His Clockwork Canary

by Beth Ciotta

  To Simon—an electric shaver. Since he seemed to have an aversion to conventional razors, Mr. Darcy said with a good-humored wink.

  Then he’d presented Amelia with night-vision goggles accentuated with a telescope loupe so she could better study the skies for her someday flight to the moon.

  The Darcy siblings accepted their secret gifts with the same enthusiasm as they were given and Phin was reveling in their good fortune and remembering his bad luck when it came to family. More memories within a memory. Willie reeled. Her knees felt weak and she’d swear someone gripped her shoulder to hold her steady.

  Then Mr. Darcy called Phin forward and she could feel his embarrassment and excitement as Mr. Darcy presented him with a brightly painted box.

  Willie leaned out of the shadows, wanting to see, but someone held her back. No, someone pulled her back. She heard her name, Simon calling her home. She didn’t want to leave, not yet, but therein lay the test. And she was detached just enough to know it.

  The memory faded and her heart cracked at her last sight of Mr. Darcy, his mischievous smile wide as Phin reached for the present. . . .

  “Willie!”

  Reality flooded her senses. Simon stood behind her, gripping her shoulders, and she thanked God for his presence as she wilted back against him. “It’s okay. I’m back. I’m good.” She looked at Phin, embarrassed that she was still holding his hands. “What did he give you?”

  Phin broke contact, reached into his inner coat pocket, and pulled out what looked to be a complex version of a set of brass knuckles. “Knuckle Shocker Stun Gun with an attached distress whistle. Supposed to help protect me from sky pirates,” he said with a wink to Simon.

  “Does it work?”

  “Not properly. Not since the day after he gave it to me.”

  But Phin kept the faulty weapon with him anyway. Because it had been a gift from a kind and caring man, a man so unlike his own neglectful father. A man who presented his children with customized secret gifts every year and that Christmas had extended the same kindness to Phin. Somehow Reginald Darcy had understood Phin’s secret misery.

  Tears blurred Willie’s eyes as she turned to Simon, heart in throat. “I’m so sorry,” she choked out. “For the loss of your father. For that wretched article.” Emotionally spent, she buried her face against Simon’s chest and wept.

  Holding her tight, Simon turned his frustration on Phin. “What the hell did you do? What did you show her?”

  Phin cleared his throat, clearly choked up by his own emotions. “A great man.”

  CHAPTER 21

  JANUARY 21, 1887 CANTERBURY, ENGLAND

  By the time Phin had landed the Flying Cloud in a small meadow, night had fallen. It was cold and dark and the walk from the field into town was plagued with tension and melancholy.

  Simon had been on pins and needles whilst Willie had traced Phin’s memories. He’d glance over every few seconds, happy that he saw no distress, just two people daydreaming. Or at least that’s how it appeared. For the most part, Simon’s attention had been riveted on Willie’s pocket watch, his heart thudding with every tick of the second hand. His own thoughts had whirled as seconds ticked to a minute and then to a minute and a half. Upon the two-minute mark, he had gripped Willie’s shoulder and called her home. His pulse had stuttered when she’d remained deep in her trance. Where was she? What was she witnessing? It had taken immense restraint not to tear her hands from Phin’s and to shake her to reality. But they hadn’t discussed breaking the physical connection. If the connection was broken whilst she was still deeply tracing, would that leave her stuck in Phin’s memory? Simon had hesitated, gripped her shoulders tighter, and commanded a more fervent return. His relief had been intense when she blinked back and announced herself “good,” but it was also short-lived. Phin had reduced her to tears with a cherished memory of Simon’s father. The notion left Simon rattled as well. He had not known how deeply affected his friend had been by the secret gift—an impulsive gift from his father, as the man had not known well in advance that Phin was joining them for the Christmas holiday. But of course he wouldn’t leave Phin out of the joyous tradition. That wasn’t Reginald Darcy’s way.

  Simon was also touched that Phin had taken it upon himself to show the Clockwork Canary her misstep in presenting Reginald Darcy to the world as an inept kook rather than the gentle and inspired spirit that he was. That one deed coupled with Willie’s tearful apology had somehow washed the hurt of that ugly article from his soul. Simon had taken the folded paper from his inner pocket and ripped it to shreds, declaring that grudge obliterated. He couldn’t quite forgive his own contribution to his father’s demise, but he could indeed forgive Willie for her insensitive transgression.

  “This is it,” Willie said, stopping and pointing to a narrow two-story brick cottage wedged in between several other homes of the same ilk. This residential road ran just outside the ancient city walls on the fringes of the more bustling areas of the City of Canterbury.

  “It’s lit up like Piccadilly Circus,” Phin said.

  “They recently wired this section with electricity,” Willie said, rubbing her gloved hands together whilst studying the multiple illuminated windows of her father’s two-story home. “Father is a bit obsessed with technology and trinkets that harken of the twentieth century. You’ll see what I mean as soon as we step inside.”

  “If you don’t mind,” Phin said, “I’ll skip the family reunion.”

  Simon watched as Phin and Willie exchanged an awkward yet meaningful look before Phin focused on the city gate. “I have business I can attend to in town. Figure I’ll grab a meal and inquire about overnight lodgings.”

  “I’d suggest the Hawthorne Inn,” Willie said, hugging herself against the night wind. “It’s on Dunstan’s Street. Just over—”

  “I know where it is,” Phin said. He glanced to Simon. “Shall I secure two rooms?”

  “Yes, please,” Willie said before Simon could answer.

  “I’m not leaving you alone for the night,” he said.

  “I won’t be alone. I’ll be with my father.”

  “Then I’ll stay here with the two of you. We’re man and wife, Willie. I’m not going to keep that from your father.”

  “I’m not asking you to, although I’m not sure how he will react to the news. Regardless,” she said with another glance at the cottage, “I’m not sure Father could accommodate us both. It gets worse every time I visit.”

  Simon wanted to know what she meant by that, but didn’t ask. It seemed too personal and Phin lingered.

  “Right, then,” the man said. “Two rooms at the Hawthorne Inn.” Bowler shading his eyes, hands stuffed deep in his pockets, Phin swiveled away on booted heel. “Good luck in there.”

  Simon nodded and Willie scrambled up the steps ahead of him. She knocked on the old wooden door and seconds later the door swung open and a fit-looking man of perfect posture greeted Willie with a dazed look.

  “Michelle?” he asked in a croaky voice.

  Willie visibly trembled with emotion as she took off her tinted spectacles and pinned the man with her raw swirling gaze. “It’s me, Daddy. Wilhelmina.”

  Michael Goodenough pushed his spectacles to the top of his head and rubbed his eyes. “But of course. You couldn’t be Michelle. She is gone to me. Your red hair threw me. You look so much like your mother.”

  She blew out a tense breath. “Would you mind inviting us inside?”

  “Us?”

  Simon stepped forward and into the wash of light flickering from the entryway. He offered his hand in greeting. “Simon Darcy, sir.”

  Goodenough gripped Simon’s hand, stared hard. “Name’s familiar.”

  It should be, Simon wanted to say, but tempered his resentment. He reminded himself that this man had done what he thought best for his Freak daughter by thwarting their plans to elope. What perplexed Simon this minute was how young and physically fit this man appeared, and yet Willie supported him
financially? Was there no job he could manage? Yes, he seemed a bit off, but not bonkers by any means.

  Still squeezing Simon’s hand, Goodenough looked to Willie, who’d just unbuttoned her duster. Noting a glimpse of her gown, he frowned. “Why are you dressed as a woman?”

  “Because I am a woman,” she said with a twinge of defiance. “I am through hiding, Daddy.”

  “I don’t think I like the sound of that.”

  “It gets worse,” she said, as Goodenough backed inside, allowing them passage. “I’m married.”

  Not the most flattering announcement, Simon thought as he followed her over the threshold. But at least she’d addressed their new status head-on. He hadn’t expected that.

  Goodenough gawked from Willie to Simon. “To this man? But he doesn’t look like a Freak.”

  “That’s because he’s a Vic, Daddy. The same Vic I was set to elope with twelve years ago. Only you and Mother put an end to that. Remember?”

  “Of course, I remember.” He rubbed his temples. “Ah. That is why the name is familiar. I told Michelle love would find a way. I’m surprised it took this long.”

  “But it wouldn’t have taken this long if you had not stopped Wesley from giving Simon my letter,” Willie said, red-faced.

  “Letter? I know of no letter.”

  The man looked truly perplexed and Simon wondered at Willie’s direct attack. It was as if she’d been harboring resentment for days only to explode the moment she confronted her father.

  “But how can you be married?” Goodenough asked. “It is against the law.”

  “Aye, well, call us rebels.”

  The man paled at that term, probably thinking of his wife. The most famous of rebels. A Peace Rebel. Simon’s attention bounced between father and daughter and the man’s cramped living quarters. Indeed the entryway and parlor were crammed wall to wall, floor to shoulder, with so much stuff it was hard to determine useful items from bobbins.

  “Why is it so cold in here?” Willie asked.

  “Conserving energy,” Goodenough mumbled.

  “Meaning instead of replenishing your firewood supply, you instead purchased what? This pop-up toaster? Don’t you have four of these already?”

  “Five. But this is a new model. Four slices of bread as opposed to two.”

  “But the four you had would make eight pieces of toast,” she pointed out logically. “And this tube thing . . . what is it?”

  “A lava lamp.” His face lit up. “Remember how your mother used to talk about these? I purchased it from a traveling Mod-Tech peddler last week. Now that I have electricity . . .” He made certain the cylindrical object was plugged into a socket and then flipped a switch. A light shone from within the glass tube and colorful globs of goo rose to the top, breaking apart, then reshaping. “Magnificent, yes?” Goodenough asked.

  “Groovy,” Simon said because in this instance a Mod term truly applied. He smiled a little, intrigued and saddened by the whimsical sight. His own father would have been entranced.

  “Aye, but it won’t keep you warm, Daddy,” Willie said.

  “I have your mother’s memory to keep me warm.”

  Willie frowned at that and Simon placed a calming hand at the base of her spine. “Perhaps I could make us all some hot tea. Just point me to the kitchen.”

  She met his gaze and nodded, seemingly understanding that he wanted to afford them some time alone and that perhaps she should relax. “I’m certain you’ll find a conventional teakettle hiding amongst all the infernal contraptions,” she said whilst indicating the next room over. “Most of which do not work and never did.”

  Simon gave her good arm a reassuring squeeze, then took off his hat and gloves whilst serpentining through the barrage of collectibles. On the surface, Simon understood Willie’s frustration. She worked hard to help support her father and yet he squandered money on modern bits and bobs. Much of what he saw must’ve been purchased on the black market. Some items looked like fantastical hybrid reproductions of pictures he’d seen in the Book of Mods. In many instances, copycat tinkerers constructed superficial look-alikes. Superficial, because all thought went into the exterior design, whilst the inner workings were either completely ignored or faulty. Many guessed at how a television or a computer might work, but no Vic had mastered the engineering. At least these were not things available to the common man. Not yet anyway. With the introduction and leaking of so much technological knowledge since the arrival of the Peace Rebels, the timetable for certain innovations was well ahead of its original course.

  Simon was sorting through the mechanical chaos of the small kitchen, remembering with fondness the chaos of his own father’s workshop, when he caught wind of another kind of mayhem altogether. Angry voices booming from the parlor. Willie and her father fighting. He tried to ignore it. None of his affair. Yet, dammit, it was. Setting a kettle of water upon the stove, he adjusted the flame of the burner, then braved the verbal row.

  “I won’t hear of it,” Goodenough blasted whilst wearing a path in the narrow space between the parlor and staircase. “Every memory regarding your mother is precious to me and there are many that I and I alone are privy to. Intimate moments. Private yearnings and dreams. Cherished reminiscences of her life in the future. I won’t have them tainted—”

  “I won’t meddle in any way. The memories will go unchanged. I will be in and out. A fly on the wall—”

  “No. Absolutely not. Discussion over,” he snapped, then stomped up the stairs like a petulant child.

  Willie stood ramrod straight, watching his retreating back. Her eyes were wide, her voice wobbly as she commented on the man’s exit. “I did not anticipate a refusal,” she said as Simon wrapped his arm around her waist. “I am his only daughter and I ask so little. I thought . . . I thought he would want to help.”

  “He obviously loved your mother very much. Some memories are sacred, Willie.”

  “But I need to know. She lied about the clockwork propulsion engine. She lied about her job. What else did she keep from us?”

  “Does it really matter?”

  She turned to him then, fists clenched at her sides. “It matters to me. What if I’ve set a terrible course of events into play by rooting out a Houdinian, Simon? What if that engine falls into the hands of someone who means to use it for selfish and nefarious means?”

  “The Houdinians have kept the engine safe and hidden for thirty-some years now.”

  “But that’s when there were three of them. Now there is only one. Filmore. Thimblethumper said the third was missing, remember?”

  “Perhaps that only means that Ollie Rollins eluded Thimblethumper. I’ve been thinking about that day in the catacombs, Willie. Are you certain that it was Filmore who attacked us? He did not seem suspicious when we left him at the pub. Why would he leave in the midst of his shift? Why would he follow us?”

  She closed her eyes as if thinking back, envisioning the moment. “It happened so fast,” she said. “A tall man, a big man, sliding out of the shadows. An enormous gun.” She opened her eyes, locked gazes with Simon. “I focused on the weapon. Not his face. I did not see his face plainly. I cannot swear it was Filmore.”

  “If they patrol the vault, it would make sense to work as a pair. Maybe the shooter was Rollins.”

  “I saw Rollins in Filmore’s memories. Just a glance. A memory from just before they arrived in this time. He was a shorter man and Filmore’s senior by at least ten years. That would make him quite old now. Although I confess there was something familiar about Rollins, I do not believe he was the shooter.”

  “All right, then maybe Filmore enlisted two other Peace Rebels to act in Rollins’s place as well as your mother’s.”

  “I don’t think so,” she said, with a glance at the empty stairway. “Something I saw, sensed, within Filmore’s memories. A sworn pact. I think this was a rogue act. Between my mother, Filmore, and Rollins. I don’t think he’d seek out another Mod. A Vic mercenary, maybe? At any ra
te, something is terribly amiss. I feel it.”

  Simon guided her into the kitchen. “Let’s have some tea. Perhaps your father needs a moment to absorb your request. Maybe he’ll change his mind.”

  “Maybe,” she said, whilst locating two teacups.

  Simon took the hissing kettle from the stove and soon after, they were sitting at a cluttered table, drinking hot tea and wrestling with inner thoughts. Simon was thinking about how he should leave and procure chopped wood for the hearths.

  Willie chimed in with something altogether different. “I live like this too,” she said softly.

  He raised a brow. “You collect things you don’t need? Hoard?”

  “No. But my belongings are typically scattered. Although I always know where everything is. Organized chaos, I call it. Dawson typically refers to my desk as a disaster area.” She shrugged without meeting his gaze. “I just thought you should know.”

  Meaning she was thinking about them living together. He’d been too wary to bring it up, knowing she was already skittish about their union. Her train of thought warmed him much more than the damnable tea. He suppressed a smile. “Have I mentioned Fletcher is a meticulous sod?”

  “Your valet.” She nodded. “I’m thinking we’ll butt heads.”

  “Most assuredly.” Now he did smile, even if only a little. “I’m looking forward to it.”

  She didn’t respond and he knew she was still torn. At least they were making progress.

  They sipped more tea. A clock on the mantel ticked. No sign of Mr. Goodenough. “Your father’s much younger than I imagined,” Simon ventured in a low voice. “And in fine health. A little thin but . . . Does his mind really wander so wretchedly that he’s unable to hold a job?”

  “Oh, he works,” Willie said. “There’s a merchant in town, a kind and patient man. He owns a sundry shop. My father works there four days a week, helping with stock and chores. I think he’d go simply mad if he had nothing to occupy his time other than thoughts of my mother.”