Glass Books of the Dream Eaters

by Gordon Dahlquist

“But that was tiny!”

  She saw that the Doctor’s face had paled as they spoke. He swallowed awkwardly and wiped his brow.

  “Exactly.” Chang smiled. “He is a clambering marvel.”

  Miss Temple caught the gaze of her aunt, still trembling in her chair, and she was flooded with guilt for so endangering the woman. She looked up at the others, her voice sharp with urgency.

  “It does not matter. They will know from the desk—from that vile Mr. Spanning, whose pomaded hair I shall set aflame. The Doctor’s room is paid for by me. They will be here any moment.”

  “How many men did you see?” asked Chang.

  “Four. Three soldiers and another, in a brown cloak.”

  “The Comte’s man,” said Svenson.

  “We are three,” said Chang. “They’ll want to take us quietly, not force a pitched battle.”

  “There may be others in the lobby,” warned Svenson.

  “Even if there are, we can beat them.”

  “At what cost?” asked the Doctor.

  Chang shrugged.

  Miss Temple looked around her, at the comfort and security that had been her life at the Hotel Boniface, and knew that it was over. She turned to her maids. “Marthe, you will prepare a traveling bag—light enough for me to carry, with the barest essentials—the flowered carpet bag will do.” The girl did not move. Miss Temple shouted at her. “At once! Do you think this is any time to shirk? Marie, you will prepare traveling bags for my aunt and for the two of you. You will be spending time at the seaside. Go!”

  The maids leapt to their work. Her aunt looked up at her.

  “Celeste—my dear—the seaside?”

  “You must move to safety—and I apologize, I am so very, very sorry to have placed you in such danger.” Miss Temple sniffed and gestured toward her own room. “I will see what ready money I have, of course you will have enough for travel, and a note to draw upon—you must take both maids—”

  Agathe’s gaze went, rather wide-eyed, from Miss Temple over to the figures of Chang and Svenson, neither of whom seemed anywhere near respectable enough for her niece to be alone with. “But—you cannot—you are a well-bred young lady—the scandal—you must come with me!”

  “It is impossible—”

  “You will not have a maid—that is impossible!” The aged lady huffed at the men, chiding them. “And the seaside will be so cold—”

  “That is the exact point, my Aunt. You must go to a place no one would expect. You must tell no one—you must tell no one.”

  Her aunt was silent as the maids bustled around them, studying her niece with dismay—though whether at the present predicament or at what her niece had become, Miss Temple was not sure. She was particularly aware that Svenson and Chang were watching the entire exchange.

  “And what of you?” whispered her aunt.

  “I cannot say,” she answered. “I do not know.”

  At least twenty minutes had passed, and Miss Temple—idly tracing her fingers back and forth across one of the Doctor’s blue glass cards—saw Chang at the main door, peering out into the hall. He stepped back, caught her eye, and shrugged. Marthe had brought the carpet bag for her to inspect. Miss Temple sent her to help Marie, tucked the blue card into her own clutch bag—without looking at the Doctor, who having given it to her again to examine had not perhaps agreed it was hers to keep—and carried the carpet bag over to an armchair, where she sat. Her attention elsewhere, she glanced through what the maid had chosen and tied the bag shut without finishing. Miss Temple sighed. Her aunt sat at the table, watching her. Chang stood by the door. Svenson leaned against the table near her aunt, his attempts to help pack having been rebuffed by the maids.

  “If these men have not come,” said her aunt, “then perhaps they are not coming at all. Perhaps there is no need to go anywhere. If they do not know Celeste—”

  “Whether they know your niece is not the issue,” said Svenson gently. “They know who I am, at least, and also Chang. As they know we have been here, they will be watching the hotel. It will be a mere matter of time before they connect your niece to us—”

  “They already have,” said Chang, from the doorway.

  “Then once they act on it,” continued Svenson, “as your niece has said—you yourself are in danger.”

  “But,” her aunt persisted, “if they are not here yet—”

  “It is a blessing,” said Miss Temple. “It means we may all get away unseen.”

  “That will be difficult,” said Chang.

  Miss Temple sighed. It would be very difficult. Each entrance would be watched from the street. The only question, and their only hope, was in what those men were watching for—and surely it was not two maids and an old woman.

  “You had best accomplish it, Sir—and neatly!” sniffed Aunt Agathe, as if Chang were a workman whose expression of doubt was a prelude to an increase in his fee.

  Miss Temple exhaled and stood.

  “We must assume that the clerk who pointed the way to the Doctor’s room has been paid to inform on us further. We must distract him while my aunt and the maids depart. The men in the street will not be looking for them, or at least not without some signal. Once you do leave,” she said to her aunt, “you must go directly in a coach to the railway station, and from there to the shore, the southern shore—to Cape Rouge, there must be many inns—and I will send a letter to you, to the post office, once we are secure.”

  “What of yourself?” asked Agathe.

  “Oh, we shall shift ourselves easily enough,” she said, forcing a smile. “And this business will soon be over.” She looked over to Svenson and Chang for confirmation, but neither man’s expression would have convinced a credulous child. She called sharply for the maids to finish and gather their coats.

  Miss Temple knew that she herself must go to Mr. Spanning, for the others would more profitably assist with the luggage—as well as best remaining concealed. She looked back to see them making their way to the rear stairs, Chang and Svenson each with an end of her aunt’s clothes trunk, the maids on either side of Agathe, one hand on their own small bags, the other steadying the aged lady. Miss Temple herself made for the main staircase carrying a large satchel and the green purse, wearing as carefree an expression as she could produce and nodding cheerfully at the other guests she passed. At the second floor her path opened onto a large gallery above the splendid lobby and then to the great curve of the main stairs. She glanced over the railing and saw no black-coated soldiery, but directly outside the doors were two men in brown cloaks. She continued down the wide steps and saw Mr. Spanning behind his counter, his gaze snapping up to hers as she descended into view. She smiled brilliantly at him. Spanning’s eyes darted about the lobby as she neared, and so before he could make any signal she gaily called to him.

  “Mr. Spanning!”

  “Miss Temple?” he answered warily, his normally sleek manner caught between distrust and pride in his own cunning.

  She crossed to the desk—from the corners of her eyes seeing that no one lurked under the stairs—while watching the front door in the mirror behind Spanning’s desk. The cloaked men had seen her, but were not coming in. Quite apart from her habit, Miss Temple stood on her toes and leaned her elbows playfully on the counter.

  “I’m sure you know why I have come.” She smiled.

  “Do I?” replied Spanning, forcing an obsequious grin that did not suit him.

  “O yes.” She batted her eyes.

  “I’m sure I do not…”

  “Perhaps you have been so set upon by business that it has slipped your mind…” She looked around the vacant lobby. “Though it does not appear so. Tell me, Mr. Spanning, have you been so set upon with pressing duties?” She was still smiling, but a hint of steel had crept into her otherwise honeyed tone.

  “As you know, Miss Temple, my normal duties are very—”

  “Yes, yes, but you haven’t had to bother with anyone else?”

  Spanning cleared
his throat with suspicion. “May I ask—”

  “Do you know,” continued Miss Temple, “I have always meant to inquire as to your brand of pomade, for I have always found your hair to be so very…managed. And slick—managed and slick. I have wanted to impart such grooming to any number of other men in the city, but have not known what to recommend—and always forget to ask!”

  “It is Bronson’s, Miss.”

  “Bronson’s. Excellent.” She leaned in with a suddenly serious expression. “Do you never worry about fire?”

  “Fire?”

  “Leaning too close to a candle? I should think—you know—whoosh!” She chuckled. “Ah, it is so pleasant to laugh. But I am in earnest, Mr. Spanning. And I do require an answer—no matter how you strive to charm me!”

  “I assure you, Miss Temple—”

  “Of what, Mr. Spanning? Of what do you—this day—assure me?”

  She was no longer smiling, but looking directly into the man’s eyes. He did not reply. She brought the green bag onto the counter top, allowing its weight to land with a thump. Its contents were not usual for a lady’s purse. Spanning saw her deftly angle the bag in his direction and take hold of it through the fabric—her manner still casual but unaccountably menacing.

  “How precisely may I help you?” he asked meekly.

  “I will be traveling,” she said. “As will my aunt, but to another destination. I wish to retain my rooms. I assume my note of credit will answer any worries?”

  “Of course. You will be returning…”

  “At some point.”

  “I see.”

  “Good. Do you know, earlier, that this hotel seemed absolutely full of foreign soldiers?”

  “Did it?”

  “Apparently they were directed to the second floor.” She looked around them and then dropped her voice to a whisper. Despite himself Spanning leaned closer to hear. “Do you know, Mr. Spanning,…do you know the sound a person makes…when they’re thrashed…to such an extreme…they can no longer even cry out…with pain?”

  Mr. Spanning flinched, blinking his eyes. Miss Temple leaned even closer and whispered, “Because I do.”

  Spanning swallowed. Miss Temple stood up straight and smiled.

  “I believe you have the Doctor’s boots and his coat?”

  She climbed back up the main staircase to the second floor and then dashed down the hallway to the rear stairs, her green bag in one hand, the boots in the other, and the Doctor’s coat over her left arm. The satchel, thickly packed with unnecessary clothing, had been left in Spanning’s care with the request for him to hold it until she was ready to leave, which she announced would most likely be after luncheon—thus making a point to inform Spanning (and the soldiers) that she (and by extension, via the boots, Svenson and Chang) could be found in her rooms for the next few hours. Once out of sight from the lobby, Miss Temple picked up her dress as best she could and briskly climbed. With luck the others had used her distraction to get her aunt and the maids out the service entrance. The porters would take the luggage and find a coach, allowing Svenson and Chang to remain hidden indoors. But were the soldiers marching into the lobby even then, men who moved much faster than she? She reached the fourth floor and stopped to listen. She heard no bootsteps and resumed her trotting pace upwards. At the eighth floor she stopped again, flushed with exertion and panting. She had never been to this topmost floor and had no idea where to find what Chang assured her was there. She walked along the corridor, past what looked like doors to normal rooms, until she rounded a corner and faced the end of the hall. She looked back the other way and saw an identical dead end. Hot and out of breath from her climb, Miss Temple worried about what next might follow her up the stairs. She whispered—or rather hissed—to the air around her with frustration. “Psssssst!”

  She wheeled abruptly at a wooden squeak. A section of the red-flocked wallpaper swung forward on hinges she had not seen, revealing Doctor Svenson, and behind him, on a narrow staircase steep enough to be more like a ladder, Chang, silhouetted in an open doorway to the roof. Despite the distress of a moment before, she could not suppress her admiration at the cunningly concealed doorway.

  “My goodness,” she exclaimed, “whoever made that is as clever as five monkeys put together!”

  “Your aunt is safely away,” said Svenson, stepping into the hall to collect his things.

  “I am relieved to hear it,” replied Miss Temple. The Doctor struggled into his coat, which—after being brushed and steamed—did restore some of his military crispness. “I could not see this door at all,” she continued, admiring the inset hinges. “I don’t know how anyone should find it—”

  “Are they following?” hissed Chang from inside the passage.

  “Not that I have seen,” Miss Temple whispered in return. “I could not see them in the lobby—O!” She turned sharply at Doctor Svenson’s hand clutching her shoulder.

  “I beg your pardon!” he said, bracing himself as he tried to put on his right boot. He could not do it with one hand and was reduced to trying with two while awkwardly hopping.

  “We should hurry,” called Chang.

  “Half a moment,” whispered Svenson—the first boot was nearly on. Miss Temple waited. His task remained difficult. She tried to find encouraging conversation.

  “I have never been on a rooftop before, or not one so high. I’m sure we’ll have quite a view—up with the birds!”

  Somehow it seemed the wrong thing to say. Svenson looked up at her, his face more pale, and started in on the second boot.

  “Are you perfectly well, Doctor? I know you did not find but a few hours’ rest—”

  “Go on ahead,” he said, essaying a casual tone that did not persuade. The second boot was on half-way. He stumbled, stepping upon it, the excess flopping around like an odd fish attached to the base of his leg. “I shall follow—I assure you—”

  “Doctor!” hissed Chang. “It will be fine. The roof is wide, and the climb will be nothing like the pipe!”

  “The pipe?” asked Miss Temple.

  “Ah—well—that—” said Doctor Svenson.

  “I thought you managed it splendidly.”

  From the passage Chang scoffed.

  “I have a difficulty with height. An excruciating difficulty—”

  “I have the same with root vegetables.” Miss Temple smiled. “We shall help one another—come!” She anxiously looked past his shoulder down the hallway, relieved to see it still empty, and took his arm. He thrust his foot down into the boot—fully in but for a last uncooperative inch. They stepped through the door.

  “Pull it tight,” whispered Chang, who had continued on above them. “It is better they not notice we have forced the lock.”

  The sky above was grey and so low as to seem palpably near, the sun well behind a thick bank of winter cloud. The air was cool and moist, and if there were only more wind Miss Temple might have told herself she was on the sea. She inhaled with pleasure. She looked down to see with a certain small wonder that under her feet was a crusty layer of tarred paper and copper sheathing—so this was walking on a roof! Behind her Doctor Svenson had knelt, concentrating closely on his left boot, eyes fixed to the ground. Chang secured the door with bits of broken wood, wedging them into the frame to prevent it from opening easily. He stepped away and wiped his hand on his coat. She saw that his other hand held her carpet bag—she had completely forgotten it, and reached to take it from him. He shook his head and nodded toward a nearby building.

  “I believe we can go this way—north,” he said.

  “If we must,” muttered Svenson. He stood, still keeping his eyes low. Miss Temple saw it was time for her to act.

  “Excuse me,” she said, “but before we travel further together, I believe—I am convinced—that we need to speak.”

  Chang frowned at her. “They may be coming—”

  “Yes, though I do not think they are. I think they are waiting for us in the street, or waiting for Mr. Spa
nning to make sure the guests in the rooms near to mine will not be disturbed by any screams. I am confident we have at least some few minutes.”

  The two men looked at each other. She could sense the doubt in the glance that went between them. She pointedly cleared her throat, bringing their eyes back to her.

  “To the great distress of my only available relative, I have been thrust into the company of two men at the very border—if that—of respectability. This morning we were strangers. In this instant all three of us are without sanctuary. What I want—in fact demand—is that we make quite clear what we each hope to achieve in this matter, what masters we serve—in short, what is our agreement.”

  She waited for their reaction. The two men were silent.

  “I do not find the request excessive,” said Miss Temple.

  Svenson nodded at her, looked to Chang and muttered, groping in his pocket. “Excuse me—a cigarette—it will distract from the altitude, this sea of vacant space—” He looked back at Miss Temple. “You are correct. It is most sensible. We do not know each other—chance has thrown us together.”

  “Can we not do this later?” asked Chang, his tone clinging to the merest edge of civility.

  “When would that be?” answered Miss Temple. “Do we even know where we are going next? Have we decided how best to act? Who to pursue? Of course we haven’t, because we have each made assumptions from our very different experiences.”

  Chang exhaled, vexed. After a moment, he nodded sharply, as if to invite her to begin. Miss Temple did so.

  “I have been attacked and now uprooted. I have been misled, threatened, and lied to. I wish for justice…which means the thorough settling of each person involved.” She took a breath. “Doctor?”

  Svenson took the moment to actually light his cigarette, return the case to his coat pocket, and exhale. He nodded to her.

  “I must recover my Prince—no matter this conspiracy, it remains my duty to disentangle him. I have no doubt that this entails a kind of war—but I have little choice. Cardinal?”

  Chang paused, as if he found this a pointless, formal exercise, but then spoke quietly and quickly. “If this business is not answered I have no work, no place to live, and no good reputation. For these all being set at hazard, I will have revenge—I must, as I say, to preserve my name. Does that satisfy you?”