The Heartreader's Secret

by Kate McinTyre

  With that, she turned and pressed a flat hand against the stone wall.

  It moved.

  The wall pushed inwards like a door. Olivia was clearly straining somewhat, her booted feet digging into the dirt, but not terribly so. The solid stone swung back.

  A breath of wind came from inside the darkened hollow beyond, stirring their hair and clothes. Olivia stepped back with a yelp, and Chris shifted into a defensive position without thinking. But after a moment, when nothing else happened, and the air didn’t move again, Olivia slowly lifted the lantern and shone in inside.

  “Oh, yes,” she said, pleased. “Who’s a genius? That’s a trick question. It’s me. It’s always me.”

  She walked forward. Speechless, Maris and Chris followed her.

  The room was about as big as Chris’s suite back at the estate. The tiny salamander’s dim light barely reached the corners. Chris could make out strange silhouettes that threw eerie, stretched shadows against the walls. “Welcome to the Miller family vault!” Olivia proclaimed, setting the lantern down. “I have no bloody idea how Em found it. Only Millers are supposed to know where it is. But if I were going to start digging into research as valuable as Em’s project, this is exactly where I’d do it.”

  She carefully felt her way over to one wall. She tapped something there, her fingernails sharp against a stone.

  Light blossomed.

  “Mother Deorwynn!” Olivia gasped.

  It bloomed out from the spot on the wall, dancing across a lattice of steel, illuminating one full wall and the ceiling with blazing white alp light.

  Olivia took a full step back. “Goodness,” she mused. “It’s not usually quite so bright!”

  She turned to look around the room. Chris followed her gaze.

  At first glance, it looked very much like Miss Banks’s attic laboratory, except that rather than recognizing few of the accoutrements, Chris recognized absolutely none. But where the upstairs lab had been a scattered, chaotic mess, there seemed to be some rhyme and reason to this one. Papers were stacked thoughtfully, and tools were well organized.

  In one corner, an ancient-looking chest was surrounded by numerous raw, new-looking ones. Olivia stepped over to one and lifted the cover. A casket of jewels shone forth, glittering in the bright salamander light.

  “Well,” she said. “At least she was kind enough to store all the family treasures.”

  “How.” Maris gaped. “How the hell did you think of this one, Faraday?”

  Olivia turned and smiled knowingly. She giggled and shook a finger. “Tsk, Maris! A magician never reveals her secrets!” And then, seeing the look on the policewoman’s face, she sighed and rolled her eyes. “Oh, very well. Mabelle Greene said that Em had enlisted her father in some heavy labour out here at the guest house. That seemed odd. What on earth could she have needed that solid fellow for when Mister Norwood was right in the same house? Unless, of course, it had to do with something she was trying to keep secret.” She shrugged, but the little half-smile on her face showed how pleased she was with her own deduction. “When I made an offhand remark about the ciders down here, it clicked. Em could never move the barrel by herself. Nor would the good doctor be able to manage the thing. In order to get it out of the way, it has to be rolled uphill. Designed that way on purpose, mind, so an enterprising thief would at least need to come prepared to get our family jewels. Em had to be at least as clever as an uncommon thief. She had to trust someone with the heft to get the job done, and Roger has….”

  Her face fell.

  “What?” Maris asked.

  Olivia shook herself as if trying to dislodge thoughts of the dead stablemaster. “Roger had a reputation as being a reliable, loyal sort of fellow. Anyone who’s ever come to Miller would tell you he’ll—that is, he would always help a soul in need and mind his own business.” She winced. “Sorry. I’m not—he’s just been alive forever, you see, always at the edge of my awareness.”

  “Wait.” Maris held up a hand. “Hold on a bloody second. Roger Greene, past tense… hells, Olivia, is this the bloke who tied a noose around his neck in the stable?”

  Olivia sighed. “The very same,” she said. “And you have the right of it. I’m beginning to wonder if it might not be connected, somehow.”

  Chris held up a hand. “No, wait. Hold Olivia. How could a suicide be connected?”

  Olivia shrugged one shoulder. “Gods. I don’t know! I only know that you don’t have to be a truthsniffer to think it’s fishy for a cheerful, carefree bloke to hang himself within twelve hours of a friend vanishing. Especially when he was the only one who shared her course-of-history-altering secret.” Olivia turned in a circle, hands outstretched, to indicate the second lab. She tsked. “It’s all about connections, Christopher. I can’t imagine how the two events aren’t connected.”

  Chris swallowed. Something about the idea made his stomach turn over in his chest. He didn’t need to examine himself especially hard to know he was thinking about Fernand.

  Olivia began rifling through elements on the tables. She stopped before the chemistry set Chris had expected when he heard “laboratory.” She lifted a beaker half full of a dark brown liquid and sniffed. She made a face. And then, to Chris’s utter shock, she dipped one finger inside and brought it to her outstretched tongue.

  “Olivia!” he gasped, dashing to her side and seizing the beaker; the liquid inside sloshed dangerously. It smelled of acid. “What are you—”

  Olivia twisted her head to give him a little smirk. She stuck out her tongue. It looked fine. “I’m touched by your concern,” she teased. “But I did smell it, first. It’s just vinegar. Apple cider vinegar, specifically.” She looked down at the chemist’s tools, tubes and lines, and beakers. “I can’t imagine why Em was working in a secret lab to distill vinegar, but there we have it.”

  While Chris was carefully replacing the beaker and choking on relief, Olivia moved on.

  A series of strange, unfamiliar contraptions covered the entire surface of one table. There were over a dozen of them, each slightly different from the others. Olivia picked one up, looking it over. About the size of a breadbox, it seemed to mostly be made from copper and wood, with some sort of long, glass tube held in a cradle between copper plates. Dark liquid swished about the tube as Olivia turned the device around. A square box made from thick, nearly opaque milky glass nestled comfortably below the tube. This was all mounted atop a polished, fine wood box with a gaping hole in the middle. Small, sharp looking steel teeth lined the hole. It almost looked like a slot for something, though Chris couldn’t imagine what.

  “What is that?” he asked.

  Olivia peered at it from all sides. It couldn’t be very heavy, as she held it in one hand, but nevertheless, she was extremely careful. She raised her eyebrows. “I don’t know,” she murmured, setting it gently back down on the table with all its fellows. “But my word, she certainly did make rather a lot of them, now didn’t she?”

  Maris was hovering over the writing desk, turning pages. “Ach,” she grumbled. “Em, I’m going to wring your beautiful neck when I see you again.”

  “Hen scratch?” Olivia asked mildly.

  Maris turned with a page outstretched. Absolutely nothing on it was even faintly recognizable. “Southern hen scratch,” she groused. “Can’t the damned woman write her research notes in bloody Tarlish?”

  Olivia furrowed her brow. She took the page from Maris, skimming it and then turning it over.

  “Can…” Chris coughed delicately. “Can you… read that?”

  “No,” Olivia replied absently, peering closely at the page. “Not a single letter. I’m as much a Tarl as you lot. We don’t have much use for other languages, now do we?” She clucked her tongue. “That’s why it’s so bloody brilliant.”

  “Why brilliant?” Maris snapped. “We find her secret laboratory and aren’t a step bloody closer to finding her! Fool woman, does she have any idea how damned—” She cut herself off roughly and tu
rned about to seize a leather journal on the writing desk, flipping it open. Her jaw was bulged hard, and Chris decided that he would never so much as acknowledge the way her eyes were shining with tears.

  “It’s brilliant because she did it on purpose,” Olivia said, intentionally mild, watching Maris’s back. “Tarlish is Em’s first language, isn’t it?”

  Stiffly, Maris nodded.

  Olivia echoed the gesture. “Then she’d instinctively want to write her notes in it. But her mother’s tongue is as good as writing in code when she’s trying to keep her work from any nosy Tarls.”

  “Doesn’t help us now,” Maris scoffed. She shook her head. “At least she wrote her journals in Tarlish, though it’s still hen scratch.” She flipped through pages while Olivia turned a slow circle, gazing around at the room. Chris found he couldn’t take his eyes off the table full of glass-copper-and-gold objects. What were they? Why were they so important that Emilia Banks, who’d invited all of Darrington to see her automobile prototype, was keeping them concealed in a musty old cellar?

  All of a sudden, Maris stiffened.

  Olivia snapped to attention. “What is it?” she asked.

  “Last entry,” Maris said. She smoothed her fingers over the page, so tenderly and with such care that Chris had to look away. It was as if she was trying to reach Miss Banks through the page.

  “And what does it say?” Olivia pressed. “Come on, now, Maris. Out with it.”

  “’Isn’t it funny,’” Maris read, her voice thick with emotion, “’that this is the safest place in Tarland to do this work? I feel eyes on me from all sides, but I can’t see who, exactly, is looking. I would leave, try to start again in another place, but to what end? Olivia’s mother fears any outside influence, and that is the best shield I will find. It is better to stay in the safest location available if I intend to continue this work at all. And I do. But that does little to assuage my growing certainty there is someone here watching my every move. Is it the Combs family or the Albany faction? I can’t say. But it’s only a matter of time before they try something. All I can do is keep my work a secret. The damage that could be done with this knowledge is… beyond understanding.

  “’Maris asks me daily if I’m fine. She worries about my safety. I hate to lie to her, to smile and say that I’m safe and happy and healthy. But I know Maris, and I know me. If she were to hear any of this, she’d never let me stay, and I’d never acquiesce to go. One way or the other, it would only tear us apart. Best, I think if she doesn’t know any of it.’”

  The policewoman snapped the journal shut. “Best she doesn’t, my arse,” she spat, and her shoulders heaved, just once. She slapped the journal down on the desk. “Dammit, Em,” she hissed. “Dammit.”

  The silence stretched long. Chris didn’t know what to say. He swallowed hard and turned to look at Olivia, who gazed back at him for a long moment before shrugging and sighing.

  “Maris,” she said.

  “Save it,” Maris snapped. She ran a hand through her mass of tight, orange curls, and then dragged it across her face. “She was right about every word, and I can’t even tell you how much I hate myself for it.”

  “I—”

  “Stop. Just stop. I…” She made her hands into fists, and then released them. The look in her eyes when she turned to Olivia was enough to make Chris avert his gaze. “What are we going to do about this, Olivia? How are we going to save Em?”

  “I don’t know,” Olivia sighed. She pinched the bridge of her nose. “I told you I’m no good at all without a damned body, Maris. I… let me think about this.”

  “Let you think? She’s in trouble. She needs us! And you’re just going to—”

  “I’m not going to just do anything, Maris! But I’m miles outside of my area, and I need—give me a moment to think!” Olivia cried.

  Maris took a step back.

  Olivia pinched the bridge of her nose. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath. All was silent for a long moment. Then, dropping her hand, Olivia fixed Maris, then Chris, with a gaze so serious he barely recognized her.

  “We all know Emilia Banks. We all care for her. Both of you want her rescued. Don’t you?”

  Chris swallowed and nodded and tried desperately not to imagine elegant, intelligent Emilia Banks in distress. Gods. Gods, he couldn’t even imagine what Maris was going through. If this were—

  (will)—someone he loved….

  Olivia hummed and nodded to herself. “We’ll just… keep asking questions and investigating. It’s all we can do. Christopher. We need to meet Miss Greene for our trip into town. And Maris…” She fixed the policewoman with a grim smile. “I do hope you brought something suitable to wear. As you might have heard… there’s a Festival tonight.”

  am absolutely not,” Maris declared, “indulging in some blasted country nonsense like a damned Harvest Festival when Emilia is most likely being held prisoner by some crazed reformist as we speak!”

  Olivia sighed. She took her time setting the trapdoor to the cellar back into place. Chris averted his eyes. By god, those trousers. When either of them bent over, it was like they weren’t wearing a bloody thing.

  “Firstly,” Olivia said, straightening and dusting her hands off on her slacks, “let’s leave your personal biases out of this. Frankly, it’s just as likely that Em’ll end up in the hands of some crazed traditionalist. Or did you forget who attacked her exhibition this summer?”

  Maris looked as if she wanted to retort, but folded her lips and bulged her jaw.

  Olivia smiled approvingly. “Secondly,” she said, turning and flouncing off. Chris hurried after her, and he heard Maris’s steady footsteps behind him. “Please calm down and think about this rationally. While I agree that taking the evening off at this point would be vastly ill-considered, absolutely no one is suggesting such a thing. The Harvest Festival isn’t a holiday. It’s an investigative tool.”

  “I can’t possibly imagine how bobbing for apples and dancing the godsdamned quadrille is going to help us find—”

  She cut off roughly.

  They had emerged into the well-lit hallway by the kitchen, which looked into the foyer. Doctor Livingstone and his nephew stood in that open room, staring down the hall back at them. The doctor cradled a bottle in his arms, and Mister Norwood held two large jugs at his side. They both looking mildly perplexed, which was enough to make Chris panic.

  Olivia switched characters in an instant, a smile spreading across her mouth. She fluttered down the hallway excitedly. “Ah! Just look at you, back so soon! Are those the freshly pressed jugs from the mill? And a bottle of the ginger blend? Oh, how lovely! Mother will be delighted!” She took the dark bottle from the doctor and smiled happily up at him. “This is why they call you the good doctor!”

  “Considering they didn’t start with that particular sobriquet until I was accused of murdering a thousand people, I believe it comes from a twisted sense of irony.” Livingstone chuckled. “But thank you nevertheless, Miss Faraday. It was no trouble.”

  Norwood was not so easily charmed. His nervous gaze flicked from Olivia to Maris to Chris, and then back. “What are you d—doing inside?” he asked. “Why is your assistant here? And… Officer Dawson?” A pained expression crossed his face. “What the d-devil are you doing here? Your—that is, er, Miss Banks… she is gone.”

  Chris felt Maris tense beside him. She was an officer of the law, used to being completely above board. He didn’t trust her to dissemble. He leapt in before her temper could overpower her good judgement. “Miss Banks didn’t want Maris to miss the Festival, whether or not she was present,” he said. “Bless that woman, always thinking of others. In any case, I asked her to come down and help me get some preserves from the larder. Missus Elouise set me to the task almost immediately after Olivia left.”

  Doctor Livingstone threw back his head and laughed outright. “She’s all authority and spirit, that woman,” he said fondly. “Reminds me of my dearly departed Karina in
more ways than a few.”

  Olivia tutted. “Now, doctor,” she teased. “You had better not have designs on my mother! I’m certainly not prepared to call you Papa.”

  Chris laid a hand on Maris’s arm. “We’d best go and find those raspberry preserves.”

  Olivia half-turned. “Are you sure you don’t need my help?” she pressed as if she’d been struggling to convince them to no avail, and had perhaps followed them inside.

  “Olivia, please,” Chris mimed a sigh and shook his head at her. “I daresay Maris, and I can handle a couple dozen mason jars.”

  Olivia pouted theatrically while Chris pulled Maris back into the larder. He’d worry his employer’s performance was less than convincing if not for the fact that theatrically was how she did most everything.

  “A couple dozen?” Maris hissed while Chris searched about for the stack of deep-basined baskets he’d seen on their way in. “You really want to haul that much bloody jam back up to the estate? On horseback?”

  Ah. There. Chris handed Maris one of the baskets and then crossed to the wall lined with burgundy jars were stacked on shelf after shelf. RASPBERRY was carefully weaved onto each of them. The script barely scratched the glass. Chris couldn’t help but wonder if that was intentionally, or if it was just an especially weak weaver who had labeled them. One way or the other, he couldn’t help but find it vaguely comforting whenever he saw signs of categorization’s usage out here in the country. It wasn’t just a foolish city problem, the loss of puissance in proficiencies. It would affect everyone. That shouldn’t be a comfort, yet it was. It made him feel less like they were living in sinful, unnecessary excess in Darrington like all those miserable, starving people on the sides of the road were suffering for no reason.