“There he is!” Father said, chuckling as I hurried over to embrace him. It was strange to remember how only a year ago, Father would barely acknowledge my presence, let alone greet me so happily. But things had changed since we foiled Mr. Binns’s plans.
“I’m so happy to be back,” I said. “Hello, Mr. Beards.”
“A very good day to you, Master Diplexito,” Mr. Beards said, with a twitch of his whiskers. He was an old-fashioned sort, and I knew he had been having a difficult time since the business he ran with Mr. Binns collapsed. But he had started an airship business with most of his former employees just two months later and was now partnered with Father. Father had confided that the old man was effectively an employee—Diplexito Engineering, Tunbridge Wells, had put up all the money for the new business—but that he and Mr. Beards had been partners for such a long time it wouldn’t do to change the relationship.
“I have such a lot to tell you,” I said, before noticing Mrs. George standing by the wall in a very respectful posture. “Ah,” I continued, “I invited Mrs. George up with me to see the guests. There’s a lot to explain.”
“Plenty of time for that, my lad,” Father said. “And this is convenient. Mrs. George, Beards will be staying for dinner, so one more, please.”
“Yes sir,” said Mrs. George, with an awkward little curtsy.
At that moment, Mother came down the main staircase, with Mrs. Winton behind her. “Darling, you’re home! Welcome back. And Mr. Beards, a pleasure as always. I do hope you’re stopping for dinner. How is Deidre?”
Mr. Beards kissed Mother’s hand as she arrived. “You look charming as always, Edwina. It will be my pleasure to stay for the evening. And Deidre sends her love. She’s been down with a bad throat the last few days, but it will pass soon, Dr. Bordon says. Gerty fancies herself a nurse these days and has been taking care of her.”
Mother nodded. “I do hope she recovers quickly. We missed her on crochet night.”
“Now,” Father said to Mr. Scant, some steps away from Mother, “Let’s have all the news from France in the study. Don’t hold anything back because Beards is here. He knows all the ins and outs, don’t you worry.”
Mr. Scant bowed his head a little and made for the study, but before he reached the door, he was stopped by a piercing scream.
“What the devil was that?” asked Father.
“Victor,” I said, and after meeting Mr. Scant’s eye for a moment, we went running in the direction of the boy’s voice.
VI
Blood and Custard
found Victor in the downstairs corridor, curled up in fear. He was on the floor in my old bedclothes, trying to squeeze himself through the skirting board in his attempt to get away from the fearsome sight before him.
Desperately trying to calm the boy by waving her huge hands at him—an assortment of animal parts poking gruesomely out of the small bag she carried on her shoulder—was the Valkyrie. I had never seen her look as troubled as she did in her efforts to shush the boy.
“Ah, it’s you,” Mr. Scant said, narrowing his eyes at the former agent of the Woodhouselee Society, now peacefully employed in her father’s butcher shop.
When Victor saw us, he scrambled up and came running to me, beginning to blub again. Father appeared with the others, demanding to know what was happening, and Victor hopped from foot to foot as he tried to decide whom to hide from. Looking back at the Valkyrie, who tried to raise a smile for him, he decided she was definitely the most fearsome of all.
“I didn’t mean to make a scene,” the Valkyrie said, looking at us like an overgrown child caught doing something mischievous. “I think I must have surprised the little one.”
“Matilda Troughton!” Mrs. George barked. “Just what do you think you’re doing?” She turned to Father and bobbed a little curtsy. “Begging your pardon, sir, if I may have a word with her?” When Father nodded, Mrs. George gave a quick jab of her thumb toward the door the Valkyrie must have come through and then led the other woman to the kitchen stairs.
“Shh, you’re alright,” I said to Victor. He had buried his face in my side, which would have seemed sweeter had so many parts of that face not been leaking various fluids.
“So this is—” Father began, but he was interrupted by Mrs. George’s voice, which a closed door did little to muffle.
“I know I wasn’t in the kitchen, Matilda!” she was yelling. “You could have waited for me there instead of stomping about, putting the fear of God into our little guest!”
Father cleared his throat and, more loudly, went on. “So this is the little French lad, eh? Come on, little fellow, you see one big girl and you start blubbing? Show a bit of pluck!”
I looked back at him in irritation. “Victor doesn’t speak English. And he just got a bit startled. The Val—er, I mean, Miss Troughton is about four times his size.”
Father looked back to Victor, who had sidled back around me, and spoke in a slow, clear voice—as though that would make him completely comprehensible to a little boy who knew only French. “If you think she’s scary now, you should have seen her when she was trying to rip people’s arms off. Rip!”
He mimed a rather alarming gesture and pointed to the door, but that only had the effect of making Victor begin to whine. Mother swept forward.
“Why don’t we try being delicate?” she said. She seemed a little puzzled too, presumably because she had never known the Valkyrie as we had, so Father’s words meant nothing to her. She knelt in front of Victor, speaking to him softly in French. He nodded but didn’t let go of me.
“Delicate?” said Father. “Well, worth a try, perhaps. But boys need to be tough, eh, Oliver?”
“I suppose so, Father,” I said. “But I think it’s probably fine to be frightened of the Valkyrie when you’re little.”
“Well, he’s calming down now, at least.”
“I told him Miss Troughton is nothing to be afraid of,” said Mother. “You shouldn’t give her beastly nicknames, you hear me, Oliver? Her name is Miss Troughton, not ‘the Valkyrie.’ In fact, I think it would be good to invite Miss Troughton to share our dinner tonight.”
“That colossus, at my dinner table?” Father caught Mother’s eye, and his expression suddenly changed. “Oh. Ah. Capital idea. Right. Scant! I’ll leave the arrangements to you.”
Dinner was a polite affair. Around the table sat Father and Mother, Mr. Beards, and myself, with Victor by my side and, opposite him, a fidgeting Valkyrie. She towered over the rest of us seated for the meal, and over some of the staff standing up too. Four of the dining chairs had been moved aside to allow Dr. Mikolaitis and Uncle Reggie to join us on their wheeled beds, which could be adjusted to place the men upright. The twins served the lamb that the Valkyrie had brought with her, which Mrs. George had prepared with remarkable speed, and though Victor sniffed it suspiciously before trying it, he found it most agreeable.
We talked about the trip to France, but as Mother was there, kept it mainly to the educational blessings of a day at the Louvre. Uncle Reggie had enormous fun making up a tall tale to explain his injuries, revolving around his interrupting a robbery at a jewelry store. His story took us up until dessert, which turned out to be apple and pear crumble with custard. Victor ate his with gleaming eyes, and when he began to use his finger to wipe up every last trace of custard, I pushed my bowl sideways so he could finish mine as well. The boy let out a little whine of joy and whispered in his best attempt at English, “Thank you!”
After the meal, when Mother had retired, Father had another word with Mr. Scant, who had begun to wheel his brother toward Father’s study. Mr. Scant met the Valkyrie’s eye, and she seemed to realize he wanted something from her, so she offered to help with Dr. Mikolaitis’s chair.
“Right then,” Father said. “Miss Troughton, please do stay. We may need your opinion on a thing or two. Gentlemen, please rest assured you can speak freely in front of Beards. Now, let’s sort this thing out. Scant, what happened in France?�
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As Mr. Scant told the full story, I looked around the strange group assembled in Father’s study. There was Uncle Reggie and Dr. Mikolaitis, invalided in their reclining chairs. Mr. Beards listened with his eyes closed, one hand stroking the white beard that so neatly matched his name, perhaps to show he was awake. Victor remained at my side, occasionally rubbing his belly in satisfaction. And the Valkyrie loomed above us all uncomfortably, clearly unsure what she was meant to do.
After Mr. Scant finished, Father nodded as though processing the new information. “So, to summarize,” he said, “even with Binns locked up, the Society isn’t done with. Beards, do you remember this Binns boy?”
“Oh yes, I remember him, but back when he was a slip of a lad,” said Mr. Beards. “They packed him off to boarding school very young. ‘Aurelian’—odd name. Thomasina’s choice. Funny story about that, once I—”
“No time for funny stories now, Beards,” Father said. “Miss Troughton, wasn’t it?”
The Valkyrie responded as if in a schoolhouse. “Yes, sir?”
“You were an important member of the Woodhouselee Society. Have they contacted you?”
“I was only there for the fighting, sir.”
“Hmm,” said Father.
“If I may,” said Dr. Mikolaitis, his voice strong despite his injury, “you didn’t answer the question.”
“Doesn’t make it any less true,” Miss Troughton said, giving him a sharp look, and just for a moment the old Valkyrie was there again, ready to fight. “They’d never tell me more about a plan than I needed to know. But yes. Yes, since the big scrap and Mr. Binns getting locked up, I’ve been asked to fight some more. I said no.”
“Asked by whom?” said Mr. Scant.
“It wasn’t just by one person. But I told them all no.”
“Was one of them Mr. Binns’ son?” I asked. “Um, Aurelian?”
“He came, yes,” the Valkyrie said, with a solemn nod and a nervous look at Mr. Beards. “Not many of them frightened me, but he did. He didn’t want me for more fighting. He said I was a failure, too weak to help. He just came to threaten me, said I’d better not talk to Scotland Yard and make things any worse for his family than they already are, or something might happen to Mum and Dad.”
“Dr. Mikolaitis, do you know anything about this boy?” said Father.
“Not at all. That is, I knew he existed—but for all I knew, he was a simple schoolboy. Nobody ever mentioned him in my time with the Society.”
“Miss Troughton, I want to hear about the other times you were approached by members of the Society,” said Father. “Can you tell us about the others?”
“Yes,” the Valkyrie said and then took her glass of water from Mr. Scant. “Thank you. There were four times in total, including the boy’s visit. The other men were scared and desperate. They threatened, pleaded, tried to make a bargain, but none of them had a real plan other than try to pretend things were the way they used to be. All of them brought big men with them. But the Binns boy, he came alone, and he wasn’t scared. I don’t think he was a fighter. He just didn’t seem to care about getting hurt or being apprehended and arrested. Nothing. He was cold. He made me feel like he had come to completely understand the world and decided it was a rotten place. It’s hard to explain.”
“I think the real question we need answered is what he has planned,” said Uncle Reggie. “Any ideas?”
“He didn’t tell me,” said the Valkyrie. “He just told me there would be a new Society and I was not welcome. I think he said it would be a force to be reckoned with, not just a make-believe club. That I should never forget I betrayed his mother and father.”
“In other words, watch your back,” said Dr. Mikolaitis. “But as of now, it’s all talk. Just words. No?”
“Hrmm,” said Father, nodding. “What do you think, Scant?”
Mr. Scant nodded his head courteously at being acknowledged. “Well, sir, from what Monsieur Bernard and Miss Troughton have said, we can deduce that while the Woodhouselee Society has been fractured, certain factions are still hoping to use the contacts made by your erstwhile business partner to further their own goals. And most prominent of these would appear to be Mr. Binns the Younger, who I strongly suspect was also behind the assault on my brother.”
Mr. Scant gave a sideways look to Uncle Reggie. “Now, unfortunately, the destination on the crate and the individuals we met during the incident in Gravesend with the land ironclad suggest to me that strong links have been made between the revived Society and a certain criminal organization in China. Moreover, Reginald’s daughter, Miss Elspeth Gaunt, may have been in some way recruited by an organization working to thwart the criminals—possibly from within. And we also must consider the possibility that she is in fact part of the Tri-Loom now.”
At this, Uncle Reggie frowned but did not interrupt.
“We have no decisive evidence that Elspeth has found her way overseas,” Mr. Scant continued, “but Madame Curie informed us that Elspeth had not been finishing her studies at Sèvres, as we’d once believed. And the Binns boy told Reggie she’d be in China before trying to send him there too. Now, it’s entirely possible this was a lie to mislead us, and Elspeth is instead working secretly somewhere in Europe.
“Crucial, in all of this: the last time we saw Elspeth, she partnered with one Miss Cai Zhao-Ji, as agents of an organization we know even less about than we do the Society. So we must ask ourselves: could Miss Cai Zhao-Ji’s commanding officers have summoned her back to her homeland? Was dismantling the Society her only goal here in England? And if she has gone back to China, might Elspeth have joined her?”
“I didn’t want any of this to happen,” Uncle Reggie said dolefully. “And I don’t know why they wanted to ship me off to China, either.”
“Another mystery,” said Mr. Scant. “Of course, you were not going as a free man, and there was probably a very specific fate waiting for you, but why go to such lengths? It’s possible that everything was an elaborate ruse, set up with the intention of us finding and freeing Reginald, with the mention of China a careful misdirection. But it seems to me the probability of our failing was too high for that to be the case.”
“Even if we’re being manipulated,” Uncle Reggie began, “what choice do I have? They say that Ellie is in China, so I need to go and fetch her.”
“You’re in no state to go anywhere,” said Father.
Dr. Mikolaitis laughed and added, “Going to limp all the way there and hit the Tri-Loom with your crutches?”
“Don’t underestimate a father’s love,” said Uncle Reggie. “What’s an ocean or two to a father whose daughter is in danger? Ellie is only sixteen! Sixteen years old, halfway across the world, and mixed up with all this secret society business.” He looked askance at the doctor. “I know what you’re thinking, don’t think I can’t tell. ‘He lets the Society take his daughter away for ten years or more and he now wants to call himself a father.’ Well, I know it better than anyone. I do! And I’m going to fight twice as hard because of my past mistakes.”
“Nobody is doubting your resolve, Gaunt,” Father said, with a hint of irritation. “But you’re in a bad state, and you’ll be worse off if you go gallivanting off around the world. What do you suppose you can do to help this girl of yours while you’re dead on your feet?”
Uncle Reggie said nothing, but it was clear from the look in his eyes his mind was made up.
“We also need to decide what to do about Victor,” I said. “He’s very worried about his older brother, Julien.”
At the mention of Julien’s name, Victor stopped playing with the fabric of Father’s study chair and let loose a rapid stream of French. Rather than answering him, Father looked to Mr. Scant.
“What do you suppose has happened to his brother?”
“We can only guess, Sir,” said Mr. Scant. “But if Julien vanished in the same place as we found Reginald, well, there were a lot of other crates there marked SHANGHAI . . .”
/> Victor hit his little hands on Father’s desk and spoke again, directing most of his speech to Mr. Scant—he’d quickly figured out who among us could understand him and who would only give him blank stares. Mr. Scant translated. “He says he’s sure his brother is in Shanghai; he heard the men talking about it. I’m not clear on which men these may be. He says he’s going to find his brother. No matter what.”
“All signs point to Shanghai,” said Father. “But it’s not a quick ferry ride across the Channel.” He let out a deep breath. “Let’s lay it all out. Gaunt here is determined to go and find his daughter, who may or may not be in China, as the Binns boy intimated. But he’s on death’s door. The child here heard his brother is in China too, from persons unknown, speaking French—which in my book is reason enough to doubt everything they say, but that’s by the by. Well, it seems to me someone has to make the trip, no?” He stroked his beard and then shrugged. “I did without a valet during your excursion to France, Scant. I suppose it will have to be you.”
“I don’t know how long it would take me, Sir.”
“I know, I know. I’ll have to get by. Can you entrust this to your brother, Gaunt?”
“Hmmph. Grudgingly,” Uncle Reggie said.
Once Mr. Scant had translated this development for Victor, Victor created a commotion in response, yelling, “Non, non, non!” He rushed over to me and grabbed my sleeve.
“Victor assumes he’s going to China,” Mr. Scant explained. “But he won’t go without Master Oliver.”
Victor looked at me with eyes big as saucers—just-washed saucers at that, because they glistened as the tears formed. He said something in a very high, tight voice.
“He says he wants you to help him,” said Mr. Scant.
“I want to,” I said. “I want to go! But . . . what about school?”
“As your tutor, I could prepare lessons and give them to dear Mr. Scant,” said Dr. Mikolaitis, with a smirk. “I’m sure he’d make a very strict teacher. Besides, you’ll learn more traveling the world than you will in a few weeks at school.”
The Shanghai Incident Page 7