The Brightest Star in the North

by Meredith Rusu

  “Where did you say you have come to us from again?” she asked.

  “The most esteemed estate known as Benevolent Children’s Home Hall,” Carina quipped.

  Mrs. Rossi did not laugh.

  Carina cleared her throat. “I mean to say that I was previously in Lord Willoughby’s service,” she fibbed.

  Mrs. Rossi looked her up and down again. “We will provide you with proper attire. And I will warn you, Hanover Hall does not take kindly to humor.”

  Mrs. Rossi’s shoes click-clacked as she walked on. Carina cracked her neck uncomfortably. “No, I daresay it does not.”

  Mrs. Rossi led Carina to the drawing room, the dining room, the great hall, and, finally, the kitchen and servants’ quarters.

  “You will sleep here, along with Miss Celia.” Mrs. Rossi brought Carina to a cramped chamber with two cots. She pointed to a girl a few years older than Carina seated at the edge of the room. Celia was adjusting her hair cap and offered Carina a halfhearted wave. She, too, looked rather downtrodden.

  Mrs. Rossi opened a drawer and began tossing fresh clothing onto Carina’s sleeping cot.

  “When will I meet Lady Devonshire?” Carina asked.

  Mrs. Rossi stopped mid-toss, her mouth agape. “My goodness, things must have been different where you came from,” she said. “Her Ladyship does not converse with the staff. It is highly unlikely you will meet her at all, unless something is amiss.”

  “Not meet her at all?” Now Carina’s mouth dropped. “You mean I am never to meet my employer? What if something is wrong that needs addressing?”

  “If something is wrong,” Mrs. Rossi said tightly, “you will address it with me.”

  Carina opened her mouth to respond and then promptly shut it.

  “It wasn’t always like this,” Celia commented. “It used to be better when Master—”

  “Celia!” Mrs. Rossi snapped suddenly. “That is enough. Go see that the fires have been tended, par favore.”

  “Yes, Mrs. Rossi,” Celia replied, hurrying away.

  Carina had perked up at Mrs. Rossi’s pointed last phrase. “Are you Italian?”

  “I am,” Mrs. Rossi replied.

  “Have you ever heard of Galileo Galilei?” Carina asked eagerly. “He was an Italian man of science.”

  “What in heaven’s name compels you to speak of ‘men of science’?” Mrs. Rossi asked coldly. “Carina—Smyth, you said?—I believe we must get one thing quite clear. You are now in the employ of Hanover Hall. All concerns from wherever you came from are no longer pertinent. You will tend the fires, clean the hall, and serve tea. From now on, I suggest you keep all questions to yourself and only speak when spoken to. Is that understood?”

  Carina swallowed hard. If she hadn’t liked the idea of her life changing before, she loathed it now.

  “Yes, it is,” she said.

  THE HOURS WERE LONG and the days even longer at Hanover Hall. Carina mastered her duties easily, mainly because there wasn’t much thinking involved. The routine was always the same: open windows, light fires, prep tea, serve tea (but never in Lady Devonshire’s presence), clean away tea, tidy sitting room, straighten great hall, sweep floors, wash floors, dust, dust, dust, empty chamber pots, prep tea, serve tea, clean away tea, repeat.

  Carina didn’t mind the manual labor. After fourteen years at children’s homes, hard work was nothing new to her. Plus, there were thirty or so servants at the hall and everyone worked just as diligently as she did. She wrote to Mrs. Altwood when she could, but it was becoming challenging to think of new things to say about her life at Hanover Hall.

  It was all just so boring.

  Not once did Carina even catch a glimpse of Lady Devonshire. Well, that wasn’t exactly true. Once—once—she could have sworn she saw the train of the lady’s gown sweep around a corner. But other than that, nothing. As far as Carina knew, none of the servants aside from Mrs. Rossi and maybe a select other few had met the woman. The tea was always to be left at a specific time and the sitting room promptly exited. An hour later, the tea would have mysteriously vanished, and the cups remained to be cleared away. Her Ladyship took all her meals in her chambers. All mail was to be left outside Her Ladyship’s door. If any visitors came, notice was delivered by handwritten note. More often than not, they were sent away either empty-handed or with a brief note from Her Ladyship (also slid under the door).

  Carina wasn’t even sure what Lady Devonshire looked like. There were no portraits hanging in Hanover Hall. On her second day working there, Carina noticed a rectangular bit of wallpaper over the mantel in the sitting room that looked brighter than the rest.

  “What used to hang there?” she’d asked one of the other housemaids.

  The fellow servant hadn’t replied.

  Everyone seemed on edge to Carina. Lunch and dinner were quiet affairs. The servants ate their food in silence. Occasionally one of the house stewards would rustle a newspaper. No one received mail. No one came and went. It was as though a dark cloud had settled on the estate, sucking up any merriment that might have been.

  “Does anyone here ever…laugh?” Carina asked Celia one day.

  “Laugh?” Celia replied, as if the word were strange to her.

  Carina blinked. “You know—ha, ha, ha?”

  “I know what it means to laugh,” Celia responded. “But no, now that you mention it, I suppose not.” She tilted her head to one side. “It used to be different. I liked it better then.”

  “What happened here?” Carina asked bluntly.

  Celia stared off, transfixed by a memory. “Her Ladyship was happy then. We used to wait for the mail eagerly—news from the university. There were always carriers coming and going. And fires burning late into the night that needed tending.”

  “So you’ve seen her?” Carina asked, delighted finally to be gaining some information. “You’ve seen Lady Devonshire?”

  “Oh, yes,” Celia said. “I’m probably one of the only ones who has. Well, me and Mrs. Rossi. Everyone else had to be replaced. Her Ladyship was never the same…after.”

  “What happened?” Carina repeated urgently. “What terrible tragedy occurred to make everyone so sullen?”

  Celia suddenly snapped out of her chatty mood. She looked around. “Mrs. Rossi will have my neck if I say any more,” she said nervously. “She and I are the only two originals left, and it’s because we’ve learned to hold our tongues.” Celia looked Carina up and down. “You should learn to hold yours if you want to stay. Or you’ll end up like all the others—handed a note informing you of your dismissal, and your bag thrown out on the front step.”

  * * *

  Three months passed. Autumn changed to winter, and the days grew abysmally short. But the one good thing about longer nights was that Carina had more time to look out the window, studying the stars. Late into the evening, after the other servants had gone to bed, Carina would sneak away and draw close to the sitting room window. It was tall with clear glass, and on a good night, she could gaze out the window for hours, memorizing the stars that were out with Galileo’s diary in her lap.

  Sometimes she could even match up the constellations from the diary diagrams with what she saw in the sky. There were Ursa Major and Ursa Minor. And Andromeda and Perseus. One of Carina’s favorites was Orion. Galileo often referred to it in his diary.

  She still hadn’t figured out how to see the map, exactly. But after studying with the master for five years and learning to read Italian fluently, Carina had a pretty good idea where to look—the stars! Galileo had believed the Map No Man Can Read was hidden in the stars. He had made references to a powerful ancient treasure—the Trident of Poseidon. Carina assumed that must be the spear-like object at the bottom of the ocean in the picture. Now she was positive she knew why her father had left her the diary: it was her birthright to seek out the map and follow it to the Trident of Poseidon. The question was, how was she supposed to find a map hidden in the stars?

  One particularly cold
night, Carina sat nestled up against the window with a shawl around her shoulders and the diary in her lap. The fire in the sitting room had long since burned out, but she couldn’t relight it without risking attention. She stayed there in the dark, looking up at the stars, reading the book by the light of the moon.

  Suddenly, she heard a noise in the hall.

  Carina stayed perfectly still, barely breathing.

  A moment passed, and Carina crept to the doorway to peek around the corner.

  Carina caught a glimpse of a woman with gray hair up the stairs on the second floor, moving away from the hall that led to Lady Devonshire’s chambers. Holding a glowing candelabra, the woman passed along silently, turning a corner toward a staircase to the third level. The glow slowly faded, sending everything back into darkness.

  Carina had never seen this woman at the estate before.

  That could mean only one thing.

  “Lady Devonshire,” she whispered to herself.

  Carina knew there was only one choice. She should sneak back to the servants’ quarters while she still could, and avoid being spotted. She should go to sleep and forget she had seen anything. It would be safer that way.

  Carina smiled.

  Yes, there was only one choice, really.

  Carina tiptoed to the staircase and followed the woman with the glowing candelabra.

  CARINA TRAILED THE WOMAN up one flight of stairs and then another. They climbed up and up, to a part of the estate Carina had never been in before. All the while, Lady Devonshire’s candelabra glowed softly, illuminating the shadowed wall.

  Carina barely breathed. She wasn’t exactly sure what she was doing. But there was a shroud of secrecy over Hanover Hall, and something about that lit a fire inside her. She felt compelled to follow the woman and solve the mystery.

  They reached the top of the third staircase. Carina kept a safe distance, noting doorways and protrusions from the walls that she could hide behind in case Lady Devonshire turned around. But the woman seemed completely absorbed. She didn’t even look from side to side as she walked—just straight ahead.

  Lady Devonshire turned a corner, and Carina waited an extra moment or two before peeking around. When she did, she frowned. The hall was long—very long—with tall windows and no doors. There wouldn’t be anywhere to hide if Lady Devonshire looked back.

  Carina took a deep breath. She pressed forward.

  The full moon shone through the long glass panes, casting the opposing wall in a soft blue glow. Something caught Carina’s eye. She gasped.

  There was a person standing in a recess in the wall!

  With a fright, Carina jumped back, stifling a cry. A moment later, she let out her breath.

  It wasn’t a person—just a life-sized statue on display.

  “For goodness’ sake,” she mumbled to herself.

  She carefully stepped forward. The statue was of a man with shoulder-length hair dressed in long robes. In one hand he held a strange-looking object: a series of spheres tilted around a central orb.

  I’ve seen that before, Carina realized. Galileo had drawn a picture of one in his diary and had labeled it armilla.

  Maybe this statue is of a man who studied the stars…like Galileo! Carina thought excitedly.

  There was a plaque with a name at the base of the statue. Carina read it.

  “‘Nicolaus Copernicus.’”

  Hmmmm, Carina thought. She didn’t recognize the name, but it sounded important.

  She crept forward down the hall. Another statue stood in a recess.

  “‘Sir Isaac Newton,’” she read softly from the plaque. That name she had heard before. The Italian master had mentioned it to her once or twice when she’d referenced something scientific from Galileo’s diary. “You are not Sir Isaac Newton’s daughter,” he’d admonish her, “so stop playing like you are.”

  Carina’s eyes grew wide. “These statues are all men of science.”

  A third statue stood just ahead. Lady Devonshire had almost reached the end of the hall. But Carina was fascinated and wanted to see more. She stepped forward to take a closer look.

  A lump formed in her throat.

  “It can’t be,” she whispered.

  Standing in front of her, real enough that she could reach out and take his hand, was a life-sized statue of the man she had spent her whole life studying.

  GALILEO GALILEI, the plaque read.

  “Is this truly him?” she asked, placing a palm on the statue. This sculpture also wore long robes, but it had a chiseled beard and short hair. It stood in a pose as though pondering the heavens, a rolled-up parchment in one hand. And at its feet was…a sculpture of the diary. Her diary. Galileo Galilei’s diary!

  Carina looked from the sculpture to the diary in her hands and then back to the sculpture. It was as though things were falling into place. Galileo Galilei wasn’t just a shadowy image anymore. She was seeing him for the first time. A true man of science. A student of the stars. The man her father wanted her to learn from.

  “What is this place?” she asked herself, overcome.

  Carina looked down the hall at Lady Devonshire. The woman was ascending a winding flight of stairs at the end.

  Carina swiftly tiptoed after her. At the staircase, she stopped. There was no way to follow now without being seen. She’d have to wait at the bottom.

  Carina watched as Lady Devonshire reached a large wooden door at the top of the spiral staircase. The woman placed her hand on the doorknob and paused. She stayed there for a long moment before sinking her chin toward her breast and resting her forehead against the door.

  Carina furrowed her brow. What was the woman doing?

  Then, as though changing her mind about the entire excursion, Lady Devonshire turned and began to descend the stairs.

  Oh, no! thought Carina. Oh, no, oh, no, oh, no!

  She hurried away before Lady Devonshire could spot her. But the hallway was too long. She’d never reach the end in time. She was going to get caught!

  I have to hide! Carina thought urgently. But where? There isn’t anywhere!

  She looked desperately back and forth across the long hall. The tall windows seemed to mock her with the amount of moonlight they threw across the passageway. And there was barely any space beside the statues in the wall recesses. Even a child would have a hard time squeezing in….

  Except for in a spot next to the statue of Galileo, Carina realized. The way his robes were carved left a wider opening to one side than the others had. But could she fit?

  Without taking time to think about it, Carina made herself as tiny as possible and squeezed into the space beside Galileo Galilei’s statue. She pulled her skirts in alongside her just as the light from the woman’s candelabra spilled into the hallway.

  Carina waited, her heart pounding. She couldn’t hear Lady Devonshire coming. She couldn’t even see her. But the light from the candelabra grew stronger.

  Carina held her breath and closed her eyes. The candlelight flashed, and rustling skirts whooshed by. Then nothing. The sounds receded and disappeared.

  A few moments later, Carina ventured a look around the corner. The hall was empty.

  “Heavens.” Carina let out her breath. “That was close.”

  She turned back to face the doorway leading to the spiral staircase.

  She should really, really go back to the servants’ quarters now.

  She did not.

  Instead, Carina walked back and ascended the stairs to the heavy wooden door. She tried the knob. It was locked.

  Frowning, Carina bent down to peer through the large keyhole. She didn’t think she’d be able to see much through the tiny opening, but she was mistaken.

  Moonlight flooded the room beyond. From her vantage point, Carina could make out a curved wall completely composed of windows facing the door. She couldn’t see much of the floor, but it looked like there were many objects scattered about.

  And then…

  “I don’t beli
eve it.”

  Propped up against the windows was a telescope. A huge telescope. Carina had only seen drawings of them in Galileo’s diary. And they had been tiny—more like spyglasses. But with an instrument such as this, Carina could not only observe the heavens; she could study them.

  I need to get in there! she thought wildly.

  Throwing caution to the wind, Carina plucked a hairpin from her hair and tinkered with the keyhole. She’d picked more than her fair share of locks at the children’s home. Surely this one wouldn’t be any—

  Click!

  “Success!” whispered Carina. Her heart raced as she turned the doorknob and stepped into the room.

  What she saw took her breath away.

  The room was no mere study. It was a complete observatory!

  “Incredible!” she exclaimed. “Those are compasses…and that is a quadrant. Is that—it can’t be—it is! A mechanized planetarium!”

  Carina marveled as she spun, gazing at all the instruments she’d only read about in Galileo’s diary. Telescopes and armillary spheres and astrolabes. Tools Carina never thought she would see in person, let alone have access to.

  “This…this…” Tears welled despite her. “This is…everything.”

  She never even heard the footsteps ascending the staircase behind her.

  “HOW DARE YOU!” A woman’s shrill voice pierced through the doorway.

  Carina whirled around.

  Lady Devonshire stood, seething, in the entrance. Her eyes flared with anger fiercer than the candelabra’s fire.

  “L-Lady Devonshire,” Carina stammered. “I can explain—”

  “How dare you!” the woman shrieked. “Get out of here, now! Get out, get out, get out!”

  Carina didn’t try to argue. She raced past the woman and flew down the staircase. She ran back through the hall, down every flight of stairs, and all the way back to the servants’ quarters. She stopped running only when she’d reached the door to her room. Leaning heavily against the wall, she caught her breath.

  I’m done for, she thought miserably. She half expected that at any moment she would hear, thundering behind her, the footsteps of men or guards prepared to take her away in the night.