“In his letters, Jimson has said some very nice things about your work. My, this is the most unusual house I have ever seen.” She used one hand to hold her hat to her head as she looked up at the staggered roofline.
“I’ll get your bags, Pansy, and Mrs. Pollet will show you to your room. I hope your journey wasn’t too strenuous.” Jimson gathered her leather traveling case in one hand.
His voice was so formal that Lena had a strange desire to giggle, but she strangled the laugh before it could escape. “Yes, not discommodious, like our journey with an escaped convict on board,” Lena said. “Did Jimson tell you there were gunshots and a man dressed as a nun? Well, I’d better get back to work in the library, but I’m sure I’ll see you later.”
Lena fled back up the steps, longing for the comfort of the library. What had possessed her to say those things to Pansy? She paused just inside the doorway, listening as Pansy exclaimed in shock. Perhaps Jimson had left out that part of his adventure when he invited Pansy to the wilds of Knob Knoster, she thought with satisfaction.
Then Pansy’s voice floated through the open door. “Jimson, what’s wrong with that girl? Her hands and feet are grotesque.”
Lena felt something inside her shrivel. She had heard those words so many times before, but never, ever at Zephyr House. She straightened her spine, preparing to walk down the long corridor to the library, but she couldn’t leave—not until she heard Jimson’s response.
“Lena’s a fine librarian, Pansy. Her hands and feet can’t be helped. You’ll like her when you get to know her.”
A fine librarian? Is that all she was? Jimson could have Pansy Demple, with her dainty hands and feet. Lena, a fine librarian, had her own work to do, and the first thing was to examine the book from Cloister. She marched down the corridor.
Alone in the library, Lena slid open the small drawer in Jimson’s desk where he kept the keys to the glass cabinets. If she kept working, kept focused, she would not hear the echo of Pansy’s words.
She unlocked the cabinet. Even when set next to the other books bedecked with precious stones, the book from Cloister gleamed. Besides the magnificent illuminations, what else could this book contain that would make it safer here than at Cloister?
Lena rubbed her gloves on her skirt to make sure that they were clean. She shot a look over her shoulder and, assured that no one other than Mrs. Mumbles was watching, picked up the book. The intricate mother-of-pearl inlay still made her catch her breath. Her long fingers delicately turned to the title page that Jimson had translated from the Latin: A History. But a history of what? If only she had attended the type of school that taught Latin.
If she couldn’t translate, then the pictures would have to do. In the midst of flora and fauna there were small people as well. A man and woman standing among flowers and trees, animals . . . each picture was so intricate she could gaze at it forever. She flipped more pages. The man and woman were hunched together, their faces contorted, the woman’s mouth open in a scream. Lena turned to the next page. The flowers, trees, and animals were gone. The man and woman had covered themselves with leaves; they were alone. A sudden chill; she knew this story. The story progressed. The man and woman were tilling the land; they were surrounded by children. Lena bent close to examine the detail. In the woman’s arms was an infant, an infant with disproportionately large hands and feet. Lena almost dropped the book.
The family grew; there were animals again. Lena searched the minutiae of each drawing, looking again for the child with hands and feet like hers. What had happened to that baby?
A murmur from behind made her freeze. But it was just Mrs. Mumbles twining herself about Lena’s legs. Lena looked at the brass clock on the wall, the one that showed the time in London and India as well. It was later than she had thought, and there was still more that she had to do before they were all summoned to dinner. Heart pounding, she carefully locked the book back in its case and returned the key to Jimson’s desk.
Jimson had described walking to the end of the first-floor corridor trying various doors. Lena hoped that Jimson was absorbed now with his Pansy. Mr. Beasley should be in his study, and Mrs. Pollet busy in the kitchen with dinner preparations. Lena considered. She should take something to protect herself. The brass letter opener was sharp enough to slice her finger. She slipped it into the waistband of her skirt and pulled her tweed jacket down over the bone handle. With Mrs. Mumbles at her feet, she made her way quickly to the south wing.
Lena remembered Jimson’s description of banging and heat. But she heard nothing as she walked, as silently as possible, down the carpeted hall. Stopping outside the last door, she felt her own heart banging, her breath tight. She swallowed and pushed open the door.
It was a laboratory, just as Jimson had described, gleaming with instruments. On an examination table in the center of the room a woman was hunched forward. Her naked back was turned to Lena, and along her back ran two ragged scars. A growth protruded just below the shoulder blade on the left side. Mr. Beasley, his back also to Lena, rested one hand on the woman’s sharp shoulder. In his right hand he held a syringe.
Before Lena could cry out, Mrs. Mumbles streaked across the floor and jumped daintily onto the examining table. Startled, Mr. Beasley and the woman turned to find Lena standing in the doorway, the brass letter opener clutched in her gloved hand.
“Mrs. Pollet!” Lena cried.
“Ah, Lena . . . Not how I planned to introduce you to my work.” Tobias Beasley’s voice was smooth and reassuring, his painted eyebrows raised in a question.
Leticia Pollet’s face was pale, her eyes wide with terror. She uttered a guttural sound. Lena looked at the letter opener in her hand. How silly she had been to think that she could do anything! She turned and ran.
Panic propelled her through the south wing and back into the main house. Jimson was not in the kitchen, nor was he in the library. Down the long corridor of the north wing, doubling back toward the kitchen, she saw no one. The image of Leticia Pollet’s scarred back and agonized face drove her on. There was a flicker of motion on the terrace. Lena called out. Jimson and Pansy walked arm in arm, oblivious to her cries. Pansy turned to look up at Jimson and laughed, a head-back, full-throated laugh. In another wing of the house, in another world, Mr. Beasley was about to do something dreadful to Leticia Pollet.
Lena threw open the terrace doors. “Help! Mrs. Pollet is the winged woman, and Mr. Beasley is doing something unspeakable right now!”
Pansy looked at Lena with her mouth slightly open, her perfectly arched brows drawn together in a V.
Jimson dropped her arm. “What? The woman I saw was not Mrs. Pollet. You saw her too—at the cemetery. Mr. Beasley’s in the laboratory now?”
“Yes, he’s holding a syringe, and her back is covered with horrible scars!”
Even before Lena finished the sentence, Jimson was running full-tilt toward the south wing with Lena at his heels.
“Wait!” Pansy hoisted her skirt with one hand and followed. Lena could hear her voice floating from behind. “Jimson Quiggley, you wait for me!” But there could be no waiting now.
Jimson burst through the laboratory door seconds before Lena. It was empty. Mrs. Mumbles slept curled contently on the examination table. As the adrenaline left her body, Lena began to shake.
“What is this place? What are you two doing?” Pansy peered through the doorway. Her yellow curls had come unpinned and tumbled down around her small face. She was breathing hard, and a bead of sweat shone on her upper lip. “Somebody please tell me what’s going on.”
Lena still found it difficult to speak. Her words came out in gasps. “They were here. Mrs. Pollet was sitting on the table. Her back was bare, and there were two long scars and something growing from them. Mr. Beasley said, ‘This isn’t the way I wanted you to find out.’” To her embarrassment, Lena began to cry. It wasn’t a ladylike cry, but great sobs that shook her body and made her nose run.
“Lena, don’t.” Jimson pu
lled a wadded handkerchief from his pocket. “I believe you. I just can’t make sense of it all.”
She dabbed at her eyes and blew her nose.
Pansy possessively clutched Jimson’s arm. “I think it’s time you explained what’s going on here.”
Jimson looked at her blankly as if he had only just realized she was there. “I wish I knew.”
JIMSON ESCORTED PANSY TO HER ROOM, PROMISING TO RETURN with a cup of tea to settle her nerves. “This must all be a terrible shock for you, especially when you’re still tired from your travels. I’ll bring you some tea and tell you everything that’s been going on.”
Lena dismissed them both with a snort. What was Jimson thinking? They needed to find Mr. Beasley now and confront him before he could do any more damage. Thank goodness the marshal had a plan in place.
The first person she found was Milo. He was in the kitchen, adding dried basil from the garden to a simmering pot of stew.
“Where’s Mr. Beasley?” Lena’s face was pale, her lips set in a thin, determined line.
“He’s making a call. Mrs. Pollet isn’t feeling well at all and I’m—”
“I saw what he was doing in the laboratory.” The picture she was trying so hard to forget was seared to her brain. “He was doing something to Mrs. Pollet. Her back was all scars.”
Jimson appeared in the doorway. Lena turned her back to him.
Milo wiped his hands on a towel and replaced the lid on the great iron pot. “Mr. Beasley is a medical man. His way is to help, not to harm. It’s that oath they make them all take.”
“But I saw him—saw him with a syringe.” Lena couldn’t keep the panic from her voice.
“Without Tobias Beasley, Leticia Pollet would be working in the mines of Scree along with her daughter, the one that’s left.”
“Her daughter?” Jimson was at Lena’s side. “Does she have a daughter here?”
Milo shook his head. “I thought you all knew about the goings-on at the house. Thought that’s why you came.” He looked pointedly at Lena. “Tobias Beasley has been helping Peculiars escape a life in Scree.”
He continued. “Leticia has sump’n rare, I can’t remember the fancy name. Folks don’t see it much anymore. But she growed wings. Mr. Beasley does this operation that cuts them off and then has to treat her every six months or so or they’ll grow back. Her daughter’s got the same thing. The wings don’t come till adolescence, so Leticia brought her here to get help.”
Lena, feeling that the world was spinning, leaned on the wooden table. “You said ‘the one that’s left.’”
“Ay-yuh. Leticia and Arthur had another daughter, Arabelle. Arthur isn’t—wasn’t—a Peculiar. They thought they stood a chance for a normal life, but when the first daughter, Arabelle, reached twelve or thirteen, the wings sprouted and the family got sent to Scree. Then the other girl, Merilee, showed signs of the same problem. That’s when they escaped and came here. Merilee’s fifteen now and just had her wings removed.”
“That’s who I saw on the widow’s walk? I’m not crazy after all.”
Lena could see the relief in Jimson’s face.
“How did they know to come here?” Lena’s heart was racing.
“The word gets spread to those who need it. Zephyr House’s always been a sanctuary of sorts.” Milo nodded toward Lena. “You can see how I thought you were needing a place to go, what with the new decrees and all.”
Lena’s thoughts collided. This was not the story the marshal told. And Milo suspected that she, Lena, would be in need of help as well.
A sharp intake of breath made them all turn to the doorway. Pansy, violet eyes wide, pale brows drawn to a point, stood with her arms crossed. “I heard what you said. That’s illegal. Helping Peculiars is against the law. Everyone knows they’re not human. They’re dangerous.” She looked at Lena and one corner of her bowed lips turned up. She drew back. “You’re a Peculiar?”
“Pansy, that’s enough.” Jimson’s voice was firm. “We have no scientific proof that there even are such—”
Lena cut him off. “I think we’re beyond that discussion now. What else could account for a woman who grows wings? What further proof do you need?” Panic beat in her rib cage like a frantic bird, trapped. It was as if she were listening to someone else’s voice. She looked at Pansy, and the strange voice continued. “Maybe I am a Peculiar. Maybe I’ll cut your heart out right here in the kitchen and add it to the stew.”
Jimson took a step toward Lena.
Pansy cowered behind him.
“Did you know my father is a goblin? He was in jail as much as he was at home.”
“Enough!” Tobias Beasley stood in the doorway, his shirtsleeves rolled up to his elbows. His eyes burned.
But the strange voice inside Lena could not stop. “Is that why you hired me? So you could observe my hands and feet? Can you cut off a joint so I’ll look ‘normal’ like her?” Sobbing, Lena gestured toward Pansy. “But it won’t change who I am, will it?”
“Lena—” Jimson’s voice was soft and controlled.
Pansy began to cry.
When Leticia Pollet entered the kitchen with a young woman by her side, Lena ran.
She ran down the front hallway and out the door, grabbing her scarf and purse on the way. She heard Jimson behind her. Heard him call her name and Mr. Beasley say, “Give her time.”
What she wanted was not time but distance, distance from them all. She couldn’t think. Her head wasn’t working right. Panic continued to beat its wings, clawed at her rib cage. At the end of the drive she passed a cart headed in the direction of Knob Knoster.
Again her own voice surprised her, this time with its steadiness as she inquired politely for a ride. When the farmer delivering a load of autumn vegetables to town agreed, Lena clambered up onto the wagon seat. She would leave them all behind. But unfortunately she could not escape herself.
The cold came creeping in from the sea. As she walked along the streets of Knob Knoster, Lena wound the plum scarf her mother had knitted more tightly around her neck. She had no destination in mind, except being away from Zephyr House. Everything she had ever heard about Peculiars was jumbled now in her head. There were so many voices she couldn’t silence. She remembered the doctor warning her mother about wild thoughts and reckless actions. When she thought of her father, the pain was visceral, starting somewhere near her breast bone and emanating out: his gentleness with her, his hot bursts of anger, the whispered rumors. The marshal’s voice was among the crowd, convincing her that Peculiars had no place in society, that it was better for them if they were with their own kind. And Pansy’s words came back with a sting: What’s wrong with that girl? Lena couldn’t pretend any longer; she was her father’s daughter. But what did it mean to be Peculiar? Why had he left her to figure it out on her own?
With hands stiff from the cold, she ducked into the first lighted doorway. Knoster Dry Goods. It was a blessing to be inside where it was warm. Lena worked her fingers, clenching and unclenching them until feeling returned, but her mind was still numb. Bolts of fabric lined one wall—winter weights, tweeds and brocades, supple wools. Drawers of buttons and threads. Beyond were rows of canned goods. The bird in her chest had stilled, was preening its feathers and waiting. The marshal’s plan had seemed the logical consequence, a way to stop Mr. Beasley from doing the unspeakable.
But what if Milo was right? What if Mr. Beasley was helping Peculiars? The marshal would raid Zephyr House either way; helping Peculiars was still against the law. Lena ran a trembling finger down a length of lapis blue jersey.
“That’s a color I fancy myself.” Lena met Margaret Flynn’s black-fringed eyes. “But it would look better on you, bring out the blue of your eyes. So, you’ve come into Knoster for a little shopping.”
It felt to Lena as if she had retreated so far inside herself that she had forgotten how to talk. She muttered and coughed. “Just window-shopping.”
“Are you sure you’re feeling all right?
You look peaked to me.” Margaret peered closely at Lena’s face. Lena tried not to pull away. “Could do with a tonic,” she added, nodding. The green feather in her hat bobbed. “Let’s have a sit-down and a cup of tea.”
Lena did not want tea. She did not want a sit-down, nor did she want the company of Margaret Flynn. But there was something in Margaret’s eyes. Lena’s lip quivered. She blinked back tears.
“Oh my, is it an affair of the heart? I know all about those.”
But Lena couldn’t speak.
“Don’t matter none. You could use some mothering. Thomas has broken more hearts than one in his time.” Margaret took command of Lena’s arm, and before Lena knew it, she was seated at a small table in the back of the dry goods store, tucked behind a giant barrel of dried beans and another of loose tea.
“Take your time. I’ve got all day. Well, at least until opening.” Margaret stretched out her stout legs in a most unladylike manner. “Let me ask you a question. Why are you really going to Scree?” Her eyes, Lena noticed, glittered as bright and sharp as a bird’s. In Lena’s chest the bird ruffled its feathers as if in recognition. “Don’t give me that cockamamy answer about business.”
“I’m going to find my father.” Lena snuffled.
Margaret produced a lace handkerchief as big as a man’s. “Now we’re getting somewhere.” She patted Lena’s hand without any hesitation. “I knew your father at one time. Saul Mattacascar.”
Lena looked up over the lace edge of the hankie. “What?”
“Oh, he was a regular customer at the Parasol on his travels north. Could charm the skin off a snake, old Saul.”
“But—” Lena began.
“Knew him before that, too. First time I met Saul we were both up in Scree. I was traveling with my husband and we were staying in a little settlement, couldn’t even call it a town. There was some trouble while we were there. Why do you want to find your father?”
The question was so direct, it caught Lena off guard. Wouldn’t anyone want to find a father who had left? Margaret’s eyes still glittered, making it impossible for Lena to lie. “I want to know why he left. I want to know if what people say about him is true.”
The Peculiars Page 14