The Janus Affair: A Ministry of Peculiar Occurrences Novel (4 page)

Eliza, recovering from whatever her shock was, whispered, “Kate?”

“I am Kate Sheppard, a citizen of New Zealand and a servant of the Empire. I also have a voice, a voice that came with a cost,” she said, motioning to her face. “A cost that, I believe, was well worth paying.”

There was a smattering of applause. Wellington looked over at Eliza. Her eyes were welling with tears.

“You know this woman?” he murmured.

The nod was imperceptible.

“Back home in my beloved land of New Zealand, I have a voice. Perhaps it is a quiet one, at present, but it is still a voice. A voice that, rest assured, will no longer remain ignored.”

“You overestimate yourself, tinkertot!” shouted a heckler from the group of men. He waved his cigar as he added, “I can easily shut out your shrieking. How about a ding-dong?
All things bright and beautiful . . .”

Then the rest of the men joined in. “
All creatures great and small, all things wise and wonderful, The Lord God made them all . . .”

Wellington looked back to Kate who raised a single finger to the wall of women originally shielding her from the audience. His eyes jumped to Eliza. The emotional display he had seen earlier was all but gone now. He was expecting her to be staring down the hecklers. Instead, Eliza was watching Kate, a grin across her face. She was clearly expecting a rebuttal from her New Zealand cousin.

Kate waited until the men reached “
God made them high and lowly, And ordered their estate . . .”
verse and burst into laughter. She turned to an attendant and motioned to a small box behind her. With a nod, the attendant hefted the box up into her arms.

“Gentlemen, your song is quite apt as God did make us all. As the child’s hymn proclaims—none are better or worse. And yet, gentlemen such as yourselves are content with having us stay silent, still, and making your dinner.”

The hecklers watched as Kate’s attendant set the box at their feet, and turned the lock on its lid. The box fell away to reveal a skinned goose, frozen solid.

“You gents want dinner?” Kate asked the men, reaching underneath the podium. What came into view next caused the women up front to scream in horror and the crowd to part as if they were the Red Sea and Eliza’s New Zealand cousin was Moses. The staff this Moses brandished in Speakers’ Corner took aim on the goose in front of the retreating gentlemen. Kate pulled back the bolt on this monstrosity of a rifle, bringing the beakers on either side of its chamber to a wild, furious bubble. The air around the rifle’s barrel-bell distorted and wavered until brilliant pearlescent rings of heat and power burst from it, striking the frozen bird over and over. Wellington, who had been the only one remaining where he stood, watched with fascination as the goose went from a sick pale colour to yellow. The smell tickled his nostrils when the fowl turned to a golden brown, and his mouth instantly began to water.

Kate released the trigger and hoisted the rifle upwards, her green eye flaring brighter than ever. “Gentlemen, your goose is now well and truly cooked.”

The crowd, even some of the men keeping company with their wives and sweethearts, erupted into applause. The hecklers, however, were slowly regaining their composure while in front of them a large goose sizzled. Wellington gave her a healthy ovation as the crowd gathered back around him.

Over the thunder of appreciation, Eliza called to him. “Welly, time to go.”

“Did you see?” Wellington exclaimed, the crowd still cheering on Kate Sheppard. “That’s a Matford-Randleson Ætheralternator rifle your friend has there.”

“And she knows how to use it. Now let’s go.”

He motioned to Kate who was now passing the rifle to her attendant. “But don’t you want to—”

“When Kate gets this way, the bluebottles are not far behind, now com—”

Her word caught in her throat as an odd scent in the air made them both pause. Stray hairs that had escaped Eliza’s braid waved back and forth a fraction. The expression on her face said this was—for once—not her doing. Wellington looked up to the podium, and saw the young attendant reach for the Ætheralternator—only to recoil as if shocked.

Now, overpowering the cooked goose, there was another odd scent in the air. Like copper baking in the sun, or . . .

“Ye Gods, Kate!” Eliza said before shoving her way through those around them.

A mix of men and women were now being thrown into Wellington’s arms as Eliza fought her way through the crush of bodies. The crowd had not seemed that large to him when they first arrived at the rally, but now there appeared to be more people between them and the stage than he’d estimated. His nose burned with the building scent of electricity, but he pushed aside both men and women in order to keep Eliza in view.

Then he was through. Instead of a thick press of fabric and flesh, he only saw Eliza, running undeterred. As she was unhindered by skirts or cloaks, Eliza bound for the podium and leapt for Kate. He heard their bodies impact with each other, and that was when he turned to face the crowd.

“Get back!” Wellington shouted, stretching his arms wide and running back towards the mass of people. “Get! Back!”

The concussion threw him forward, pushing him into the curious that were trying to watch the excitement on the stage. He knocked at least five over when he went flying; like he was a ball and they were the skittles. Wellington gingerly pulled himself free of the startled ladies, some of them trying to gather their wits, while a few looked at him and blushed.

Pulling himself up to his feet with apologies flowing left and right, Wellington gave a tug on his lapels and ran back to the smouldering podium.

“Miss Sheppard,” Wellington called, “are you well?”

Kate Sheppard, the voice of the women’s suffrage movement in New Zealand, was still trying to get her bearings. She must have landed hard against the ground when Eliza tackled her. Her head lolled from side to side, but came to an abrupt halt when she locked here eyes, both real and substitute, with her saviour.

“
Kia ora
, Kate,” Eliza said, flashing her a friendly smile. “Been a while, hasn’t it?”

“Eliza?” Kate asked, her breath short.

Wellington looked around them. “Eliza, who was—”

The scream cut through the lingering silence.

Kate’s glass eye swiveled around, and she jerked upright. “Melinda? My goodness, where is Melinda?”

Eliza shot a look back to Kate. “We’ll have to catch up another time. Good to see you.” She grabbed Wellington’s forearm and used it to pull herself up to her feet. “Sounds like near Grosvenor Gate, Books!”

Again they were pushing their way through the stunned crowd, though it was easier going since many of their fellow audience members were streaming away from the podium. Once beyond the initial impact zone, they reached pedestrians who had no idea what had happened and were instead enjoying the remains of the morning. At least until they processed that terrified screaming was coming from somewhere up ahead. Wellington remained only a few steps behind Eliza until they came within sight of Upper Grosvenor Street. By then, the screaming had stopped, but the crowd of onlookers had started to gather.

Eliza and Wellington forcefully managed their way through the gawkers to the source of the cries.

The young girl was trying to speak, but found she couldn’t as the thick iron bars comprising the large gates surrounding the apartments were now running through her throat. And her chest. And her skull. She was no longer holding the Matford-Randleson Ætheralternator, but it never fell to the ground as it had also been fused into the gate. The body, being part of the ironworks, twitched as much as it could; and Wellington gave silent thanks that he and Eliza had not taken in a tea or an early lunch. He swallowed back the queasiness and, with Eliza at his side, approached the poor girl who was gasping out her final moments.

“It was the rifle,” Wellington whispered. “She had taken it from Kate just before you got her out of the way. The rifle must have attracted the electricity to her.”

“What does this?”

“I don’t—”

The woman gave a tiny whimper, and Wellington felt completely impotent. The victim was looking at them both, though, and her brow was creasing. Then her eyes looked out and then down. Out, and then down. Again. And again.

“Wellington,” Eliza said, causing him to jump. “Her hand.”

The woman was trying to make a fist of her right hand, all except for her index and middle finger. She had wanted them to see this gesture.

“Two?” Eliza asked her.

The hand relaxed, and the woman looked at Eliza and smiled. Or at least, tried to.

Then her eyes stopped looking at them, and now looked through them to some place they could not see.

In the distance, a police whistle sounded out.

“Eliza,” Wellington muttered to her. “We need to go. Now.”

So much for that low profile that he’d hope to maintain. As they disappeared into the bustle of London, Wellington considered exactly what he would tell the Director tomorrow.

Interlude I

Where Many Things Go Bump in the Night

T
he clouds above the greatest city in the Empire were grey and thick, and just before midnight they finally let loose their promise of retribution.

Most of London was hiding inside from the downpour, but Sophia del Morte loved the rain and thunder. It was not just that her nefarious comings and goings were less likely to be noticed—she also enjoyed the way nature’s opera rattled her bones. Unfortunately, it also made her feet, braced as they were into the window frame of London’s Natural History Museum, slightly slippery. She was wearing the latest fashion in rubberised footwear, but even that was having difficulty in these conditions.

When her foot slipped Sophia sneered, shaking her head in disgust. Breaking and entering? This was an utter waste of her abilities. True, being an assassin meant she was well versed in stealth and infiltration—but she was not a common cracksman. She had served aristocracy, minor nobility, and on the rare occasion high ranking members of government. It was most likely her mention of procuring the plans for Lord Fontaine’s time actuator that led the Maestro to believe this sort of thing was part of her repertoire.

She’d managed to suppress her disdain for this charge when in front of her master, but now she was free of such restraints. While she knew nothing could keep her from gaining access to what she wanted, it appeared citizens of a most law-abiding nature were attempting to slow her night’s progress. It only contributed to her wrathful mood.

One such device that had put a proverbial stick in Sophia’s spokes this evening showed all the hallmarks of the McTighe-Fitzroy Laboratories. It was bad enough to have Julia McTighe taking up the family business, but since she had teamed up with the young Verity Fitzroy, their combined inventions had become far more complicated. Sophia contemplated sending them the bill for her ruined chemise and time wasted when she could have been dining at the Savoy with a delightful Argentinian trader.

When she’d first arrived at the museum, it was immediately apparent that the doors, main and side, were locked with a cypher that would take her until morning to crack. She simply didn’t have the time—or indeed the inclination for such things. Luckily, that arrogant little strumpet Fitzroy was not the only woman with devices on hand. The ascent claws strapped to her palms and her knees had got her this far up the side of the towering stone building in rather quick order.

As they approached a new century, the British had begun to build temples to science and art. None of them was as beautiful as Rome’s, but they were certainly harder to break into. This building was impressive with its multistory stone façade, rows of stained-glass windows, and square towers at each end.
A cathedral to the natural world
, she mused while rain poured down her cheeks,
but at least one thing it contains is most unnatural.

The thunder was getting louder and closer. She ducked her head instinctively but kept moving higher. Her master was not one to be put off—not even for a day. So, she climbed on, muttering under her breath things she most certainly would not have repeated in his presence.

Just as Sophia reached the roof, the sky lit up, as if announcing her arrival. It was nice when Mother Nature was in agreement with her own mood.

Wiping water out of her eyes, Sophia ran over the slate roof tiles of the façade towards the roofline of the Central Hall. All the museum’s windows were protected with McTighe’s annoying etheric sensors, but to the well-informed there were ways around such inconveniences.

Reaching the great barrel roof of the Hall, Sophia smiled, wiped the water out of her eyes, jerked her satchel around in front, and removed from it another of her master’s devices. Her informants had passed on the news that work was being done on the leaks in the Central Hall windows, and the sensors were disengaged for a few days.

Perfect for her purposes. As was her Maestro’s device. It was a narrow rope that looked strangely as though it were made of metal, but woven in ways she’d never seen metal worked before. Sophia liked how it felt in her hand: smooth, slick, and strong. One end she wrapped around herself, cinching it tight around her waist, while the other she snapped onto the ridge of the roof. It locked tighter than a crocodile on a person’s limb. The rope itself was very fragile looking, but she trusted her Maestro and his devices implicitly. He was more than the equal of any McTighe or Fitzroy, she thought with reflected pride.

One more thing was needed. Sophia fished out strap on soles for her boots. Sooner or later even the fools at Scotland Yard might stumble on her activities, so it was better to put another of London’s numerous felons in the frame.

Then she leaned hard into the rope, and turned on the little box that held the ropes tight about her. When she flicked the lever, the gears began to turn, the rope loosened out, took her weight, and then she simple walked down off the slate roof tiles to the windows that comprised the sides of the barrel vault.

She came to rest with her boots against the glass, as if out for a morning vertical stroll evening as thunder crashed and rain fell. In the interests of not being obvious, she crouched down and pressed another of the Maestro’s gifts to the surface of the glass. A diamond edged knife cut a small enough hole in the window that she was able to wriggle her way through.

She released the catch on her line, and dropped down into the Central Hall, leaving the wet bootmarks of Fast Nate Lowell behind. He was going to have some explaining to do.

Then she withdrew the slightly bulky goggles she had not dared to wear outside in the rain. As Sophia slid them over her eyes and adjusted the oculars on each side, a soft scarlet glow bathed her field of vision. Something about the curious illumination always made her uncomfortable, but it gave her the night vision of a cat, which was beyond useful in these circumstances.

Sophia didn’t pause at where she had landed for long. Instead she scampered up the central stairs as quickly as possible.

The lightning lit up the great vaulted ceiling through the museum’s many windows, and for a minute she saw nothing while the oculars were overwhelmed by nature’s own fireworks.

Sophia chewed her bottom lip while waiting for the Maestro’s device to compensate—which they did eventually. Now below, she could see the shapes of the watchmen’s lanterns, which in the oculars looked a deep blood red. They were triangular glows in the vastness of the room below, and there were only two of them.

These telltale lights were moving slowly enough to tell her that—like most guards—they were bored with their lot. Certainly there was not much in the Natural History museum that was worth stealing; mostly old bones and preserved skins from distant parts of the Empire. At least that was what most people thought. Sophia knew better than that.

She watched the guards negotiate around the displays for a moment. They were among the fantastic exhibits of fearsome animals from the wilds of Africa, the menagerie of beasts all frozen in time in various states of alertness, curiosity, or combat. During the day, their mechanical skeletons would resurrect them and show visitors how they lived and, considering the lions’ poses, how they hunted. It was something her master could have enjoyed or at least appreciated.

A soft rumble thrummed in her ears and flashes of white light illuminated the side of the gazelle’s snout.

Sophia smiled. The prey. She understood prey.

To the accompaniment of thunder, she turned and entered the geological gallery. Lightning illuminated all the treasures surrendered by the earth. Most were pretty hunks of rock or crystal but worthless.

However, the museum had recently acquired the Carrington Collection, a collection made by the kind of people England specialised in—the eccentric. The Carringtons had apparently cleared out the attic, and felt philanthropic enough to donate what they found to the museum. One of the items in particular had caught the eye of one of the Maestro’s collaborators. She’d seen it and known what it was immediately, but apparently lacked the courage to take it herself. Typical of many of the clankertons Sophia was forced to deal with, he’d sent her to do what they could not.

Looking down into the display case through the oculars at her prize, she was almost blinded. The square crystal looked like a pulsing heart through them, with blazing lines of lights darting deep within. Her master, not usually given to sharing information, had told her that the ancient civilisation now lost beneath the waves had once powered its cities with such stones. It was just the thing his little protégé could make use of.

Though it irked her to be an errand boy, her fear of his wrath overrode any sense of pride. She’d seen what he’d done to those who displeased him—and had tended to the mess afterward.

Lightning flashed once more, followed only a heartbeat later by the rumble of thunder. The storm was right over the museum now; and Sophia glanced instinctively up, the instinct blinding her as the nocturnal lenses compensated. Clamping her hands over her eyes to give the device time to recover plunged her into darkness, and that was when Sophia heard movement. Behind her.

Somehow one of the guards, blundering about like a drunk elephant, had by sheer chance managed to catch her unawares. Sophia spun about with a soft curse and jerked off the oculars.

The guard, a huge oafish-looking man, was staring at her—something that she was quite used to. Not for the first time her beauty saved her. While he was still gawking, his mouth hanging open fish-like, she reached into the tiny pouch hanging off her belt, grabbed one of the tiny missiles, and flung it at the man.

The British liked to play at darts in their public houses and probably thought themselves masters of the art. They had not however ventured up the Amazon to study with the Huian tribe as she had in her youth. Her aim was perfect.

The guard reached for the sudden sting in his throat, but already his knees had given up on him. Sophia heard the thump his body made as it hit the hard marble floor, but she did not see it. She was already picking the lock on the case, and removing the stone her master had sent her for. The unlucky guard was already forgotten.

The rock was warm and heavy in her hand, but without the lightning and the oculars it really did not seem that remarkable. After wrapping it in a handkerchief, Sophia pressed it under her corset and between her breasts.

She scooped up the oculars, stepped over the guard who was twitching and convulsing the last moments of his life away, and slipped from shadow to shadow until she found her exit. Outside the rain was still coming down hard, and so she had to be cautious on the slick roof, crouching low until she reached the parapet. Then she affixed her rope to one of the stone griffons looking out over storm-tossed London, and slid down it to the ground.

The knot she flicked loose, reclaiming her equipment with smooth efficiency. As for the repelling equipment she had used to gain entry, it disappeared in a flash once she pressed the detonator’s trigger. The curators would know someone had been in the museum tonight on account of damage to a window, a dead guard, a few puddles of water, and Fast Nate’s footprints. It was a matter of professional pride, though, that she would leave nothing of hers behind.

The streets of Kensington were still quiet but definitely wetter than when she had gone in. She raced across the road and around the corner to Thurloe Street where the reinforced carriage awaited.

Sophia del Morte took a moment to smooth her hair and adjust her clothing before entering. The interior was dimly lit, and her master sat in shadow.

“I take it you were successful?” His voice came out accompanied by a series of steam hisses; she had come to think of it as his own little orchestra.

Withdrawing the stone from its intimate hiding place, she held it out to him on a trembling palm. It was terrifying how dull and ordinary it looked inside the carriage. She held her breath. Her heart was racing, her body near to aching with stress.

For the longest moment she hung suspended between pleasure and terror, until he finally released her. “Indeed, it appears you were.”

One brass gauntlet appeared out of the shadows to take the stone from her. Her master leaned forward and examined the stone through the brass helmet that obscured most of his features and expressions. Sophia suspected the articulated suit he always wore was fitted with the same ocular devices as he had given her, because he nodded. “A nice piece that will do the trick for my little investment.”

He dropped it back into Sophia’s still outstretched palm. She blinked at it for a moment worried that he would ask her to return it from where she had stolen it; he could be capricious like that sometimes.

“Take it to her,” he snapped, his voice distant through the grate of his helmet.

Sophia tightened her hand on the stone and nodded. “Yes, Maestro.”

And then, just like that she found herself standing on the street, in the rain watching the carriage disappear into the night.

No acknowledgement of her abilities. Not even a word of thanks. It was so hard to know what he thought of her, and she so desperately wanted to know.

Her body was trembling, but it was not with fear anymore—it was from accomplishment. What had begun as a relationship based on terror had begun to shift to something else entirely—but just as primal.