The Lady's Guide to Celestial Mechanics

by Olivia Waite

  Lucy hummed happily, her greater height blocking the wan summer sun and casting Catherine in shadow. Her arms bracketed the countess like columns as she hovered above her, and Catherine felt her panic ease a little to be so confined and protected. She slid a hand beneath Lucy’s petticoats and up the long length of her thigh. Her other hand curved over the back of Lucy’s neck, pulling her down for deep and ravenous kisses.

  Lucy held nothing back, making hurry up noises in her throat and gasping into her lover’s mouth when Catherine’s fingers slid into the heat of her. She shook and trembled and Catherine gave her more and more until she shuddered and cried out, back bowing and fingers clutching at the upholstery. At last she collapsed on top of Catherine, who gloried in the slight, trembling, dewy weight of her.

  Lucy blinked to clear her eyes of passion’s mist. “But you . . . ?”

  “Later,” Catherine whispered, and pressed her lips to Lucy’s temple.

  Chapter Nine

  Griffin’s print shop was hard by Queen Square, not terribly far from Somerset House. Lucy followed Catherine through the doorway and found herself in a light- and color-filled space. It was like stepping into summer proper, with its hue and haze, and some part of her country heart sighed to see it. All around her hung framed views of London: the river Thames sparkling blue in sunlight, the great conservatory of Carleton House, the tall pagoda in St. James’s Park, delicately tinted. Copies of famous landscapes and paintings she recognized from the Exhibition added more color, bright in the light that slanted down from windows set high in the walls above. A pair of young women flipped through loose prints in folios resting on their spines in V-shaped cradles, and glass-fronted cabinets behind the counter held copies of books in sheets, each manuscript stack tied neatly with twine to prevent individual pages from being lost before they could be carried to the buyer’s favorite bindery.

  Catherine strode through this treasury, direct as an arrow. Lucy hurried after, head craning to take in as many sights as possible.

  The young man behind the counter couldn’t have been more than fifteen. He blinked anxiously at Catherine and hurried forward. “How may I help you, madam?”

  “I am here to see Mr. Thomas Griffin, please,” Catherine replied, and held out her card.

  Lucy had to hide a smile as the young man’s eyebrows fairly flew off his head at the letters announcing Catherine St. Day, Countess of Moth. “He’s in the back, my lady,” he said, with a quick, bobbing bow. “If you’ll wait here for just a moment.”

  He was back again almost immediately—no wonder, with a countess waiting. Catherine sailed through the doorway after him. Lucy scurried to follow—and stopped, blinking at the sudden assault of noise.

  In the far corner, an apprentice was pulling letters from a box of type and dropping them into place in a frame, his master’s keen eye spotting misspellings almost before they could happen. Beside them, another man was printing on a single large handpress, pulling the iron handle to bring the press down with a deep thump Lucy could feel from her breastbone down into her toes. Every thump produced another identical sheet filled with blocks of text, which were then hung to dry before being collected and folded into signatures. In the other half of the room was a boy of thirteen or fourteen, bent over a reproduction of a famous painting, carefully shading forms in bright hues to add depth and vividness to the detail of the scene.

  Supervising that boy was Mrs. Griffin, standing hawk-like above the young colorist. She glanced up with a piercing gaze; Lucy dared a small wave, and saw the engraver’s mouth quirk in brief amusement.

  Lucy and Catherine were let into a small office with windows looking out on the back street. With the door shut it was indeed much quieter than in the print shop itself. No doubt some of the sound was muffled by the stacks of manuscripts, prints, and pages piled every which way: the main desk was mostly clear, as were the two guest chairs in front of it, but the walls were lined with shelves and crates and cabinets from which paper burst chaotically like doves caught in the act of fleeing the coop.

  Thomas Griffin was a man with a creamy complexion, white-blond curls, and a cherub’s smile. He rose politely and bowed. “It’s an honor to meet you in person, Lady Moth. What can I do for you today?”

  Lucy sat. Catherine took possession of the left-hand guest chair as though it were a throne. “I will be direct, Mr. Griffin. My friend, Miss Lucy Muchelney—” Lucy nodded at being named, while Mr. Griffin’s eyes cut to her “—has recently translated an important French astronomy text. We would like to make arrangements to have it printed and sold.”

  “Ah.” The printer leaned back in his chair, fingers tapping lightly on the desk. “Griffin’s has the luxury of being very choosy about what we print, my lady. We pride ourselves on producing a spectrum of work in which any lady of good character might take an interest. You know this quite well, of course—your name has graced our subscriber rolls for some time now.” His angelic smile dimmed somewhat. “But it sounds like Miss Muchelney’s work is quite scholarly and erudite—nothing wrong with that, of course . . . but perhaps you would be better served by one of the scientific presses here in town?”

  Catherine’s polite smile didn’t budge, not a whit. “I will of course take all the financial risk of publication.”

  Mr. Griffin’s eyes glinted at this. “In return for a larger cut of the profits, I assume.”

  “Naturally.”

  Mr. Griffin chuckled. “And what would I get out of this arrangement, for my smaller stake?”

  “The chance to publish the first English translation of a significant scientific achievement from the Continent,” Catherine replied easily. “You publish work that appeals to ladies of taste and intelligence—and this is a scientific text aimed at precisely such women.” She tilted her head. “Have you been to any of Mr. Edwards’s chemical demonstrations?”

  “Yes, my son insisted on seeing the volcano eruption in person—quite dramatic.”

  “How many women would you say were in the audience?”

  The printer bit his lip and looked thoughtful.

  Catherine pressed on. “The motto of your Menagerie is ‘A Lady’s Treasury of the Arts and Sciences,’ is it not?”

  “It is—but we have never published anything scientific, outside of the short articles in the Menagerie itself.” He pursed his lips. “I don’t suppose you’d be interested in serializing . . . ?”

  Catherine shook her head, even as she smiled to soften the refusal. “You would prefer to test these unknown waters. It’s a cautious impulse, and quite understandable. But if the serialization is a success, you’ll want to publish the full volume next anyway—and if it isn’t, you’ll have used up some of the limited territory of your most valuable publication.” She leaned ever so slightly forward, her voice dropping into an intense register, as though she were imparting secrets. “You don’t have to choose one thing only. You can do both. Your Menagerie—that curated, ladylike collection of shorter pieces on history and science and the domestic arts which is already popular—and a substantive work of scholarly brilliance that just so happens to have a lady as an author.”

  Thomas Griffin stared for a long moment—but then, with a small laugh, said: “Lady Moth, I admit myself conquered.”

  He and Catherine began hammering out the finer details: number of copies printed, size of manuscript, costs of paper and platemaking and percentages of the profits. Most of the latter were to go to Lucy, at Catherine’s insistence; Lucy herself could only listen breathlessly with the strange sense that the world was beginning to turn faster and faster around its axis.

  She’d thought Catherine was afraid to discuss money.

  She’d been wrong.

  The woman who talked Thomas Griffin around was the same woman who’d funded three expeditions across the globe—and who’d arranged that famous pyramid dinner, in a foreign country where language and custom were significant barriers to cooperation. This woman had survived voyages with no small a
mount of peril involved in their very undertaking. And now she was here, in London, making Lucy’s most cherished ambition into reality.

  One worry clouded Lucy’s happiness. How could Lucy possibly repay her for this?

  Some detail about manuscript binding had Catherine and Mr. Griffin walking back out to the workroom. They bent over leather samples stamped with gilt and silver foil, arguing with apparent relish about cost and color.

  Lucy didn’t feel qualified to weigh in on this question herself, so instead she wandered across the busy print shop toward Mrs. Griffin.

  The engraver had left the colorist to his work, and was now engaged with a piece of her own. A metal plate coated in wax had been inscribed with a flowing, floral design that Mrs. Griffin was now painstakingly carving away.

  “That’s quite pretty,” Lucy said.

  “Is it?” Mrs. Griffin had a wry twist to her lips. “I’ve copied out so many flower patterns this season for the embroidery pages of the Menagerie, I’m afraid I’ve lost my taste for them. But my last apprentice left us to go live with her aunt in Sussex, so there’s nobody else to do them until I find another.”

  Lucy leaned down, watching the metal graver carve a series of careful arcs into the wax. One, two, three—and then a connecting swirl, something that just managed to suggest a flower without being so gauche as to depict one. It almost reminded her of the geometric sketches Eliza Brinkworth had done . . .

  That was when it happened. One of the journeymen at the press in the back dropped his composing stick—the long piece of metal full of leaden letters hit the floor and rang like a thousand bells. The sudden commotion startled the colorist; his hand jerked in alarm, and a spray of droplets in deep Prussian blue arced off his brush and splattered against the soft gray sleeve of Lucy’s dress.

  “Sydney!” Mrs. Griffin exclaimed, then huffed out a sigh. “My sincerest apologies, Miss Muchelney.”

  “It’s quite alright,” Lucy hurried to say. “I’m sure it will wash out.”

  “Out of the fabric, perhaps—but I’m afraid it’s caught some of the border as well.”

  She sent poor Sydney running for clean water and soap, but after a few daubs Lucy had to admit Mrs. Griffin had been correct: the blue had bitten deep into the light-hued silk chevrons.

  At home, Catherine went to work on her never-ending correspondence. Lucy rang for Eliza and showed her the stained sleeve.

  The maid’s mouth flattened as she surveyed the ruin of her work. “Oh, damn.”

  There was a moment of exquisite silence.

  Then Eliza clapped a hand to her mouth, her eyes teary with horror. “Oh, miss, I’m sorry—please don’t tell Mrs. Shaw!”

  “Of course not—”

  “Or my father!”

  Lucy stopped at that, her eyes narrowing. “I won’t,” she promised solemnly.

  “I’ll have it fixed at once, miss—let’s get you a new gown . . .”

  Eliza pulled a lavender frock from the wardrobe and helped Lucy change with shaking hands.

  Lucy held her tongue while her mind turned over the known facts about Eliza Brinkworth. “Is Mrs. Shaw terribly hard on you?”

  “Oh no, miss—that is, she is, but I’m so new, and I’m always making mistakes—one of the other girls might have been better, but Mrs. Shaw says my lady insisted . . . It’s been a great trial to her, she said once, though I don’t think she meant me to hear.” She fastened the last button on the lavender frock and stepped back, hands clasped together in front of her. “There you are, miss.”

  With a quick curtsy, she gathered the stained gown into her arms and hurried back to the workroom.

  Lucy stood very still for a moment, her mind putting one piece of evidence next to another and coming to a swift calculation. Last week one of the under housemaids had dropped a bucket after sweeping the fireplace and sent soot billowing out over the blue parlor; the week before, Brinkworth had horrified himself by discovering he’d walked around for the better part of an hour with a streak of silver polish on the sleeve of his coat. Two days ago Cook had had sharp words with a kitchen maid who’d scorched a caramel sauce and ruined the saucepan.

  All accidental events, of course, and none of them truly serious—but they were the kind of things that Lucy couldn’t remember happening before. Now they all seemed to be happening at once.

  And they’d begun around the same time Eliza had started training as a lady’s maid for Lucy. Even though there were other older girls around who’d wanted the job. Catherine had insisted, according to Eliza.

  Now Eliza was struggling, the staff were disheartened, and everyone’s lives were slightly worse off. If only there were somewhere else for the girl to go . . .

  Lucy turned on her heel and marched downstairs.

  Catherine was halfway through a reply to a very curious beekeeper in Melliton when she heard a throat being cleared behind her. She smiled when she saw Lucy—though a Lucy who looked unusually stern and serious. “What is it, love?”

  “Mrs. Griffin is in need of a new apprentice engraver,” Lucy said. “I think we should ask Eliza Brinkworth if she’d like the job.”

  Catherine set her pen down and turned in her chair. “Is Eliza not improving? Mrs. Shaw said—”

  “Eliza is doing as much as she can, while knowing that she’s not doing as well as she ought,” Lucy said, her voice quiet but steady. She bit lightly at her lip, then continued: “I know it’s not my place—but I think she’d be happier with Mrs. Griffin than she is here with us.”

  “But her talent with a needle—”

  But Lucy was already shaking her head. “Talent is not the same thing as choice—and between embroidery and drawing, she evidently prefers the latter. She’s a sweet girl, and a clever one. But she said Mrs. Shaw is always catching her drawing, that she sneaks time for it.” The astronomer stepped forward and turned one palm out as she pled her case. “Why shouldn’t she consider an apprenticeship in the art she loves best? Something that gives her more scope than what a single household can offer her.”

  And there it was; denial withered on Catherine’s tongue. Of course Eliza would want to spend her paid hours doing bigger and better things than embroidery—why settle for a craft so domestic and ephemeral when she could be learning to produce art, or at least the kind of work the public would notice. “You’re right,” Catherine said to Lucy. “We’ll ask her.”

  Once settled upon, the change took remarkably little time. Within a week, Eliza was happily putting her drawing and drafting skills to work as Mrs. Griffin’s apprentice. Joan was promoted in Eliza’s place, and the whole house seemed to take a deep breath of relief. Joan turned out to be a living treasury of stain-removal recipes, and was even able to get the Prussian blue off Lucy’s gown. The occurrence of minor accidents dropped dramatically, and even Mrs. Shaw was twice caught humming cheerfully under her breath by the stillroom maid.

  Catherine pulled another knot tight on the cushion she was covering with berry bunches. The mix of red and burgundy flowed under her hands like stage blood: dramatic and striking to the eye, but ultimately meaningless. Just something for an idle lady to do to pass the time.

  As beautiful and useless as Catherine herself.

  One afternoon not many days later, Catherine lifted the letter from the tray Brinkworth brought in and then dropped it again with a cry.

  Lucy put down her teacup, concerned. “What is it?”

  Catherine was scowling at the creamy envelope as if it were a serpent about to strike. “Mr. Hawley has finally written.”

  Tight fear released her shoulders, and Lucy shrugged. “He couldn’t ignore you forever, I suppose.”

  “No,” Catherine said, and Lucy paused. The countess’s eyes were angry and troubled, her lips thin with displeasure. “He’s written to you.”

  “Me?” Lucy turned this over from every possible angle, but couldn’t decipher it. What could Mr. Hawley possibly have to say to her?

  There was proverbially onl
y one way to find out.

  She slit the side of the envelope and once again found herself staring at the Polite Science Society president’s precise, restrained hand.

  My dear Miss Muchelney,

  I cannot express how deeply I regret the result of our last conversation. It pains me daily, as I’m sure it must pain you. Would you come to tea tomorrow afternoon, and see about how we might mend this breach in the name of Truth and Science?

  Yours most sincerely,

  Roger Hawley, President, PSS

  Lucy handed the letter over to Catherine, trying not to find it adorable when the countess’s brow furrowed and fury sparked in her blue eyes. “This letter does not contain an apology,” she said, her consonants as crisp as corporal punishment.

  “Maybe he wishes to apologize in person,” Lucy suggested.

  Catherine’s skepticism melted into worry. “What will you do?”

  Lucy picked up her cup again, staring into the dark depths as though guidance might be found there. But she was no mystic, to read the future in tea leaves. She could only drink, and hope whatever advice they had could be absorbed that way. “I suppose I’ll have tea.”

  She set out the next afternoon. Catherine bid her farewell in the parlor, worrying at the corners of her sketchbook. Lucy kissed her and closed her eyes, breathing in the light notes of soap and citrus that bedewed Catherine’s skin. She wished she could take those scents with her like incense to ward away malignant spirits. “I’ll see you for dinner,” she promised.

  Catherine kissed her farewell with just as much apprehension.

  It felt dramatic out of all proportion to the invitation, and Lucy scolded herself silently as the countess’s carriage bounced across the London cobbles. It’s only tea, she repeated. It’s only an afternoon.

  But lives had changed in shorter spans of time than that.

  She twisted her gloved hands together and swallowed against the high neck of her purple frock. None of Eliza’s artistic embroidery today—Lucy wanted to look stern and serious, and Mr. Hawley was decidedly not the sort to appreciate the niceties of feminine dress and decoration.