by Candace Camp
He agreed to that, though he insisted on lingering until the vehicle actually arrived and she had boarded before he left. Thisbe watched him through the window of the omnibus as he jogged out of sight. Unfortunately, she was trapped for however long it took to reach the next stop. She had no idea where she was headed. She would have to get off at the first opportunity and walk back to her coach, which, she saw, was trundling along after them. She began to chuckle. No doubt this would make another excellent story about the Moreland madness for the driver to regale the other servants with at their meal tonight.
She didn’t care. This evening had been worth far more than an embarrassing story about her making the rounds of the servants. She felt something tonight that she had never known before. For the first time, she had met a man who could make her forget all about science.
CHAPTER TWO
DESMOND RAN MOST of the way home—he was cold, but also bursting with energy. Thisbe—it was a delightful name. Unique and lovely, just like her. He had noticed her the moment he had walked into the hall simply because she was the only woman in the room. She had intrigued him. That was why he had chosen that chair instead one of the other empty ones.
Then he had seen her up close, and his entire chest had seized up. She was beautiful. Not the china-doll beauty of blond hair, blue eyes and a simpering smile. Her hair beneath her bonnet was jet-black, darker even than his own, and her eyes were a startling shade of bright green. She was so tall that he had not had to lean down to talk to her, and she was slender as a reed. Her willowy form was not the hourglass ideal achieved by cinching one’s waist until it cut off her air, but it was more appealing to him. She moved with grace and ease, unlike the stiff posture of a corseted woman. And her face... Well, there was no adequate way to describe her face—even featured and feminine yet strong, with a squarish shape and a determined chin, all softened by her curving mouth, with its plump lower lip. Heavens, that lip; it was almost shocking how much he longed to feel it beneath his own mouth.
But it wasn’t merely her looks that had turned him into a tongue-tied, clumsy wretch. She was just so—so...utterly different. There were her clothes—a small hat with no more than a plain ribbon to decorate it, a small-hooped skirt unadorned by even one ruffle and half boots that were more sturdy than fashionable. More than that, there was the way she talked—directly, even bluntly; the way she walked—with long, quick, purposeful strides; the way she looked at someone—straight on and confident. There were no demurely downcast gazes with her, no giggles or fluttering lashes or flirtatious glances. Thisbe was simply...herself.
He, of course, had acted like a dolt, sneaking glances at her as he wrote—he hated to think of the state of the notes he’d taken—then dropping his pad and pencil when he stood up. He couldn’t pick it up with it touching her skirt; that seemed too forward to do without asking. Yet he’d also been too embarrassed to ask her. He was a trifle shy usually, but not that paralytically shy. He’d been so gripped by fear that he would bungle it all that he had been unable to talk at all.
Another man, someone like his friend Carson Dunbridge, say, would have talked to her and smoothly made a jest about dropping his pen. Desmond had seen Carson talk to women—he was relaxed and assured, and charmed them with a smile. But then Carson was a gentleman’s son, trained from infancy in correct behavior and social ease. He was accustomed to dealing with ladies.
And it was clear Thisbe was a lady, though her plain clothes and bonnet suggested that she was not a wealthy one. Proper English could be taught—after all, hadn’t Desmond himself learned to use proper grammar and speak with only a trace of a Dorset accent? But Thisbe had that unteachable, indefinable air of gentility. The manager of the Covington Institute had obviously recognized it, given the respect with which he spoke to her.
Desmond, however, was very much not one of the genteel class. He had not lied exactly about his father—the man was gone—but his answer had been an equivocation at best. His father had been a laborer and sometime thief whenever he couldn’t find honest work; he’d ended up being shipped off to the penal colony in Australia.
Desmond’s education had been largely self-taught, with the generous aid of the village vicar, who had recognized the intelligence and thirst for knowledge in him. It had been lack of funds as much as lack of scientific classes that had cut short his career at London University. Unlike Carson and the others in Gordon’s laboratory, he had no stipend from parents and therefore had to work in a shop to support himself.
He would never have dreamed that a woman like Thisbe might start a conversation with him. Yet she had. It was then that he had discovered how truly fascinating Thisbe was. Once they began talking, it had been easy. Desmond had always had trouble talking to women, as they found deadly dull most of the things he was interested in. To be fair, most men found them deadly dull, as well.
But it had been entirely different with Thisbe. Even when she disagreed with him, it was friendly and enjoyable, even invigorating, to discuss the matter. She hadn’t even seemed to find it peculiar that Desmond could be so absentminded as to forget his coat or lose his gloves, which, perplexingly, seemed to happen often.
He had been worried when she brought up Theo. It seemed unlikely that a woman as special as she would not already have a beau—he had already checked her hand to see that she wore no wedding ring. It had been a relief to find out the man was her brother. Because, as unlikely and impossible as it would be to win her, Desmond wanted this woman.
His chances of success were low; he was well aware of that. But for the moment he wasn’t going to think about that fact. He was going to let himself dream. He would concentrate on the thought that he’d see her again in only a few days.
He couldn’t retrieve his coat, which he had left in the workshop, now locked for the night, so he went straight to the laboratory. It was located in the basement of a building, reached by a set of stairs leading down from the street.
Inside the laboratory the light was low, having only the two high windows aboveground, and the rough stone walls of the narrow room were old and often damp. But it was well-equipped and spacious, being long as well as narrow, and none of the men who worked there noticed the musty smell or the lack of a view.
Desmond opened the door to find Professor Gordon and the other workers clustered together in the wide space between the worktables and the professor’s desk, all talking in excited tones. His mentor looked over at him first and said, “Desmond. There you are. You’re rather late this evening.”
“Yes, I went to a lecture after we closed.” He was reluctant to say anything about Miss Moreland. There was no reason to keep it a secret, but still, he’d rather keep it close to him, savor it, for the moment. “What’s happened? You look—”
“Excited? That’s because we are, my boy.” Gordon beamed, his round face flushed. He gestured to Desmond. “Come here, come here, and see. I received a letter from Mr. Wallace. It’s the most wonderful news.”
“More money?” Desmond guessed, walking over. The room was warm from the Franklin stove, thank goodness, and he was starting to have feeling in his fingers again.
“Better than that.” Gordon’s eyes twinkled.
Whatever it was, Desmond was glad to see his mentor in such good spirits. More and more these days he seemed sunken in gloom; the damage to his reputation weighed on him. Years ago, when Desmond first came to London, Gordon had been one of the leading lights of science in the city, his opinion sought after. Desmond had deemed himself fortunate indeed that Gordon was a friend of the vicar and had, as the vicar asked, taken Desmond under his wing. But now, having attached himself to the search for proof of the existence of the spirit after death, Gordon was ridiculed by his peers. It pained Desmond to see him grow more and more despondent.
“What’s the news?” Desmond smiled, glancing around at the others. “Tell me.”
“Mr. Wallace has located
the Eye of Annie Blue,” Gordon said triumphantly.
“What?” Desmond’s eyebrows shot up. “Really?”
“Yes!”
“See, I told you Anne Ballew was real,” Carson said in his careless way, leaning back, elbows propped on the high laboratory table, his mouth curved in a lazy smile. Carson never used the nickname given to the woman by the crowds.
“I knew she was real. And that she was burned at the stake as a heretic.” Desmond had dug up all the history he could find on the woman—though at the time he had been trying to disprove his aunt’s wild stories about her. “I will even accept that she made an instrument called the Eye. But I’ve never seen any evidence that it actually worked. Or that it survived her downfall. There’s been no sign of the Eye since Anne Ballew. There were rumors it was burned.”
“And there were rumors that it was saved from the fire,” Carson pointed out.
“But we have proof of it now.” Gordon waved the paper in his hand. “Mr. Wallace is certain he’s found it.”
Desmond made no comment. He would never dispute his mentor, but Gordon had more faith in his patron’s expertise than Desmond did. Mr. Wallace was no scientist or scholar, but a wealthy man who was immensely eager to prove that ghosts existed. And as Thisbe had pointed out a few minutes ago, it was very easy to believe in something when one wanted to badly enough.
“Right here, you see.” Gordon tapped the paper and began to read. “‘I have seen with my own eyes a letter from a man named Henry Caulfield, written in 1692. In the letter, Mr. Caulfield describes a visit to the home of one Arbuthnot Gray, in which he states that Gray showed him Annie Blue’s “devilish instrument.”’”
“So Mr. Wallace now plans to track down what happened to the Eye after that?”
“No.” Gordon fairly vibrated with excitement. “Mr. Wallace already knows where it is. He is convinced it remained in the possession of the Gray family, passed down from generation to generation. There is a will, written by this Arbuthnot’s granddaughter, in which she bequeaths to her daughter ‘the collection of antiquities, oddities and mystical curiosities given to me by my mother.’ They’re clearly family heirlooms—they would keep them even if they shut them away in a trunk somewhere. That’s how the aristocracy is. Mr. Wallace is certain that it is now in the possession of her descendant, the Dowager Duchess of Broughton.”
Despite his doubts, Desmond could not help but feel a thrill of excitement. “Does Mr. Wallace intend to purchase it?”
Gordon’s face fell. “He’s tried. He said he has written three letters to her and received no reply. He hoped to actually have it in his possession before he told me of it, but he is at such an impasse, he felt he had to let me know. Perhaps he hoped we would have some idea how to obtain the Eye. Though I’m at a bit of a loss to see how I could persuade a duchess when he could not.”
“Steal it,” Carson suggested lightly.
Desmond rolled his eyes. “Don’t be daft.”
“I’m serious,” Carson protested. “Mr. Wallace seems to think there is no hope of getting the thing from this woman.”
“Yes, he did explain that the duchess is odd and difficult to deal with. Apparently she is an avid collector. Never gets rid of anything.”
“Then she won’t even notice it’s gone,” Carson said. “It’s easy.”
“It’s illegal,” Desmond responded.
“Well, if you think about it, it doesn’t really belong to this duchess now, does it?” Benjamin Cooper said from his perch on a stool behind Gordon. “I mean, Anne Ballew was the true owner—she created it. It was undoubtedly stolen from her when they hauled her off to jail.”
“That’s true,” Gordon said thoughtfully, nodding.
“Anne Ballew was an alchemist, the scientist of that day and age. She was dedicated to knowledge and discovery, just as we are,” Albert Morrow, the other scientist in the room, chimed in. “Don’t you think she would prefer that we have the Eye so we can study it, learn from it, instead of it lying about gathering dust in some old duchess’s attic?”
“Yes, I’m sure she would.” Professor Gordon’s eyes gleamed. Over the years, Anne Ballew had become something of an obsession with him. “It would actually be a reclamation of something lost to science.”
“Be that as it may,” Desmond said wryly, “most of the world would call it theft.”
“Come, come, Dez.” Carson’s eyes danced with mischief. “Don’t be such a spoilsport. Wouldn’t it be grand to take something from the ruling class for once instead of the other way around?”
“I hate to remind you, but you’re part of the ruling class,” Desmond retorted.
“I’m not really one of them,” Carson said lightly. “My family hasn’t the name or fortune to be important. I’m only on the fringes—you know, a bachelor one can invite to even out the numbers or fill out a party.”
“You aren’t serious about this, are you?” With Carson, it was always hard to tell. Desmond glanced around at the others.
The professor heaved a sigh. “No, you’re right, of course. We can’t take it, no matter how little she deserves to have it. It’s just... I hate to think that it’s right there, and we can’t get it.”
“Why don’t you write this duchess?” Desmond suggested. “She probably looks on Mr. Wallace as just another wealthy gentleman. But you are a man of science. You want to study the Eye. What’s important to you is discovering its mysteries, not possessing the thing. She could be more willing to lend the Eye to a man of science for a noble purpose than she is to sell it to another collector. Or she might allow you to study it at her home if she doesn’t want to let it out of her hands.”
“Mmm. You might be right. Especially if she thought she might receive some acclaim for it.”
“That’s the reason most gentlemen give to sponsor a project,” Carson agreed.
“Yes. And I know how to flatter them—Lord knows, I’ve had to do it often enough.” Gordon went to his desk at the far end of the room. Everyone else returned to their worktables—though from the continued murmuring among the tablemates, more speculation than experimentation was getting done.
Desmond sat down at his usual place beside Carson and pulled out Thisbe’s notepad, as well as his own. Her handwriting, like her, was neat and crisp. He flipped to today’s lecture, resisting the temptation to look back through it to find what else she had recorded there. Of course, she would hardly have given it to him if there was anything in it she minded him seeing.
“Lost your coat now, too, have you?” Carson turned on his stool to face Desmond. Carson always found amusement in Desmond’s forgetfulness.
“No. Just rushed off without it. I was late to a lecture.”
Carson chuckled and shook his head. “I must admit, I admire your single-mindedness. Sad to say, I am rarely careless about my comfort.” He paused, then asked, “Was it worth it?”
“What?” Desmond glanced up sharply, then realized Carson meant the lecture, not meeting Thisbe. There was no way he could possibly have known about Thisbe. And, Desmond realized, he had no desire to tell the other man about her. Carson was something of a friend, but Thisbe Moreland was a subject Desmond meant to keep to himself, too precious to let others pore over it. “Oh. Yes. It was very interesting.” Though he couldn’t remember half of it. “I’ll probably attend the next one.”
Carson turned back to his experiment, and Desmond began to copy the notes. After a moment, though, Desmond stopped and turned to the other man. “You weren’t serious, were you? About stealing the Eye?”
Carson grinned. “Only halfway. I don’t suppose I’d go so far as to steal it, but the Eye shouldn’t be locked up with some old lady who knows nothing about it or Anne Ballew.” He gave Desmond a shrewd look. “You’re still skeptical about the whole thing, aren’t you?”
“It’s all based on Mr. Wallace’s suppositions b
eing true—that this ‘devilish instrument’ really was the Eye and that the present heir still maintains possession of it. No one has actually seen the thing, let alone used it. We don’t even know what it looks like. What it consists of.”
“That’s the best part. We get to explore all that. Doesn’t it interest you?”
“Of course it does. I’d love to find out if she’d discovered the secret of seeing spirits. To see how it works, how to replicate it. It’s just...” Desmond shrugged. “There are no drawings, no descriptions, no explanations. Only stories. It’s the stuff of legends—‘the great witch Annie Blue.’ My aunt told me all the tales of Anne Ballew and her magical abilities. That she was a sorceress, that she could see the dead and speak to them.
“She also told me that if you see a hare run down a street, a house on that street will burn. I am willing to believe it could be possible that there is a spiritual world around us that we cannot see. But I don’t believe in magic. There’s no proof of the Eye. Fantastical folktales don’t make the basis for proper science.”
“Ah, but they’d make for public acclaim if it turned out to true.”
There were times when Carson’s cynicism grated on him. “You think—” His voice rose somewhat in indignation, and he glanced over at their mentor, then continued in a lowered voice, “You think Professor Gordon is doing it for public acclaim?”
“Not entirely. He truly wants to know—he wants to see the spirits. But it sweetens the pot a good deal to think he could toss it in the faces of all those who reviled him.”
“They have been very unfair,” Desmond said. “He has the same intelligence, the same probing mind, the same dedication to science that he did before.”
Carson shrugged. “He shouldn’t have announced it so loudly. He said he could prove the existence of the spirits among us, when the only thing he had were some questionable photographs. You’re too close to him—your reverence for him muddies your vision.”