“Don’t you think it strange that he put up a barrier?” Hetty suggested. “He could have put it up in the midst of well-intentioned panic. But if you couldn’t break through it without resorting to breaking his focus, it means the spell was firmly set up. If that’s true, him trying to get rid of us is less about the punch he deserved and more about reasons he doesn’t want us to find out.”
“That does make sense,” Benjy muttered. “Why didn’t that occur to me?”
“Do you wish for me to answer that?” Hetty asked. “Because you won’t like my opinion.”
“No.” Benjy smiled down at her. “I always want to hear your opinion.”
He might, but she wasn’t about to let him know her thoughts at the moment.
“Good thinking with the locket,” Benjy continued. “Now there won’t be any questions about me casting spells.”
“Or me.”
“No spellcasting for you.” Benjy turned his eyes to the grass. “You once held a disillusionment charm for half an afternoon while dogs were sniffing around the trees next to us. This one lasted for how long?”
Hetty grunted, her only admission that he had made his point. “Why don’t we start looking before Baxter comes back?” she said.
Benjy stepped away from her then, small steps at first as if afraid she’d topple over. When she didn’t, he strode further away. “Tell me more about the second blast.”
“It was smaller,” Hetty said as she followed with care across the ground. “It didn’t make as much of an impact.”
“It certainly didn’t leave a mark.” Benjy’s eyes roved across the ground.
Compared to the blast site, the area they stood in was unblemished. You couldn’t even tell that a bicycle had rolled across it.
“Was your bicycle enchanted?” Benjy drew Capricorn into the air. The form of a goat with a fish tail floated before him, waiting patiently to be set to work.
“It would be a clever trick if it was,” Hetty remarked. Off his raised eyebrow she added, “I don’t think it was. The protections in my clothes would have reacted.”
“Not that dress.” His eyes lingered on her for a moment. “You don’t wear a dress like that when expecting trouble. Your usual spells aren’t stitched in.”
“Maybe I should change that habit.”
“Maybe.” He flicked his hand and Capricorn dove toward the ground. It skimmed along the grass, circling around them. At first the men over by the blast site turned, but none moved toward them. She supposed it did look like Benjy was searching for a missing locket. Only, she knew he was seeking magical residue that might have been left from the second explosion.
As if conducting an orchestra, he guided the star sigil across the ground, leaving no blade of grass unturned. Just when Hetty was starting to think there was nothing to be found, the sea-goat suddenly leapt into the air, then dove back into the ground. The spot where it disappeared shone with a red tinge of magical residue no bigger than a dinner plate.
At once, Benjy bent over as if digging for a fallen object.
“What could this have been,” Hetty asked, as he ran his fingers through the grass, “besides explosive?”
“Anything,” Benjy remarked. “A reversed summoning spell, a trigger for the explosion, but those are just details.”
He stood up holding out a cupped hand. With exaggerated care he took her hand, and made it seem as if he dropped something into her palm.
He didn’t let go, but held on to her hand.
“I suppose the details don’t matter,” Benjy added, “since either way, I couldn’t do a thing to stop it.”
She squeezed his hand. “Neither could I.”
Everything had happened so quickly that her memories could have been jumbled up in more ways than one. Yet she could correctly recall the events of her perilous ride—the veering of her bicycle under her, the rush of wind, the blast appearing right in front of her.
She could see it clearly.
The first blast was planned, but the second was not, even though it was equally deliberate. Deliberate . . . and focused on her.
They were right to speculate that someone with the answers they were seeking was here.
And so was the murderer.
LYNX
21
WHEN SUNLIGHT STARTED TO CREEP upward on their bed, Hetty watched as Benjy traced the Shield sigil along the sheets in front of her. Once the sigil was complete, he flicked it toward the window. The curtains yanked themselves together and the room fell back into semi-darkness.
On a normal morning, Hetty would have bumped her shoulder into him and told him to go to work. When the sunlight had reached their bed, early morning had already burned away. He was late, she was late, and just lying around wouldn’t lead to anything productive. However, this morning she was content to pretend to be asleep just a bit longer.
For all the things they’d had to figure out when they married, sharing a bed was never a problem. Since their time on the road, they had grown accustomed to sleeping near the other. Sleeping close meant they’d be quicker to stir, quicker to be at ease, and quicker to make sure the other was near. Bits of this habit lingered to the extent that even now she slept better when he was at her back.
As for other things, well, Hetty would be lying to say the sleeping was always chaste. She was curious by nature, and being thrust in danger and uncertainty most of the time only added to it. When it happened it was more of a relief to put aside a lingering question that would have dogged their steps as they moved about their tiny room. It hadn’t occurred often or changed anything in their partnership. But since it had happened, it allowed her to get comfortable around him.
Comfortable to not second-guess motives or to question every word he said. Comfortable to cry into his shoulder, and to dump problems into his lap. Comfortable to admit her fears and share fragile hopes.
Comfortable that even waking up this close next to him stirred up only mild surprise.
She couldn’t remember the last time she woke tucked under his arm. Stars, she couldn’t remember the last time when she woke up next to him—most mornings he was long gone before she even stirred.
When was the last time this occurred? Winter? It got bitterly cold in their room, and they often turned to each other for added warmth. But that didn’t seem right. Last winter she’d sewn spells in their quilt to soften the chill and better hold warmth. Not winter, then? Further back?
She searched her memory. Maybe it was when he started boxing? Did the guilt make him pull away?
“Are you awake?” Benjy mumbled into her ear, his breath brushing against her cheek.
“No.”
He chuckled, and sheets shifted as he moved away. “Liar.”
“Don’t go into work,” Hetty said as she rolled over to watch him creep about the room. He hadn’t turned on the lamp, but instead conjured a small light that hovered over his head so that the bumpy map of scars on his back looked smooth and somewhat altered.
“Go back to sleep,” Benjy murmured.
“You should too.”
“I would, but I have work. Unless”—his eyes flew back to her as if her blood had seeped into the sheets—“you’re not feeling well.”
Hetty playfully coughed into her hands. “I think there might have been something in that river. I don’t know if I’ll make it.”
Benjy leaned back over the bed and pressed the back of his hand against her forehead. Hetty abruptly stopped coughing as she stared up at him, her skin prickling at the intimacy of his touch.
“You don’t feel any warmer than usual . . .” he said, and their eyes met for a long moment. “Then again, I’m not a healer.”
He slipped away from her again. “I have to go to work,” he repeated, mostly to himself. “If I don’t show after being absent for the past two days, I’ll lose my job.”
“Lose your job?” Hetty exclaimed. She sat up, nearly throwing off her covers, more than wide awake now. “After all you done for hi
m?”
“It’s me who’s taken advantage of Amos’s goodwill, not the other way around,” Benjy remarked as he shrugged on his shirt. “He always held my job for me during our trips south.”
“And all you had to do was bring every member of his family to freedom,” Hetty grumbled. She got off the bed, absently tugging her nightgown around her as she turned on the lamp.
Light spilled into the room, illuminating Benjy’s somewhat amused smile.
“It’s nothing to worry about.”
“Nothing? You do all the work at the forge. You’re the reason it’s still open! Then there are all the odd jobs he just hands over to you, followed by complaints when you can’t get your work done. I would have left ages ago.”
“Yes, but Amos is absent enough that I can use the forge to work on little projects of my own. Though I suppose I could find work at other places. Maybe even do something different.”
“Something different?” Hetty asked. “Do you mean carpentry? Or mason work?”
“Something vastly different.” For a moment, Hetty thought that this would be the last word on the subject, but then he added: “When you first pressed Oliver into putting on funerals, I wasn’t keen on the idea. Oliver is an embalmer. Everything else is additional work for him, including pretending to be nice to people. Him doing funerals meant we had to help. After doing it a few times, I found I don’t mind making arrangements. The settling of the church, the arrangement of the services. Helping give people some peace and allow others to grieve. It’s quiet work and it’s a job that needs doing.”
Hetty smiled. Those words were an echo from the past, and rang as true now as they had back then. “And someone must do it.”
“I like working at the forge,” Benjy continued, “but I only stayed because one of us needs steady work. But there are other possibilities out there. For me. For you.”
“I can find work quicker as a dressmaker,” Hetty protested. “I can even open my own shop.”
“You could, but I’m keen on a change. It’s just a thought.” Benjy smiled. “Nothing more.”
As he said that, Hetty could see herself, see them, standing in a cellar. There was a body on the table, and there was a casket, and the old man lying there was greatly mourned. But his death, while unexpected, was only the natural end to a long life.
Just a thought, he said. But what a wonderful thought it was.
“I would advise you to stay here and rest,” Benjy said. “There is nothing that pressing you need to take care of at this moment.”
“Rest,” Hetty huffed. “When there is so much to do? I saw Alain Browne at the excursion but did I tell you I saw Geraldine selling her wares on the street? She told me that Alain lied. But I don’t know if that’s true or if she was just trying to distract me from the wares that I will certainly be throwing out again.”
“Distract you.”
Benjy moved toward the mantel. He lingered there for a moment, before moving things aside. Tucked behind her box of old pins, the little plant of Moonleaf, and his collection of books was the vial that Penelope had given to her earlier this week. The one Hetty had shown Geraldine, who claimed to never have laid eyes on it despite the label being in her own hand.
He turned it over in his hand. “Your interactions with her always lead to confrontations. You complain about her, tell stories about—”
“To warn people!”
“And such stories get told elsewhere. Do you think you just happened upon this vial by chance? After all the dust you kicked up about her potions, she wouldn’t just have them out. This only ended up in your hands because someone came to Penelope’s shop. And it’s this specific potion.” He pointed to the label, which spoke of promises that any person wishing to bear a child would hope for. “Would you have given this a single thought if this was wart remover? The only thing missing is a tag with your name on it. Someone was trying to get your attention.”
“This was bait,” Hetty said.
“Not bait.” Benjy shook his head. “A distraction. Maybe not by this Geraldine woman, but by someone who wants you to focus on this instead. Especially when . . .” He twisted open the cap and poured some into his cupped hand. Clear liquid trickled into his palm, a world of difference from the amber liquid that Hetty had seen before. “It’s water.”
“You sure?”
“Positive,” he said. For a moment she feared he would move to prove his assertion, but instead he dried off his hands with a handkerchief. “This is a fake, and I bet this isn’t the only one. Otherwise, tales of people becoming dreadfully ill would have reached your ears.”
“It is a clever distraction. I wouldn’t have checked the bottle.”
“That’s what they gambled on.” Benjy put the empty vial back onto the mantel. “With this I’m not sure if the Brownes’ involvement is an accident or on purpose.”
“I could go around to see them. This only adds to my questions.”
“I want to go with you.”
“But you have to go work.”
“Precisely.”
Hetty snorted, sensing the other sentiments contained in that single word. “I will not go,” she said in the end, “but I will not stay here all day. I have another case to work on.” Hetty went to the dress she’d made for Maybelle’s daughter. She smoothed the fabric as she gave it one last glance. “The dress is nearly done, and it’s the perfect excuse to find out what Penelope or her cousins were able to find out about Judith.”
“That doesn’t sound too dangerous.”
“Worried about me?”
He went quiet for a moment, weighing and disregarding each word before he selected the perfect one. “Only the right amount.”
Benjy left then, leaving Hetty to make her last fixes to the dress. Reaching into her sewing kit, her fingers brushed against the cool metal of Charlie’s pocket watch.
So that was where it went. She forgot all about it.
She opened it, and flipped it shut like she had seen Charlie do so many times to punctuate his words.
Charlie always had it with him, so why did he not have it the day he died?
Was it forgotten, or left on purpose?
Maybe there was something about the astrolabe. Hetty had disregarded the astrolabe side since it wasn’t broken like the clock, but Charlie was up to a number of things they did not know at all. Could the astrolabe lead them to the answers they sought? At any rate, it was worth it to show Benjy, especially if she could persuade him to leave the forge early.
She had little doubt it would be a hard task. He had made it clear he preferred to be with her if she started following leads for this case. And in that she was in perfect agreement.
* * *
When Hetty arrived at Maybelle’s shoe shop with the wedding dress and little christening gowns carefully wrapped up, the windows were dark. She peered inside for a bit until she spotted a handcrafted Closed sign posted on the door. Not wanting to linger, she debated making her way toward Maybelle’s home before she remembered there was a better option.
A few streets more brought her near the herbalist shop. At this hour, the tiny space was quite empty, with only Penelope seated at the stool at the counter as she sorted through a batch of dried plants. The shelves on the walls were laden with herbs, the more common ones near the door. Moving inward the selection increased in rarity, level of poison, and magical properties, culminating with the deadliest of herbs behind the counter. Penelope claimed the latter were kept under lock and key, but Hetty doubted they were actually kept in the shop at all. This was the only herbalist shop that openly displayed its magical wares. Other shops had been burned down in the past by angry white mobs who’d gotten twisted up about brewed magic. But this shop, with wards put in place by Hetty and a bell forged under Benjy’s hammer, was protected in numerous ways.
“Morning.” Hetty held up the bundle in her arms. “I come bearing gifts.”
Instead of looking pleased, Penelope let the herbs slip from her
fingers as if a ghost had walked through the door.
Hetty sighed. “Which one of your cousins was at the excursion?”
“Clarabelle,” Penelope rasped. “She told me about what happened.”
“Whatever she told you is a gross exaggeration.”
“You fell into the river! You could have drowned! I should have been there. I bet they didn’t have proper healers there.”
“It would have been worse if you had. You would’ve gotten caught in the blast with me. I’m sure I would convince you to be in the bicycle race as well.”
“But I would have been there. I should have taken Isaac Baxter’s offer.”
Thinking of her last encounter with Baxter, Hetty said, “No, best you didn’t. Nothing around that man seems right.”
“Is that why you were at the excursion?” Penelope asked. “Because of Baxter? Do you think he murdered Charlie? I hope he did—then we can be rid of him!”
“I don’t like him either,” Hetty said, “but that’s not reason enough to accuse a man.” Hetty leaned against the counter, staring down at the herbs, before another question rose up in her mind. “Do you think Clarabelle can tell me more about the members of the E.C. Degray club?”
Penelope shook her head. “She wouldn’t tell you anything interesting. Her husband is barely involved.”
“Too bad—the only other people I know are George and Clarence. And they’re not options.”
“Why not Clarence?”
“After all that happened at the excursion, he’s probably not keen on talking to Benjy.”
“Why not? Is he on the suspect list too?”
“He’s more a stand-in to be honest to represent someone who might fit the profile of the murderer. He and Eunice have connections to Charlie and Marianne. But I can’t think of any good motives, no more than George and Darlene. Although I did ask Clarence a few questions, but for some reason he didn’t seem keen on talking about certain details while Eunice was around. So I had Benjy whisk her off. Which nearly made things worse, since Clarence was going to chase after them.”
The Conductors Page 24