by Karen Odden
I should have known Matthew would guess at least this much. “She’s afraid her brother has gotten mixed up in something he shouldn’t,” I said with a sigh. “I don’t know what it is—but I think she was afraid you were going to press her about him.”
He nodded, seeming to accept my explanation, and started to walk.
After a moment, I ventured to ask, “You looked as if you recognized someone from the description she gave.”
“Did I?” he said blandly.
I gave him the same scowl he’d just given me, and he shrugged. “I could be wrong. We’ll see.”
“Do you think her attack has anything to do with the others?”
“Yes. But not in the way I’d expected.” He paused at the street corner, and I could see his mind was already elsewhere. “Thank you, Nell. I’ll see you at home.” And then he was striding away.
Chapter 18
After I left the hospital, I headed toward Cromwell Road. A few blocks from the South Kensington Museum, it began to sprinkle, and I put up my umbrella.
Knowing it might rain, Jack and I had made plans to meet there so we’d be indoors. It was also—as Jack said wryly—one place in London where we could be fairly certain we wouldn’t see anyone connected with the Octavian.
I lowered my umbrella to shake off the raindrops as I came close to the entrance, which admitted a steady stream of Sunday museum goers. I made my way through the door, scanning faces in the crowd until I found Jack’s. A smile lit his face as he saw me. He put out his hand to carry my umbrella, and crowd or no, he leaned over to brush my hair with his lips. I tucked my hand inside his elbow as though I’d been doing it for years, and we made our way out of the throng.
“The last time I was here was with my uncle over a year ago,” he said, as if we were merely continuing a conversation.
“I used to come with my father before he died. His favorite section was the inventions from the Great Exhibition.”
“Let’s start there, then.” We moved toward the first court. “Your audition is in three days. Are you nervous?”
I felt my stomach tighten at his words. “Yes. Although your uncle was very kind and reassuring. He seems to feel I’ll pass.”
“He told me what he said to you about your playing. He felt horrible about making you cry.”
“Oh, he didn’t make me cry.” I shook my head. “Not really. I hope he knows that.” We paused before a voting machine, and I continued, “I expect the reason I was crying is that for years I’ve been told that I need to restrain my feelings, not only by my doctor but also by Mr. Moehler, and I’ve done so, for the most part. But there was your uncle, wanting to know why and opening up the possibility of doing it differently.” I sighed. “I love the idea that I could play with what your uncle calls ‘susceptibility.’ To feel the influence of the piano upon me. I’m just . . . not sure I can.”
“Safely, you mean.”
I nodded and walked toward the enormous telescope, roped off in the center of the room, and peered up at the metal structure that towered above us, with its metal dials and odd levers.
“What if you were to try?” Jack asked. “You have people who would keep watch and let you know if you began drifting into danger.”
“Yes, I do.” I kept my eyes on the placard that listed the telescope’s dimensions and made my voice light: “Are you offering to help?”
“Well, you’ve already caught me spying on you once,” he said soberly.
Chagrined, I looked up—only to find him repressing a smile. I poked at him with my elbow. “That’s rotten of you, to cast that accusation up to me.”
He just laughed, and we moved on, halting in front of a player piano.
Jack read aloud: “The first to use light springs to read the roll and to employ a mechanical amplifier. Eighteen fifty-one, Pape, England.”
“Now this is what the Octavian needs,” I said.
“Until there’s a new act that needs to be worked in at the last minute,” he replied.
I snorted.
“I assume you’ll stop playing at the Octavian once you’re accepted?”
“If,” I corrected him. Then I considered his words. “You know, I hadn’t really thought about it.”
“But you’ve an idea what you’d like to do after the Academy, don’t you?”
“Well . . . somewhat.”
“Would you want to play with an orchestra, at the Monday Popular Concerts at St. James’s, something like that?”
I said nothing for a long moment. I’d never admitted my ambition out loud to anyone, but at last I said, “It’s probably more than I should hope for, but yes. I saw Arabella Goddard play there once. Mr. Moehler had an extra ticket—or at least that’s what he told me then. I have a feeling now that he bought it for me. She was going to tour abroad, and he wanted to be sure I saw her before she left.”
“When was this?”
“Three years ago. She played Beethoven’s Concerto in E-flat. I could hardly breathe, it was so magnificent. And I wasn’t the only one affected. The two men next to me were crying, and the papers the next morning were full of praise.” I quoted one of them: “ ‘Such fullness of tone, such breadth of style, and sustained elevation of sentiment, we have never met with before, except in the happiest efforts of our greatest male pianists.’” I smiled. “I guess that’s when I began to imagine what it would be like.”
We crossed the threshold into the Oriental Court, whose rooms featured works from China, India, and Japan. The walls were hung with paintings, scrolls, and cases of ornate weapons, and we made our way through desultorily until we reached the last room, where my eye was caught by an object at the far end: a large, multicolored sculpture of wood in the shape of a tiger mauling a man who was lying flat on his back.
“What on earth is that?” As I drew closer, I could see that the tiger’s teeth were bared and at the man’s neck. “Tippoo’s Tiger,” I read from the card near the tiger’s left foot. “ ‘Made for Tipu Sultan, ruler of Mysore (seventeen eighty-two to seventeen ninety-nine). A mechanism inside the tiger’s body causes the European man to lift his arm and emit wails of pain.’” I frowned, remembering. “The Siege of Seringapatam was in seventeen ninety-nine, so I guess Tipu was killed by the British soldiers.”
“If that isn’t a symbol of India’s resentment against the British, I don’t know what is,” Jack said. “Look at those incisors.”
“Rather pointed,” I agreed. “Both the reference and the teeth.”
We were on our way out when he paused by the door in front of a glass case. Inside was a life-size wooden figure of a man upon which hung a lavishly embroidered red-and-gold silk kimono. A broad band of black silk encircled the waist, and from the sash hung a pipe and a small carved wooden turtle with a laughing man riding on his back.
I leaned close to the glass. “Japanese kimono, seventeenth century, with obi, pipe, and decorative turtle netsuke.” I studied the exquisitely detailed figure. “Net-suke. I’ve never heard of that before.”
“It’s pronounced net-skay,” he corrected me. “Usually they’re made of ivory or stone. They’re used to hold items on sashes.”
I couldn’t help but laugh.
Jack’s eyebrow rose. “What?”
“It’s just that you sometimes surprise me with the things you know.”
For the briefest moment, there was a peculiar look on his face, but then he smiled back. “My uncle has a friend who collects them. The pipe looks like a bassoon, don’t you think?” When I didn’t answer, he added, “We should start back. I need to be at the Octavian in an hour.”
We dawdled a bit on our walk homeward, strolling in companionable silence when we weren’t conversing. At Cork Street he handed me my umbrella and squeezed my hand. “I’ll see you tomorrow night.”
He left me then, and I wondered, not for the first time, how on earth I was going to explain to my brother how we met.
Chapter 19
The next morning, I woke
to a house that was silent and peaceful, with the rain spattering my window. I took a deep breath in and let it out contentedly. I’d have all day to practice and rest before I performed. I rose, dressed, and headed downstairs, but as I reached the landing, the front door opened and Matthew entered and collapsed his drenched umbrella. His expression grim, he dropped a newspaper on the table and shrugged out of his coat.
“You’re up early,” I observed.
He looked up. “I wanted to see what the papers were saying.”
“About what?” Silently, he handed the paper to me, and I opened it so I could see the front page.
It was the morning Record. In the middle of the lower half was a woodcut of a scene: three grand houses behind wrought iron fencing; on the footway stood a plainclothes detective beside a uniformed policeman carrying a bright lantern. Each loomed over a thief lying facedown. I looked closely. Yes, I’d say the detective bore a fair resemblance to Matthew. The headline read: “House Robbed in Westminster; Scotland Yard Baffled.”
I wrinkled my nose. “Did the paper get it right?”
“No,” he said. “Are you hungry? I want some coffee this morning, and I’m half starved.”
I folded the paper, tucked it under my arm, and followed him into the kitchen. While he started the fire, I filled the pot for the coffee. He sliced some pieces off a loaf of bread and put cheese on a plate, and I prepared some soft-boiled eggs.
“Let’s eat in here,” he said. “What Peggy doesn’t know won’t hurt her.”
I poured a cup of coffee for him, and sat down opposite with one of my own. “I assume the plainclothesman in the picture is supposed to be you?” I said, teasing him a bit. “They’ve made you look like a giant. You positively tower over the thieves.”
There was no answering glint of humor in his eyes. “They were just boys, Nell. They fell off a three-story roof. We found them dead on the pavement.”
The smile slid off my face, and my cup rattled onto the saucer, coffee splashing over the rim. “Oh, my God. Matthew. That’s dreadful.”
Matthew pushed his plate away. “The younger one couldn’t have been more than ten, a scrawny little thing. Just bones under his clothes.” He pressed the heels of his hands into his eyes as if he were trying to rub the image of those two boys out of them. “There was blood everywhere. With the rain, it had turned that bit of the street pink.”
A hard lump formed in my throat, and I swallowed it down. “Where in Westminster?”
He took his hands away, and his tired eyes met mine. “Pentwick Street. The rain last night probably made the roof slicker than usual. Their feet were bare—they must have slipped.”
“Were they . . . part of the Fleet?”
“I think so.” He groped inside the pocket of his trousers. “They had silver in a sack, and one of them had this.” He held the small object between his thumb and forefinger. It was barely two inches tall, pale gray stone, in the shape of an animal. “Curious little thing, isn’t it? I’ve never seen the like before. Maybe it’s this month’s new trifle, as Mrs. Kendrick said. I’m going to take it to someone I know. I’m hoping he can tell me something about it.”
With a feeling of misgiving, I held out my hand, and he put the little figure in my palm. It was a fox, with a bristly tail curled around its front paws, its ears cocked, and its face so finely etched that I could see the creature’s tiny nostrils and the line of the mouth.
“Matthew, I think this is a piece of netsuke,” I said carefully. “I’ve seen some at the museum recently. How fine it looks, with all this detail about the face and ears.”
His eyebrows rose. “Bully for you, knowing your treasures. What’s netsuke?”
“It’s from Japan. People used to hang them off their sashes. For decoration, I suppose, but they also hold objects, such as pipes. They can be made of wood or ivory, too.”
“And you’ve seen it at a museum,” he said slowly. “I suppose that means it could be worth a good bit.”
“I imagine so.”
Matthew made an unhappy sound in the back of his throat. “Yet again—something new, something we haven’t seen before. That, and the scars on their feet.”
“What scars?”
“The boys had been branded, like cattle, Nell. It was in the shape of a C, right on their heels.”
I felt the blood rush out of my face, and suddenly I was very cold. In my mind’s eye, I was back in the corridor under the Octavian, staring at the mark on Rob’s heel. I’d taken it for a U, but it could have been a C.
“I’m sorry. I know it’s vile. I shouldn’t have told you.”
The coffee roiled my stomach, and a wave of nausea came over me. “No—it’s all right. It’s just—it’s wretched.”
He nodded. “I’ve no idea if it’s connected to the Fleet. They could just as easily have had the marks before they joined, and in that case, God only knows what the C means. Christchurch? Covent Garden? Or Crow, or Chiv, or Crapped, for all I know.”
I was only half listening. Could the two boys have been Rob and Gus?
“It could also be a U.” Matthew stood and paced to the window. “I’d give anything to begin to break the Fleet apart—even just a few ships. To think of the captains using boys that young.” He took a deep, controlling breath. “The good news is—I found someone else who might be willing to talk. I just wish I’d found him three days ago. The boys might still be alive.”
My words came through dry lips: “Who is it?”
“A man named Avery. He’s a fence.” He turned. “William found him, actually. But this time we’re not taking any chances. The minute we finish talking to him, we’ll put him on a train. He’ll be gone by tomorrow night.”
“Out of London?”
“Yes.” He glanced around the kitchen with an apologetic, hesitant look. “I’ve a lot to do today.”
“Don’t worry, I’ll wash up,” I said quickly, wanting him away so I could think without him watching me. He gave a smile of thanks, patted my shoulder, and headed toward the front door. I sank back onto the stool, my fingertips pressed to my mouth.
What if the mark on the bottom of Rob’s foot meant he was part of the Fleet? And why had he been at the Octavian that night? Could it be possible that the music hall is the site of one of the ships?
The front door closed, and I snatched up the paper to read the article:
Within London, close courts and stifling alleys lie at no large distance from elegant streets whose denizens may fancy themselves far from the haunts of vice and villainy. But almost nightly, residents of one fine house or another discover their error. Young thieves with the talent and daring of circus performers risk life and limb to gain access to these homes by any means, in order to steal treasures, including bits of silver, jewelry, baubles, and such other small items as can find their easy market. Under existing jurisprudence, children between the ages of seven and fourteen are deemed incapable of forming criminal intentions, but there are vicious men who are well able to step into the breach—men such as those immortalized by Mr. Dickens in the character of Fagin, who find and train children to carry out their felonious plans, with this great advantage: that the children will often have their prison sentences commuted to workhouse terms, and death sentences commuted to transportation. But what sort of commutation exists for the child who dies as a result of such criminal acts?
Such was the sad event of last night, at approximately eleven o’clock, when two young boys fell from a steeply pitched rooftop on Pentwick Street and met their tragic fate. The owner of the house, who wishes to remain anonymous, was gone from his residence, with his wife and two daughters; at home were a maid, the butler, and two footmen, but they were all abed and saw and heard nothing. Uniformed police and detective inspectors from Scotland Yard were at hand to examine the bodies and retrieve the stolen property. Their countenances wore expressions of pity for those forced by cruel men to pursue such activities, and one reflected that this sort of crime harkens back to pr
evious decades in this century, when flash houses dispersed young boys nightly to pillage the city.
There was more, but it provided no further details about the crime, or the boys. No mention was made of the brands, and, fortunately for Matthew, his name was left out of it.
If the Octavian was one of the ships, did that mean that other ships were based in music halls as well? There were hundreds of them in London, scattered in every borough. Now that I thought about it, music halls were admirably suited to being used by the Fleet: the thieves could stay there during the day and leave at night, when the halls were needed for their usual purpose. And if other music halls were like the Octavian, there were no doubt various rooms where the stolen goods could be stored and counterfeiting equipment set up.
I read the article once more, and this time, the comparison with circus performers struck me as I refolded the paper and laid it aside. Was this what Sebastian had become involved in? I pressed my hands to my temples, trying to put my thoughts in order.
Like dozens of other acts in London, Sebastian and Marceline had made the rounds of music halls and theaters. If the Fleet was tied not just to the Octavian but to other music halls as well, Sebastian could have found and joined a ship anywhere.
If so, did Marceline know about it? Given her agility, who was to say she wasn’t part of it as well? She’d certainly be as adept as any boy. She’d crossed a roof and slid down a drainpipe after she’d been beaten nearly unconscious.
I went back to the sink and mechanically began to wash up from our hasty breakfast. But I was already forming a plan. First, I had to find out if my guess was right—that the Octavian was one of the ships. And I couldn’t go at my usual time at night; by then, the boys would be safely away. I needed to go this afternoon, and I couldn’t risk being recognized as Ed Nell.
I needed to go as myself.
Chapter 20
That afternoon at half past two, I left the house with my heart thudding under the thin wool of my dress. I wore a hat, and I carried a small reticule and my umbrella, which I was grateful for by the time I reached Regent Street, as the clouds were darkening overhead and a breeze was picking up.
