high school, I doubt that any of them have ever spoken with her either. Your daughter has never been inside this house. Frankly, I’m not sure what it is you expect me to refrain from doing.”
Mettle seems to be formulating his next move, so Helena goes on. “I hope you won’t take offense at what I’m about to say, Dr. Mettle. I know that your daughter lost her mother at an early age, and you must not underestimate the difficulty that motherless children face as they move through adolescence. After all, one cannot expect even the best of fathers to fulfill the roles of both parents.” Helena reaches for the ambrosia cake and cuts him a slice. “I must say I admire your determination to do right by your daughter. I lost my own father when I was very young.”
“And just how long ago was that, Mrs. Harbinger?”
“I was only three years of age. It was a long time before your family arrived in Blackabbey.”
“A very long time, I think,” Dr. Mettle replies with a meaningful glare. “And if you don’t mind my asking, what was your family name?”
“I really wish you would have a slice of cake, Dr. Mettle. Let us be civil.”
The botanist shakes his head. “I know how you lot do things around here. I’ve watched you. You’re all too skilled in the art of distraction, and I tell you, I won’t be waylaid by food, conversation, or anything else you try to ply me with.” Mettle leans in, pointing a finger. “I know what you are!”
Helena shrugs, still smiling pleasantly. “Positively nonplussed?”
He pounds the table with his fist. “I’ll expose you.”
“Are you threatening me, Dr. Mettle?” Helena speaks as if she’s asking if he would like another cup of tea.
“If you don’t keep well away from my daughter, believe me—I won’t hesitate.”
“That is easily done, as I’ve said, since I have had no contact with your daughter in the first place.”
Without further comment Dr. Mettle rises from his seat, puts on his hat, and stalks out of the house.
“How odd,” Morven says as I place the View-Master on the sofa between us. “She never told me Dr. Mettle came to see her.”
Fawkes’s words come back to me now, try as I might to suppress the memory: Them two deaths was linked somehow, I just know it. I don’t say anything, I just look at her. Morven stows the View-Master in a drawer on the end table, purses her lips, and resumes her knitting.
Some Dread Malady of the Soul
22.
Autumn 1944
AFTER THE liberation of Paris they claimed there was no more work for us. They even tried to shoehorn Jonah into a desk job. There was no need for new agents in Cairo, Istanbul, or anywhere else, they said. I couldn’t begin to imagine Jonah on his took shifting papers all day—and more to the point, neither could he. I saw how it maddened him to be sidelined like this, but I felt sure a new opportunity would present itself; I could do as I liked, of course, but I didn’t want to go back to Germany without him. No matter how fluent we were, or how well we could claim to understand the quirks and customs of the German people, a mission to Nazi Germany was tantamount to suicide. At least that’s what the Brits said.
The Americans, on the other hand, were willing to try it.
We were only cooling our heels in London for a couple of weeks, but to Jonah it felt like the better part of a lifetime. At the end of that fortnight, we found ourselves in a snug at the Monkey’s Uncle, where he got so pickled he said they’d have treated him better if he’d died in a death camp.
I’d had a dream the night before that three old men were playing a card game under a green lamp. One had a cigarette tucked behind his ear, out of which sprouted a little thatch of gray hair; another tapped his feet to a tune he heard only in his head. The game ended and one of the losers stood up and threw his cards on the table. “That’s the last time I play a game with you, Charlie. You’re a fink.”
“See you tomorrow, Ed!” Charlie called gleefully after him.
Well, when my dreams come to pass it means I can expect a tall dark stranger within the hour. The old men set up their card game as Jonah drank his whisky, and Ed told Charlie to shove it in just the words he’d used in the dream. I told Jonah to hush, that I’d had a portent and I felt sure our luck would turn on a dime.
He frowned. “Turn on a dime?”
“Turn on tuppence, then.”
I heard a coin drop nearby, and a man bent over to pick it up just beside our snug.
When he straightened up I saw a bespectacled gent, somewhere past forty, wearing a Fair Isle waistcoat under his jacket. He might have been a professor. “Did somebody drop a coin?” he asked in a Boston accent.
I smiled as I shook my head. “Do sit down,” I said. Jonah was looking at him with great interest, his empty whisky glass, thankfully, forgotten.
“Name’s Howard,” the man said as he slid into the booth. “I took the liberty of ordering another round of whisky sodas.”
Here, too, was a fortress inside a mountain where machines were made that could obliterate whole city blocks. Oh, how I wish I could say it was only another one of those horrid fairy tales—but the ogres who ran this death factory were all too real. The Allies had found their first complex on the Baltic Sea, where the V-1 buzz bombs were made, and blown it to smithereens. So they’d built this new subterranean plant, Mittelwerk, on the southern fringe of the Harz—and it was bomb-proof. Our objective was the same as it had been at the V-1 depots in France: to learn the supply routes and transit schedules and bomb the hell out of the railway lines, so that the new generation of rocket bombs, the V-2S, could never reach their targets.
With the mission to Germany we were starting afresh; we were under a new authority, and our code names for radio and courier transmissions, aliases, and cover stories were all reassigned. My code name was Marvel—rather fitting, and I don’t mind saying so. My alias was Uta Braun, age thirty-two, widow, no children, formerly employed as a governess in Quedlinburg, and I’d been given the name and details of a local family that had left for Switzerland. As I say, we were in fairy-tale country now, ironically enough. Whenever we would pass a shop window full of witch ornaments whittled out of wood, each hooked nose topped with a huge knob for a wart, Jonah would laugh and say we’d arrived at my ancestral home.
Howard had also brought on board our demolition man, Fisher, but we had a new radio operator: Hans Grüssner, a German in his middle thirties recruited from the socialist workers’ union in London. His wife and two daughters were living in a one-room flat in Brixton, and he fretted endlessly about how regularly they could expect to receive his OSS salary. I had my doubts about Grüssner—he was just the type to shriek if he spotted a mouse—but Jonah was so eager for departure that I decided to say nothing.
Petty Magic Page 19
