The Convent's Secret

by C. J. Archer

  "Sister Francesca!" Sister Bernadette blurted out. "But what does Mother Alfreda's disappearance have to do with her? Are you saying she knew something?"

  Sister Margaret made a small sound of protest.

  "That's what we wanted to know," Matt said. "Her leaving at the same time seemed too coincidental, but after speaking to her, we don't think she had anything to do with it."

  "Are you sure?" Sister Bernadette shook her head. "She wasn't a good girl, if I remember rightly. Don't you agree, Sister Margaret?"

  Sister Margaret looked like she would burst into tears.

  "Why did you mention her to us?" I asked gently. The nun looked troubled and not at all like she had cruel intentions toward Abigail. "Did you suspect she knew something? Or were you motivated for a different reason?"

  Sister Margaret's lower lip wobbled. She squeezed her eyes shut and pressed her lips together, holding her emotions in check.

  I leaned forward and touched her arm. "Tell us what you know about Abigail Pilcher," I urged her. When she didn't speak, I added, "Did you know she was with child?"

  She nodded. Neither she nor Sister Bernadette seemed surprised. If they both knew, perhaps the entire convent did.

  Something black fluttered just outside the door. It could have been a bird, but was more likely a nun's habit. Someone was eavesdropping.

  I sat back and glanced at Matt, lifting my eyebrow. He nodded, encouraging me to go on. I drew in a deep breath. "Did you know that Abigail is a magician?"

  Sister Margaret's eyes flew open and she crossed herself. Sister Bernadette pressed the crucifix hanging around her neck to her lips. Her face turned as pale as her wimple.

  Behind and above me, something cracked and wood grated against wood. I turned and looked up just in time to see the large cross plunging toward me.

  Chapter 8

  Matt dragged me to the floor a moment before the cross smashed into the chair I'd been sitting on. The backrest splintered and the chair collapsed under the weight of the cross.

  I lay on the floor, half beneath Matt's body, and stared at the spot where I'd sat moments ago. The cross was intact, but the chair was destroyed.

  "Are you all right?" Matt asked, helping me to sit up.

  My heart hammered but I was unharmed. I nodded, knowing I could not yet speak without my voice shaking. I'd never been an overly devout person, although I was a regular church goer, but the timing of the cross falling on me as I mentioned the word magic…it was too coincidental. As Matt often said, he didn't believe in coincidence. Nor did I.

  "Do you see now?" Sister Bernadette said, her accent thick despite her trembling voice. "Magic is the devil's work, and God does not approve of you coming to his house and questioning his faithful daughters about it."

  Sister Margaret clutched her friend's hand in both of hers. The two nuns held one another, clearly shaken by the incident.

  As was I. My body trembled uncontrollably. Matt must have felt it as he helped me to stand. He eyed me closely and I offered him a smile that I knew wasn't convincing but it was all I could muster.

  "You should go now," Sister Margaret said, rising. "The sign is clear—God doesn't want you here. He doesn't want us to talk to you about the devil's work."

  "Magic is not the devil's work," Matt growled.

  Both nuns looked to the cross now lying dormant where it had fallen.

  "If God didn't want people to possess magic then why did he give it to some?" he went on. "Why are some born with it?"

  "I don't have all the answers, Mr. Glass," Sister Margaret snapped. "But if Sister Francesca—Abigail—is a magician, then there is your evidence. She was not a good Catholic girl. One sin begets another and another."

  I clasped Matt's arm, digging my fingers into him. There was no point in arguing with the nuns. He could not change their minds.

  Even so, he continued to try. "She made a mistake," he said tightly. "And it wasn't entirely her fault. The baby's father had a role to play in her predicament."

  "She seduced him! Father—" Sister Margaret bit her lip and glanced at Sister Bernadette.

  But Sister Bernadette was still staring at the cross and didn't appear to have heard. She bent to pick it up and Matt let me go to help her. Together they righted it and leaned it against the wall. Matt inspected the wall and the nails that had held the cross in place. They were badly bent and one had snapped in half.

  "Thank you," Sister Bernadette murmured. She was not the same fiery nun who'd scolded us at the church gate. Her face remained pale and her hands still shook.

  Sister Margaret stood by the door, arms crossed, and scowled as we departed.

  Matt and I crossed the courtyard, meeting the mother superior inspecting one of the window frames on the school building. If she'd been there a few minutes ago, she would have seen the person who'd come to the hall's doorway. She would also have heard the cross falling.

  I planned on slipping past her, but Matt had other ideas. He greeted her with a tip of his hat.

  "Does it need repair?" Matt asked, nodding at the window frame. "I can have my friends look at it."

  "In exchange for information? No, thank you, Mr. Glass." She flaked off some paint with her finger and clicked her tongue.

  "Sister Bernadette can't do it all on her own," he went on. "She's aging and this place is getting older too."

  "She doesn't complain."

  "I'm sure she doesn't, but that doesn't mean she's not struggling to keep up."

  "I told you," the mother superior ground out through a hard jaw, "I will not pay the price you ask."

  "Reverend Mother!" came a sing song voice from the convent side of the courtyard. "Reverend Mother, are you out here? Oh." Sister Clare, the mother superior's assistant and the one who first alerted us to the missing babies, stopped upon seeing us. She looked torn as to whether she ought to return inside or join us.

  "What is it, Sister Clare?" the mother superior asked.

  "There's a matter requiring your attention. It can wait until you're finished with Mr. Glass and Miss Steele."

  "We are finished." The mother superior arched a severe brow at Matt, waiting for him to concede and depart. Clearly she had a lot to learn about him.

  "We spoke with Abigail Pilcher, known as Sister Francesca when she lived here," he said.

  Mother Frances showed a flicker of surprise but schooled it quickly. Sister Clare, however, gasped. "How is she?" the assistant asked.

  "She's well, and so is her son," Matt said.

  "She has a son? How marvelous."

  The mother superior glared at her and Sister Clare bowed her head.

  "Do you have a point, Mr. Glass?" Mother Frances asked.

  "Abigail told us that she was forced to leave the convent," Matt said. "She claims you forced her to go soon after you took over the role of mother superior here."

  "She was wholly unsuited to being a nun. I would have thought the condition she was in upon her departure was proof enough of how unsuitable. Mother Alfreda should have overseen Abigail's departure but she was too weak to do anything about it."

  "So you didn't force her to leave because she was a magician?" Matt asked.

  Sister Clare gasped again. She stared wide-eyed at Matt. "Magic," she whispered with reverence.

  "Magic doesn't exist," the mother superior said in cold, clipped tones. "I would appreciate it if you didn't come here and say otherwise, sir. Magic is harmless fantasy for children but it's irresponsible for adults to perpetuate the myth of its existence. Believing in magic does more harm than good."

  "But the newspapers," Sister Clare murmured. "At least one is saying magic is real."

  "Journalists will say anything to sell more copies of their publications. You've been taken in, Sister Clare. You all have."

  "Sister Clare," I said to the assistant, "were you aware that Abigail was a silk magician?"

  "Silk?" she whispered.

  "Stop this nonsense!" the mother superior spat. "Sister Clar
e, you ought to know better."

  Sister Clare bowed her head. "Yes, Reverend Mother."

  "We have work to do, Mr. Glass, Miss Steele. Good Christian work that requires our complete devotion."

  Matt held up his hands. "We're going."

  I couldn't leave like this, with the mother superior thinking the worst of us for mentioning magic. Imagine what she'd say if she knew about me. "We are not your enemy, Reverend Mother. We respect your values and rituals. We only wish to find the man known as Phineas Millroy, who was given into the convent's care twenty-seven years ago. It's absolutely vital that we find him. He has the power to save someone very dear to me. We know he disappeared from here under mysterious circumstances around the same time Mother Alfreda disappeared. Perhaps they are linked in some way."

  "Don't be absurd." She made a scoffing sound. "There is no link between the two. Mother Alfreda left of her own accord, and the baby's records have merely gone missing. There is no mystery and no conspiracy to cover anything up. I don't know what you think magic has to do with anything, nor do I wish to know. I've given you my views on it, and I have no wish to explore the matter further. Good day."

  She thrust her sharp chin out and strode off across the courtyard toward the convent. Sister Clare shot as an apologetic smile and trailed after her. The mother superior did not close the door until she saw that we were on our way.

  "She's prickly," I said to Matt as we rounded the school building and returned to the street. "Do you think she has something to hide?"

  "Hard to say. Sister Clare seems genuine, though."

  "I'm glad you think so, because so do I."

  "Trust your instincts, India." He scanned the vicinity thoroughly before climbing into the coach behind me.

  "Surely you don't think Payne had something to do with that cross falling?" I teased.

  "You never know with Payne." He eyed me closely and took my hands in both of his. "Are you all right? Did you get hurt?"

  "I bumped my elbow, but it's fine."

  "Sorry," he said, palming both my elbows. "I wasn't very gentle."

  "You saved my life."

  He tossed me a sheepish smile. "I saved you from getting a bump on the head. I doubt it would have killed you."

  I wasn't so sure. The cross looked heavy, and it had required both Matt and Sister Bernadette to lift it. "Tiredness hasn't slowed you. Thank you, Matt."

  "Just repaying the favor you've done for me a number of times." He leaned forward and kissed me lightly on the lips. It was deliciously tender and banished the last tremble of my frayed nerves.

  It also had the potential to turn passionate. I gently pushed him away before I deepened the kiss. He sat back again with a curiously satisfied smile, as if he'd won a small victory.

  Time to return the situation into something less dangerous. "How do you think the cross fell?" I asked.

  "The nails were bent."

  "But why were they bent?"

  "Nails sometimes bend if the weight they bear is too heavy. Those nails weren't strong enough for that cross."

  I wasn't quite convinced. The cross fell at the moment I asked about magic. The very moment.

  "It wasn't God trying to strike you down, India," he said. "Don't think like that."

  "I'm not. I'm thinking how unlikely it was for it to fall right then, and how no one had touched it." I met his gaze. "And how I can make watches and clocks move without touching them."

  He looked as if the stuffing had been knocked out of him. Mere tiredness didn't do that. "You think one of the sisters is a magician and made it move? But…no other magician can do that, only you."

  "How do we know? Just because Chronos did not know of one doesn't mean another pure-blooded magician doesn't exist. What does surprise me is that it means one of those nuns is a magician. They both looked upset by the discussion and shaken when the cross fell, however."

  "The mother superior was just outside," Matt said with a slow nod of agreement. "She could have done it. So could Sister Clare. She wasn't far away either; she could have doubled back to the convent after leaving the meeting room. India, why are you frowning like that?"

  "I saw something near the door just before the cross fell. A flap of black fabric, I think. Like a habit or cloak."

  "It's too warm for a cloak, unless someone wishes to wear a hood to hide their face. Someone like Payne."

  "Surely you're not suggesting he is a magician too."

  He dragged a hand over his face and down his chin. "I don't know what I'm suggesting. We can't discount anything at this point, but it's more likely to be a nun. I'm still not convinced the cross moved magically, though. Those nails weren't sturdy enough to hold such a heavy object."

  I wished I'd touched the cross to feel if it held magical warmth. Damnation. I almost suggested turning around and sneaking into the hall, but Matt looked too tired.

  The first thing I did when we arrived home was use the extending spell on his magic watch. It usually lengthened the time needed between uses. Whether it still did, he didn't say and I didn't ask. He thanked me and retired to rest before dinner.

  His condition threw a cloud over the household. Willie, Cyclops and Duke were like caged tigers, too restless to sit still yet unwilling to take their mind off our predicament by visiting one of London's many entertainments.

  "Why not see a show?" I said. "There are any number of theaters around the city, some of them quite respectable. Or you could have a few drinks in a tavern. Some have music or other entertainments."

  My suggestion was met with grumbling excuses.

  "I ain't going nowhere," Willie said. "Not while Matt's like this. What if he needs me?"

  "Why would he need you?" Duke asked. "You can't make him better."

  "Not needs me then, just…if something happens, I want to be here when it does."

  "If. If it happens. Don't bury him yet."

  She pushed herself out of the chair and shoved her finger in Duke's face. "You wash your mouth out, Duke. You hear me! I ain't saying nothing of the sort, so don't put words in my mouth."

  Cyclops groaned and rubbed his forehead. "Help me, India. They've been like this all afternoon."

  "We're all tense," I said. "We're all worried about Matt. But please, this is not helping." As the newcomer to their group, I perhaps had no right to admonish them, but their bickering was getting on my nerves and it couldn't go on. "Matt doesn't want to hear your arguing on top of his other problems. Be kind to one another, for his sake."

  Cyclops nodded his approval at my little speech. Willie resumed her seat without a grumble, which I took as agreement. Duke got up and poured drinks at the sideboard. He handed one to Willie.

  "Sorry," he said. "India's right. How about we call a truce?"

  She clinked her glass against his. "Truce. We all want what's best for Matt."

  "So what else can we do, India?" Cyclops asked. "Can we investigate the convent more?"

  I tapped my fingers on my thigh as I considered what paths were open to us. There were very few. If I was right, and that cross had not fallen of its own accord, then there had been two magicians at the convent twenty-seven years ago—a silk magician and a wood magician. If Abigail had told the truth, and she didn't know that Phineas was magical, then she wasn't the link we were looking for. But if the wood magician knew…

  But how could the wood magician know when Phineas was too young to talk, let alone recite a spell?

  I told the others of my theory, and talking it over helped cement the idea in my head but it didn't provide any answers. "We'll talk to Abigail again and see if she knew about a wood magician," I said. "She might know which of the nuns had an affinity for it, if nothing else."

  "It might not be one of the nuns," Duke said. "Could be Father Antonio."

  "The convent could do with some further repair work, and the three of you are bored here. Why not offer to help Sister Bernadette tomorrow and discreetly ask questions."

  "Finally, something to
do," Willie said.

  A fist pounded on the front door, the thumps echoing through the house.

  "Someone ain't happy," Cyclops said.

  We met Bristow in the entrance hall just as he was about to open the door. Willie put a hand on his arm to caution him. She showed him the gun she held at her back.

  His eyes widened and he let the door handle go as if it stung. Duke rolled his eyes and opened it.

  Lord Rycroft barged in, brandishing a walking stick with a silver head. "Where is he? Where is my nephew?"

  Lady Rycroft followed her husband. Her eyes bore signs of crying and she held a handkerchief to her nose.

  "Matthew!" Lord Rycroft shouted up the staircase. "Matthew, come down here at once!"

  "Keep your voices down," Willie snapped. "He needs his rest and your bellowing ain't helping."

  "Should I fetch him, Miss?" Bristow asked me.

  "I don't think there'll be a need," I said. "He'll hear. Madam, what's happened?" I asked Lady Rycroft, even though I dreaded the answer.

  Neither Lord nor Lady Rycroft answered me. She stood by her husband and stared tearfully up the staircase where both Matt and Miss Glass now stood. He escorted his aunt down the stairs as if he didn't have a care in the world. She glowered at her brother and sister-in-law.

  "Such a racket, Richard," Miss Glass scolded. "The servants will have heard everything. Do lower your voice."

  "I don't bloody well care what your servants think!" Lord Rycroft marched off toward the drawing room without waiting to be invited. "Come. We have a serious matter to discuss. A matter for which you must make amends, Matthew."

  I watched them go, feeling sick to my stomach.

  "Anyone want to take a wager what that's about?" Willie asked as Matt shut the door, excluding us.

  "Ain't no point in wagering," Cyclops said. "We know what it's about."

  "Payne," Duke said heavily. "He must have told Lord Cox."

  "So much for Matt's advertisement." Willie headed across the hall to the library. "I need a strong drink."

  As did I. It did nothing to comfort me, however, and I brooded in silence until I heard the Rycrofts leaving only a few minutes later. Matt then joined us. He looked like a man driven to the end of his rope, and Matt's rope was very long.