The Strangely Beautiful Tale Of Miss Percy Parker (9 page)

“Even if I am a woman?” Percy asked. When the professor raised an eyebrow she added, “Miss Jennings said that, even if I could speak every language known to man, no matter, it remains far better to be seen than heard.”

The professor put his book down. “And who is this sage Jennings?”

“Our dormitory chaperone.”

“Ah,” replied Rychman. “I should hesitate to regard your dormitory chaperone’s words as gospel, Miss Parker. In my presence you will speak, ask questions and answer mine whenever I pose them. As for my thoughts on circumstances when men and women should best be silent…they are not covered in today’s lesson.”

Percy, at a loss, said nothing, but allowed a slight smile to grace her lips. The professor seemed satisfied that he had been understood.

He opened her class book to several previously assigned pages and gestured. “These basic mathematics, Miss Parker. What did you make of them?”

“The geometry I understood more than all the rest, Professor.” She produced the corresponding homework, a piece of paper with a few numbers and scribbles a lesser mathematician might construe as equations.

The professor peered at the paper, grimaced and hastily penned over the entire page. “It would seem that the geo
metric problem was the single thing you managed to answer correctly, Miss Parker. As for the rest of your answers, they might as well be one of your foreign tongues.” He furrowed his brow over a particular notation. “I assure you, I speak all forms of mathematics but the one you’ve created here.”

“I was afraid you might say as much, sir.”

The professor spent the next half hour attempting to explain where Percy had gone wrong in her figures, and to discern at which step she had lost her way. At long last he sat back in his chair, put his fingers to the bridge of his nose and gave a sigh. Percy drew her scarf about her cheeks, trying to hide from both his regard and her own shame.

“Miss Parker, now it is I who cannot understand.” The professor spoke in an even tone. “You are quite adept with language. The mathematics involved here is a language. Look at these rules, and think of them as if they were the same as conjugating a verb. Think of these symbols as if they are simply a foreign alphabet!”

“I’ve tried, sir,” she cried. “I understand how to read the formula, and I can translate, partially, but it’s in the wrong tense. I could list every element in the pyramid chart on the wall behind you, but if you were to ask me how to configure a compound, I’m at a loss.”

Professor Rychman sighed and rose from his chair. He turned to the fire behind him and muttered irritably in an archaic tongue, a long-dead dialect. What was it? All Percy knew was that, after a moment, the words became clear:
“None shall weave of my teaching who cannot first grasp a thread. And why am I wasting my time when there’s so much else to be done?”

In response, Percy raised her eyebrows and replied in the same archaic tongue,
“One must wish to weave if she is to excel at the loom. But if you’ve more important work, Professor, is there a way I may be of assistance?”
The conviction with which she spoke surprised them both.

The professor faced her, amazed. His expression quickly returned to its usual cold and careless façade, but not before Percy’s heart missed a beat. “You are a linguist indeed, Miss Parker. Aramaic. Impressive. I spoke hastily in a language I assumed you would not know, and I have been proven a fool.”

Delighted with herself, Percy fought back a smile. “My apologies, Professor—and I’d never call you a fool. But,” she added sheepishly, “if you wish to mutter something secret, I suggest sticking to a Chinese tongue. I’m quite insufficient in Mandarin, for example.”

The professor smiled. “I’ll bear that in mind, Miss Parker. Tell me again how you learned so many tongues while behind convent walls.”

Percy shrugged. “I wish I could explain, sir. But they just come to me, like the melodies of long-forgotten songs.”

“Interesting, indeed.” He gestured to her assignment. “I can only hope the meaning of mathematics is similarly long forgotten yet waiting to be discovered.
Comprende?
”

“Sí, Señor.”

“Versteht?”

“Ja, Herr Rychman.”

The professor set his jaw. “I suppose I could continue to ask, and you’d continue to understand, wouldn’t you?”

“Oui, Monsieur.”

“Every tongue except mathematics.”

“I’m afraid not, sir. Forgive me.”

“I expect all those problems finished to the best of your ability,” he commanded abruptly, pointing to a new page in her text.

“Of course, Professor. Thank you.”

“You’re very welcome. Good evening, Miss Parker.”

“Do svidaniya,”
Percy replied.

The professor’s ears perked up and a smile toyed at the corner of his mouth. “My grandmother was a Russian immigrant,” he admitted, looking as if he had found something long misplaced. “I’ve not heard a word of that language in many,
many years. It is a beautiful sound, and I thank you for it. Good night, lady of all lands.”

Feeling a little silly but nonetheless pleased, Percy blushed, gave a tiny wave and scurried out the door.

Unable to sleep for nerves, Percy took to the library to dive into the company of her dearest friends: books. She shouldn’t have been in the library at Apollo Hall at such an hour, it was against the rules, but Miss Jennings was frankly scared of her and let her come and go as she pleased. As if she were a ghost. And, Percy confessed to herself with a little thrill, the idea that she was in the same building as Professor Rychman, whose candelabras she’d seen lit from the courtyard window, produced a titillating effect. She wondered what he was reading, thinking, doing…

A book about Newton’s deterministic universe lay open at her fingertips. She’d been hoping a grand theory might crack open the mysteries of mathematics. The theory was fascinating, the calculations daunting.

The librarian, an elegantly featured, black-skinned woman to whom Percy hadn’t had the courage to introduce herself, was shutting down and trimming the lights at her desk when she saw Percy at a back table and gasped. Percy looked up, flushing. She’d removed her accoutrements due to the lateness of the hour, but she hastily put on her glasses. Perhaps she was less frightening with her glasses.

“I’m sorry, Madame Librarian, I’m sure I’m well past a reasonable time…I…couldn’t sleep.” Percy stood. “I’m Percy Parker, I’m fairly new here.”

The librarian was dressed in a modest, freshly pressed dress, her black hair pinned tightly beneath a sensible dark bonnet. She smiled, her brown cheeks dimpling.

“No, miss, it is I who should apologize. I thought you were…”

“A ghost,” Percy finished. She’d heard that phrase so often. “It’s understandable.”

The librarian came closer. “Of all the things,” she said softly, her tone rueful. “Of all the things a woman like me ought never do is react to a person’s skin colour as if it were shocking.”

Percy blinked. Then she smiled. Perhaps there were oases in Athens, places where she could be on some level understood. Certainly a woman such as this had withstood plenty.

“I’m Miss Mina Wilberforce,” the woman offered. “Pleasure to meet you, Miss Parker.”

“Wilberforce?” Percy breathed. Such a famous name, that: the man who had ended English slavery.

Mina grinned. “No relation. But I decided I’d take the name of an emancipator rather than any from a master.”

Percy grinned back. “Brilliant.”

“Shall I leave you to your studies? I can’t get enough of these books. I think a woman should read every one that’s ever been written. So, you’ve got a deal of work to do, Miss Parker. Just drop the latch on your way out.”

“Thank you, Miss Wilberforce.”

“Mina, please. And if you ever get tired of the harsh stares, come sit with me. We’ll stare at each other, unflinching, for a good long while.”

Percy laughed. Mina turned and shut the door behind her.

Buoyant, Percy sat back down to her studies and didn’t notice the sudden chill on the air, nor the pale hovering figure beside her until it spoke. “Ah, Newton…” cooed the wispy, feminine voice.

Percy jumped slightly. She looked up to find a young woman much like herself both in pallor and age, but with the distinct difference that this young woman was transparent and floating. The female spirit glided backward, obviously startled to see Percy’s eyes meet hers.

“Yes, I can see and hear you,” Percy clarified, familiar with the reaction. Many spirits spoke to mortals. Few received a reply.

“Indeed! Most exciting!” exclaimed the spectre. Tightly spiraled curls floated about a face cherubic save for dark, sunken circles around the eyes. The frayed dress was dated; the open neck of the gown hung loose on a frail frame. “My name is Constance.”

“Hello, Constance. I’m Percy.”

The two girls nodded, knowing they could not take hands.

“Percy? That’s a woman’s name, is it?” the spirit asked.

Percy smiled. “It stands for something ancient.”

“You do not look a bit ancient.”

“Well, I’m not,” Percy admitted.

“No, but you do look like one of us. How did you learn to see my kind?”

“I’ve always had the ability,” Percy explained. “But I’ve dared not speak of it, else I’d be thought mad.”

Constance batted Percy’s stack of books with a hand that passed right through. “Mortals know nothing,” she scoffed. “I thought I knew everything when I sat at that table. On the other side, you realize how little you really know.”

“Really?” Percy breathed.

“Indeed. I now know the most important lesson: not everything can be explained. When I was alive, I thought I understood the whole of science, life, God…Went quite mad because of it.”

“Is that why you travel this hall?” Percy asked.

“My body lies in a tiny plot behind. I come into this room looking for something”—Constance made one floating turn around the table—“but I cannot, for the death of me, recall what I seek. Here I drift, looking for a once-insignificant item that now means peace.”

“And you think you’ll find it in this hall?”

“I spent inordinate amounts of time here when the academy first opened, years ago,” the ghost explained. “The first in the area to let young women attend a full curriculum. My family disowned me when I told them I wished to become a
scientist. No daughter of theirs would become educated beyond eligibility, doomed to a field meant only for men! I was a revolutionary, here by the grace of the founder…” Constance trailed off. “Ah, well. I shall keep looking. I don’t have much choice.” Her hollow face took on a hopeless expression, and she glanced around, her ethereal curls quivering in a nonexistent breeze. “It’s something over there, perhaps,” she murmured, and began to fade.

“I hope you find whatever you seek, Constance.”

The spirit looked her in the eyes. “Same to you, Percy of the spirit flesh.” The ghost faded a moment, then brightened, as if an afterthought increased her link to the world of the living. “And do be careful. London is going absolutely mad.”

Percy shivered. “How so?”

Constance failed to answer; she simply disappeared. The lamp grew brighter and the air warmer.

Percy gave a yawn, closed Newton and turned down the lamp. Moonlight fell in great pearly slabs against the bookshelves as she made her way to the library door, which clicked softly shut behind her. Percy then slipped through the darkened corridors of Apollo Hall and back to her bed. Despite all that she’d learned, she knew exactly what would occupy her dreams until morning. It wouldn’t be ghosts or mathematics or Newton’s deterministic universe, but something—someone—infinitely more corporeal.

“The Groundskeeper reports destabilization. Shall I go and see for myself? I’ve an idea where to find them,” the servant of shadow stated, one toe on the threshold between the eternal and the mundane.

The Darkness shook and roared. “Go! For the love of the Unholy, go already!”

“You don’t have to be such a brute about it.” The woman made a fierce face and turned in a huff, her elaborate skirts of
the latest human style swishing across the portal and onto a cobblestone street. “You know, you’d best be nice to me. Or I’ll switch sides and join
their
fight instead!”

“You wouldn’t dare.”

The woman narrowed emerald eyes. “Are you threatening me? I’d advise against that. You’d best consider a promotion, too. Minor Arcana status? I’m insulted. I’m far too talented not to be better recognized. If you knew what was best for you, you’d replace her with me.”

The shadows roared, but the servant expected it and did not flinch.

“Then treat me better, or I
will
turn on you. It’s high time I was important to someone.”

Josephine arrived at the table with several glasses of red wine. She tousled Elijah’s hair and mimed a kiss—but only when her friends weren’t looking.

It wasn’t that fraternization within The Guard was prohibited, of course. There were several miserable triangles of unrequited affection, at the very least. Elijah and Josephine had simply decided to love each other in private.

Just as Elijah was about to reach around to give Josephine a surreptitious but deliciously inappropriate pat, Alexi whisked in through the door of the café, his black robes swirling, and halted the frivolous chatter of his friends with one quiet question. “I don’t suppose any of you has seen a door?”

The group blinked up at him.

“You mean a portal?” Michael clarified.

“Of course I mean a portal,” Alexi snapped.

“No. Why? Whom have you met?” Rebecca asked. Everyone looked at her, unable to mistake her sharp tone.

Alexi held up a hand. “Don’t be hasty, Rebecca. It’s nothing. I’m simply on guard,” he explained. “As we all should be.” He seated himself in a chair but then fidgeted. “At our last meeting in the chapel I assumed we’d get some sort of help or direction, but…”

Michael laughed. “I gave up hope of ever seeing that goddess again years ago.” Only Rebecca noticed the flash of profound sorrow that passed over Alexi’s face.

Elijah leaned forward, pulling a gold-plated notebook from his vest pocket. “Now that you mention it,
I’m
adding a name to our list.”

Alexi raised an eyebrow. “You think you’ve met a candidate?”

Lord Withersby smiled. “My dear professor, I just saw the incomparable Ellen Terry play Lady Macbeth.” He placed a dramatic hand over the sumptuous silk of his breast pocket. “She brought the lyceum to its knees. She channeled raw power. The spirits trembled.
I
trembled. I’m sure she could do wonders with us. Even if not, we’d get a hell of a performance.”

Alexi grimaced as he stared at the list before him on the table, the notebook of candidates with nothing to recommend them but either beauty, prominence or sham spiritualist credentials; every one had been a failure, at least to his mind. “Come now, Elijah, we considered and crossed Queen Victoria off our list. You truly think an actress, however talented, will prove to be our woman?”

Getting a private audience with Her Royal Highness had been a feat only Lord Elijah Withersby had been able to manage, and then only because the poor woman was hysterical, desperate to see her dear Albert on the other side. Alexi had apologized, explaining that it wasn’t their job to reunite the living and the dead, even for royalty. As with
everyone else they interviewed, The Guard had been forced to wipe Her Royal Highness’s memory clean, and they had departed a bit more worried about the crown than ever before.

“I daresay Terry is a visionary,” Elijah promised, penning the name in bold strokes at the bottom of the list. “I’ll try and obtain a private audience with her soon.”

Josephine eyed him, then turned to The Guard’s leader. “You must admit it’s thrilling to consider, Alexi. Why
shouldn’t
Prophecy be famous?”

Alexi simply shook his head. “It’s not
that.
But…one would think none of you sees any excitement of your own. Chasing celebrities and actresses—”

“We can’t, the lot of us, be above everything like you, Alexi. We must take our pleasures when they’re thrown at us…or try and get in their way,” remarked Elijah.

“Above everything?” Rebecca scoffed. “Please. Don’t encourage him. He already thinks himself omniscient. Omnipotent. Tortured.”

Alexi rose from the table, long folds of black fabric rustling. He offered his companions both an expression of pity and the comment, “How little you all understand.”

“Of course we don’t,” Elijah mocked. “Only you do. Only you ever have.” The others laughed, albeit nervously.

“If you’re all so brilliant, discern Prophecy,” Alexi snapped. “Oh, but
do
be looking for a door while you’re out chasing actresses. Don’t forget that. Remember, a door’s the one sign we were given. I doubt it’ll be a stage door.” And with those words, he made a grand, sweeping exit—with Elijah, of course, humming a bit of Beethoven in his wake.

“He couldn’t have been
truly
offended,” Josephine tittered once the door shut behind him.

“If he didn’t maintain such an absurd stoicism, we’d have nothing to tease him about. And then how would he know we care?” Rebecca smiled suddenly, thinking of something else, something from long ago. “You know, our dear profes
sor wasn’t always as omniscient and omnipotent as he now pretends. There was a time when he was just learning. Michael, would you like to tell this, or shall I?”

Grinning, the vicar gestured for her to continue.

“We weren’t yet fifteen when Alexi started first experimenting with alchemy, thinking his powers granted him insights beyond the books and treatises he’d already devoured. So there he was, hovering over an array of powders, books and bottles when Michael and I came to escort him to a meeting. Flowers were bound by metal clamps at the center of the room. He was muttering things, swirling fingers in the powder. He gestured to the flowers…and the stone wall opposite him burst into flame. Poor Michael nearly lost what little mustache he was trying to cultivate!”

The company chuckled as Rebecca continued. “Alexi cursed and the fire extinguished itself, leaving a charred wall. Best of all, though, bits of exploded flower landed on his head and he didn’t notice. Alexi replied—in that voice of his, mind you, while wearing a crown of daisy petals—‘Bloody hell, I’ll never be able to explain that to the help.’”

The table rang with laughter—a sound that bound the group together through happiness and strife. Michael’s hand, shaking with his guffaws, found Rebecca’s, and the shared amusement made all The Guard feel for just a moment as if they were once again young.

Out on the street, Alexi paused. Inside La Belle et La Bête he heard laughter, but he was not included. He never was these days. And he couldn’t help but wonder, couldn’t help but fear that he had nothing to look forward to but an empty life of monotonous spectral policing until his body gave out from the strain. Perhaps Prophecy was all a lie, a carrot to keep The Guard trotting along a life of service with no reward. He felt like a failing actor who no longer believed his own lines.

One of the neighborhood spirits was acting up, but Alexi
had no desire to give chase. He was contemplating ignoring it altogether when he bumped shoulders with a cloaked figure moving quickly in the opposite direction.

“Oh!” the figure exclaimed, with a feminine gasp. The hood of her cloak fell back to reveal the most beautiful woman he had ever seen. The woman and Alexi both stopped and stared at each other. After a moment Alexi recovered himself, bowed and tipped his hat.

“Don’t I know you?” the woman breathed, her beauty lighting up the alley. Her perfectly coiffed, raven black hair glinted blue in the falling twilight, and her green eyes sparkled with mystery.

Alexi’s heart faltered, for he remembered the words of his goddess. She had hoped they would know each other instantly. But…“Pardon me, miss. I don’t believe we’ve met. I am Professor Alexi Rychman.”

The woman blinked and seemed to recover herself. “Of course. Do forgive me, Professor. You merely reminded me…” She shook her head. “Ah, I grow distract. My name is Miss Linden, and I’ve only just arrived unaccompanied in the city. I know how that must seem to a gentleman, a man of letters such as you. Please forgive my desperate air, but do you have any idea where I might find shelter? I…” Her voice broke. “I’m sorry, but I…I am on the run from something terrible.” There was a pause. The woman’s emerald green eyes shimmered with tears.

Alexi ruminated. His goddess had said the prophesied seventh would need refuge.

“I am aggrieved to hear it, Miss Linden. Might I recommend this very café before you?” He gestured to La Belle. “I know the owner and clientele well. Though you are in trouble, I know it to be a place of safety.”

Miss Linden looked immediately relieved. She glanced from the café to him again, the creases easing across her brow. “Thank you, kind Professor. But, were you just leaving?”

“Yes, I…I have work I must attend.”

“Of course. And thank you.” She smiled demurely. “Perhaps we shall cross paths again.”

Alexi chose not to respond to that, no matter how tempting. “You are welcome. Good evening, Miss Linden.” He bowed and stalked off, fighting the urge to glance back. He was used to ignoring urges.

His racing blood calmed after several blocks. Until there was a critical mass of evidence, he could not allow his thoughts or sentiments to run ahead. There was no margin for error, not when one was blessed or cursed with his fate. Mortal hearts were known to make mistakes, but Alexi Rychman would make no more.

The door of the café opened, and a woman entered whom none of The Guard would ever forget. She pulled back the hood of her cloak, worry on her face, hands shaking. She looked up, met Josephine’s welcoming gaze and offered a strained smile. Elijah and Michael both stood, bowing slightly. She nodded to each in turn, and took a few steps inside.

Josephine, as hostess, attended the new guest. “Mademoiselle, welcome to La Belle et La Bête! I am Mademoiselle Belledoux, proprietor.” She collected the newcomer’s cloak and placed it in an alcove nearby.

The newcomer had a flawless face and raven black curls piled delicately atop her head, and she well surpassed the average patron of La Belle et La Bête. She was truly a vision, a beauty clad in a mixture of deep crimson velvet and satin brocade. A slender, gloved hand flew to the cameo at her throat. Her emerald eyes glowed warm and hopeful.

“Greetings, mademoiselle. Forgive my intrusion, but I, seeking a bit of refuge, was sent here by the kind professor I just met outside.”

“Kind?”
Elijah snorted. Rebecca elbowed him.

“We are honoured that you take refuge here. Please, have a seat. What may I procure for you this early evening,
mademoiselle? Tea, perhaps? Or”—Josephine leaned in—“we have been known to tempt royalty with our special cabernet.”

The woman smiled. “How can I refuse?”

“Compliments of the house, mademoiselle!” Elijah stated, rising from the table. Josephine turned to the wine cellar and flashed him a glare, but he simply beamed at her in response.

The newcomer’s lips curved into a wide smile. “Why, thank you, sir! What a relief to find a haven in such an out-of-the-way place.”

Elijah hurried to settle her at a table. “Please allow me to introduce myself. Lord Elijah Withersby, miss, at your service.” When the woman offered it, Elijah took and gave her satin-gloved hand a kiss.

“Miss Lucille Linden. A pleasure to make your acquaintance, Lord Withersby.”

“And may I introduce my esteemed colleagues? Miss Rebecca Thompson, Mr. Michael Carroll and that French tart fetching your wine is—”

“My mutually esteemed colleague, Lord Withersby, curb your heathen tongue or I’ll not hesitate to remove it,” Josephine called from the cellar stair.

Rebecca also scowled at Elijah, and she turned to address the newcomer. “Please forgive Lord Withersby. He ought not be allowed out in polite society, for reasons which should be clearly evident to a lady such as yourself.”

“Terribly sorry, Miss Linden. I am a cad,” Elijah admitted. He paused a moment before grinning wickedly. Rebecca and Josephine both shook their heads.

Miss Linden brimmed with amusement. “So it would seem, Lord Withersby. A scandal to your class.”

“Thank heavens I’m a second son and my family’s all abroad, else I believe I’d have been shipped off to some tedious war somewhere rather than slumming about in this tedious city,” Elijah said with a casual wave.

Josephine set one glass of wine before her guest, kept a
glass for herself and raised it. “To new acquaintances! Not many fresh faces find us here, but when they do they are always welcome.”

“I, too, shall raise a glass!” Elijah cried.

“Pity you don’t have one, Lord Withersby,” his secret mistress replied; and she and the newcomer shared an innately feminine smile as they toasted and sipped the bloodred liquid.

“I offer you my sincerest appreciation, my new friends!” Miss Linden exclaimed. But then her hand rose to her throat again, and she leaned forward, her beautiful face clouded with worry. “May I call you friends? To be honest, I am in most desperate need of them. I realize this is a great imposition after so short an acquaintance, but…I need to hide.”

“From the law?” Vicar Michael asked. He was determined to be careful. They couldn’t have the law snooping about, not if they intended to continue their Grand Work unhindered.

“No. From a…beast of a man,” she said at last.

“Your husband?”

“Of sorts. My master…He’s—oh, I do not wish to bore you with my unfortunate, improbable details. I’ve lived a strange life. You’d not believe me were I to explain.”

“You might be surprised,” Elijah suggested. Rebecca gave him a warning glance.

Miss Linden raised an eyebrow. “I just need shelter,” she explained after a moment. “I cannot go to my family; he’ll know where to find me. I have to throw myself upon others’ kindness and wait out this terrible storm. Any suggestions you may have, I would deeply appreciate.”

Josephine looked at Elijah, Michael and Rebecca before finally ending on Lucille. She seemed to come to a decision. “There is a room two floors above. You may call it your own, so long as you don’t bring the law or your master’s wrath down upon us. We are a secretive group but kind. You need pay only what you can afford—if that is anything at all.”

Tears filled the newcomer’s eyes. “Bless you. Bless all of you! My new life begins,” she murmured. “But now, you must forgive me again. This may seem frightfully forward, but as my life has come undone at the very seams I have little to lose. Tell me more about your professor.” As Elijah began to chuckle, Miss Linden’s face flushed. She hurried to add, “Perhaps I spoke too hastily. I—”

“Professor Alexi Rychman,” Elijah interrupted. “Our Master of Ceremonies, Minister of Revels, our Melancholy Prince of Denmark.”