Imperial Clock

CHAPTER Thirteen

Hits and Misses



“You had to do it, didn’t you? Couldn’t leave it alone like you were told.” After a brief scan of the corpses both in and out of the bar room, Aunt Lily slapped Meredith’s cheek with extreme viciousness. It didn’t just sting, it throbbed against the bone. “You always were a wilful child, but this—words can’t even begin to...” She held a trembling forefinger and thumb to her brow. “You may have killed us all. And for what? So you could play at Wilkie Collins, solve a piece of a puzzle you had absolutely no hope of getting to the bottom of. You selfish little bitch!” Another fully swung slap, this time spilling stars from Meredith’s left temple, knocked her sideways into a table.

Hot tears welled in Meredith’s eyes. Her only resistance to convulsive sobs was the sobering thought of where they were, the impossible and immediate bind she’d put Aunt Lily and Cathy in, which they now had to somehow escape from—and quickly. For this was a place deep in enemy territory, behind multiple locked gates, girdled by the secret underground roots of London. “Is there another way out?”

“You came in via the cemetery, I take it?” Cathy didn’t stop rifling through the corpses’ clothes as she spoke. “Impressive, Meredith. When you appeared just now, I assumed you’d followed me directly from the party. But seeing how you’re dressed, you had to have found your own way in from the opposite end.”

“Is your exit nearer?”

“Yes, but it’s out of the question. You can’t see it from where we’re stood, but behind the cloistered building to your right is the Leviacrum tower itself.”

“Impossible. That was at least a mile across the river.” Meredith considered the geography, the journey she’d taken. “You mean the tunnel goes under the Thames?”

“More than one of them. There are eight tunnels in all, each leading to the tower. So in effect they all have two ways in and out—but only the senior members are granted access to and from the tower. Certainly not filthy girls in overalls.”

Aunt Lily plucked as many glass shards as she could out of Meredith’s soles, with little remorse. The excruciating pain would haunt her forever, if she even survived the night. After bandaging her feet with strips cut from a bar towel, Aunt Lily then rummaged through the pockets of Denton and Cybil, tossed their wallet and purse onto a table. “Gather all their valuables,” she said to Cathy. “It will add fuel to our story.”

“Good. I may have found something here.” Cathy collected the wallets and keys and pocket watches, then handed Meredith a small, riveted brass object shaped like a fat cigar. Several tiny wheels protruded at one end. After seeing Meredith’s frown, she took it back, held one end of it up to her eye, pointed the other end at a wall lamp and fiddled with the wheels, demonstrating its use. “It’s a sort of microscope, for reading miniaturised plans and diagrams. Guard it closely. We may have something there.” And to Aunt Lily, “Who wants to go first?”

“I will. There’s no time to draw straws.”

For some reason, scissors-paper-stone flashed through Meredith’s mind. She kept it to herself.

“Blade or bullet?” Cathy asked.

“Oh, blade. Please God, don’t put a bullet in me.”

“Wimp.”

“Tramp.”

“I should shoot you for making sure I get the bullet,” Cathy said. “Now, you want it in the arm or the side?”

Aunt Lily caressed her own waist, chewed her lip. “Which is safest?”

“The arm is safer. The side is more convincing.”

“You won’t nick anything vital? I’ve always had a waist to die for.”

“Trust me.”

“You’re sure, Cathy? I mean if you’re in any doubt, I’d rather flee the scene, dispense with the wounds altogether. All three of us.”

Meredith liked that idea—one hundred percent less organs nicked was fine with her.

“We’d be bowled out immediately and hunted to our dying day. They saw us enter. It has to be this way, I’m afraid.” Cathy tilted her head back, sucked in a night of cool air, then cast Meredith a forlorn look. “The sooner you leave, the sooner you’ll be safe. The familiars haven’t come to see what’s happened. Either they didn’t hear the shots, or they’re too frightened to do anything about it. Either way, you’ll need to be armed. Here.” She passed over one of the steam-pistols. “Don’t worry about us, dear. This is what we do.”

“And what is that?”

“Why, play-acting, of course.” Aunt Lily paused, held up a finger. “When this is over, I promise to explain every last detail, but for now—” The manic speed and efficiency with which she stripped Denton of his trousers, jacket and shirt was stunning, “—you can be in charge. Get out of those filthy things—they’re far too big for you. These are more your size.” More like the Aunt Lily she knew, chastising Meredith’s sloppy appearance as she tossed her the small gentleman’s togs. “Change on the go. We’re out of time.”

A floodlight blazed down upon the quadrangle but caught only the left third. The rest was shielded by the high roof of the cloistered building. Meredith shoved the wallets, purses, letters and the brass document reader into the pockets of Denton’s jacket, then limped for the stairwell. “But what will happen to—”

“They’ll think we’re victims, too, that this was a Coalition raid.” Cathy hung up a telephone on the bar counter. “Retrace your steps, and don’t waste a second. Donnelly will pick you up at the gates.”

“Donnelly? But—”

“I’ve just arranged it. I had told him to wait for you outside the party, but you didn’t stay there, did you.” Cathy threw Denton’s shoes across the room at Meredith. “I hope they’re your size. Now run, little leopard, run and don’t look back. And no matter what, let no one see your face.”

By the time she heard the gunshot that pierced the shoulder of the most beautiful woman in London, Meredith was passing the empty octagonal conference room at the underground junction. Where the former occupants were—Slocombe, Kingsley, the vociferous old woman—she didn’t know, but it prayed on her mind the farther she went. Sled in one hand, pistol in the other, she limped to the magnetic tracks, an alternating limp that shifted her weight, her bloody, ribboned feet mashing against the hardest insoles ever invented. It was like running on a bed of nails. Soon she could only walk on the sides of her heels.

Picturing Aunt Lily impaled, strewn across the corpses of the bigwigs she’d killed, and Cathy lying nearby, bleeding in agony as the Leviacrum agents burst in—

What the hell have I done?

No time to dwell on it now. Enemies might be circling to the cemetery exit, and that would put poor Donnelly in harm’s way as well. Good God, she was racking up quite the casualty count tonight, and all through her own bloody-minded curiosity. Cathy and Aunt Lily hadn’t even asked how she’d gained entry. That put it in perspective, told her how trivial her momentous puzzle-solving had really been. Buying books from abroad, hiring her own private investigator, staying up nights to research the history of the Atlas Club—the single greatest academic effort of her life—amounted to a childish stunt, nothing more, that had cost the lives of six people, six powerful people, and put the two women closest to her in the world at the mercy of its most dangerous institution.

826. A number she would rue forever.

She rode the right hand magnetic track with a grim, single-minded focus on reaching the outside world to somehow make this up to Aunt Lily and Cathy. To set the world to rights...somehow.

The gates to the parking bays were closed, the bays themselves half empty. Several vehicles remained, including a couple of horse-drawn carriages, which meant some of the sect members were still inside the tunnels, while others had to have left. At the sound of gunfire? Where exactly were the others? She hadn’t explored the right hand passage around the octagonal room—maybe that led to other meeting places.

Luckily her dress, coat and shoes hadn’t been moved from the storeroom through the alcove. She packed them into a pair of overalls and slung the bundle over her shoulder. Leaving any evidence that she’d been here at all might prove costly. She put the flat cap on and left via the hidden stairwell rather than the ramp, for greater stealth. It led her outside via a door to a secret room full of ivy plants in the crypt above. One had to enter one’s code for ingress, but not for egress.

It felt chillier out—she was perspiring pints in her gentleman’s suit, so her pores were open—and a damnable lack of cloud would aid airships in their search for trespassers. She counted four small vessels circling above the cloistered building across the river, near the foot of the Leviacrum tower. They’d likely found Cathy and Aunt Lily by now. How long before they flocked to the cemetery?

Moonlight the colour of cold steel seemed to spoil all her potential hiding places, giving hue to what should be naught but shadow. Meredith kept to the tree line as she had before. At last she reached the front gate, where Donnelly waited with a blanket and a bludgeon.

“Which of those is for me?” she asked.

“Depends how long you take to open this thing.”

She entered her code onto an identical plaque on the opposite side of the gate. The iron door squealed open moments before the first airship searchlight began zigzagging across the cemetery. Donnelly hustled her into his car, tossed her bundle onto the backseat.

“You all right, darlin’?” As the car gathered steam, he draped the blanket over her. “Swanny’s had me flying here, there and everywhere this evening. What’s all this about?”

“You don’t know?” Meredith sighed and held the monocle up to her eye. The moonlight and the airship became pink, distant, childish.

“I can guess.”

“No, Mr. Donnelly. No, I don’t believe you can.”

So she told him everything.



***



“Mother, Father, have you a moment? I’ve something I’d like to discuss with you.” A little after one in the afternoon showed on the master bedroom clock, Father’s custom-made timepiece built into the top panel of the imperious cedar armoire. Odd designs like that could be found all over the Auric house, and Father was usually behind them, his penchant for standing out from the crowd extending to every minute facet of his existence, including his rigorously healthy diet and recent obsession with vitamins. Being abed with a chest cold when no one else he knew was ill had humbled the old man today, and Derek planned to take advantage of Father’s amenable temperament while it lasted.

Mother poured a tincture of medicine into her husband’s mouth, then wiped his chin with a handkerchief. “Is it about the McEwan girl?”

“It is.”

Father’s blustered effort to reply excited his full-bore cough. “What about her?” He thumped his chest with the underside of a fist.

“With all that’s happened lately, the incident at the Steam Fair, my new situation in London and all, I’ve had to ask myself some difficult questions.” His upper body went rigid, chest out while he thumbed his lapels and rocked on his heels. “And I’ve realised it’s time to make deliberate plans. I’d like you to consent to my asking for Sonja McEwan’s hand in marriage.” There, it was out of him, with them, a truth more precious than his own life. He was in love with Sonja, and the world now knew it.

Mother reached across and clasped Father’s hands. Her brow was scrunched with a kind of sad, knowing joy, as though she’d half-expected this but was touched nonetheless. The only thing missing was an “Awww,” her sure-fire way of embarrassing him when he’d been little.

Father’s inscrutable gaze, however, didn’t bode well. “A little tricky to ask her family’s permission first, I suppose?”

“True. Professor McEwan will be out of the country for some time, perhaps indefinitely. It’s a dangerous thing he’s embarked on. Her aunt is her guardian for the time being.”

“And the girl’s what...fourteen, fifteen?”

“Sixteen, almost seventeen. The same age Mother was when you—”

He batted the idea away. “That was different.”

“It was?” Mother asked.

“Yes. Your family name was without reproach, and all the proprieties were observed through and through.”

Mother sighed, then read the label on the medicine bottle as Father chunnered to himself. “Let’s talk about Sonja for a moment then,” she said. “Strict proprieties aside—hers will always be an unusual situation after all—tell us about her, Derek. What is she like? Would we like her?”

“I’m certain of it. She’s a spark. Quite unlike any girl...woman I’ve met. She’s bright, sharp as a tack, has this marvellous dry wit, and is curious about all the things I’m curious about. You know when you have that instant rapport with someone, as though you’ve always known them—the conversation flows, no awkward silences, and you don’t want it to end—well, that’s Sonja and I. Best friends from minute one, even though we were teacher and pupil. And she’s beautiful. Maybe not in the obvious classical way like her sister, but obvious holds no appeal for me, never has, as you know. What else can I say? I’m in love with her, and I’m certain we’ll be very happy together.”

Mother smiled a secret smile just for him, smuggled him a wink. “She sounds lovely”. Then she elbowed Father.

“Yes, yes, she does. Lovely.” Father leaned forward to fluff and reposition the pillow behind him. “But—”

“Would you like to meet her first?”

“I don’t think that will be necessary, son. The fact is...as much as we want you to be happy, I must prevail upon you to consider the broader implications.” God, here we go. “Don’t think me heartless for saying this. Lord knows, I despise playing devil’s advocate. But it’s for your own good, boy. You’ll see the wisdom in the long run.”

Derek bottled his urge to turn and walk out. This time he felt well-equipped to fell any argument Father put forward.

“Firstly, your own situation in the Leviacrum, a chance in a lifetime,” Father said. “Do you really think they’d keep you on if you became Ralph McEwan’s son-in-law? The man is a known swindler, stealing patents and cheating colleagues out of their rightful discoveries.”

“Never convicted in any court of law, nor even charged. It’s all slander, toxic slander, nothing more. You know that.”

“Son, he’s been tried and convicted in the only court that matters—the court of public opinion.”

“If you truly believe that’s the only court that matters, you should have your head examined.”

“Yes, yes, we’ve heard this free-as-a-lark song and dance before. That’s all well and good when you don’t have a business to run, clients to retain, a reputation to uphold.”

“So that’s your real objection. The business! Hang your son’s happiness as long as the pulp and ink are flowing. You really think your clients are going to sever ties with you because your son has married into a family so apolitical that its name is synonymous with a world no one else has ever seen? This girl is practically an orphan. Her father spends most of his time beneath the earth. In what dream world can her maiden name possibly bring down the Auric Empire? Tell me. I’d love to know.”

“You’re very naive, son, and very, very foolish. Empires are built on names, reputations, public opinion, and I can tell you they’re also brought down by them. McEwan isn’t finished yet. He’s a hurricane waiting to happen. Already two scandals to his name, and that isn’t counting the rumours that persist of his Coalition hobnobbing. My God, must I spell it out for you? The surest way to self-destruct in a climate like this is to strap yourself to a ticking bomb like Ralph McEwan. I’m sure his daughter is a lovely girl, but if we’re to survive at all, given what’s looming on the horizon politically, she must never—I repeat never—become a member of this family. As harsh as it may sound, it’s for all our sakes that I insist you not pursue the McEwan girl any longer.”

Derek widened his stance, squeezed palm around fist behind his back. “And that’s your final word on the matter?”

“It is.”

Derek looked at his mother, whose solemn gaze at the floor told him she wasn’t about to disagree with the old man. “In that case, I...” He turned and marched out, choking down the tirade he was dying to unleash. No, the air was thick with wrongheadedness already. Before he said something he’d regret, he needed fresh air, somewhere to think, to consider his next move.

For without his family’s blessing, or society’s approval, what was he really subjecting Sonja to? For all love, did anyone have a good word to say about this match? And if not, would she even want it?

In the three quarters of an hour it took for him to walk, or rather march to her house, he considered, as per Father’s command, umpteen futures in which Sonja was not a part of his life. Snowflakes in a kiln, they quickly vanished. He’d found the woman he wanted, and she was more important to him than any family business, any career-making situation, any social taboo. The idea put a spring in his step so propulsive his calves ached by the time he reached Bitker Lane.

Mrs. Van Persie answered the door, but Sonja was standing behind her, bright-eyed and pensive. No smile, but a look of fascination, of concern. He accepted her invitation inside, wiped his feet, and waited for the housekeeper to toddle off. Sonja was about to speak when he held up his hand. “Please, let me say what I came here to say, before anything else tries to stop it.” He swallowed, then sucked in a mighty breath that left him a little lightheaded.

“Oh my God, you’re finishing with me.”

“No. No, that’s what they want.” He got down on one knee. “I know this is sudden, but I’ll not ask your forgiveness. With so much uncertain in this world, it’s a relief to know, know truly and without a shred of doubt, who I want to spend the rest of my life with. That means more to me than anything, except one thing—whether she will have me. Sonja McEwan, will you do me the extraordinary honour of becoming my wife?”