The Plastic Magician (A Paper Magician Novel)

by Charlie N. Holmberg

  He accepted the papers back. “I should be thanking you. You’re going to make quite the mark on the world, Alvie. I’m honored to be at the beginning of your journey.”

  She wasn’t sure what to say, so she just nodded. Mg. Praff mirrored the gesture and slipped away, closing the door behind him.

  CHAPTER 11

  ALVIE PUT ON HER nightgown in her closet for some privacy while Emma turned down the blankets of the bed and tidied the room. Once Alvie was dressed for sleep, she walked to her window. Through it she could see the polymery. The extinguished lights made her strangely sad, and it occurred to her that she’d stayed up working enough nights that she wasn’t particularly tired now.

  Glancing out the window again, she said, “I’m not terribly tired. Maybe I’ll head back to the polymery.”

  Emma scurried over and glanced out the window. “I don’t know, miss. Might rain. Best to stay in tonight.”

  It was too dark for Alvie to tell if it was going to rain or not, but she was a foreigner here, so she nodded and climbed into her bed. Emma wished her good night and slipped away.

  Alvie struggled to sleep. Excitement over the abstract and the Discovery in Material Mechanics Convention, most likely. Or, perhaps, because Emma had changed the sheets on the bed to flannel ones instead of cotton, and Alvie had never slept on flannel before.

  Whatever it was, Alvie dreamed about plastic arms and the convention when she did sleep, and when she didn’t, she stared at the blurry starlight edging her curtains and wondered why she wasn’t more tired. Around two thirty in the morning, when she found that she was staring quite a bit more than snoozing, Alvie threw back the covers and got dressed. That was one nice thing about living in a house that employed servants—Alvie hadn’t done her laundry once since arriving, yet her clothes were always clean and pressed and ready to wear. She’d need to remember to thank Emma for that when the sun was up.

  Thankfully, it was not raining, so her late-night venture would leave her no worse for wear. She ran a wide-toothed comb through her jungle of hair before twisting it atop her head. She donned her jacket—her hardy Ohio coat had been too large to fit into her suitcases—grabbed a Gaffer lamp, and slipped out the door.

  She stayed late in the polymery more often than not, so this was not her first time wandering the house at night. But that was always coming in, not going out, and for some reason, the two felt very different. Like she was getting away with something. She rechecked her pocket for her polymery key and whispered, “Brighter,” to her pre-enchanted lamp so that it filled the fancy corridors with its glow. She didn’t want any stirring shadows to startle her. She hadn’t the slightest idea when the servants got up, though she knew Mrs. Praff liked to sleep in.

  She turned the glow down to its lowest setting when she reached the back door and slipped outside. The shifting mosaic of metal tiles looked like water in the moonlight, rippling and twisting with unseen aquatic life. Alvie watched it for a moment, marveling. If only she could study more than one form of magic! She imagined Smelting involved a great deal more sweating than was required of Polymaking.

  She stepped onto the path, watching the movement of the tiles pause for her as though frozen by the autumn chill. For some reason, that made her think of Bennet. Would he see water in the shifting tiles? Did he ever wake up in the middle of the night, only to feed the desire to work? Folding hadn’t been his first choice, but he seemed to like it. He would have been a Polymaker, or so he’d said at the train station. That made her like him even more.

  A couple more steps, and Alvie paused. Yes, he’d been very kind at the train station, hadn’t he? Nice from the start. At the hospital, at the house, on the date. That’s the sort of person Bennet Cooper was. The nice sort.

  What if he’s just being nice?

  It would be a silly thought for someone like, oh, Emma to think. Emma, who was petite and pretty, pretty in a way that didn’t need cosmetics or fancy dresses or special serum to tame her hair. But despite what her parents said, Alvie wasn’t exactly pretty, was she?

  She touched her heavy glasses. Not a lot of young people wore glasses, and if they did, they weren’t glasses like hers. Big, ungainly things that could compete with a headlamp. Alvie had tried smaller frames once—frames like Mg. Aviosky’s. But they hadn’t worked for her. Her original lenses were too thick for small frames—they’d constantly popped out. Besides, the narrow frames gave her a narrow window through which to see the world. It seemed God had given her a high-functioning mind as trade for good eyesight. At least Mg. Praff had thinned out the lenses so she didn’t look so bug-eyed anymore.

  A cold breeze bit her exposed ears, so Alvie continued down the path, shivering. Prescription eyewear aside, it was just that boys—men—didn’t tend to take an interest in her. That was a scientific fact. So why would Bennet Cooper, a dashing specimen of a man, suddenly bend the numbers?

  Her stomach squirmed and made her chest feel heavy. Reaching for her key, she tried to push thoughts of Bennet away by wondering if there were any snacks in her workroom, but that only made her wonder what sort of snacks Bennet liked, and it frustrated her to be thinking more about a Folder than about plastic.

  “Bother,” she muttered.

  But then Alvie heard something that sounded off. Even this late there was plenty of ambient noise—a cold breeze rustling the gardens or a skittering rabbit or a buggy out driving late—but this was markedly the shuffling of feet, followed by the breaking of something distinctly plastic.

  She froze, the metal tiles swimming a few feet in front of her. “Cease,” she whispered to the light, and it went out. Darkness swallowed the yard. Alvie blinked rapidly, trying to adjust her eyes.

  No noise. Had she imagined it?

  She stepped off the path, letting the enchanted tiles return to their watery swaying. The noise had come from the polymery, had it not? There was nothing else that had plastic in this direction. Only the polymery—

  There was a distinct tapping of a hammer—chisel?—being worked. But Alvie could see the polymery now, and none of the lights were on. Anyone who belonged in the polymery would have turned the lights on. At the very least, they would be carrying a Gaffer light.

  A new chill tingled over Alvie’s skin.

  Good heavens, were they being burglarized?

  She froze, clutching her extinguished Gaffer lamp, mind spinning. Was there a spell she could . . . of course there wasn’t, and she had no plastic on her, anyway. She should run back into the house, but by the time she roused someone, what if . . . Ethel’s arm was in there! All their prototypes, what if . . .

  She thought of Mg. Ezzell and his scowls and did the one thing she hoped might help.

  She screamed.

  Alvie had a number of talents. She could factor large numbers in her head, for one, and she could write in shorthand with incredible speed if she didn’t heed her penmanship. She knew almost all the rudimentary spells for Polymaking, and she was fairly certain she could disassemble and reassemble the engine of an automobile in six hours and four minutes without having to consult a manual.

  She was also, apparently, very good at screaming.

  The noise hurt her own ears, it was so loud and high. Evenly pitched, enough to stir a slumbering bird from a nearby tree. And though Alvie wasn’t an orator or singer, she screamed for a very long time. Seemed that, beneath her well-endowed chest, she had a remarkable set of lungs.

  She screamed loud and long enough that several lights went on inside Briar Hall. When she finally ran out of air, her throat tingling, she thought she saw a large shadow beside the polymery move very quickly toward the fence bordering the estate.

  So she screamed again.

  Several policemen lurked about the polymery in the wee hours of dawn, along with Mrs. and Mg. Praff, Mr. Hemsley, and Mrs. Connway. A few other servants lingered by the back door, trying to peer over one another to get a better look at the scene. Alvie was quite cold, but evidence needed to be collected,
so she couldn’t go into the polymery, and she couldn’t bear to return to the manor before hearing what the policemen had to say.

  So she huddled inside her jacket, cold hands pressed into its pockets. She’d let her hair down, and that helped.

  One of the policemen, carrying a clipboard, stepped out of the polymery and approached Mg. Praff. Alvie hurried in that direction, her cold toes aching in her shoes.

  “Doesn’t seem like anything was stolen—none of the things you mentioned,” the policeman said. “The burglar didn’t get very far. He entered the workroom through the window on the north side and got as far as the foyer before fleeing. It’s a mess, but the damage won’t be too expensive to set right.”

  Alvie sighed. Her workroom, then. What a bother. But they were so fortunate the crook hadn’t made it to the lab.

  The policeman took a pen from behind his ear. He turned to Alvie. “You’re the witness.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Did you make out anything about the individual? Individuals?”

  She shook her head. “I think it was only one. I just heard it, and saw a shadow.”

  The policeman nodded, jotting something down. “Can you describe this shadow?”

  “Um. Black and shadowy?”

  He glanced up at her.

  Alvie shrugged. “I’d bet twenty dollars—er, quid—that it was Magician Ezzell.”

  “Alvie.” Mg. Praff’s voice had a note of warning in it.

  “What?” she asked. “He’s practically threatened to overturn your work and tried to bully me into sharing your secrets.”

  The policeman seemed interested. “Is that true?”

  Mg. Praff sighed. “I’m afraid so.”

  “I don’t know that we have any evidence to pin the man, but we can question him. Magician Roscoe Ezzell, I take it.”

  Mrs. Praff asked, “You know him?”

  “His polymery was also recently burglarized.”

  Alvie pressed her lips together. Perhaps it wasn’t him . . . but circumstances told her otherwise.

  The policeman adjusted his cap. “Seems to me it’d be much easier to simply melt one of the plastic windows and enter that way. Silent, quick. Effective.”

  “If one were a Polymaker,” Alvie pointed out. Which the burglar probably was. “Of course, anyone could melt plastic with a torch or the like, but the light would give them away . . . unless there’s a tool that could impart heat without direct fire . . .”

  The policeman blinked a few times. “Er, yes, I suppose.”

  Alvie pushed up her glasses. “Even so, if the window had been melted, the likeliest perpetrator would be a Polymaker. Magician Ezzell would have known better than to use a Melt spell.”

  “Alvie.” Another warning from her mentor.

  The policeman added, “Any evidence pointing to Ezzell at this time would be circumstantial at best. We can talk to him, miss, but we cannot assume he had any part of this.”

  I can still assume, Alvie thought, huddling into her jacket.

  To Mg. Praff, the officer said, “I’ll see if we can finish up in there and get the men out. Make sure to record and report anything strange that you might find, anything missing.”

  “I will do that. Thank you.” Mg. Praff seemed haggard. Possibly from lack of sleep, probably from having his lab broken into.

  “Miss?”

  Alvie jumped. Emma stood beside her, looking tired herself, though her maid’s uniform was neatly pressed. Everyone looked tired. Mr. Hemsley would topple over snoring any moment now, Alvie was sure of it.

  “Sorry.” Emma apologized and offered a quick curtsey. “Are you all right?”

  She nodded as Mg. and Mrs. Praff walked off with the officer who’d been questioning them. “Just a little frazzled is all.”

  “But the polymery is safe?”

  She nodded. “Just a mess. The burglar didn’t get far.”

  Emma smiled. “I’m glad to hear it. Do you want help? With the mess?”

  A sigh passed through Alvie’s lips. “I haven’t even looked at it yet. It’ll be all right.” She started toward the polymery.

  “Are you sure that you don’t want a hand?” Emma hesitated, chewed her lip. “And that . . . it’s safe in there?”

  Alvie’s shoulders relaxed a little. “I’m sure. The police have already been through it. Thank you, Emma. We’ll work it out one way or another.”

  Though as Alvie turned back for the workshop, she frowned. The motives seemed quite obvious to her, as did the crook, but there was little she could do to prove the latter. At least the hands and arms hadn’t been found. At least, as far as she knew, Mg. Praff hadn’t written down the newly discovered spell, even in the abstract he’d submitted to the convention.

  If anyone wanted that, they’d have to crack open his—or Alvie’s—head to get it.

  Alvie spent that morning straightening her workroom while Mg. Praff personally installed new locks on the polymery door and windows. The burglar hadn’t meddled with any of the old locks, but Alvie figured it was more for Mg. Praff’s peace of mind than anything. When she’d finished tidying, she stepped around to the front door where Mg. Praff was twisting a final screw into a hardy Smelted knob.

  He spoke without looking up. “These are specially enchanted to withstand Smelters. There’s an Unlatch spell those magicians can use that releases nearly any lock, unless it’s either exceedingly complicated or enchanted to withstand it.” He tightened the screw and stood up. “There.”

  “Looks expensive.”

  He chuckled. “It is.”

  She grabbed the knob and turned it. Just an ordinary door handle from this end. “I suppose a plastic one wouldn’t do.” Though if Mg. Ezzell was the culprit, that would be a very poor choice of lock.

  “No. Even the strongest plastic can’t hold up to the durability of metal. And I’d still need a key. The Unlatch spell isn’t included in a Polymaker’s repertoire.”

  He pocketed his screwdriver and stepped into the foyer. “Come. I set something up for you last night. Fortunately, our burglar didn’t get far enough to meddle with it.”

  Curiosity piqued, she followed him up the stairs, past the library, and into the larger room over the lab. When she entered, she beheld a massive igloo of plastic formed from thousands of tiny hexagons. Three could fit snuggly in her palm. The thing was taller than she—about eight feet high—and took up two-thirds of the room. It looked like a strange sort of carapace—a celestial turtle, maybe. The edges of each tile seemed to glimmer, as if the magic were letting her know it was there.

  Her jaw dropped, and she pressed her hands over her mouth.

  Mg. Praff grinned. “Recognize it?”

  “It’s the Imagidome!” Alvie said through her fingers, walking around the beautiful monstrosity, taking in its opaque structure. It would take months to construct something like this, but she could see faint lines delineating sections. It came apart in wide pieces, then, not as individual hexagons.

  This. This was the creation that had turned the Discovery Convention on its head two years ago. This had been the main feature in every magazine her papa subscribed to for months.

  “Can I touch it?”

  Her mentor laughed. “Of course you can touch it. I want you to try it.”

  She tried to suppress a nervous giggle and only half succeeded. She poked the structure. It was firmer than expected. She traced the tiny hexagons with her index finger. They tingled beneath her skin.

  “Can I really?” she asked, winding around to the door. It was only about four feet high, and also made of hexagons.

  He gestured inside. “After you.”

  Squatting, Alvie shimmied inside the dome and stood erect within it. The plastic let in a bit of muted light, but once Mg. Praff came in and shut the door, the space was almost entirely dark.

  “I’ll teach you how to program it yourself before the convention,” he said.

  “You will? You’re bringing it?”

 
“Of course I’m bringing it. It might be old news, but it’s not boring yet!”

  She saw the outline of his hand against the wall of the dome. “Image Memory: Starry Night.”

  The light snuffed out all at once, then built up in dark-blue hues. Above her head, small, false stars burst to life, twinkling across the Imagidome’s ceiling. She gaped. She couldn’t make out the hexagons anymore. She felt as if she stood somewhere else, staring up at a true night sky. Around the base of the dome formed silhouettes of grass, expanding out until they met the “horizon.” A field. And . . . over there, a tree. The grass and the tree’s branches waved in a breeze Alvie couldn’t feel. The lit heavens rotated slowly around one star immediately above her head.

  “This is . . . amazing.”

  “This is four years of work,” Mg. Praff said. “Revealing it was one of my proudest moments. I hope we’ll have another moment like that, come March.”

  “The hand,” she said, turning and taking in the loveliness of the scene around her, “is very important. But this is exquisite. Magical.”

  This was the gap that technology couldn’t fill. This was the stuff magicians were made for.

  This was what she could create.

  “But in the end, it’s pandering, really.” Mg. Praff touched the edge of the starry sky and murmured, “Cease,” and the otherworldliness of the spell blinked out, opening a strange sort of longing inside Alvie’s chest. She rubbed at it.

  Mg. Praff continued, “It’s art; it’s entertainment; it’s an escape. But society can go on without those things. What we’re doing now, Alvie, is making the fundamentals of life—movement, capability—better. What we’re doing is restoring functionality to a young woman who thought those things were lost. Think of what we could do for veterans alone.”

  Alvie dropped her hand. The dreaminess of the Imagidome enthralled her, but she very much liked Mg. Praff’s speech. If they could push a little harder, work a little longer, they truly could better the lives of those who had lost limbs. And what next? Her mind spun with the possibilities.