The Stockholm Octavo

by Karen Engelmann

  Johanna discovered a rainbow in these flowers and plants, and began to make pigments and infusions in order to keep these colors close. She studied the tints of the roots, seeds, flowers, and bark that she gathered, then dried and ground them to powder. Adding the pigments to linseed oil and alcohol produced brilliant results. She told her father it was a way to study botany and pharmacy, and told her mother it was a form of personal prayer. Some of the combinations had medicinal properties, and Johanna proposed to her parents that her tonics could boost the family income. These tasty drinks proved popular and comforting, especially one Mr. Grey dubbed the Overindulgence Tonic. Made with ginger, cardamom, and schnapps, it had tiny white yarrow flowers suspended in the clear liquid, and cured much crapulence in the surrounding county while bringing a decent sum into the till.

  The Grey family had a year of prosperity and relative tranquility, until Johanna finally got her woman’s cycles at sixteen. Mrs. Grey saw this as her daughter’s entry into the dangerous shoals of womanhood, and held daily tirades against the deadly sin of lust. She made Mr. Grey read grisly stories of dismembered harlots from the Old Testament, and took the single fern green hair ribbon that Johanna kept hidden in her chemise and burned it as the bud of licentiousness. But in this they need not have feared, for Johanna had no carnal appetites, nor had she received even the slightest attention from the opposite sex. It was as if the neutral chemistry that ruled her appearance had been mixed with a draught from the angel of chastity. Johanna had never even dreamed of taking her own hand and running it along the smooth skin of her breasts, down her stomach to explore what was between her legs. The only thing her maturity inspired was a desire for frequent baths. When Mrs. Grey recognized her daughter’s inherent virtue, she saw it as a blessing from the Almighty and began searching for a suitable match. Mr. Grey began looking for a new apprentice. But things did not work out according to the Lord’s, or the Greys’ plan. Nor young Johanna’s.

  HINKEN TOOK JOHANNA’S WRIST and pressed a coin into her hand. “We meant no harm, Miss Grey.”

  “You have a soft heart, Captain,” I said, suddenly wishing I had been the generous one.

  “It softens with practice, Sekretaire,” she said.

  I fished a coin from my pocket and handed it to her. “I can start small, I suppose.”

  “A small key can open a great door,” she said and walked away.

  Hinken and I clinked mugs, then turned our attentions to a loud table of gamblers. They were deep into a round of Poch, a German card game played with a staking board that has eight compartments around a central well. I followed the betting for a few minutes, but then began to study the board itself and its eight compartments, which reminded me of my appointment with Mrs. Sparrow. The compartments were labeled with words like MARRIAGE, KING, and GOAT. It was already past eleven, and I frowned at the thought of heading to Gray Friars Alley in the rainy dark, but I would be the goat if I did not show.

  Hinken nudged me in the ribs. “Such a sour face, Sekretaire. A song will change that. Here is the music you asked for at last.” He took his concertina from the bench beside him and warmed up with a simple scale—C D E F G A B C.

  “This is called the octave is it not?” I asked. “The first and last note the same.” Hinken nodded. “And why is that repetition of a note necessary? Why can’t it just be seven? Why must it be eight?”

  Hinken knit his brow at this puzzling question, then played the scale up and down several times, leaving out the last note. He put down his concertina and shrugged. “It doesn’t sound right. You must have all eight.”

  “So . . . so this is a Truth?” I asked quietly. “In the larger sense?”

  Hinken shrugged and resumed his playing, but after two mournful and off-key ballads the innkeeper had enough and insisted he stop. Last call was announced, and the scrape of chairs and benches being set atop the wooden tables was mingled with the clink of washing up from the back. Johanna began to throw a mix of sawdust and sand on the floors, preparing to sweep.

  “What else do you know of octaves and eights?” I asked Hinken. Johanna moved closer, sweeping so slowly there was little sound from her broom.

  “Eight has always been lucky for me, Mr. Sekretaire. There are only seven seas, but my boat is named The Eighth. Henry, I call him. It’s not often a ship is masculine, but he is.”

  Johanna leaned on her broom. “My father is an apothicaire, and bought herbs from a Chinaman who had a tattoo in the form of the number eight. It started above his middle finger and went all the way up his forearm to the elbow. The Chinaman worshiped the Eight Genies, who bring wealth and a long life. He told my father that eight was the luckiest of numbers.”

  Hinken nodded. “And Orientals are the luckiest of bastards. Every one I ever met had all his teeth,” he said. “But why do you ask?”

  “A fortune-teller began a spread for me of eight cards, called the Octavo,” I said. “I should be there now to lay the next card.” I looked over to the neighboring table and the abandoned Poch board with its circle of eight hollows around a blank center. “The Seer made me take an oath that I would finish, and told me it would lead to my rebirth,” I said.

  “And what kind of rebirth will this Octavo bring you? Wealth and a long life, like the Chinaman’s genies?” Johanna asked.

  “She said it would bring me love and connection, but I will have that anyway, cards or no cards. I am nearly engaged.”

  “My congratulations.” Hinken slapped me on the back. “And condolences.”

  I stretched my arms above my head, hearing the bones in my shoulder blades pop. “Perhaps I can go tomorrow night instead.”

  Hinken rose abruptly, grabbing my arm to keep from falling. “It’s dangerous to go back on an oath, especially if the Seer has a gift. She might curse you instead.”

  While Mrs. Sparrow would not want to lose her sharping partner, she had said that the seekers who neglected the Octavo lost their way. Best to secure the rich ship Carlotta by any means necessary. “You are right, Hinken. It would be wise to follow through. A kind of extra assurance of my success.”

  “Chart your course and you will arrive at the destination of your choosing,” Hinken advised as he put on his overcoat. “I would escort you to this fortune-teller myself, but you understand it’s best for both of us if we part ways here.”

  “And how can I find you to collect the favor you owe me?” I replied, retrieving my red cloak from the floor.

  Captain Hinken opened the door and the rain hit me cold in the face. “My cousin, Auntie von Platen, keeps the orange house on Baggens Street. I bunk in the attic between runs and during the ice-bound months. She will know where to find me.”

  I whistled and nodded. Johanna took up her broom with a flurry; even she knew of the infamous orange house on the whore’s street. “I hope to have the pleasure,” I said.

  Chapter Eight

  Teeth Marks

  Sources: E. L., Mrs. S.

  A BOAT WOULD HAVE BEEN quicker conveyance back to the Town, but even if I found one, the ride would have left me soaked and seasick, the rowboat madam cursing me to hell and back as she pulled against the wind. Thankfully I sat in the dark interior of a coach with only the smell of mildew and the sound of intermittent rain and hoofbeats to keep me company, hoping I was not too late and that Mrs. Sparrow would make me strong coffee with lump sugar and cream.

  I exited near the Great Church to take in some fresh air and stumbled down Gray Friars Alley all in shadow and fog. There was a beckoning sliver of light from Mrs. Sparrow’s front windows, so I climbed the stairs and knocked. Katarina cracked open the door but did not speak, the tired circles under her eyes a blue smudge.

  “Katarina, I was expected at eleven but have been regrettably delayed.”

  “The Mrs. is in private conversation, Mr. Larsson, and the hour is very late.” She was about to shut me out, but I pulled the spool of lace from my leather satchel and handed it to her. Her eyes wide with disbelief, she t
ook the spool and told me to follow to the seekers’ vestibule. She walked on tiptoe, and I mimicked her in my drunken way, not wanting to disturb my hostess, surely engaged in business spiritus.

  I felt damp and clammy from the walk, so I removed my jacket and boots and set them by the stove to dry. My feet gave off a horrid odor, so I opened the window to air the room and was soon shivering in the chill night air. This discomfort caused me to pace, poking my head into the hall every few turns to see if Mrs. Sparrow’s late-night client would take his leave. At last I heard their treads on the stair and the door creaking open.

  “You are too late,” Mrs. Sparrow said.

  “But I have made an oath.”

  She regarded my bare feet and wrinkled her nose, then escorted her client to the door. I hurried to fetch my boots. When Mrs. Sparrow returned, she stood arms crossed in the doorway. “Some excuse?”

  “I was delayed by work on Skeppsholmen. You know my position at Customs is in jeopardy and I cannot shirk, even for the Octavo,” I said. She shook her head in exasperation and we climbed to the upper room.

  “The Courier arrives tonight. I hope he is close because I am very tired,” she said, yawning as she laid out the diagram and the deck.

  The Courier must have been in Skåne; it took him nearly nine rounds to appear.

  “Look at this—more Printing Pads, but atop the packet he carries is a wine vessel, the sign of your Companion,” Mrs. Sparrow said.

  “I sent a note to Carlotta today,” I said, frantically trying to recall the details from this morning. “It was my landlady’s boy who brought the note!”

  Mrs. Sparrow ignored my agitation. “Your Courier will serve as a trusted messenger, either bringing a missive or delivering one for you. It may be once or many times. Think how many lives have been altered by a letter gone astray, or news that arrived just in the hour of need.”

  “I need to be certain the note was delivered,” I said, half-rising from my seat.

  Mrs. Sparrow tapped my arm. “Pay attention here. The number four is grounded, so he will be solid and true. A practical man who deals in valuable goods. Industrious, too—there are the cattails again. Successful, judging by the fine clothes. But he is looking back at something, and it is not toward his helpmate. A man anxious at being followed. Or a man with regrets, perhaps.”

  “There could not possibly be more than one wine seller Vingström,” I said, turning toward the door.

  “Have you heard anything that I said?” she asked.

  The downpour began again outside. I shifted in my seat and looked back at Mrs. Sparrow. “Perhaps you were mistaken. About my vision. I have never been handed good fortune in my life.”

  “No mistake. The vision was yours. And most good fortune is built with hard work,” she said, a tired edge to her voice.

  I nodded and toyed with the melted wax pooling in a candle that had gone out.

  “Emil, what is giving you pause?” she said, softening.

  “Mrs. Sparrow, it is . . . it was once said that I was cursed.”

  “I find this unlikely.” Mrs. Sparrow relit the taper, but instead of returning to the table, she settled into one of the armchairs set near the stove. “But tell me. You will never find a more sympathetic ear.”

  “I was nearly twelve and my mother was pregnant with a bastard child. She felt she would not likely survive and said she needed to tell me of my own birth. It seems I was born with two tiny teeth planted in the front of my pink bottom gum. Mother claimed it meant I was gifted, but the ancient midwife ran at once for the priest, calling it the sign of the Beast. The midwife spread the word, and the old women at Katarina Church spat on the ground and made signs with their hands against the evil eye when mother came there for the baptism. Soon all of South Borough was whispering. The downstairs neighbor suggested I might be a troll and should be taken up into the mountains and returned. Others said mother should take me to the barber and have the teeth yanked; better that I have no teeth at all than grow to be a son of Satan, biting the hand of the blessed. Mother refused, and the neighbors never forgot.” I came across the room and sat on the arm of the chair opposite Mrs. Sparrow. “As I grew up, Mother made it her business to keep me close and make me disappear, pressing me into the folds of her skirts. She taught me to hold my tongue, and never draw attention to myself. And so I learned to observe and listen. I learned to be anonymous. When I asked my mother what had happened to those baby teeth, she told me that within a fortnight of my birth, they were miraculously gone.”

  Mrs. Sparrow’s face had grown flush with anger in my telling. “And why was that?”

  “Mother, I think, had wiggled them free. Or they may have fallen out. But my father, mother, and stillborn sister all went to the grave. I wonder sometimes if I really have been cursed.” I swallowed hard and met her eyes at last. “Look how it goes now with Carlotta. How am I to find love and connection, if the devil has marked me for his own?”

  “Nonsense. The devil cannot mark you. But others are eager to see his mark in anyone, especially when times are uncertain. Fear trumps reason then, and people find evil before they ever look for good.” She rose and went to the table, leaning over the five cards. “You are marked for something very different, Mr. Larsson. When the Octavo is in place you will see.”

  Chapter Nine

  The Devil’s Tickets

  Sources: E. L., Mrs. S., A. Vingström

  AFTER COFFEE AT THE BLACK CAT the following day, I walked by Vingström’s wine shop to see if I might catch Carlotta and be certain my note had arrived. The welcome from Mr. Vingström cheered me considerably, but his wife took aim and felled me with a sentence when I asked after the health of their daughter: “Carlotta is engaged, Mr. Larsson.”

  I swallowed the mouthful of crianza with nervous haste. “To whom?”

  “Now now, Magda, we cannot say as yet,” Mr. Vingström countered. Mrs. Vingström raised her hand to silence her husband, then turned on her heel and shut the storeroom door with a bang behind her.

  “Is this true, Mr. Vingström?” I asked, fingering my glass nervously.

  Mr. Vingström opened the door a crack to make certain his wife had really gone. “Carlotta’s benefactress has introduced a potential match: a lieutenant with some noble connections. Mrs. Vingström hopes for news of a betrothal soon.” He poured a swallow of wine into a glass and swirled it around. “For my part, I think him a crooked sapling without the strength to withstand the storms of matrimony. Especially with my Carlotta.” He swirled the wine in his mouth then spit into a pewter cup. “Would you like to try it?” he asked, smiling.

  I had a glass with Mr. Vingström, praising Carlotta, imagining the whole time what it might be like to call him father. It was not an unpleasant thought but strange, as he was a customer of my confiscated goods and I had never called anyone father in my life. We shook hands when I took my leave. “Please give my warm regards to your lovely daughter. She deserves happiness above all else.”

  I wandered, listless, to the Peacock for supper and then over to Gray Friars Alley to play cards until Katarina tapped me on the shoulder. Mrs. Sparrow was ready and waiting upstairs at the table. “Get comfortable, Mr. Larsson. The Trickster usually takes time.”

  Mrs. Sparrow peered at the card that arrived after a dozen tiresome rounds. “Printing Pads again. Here is another industrious person, but they may not be what they seem. The Trickster can play the king’s fool and is often his best adviser. Otherwise . . . well, the Trickster is a name of Satan, is it not?” She handed the card to me.

  “She resembles Mrs. Murbeck.” I saw the question in her raised eyebrows. “My landlady. She is constantly scolding her son.”

  “Do not rush, Mr. Larsson. Your Trickster may appear one way but be another, like the tale of the old hag who becomes a lovely maid when she is shown respect and true affection. Or the wizard disguised as a simpleton whose sole purpose is to ensnare you. The Trickster is a card you must take care with, especially a seven
. That is the abracadabra number.”

  I looked more closely. “The man looks too stupid to be a magician. But the woman means business. Look how she throws a curse.”

  “Are you sure it’s a curse and not a blessing?”

  “Oh!” I said, feeling the blood rush to my head. “This is the Vingströms! I saw them today, and Carlotta’s father was welcoming, but her mother stormed out—after she raised her hand at her husband. And the overturned basket must mean Carlotta is lost to me; she has not sent word, and her mother says she is soon engaged.”