The Heartreader's Secret

by Kate McinTyre

  “It’s hardly reasonable that my mother put so much in your lap right after losing your father, Mabelle,” Olivia was saying. “The stable, and now this?”

  “No, not at all! It’s good! It keeps me busy, keeps me—”

  Rosie leaned over the unicorn’s neck to embrace her and give Chris a meaningful look. “That was my first time trying a bar that high. Did you see me clear it? None of the others even tried it, yet.”

  Chris shook his head. “Didn’t I only just buy you a pony two months ago?” he demanded.

  Rosie grinned and squealed happily. “Yes! She’s in the stable. She’s a treasure, Chris, she really is, but Mabelle could see after one week of me riding her that she wasn’t enough horseflesh for me!” She ran a hand through the unicorn’s mane. The animal’s sides heaved. “This is one of Elouise’s unicorns. Elouise says it’s good for her to have a rider who can handle her.”

  “Rachel said you were in bed,” Chris said.

  Rosie’s grin turned mischievous. She raised a finger and laid it on her lips.

  Chris’s head spun. This wasn’t right, not at all. What happened to the perfect, subtle little lady he’d seen at dinner the night before? How had this little hellion replaced her? No, he knew the answer to that. Rosemary’s association with Mabelle Greene had to be stopped.

  “I need to see to Olivia,” he said, his voice very tight, and he turned sharply.

  “Chris,” Rosie said firmly, stopping him in his tracks. Her voice was tight, too, and knife-sharp. “Did you hear me? None of the others have even tested the course, yet. I cleared it perfectly. What do you think about that?”

  She wanted his approval.

  He saw it like it was written in the sky. She wanted him to jump and cheer like all her inappropriate friends and tell her how damned talented she was while she was dressed like a common labourer, sneaking out of bed, and playing country games!

  He felt his jaw bulge. He took a deep breath. “Aes must be an especially quality mount,” he said.

  The only response was stunned silence and then a quick flick of reins. Rosie trotted past him, the unicorn’s head held high, and she didn’t so much as glance back.

  Olivia and Mabelle had taken seats on a bench made of a long plane of wood suspended between two logs that still wore their bark covering. It was low, which was fine for them. Chris felt as though he was sitting forever. He forced himself not to watch Rosie bounce on Aes’s back, down into the orchard paths, her back stiff. The first real conversation they’d had since he’d arrived, and he’d deliberately hurt her feelings.

  Wonderful.

  What was wrong with him?

  Olivia gave him a pointed glance as he sat. “There you are,” she said. “I don’t suppose you have your notebook?”

  He pulled it out and gazed at her flatly. “I always do.”

  She raised her eyebrows and quirked her lip at his sullen tone.

  He pressed his lips firmly shut.

  “Oh,” Mabelle said, frowning, twisting her hands in her lap. “I… I’m really not sure I want my words written down, Miss Olivia. I don’t… that is, doesn’t that go on Crown records? What if I say the wrong thing? I’m… not exactly really comfortable….”

  “It’ll help me quite a bit,” Olivia said as gentle as she ever was.

  The stablemaster took a deep breath and straightened her shoulders. “You mean, this might give you a lead on Dad?”

  Olivia looked pained and then sighed. “Yes, I suppose,” she said, resigned, and threw Chris a helpless look. Do you see this? It seemed to say. I am doing my level best to be sensitive here, Christopher.

  He managed a bitter sort of half-smile.

  Mabelle peered at Olivia. “Then you agree! It isn’t just a suicide.”

  “Mabelle, I really can’t comment on the details of an investigation. I hardly want to…” Olivia raised a hand as if to lay it gently on Mabelle’s shoulder, and then, with a grimace, dropped it to her side. “Oh, just answer my questions, won’t you? Do that, and have some faith?”

  Mabelle sighed and nodded.

  “I heard some of the girls in the kitchen say that your father was quite friendly with the woman staying at the guest house,” Olivia said. She put it out there casually like it was just a suggestion. A possibility.

  “Oh, Miss Banks?” Miss Greene nodded. “They got on famously.”

  Olivia raised an eyebrow. “Oh?” she asked pointedly. “Miss Banks, is it? What happened to all the smoke and mirrors? I thought she was just some scientist from Lowry.”

  Mabelle shrugged expansively, using both arms from shoulder to fingertip. It was very unladylike. “She says she hates subterfuge. She doesn’t go around introducing herself to the house staff, or anything, but like I said, she got on with my da. She wasn’t exactly going to give us a fake name. That’s not like her at all.”

  Olivia winced. “No, it isn’t, is it? And Maris says that I don’t understand discretion. How do those two even put up with one another?”

  Chris couldn’t help but crack a smile at the exaggerated long-suffering in his employer’s voice.

  “That still begs the question, of course. However, did Roger and Miss Banks become close, Mabelle? They aren’t exactly contemporaries.”

  The girl tilted her head as if thinking. “Not long after she arrived at Miller, Miss Banks said she needed some work done at the guest house. Heavy lifting and somewhat, while the doctor and his nephew were out, so as not to put a bug in their arse—pardon.”

  “Oh, I’ve said worse.”

  “Missus Elouise recommended him for us. Miss Banks paid him too well, really, not that I minded. I got new boots out of it. After whatever work he was doing was finished, Dad told her that since she was out here all alone, so far from her people back in the city, he’d help keep her company. To make them even.” Mabelle grimaced. “That’s probably where all those damned rumours the kitchen folk spread started.”

  “Well,” Olivia said with a little laugh. “You know what house staff are like.”

  “Ninnies and flakes, nothing like we good, solid grounds staff,” Mabelle said, as if on reflex, but there was no real feeling behind it. She looked down at her hands. “I don’t mind answering, Miss Olivia,” she said. “I do have faith, and I’m not even mad about putting it in records, but… these aren’t really the questions I expected? I heard from—well, I just heard that Miss Banks left the night before he… d-died.”

  Olivia furrowed her brow. “Is that so? Hm.”

  Mabelle blinked hard and shook her head. “Miss Olivia? Did… do you think… did Miss Banks have something to do with my father dying? Do you think she was…”—she screwed her face up—“responsible, somehow?”

  “What?” Olivia’s voice came out a little too high. “I—of course not! Gods, no! Completely unconnected! I’m only just… trying to retrace the last few days of Roger’s life leading up to the moment of neck-snapping, that’s all!”

  Chris flinched.

  Mabelle’s eyes went wide.

  “Th-that is…” Olivia began and then shot a helpless look at Chris. Something about her eyes… she actually felt quite terrible.

  Mabelle wrapped her arms around her middle, looking for all the world a lost, confused little girl. Despite his feelings about her influence on Rosie, Chris’s heart tore in two for her. She’d lost her father to suicide only just a week ago.

  “Miss Greene,” he said. “I… that is, I do believe that Miss Faraday and I have decided that we’ll definitely be pursuing that angle you’ve mentioned! The veterinarian. The horses. And… ah… I… think that we wanted to take a carriage into Summergrove? A four-in-hand, even! That way, you can hook up four animals you think are particularly… suited? And we can handle it all there, with no need to interrupt Mister Foster’s festival duties! Miss Faraday will cover all the expenses if you don’t mind setting it up?”

  The girl looked back and forth between them. Her lips firmed up when she focused on Olivia,
and so she turned her attention back to Chris. “I can do that,” she said. “I need to finish setting up the jumps, but that’s all my work until this afternoon.” Her frown turned into a small smile. “That’s a good idea, Miss Olivia.”

  “Of course it is,” Olivia declared primly. “I’m a professional, Mabelle! I’m full of good ideas, and I always get results.” She shot Chris another little look, and her apple bob as she swallowed hard.

  It was hard to look at Olivia be anything but confident and easy. Chris averted his eyes, looking down at his page of notes with this nonsense. Olivia please and I dont even knowrosieanymore and cleaningup her messes and fernand spread across the notebook. He winced and carefully removed the page, tucking it into his waistcoat pocket.

  “Do you think Mister Foster is going to mind us going up there so early in the day? Maerwald’s sigh, and on Festival Day, too!” Mabelle asked. She sounded painfully like Chris had when he used to beg Will to examine the knife Fernand had used. So much hope.

  Olivia laughed and nudged the girl playfully on the shoulder. “Oh, don’t worry!” she sang, all forced good cheer. “I’m a Miller, after all. All I need to do is break into the really valuable old ciders, offer up a cup, and then—”

  She froze.

  She’d been in mid-gesture, and she simply went still as a statue, one hand up, the other gesticulating, like a monument to the conversation. For a long moment, she didn’t move at all.

  And then she snapped back to herself. “Christopher,” she said, whip-sharp. “Maris should be back from Summergrove before long, now. Won’t you go wait out front for her, that’s a dear. Bring her to the guest house, yes, thank you. And—and Mabelle, I—yes, we are certainly going to town! Absolutely! Just… do you mind… meet me with the four-in-hand in front of the estate in two hours, yes? Yes!”

  Before either of them could even acknowledge her demands, she was up off the bench and moving at a dead run for the stables.

  Chris watched her go.

  Mabelle Greene shook her head and blew out a stream of air. “She’s an odd duck, Miss Olivia. Sometimes, I think Missus Elouise is just full of manure when she says awful things about her. And then, others…” She looked up at Chris. “She isn’t going to forget about this, is she? What got into her just there?”

  He’d seen it enough times.

  She’d just had a breakthrough.

  “She’s just in one of her… moods,” he demurred. “Don’t worry. I’ll have her back on time.” He rose from the bench and dusted his pants. “Best luck with the preparations, Miss Greene. And… my condolences for your father.”

  hen Chris and Maris arrived at the guest house, they found Olivia pacing back and forth before the rainbow moat of pansies, twisting her poor little bowler hat into a croissant. Her brow was scrunched, and she was frowning precipitously.

  Maris dropped down off her shaggy mare, and the animal whickered and pawed at the ground. Olivia’s head snapped up and her eyes focused as if she only then noticed their presence. “Well!” she exclaimed. “Gods, it’s about time! You’d best be grateful it took me a good ten minutes to get Doctor Livingstone and that cringing nephew out of the way, or they’d already be halfway back!”

  Chris carefully dismounted. Hobby stayed remarkably still. “I had no idea there were any time constraints on this,” he said carefully. Hobby nosed his arm, and Chris acquiesced to pat the beast’s muzzle. His coat was very soft.

  Olivia snapped the bowler out and set it back on her head. It had seen better days. “Doesn’t it seem obvious enough?” she demanded. “I command you to bring Maris back the moment she appears, and doesn’t that impart a sense of urgency? Why, if the Livingstones finish up early down at the mill, then—”

  “Olivia,” Maris said, her voice firm. “If time is so limited, how about you get to it instead of wasting more?”

  Somehow, the policewoman always seemed to reach Olivia when she got like this. She tilted her head, as if confused, and then nodded once. “Oh. Yes, quite right. Come along, then, both of you—and be quick about it.” She turned on her heel, which left a divot in the soft ground and threw open the front doors.

  Maris gave Chris a flat look and shook her head with a sigh before following after. Chris brought up the rear.

  Chris had seen much of the guest house—Em’s laboratory in the attic, the kitchen, main and servant stairs, Livingstone’s dark room and photo collection—but Olivia lead them somewhere entirely unexpected. They moved past the kitchen, which smelled heavenly but seemed quite silent, and found themselves in a well-stocked pantry and larder. Olivia brushed past apples and berries hung to dry, onions and garlic, jerked meat. She ignored the shelves of preserves and pickles, the iceboxes glowing fiaran white.

  She stopped at a trapdoor mounted with a large iron ring in one corner of the stone floor.

  “If you will?” she said, stepping back. She gave them a playful little smile and held up her hands, wiggling all ten fingers. “I’m not made of Em’s mettle. I prefer not to give myself callouses if I can help it.”

  Chris looked down at his own soft, well-manicured hands. He winced and turned an entreating eye to Maris.

  She looked back and forth between them before puffing out a dramatic sigh. “Ach.” She rolled her eyes. “We’ve got a whole set of sensitive young ladies, here, now don’t we?”

  “Thank you kindly, Maris,” Olivia chirped sweetly, dropping her hands. Chris hoped the dim light in the larder hid his blush.

  Maris bent and threw open the trapdoor without any difficulty. “Light as a bloody feather,” she grumbled.

  Olivia grabbed a dimly pulsing lantern hanging on the wall and tapped it with a long fingernail. The salamander within spun into life. It was an incredibly small creature with glowing green eyes the size of peas and hands and feet littler than Olivia’s baby fingernail, but the space between its tiny scales glowed ruddy orange and illuminated the staircase heading down into the cellar.

  “Is it safe?” Chris asked hesitantly, peering down into inky blackness. Embarrassing as it was, he’d never been in a cellar before. Most buildings in the city were new enough to have been built without them, relying on temperature controlled rooms above ground fuelled by fiaran-cold. He wasn’t sure he liked the idea of walking down beneath the earth.

  Olivia and Maris both snorted at him, and he averted his eyes, embarrassed.

  Olivia tutted. “Since the gentleman is skittish,” she said, gleefully relishing the chance to tease him, “I suppose I’ll have to go first, now won’t I?” She started down the stairs.

  Maris gave him a flat glance, but amusement danced in her green eyes. “Would you like me to bring up the rear, in case something is on our tails?” she asked.

  “I—” Chris puffed up and straightened his shoulders. “I hardly think that’s necessary, Officer. By all means, ladies first.” He indicated the staircase.

  Maris chuckled and started down. Chris followed.

  The cellar was stone-walled, dirt-floored, and filled with barrels barely small enough to have gotten down the staircase. They were clearly ancient because they were all one piece rather than segmented and held together with iron rings. Such fine dryad cultivated wood hadn’t been grown in decades. Each one had dates and a long string of letters and numbers branded into them and were fitted with taps at the base.

  “We’ve always kept our finest batches here. It’s closer to the cidery, and we don’t have to move barrels uphill.” Olivia swung the lantern. Light bounced off hundreds of massive barrels stretched in long lines, creating the impression of hallways. The area was huge, probably bigger than the entire guest house it resided under. Perhaps it stretched out into the yard beyond? From the way the floor slanted downwards, it certainly seemed possible. “We fill bottles and smaller barrels from the taps for special occasions and orders from wealthy patrons, but the big drums themselves never leave. Each barrel was specially grown for the batch of cider it was to hold. Wood so fine and carefully grow
n helps impart flavour. It’s as much a part of our finest ciders and liquors as the apples themselves.” She practically glowed with pleasure. “Some of the cider in here is over one hundred years old.”

  He wasn’t sure he could ever understand how she could burst with pride at her family’s legacy and yet reject it so thoroughly. His own feelings for the Buckley family’s traditions and birthrights were considerably less confused.

  Maris refused to be impressed. Her lips had pulled into a sour little pucker, and she tapped the packed earth floor with one black-booted foot. “And what the hells does this have to do with Em?”

  Olivia tapped her nose and whirled about. She led them farther into the belly of her family’s treasure vault. The air grew redolent with the smell of alcohol and apple, and damp, mossy earth the farther they went. The dates on the barrels went farther and farther back. It felt strangely like walking through time. Olivia paused beside a clean-looking steel contraption with a crank and a long line of cable. It looked very out of place amongst all the natural hues of dirt and wood. Olivia laid a hand on it thoughtfully. “Mmm-hmm. Just as I thought. Em,” she said, turning holding the lantern high above her head, “is the absolute smartest woman I’ve ever known. Perhaps even smarter than me. And she does it without truthsniffing.”

  “She is smarter than you.”

  “Maris, please. Be kind! Now. I’ve been thinking about that chandelier. The one in the dining room. In fact, I can’t stop thinking about the blasted thing. The automobile was something. Her copper pipe heating system is something. But the more I think about that light, the more I think that that’s her masterpiece. It’s just a feeling. And if my feeling is right, I think Emilia would try to protect something so valuable.”

  She stopped again before a solid wall, empty but for a series of steel tracks and counterweights. Unlike almost every other surface in the cellar, it didn’t have a barrel in front of it. “Aha!” she proclaimed. “I knew it. The old oak barrel is supposed to be right here!” Her fingers ran up along the line of one steel track. “And this is entirely new…” She turned and smiled at them knowingly. “Where do you hide your valuables?” she asked. When they didn’t immediately reply, she rolled her eyes and sighed. “Oh, come on, now. You know this one! You hide them all in the same place!”