A Spark Unseen

10

By a quarter past eight I was ready, or as ready as I was going to be. The three of us had worked feverishly, dragging the cases and trunks up the stairs and into the storeroom, handing through the hidden door my uncle’s floor pillows, his teacups, a smattering of clocks, and the tools, pieces, parts, and half-finished automatons from the workshop at Stranwyne, all his comfortable familiarities I’d told Mr. Wickersham had been melted. I pronounced the mattress on the cot in the bedroom unusable, so Mr. Babcock ransacked the house to find another while Mary warmed water, scrubbed, swept away mice droppings, and brought out the linens.

Then carefully, and with a struggle, we brought my sleeping uncle out of the trunk and got him through the little door. We laid Uncle Tully out on the floor and cleaned him — no time for modesty — dressing him in his usual nightshirt before putting him on the bed with a new mattress and fresh coverings. He was thrashing some now, groaning and speaking the nonsense of dreams, not asleep but never truly awake either. Dr. Pruitt had told us to expect this, a certain time of grogginess and weakness after the prolonged anesthetic, and that my uncle would become himself again given time. But it hurt me to see it. Uncle Tully drank half a glass of water, eyes closed, before I laid him back on his pillow.

“Are you sure you’ll be all right?” I’d asked Mary in a whisper, helping her tighten the blankets around his kicking legs. Lane had discovered this, cocooning Uncle Tully in a blanket when he was upset, a trick that had always seemed to give my uncle security. It was doing nothing for him now, and the guilt of leaving him was nearly intolerable. But for his own safety this task had to be done, the quicker the better. And short of burglary, I could not see how it was a task that could be performed by anyone but myself.

“We’ll be just fine, Miss,” Mary said softly. “I’ll be taking care of Mr. Tully; he’s used to finding me with him. It’s Mr. Babcock that’ll have to be staying away, but I’ve sent him off to be getting us a bit of bread and honey for toast, as I’ve already got Mr. Tully’s tea. I’ll be keeping Mr. Tully wrapped up tight, but if he’s waking up proper while you’re gone, then I’m thinking I should be giving him a time for your coming, Miss, so he can look at my watch. And I’ll explain how we’ve all been doing just as Miss Marianna said, and let him wind up the clocks.”

I considered. “No, I think perhaps have the clocks wound already, if you can possibly manage it, Mary. Seeing them stopped will make him upset. Though I daresay he’s going to throw a tantrum once he understands his surroundings, no matter what we do.”

“But, Miss, if Mr. Tully does shout his head off, and if you can be hearing it from next door, and the others can be hearing him, too, what are you going to do, then, Miss?”

What we would do, I thought, was pack our things again and take my uncle out of this place. I had not the first notion of where we could go. The knot inside me twinged with familiar pain as I glanced guiltily at Mary; there was nothing about my life lately that did not involve guilt. “I had thought to tell them that my maid was … prone to nightmares. Do you mind?”

“Lord, what would I care, Miss?” she replied, tucking in the last corner of blanket. “’Tis no skin off my nose, as they say.”

I wondered what I had ever done in life to be blessed with the likes of Mary Brown. “Then let’s try to keep him calm,” I said, “but if he shouts, he shouts. And be sure and move about normally. I need to understand what can be heard from the other house. But you’re perfectly right about giving him a time. Let’s say eleven … no, we’d do better to say half past. Mrs. Hardcastle mentioned four courses, and I’ll need time to look about the house.” Only heaven knew how I was going to manage that.

Mary shook her head, a dark smudge beneath each eye. “Well, don’t be a minute after, that’s what I’m saying, Miss. There’ll be the devil to pay if you are. Is there anything fit after being stuffed in your trunk — your dresses, I’m meaning, Miss, not your uncle, and I’m meaning your real trunk, of course, the other one — and are you needing any help with your hair?”

I’d told her that I could find something to put on and do my own hair. And I did, my appearance scarcely being a priority. But the deep brown silk rustling at my toes suited me well, and under artificial light should be dark enough to be taken for proper mourning. It was a far cry from a gray worsted dress, I reminded myself. I touched the small, healing cut on my neck, pulled some wisping curls around my face, hoping to lessen the effects of fatigue I could plainly see there, turned from the gilded mirror of the foyer, and shut the red doors quietly behind me.

It was nearing full dark and the streetlamps were lit. I pulled a patterned shawl tighter around my shoulders, more against the strangeness than the slight chill. Rue Trudon was mostly residential, it seemed, with only a boy, whistling, moving leisurely to what was likely his last destination of the day. I could smell cooking that was not like London, could hear the clop of horse hooves from the cross street, oddly muffled on the smooth, black pavement and, from an open window, a conversation I could not understand. Seven days and eight nights had passed since the Frenchman had died in my uncle’s workshop, and since then I had buried a stranger in my own family plot, told more lies than I could count, bribed a sea captain and a bevy of French officials, committed what I suspected might be treason against the British government, and left behind the only place in the world I had ever known as home. It seemed blatantly unfair that dinner with the likes of Mrs. Hardcastle had to follow. I sighed, walked thirty-two steps to Mrs. Reynolds’s door, and knocked.

A servant answered, very formally attired in a black frock coat with silver buttons. He stared at me without the slightest hint of welcome, brows raised in inquiry.

“Miss Katharine Tulman,” I said to him, “acquaintance of Mrs. Richard Hardcastle. I believe I … am expected to dinner.” I only just kept the question mark from my sentence. I’d sent Mary flying next door with a note accepting Mrs. Hardcastle’s invitation several hours earlier. Surely it had been received? The door opened a bit wider.

“Come in, Miss,” he said, “and I will summon my mistress.”

Vaguely uneasy, I stepped inside a foyer the same size and proportions as mine, only much more sumptuously furnished. It was all knickknacks and portraits, fringed velvet hangings and thickly woven rugs. Stuffed birds, eyes sparkling in the gaslight, peered down at me from glass-domed perches on the walls, and I felt instantly sorry for whichever maid had the misfortune of dusting. The black-frocked man disappeared through a green velvet curtain to my left, its edges leeching the light and the sound of voices, many of them, male and female, while I ran my gaze over the gently curving stairs.

Just as in my grandmother’s house, the stairwell rose upward through the center of the foyer, while to my right there was a closed door. A room, I surmised, that must share a wall with my ladies’ salon. It would be important, then, to see whether the top floor had any rooms to the right of the stairwell. I suspected that it did not, that my uncle Tully was currently occupying that space. The longer I looked, the more each step seemed to lure my feet, enticing them to climb, to run all the way to the top, find what I needed, and then dash back down and out the front door again before anyone was the wiser. This fancy was cured by the unmistakable tremolo of Mrs. Hardcastle as she flung aside the hanging velvet.

“Oh!” she said, the pince-nez in the act of falling from her nose. It swung crazily on its chain, bouncing against a dress of salmon-striped taffeta with gigantic, poofing sleeves. “Katharine, my … Forgive me. Miss Tulman, what a lovely surprise! I am so happy you decided to accept my little invitation!”

I cringed inwardly at her use of the word surprise. “Did you not receive my note, Mrs. Hardcastle? Truly I would not have …” I took a breath. “I would never have meant to …”

“Your note? Oh, of course, my dear. Your note! Think nothing of it. I merely forgot to notify Hawkins is all. Silly mistake.” She turned back to the servant in the frock coat, who I assumed must be Hawkins, and said something in his ear. He took my shawl, bowed, and then left the room in a dignified hurry, to have an extra place set at the table, more than likely.

Mrs. Hardcastle took my arm. “Now do come and meet everyone. I simply can’t wait to introduce you.” She pulled me firmly through the curtain, and when it fell shut behind us I froze for just a moment, like an animal trapped, eyes as wide as those of the company staring back at me.

I was in a room full of skirts, huge, billowing, in shining pinks and yellows and pale greens, with lace and flowers and trimming of every sort from head to hem. Necklaces, bracelets, and earrings winked, and there were also pure-white cravats and neatly trimmed whiskers, coal-black jackets against waistcoats of satin, gloves and handkerchiefs, and beribboned shoes. This was not the sort of clothing I would have worn to a dinner. This is what I would have worn to a ball. Or an audience with the queen. I smoothed my brown silk. I might as well have been back in the gray worsted. Mrs. Hardcastle beamed.

“Gentlemen and ladies, may I present Miss Katharine Tulman to you, lately of Devonshire, previously of London.” I barely managed the bending of my knees. “Miss Tulman has only just arrived today in Paris.”

I saw a young lady with flowers in her blonde curls speaking surreptitiously to her companion behind a gloved hand. An older woman, perhaps in her sixties, stepped forward with an enormous pile of gray hair and a beaded bodice of magenta. “I am Mrs. Reynolds, Miss Tulman. Welcome to Paris.” But her expression did not say welcome, rather it seemed to ask Mrs. Hardcastle what she could mean by bringing me here.

Mrs. Hardcastle said quickly, “Miss Tulman is in mourning, Caroline, as you can see. She has recently inherited a large fortune and estate, and is now mistress of the house next door.”

Now both the young lady with the curls and her companion had their mouths behind their gloves, eyes demurely pointed to the floor. Mrs. Reynolds’s features softened just slightly.

“I will look forward to making your better acquaintance, Miss Tulman.”

“Thank you, Ma’am,” I whispered.

What followed next was a blur of exactly seventeen more faces, most of them English with three or four French, and other than the occasional title of Sir or Lady, very few to which I could later attach a name. I did note that the whispering young ladies were part of Mrs. Reynolds’s household, her nieces, both of whom were named Miss Mortimer. The eighteenth face presented to me belonged to a young man, French, dark hair slicked, and with a pencil-thin mustache. Instead of a bow or even shaking my hand, he leaned forward and, before I knew what he was about, had kissed both my cheeks. My face blazed first with shock, and then anger. Mrs. Hardcastle laughed heartily.

“For shame, Mr. Marchand! Miss Tulman has only just arrived, and is not yet accustomed to your French ways.”

“Forgive me, Miss Tulman,” he said, his accent light, brown eyes sparkling with amusement. “I hope I did not offend.”

I murmured something unintelligible, and the sparkle in his eyes became a gleam.

Dinner was something of a nightmare, as the table was obviously made to accommodate twenty, and my presence made twenty-one. I was crammed at one end, where I sat around the corner from a bearded gentlemen — one of those whose name began with a Sir — and directly beside a matronly woman who was the wife of someone I could not identify. Both were more interested in the food than my person, so I was left to eat in silence. The room was stuffy and hot beneath the gas chandelier and all my petticoats, the steaming dishes and flaming candles on the sideboard adding to the lack of air. I pushed at the food on my plate, feeling curls fly loose from my hair knot under the influence of the heat.

During the second course, I caught a lady in gold satin looking at me. Her gaze went instantly to her lap, where she fussed with her napkin, ceasing her low conversation with one of the nieces of Mrs. Reynolds. But I had caught the last word she spoke, watched it form, ugly on her lips. The word was lunatic. And as the dinner progressed, I noticed a similar undercurrent, a whispered conversation running beneath the acknowledged one, smooth ripples of gossip, neighbor to neighbor, flowing like a tide toward me.

I knew what they were discussing: the young heiress who had so scandalously and unrepentantly carried on with a servant in her uncle’s household, who had chosen to live with a lunatic rather than put him properly away in an asylum. My temper warmed like the hot air. I tried to put my thoughts on Uncle Tully, to think about rooms and walls, to lay the plan of Mrs. Reynolds’s house clear in my mind. Then I tried to take my mind away from my uncle, confused, ill, uprooted, and without me; the thought left me nearly unable to swallow. Fourth course, and I realized the table’s open conversation had turned to the war.

“… preposterous,” a man was saying. “Whipped like puppies when we had the Russians outmanned and outgunned. The shame of the Royal Navy. Admiral Price shot himself and no wonder. Fought like schoolgirls, they did.”

I raised a brow, thinking this man must have had a very limited experience with schoolgirls to make such a statement, but I also pricked up my ears. Mr. Wickersham had mentioned this defeat of the navy in my morning room.

“But do you not think, Monsieur Fortescue,” said Mr. Marchand, the impertinent young Frenchman, “that the shame of your navy is the age of its boats, and not its captains? If your English ships had fought with the power of steam instead of waiting for the winds, if your Royal Navy could have had the use of ironclad batteries to bombard the shore, like the French, do you not think the British would have defeated these inferior Russians?”

Mr. Fortescue spluttered indignantly. “Floating batteries of iron, you say? And you think Russian cannon shot will bounce right off them, do you?”

The young Frenchman grinned, stretching his tiny mustache. “Like so many rubber balls. And neither shall they catch fire, as your English ones do.”

Mr. Fortescue turned red in the face, evidently interpreting this remark as some sort of slight to his nation. “Gentlemen, do enjoy your pudding,” Mrs. Reynolds suggested, which did nothing to lessen the man’s color.

“I think, Monsieur,” Mr. Marchand continued, leaning back in his chair, “that the country that builds these ships of steam and of iron from which the shot will bounce, I think this nation will need a new name for its monarch. Which do you think it shall be, Monsieur? ‘Queen of the oceans’? Or shall it be ‘emperor of the seas’?”

The man threw down his napkin, blowing out his breath in outrage, but before he could speak, Mr. Marchand half raised his glass, his light French almost a purr. “To allies, sir,” he said, “and the ingenuity of both our countries.” And just before he drank, he looked straight at me and winked.

Every head at the table turned, instantly distracted from the political squabble. I looked away from the staring eyes, from Mrs. Reynolds’s rising brows, frowning at my place settings. How dare he treat me in such a familiar way? Did he think my character so tainted that I would tolerate such behavior, and in front of all these people? And who were these people to judge me, in any case, and who was I to care for their judgment? I sat up straighter in my chair, and turned to the bearded gentleman next to me.

“And what think you, sir?” I said loudly. “Will England and France continue to be allies, or will the Emperor Napoléon use these new iron ships to start a war in Europe and spill the blood of thousands of Englishmen, as his late uncle did?”

One rattle of a spoon disturbed the charged silence that now reigned in Mrs. Reynolds’s dining room. Not only had I spoken out, I had spoken on a subject that was not in a lady’s province, spoken of it rudely, and in such a way that one half of the guests was like to be set against the other. Good. I took a slow bite of my pudding, enjoying a moment of satisfaction as I waited politely for the poor man’s reply, his expression now that of a gasping fish. Mrs. Reynolds folded her napkin deliberately, set it beside her plate, and stood, her austere face thunderous.

“Ladies, we shall leave the men to their port. Coffee is served in the drawing room.” The only thing lacking from her statement was the command of “Now!”

I dabbed the corner of my mouth, all my pleasure transforming into shame. So much for the demure young woman I’d described to Mr. Babcock, the one who had promised not to draw undue attention. I would be the talk of several drawing rooms tomorrow; I might as well have put an advertisement in the papers. I filed out with the other ladies, crushed among the bell-shaped dresses, careful to give the impression that I had not noticed the grinning young Frenchman once again half raise his glass to me. Never had I seen Mrs. Hardcastle look so amused.