Factotum ft-3

by D M Cornish

  An obstruction of wagons on the Dove slowed them on their way back to Cloche Arde, forcing them to go one leisurely clop upon another beside the city-bound wood-lands of Moldwood Park, brooding, quiet and impossibly threwdish.

  How can such land stay like this in a city as old as Brandenbrass? Rossamund marveled. Continuing the thought aloud, he said, "Don't powerful people want to build tenements and mills and foundries on it?"

  Carp blinked at him. "Build tenements and foundries on what?"

  "On the Moldwood."

  "Oh." Carp smiled stiffly. "Spoken like a true Brandenard," he said dryly. "A permanare per proscripta is a powerful thing, Master Bookchild. Besides such, we greatly esteem our broad garden spaces here; it is a mighty city indeed that can waste ground in such a pretty fashion."

  Indistinctly from somewhere within the trees, Rossamund was certain he could hear distant music.Volume ever shifting, it seemed a peculiar, twanging, crashing tune, wild and rolling, the vague hints stirring his soul at turns with grim earthy excitements or foreign, sorrowful longings. "What is that music?" he asked, leaning out of the dyphr to hear more.

  To this the man-of-business gazed absently for a breath at the slow passing park and simply shrugged. "Brandenbrass is a puzzling place for those not acquainted with her," he concluded unsatisfactorily, and flicked his horse to pick up its pace.

  Reentering the gate of his new home, Rossamund passed a lank-haired fellow exiting the grim town house wearing a cingulum of black edged with white and a look of scarce-contained dismay. By the calibrator in one hand and the thick book in the other, the young factotum recognized the man as a variety of concometrist. As Carp passed him without the merest acknowledgment, the fellow gave Rossamund a brief and mournful glance, a worldly weight heavy in his gaze and a hungry hint of envy too.

  "Hallo, sir," Rossamund greeted him, wondering how it was that a person of such noble profession should look so careworn.

  "Well-a-day," the concometrist replied without conviction, going on and out of the gate.

  "Oh, he was a simple illustrator" was Europe's explanation of the stranger, when Rossamund returned to her file. "One of the many mendicant freelancers who seek me out for my patronage. The fleas take scant time to infest the new-washed dog. This fellow was the second imagineer to come in as many days, asking if I had need of a fabulist to prepare etchings of my travels. Our course will be crowded enough without some inky booby slowing me up to scribble all and sundry too."

  Carp sniggered.

  "He looked sorely hipped, Miss Europe," Rossamund uttered before thinking. "You might have let him draw you something for a fee. Concometrists are noble fellows," he concluded.

  The fulgar, who had been scribing in her ledger, looked up at her factotum slowly, fixing him with a steely inspection. For a long moment she held him so. Then, eventually looking down to her book again, she said, by way of shifting subject, "What of my submissions to the knavery? They proceeded simply?"

  "Aye, Miss Europe, though the… the singular for the corpse-eater was taken."

  "Who took the contract?" she asked

  "It was Flabius Flinch," Mister Carp interjected, his tone weighty with meaning. "Filled at one of the parish knaveries."

  "Hmm," Europe murmured, with a slight curl of lip and a contemptuous cluck of tongue. "That oily toad still lives, does he…" She picked at some spot on her coat hem. "Too bad for you, little man: it was my intention to let you receive the entirety of the prize for that writ, but now I guess you must forgo the forty sous."

  "I guess I must, Miss Europe," he replied in honest indifference. "It does not worry me."

  "Truly…" The Branden Rose looked long at him again with feline calculation. "An easy boast for you, Rossamund, when it is another who puts the food on your table and a roof above your sleeping head."

  Stung and painfully aware of the man-of-business standing only a pace to his right, Rossamund could conjure no answer. Instead he looked determinedly at a silk painting immediately behind his mistress-a twisted, strangely posed heldin aboard a flimsy curricle spearing a sea-nicker through the cranium-and kept black thoughts at bay.

  "So we are off to remote adventures again, little man!" Europe spoke into the uncomfortable moment with a sudden and strange lightness that Rossamund did not recognize.

  Keeping check of his soured temper, he placed all the knavery documentation and the fifty-sou folding note in her expectant palm.

  "Before I forget it, Mister Carp!" The fulgar shifted subject as rapidly as she took the papers. "Write up a presage exemption for our young extravagant here-I do not want the best treacle-tester this side of the Marrow to be suddenly bundled away into naval service by some uppity press gang or a short-listed arming contractor."

  In a moment she had taken Rossamund to the depths of shame and then lifted him to a bliss of gratification. The best treacle-tester this side of the Marrow…, he repeated to himself glowingly as Mister Carp obeyed, rummaging the lock-safe bureau at the near corner with silent efficiency.

  A knock at the door brought with it the arrival of Kitchen at the head of another guest: a moderately tall man in long black soutaine, his short, equally inky hair slicked and sleeked back over the dome of his slightly flattened skull. Europe rose and stepped out from behind her marvelous desk, greeting the somber fellow and introducing him to Rossamund as Mister Oberon, Companion of the White, eminent surgeon and examining transmogrifer. "He has come to make sure my innards have stayed in their proper trim after my excursion to Sinster."

  The serious transmogrifer gave a gracious nod to all three. "Ut prosim-that I might be useful."

  Rossamund returned a gracious bow of his own.

  A real and living transmogrifer!

  "Allow me to name my factotum, Mister Rossamund Bookchild." The fulgar completed introductions, to which Mister Oberon let slip only the mildest surprise before returning to a fixed, opaque expression. "Mister Bookchild," he intoned with an oddly deep voice, gray eyes searching the young factotum's face, as if seeking to know him entirely by sight alone.

  "I thought it was illegal to transmogrificate in the Empire, sir?" Rossamund asked a little carelessly, to distract this untoward inspection.

  Europe gave a laugh of open delight.

  "That it is, sir," the transmogrifer conceded, "though a discreet exam of an existing mimetic construction is not."

  "You must forbear with my factotum, Mister Oberon," the fulgar said almost indulgently. "He is diligently after my welfare."

  MISTER OBERON

  Rossamund did not know whether she sought to mock him or encourage him.

  "As all good employees should be, I am sure," the transmogrifer said flatly, with a nodding bow. Midafternoon saw the advent of a thin, superciliously smiling gentleman in dark and deeply fashionable gold-striped purple, with volumes of white ruffles gathered at neck and cuff. After many ingratiating bows he introduced himself. "Brugel, Master Gaulder and Armouriere, presenting himself for your eminentical service, sir."

  He soon had Rossamund pinned in rough cuts of sumptuous cloth intended for his new harness. For well beyond an hour the young factotum stood arms in, arms out, legs apart, legs together, in constant worry of being pricked by pin or needle. All the while Master Brugel paced about him, squinting, tapping his lips with his forefinger and calling numbers and obscure instructions to his dogged gray-haired assistant.

  "I shall make you the most splendorous man of your trade," the armouriere enthused melodiously.

  Trying to keep his neck twisted away from tickling threads, Rossamund was not sure such promised splendor was worth it.

  Evening came, Brugel left in his fancy-carriage and, the examination of Europe complete, Oberon departed too. Having delivered up her nightly dosing and taken his seat at the farther end of the solar, Rossamund asked after her health.

  "Most excellent," she declared, her eyes twinkling with self-contained triumph. "My repairers in Sinster exceeded themselves. Mister Oberon
pronounced me better knit than I have ever been: I am in my fighting prime, it would seem. A happy reversal of my… distress in the Brindleshaws, would you not say, little man? Your valiant rescue was not in vain."

  Rossamund smiled, ducked his head and nodded.

  Indeed, the fulgar was in such high spirits that she allowed him to remain with her in her file that evening, sitting by the fire in the crackling, ticking quiet under the defiant gaze of Europe's childhood portrait. While the Branden Rose perused the pages of massive garlands-half a person's size and delivered to her that very afternoon by Master Brugel-Rossamund sat at a low table to organize the castes and salperts purchased the day before. There was the Frazzard's powder from his days with the lighters, and the less flammable beedlebane too. Loathly lady and botch powder were prescribed to frighten a foe and knock a soul unconscious. In place of evander, Pauper Chives had provided levenseep, claiming it to be the superior restorative. By these Rossamund laid out cylindrical wooden thennelevers of glister-dust to stun and daze-and beside them he placed with utmost care what looked very much like large geese eggs dyed a glaring red with waxen crowns of emerald green at both ends. A lepsis, so Pauper Chives had named it, holding a powerful script known as greenflash, "… Bursts with a mighty flash of levin-fire like some thermistoring fulgar," the script-grinder had explained. "Handle it with grace," was the added warning. "You must throw it at least ten yards, else suffer its fury."

  Safe and snug in a padded silt-cad were three dozen castes of hard glossy black glass, each holding a dose of what the saumiere called asper,and which Craumpalin held in awe as being "one of the nastiest repellents thy can use this side of scourging."

  The young factotum stared in wonder at these and yet more all laid before him.

  "So this is where my money went," Europe said, looking up from her perusing. "One would think you a true skold. But who will you hunt, I wonder…"

  Rossamund gave a bemused grin and then carefully found a place for each script in the digitals, assembling the more healing and helpful potives in his stoups. When all was arranged, then rearranged according to what he reckoned he would need most or least, he set himself to write letters on paper borrowed straight from the fulgar's great desk.

  The first was a brief missive to Sebastipole, the lamplighters' agent, serving the Lamplighter-Marshal against wrongful accusation down in the Cousidine.

  After this he scribbled three simple lines to Doctor Crispus languishing still in Winstermill, leaving off any distinguishing detail but his name for fear of the prying suspicions of the Master-of-Clerks and his mindless staff of loyal cogs.

  His thoughts turned to Threnody, cornered by cunning questioning into betraying him at the inquest. She had looked in great distress when her betrayal was fully played, and he wanted to tell her that he understood, that he bore her no grudge, that he was in a far better situation now. However, Rossamund well knew that Threnody was fractious and changeable, and he could not be certain she truly cared to receive such a communication.They had fought together, shed blood together, survived together, but still he did not know if his words would be welcome.

  Ahh!

  After a long time simply staring at the blank letter sheaf in a spin of indecision, he gave up on the notion and instead set about penning something to Verline. Yet even here he could not think of what to say. It was impossible for him to write to the beloved parlor maid and keep the full truth of events from her, yet how could he compose the unspeakable? He tried one line on a fresh sheaf: We are all waiting for the monster-blood tattoo made of my own blood in Master Fransitart's arm to show and prove that I am in truth a monster… but with a low, frustrated growl that caused Europe to look up in mild and short-lived curiosity, he crushed the paper with its damning confession and threw it into the fire. He wanted to tell everything and so could not tell anything. Oh! How he wished most desperately that the terrible troublesome truth of those words might be consumed as easily as the paper by the flames and leave him free to live a quiet, simple life. In the end all he wrote was this: Dear, dear Miss Verline, I am no longer working for the lamplighters but have entered the employ of the Duchess-in-waiting of Naimes as her factotum. I am safe with her, well fed and well paid.

  I hope your nephew is doing well. Forever your

  6

  A DAY AT THE SEASIDE

  Weed-bunts small flat-bowed, sharp-prowed wooden sailers used by kelpmen to cut through and gather kelp, matted algaes and other seaweeds for either disposal or use, keeping common lanes clear of screw-fouling growths. A ubiquitous sight in any harbor, their operators labor in the hope that they might find some chance treasure churned up from the deeps by storms or the titanic struggles between the great beasts that dwell in the crushing dark.

  The entirety of the next day was spent making preparations for the knave. In the morning Rossamund worked in the rear parts of Cloche Arde guided by the ever-humorless Mister Kitchen and hindered by the territorial Mistress Clossette, directing the staff bustling to collect all the necessaries.

  In the afternoon he went out to the stalls across the Harrow Road, and there, with Latissimus, the gentleman-of-the-stables, attached a laborium-one of the marvels bought from Pauper Chives, a cooking-box that abolished the need to make fires for testing-to the back step of the landaulet. Spent but satisfied after a day of such busyness, at mains he ate hungrily.

  "So, what are your plans for your Domesday vigil?" Europe asked over her glass of claret. "Will you lie abed all day? Have a jaunt to the seaside?"

  "Maybe a jaunt to the seaside," Rossamund declared cheerfully. "I might ask Fransitart and Craumpalin to join me."

  The fulgar beheld him with twinkling eyes. "Perhaps you could take Master Right's letter of refund to his agents and redeem our crossing fee," she posited. "A small errand.You may keep the proceeds as payment for your effort."

  Rossamund finished his meal with the hunger of the diligent and the rapidity of the excited and retired early. After a profound sleep, he woke excitedly to a brilliant Domesday morning that glowed with the promise of a day of leisure ahead. Rising with a loud, stretching yawn, Rossamund stared through open windows out over the mysterious roofs to the pink dawning sky.

  Nine days until Fransitart's mark will show.The dark thought intruded, and he frowned at its unwelcome gloominess.

  Peering down into the long sparse yard below, he could see a modest flock of sparrows sitting atop the yard wall, scooting and diving and playing chase-a-tail in threes and fours among the runners of a glory vine that spread across its face. Others were darting and disappearing in the compact branches of the cypress, and there Rossamund discovered one all-too-familiar brother of their kind sitting on his own upon a high branch, attention fixed on him.

  Good morning, little spy.

  Chattering excitedly, a pair of female sparrows swooped up to land on either side of this lone watcher. In turn the bird puffed his feathers with a distinct air of grave self-importance and made a show of ignoring them utterly. Clearly expecting a different reaction, the female birds flapped about their brother for a moment and made to squabble and fret as sparrows normally do, yet the little fellow would have none of it. He gave a single loud and a rather angry Chirrup! that stopped the girl-sparrows still. They seemed to give each other a quick look that-to Rossamund-appeared to say, Well, if that is how you want to be! and darted away, leaving this pompous sparrow-spy to his lonely spying.

  Rossamund smiled at their antics and drew in a deep, bracing breath. Just for one day he refused to be troubled by the insoluble complexities of his life and rumor's wicked work. He washed, applied what Craumpalin now called his Abstinker-an improvement on Exstinker reformulated by the old dispensurist in a letter sent from the Dogget amp; Block-hurried on his old longshanks, weskit and blue frock coat, tested Europe's treacle, ate breakfast promptly with little more than a "Good morning, Miss Europe!" took Master Right's letter of refund and set forth in the landaulet.

  It was the strangest se
nsation to be at such liberty, largely unhindered to pursue his own plans, driven about by Latissimus like some young lord on important business. A feeling of expansion, of being capable of besting all useless doubts and hindering fears spread like dawning warmth through him, and it seemed almost that his soul might stretch out to fill every circuit of the wind. His first port was his old masters' hostelry to ask if they cared to join him while he secured the refund, and after that he would let the day do as it would.

  The gentleman-of-the-stables took him slowly by roads he had not yet been, joining all the Domesday strollers and sunshine soakers in their vigil ease.Yet even now under the fancy dress, the parasols, the smiles and friendly greetings, the city hummed with irrepressible haste and industry.

  As he stared and marveled, he found that the sparrow-spy was following, the bird making darting, stop-start loops from branch to wall-top, roof-spout to red-painted lantern, keeping pace with the landaulet, trailing them all the way to the Dogget amp; Block. Glowering his disapproval at this more penurious end of town and the lane just broad enough to admit the carriage, Latissimus let Rossamund alight at the very front of the alehouse.

  "Hold tightly to hat and wallet here, m'boy," the gentleman-of-the-stables warned, and, with a dour look up at the beetling salt-stained tenements, set back for Cloche Arde.

  Barely avoiding a trip over a pole festooned with dead rats and mice tied on by their tails and rabbits tied by their ears, Rossamund entered the pleasing world of timber pillars, hammer beams, high wattle-and-daub walls, eonsmudged wood benches and a crackling fire for a cool spring day. He nodded good morning to a sweet-smelling, remarkably clean scarper sat taking a tipple near the door, a rest between patrons-it must have been his rat-pole leaning against the door outside.