“He did say that,” Jenny said, sinking back to my level. She regarded me thoughtfully. “You saw my memories? What else did you see?”
“Nothing much. He asked you to promise him something in return—only then I slipped back here. What was it he never wanted you to do?”
“A promise?” Jenny thought for a moment. “I don’t remember.” She crinkled her brow. “Do you think you could see further if we tried again?”
“I suppose so.” Jenny looked completely in control, invigorated, even—but I could not forget Jackaby’s cautions about pushing her too far or too fast. “It isn’t upsetting to know that I was inside your memories?”
“What’s upsetting is knowing that I might have secrets hidden inside me and I can’t get them out.” Jenny looked at me pleadingly. “Abigail, this could be the answer.”
It really could, I had to admit. With practice, possession could grant her the means to leave the house and pursue secrets that had been hidden from her for so long—and at the same time, it could grant me the means to uncover the secrets hiding within.
“All right,” I said. Douglas was bobbing back and forth, looking more disapproving than a duck has any business to look. I ignored him. “Let’s try again.”
This time I was ready for the pain. I leaned into it, and it passed over me more quickly. The blinding whiteness returned, and when the mist cleared, I found myself not in the foyer of 926 Augur Lane but in a drawing room I did not recognize. The sky outside was black, and the room was dim. I had entered a different memory.
“No. That’s no good. The output will be half what they asked for,” said a man’s voice.
“It’ll be twice what it should be. There’s no way to stabilize at these levels.”
Two figures stood directly ahead of me, their attention fixed on a stack of schematics spread over a wide desk. Something about them was familiar. The first was an energetic, handsome man. I felt uncomfortably drawn to him, although I could not say why. And then he smiled and I knew. This was Howard Carson. This was Jenny’s fiancé—the man who had loved her—the man who had left.
Across from him stood a man with white-blond hair. He wore a scowl and a three-piece suit, tailored impeccably to his slim figure. “They’re not going to be happy about this,” said the slender man.
“They’ll be a lot less happy if the whole thing blows up in their faces,” countered Howard Carson. The thin man grimaced as Carson rattled on about conductivity and tensile strength.
In a chair behind them sat a third man, heavyset with a chubby face and a mustache waxed into thick curls. He said nothing as he fidgeted an unlit cigar from one hand to the other, watching the men work. Beside him stood a prim woman with ink-black hair holding a clipboard and a pen. “Are you getting all of this down?” the big man asked quietly.
“Yes, Mr. Poplin, every word.” She remained expressionless, her pen scratching away.
“Good girl.”
“Don’t forget, boys,” came a soft voice from behind me. Before I could turn to see her face, a woman with brunette locks stepped through me toward the desk. I shuddered, or I would have if I had a body to shudder; I would never get used to the sensation of not physically existing. “The copper fittings in the prototype lost conductivity as they tarnished. Silver will cost more, but it will also increase the output over time.”
The thin man grimaced. “What do you know about it?” he said.
“She knows quite a lot, actually,” interjected Carson. “I told you already that my fiancée has been assisting me with my work. She’s as sharp as they come.”
Jenny Cavanaugh stepped behind the desk and turned to face the room. Had I been in possession of my own jaw at the time, it would have dropped. The Jenny I knew was a beautiful ghost—but the woman before me, with real weight to her steps and a flush in her cheeks, looked like another person entirely, so vibrant and alive. Her hair framed her face rather than hovering in weightless silver waves. She wore a honey yellow dress, practical and pretty, and around her neck hung a little pewter locket.
“She’s quite keen, you know,” Carson was saying. “And she’s right about the fittings.”
“Thank you, Howard.” Jenny Cavanaugh and Howard Carson looked at each other for only a moment, but their affection was obvious.
“We discussed this already,” said the blond man flatly. “We will move forward with copper.” I did not like him. It was more than his sanctimonious sneer. Something within Jenny disliked the man, so I disliked the man.
“If you insist,” Howard said, taking a deep breath. “Copper will do.”
Jenny was not satisfied. “It would save us all a great deal of time and effort if we knew the exact purpose of our efforts.”
The man glared at Jenny. “Our benefactors have provided us with very clear objectives.”
“Objectives are not an ultimate purpose. What exactly are your benefactors building?”
“Jenny—” Howard said.
“The future!” declared a new voice, and all eyes turned to the door. “We’re building the future, young lady. One shiny cog at a time.” The man who stood in the doorway was stout and unshaven. He had coal-black hair and wore a shabby black coat over a black waistcoat. His skin was deathly pale, save for a bluish shadow across his chin and under his eyes.
I knew that face. That was the face we had fruitlessly hunted across the countryside and back into the shadows of New Fiddleham. That was the last face our client poor Mrs. Beaumont had ever seen before she died. I watched as that face spread its pallid lips into a crooked grin. “Doesn’t that sound exciting?”
Chapter Three
“You knew him?” I gasped as the dark drawing room faded away and Jackaby’s office reappeared, the midday sun streaming in through the windows. I stood up abruptly from the leather armchair and immediately regretted my decision. My vision reeled and I sat back down.
Jenny—my Jenny—hung pale and translucent in the air ahead of me. She had been beaming, but the smile was rapidly melting away. “Knew whom?”
I breathed, holding on to the armrests to keep from falling out of the chair. Slowly the world stopped spinning and the feeling returned to my skin. “How did I get—Jenny, did you possess me all the way into the armchair?”
She nodded, but the pride had left her face. “I knew whom, Abigail?”
“That man. The one in the photograph.”
Rising more gradually this time, I stepped over to Jenny’s open file. My temples were throbbing and the room felt as though it were slowly spinning to a stop. Jenny stood beside me as I tried to pull my mind together. When the world was finally stable again, I looked up to find that she had already fixated on a picture. Her translucent hand brushed the image of her body, sprawled across her bedroom floor.
“Jenny . . .”
“Howard gave me that locket,” she said. “It’s not in the house any longer. I’ve looked and looked. It had a note inside. ‘From Howard with love.’ It’s just a little pewter thing, but it’s the little things you miss.”