The Magicians And Mrs. Quent Part 16

He asked if she had ever seen Mr. Sarvinge and Mr. Grealing; he described their general appearance.

"Oh, aye, I know them well enough. The one skinny as a stick, and the other as round as a puddle of oil. And if I saw either of them, I would dash their heads in." The andiron drooped in her grip. "But I don't doubt I'll never see either of them again. And I warrant you will neither, if that was your hope."

An ill feeling came over him. Forgetting the length of iron she held in her hand, he stepped off the threshold. "You're mistaken. I have business with them."

"Aye, and so do I! They owe me ten regals in rent, they do. Kept promising me they'd have it for me. 'Just another day, missus. Just give us one more day.' They swore to Eternum and back they'd pay me. Now swearing is all I have." She let out a curse, then dropped the andiron, reached into the drawer, and pulled out a fistful of papers. "A fine pair of talkers they were. But words is all they had to trade. I'll never get my coin out of them. And neither will you, if they owed you anything. Sure as a long umbral is dark, they're halfway to Torland by now."

She threw the papers at Eldyn. They swarmed to the floor, and one landed on the table before him. It was a printed certificate of investment for a trading company to the New Lands. He sagged against the table.

"But we had business..."

The landlady snorted. "The only business those two had was swindling folk. If you gave them anything, you'd have as soon given it to the illusionists down the street for all you'll get in return."

With that she s.n.a.t.c.hed up the candle, set her bonnet straight, and marched through the door, leaving Eldyn alone in the gloom.

CHAPTER TWELVE.

A T FIRST THERE had been good reason to hope the situation was not in any way serious.

Miss Lockwell was hardly the first young lady to have fainted at a party. It was agreed by all that the evening had offered more stimulation than she could have been accustomed to. The wine, the presence of so many important personages, the general grandness of everything had all worked to overwhelm her. She was carried to a bed upstairs and the doctor summoned.

"It is the fault of fashion," Lady Marsdel proclaimed to those who remained in the parlor. "To be considered stylish, a young woman's gown must squeeze the breath out of her and not leave room for two bites of food. Soon ladies everywhere will be so beautiful that they'll never be seen at all, swooning before they can leave their rooms for want of air and nourishment."

A message was dispatched to Whitward Street, so that Mrs. Lockwell might not wonder at her daughter's failure to return. The note expressed the conviction that it was the most minor of conditions; Mrs. Lockwell could certainly expect her daughter's return tomorrow.

Mrs. Baydon, feeling a keen distress for her new friend, sat with her for many hours, as did the doctor, who held all manner of salts and acrid-smelling potions under her nose. However, all such efforts failed to induce consciousness, and by the end of the umbral a fever had come upon her. The doctor called for cool cloths; he bled her arm into a silver bowl. Dawn found her pallid, her eyes shut, her breathing swift and shallow.

At breakfast the doctor spoke with Lady Marsdel. The situation was dire; the mother must be called for at once. After writing the unhappy letter on behalf of her husband's aunt, Mrs. Baydon dashed off another missive-a note to Mr. Rafferdy.

He had just been rising after what he indulged himself in thinking had been a wretched night. However, upon reading Mrs. Baydon's note, all thought of the previous dozen hours vanished, and he was dressed and out the door before his carriage was ready-a fact that gave both his man and his driver some cause for wonderment. He arrived at Fairhall Street nearly simultaneously with Mrs. Lockwell, and he could hear her voice ringing out even as he set foot in the door.

"My poor daughter!" came the mother's cries. "She was out in that dreadful rain yesterday, I hardly know why. A horrible storm it was, stirring up all sorts of vile mists and humors, I am sure. I told her she must rest, that she would catch something dreadful if she didn't keep to her bed. But she was all aflutter about the party. Coming here meant the world to her, though I dread to say it might cost her the world in the end!"

Rafferdy entered the front hall to witness the end of this speech. "Oh, Mr. Rafferdy!" Mrs. Lockwell exclaimed at the sight of him, but after that she was overcome by her distress.

Lord Baydon took her arm and led her to a chair. "There, there, madam," he said. And, unable to think of anything else that might help, he attempted to lend his words all the greater efficacy by repeating them. "I say, there, there."

Water was fetched, and one of Lady Marsdel's fans for air, and the two elements revived Mrs. Lockwell enough that she was able to follow Mrs. Baydon upstairs. The doctor started up after, but Rafferdy touched his arm, speaking quietly with him at the foot of the staircase.

"How serious is it?" he asked.

"It is very serious, Mr. Rafferdy. I cannot make light of the young lady's condition. The fever came upon her with great speed and force."

"What will you do to treat it?"

"I fear I can do no more than I already have. Now the thing must run its course. It lies only in her power to break the fever now, and in G.o.d's."

"But how long will it be before she recovers?"

The doctor gave him a stern look. "Mr. Rafferdy, it is not a matter of when she will recover. Rather, it is a matter of whether she will recover at all. As for the answer to that, we can do nothing but wait."

At that moment Rafferdy felt a sort of fear he had never in his life known before. So strong was the feeling, and so entirely novel to him, that he was forced to sit, put a hand to his brow, and try to fathom what it was that had come over him.

Of course he had felt fear before. He had experienced all the usual childish horrors: of the dark, of strangers, of being lost. There had been one terrifying experience when he had been chased by one of his father's hounds that had turned feral.

As a man he had known the fear of losing, the fear of discovery, and the fear of not getting everything he wished. But this new dread that owned him now was different from all those. There was no threat of any harm to himself, yet his hands trembled as they had on the day he had shrunk against the stable wall as the slavering hound prowled toward him. His father's stablemaster had brought the dog down with a rifle shot. It had collapsed at his feet, dead. Only this time there was nothing to shoot at, and it was not for himself that he was afraid.

And that was what was so different about it. Even as he realized this, his shaking ceased. An urgency rose in him, a desire to make himself useful.

"Are you well, Mr. Rafferdy?" Mrs. Baydon said, for she had returned from upstairs. "Your color is very high."

"I must see if I can be of aid," he said, leaping to his feet.

He made as if for the stairs, but she held him back. "Only her mother and Dr. Mercham can be with her now. If you wish to be a help, then stay here and give us the benefit of your conversation, so that we do not all sit here and stare and become morose. There is nothing we can do except wait, and the more lively we can make the hours, the more swiftly they will pa.s.s."

He gripped his hat in his hands. "I should have been here last night."

"I agree. You are awful for not having come. Yet you can hardly think what happened is your fault. While I have no doubt your presence has at times caused some to feel discomfort, I am equally certain it has never been the case that your absence has caused anyone to fall ill. Besides, I can a.s.sure you that she had a wonderful time."

Rafferdy looked at her. "Did she really?" The thought of her there, moving about Lady Marsdel's parlor, brightening it with her presence in a way mere candles could not, gave him cause to smile. "I am certain she was the prettiest creature in the room."

Mrs. Baydon arched an eyebrow. "Well, one of the prettiest, I might presume to think. Though I begin to think that some glances, had they been in attendance, would have been only for her."

Despite Mrs. Baydon's hopes that Rafferdy would entertain them, they made for a dreary party. Lady Marsdel continued to expound upon the evils of current fashion, while her brother offered every belief that it was no more than a trifle of a cold and that Miss Lockwell would be down at any moment, wanting a ball to dance at, for that was all any young woman ever wanted.

"My father-in-law can always be counted upon for optimism," Mrs. Baydon whispered to Rafferdy.

"Indeed," he said, flipping the pages of a book he was not reading, "Lord Baydon is remarkable in that quality. If confronted with the loss of all his worldly fortune, he would profess his belief that he would surely stumble upon a halfpenny in the street before long, so there could be no cause for worry."

Mrs. Baydon began to laugh but stifled the sound at a snap of Lady Marsdel's fan.

At last, as the middle of that middling but interminable-seeming lumenal approached, the doctor and Mrs. Lockwell came down. She leaned upon his arm and, despite her plumpness, appeared somehow thin, or rather, faded.

Rafferdy was the first to his feet. "How is she?"

"There is little change," Mercham said. "The fever has not broken."

"I dread I must impose upon your hospitality further, your ladyship," Mrs. Lockwell said to Lady Marsdel in a faint tone. "It is terrible that I must ask such a thing of you, but she must be allowed to stay."

The doctor agreed. "Her situation is precarious. She cannot be moved. However, for the present I would suggest everyone keep from that part of the house to avoid any risk of contagion."

This advice was readily agreed upon.

"Lily and Rose!" Mrs. Lockwell exclaimed, becoming suddenly animated. "What if they are not well? I must go to them. Only I dare not leave my poor Ivy."

Rafferdy tossed down his book. "I will fetch them here, madam. My carriage is outside. That is, if that is acceptable to you, your ladyship." He added this last belatedly, with a nod toward Lady Marsdel.

"Far be it from me to decree to you how things should go in my own house, Mr. Rafferdy. It seems doctors and sons of cousins can do quite well at ordering my affairs." She fed a bit of cake to the puff of dog beside her, a thing as fringed and frilled as the pillow on which it sat. "But of course you must go. We cannot expect Mrs. Lockwell's motherly attentions to endure being so divided for long." She hesitated. "There are only the two of them, didn't you say?"

"Indeed, your ladyship, only two," Mrs. Lockwell said, brightening. "And each as sweet and pretty as their eldest sister, I am sure you will agree!"

"I will reserve my judgment of their sweetness and prettiness until I meet them." She looked at Rafferdy. "Go then, and be back within an hour, or I shall be vexed. We will suffer all manner of tedium while you are gone."

Rafferdy was certain he had added little if any amus.e.m.e.nt to the proceedings; however, he was forced to revise his appraisal of this. For upon his return an hour later, the two younger Miss Lockwells in tow, he found the party in the sitting room even more dour than when he left it.

Lily and Rose were presented to Lady Marsdel. It was an experience that left Rose bereft of the capacity for any sort of expression, while Lily bestowed a theatrical curtsy upon her ladyship.

"Well, you are neither of you so pretty as your sister," Lady Marsdel p.r.o.nounced after examining them both, "but your height is good, and your complexions. You are both tolerably pretty girls."

Rose at last managed a curtsy and hurried to a corner of the room, but Lily appeared aghast as she slouched off. Rafferdy could not help trading a smile with Mrs. Baydon.

"I suspect," he murmured to her, "that being merely tolerably pretty is something the youngest Miss Lockwell finds quite intolerable."

Mrs. Baydon agreed. "However, while my aunt's words might be unwelcome, they aren't untrue. Both are handsome girls, in that plain, solid way of the gentry. No doubt they will each do fine, in their own way. But they do not compare to Miss Ivoleyn Lockwell."

"You have my agreement on that!" Rafferdy said.

Mrs. Baydon regarded him. "Yes, I suspected I would."

D USK CAME, AND still there was no change in the patient's condition. Lord Baydon had returned to Vallant Street with Mr. Baydon, and Lady Marsdel had retired to her chambers. Lily had occupied the afternoon by playing the pianoforte, and the dreary airs she pounded out had done little to lift the atmosphere of gloom. At some point Rafferdy heard the doctor and Mrs. Baydon whispering; Mercham had asked if she knew a priest who might be summoned if there was need.

These words brought a kind of madness over Rafferdy. He could not stop pacing; he felt if he ceased moving, the darkness that nipped at his heels would overtake him, like the hound that had chased him so long ago. As he paced, he twisted the ring on his right hand. His visit yesterday to Mr. Mundy's shop off Greenly Circle had been pointless. The little toad of a man had only cackled with glee when Rafferdy demanded that he remove the ring.

It was not within any power of his to remove it, the wretched fellow had said. If the ring had no present owner, it might be tried on and removed at will, but once the thing was bought and claimed-or in this case, once it was bestowed and accepted-it could be removed only by the most powerful enchantments. Or by the death of the owner. And, Mr. Mundy a.s.sured him, the former often resulted in the latter.

When Rafferdy demanded to know who had bought the ring, Mundy repeated that his customers received the utmost discretion. Not that Rafferdy needed confirmation; that Mr. Bennick had bought it and sent it to him he could not have been more certain.

But why? That was a mystery that was not as easily answered. Had Bennick really done it to punish him for following that day? It seemed an elaborate and expensive way to torment someone so little known to him, and for so small a slight.

He had stayed up all night, drinking whiskey until his head ached, tormented. Each time he looked at the ring, the blue gem seemed to stare back at him like a hideous, mocking eye.

A commotion on the stairs brought him out of this miserable reverie. It was the doctor; he had come down and was speaking to Mrs. Baydon. Rafferdy hurried toward them.

"It has pa.s.sed," Mrs. Baydon said with a smile. "Her fever has broken."

"The worst is over now," Mercham said, "but she is still very weak. I must return to her."

The doctor left them, and Rafferdy sagged against the newel post.

"But what is wrong, Mr. Rafferdy?" Mrs. Baydon said as the doctor left them. "By your expression, I would hardly think you glad at the news."

Rafferdy could only shake his head. Sometimes relief was more unbearable than worry.

"Come, let us tell the others," Mrs. Baydon said. She took his hand, then frowned as she lifted it. "But what's this awful ring you're wearing? I can hardly bear to look at it."

"It's the latest fashion," he said, and before she could inquire more, he led her to the parlor to deliver the glad news.

M ISS LOCKWELL REMAINED at the house on Fairhall Street for the next quarter month. While her fever had pa.s.sed, Dr. Mercham would not permit her removal until her strength was sufficiently restored.

Mrs. Baydon spent many hours with Miss Lockwell, amusing her with talk and bringing flowers from the garden, for her charge wanted greatly for being out of doors. For his part, Rafferdy visited her every day-twice on long lumenals-and read to her from a book of Tharosian epics during one particularly long umbral.

"For a man who reads so little, you read very well," she told him as he turned a page. She sat in a chair by the fireplace, wrapped in a shawl. "I don't know why you don't read more often."

"What use is there in doing something one is already good at? The practice can bring no possible improvement."

"It is said there is pleasure in doing something one excels at."

"Which is precisely why you will so often find me doing nothing at all."

She laughed, the action bringing color to her cheeks. By then she was spending much of her time in an upstairs parlor that was favored with afternoon sun; it was there he paid her his visits. He liked to imagine her condition always improved in those first few minutes after he entered the room. It was a vanity, perhaps, though hardly his only one.

"You are very dutiful in your charge, Mr. Rafferdy," Lady Marsdel told him one evening at supper. "It is admirable of you. But you seem to think we are incapable of seeing to the needs of one rather smallish young woman."

It took him a moment to formulate a reply. It was just that he felt a responsibility, he said, having been the one to invite her. What sort of proper gentleman would he be if he abandoned her?

"But she is in no way abandoned!" Mrs. Baydon protested. "That she could be looked after with more concern is not possible were she in her own home. Besides, I think I have earned a claim to Miss Lockwell myself. She is my friend, you know. I am sure I have spent more time with her than you. And," she added with an arch look, "since when was it a very particular concern of yours to be a proper gentleman?"

That was a question, Rafferdy was forced to admit, for which he had no answer.

T HE NEXT DAY Miss Lockwell was deemed fit enough to come downstairs for a few hours and engage in the society of the household.

"But I cannot possibly," she said when Mrs. Baydon brought her the news. "I have already imposed upon the hospitality of her ladyship in the most unimaginable way."

"It is my aunt herself who said you should come down," Mrs. Baydon said. "So there can be no imposition, and you can have no reason not to come. If your spirits allow, that is."

"Of course they do," Rafferdy said, taking her arm and leading her to the stairs before she could mount any further protest.

It was soon clear the change in scenery was just what she needed. Her eyes were clear, and she smiled often. Despite this improvement, she seemed determined to do no more than sit quietly and listen to the conversation of the others. Rafferdy made several attempts to provoke her partic.i.p.ation, but she resisted all such efforts.

"I've heard that Viscount Argendy is to give another masque," Mrs. Baydon said. "Though I cannot imagine I shall be allowed to attend."

"You cannot imagine it, yet you have brought it up," Mr. Baydon said over his broadsheet. "What a curious situation. I would have thought it impossible to speak of something one cannot even imagine. How about you, Rafferdy? Can you perform such a singular feat?"

"I cannot imagine you will ever smile while reading an issue of The Comet," he said, at which Mrs. Baydon clapped her hands.

"You see, Mr. Baydon?" she said to her husband. "It is not so impossible a thing, after all. Though I suppose it is impossible I will ever go to a masque. And by all reports the last was such a success! It was said they made the interior of his house to look like a garden, with fountains and trees and fauns running about. Next time he promises to have twice the number of illusionists."

This news sent Lady Marsdel's fan into a fit of fluttering. "It is bad enough that those with no sense of propriety or shame slink down to Durrow Street to view the work of those indecent illusionists. But to invite them into the very homes of superior society to work their mischief-it is intolerable!"

"But it's not indecent," Mrs. Baydon protested. "How can it be, when it's the fashion? Wouldn't you agree, Miss Lockwell?"

Ivy looked up from the book in her lap, her expression startled. With everyone looking to her, she was at last forced to speak. "I am sure my opinion on the subject cannot matter."