The Wicked Deeds of Daniel Mackenzie hp-6

by Jennifer Ashley

  Her lips were warm despite the cold, and soft, sweet. Daniel wanted to take the kiss deeper, to taste her again.

  He drew back as someone passed along the street, and Violet slipped her hand from his. “Good night,” she said.

  “Wait. Your wind machine.” Daniel took the box from under his arm, and leaned down and kissed her cheek. “Good night.”

  Violet took the box. “Good night.”

  Daniel grinned, not moving. “Good night.”

  Violet shifted the box to one hand, braced it against her hip, and reached for the door handle. “Good night.”

  Daniel stepped down from the doorstep to the street. “Good night.”

  She smiled over her shoulder. “Good night.”

  Violet opened the door, and Daniel tipped his hat. “Sleep well.”

  “And you.”

  “Good night, then.”

  “Good night.”

  Simon was watching with interest, leaning on the cab’s back wheel and smoking a cigarette. He grinned as Daniel turned around one last time and waved to Violet.

  “Good night,” Daniel called.

  “Good night,” Violet returned and finally disappeared inside.

  Daniel heaved a sigh, dragged a cigarette from his pocket, and accepted Simon’s offer of a light. The driver looked down at them impatiently, but Daniel leaned on the coach wheel beside Simon and waited.

  Simon guffawed. “If you hurry home and go to sleep, sir, you can see her again in the morning.”

  “Cheek,” Daniel said, drawing in smoke. “Am I that bloody obvious?”

  “You look as my youngest brother did when he was first wooing his woman. Didn’t like to take his eyes off her for nothing.”

  “No?” Daniel gazed up at the window in which he’d seen Violet before. “What happened to him then?”

  “Married her. And they lived happily ever after. Well, as happily as they can in a small flat with four children and a dog.”

  “Sounds idyllic.”

  “They think so. There’s the light you’re watching for.”

  A curtain went back in the upper window, a faint glow of a kerosene lamp behind it. Violet’s silhouette appeared, she looking down into the street. Daniel raised his hand, and Violet returned the wave, hers graceful.

  She didn’t turn from the window. Violet watched Daniel, and Daniel watched her.

  “Is this going to go on all night?” Simon asked. “If so, I’ll step to a wine shop. I don’t much understand the pubs in this country, but I’m learning to like the jug wine.”

  “Get into the damned coach,” Daniel said. He knew he was making a complete fool of himself, but he couldn’t stop.

  He took off his hat, blew Violet a dramatic kiss, jumped onto the step of the coach, and told the driver to go. Simon tossed down his cigarette and flung himself inside through the other door as the carriage pulled away.

  Daniel remained on the step, waving with his hat as the coach rumbled down the street. Violet shook her head and let the curtain fall, but Daniel knew she was laughing at him. He clung to the side of the carriage all the way around the corner and into the next street.

  If Daniel was going to make a fool of himself, he might as well do it all the way.

  Violet had no idea why, the next day, she put on the best dress she owned and made a fuss over her hair. Daniel wouldn’t come. Their adventure was over, finished.

  Not that Violet was finished with it. She’d lain awake most of the night, reliving the memory of Daniel lying behind her in the bed, his arm around her. She felt again the moment he’d rolled her over and parted her nightdress, then kissed her with such caring thoroughness. She remembered every touch, every heartbeat, every breath.

  Violet dozed off as morning came, and she awoke to a tray of croissants, coffee, and a bite of cheese, but no Daniel. She donned a peach-colored broadcloth dress, the fabric so fine it felt like satin. The bodice had lace and braid appliqué, the sleeves modestly puffed, the skirt graceful. She couldn’t help but picture a warm look of approval in Daniel’s eyes when he saw her in it.

  But he didn’t come at midmorning, nor at luncheon. As the afternoon wore on, Violet made herself stop pacing, sit down, and have tea.

  Outside, the short winter afternoon was ending. Celine finally came out of her bedroom, where she’d been resting all day.

  “Ah, Violet, darling, there you are.” She was dressed in her black bombazine, the brocade turban in her hand. “It’s almost time for our appointment. I’m glad to see you’ve dressed well for it. We’re going to be late.”

  Chapter 13

  “Appointment?” Violet’s hand jerked, and the tea in her cup nearly landed on her lovely peach skirt. “What appointment?”

  Celine stared at her. “You’ve forgotten? You never forget appointments. But I see now why Mary had to rouse me. She didn’t forget. Monsieur Lanier, a banker, very rich. We’re going to his house to give his wife a bit of table-turning, remember? He’s not a believer, and neither is his mother, but Monsieur Lanier indulges his wife. At least, that’s what Mary says. She learned everything about him while you were gallivanting in the country, leaving your poor mother all alone in a strange city.”

  “Oh,” Violet said. “That banker.” Monsieur Lanier had sent a letter to the concert hall, which Mary had collected the morning Daniel had whisked Violet away. Mary trotted every day to the concert hall for their mail, which was the address on the cards she gave out to the audience. They never told anyone where they truly lived.

  Monsieur Lanier had asked for a private consultation in his letter, offering to pay well for it. Violet would have dealt with answering the letter and setting the appointment, but Daniel had arrived, and she’d gone.

  “You agreed to go to his home?” Violet asked. “You know we should set up the consultation at a place of our choosing, especially if unbelievers attend.”

  “Don’t be silly. Mary says the Laniers have a comfortable house, and it is easier to turn unbelievers if they see incontrovertible evidence of the truth in their very own homes. Besides, Mary says their cook makes excellent cakes, and the house has good heating.” For someone so attached to the spiritual, Celine loved her bodily comforts.

  Violet sighed and quickly drained her teacup. “Blast. This means I have to wear those dratted veils.”

  Celine gave her a triumphant smile. “If I have to wear the turban, you have to wear the veils. The next place we go, we’ll be Romany again and dress in easy skirts and scarves. Much more manageable.”

  Monsieur Lanier had offered to send his private coach, but Violet negated that idea, much to Celine’s disappointment. They must go by hired coach, Violet said. That way, they could leave the boardinghouse as the respectable widow and her daughter and change into their personas on the way. Violet wanted no connection between the stage shows and the two ladies at the boardinghouse. Saved trouble all around.

  Monsieur Lanier and his wife and mother lived on a fashionable street of elegant town houses, each with tall windows hung with thick drapes. Lights shone behind the draperies, making the houses look cozy and warm inside. The hired coach stopped at the doorstep of Monsieur Lanier’s house precisely at eight, and Violet and Celine were ushered inside. Mary took their wraps and followed one of the housemaids down the back stairs to wait until they were ready to leave. All as usual.

  The younger Madame Lanier—a thirtyish woman with blond hair and large brown eyes—wished to contact her deceased mother, whom she’d much loved. Her husband, who was a little older than his wife, made it clear, as they took seats around the dining room table, that he thought this all nonsense. But his little Coralie had to have her notions.

  The older Madame Lanier said nothing, but she obviously thought little Coralie a complete fool and nowhere near good enough for her son.

  Celine took her place at the head of the table, and Violet, garbed in her peach gown and the dark veils, stood a little behind her left shoulder. Violet would be on hand to bring
Celine anything she needed, to catch her if her trance made her faint, or to provide special effects when necessary. Celine didn’t like the special effects, but sometimes they made a difference when a client hesitated to believe Celine could contact the spirit world. When Violet used the effects, they always got paid.

  “Do you have something of your mother’s prepared for me, Madame?” Celine smiled kindly at the shy young Coralie. Coralie nodded and dropped a locket into Violet’s gloved hands. Violet passed the locket to Celine, who took it between both hands and closed her eyes. “The connection, it is quite strong,” she said in her Russian-accented French. “She gave this to you.”

  The elder Madame Lanier snorted. “There’s no magic in knowing that. Who else would a mother leave her locket to?”

  Celine ignored her. She had a gift for focusing only on the believers and entering into their world. Everyone else ceased to exist for her.

  “She is near,” Celine said. “I feel her. She misses you.”

  “And I miss her,” Coralie said in a near whisper. “Can you tell her? Please?”

  The poor woman was starved for love. Violet watched the family from under her veils, seeing contempt from old Madame Lanier and bare tolerance from the husband.

  Violet knew exactly what Coralie felt. Spending the day and night and another day with Daniel had been like being given a taste of a feast she hadn’t been invited to partake of. The trouble was, the taste made Violet crave the feast all the more.

  “You may tell her yourself,” Celine said to Coralie. “Let us turn the lights low and see if the spirits will let us through.”

  Violet moved to the wall and turned down the gas to the chandelier. Once the room had dimmed, Violet lit the candles in the silver candelabra they’d brought with them. While Madame Lanier went on about how ridiculous it all was—How are we to see whether they trick us in the dark?—Celine closed her eyes, joined hands with Coralie, and sent out her supplication to the spirits.

  Violet sat down at the table this time, pulling on gloves as she took a place between her mother and the older Madame Lanier. She had few tricks to employ when she couldn’t set up a house or theatre beforehand, but she had already pressed her bare palm, coated with phosphor-luminescent paint, onto a wall when she busied herself turning out the lights. Behind Celine, a handprint began to glow in the dark.

  Coralie gasped, then gasped again when a loud rap broke the stillness.

  “Ah,” Celine said, her eyes closed, hands rigid. “Are you there?”

  One loud rap indicated Yes.

  “She’s here,” Coralie said excitedly. “Maman?”

  “Of course she isn’t here,” Madame Lanier said. “The girl in the veils is knocking on the table.”

  Violet took her gloved hands from her lap and laid them on the table just as the spirit gave a decided double rap. She always enjoyed employing her tricks right in front of the most skeptical. Misdirection was the key. Make them doubt their own doubts.

  “Two knocks mean no,” Celine said. “Are you still there, Spirit?”

  One hard knock. Violet lifted her foot carefully from the small pedal she’d dropped on the soft carpet under the table. It connected with a little drum with a speaking tube attached, which she’d found at a market in Paris. The contraption made a considerable noise but was small enough to tuck into the box with her matches and extra candles, or slip into her pocket in a pinch.

  “Can you open the veil?” Celine asked the air. “Let me through? We are looking for Madame Saint-Vincent. Seraphine Louise Saint-Vincent.”

  Coralie gasped again. “How did you know her name? I never said.”

  Celine knew because Mary had gathered every bit of information on the client she could beforehand. Violet usually helped her, but Mary was an expert. Few noticed a maid running an errand on the street, and servants were happy to stop and pass the time in gossip. Mary was open and friendly with women, coy and cheeky with the men, and fluent in several languages.

  “She knows,” Celine said. “I shall try to find my guide now. Hush. I need quiet.”

  While Celine sat still, preparing for her trance, Violet’s thoughts wandered.

  Daniel had not come today. And why should he? Violet had no business putting on her best dress and waiting for him like a love-struck schoolgirl. Daniel didn’t owe her a call. He had things to do, people to see, engines to invent. He might have gone back to visit Monsieur Dupuis, to talk about the balloon adventure, or about propulsion and internal combustion, things of that nature.

  Or Daniel was busy being a wealthy man-about-town. This was the south of France in the winter season, and Daniel must know people in the highest circles. He might even now be drinking wine with a count, smoking with a duke, dancing with a duchess. Or planning to move on to Nice and Cannes, or Monte Carlo, where the lovely young butterflies in the Casino would touch their fingers to his arm, and smile at him, and entice . . .

  Violet’s heart stung, and her foot slipped. A loud knock burst through just as Celine began speaking as Adelaide, the Parisian girl.

  “Oh,” Celine shrieked in her little-girl voice. “She is here!” In the pause, Violet gently moved the drum and pedal back under her skirts.

  Celine’s voice changed again, taking on a lower note and a scratchy tone. “Coralie, my love, is that you?”

  “Yes!” Coralie’s eyes swam with tears. “Yes, Maman, I’m here.”

  “Are you well, petite?”

  “I think so, Maman. I had that awful cold, but it’s been gone weeks now.”

  “But are you happy, child?” the voice of Madame Saint-Vincent went on. “It is a different thing. Your husband, he means well, but perhaps he is not as attentive as he ought to be.”

  Coralie shot a look at her husband, whose brows drew down. Monsieur Lanier was a well-fed man, not quite fat, with soft hands and an expensive suit. If he kept eating his cook’s fine cakes, he would become portly later in life, not having the height to carry weight well. He had all his hair, though, thick waves of it slicked with pomade. He pomaded his chestnut brown moustache as well.

  “Oh no,” Coralie said nervously. “He is . . . a very good husband.”

  “I never liked him,” said Celine as Madame Saint-Vincent. “Perhaps he will grow kinder when his goat of a mother is no longer there to command him.”

  “Oh . . .” Coralie’s cheeks went red as she flashed a glance at her outraged mother-in-law.

  Celine went on, still in the scratchy voice. “If his mother is here, tell her I am watching her. I will know if she is not kind to you, and I will take steps.”

  “No, no, Maman. No need. Madame Lanier is quite kind to me.”

  “Ha!” The sound rang through the room. “The lie becomes you, my darling. You are so angelic, little Coralie. But beware. Treachery surrounds you.” The table shook and shook hard. “I will look out for you, but you must beware.”

  “Stop!” The elder Madame Lanier sprang from her chair, her face dark with anger. She pointed at Celine. “This woman is a liar and a fraud. And that one . . .” She swung her rigid finger to Violet. “She has a device under the table that is making noises and moving it.”

  “Madame, I assure you, no.” Violet didn’t need a device to move the table. Bracing her legs against it and rocking it sufficed.

  Madame Lanier jerked up the tablecloth and peered beneath. Violet, with the drum safely beneath her skirts under the chair, didn’t move.

  “You,” Madame Lanier snapped at Violet. “Stand up. Turn out your pockets. I want to see what you have in there.”

  An empty bottle that had contained the phosphor-luminescent paint was all Violet had in her pocket. The glowing hand was fading behind her mother—she or Mary would wipe the wall clean before they went.

  “You had better do as she says,” Monsieur Lanier said to Violet in a stentorian voice.

  Before Violet could decide whether to risk showing the empty, unlabeled bottle, her mother’s voice rose to a shriek. “No. No
! Adelaide . . . help me!”

  Celine clutched her throat, her eyes widening at some fear only she could see. She writhed in the chair, her breathing hoarse, spittle flecking her lips. She continued to wail, the sound rolling around the high-ceilinged room, then she began striking at unseen attackers.

  Violet rushed to her side. “Please, fetch help! The countess is in danger!”

  Monsieur Lanier and his mother remained rooted in place, staring in shock at the display. Coralie leapt to her feet and yanked a bellpull, then rushed to Celine, trying to catch her flailing hands. As several footmen, two maids, and Mary tumbled in, Violet retrieved her pedal and drum and concealed them in her box.

  Mary produced smelling salts, which calmed Celine. Coralie hovered, wanting to help, but Madame Lanier held out her hand, her anger making the curls of her carefully coiffed gray hair tremble.

  “Come away, Coralie. These are tricksters and frauds, and they are not getting a penny of my money.”

  Oh, damn and blast. Violet ground her teeth. They needed that fee.

  Coralie showed some backbone at last. She refused to leave, gave orders to the servants, and oversaw getting Celine into a hired conveyance she sent a footman to fetch.

  Madame Lanier loudly announced her intention to retire, ignored by everyone but her son, and marched upstairs as Celine was bundled out the door. Celine, surrounded by servants and breathless with gratitude for them taking care of her, entered the coach. While the attention was around her, Violet stepped back into the dining room, wiped the remains of phosphorus paint from the walls, and stuffed the handkerchief into her pocket. She’d already shoved the box of their accoutrements and the candelabra at Mary.

  Violet reached the foyer again to see the hired coach pulling away from the door, Mary looking anxiously out the window. Violet rushed out, but the coach kept moving, its lights growing smaller in the darkness. Bloody . . .

  A touch on her arm made her jump. Monsieur Lanier stood next to her, a look of apology on his face. Violet remembered, in her agitation, to remain in her persona. “But where have they gone?” she asked, her Russian accent heightened.