I could not find it.
I looked once more, certain I’d missed it the first time through. But no, the page was gone, along with several more, detailing my theories about the murder. I supposed I’d left them on my workbench aboard the Mercury. Quite annoying. I’d hoped Maman could give me some insight as to the button’s maker. In any question of fashion, Maman generally knew the answer.
“Maman, I found a brass button in Captain Rollins’ pocket, depicting a sailing ship in flight around a planet. Do you know where it came from?”
Her smooth forehead crinkled as she thought. “An obvious airship reference, almost certainly from an older uniform. Fashionable uniforms use silver, now. You did not recognize it from the airfields?”
“Not really. It seems familiar, but I cannot place it.”
“Edmund never brought work associates here. I am afraid I cannot help you, my dear.”
Disappointed but undaunted, I took out the copy of the contents of the secret ledger. “I found this information hidden in his cabin. Maman, you knew him better than anyone save his wife and son. Possibly more than they. You told me once a man tells his mistress things he tells no one else. I thought you might know to whom he made these payments.”
Maman took the paper, leaning closer to the lamp in the middle of the table. In the stronger light, I saw faint traces of redness around her eyes. She’d been crying. I wished I could have been here when news of Captain Rollins’ death came. We could have comforted each other.
She turned the page around so I could see it. “I recognize some of them. See? Here are my initials. DP stands for Dearest Phoebe. He had a standing engagement, whenever he landed in town.”
I fought not to grimace, banishing the image of my mother and Captain Rollins together in the sort of tryst one expected from a mistress.
She pointed to the other entries. “AC is obviously Arthur Crabtree, the bookie. Edmund enjoyed a little flutter, on occasion. I don’t recognize these others, though. Have you any idea who MB and YS are? The amounts are unusual, as well. The regular payments are too high to be explained away as another mistress, not that Edmund would take one. And the irregular ones?” She chewed a rouged lip as she thought. “Perhaps . . .”
“Perhaps what?” I leaned forward, eager for my first answer in a mystery that seemed to be accumulating questions alone.
“I know Edmund made occasional donations to a competitor’s widow and little boy. The man died under questionable circumstances. Edmund spoke so vaguely about the death, I’m certain the specifics were embarrassing at the least, perhaps even socially crippling for his remaining family. Could have been suicide. Or he died in the wrong person’s bedroom. Perhaps he betrayed Queen and country somehow. Whatever the case, Edmund felt badly for the family, and helped pay for the boy’s tuition at a good school. Perhaps YS is the schoolmaster or it stands for the boy’s name.”
A spark of excitement leaped to life inside me. If the payments had been made to this unknown boy—and the amounts appeared to be in line with what I’d expect a lad at university to require as he discovered certain vices such as gambling and drinking to excess—I could imagine how angry he might have felt when the flow of cash ceased. Anger and spite may have driven him to kill.
“Maman, do you have any clue to the boy’s identity?” I gathered my notes together and tucked them into my waistcoat.
She shook her head. “I am sorry, my heart. Edmund never shared that part of his life with me.”
Resentment rose once more. No, Captain Rollins had been very good at keeping all parts of his life distinct and separate. He’d known everything about me; I’d kept nothing back. But he had secrets upon secrets—kept from his wife and family, from his mistress, from me. He’d shut every aspect of his life neatly away in its own box before he’d opened the next box.
But something in one of those boxes had gotten his throat cut. I intended to rip the tops off all of them until I found out why.
The time had come to tear open one box in particular. “Maman . . .” I paused, feeling oddly shy.
“Yes, dearest?” She idly fingered the jewels flashing around her neck.
“I need to know. Was Captain Rollins my father?”
She froze. Her hand fell limply to her lap, and she went pale, causing the skin around her eyes to appear pinker than before, then she flushed, and the tear-ravaged flesh blended with the rest of her complexion. “No,” she stated, her voice as clear and cold as the emeralds she’d been playing with a moment ago. “No, Amelia. Edmund Rollins was not your father.” Her voice lowered to a whisper. “Much to my regret.”
Though her eyes stayed on me, I did not think they saw my grubby, soot-streaked self. I did not like the depth of anguish they revealed. “Maman, are you well?”
She focused on me once more, and shook herself a little, her stark expression bending into the beginnings of an absent smile. “Of course. Merely a bad memory, and memories cannot hurt us, now, can they?”
Her reaction to my question made it obvious that, yes, a memory could hurt a great deal. My origin belonged to this tale. I hated the thought I may have contributed in any way to dimming her joy in life.
“If not Captain Rollins, then who…?” I snapped my mouth shut, refusing to finish my query. If the mere memory of my conception hurt Maman so badly, perhaps I didn’t want to know. I stood, scraping my chair along the floorboards. “I should go.”
“No!” Maman rose as well and paced the confines of the kitchen, table to stove to sideboard and back to the table. “No. Please stay a moment longer. You deserve to know the story. I always meant to tell you, someday. I only… I couldn’t…” She gave up on the sentence with a sigh. “I need some wine.” She knocked on the door to Matilde’s room on her next circuit and sent the cook off to fetch a carafe from the dining room sideboard.
“I probably should have told you years ago, but I wanted to protect you from the ugliness of the tale. I didn’t want to spoil your childhood with resentment and anger.” Maman paused as she accepted the glass with a nod of thanks and dismissed Matilde. Matilde set the carafe and extra glass on the table, patted Maman on the shoulder and returned to her rooms, shutting the door softly but firmly between us.
I refused Maman’s offer of wine with an impatient shake of my head.
Maman drained her glass. She watched the fire, not me. Usually I used that trick, but tonight I focused on her face, watching the expressions chase across her wide, troubled eyes.
“I have always been beautiful, even as a small child. As beautiful as you could be,” she glanced at me, “if you bothered to dress as you should.”
“Maman…”
She flipped a hand as if to brush her comment away. “My family is old, titled—and not named Everley, as you probably have guessed. We once held large estates in both England and Scotland, but they’d been lost to poor judgment in investments and wild living, leaving us essentially destitute, although we kept up a good front. My father did his best, but with no resources, he could do little to recover our fortunes.”
I snorted, an ill-bred sound, perhaps, but I’d not been raised as gently as it appeared Maman had been. “He could have obtained employment.”
Maman sat back in her chair as if I’d slapped her, gaze snapping to me. “Barons do not labor as if they were common men.”
And what did that make me? I forbore to ask aloud.
“All our family’s hopes were pinned on my making the best match possible. We had no need of a title—that, we already possessed. We needed capital. I had to marry someone with enough money to overlook my lack of dowry, someone whom I could charm into lending us—or giving us outright—enough money to set my family’s finances in order.”
So her family meant to sell her to the highest bidder. I understood the mechanics, and that it happened multiple times a Season, both here in France and in London, but the thought still turned my stomach. My mother’s current profession became much more of a reasonable choice to
my mind. After all, she’d been raised for, essentially, the same purpose. Selling her body for money.
Thank God, Edmund Rollins had given me another way to support myself.
Maman rose and began to pace once more, her hands twisting together until her knuckles went white as steam. “I met Edmund—Captain Rollins, although he wasn’t a captain, then—at Almack’s my first Season. He proved to be handsome, charming, considerate, titled—everything I could want in a man. We fell in love.
“He had prospects, but no money. He could no more marry me than I could marry him. My father arranged for me to meet another prominent man, one with no title, but with power, nonetheless. And enough money to satisfy the demands of our creditors.”
“Did you even like him?” I asked, not wanting to interrupt but needing to know how my mother could have gone against her heart to marry someone else. I think if it had been me, I would have eloped with my true love, and left my unfeeling parents to deal with their own problems.
“Well, no, but he was rich, very rich, and not bad-looking, despite being older than me by a considerable margin. While not precisely handsome, he possessed a presence that drew eyes to him. Mesmerizing, more than pretty.”
She gave a laugh as dry as the air blown from the firebox, disgust at herself evident in both her expression and her tone. “Mesmerizing enough to convince me we had no need to wait for the actual marriage ceremony to formalize our arrangement.”
I sighed, torn between disbelief that my mother could ever have been so naïve as to believe that sort of lie from a man no matter how young she’d been, and thinking that trusting in a person’s better nature sounded exactly like her. I already knew this story had no good ending. “Who was he?”
Maman waved the question away. “It matters not. I do not wish to speak his name. I do not wish to remember. What matters is the Corps arrested him shortly after I found out I was carrying you.”
“They arrested him? What for?”
“Attempting to burn down Prime Minister Gladstone’s Hawarden Castle.”
I could not hold back the gasp. “Attempting to burn…!”
“You did not think you got your phlogistological abilities from me, did you?”
“No, I suppose not. But I did not want to think of my father being a criminal.”
“His folly contributed to the making of Queen Victoria’s edict enslaving pyromancers, and was the main reason Gladstone did not oppose it.”
“I am glad he did not marry you, Maman. He did not deserve your good heart.”
She smiled and crossed to me, laying a slim and still-smooth hand against my soot-darkened cheek. “But he gave me you, and that is a gift not to be underestimated.”
This is why I made a point to stop by whenever we landed in Paris. How could I not adore one who loved me so dearly?
She drew her hand back and stared in dismay at the smears of greasy black staining her fingers. “But I do not understand why you cannot wash up like a normal woman and wear the lovely dresses I have had prepared for you by the best couturier in Paris!” Her French accent had returned, along with her coquettish mannerisms.
“I beg your pardon, Maman,” I said, jumping up to fetch a cloth for her.
Maman took the proffered dishrag and began cleaning her delicate fingers. “When my family found out my condition, after the arranged marriage fell through, my father raged for a week. Then he found another match for me with a diseased and ancient merchant who needed the child I carried, since it seemed the man could father none of his own. He’d survived three other wives, none able to bring a pregnancy to term, whether from some sort of problem with his seed, or because of the abominable way he treated his wives, I do not know.” She shuddered, closing her eyes and allowing the cloth to drop to the table.
“That is when I balked. I felt I had done more than my duty toward my family by that point, and began to plan for my escape. In the end, Edmund saved me. He smuggled me aboard the one ship he owned at the time—your beloved Mercury, in fact—and brought me here to Paris. He left me with the woman who used to own this house. He had met her in one of the fashionable salons.”
“He left you with a courtesan?” I asked, shocked that Captain Rollins—so reserved and protective toward me—would consider leaving his ladylove in such a place. I guessed it won out over marrying a diseased, wife-beating reprobate, but surely there had been some other alternative.
“Edmund had precious little money, then,” Maman said, shrugging one elegant shoulder. “Else he would have married me instead of that lowborn Welshwoman with the thirty-thousand-pound dowry.”
“How could you still be such good friends when he chose another?”
“Ah, but he hadn’t chosen her. His family had, as my family had made similar choices for me. Here,” she swept an elegant hand, encompassing the comfortable house with its luxurious furnishings, although few were evident here in the kitchen, “we can make our own choices.”
She leaned forward, taking my hand once more, despite the soot that still stained it. “I am, at heart, a practical creature, Amelia. I understand why Edmund decided to marry that woman. I even encouraged him, knowing he needed the money for his business and understanding that I possessed a part of him his wife never would. I have known more happiness choosing my own partners, directing my own affairs, and raising you in the manner I alone chose than I ever did bowing to my family’s wishes.”
I may have gotten my ability to work with fire from my father, but my practicality and independent streak I definitely got from Maman. I gave her a wobbly smile. “Thank you, Maman.”
“For what, ma petite?”
“For being happy. And for allowing me to live my life as I see fit, too. In spite of never having a Season.”
“Oh, pshaw! We are both being unforgivably maudlin.” She dropped my hand and stood in a rush of silk. “Have you had enough dinner? Should I call Matilde back to bring you more?”
I rose, as well. “No, thank you, Maman. It’s late, and I must get back before I’m missed.” I hugged Maman gingerly in order not to stain her fine gown.
Matilde popped out of her chamber, confirming my suspicion she’d been eavesdropping. “Wait! You must take some tarts with you!” She hastily made up a packet with four jam tarts nestled inside.
I made no hesitation at tucking them into a vest pocket. No one in their right mind passed up Matilde’s jam tarts. I leaned in and kissed her cheek. “Take care of Maman,” I whispered and slipped out into the night.
I left the way I’d come, out the back gate, passing yet another fine black carriage pulling up to the front of the building. A wave of perfume and hushed laughter spilled out as Antoine, Maman’s butler and bouncer, ushered the gentleman into the welcoming embrace of Maman’s house.
I’d always suspected I’d been illegitimate. Maman had called herself a widow, and told others when asked that Mister Everley had died in a carriage accident, but I think I’d known, somewhere deep inside, that was not the case, since I had never seen any cherished mementos, heard any mention of grandparents or extended family. It had always been just Maman and me.
And Captain Rollins, hovering in the background.
My heart stung to hear how she’d been used and betrayed. If I hadn’t happened along, she might have married someone who would love her—perhaps even her dear Edmund, if she could have waited a few years for him to establish himself. Certainly, no father of a dowerless girl could object to an alliance with the Rollins family now.
I could set my mind at ease on one point, however. Captain Rollins was of a surety not my father.
That knowledge, however, did not make me feel much better. My true father had been a criminal. An arsonist. No one I could respect. How much of his temperament and spirit had I inherited?
Not even the prospect of one less bar to an affaire de la coeur with Josiah could settle my temper. After my mother’s recounting of the cavalier way she’d been treated, I felt rather uncharitable toward men at
the moment.
I moved at a jog-trot back to the airfield. The colliers would need my signature to show I’d approved the quality and quantity of the pelletized coal. If I were not back in time, my absence would surely be noted.
I slowed before moving into the light of the gas lamps at the entrance gates, checking for watchmen. I needed to board the Mercury without being seen. Not a soul was in sight.
Good. I might be able to pull this off. I darted toward the airfield’s entrance.
A cloaked figure stepped from the inky shadows behind the gatehouse, blocking my way onto the field.
Chapter Eight
I squeaked in alarm, and my hand went to the wrench hanging inside my waistcoat. I had a knife in my boot, as well, but the wrench could take the fight out of most men with a well-placed blow or two, and drew less blood.
The figure advanced, coming straight for me, and my grip on the wrench tightened.
The man raised a languid hand to his top hat’s brim. “Good evening, Miss Everley,” Mr. Fairlane said. “It is Miss Everley, is it not? Your appearance is much changed from last we met.”
I straightened from the defensive half-crouch I’d assumed and straightened my coat. Mr. Fairlane’s impeccable appearance and manner made me as conscious of my bedraggled and dirty state as being in Maman’s presence. “Mr. Fairlane. What are you doing here? Besides lying in wait for me.”
I don’t know why I was so surprised to see him here in Paris. Although I’d last seen him in London at Captain Rollins’ funeral, Mr. Fairlane captained an airship as well, and the London-to-Paris run was an extremely popular one.
He laughed. “So direct! How refreshing. Nothing I should not have expected from an engineer as talented as you. Engineers, as a breed, tend to think in straight and logical lines.”
I nodded to acknowledge the compliment, for that is what it was. To me, anyway.
“What a happy circumstance to find you here,” he continued. “I wished to renew my offer of employment.”
Fires of Hell: The Alchemystic Page 8