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In the silver shafts of light, like sunbeams floating in the darkness, the actors onstage cast shadows that could not be helped. The cinema background guttered like a candle now and then, but the audience always gazed at the actors, not the gardens or train stations or tempests on the screen. �I promise you, one of these days those film-makers will realize they can make more than backgrounds, and these stage actors will be out of a job,� said Camilla. Rose Hannah liked the cinema sufficiently to rent one of the balcony boxes for the season, but mostly she did so because Camilla could not be kept quiet during a performance. Nell, on Rose�s other side, glowered at Camilla over her knitting. �Do you really think people will pay to watch actors who aren�t even really in the room with them?� �Mark my words,� retorted Camilla. She had once been an actress herself, and retired early�a young widow, her blonde not yet dimmed by grey, and �an adventuress� according to the newspapers; her affairs with minor European royalty had been well-chronicled in the press. Rose Hannah was one of the few women who didn�t care what was said about the infamous Mrs. Kirke, and in turn she was one of the few that Camilla didn�t consider hopelessly insipid. Nell, on the other hand, was a year older than Rose Hannah, taken in by Dr. Munro as a maid and companion for his daughter after her parents had died. She was generally a very cheerful soul when she wasn�t around Mrs. Kirke, but fortunately the violent purling motions of her hands slowed as she became engrossed in Ariel�s antics onstage. �She�s no Ellen Terry, that one,� muttered Camilla. �About coffee afterwards�will this mysterious guest of yours be there?� �I couldn�t tell you, honestly. He slipped out almost as soon as he arrived, and I�ve only seen him once or twice since. Good luck trying to throw yourself at him,� said Rose Hannah. She was only partly teasing. �I might just at that.� Camilla winked. �Of course, if you want him for yourself�� �He�s too strange a character for me. Not sociable in the least. For that matter, if you can catch him, consider him yours.� And Rose Hannah considered that the end of the matter. Dr. Munro was apparently not going to let Dr. West leave the house alive until he had sufficiently dined with them, so their guest was finally coerced into staying for a formal supper, and Rose Hannah even felt a little sorry for him at first. She was used to playing hostess to her father�s inventor friends�mostly from his club, but her father picked up strange acquaintances elsewhere, too. Most of them were doctors, inventors, professors, or some manner of scientist. Many of them led perfectly ordinary, balanced lives with happy families, but there were a few poor souls (Mr. Trelawney the chemist came to mind) either bereft of feminine company or actively trying to avoid it, widowers or eternal bachelors or men who were simply shy and awkward, and Rose Hannah knew how to speak their language and make them feel at home. As a result, the club had frequently met at Munro House before her trip to New York; Rose Hannah was their hostess, princess, and favorite, pouring coffee and laughing at their jokes (��and so then the chemist said to the archaeologist, �You ought to barium!��). So the fact that Rose Hannah found Dr. West to be the oddest man her father had ever had to dinner was saying something. He didn�t make toasts in Crimean Gothic, or engineer catapults with the coffee spoons the way Dr. Fellowes had that one night, which got the entire company firing sugar cubes at each other. Dr. West was just brusque and silent and secretive, and she had no experience for that. He came down late, marginally less scruffy than usual, his clothes suit threadbare but clean; his heart was clearly not in the occasion, and she felt badly when her father immediately jumped into what Rose Hannah privately called �the dog-and-pony show�: conversation designed to show off his daughter�s accomplishments. It was clumsy, irritating, and endearing all at once, and she had yet to figure out how to effectively stop him. �How is Mrs. Radcliffe, Rose?� Dr. Munro asked as the soup was served. �I do trust her pleurisy is under control. She won�t have any other doctor but my Rose, you know, West.� And her father chuckled knowingly. �Hmm,� said West, as the Parkes brought the turtle around. And so it went on for the first two courses: How is your Aunt Jessamine, Rose? How many letters have you gotten from your States friends? She was the belle of the ball in New York, you know. Have you heard anymore from that young man of yours� �No,� Rose Hannah said, and shot her father a dark look. �Hmm,� said West, as the cold chicken arrived. �It�s just as well,� Dr. Munro continued, smiling. �Wouldn�t want you to settle down too far from your old father, you know. You�ve got plenty of time to decide what you want, if you want to practice�� �Hmm,� said West. �Did you ever intend to do anything with that degree, or is it something all the accomplished English ladies get nowadays?� �I wanted to go to India,� Rose Hannah said sharply, all her sympathy for their guest draining away. �Female doctors are in high demand there, both for the colonials� families and the natives themselves�� �Yes, I know. I grew up near Mombai.� �Oh.� She felt a bit deflated; India would not impress him in the least, then. �So you can see what I wanted to practice there.� �But you didn�t.� �I was going to�I may still. My aunt wanted me to come back to New York for a year after I finished university, stay with my mother�s family before I left�� �I may exact the same promise here,� Dr. Munro piped up cheerfully. �Well, it�s all fine and good to get a degree and not use it,� said West. �Parkes, is there anymore of that claret?� I will not be rattled, Rose Hannah glowered to herself, by a man with table manners as bad as that. �What about the exhibition, how is that coming?� Dr. West said, turning to Dr. Munro. �Oh, excellent, excellent. We�ve got the�You Know What�locked up safe at the Crystal Palace, and everything�s going swimmingly with the marksmen and the volunteers. One of them lost his courage, though�can�t say that I blame him, but really, he ought to have more faith in the thing than that!� �You can tell him that I vouch for them fully�extremely useful that last time in Copenhagen. I dare say I wouldn�t have gotten out alive without it. I�ll let him look at mine if he wants, see how it works�� And Rose Hannah sat there, already ruffled, watching the two men carry on conversation about You Know Whats and Things as if she weren�t there at all. �Oh, this is a fine one,� said Camilla, reaching out as if to trace the lines of the painting on the gallery wall. �They seem to be the best of friends, and I never had any idea at all,� Rose Hannah muttered. �Yes, darling, I gathered that the first fifty times you mentioned it. Don�t sulk�ohhhh, look at this one!� The portrait was of a young woman, serene and raven-haired and tinted with the tragic blush of consumption. �I do believe that is the most beautiful woman I have ever seen,� breathed Camilla. They stood there a minute in the salon, gazing at the painting. �You know,� said a voice close behind, �that�s one of the finest paintings in the Hewitt collection. It�s terrible that the family has to sell them off now�this one, after the style of Ingres, and more than thirty years old. Many of the others date back to the thirties.� The women turned around to find the sleek gallery dealer smiling at them in what he must have thought was an ingratiating fashion. He seemed nice enough, but reminded Rose Hannah of a well-kept mink. The dealer pointed to the card beneath the frame: Portrait of Miss Rachel Carey, 1851. �She should be on the stage, or in the cinema at the very least,� said Camilla warmly. �Sadly,� said the dealer, �Miss Carey died of consumption a very few years after this portrait was completed, or so the Hewitts tell me.� He gave them his card�James Beasley �and said, before slipping away again, �Do let me know if I can be of any service.� West turned his collar up against the wind; it looked like snow again, which was good�good for leaving footprints and stains. He had started hanging around the riverbanks of the slaughterhouse district on tips from his boys, hoping he would see something himself, some clue as to where the vipers were nesting. He was getting a lot of false clues as well, of course, from street urchins just wanting largesse, but this was just another hazard of the trade; he knew to take every lead with that proverbial grain of salt even as he pursued it. So it was not unusual that someone�s servant boy or apprentice�or even an adult vagrant�might approach him, just from having heard through the grapevine that information was wanted. It was not unusual that, as West was conferring with Ham at the hansom on their latest findings, he should notice a towheaded boy, hair covering one eye like a patch, staring at him from a slaughterhouse alley. ��but that baggage as went missin� two days ago, she�s turned up in the foreman�s shack right enough, she has, so she can be crossed off the list� What�re you lookin� at, doc?� �Boy over there,� said West, his eyes not leaving the brick mouth of the alley. �Two of them, in fact.� A darker boy was peering over the first boy�s shoulder. The towhead beckoned to West with a curt flick of his fingers. �Bloody bold one, he is,� muttered Ham. �Stay here�it�s worth looking into. I�ll be back.� As he approached, the boys plunged further into the alley; West began to wish he hadn�t left his bag in the carriage. They stood waiting for him at the trash bin in the back. �What is it, then?� he asked, keeping his distance. �You�re that Dr. West,� said the darker boy. West nodded, curt himself now. �Jim with the pieman says you want information.� �The pieman,� said West. �The pieman over a� Victoria,� the towhead clarified. This was the confirmation West wanted. �What have you got, then?� �What�ve you got for us?� asked the towhead, squinting with his one visible eye. �Sixpence each.� West jingled some coins around in his pocket. The boys looked at each other; the dark one whispered something, and the towhead nodded. �C�mere then,� the towhead said. �Can�t risk nobody hearin�.� |
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