The Alchemist of London

by M C Dulac

  “I could make medicine,” Elise said. “But I need flowers.”

  “Joe sells flowers,” Rosie piped up. “At the markets.”

  “I need special flowers,” Elise said, thinking of the Physicians’ Gardens in Chelsea.

  Mrs. Bell lowered her voice. “I advise you to stay away from that room, Miss. Georgia’s fever was a bad one and you are looking pale yourself. We can’t take on all the burdens of the world,” Rosie was creeping down the stairs. “Come on, little one, why don’t you run across the yard and fetch us a pudding for supper.”

  Rosie returned with a pudding that seemed to be made only of flour and water. Elise, Mrs. Bell and Rosie ate in the parlour. The bespectacled man, who was a law clerk called Mr. Pinpott, appeared with a bowl of oysters and crab claws, which he ate without speaking.

  After supper, Elise returned to the attic. In the room below, Georgia’s cough was as regular as dripping rain. Elise knew the elixir that would cure the fever. She had read about it in Paracelsus’ writings, and made it herself one night in her conservatory. She had been trained by an alchemist. What had been the point of the years of study in her garden, if she could not help people?

  The plants she needed were in the Physicians’ Garden in Chelsea. To obtain them, she needed to return to the West End where Barnabas Wyatt was looking for her. The journey would also delay getting to Hampstead. Thoughts rose and fell like waves as she tried to sleep, until at last one truth was certain.

  Barnabas Wyatt would not find the book in one day, but Georgia may not last that long. Elise must try to help.

  The dawn was grey when she woke to the hopeful cries of street hawkers. She’d need money for the herbs and flowers. She took out a shiny coin and stared around for somewhere to hide the pouch.

  In the yard downstairs, men lounged in doorways. Unlike Madame Rochelle’s house, she was not sure who might enter Cramley Court during the day. She decided to take the pouch with her.

  She dressed in the midnight blue dress, which shone like a fairytale gown in the drab attic and slipped on her cloak.

  When she passed Georgia’s door, she heard fitful breathing. Georgia had survived another night, but in that stage of fever, every hour mattered.

  Mist and smoke drifted up from the river. She descended a set of rickety steps and bought a ticket on a steamer, the quickest and most anonymous way down the river. She waited impatiently for the boat to appear through the fog and then boarded.

  The steamer puffed by the houses of Parliament and the towers of Westminster Cathedral. Following the bend of the river, the boat came to Chelsea.

  Elise slid off the cloak and walked confidently toward the Physicians’ Garden.

  The gates of the walled garden were open. She told the attendant which flowers and herbs she needed. He ground them up and placed the powder in a glass bottle. A few streets away she found an apothecary, where she purchased some mineral salt and a bottle of water.

  “The finest medicinal spring water from Lambeth Wells,” the shopkeeper assured her. “Far superior to the water from the London pumps. We really do have to improve the London water supply.”

  Elise looked at the sparkling bottle. “That will do very well.”

  Elise made her way to the garden square she had found on her first day in Chelsea. Sitting on the stone seat, she poured the spring water into the bottle of ground petals and added the salt. She hoped it would work; the old medicine books were so particular about how the elixirs were to be prepared, discussing the time of the day, the type of water and the cultivation of the plants. She was certain the draught was as good as any she could make in Little Bingham. Even the sun shone a little stronger that day, helping the process along.

  When the powders had dissolved and the elixir had settled, she returned to the riverside, taking another steamboat to the city. As she disembarked on the busy wharf, she took a deep breath. She had been to Chelsea and back, unobserved.

  “Can you really make medicine?” Rosie rose from the front steps, when Elise entered Cramley Court.

  “I have the draught here,” Elise said, revealing the bottle.

  Rosie accompanied her upstairs. Georgia lay on the bed, drifting in and out of sleep.

  “I have a tonic for you,” Elise said.

  “The doctor hasn’t been,” Georgia’s eyes opened. Georgia blinked at the elixir. The clear liquid looked brighter than anything in the room.

  “No, I have made it myself. It will do you good.”

  Georgia looked confused but nodded weakly. Elise watched Georgia take her first sip. The ingredients worked slowly, lowering her temperature and fighting the infection. As Georgia finished the glass she nodded and smiled.

  “Now sleep,” Elise said.

  The rattling noise stopped. Georgia’s breath was steady and her chest rose and fell. Her eyes closed and the perspiration faded from her face.

  Elise felt her heart swell. She had never applied her knowledge before. An unfamiliar feeling of pride swept over her.

  She had done something good. She was part of the way to being worthy of the name of alchemist.

  Georgia fell into a deep sleep. The cough that had racked the walls fell away, and only the calls and cries from outside filled the house on Cramley Court.

  “She’s sleeping at last,” Mrs. Bell said, as Elise joined her on the landing. “Whatever that mixture was, it worked.”

  “I trained in Paris,” Elise said. “I know the medicine that will cure the infection.”

  “You have been a lucky charm, Miss, haven’t you?” Mrs. Bell folded her arms.

  “But Georgia will need fresh food to restore her strength,” Elise rubbed her temples, thinking of the fruit and vegetables in Little Bingham.

  “The pudding shop feeds us well.”

  “Is there anywhere to get vegetables?”

  “Vegetables?” Mrs. Bell did not look impressed. “You could try the markets.”

  “Covent Garden?”

  “You better hurry. They’ll be closing up for the day, but you’ll get good prices.”

  “That is close to the West End.”

  “That’s right. Do you know the way?”

  “I do,” Elise said, and the words had a bitter taste. For the second time that day she would be returning to Barnabas Wyatt’s London.

  But when Georgia woke she would need proper nourishment. Everything about Cramley Court was destroying her health - the old dusty floors, the mold-spotted windows and the sour puddings and sausages that fogged up the shop windows across the yard. Elise wished she could return to Madame Rochelle and her country feasts. But there’d be fresh food in the markets.

  She would take a chance and return to the West End one more time that night.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Do not tempt the fates Sister Agatha had always warned Elise when she was a child in France.

  Elise did not know why the old warning came back to her that evening. Growing up in the convent of Reveille, she had always taken pride when she confronted danger, whether finding a rare wild rose when all others had given up, or safely crossing the river in flood with bread from the village. If the task involved some higher purpose, Elise believed she deserved luck. Helping Georgia and Rosie was certainly an end that justified the danger, even if she had defied fate once that day.

  Clerks and labourers filled the streets and paperboys and street hawkers meandered in front of her. Elise sighed impatiently. Carriages and coaches shone lights in her eyes and the gas lamps did little but to distort the passing faces.

  There was a jam of carriages ahead. The crowd surged sideways, carrying her with them.

  She walked on and on, aware time was passing. The street that she thought led to the Strand ended in a narrow lane. She followed its path but emerged onto a different thoroughfare.

  The tower of Westminster Cathedral rose in the distance. Her heart began beating fast. Somehow she had gone in the wrong direction. She was lost.

  She took a deep b
reath and turned around, hoping she was going the right way. Maybe she had tempted fate too many times that day.

  She breathed a sigh of relief as she recognised a clock tower ahead. She was not far from the markets. Then silhouetted in the dark, a familiar figure walked towards her, hands in his pockets.

  Fitzgerald.

  How did their paths keep crossing? She stepped backwards, hoping he had not seen her. But then she heard his voice.

  “Miss Elise!”

  Elise darted into a passage. Fitzgerald followed her. He covered the ground with long strides and towered over the crowds.

  A warren of dark streets lay at the foot of the Cathedral. The weak moonlight illuminated sagging roofs and broken chimneys. Elise hesitated, searching for the way to the main street.

  Fitzgerald rounded the corner.

  “Stop!” he stepped forward.

  Elise plunged into an alley between rundown tenements.

  Light spilled from dirty windows. She ran past houses with sunken doorframes and missing shingles, and onto a lane where an open gutter glittered with slime. Men, women and children lounged in the shadows.

  The lane opened onto a courtyard full of idlers. A ripple of interest rose from the crowd. She had run into Devil’s Acre, the slum she had been warned about.

  Fitzgerald entered the courtyard and paused. His arrival in Devil’s Acre created much amusement, but he was taller and stronger than many here, and stared them off with a pugnacious glare. He stared ahead and walked fast toward her.

  Elise spotted a passage at the end of the courtyard and began to run. Fitzgerald’s footsteps were close behind.

  The passage narrowed and then opened onto a bigger courtyard. Men and women spilled out of a pub, bawling in the darkness.

  Ahead a lantern hung over an archway. Elise threaded her way through the narrow alleys and ran blindly onwards.

  She turned again but suddenly the alley ended in a brick wall.

  Her hands felt along the rough bricks. Low, crooked houses rose on each side. The only way forward was over the wall.

  Fitzgerald’s footsteps rounded the corner.

  Elise spotted a broken cart loaded with empty crates and pushed it toward the wall.

  The cart wobbled as she climbed onto it. More children than she had ever seen had poured out of the houses and their grubby faces watched with excitement.

  Elise’s pulse raced. The crates were tilting. She reached up and felt the top of the wall. Her hand slipped. She found a foothold and pulled herself upwards.

  “Elise!” Fitzgerald called. “I need to talk to you.”

  She glimpsed him in the gaslight below.

  In that instant the pouch of coins swung from her belt. Before she could catch it, the cord snapped, and the pouch fell to the ground.

  The coins spilt over the cobblestones.

  The children rushed forward. Tiny hands seized the sovereigns, crowns and shillings. The coins disappeared into pockets, boots and behind ears.

  Fitzgerald shouted. The children scattered into the darkness.

  Elise stared with disbelief at the empty flattened pouch, now lying in a foul smelling puddle.

  Fitzgerald was climbing fast up the wooden crates. Elise stared over the wall. She dropped to the street below and began running.

  Westminster Abbey rose serenely into the night sky, but the twisting alleys led deeper into the slums. The idlers stopped to watch. More pale faces appeared in doorways and windows. A cackle of laughter went up from the crowd.

  “Peelers is it?”

  “No. A gentleman’s chasing her!”

  The crowd settled back, taking no sides in the race. Elise ran past the jeering faces. She had almost broken free of the tenements, when her foot caught on an upturned stone.

  She tumbled to the ground.

  She tried to get up but she was not fast enough. Fitzgerald’s shadow blotted out the light.

  Barnabas Wyatt had the arrest warrant. Champillon did not know where she was. Without any friends in London, she had no one to help her. She stared at the muddy cobblestones.

  It was all over.

  * * * * *

  Behind her the footsteps came to a halt.

  “You run fast,” Fitzgerald breathed deeply.

  “Where is Wyatt?” Elise wiped the mud from her palm.

  “I do not work for him anymore,” Fitzgerald said.

  “You don’t?”

  “Not since an hour ago.”

  The pain from her fall mingled with confusion.

  “Why did you chase me?”

  “I wanted to talk to you. I didn’t expect you to run and not into Devil’s Acre of all places.”

  “I thought you were going to arrest me.”

  “Not me. That’s Wyatt’s doing. Let me help you up, Miss.”

  “I do not need your help.”

  Fitzgerald sunk to his knees. He had the concerned look she had seen when he calmed the dying horse. He held out his hand.

  “Miss?”

  Elise tried to raise herself. Reluctantly she took Fitzgerald’s hand. His strong arms lifted her to her feet.

  “I lost my coins,” Elise remembered, feeling the broken cord on her belt. The thought of the lost coins cut like a knife through her heart. They were all the money she had, her only way of supporting herself.

  “I don’t fancy you getting them back. This is the worst slum in London. Let’s go. We don’t want to run into a mob.”

  Elise shook her skirt. “Thank you. I will be on my way.”

  “At least let me accompany you out of here.”

  “I will be fine on my own.”

  “Will you?”

  “Of course,” Elise said defiantly.

  “Everyone needs help sometimes.”

  Elise bit her lip. A crowd was roaring in the tenements. Shadows moved and shifted. Elise tried to walk, but her ankle was sore.

  Fitzgerald offered his hand again.

  “Thank you, Mr. Fitzgerald.”

  “Ed,” he replied, as they walked slowly out of Devil’s Acre.

  “Why did you leave Wyatt? Was it because of what I said in the park?” Elise remembered their last meeting.

  “No,” Ed rubbed his chin. “Or yes, maybe. I’d been feeling that way for a while. Then when I heard his speech, and saw the horse die, and I spoke to you, I was sick to my stomach at what I’d become. I’d made up my mind to leave, but I hoped to wait until I’d saved up more money. But then everything happened so fast.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Wyatt’s been in a terrible mood since you disappeared. He’s been stomping and raging and shouting. I was glad you’d gone to be honest, because I did not want to see you thrown in prison. He made his men search all over London, but none of us could find you. Just before dinner this evening, he summoned me to his study and told me I was dismissed. I think it gave him back his sense of power. I’ve seen him do this to his servants before, but I didn’t expect it so suddenly.”

  “I’m sorry that I was the cause.”

  “I am sorry that I am the cause of your misfortune. You would not be running away from the police if I had kept my mouth shut about those letters in Little Bingham.”

  They reached the yard before Westminster Cathedral. Well-dressed churchmen crossed the flagstones, in the bright light of gas lamps.

  “I was on my way to get some dinner,” Ed said. “Would you like to come with me? There’s a tavern around the corner which serves fine roast beef.”

  “I would like that,” Elise said, realising she was hungry.

  “Nothing fancy,” Ed said, earnestly. “But it’s good hearty food, and we’re unlikely to meet any of Wyatt’s friends.”

  The bright lights of the tavern shone through the descending fog. Inside they sat down in a wooden booth. Ed greeted the waiter who recited the menu with confusing speed. Shortly afterwards a plate of roast beef, carrots, potatoes and greens appeared, with a tankard of ale.

  “I’m glad
you said what you did in the park,” Ed added, after he finished eating. “I’d been having my own doubts about Wyatt. The more I listened to his speeches, the more I agreed with the Chartists and the churchmen. I tried to justify what he said, and tell myself he was an honorable man, but I couldn’t believe it anymore. He and his friends control this world - for now - but what really worried me was what he wanted to do with this alchemy. And knowing that it was all because of me,” Ed slumped his shoulders.

  “Because of you?”

  “I should have thrown away those letters in Bingham Manor.”

  “You were not to know.”

  “The truth is I wanted Wyatt’s approval. When I brought him the letters, he didn’t roar and send me away, as he usually did. He read them closely and made me stand by. I asked him if they were valuable. He smiled, to the extent he can smile, and I’ll never forget that glint in his eye.

  “The worse thing is I felt proud that I’d pleased him. I asked him why they were important. His finger rested on a symbol and he said ‘alchemy’. I didn’t know what alchemy was and when I asked he said ‘magic’, like I was a fool. Then instead of pride I felt uneasy. It’s not our place to mess with magic. For you never know who you conjure up if you go messing about with good and evil, as my Gran used to say.”

  “Very sensible,” Elise sipped her ale.

  “Wyatt had a speech to prepare - the one he delivered at the assembly rooms. It was a big deal, what with the Chartists planning more marches. But when he called me into his chambers a few weeks ago, he gave me another task - to find out who this alchemist was. That’s when we discovered the alchemist was called Albert Price and he had been in England two centuries apart!

  “Wyatt told me alchemists made gold and created their own coins, and lived for centuries without growing old. Albert Price had last been heard of in Paris, and was on the run from the police. It gave me the creeps, Miss, and I was certain that we had to stop this. I honestly believed that was what Wyatt wanted to do.

  “He sent me to meet other ‘alchemists’ in London, but they were fraudsters, with parlour rooms full of magic books. All of them had heard of Albert Price though. When Wyatt heard that Price might have had a laboratory in London, he told all his men to find it, and sent me back to Little Bingham to search the house again. Of course, I never realised that I was speaking to an alchemist all along.”