A door slammed and a maid appeared in an upstairs window with a rug and duster. I started to pull my hood over my hair and duck away, but I reminded myself that I was once again welcomed into this house. The Radcliffes had forbidden Lucy to see me after Father’s scandal, but now that I was ward of the illustrious Professor von Stein, they had no problem smiling at me like nothing had happened. I approached the front door and knocked.
Clara, the maid, answered the door while wiping her hands on a rag. Her face lit up when she saw me. “Miss Juliet! What a treat—we haven’t seen you around here much.” She paused. “You looked like you’ve seen a ghost, miss. Are you ill?”
I shook my head, though she was closer to the truth than she could imagine. “Is Lucy home?”
“She’s in the salon with her aunt. Shall I tell her you’re here?”
I hesitated. My heart thumped with need to see Lucy, to make certain she was safe. But with her aunt in the room, I wouldn’t be able to speak openly. “I didn’t realize she had company. I’d really wanted to speak with her alone. If you’ll just pass along the message that I came, and have her come visit as soon as she can . . .”
“Juliet!” Lucy’s face appeared behind Clara, and she jerked the door open wider. Her frown accused me just as much as the finger pointing at my chest. “You’re not leaving without saying hello, are you?”
Her face was so warm and full of life, after those in the basement. “If you’ve already company—”
“Henry’s here for tea and Aunt Edith is chaperoning. And I’m in desperate need of you, you horrid friend. After you left me alone with John, I practically had to fend him off with an umbrella to keep him from kissing me again.”
“I’ll come back tomorrow. We’ll chat then.”
Lucy folded her arms across her chest. “I’ve told Henry so much about you that he must believe you’re an imaginary friend I invented out of boredom. The least you could do is have a cup of tea with the poor, dull man.”
At the end of the alley a carriage rumbled by in the direction of Covent Garden. I should be headed there now, to get the latest gossip from Joyce about the murders and see what else I could find out about Scotland Yard’s investigation. But Lucy was narrowing her eyes at me, and I said, “All right. Though I can’t stay but a few minutes.”
“We’ll see about that. And Clara, I came to tell you I’ve eaten all the gingerbread cakes and we need more.”
Lucy linked her arm in mine as she dragged me up the main staircase to the parlor. “Thank god the holidays will be over soon, else I’d put on a stone in weight. Oh, I’m so glad you arrived! Henry’s been boring my ears off and I’m desperate for some real conversation. At least he’s nice to look upon.” She caught herself, and quickly added, “Though only in a certain light. Otherwise he’s an ogre.”
We reached the top of the stairs and I tried to brush my hair back and make myself look presentable, when all I could think about was a boy back from the dead.
We entered the parlor, a small but opulent room with a cheerful fire crackling in the ornate fireplace and tea service set out on the low table between the upholstered chairs. Lucy’s aunt, a rather stiff-lipped, dried-out woman, turned when we entered, eyebrows raised at my sudden appearance. Henry was sitting on the sofa with his back to us.
Lucy brushed an errant curl back. “Aunt Edith, Henry, I’d like to introduce you to a dear friend. This is Juliet Moreau.”
I dimly heard my name, but for some reason she sounded far away. Henry had turned at the sound of her voice and was staring at us. At me. Suddenly the room felt too small, as though the furniture was pressing in and the fire consuming all the oxygen. He stood slowly to greet us. I was vaguely aware of Lucy’s aunt standing as well, her mouth moving and sound coming out, but she was no more real than a dress shop mannequin. Everything seemed equally unreal, just vague suggestions of furniture and people.
Everything, that was, except for the young man whose gold-flecked eyes met mine.
“Juliet,” Lucy said. “May I introduce Mr. Henry Jakyll.”
He stepped forward to shake my hand.
The faded scar on his right cheek. The face that was so achingly familiar.
The hand extended to me belonged to Edward Prince.
UNCORRECTED E-PROOF—NOT FOR SALE
HarperCollins Publishers
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NINE
THE FIRE STOPPED CRACKLING. The steam froze in the air. Everything had drifted into a far-off place, shifting into a colorless world like a fading photograph.
Everything but Edward.
Jakyll, I thought. Another false name, just like other name he’d created—Edward Prince, or rather Prince Edward, a name borrowed from the pages of Shakespeare. Edward didn’t have a given name since he’d never truly been born, but made in a laboratory out of a handful of animal parts. Fox. Heron. Jackal. Of course—that was the source of his false name, a testament to his darker animal side.