Bewitching Season (12 page)

“A good approach,” he approved. “You should be able to control and utilize your own internal

power before learning to use externals. Is milord Seton, ah, acquainted with your abilities?”

“No!” Persy replied urgently. “He doesn’t know anything about it. He knows we’re worried about

Ally, but he accompanied us as a favor and to find a certain book. If maybe Mrs. Allardyce …”

“I’ll keep him occupied for as long as you need. Go on. I’ll manage.” Mrs. Allardyce nodded at

them, then moved toward Lochinvar with a bright smile.

The small back office looked more like Persy’s memories of her previous visit to the shop, with

piles of books stacked round the room. Mr. Allardyce set out two chairs for them, cleared several

stacks and numerous sheaves of paper from the center table, then sorted through a pile of rolled

parchment until he grunted in satisfaction and pulled one out. He unrolled it on the table, holding it

down at the corners with books, and Persy saw that it was a map of England.

Next Mr. Allardyce rummaged in a drawer of his desk and pulled out a turned-brass plumb bob

hanging from a short length of chain, and a long brass ruler. He stood over the table a moment, eyes

closed, the pendulum hanging loosely between the thumb and forefinger of his right hand.

“Very well,” he said, opening his eyes again. “This is what is known as map dowsing. I am going

to move the ruler very slowly over the map while holding the pendulum above it, and ask the

pendulum to indicate when it passes over where she is. We’ll draw a line, and do it again from the

other axis to find a point. Then we will change maps again, until we can locate her quite precisely.

Do you understand?”

Pen nodded, eyes wide, and looked expectantly at the pendulum as Mr. Allardyce slowly began to

slide the ruler over the map. When the brass weight began to circle counterclockwise frantically, he

set it down and drew a faint line along the length of the ruler. The line ran directly through London.

So did the next. Mr. Allardyce looked both relieved and concerned at this turn of events. “It means

she can’t be far, which is reassuring. But there are a great many places in London where she might

be,” he said, riffling through the rolled maps until he came to the one of London.

Persy felt Charles’s hand grip hers as Mr. Allardyce began to draw the ruler slowly across the

closely printed page, first one way and then the other. Charles’s palm was sweaty, but he looked

more excited than she had seen him since before his accident.

“There,” Mr. Allardyce said as he drew the second line. They all leaned forward to stare at the

structure on the map, set in its frame of green, at the point created by the two lines. Persy looked up at

her sister, knowing that Pen’s face must be reflecting her own surprise, but Mr. Allardyce only looked

more puzzled.

“Kensington Palace?” said Charles aloud. “Ally’s at Kensington Palace?”

Lorrie came down the stairs then, holding a tray of wine biscuits and a decanter of deep red liquid.

“Mother’s strawberry cordial, from last year. It came out rather well, I thought.” She paused and

leaned over the map. “Done already? But what could she be doing at Kensington Palace? Are you

sure, Father?”

“As sure as I ever am.” He stared down at it. “Kensington Palace is out of my ability to investigate,

I’m afraid. Is there any way you two might have reason to go there?”

“Us?” squeaked Pen. “Why, I don’t know. We can talk to our father about it, though. I don’t even

know who lives there, apart from Princess Victoria.”

“Don’t some of the king’s brothers and sisters live there too?” Persy added. “The children of old

King George the Third who never married?”

“So I hear.” Mr. Allardyce hunched his shoulders, looking baffled. “Kensington Palace,” he

murmured. “I don’t like it. Why is she there? You young ladies were quite right about that note—why

ever she’s there, it isn’t because she wants to be.”

Mrs. Allardyce’s voice could suddenly be heard from the next room, pleasant but loud. “So happy

we were able to find Mr. Mayo’s book for you, your lordship. Shall I have it sent, or would you care

to take it with you?”

“I believe that means we should complete our business here,” said Mr. Allardyce, motioning them

back toward the shop. “Please, if you learn anything, send us a message. I doubt we’ll either of us get

a night’s rest until we know what is happening. Kensington Palace,” he murmured again. The furrow

between his brows deepened. “What could the high folk want with us?”

Lochinvar looked happy as he stroked the spine of a book and listened to Mrs. Allardyce’s

monologue on the relative merits of calfskin and kid bindings. He glanced at them with an inquiring

expression as they emerged from the back room, but he did not interrupt.

Lorrie set down her tray by her mother and strategically sat across from Pen and Persy, the better to

study their clothes, Persy guessed. Mrs. Allardyce poured them tiny glasses of cordial and passed the

sweet biscuits, her stream of chat never slowing, but it was easy to see that she was only half

attending to her own words. Persy wished she could dispel the tension that whirled and eddied

around them, and just talk about Ally. It was with great relief that she glanced out the window and

saw the family carriage draw up and disgorge Mama.

Mr. Allardyce rose and opened the door. Mama looked thunderous as she swept in, though her

greeting was courteous enough. She clutched a pair of hatboxes by their cream-colored ribbon ties.

“Have you had a pleasant visit?” she asked. Then, without waiting for an answer, she said, “Mrs.

Allardyce, I would be most extremely grateful for a glass of your cordial. I have just had a most trying

twenty minutes.” She let the boxes fall carelessly to the floor.

“Madame Thibault,” breathed Lorrie, staring at the name stenciled on them.

“You know her?” said Mama. “Then I trust that you will have the sense never to patronize her if

you don’t want a bonnet fit only for—for—” She drained the glass Mrs. Allardyce handed her and

sighed. “I am sorry, girls. These were supposed to be your new visiting bonnets. What could Madame

Gendreau have been thinking when she recommended that woman? She has all the millinery talent of a

dyspeptic goat.”

Lorrie sidled over to her. “May I?” she asked, gesturing at the boxes.

Mama looked surprised, but nodded. “If you want to. So long as I don’t have to look at them

again.” She shuddered.

Lorrie took the lid off the first box and peered inside. Persy looked too and got an impression of a

large bird, festooned with garish ribbon rosettes, that had had a fatal encounter with a plate-glass

window. She stifled a giggle as Lorrie tsked and replaced the cover, then picked up the other box as

well.

“Excuse me for a moment,” she said grimly. “I think I have some work to do.” She stalked down

the hall toward the office.

“Lorrie was once apprenticed to Madame Thibault,” Mrs. Allardyce explained to Mama, who

looked alarmed at this news.

Persy felt a sudden tingle of magic in the air, emanating from the back room. She saw Pen glance

that way, then back at her. A faint odor of burning feathers made Mama look even more apprehensive.

Just as she opened her mouth to speak, however, Lorrie came back, looking satisfied. She handed the

boxes to Mama.

“In future, you might want to buy your hats from Madame LeBlanc, your ladyship,” she suggested.

“I do—that is, she’s my regular milliner. But she is so busy just now …”

Lorrie inclined her head. “If you continue to patronize Madame Thibault, I would be happy to

repair the worst of her work. But Madame LeBlanc drinks less, so I hear.” She sat down, took a

biscuit, and crunched it.

Lady Parthenope blinked.

“Mama,” Pen ventured, “Lord Seton might have other commitments today.”

“What?” Mama looked startled. “Oh, of course. Thank you so much for the cordial, Mrs.

Allardyce. We are so sorry to have missed Miss Allardyce. Please convey our greetings and hopes

that she will be able to return to us
soon
.”

Mrs. Allardyce looked pale but bowed. “Of course, Lady Atherston. It was most kind of you to

visit.”

Mr. Allardyce held the door for them. “Write if there’s news,” he mouthed. Pen nodded.

“Or if you need more emergency bonnet repair,” added Lorrie.

Persy was grateful that Lochinvar was so delighted by his book. At least he seemed to be as they

rolled slowly down crowded Oxford Street. His animated conversation about schooling for young

children filled the gap left by everyone else’s silence as they contemplated Kensington Palace and the

vagaries of milliners.

He had known at once that something had happened when they came out of the Allardyces’ back

room. Persy had seen the inquiry in his expression, but he had been far too polite to ask any direct

questions. And now he could see that they were all preoccupied, and he was doing his best to make

solo conversation so that they could be preoccupied in peace. It was an act of charitable gallantry that

Persy, at any rate, was not too absorbed to notice.

When had he learned how to do this? Had the thoughtful, considerate man always been there behind

the sometimes sullen, sometimes boisterous boy, patiently waiting for the boy to grow up? And his

enthusiasm for founding the new school on the Seton estates … that was not feigned. He very clearly

cared a great deal about it. Schools! Teaching! Oh, if only she could talk to him without tripping over

her own tongue in embarrassment. Just think, they were both interested in the same things … .

But what did it matter if they were both interested in schools? That was the only thing they would

ever share. Surely he’d forgotten about the talks they’d once had—and even if he hadn’t, she’d been

only thirteen then. He’d been humoring her, the funny little bluestocking-to-be. She shouldn’t start

fancying she felt anything for him, because handsome young viscounts didn’t propose to girls who

wanted to teach.

But what wouldn’t she give to be able to discuss his new school with him, to talk of how to help

children love learning, just as they had once talked about books. She closed her eyes and pictured

herself and Lochinvar, snug by the fire in the morning room at Galiswood, planning lessons and

making lists—

“Persy, I can’t stand it anymore,” said Pen, interrupting her daydream and Lochinvar’s monologue

on nature as classroom. “Open that box by your foot and let’s see what Lorrie Allardyce did to those

bonnets.”

“Must you?” sighed Mama, closing her eyes. “Very well. She didn’t have enough time to make

them any worse, I suppose.”

Persy lifted the box and untied the sturdy knot Lorrie had shut it with. She pushed aside the tissue

paper and stared. The flattened bird had vanished, or had somehow been transmuted from ghastly to

charming. Delicate feathers and ribbons in soft blending shades, along with a cluster of tiny silk

rosebuds, greeted her delighted gaze.

“Oh!” she exclaimed, and rapturously lifted it out of the box.

“Persy!” Pen nearly shrieked. “It’s wonderful! Try it on!”

“That’s not the same hat,” said Mama, staring also. “Or is it?”

Persy untied her old bonnet and set Lorrie’s revision on her head. Pen leaned around their mother

to look. “She’s amazing,” she breathed.

“How did that girl have time to do
that?
” Mama said in wonderment.

“I liked it the other way better,” said Charles. “It was horripilatious.”

Persy wrinkled her nose at her brother, then caught sight of Lochinvar seated next to him. He too

gazed at her, hazel eyes wide.

“It’s a lovely hat,” he murmured.

Persy felt her spirits rise at his words, then plummet. Of course it was a lovely hat. But that didn’t

mean she added anything to its beauty. “Thank you,” she muttered. From her mother’s other side, she

heard Pen sigh.

7

“P
apa, tell me about Kensington Palace,” said Pen at dinner that night. Persy looked up and gave her

an encouraging smile.

The three Lelands had huddled in Charles’s room after Lochinvar left, trying to figure out their next

step in finding Ally. As Persy pointed out, they needed more information. Asking Papa would be a

safe way to get it, as he and Mama would assume it was another part of their continuing obsession

with Kensington Palace’s best-known inhabitant.

Lord Atherston’s eyes twinkled. “Well, let me see. I believe a young lady by the name of Her

Highness the Princess Alexandrina Victoria, heiress presumptive to the throne, lives there.”

“We
know
that.” Pen rolled her eyes. “But what else? What’s it like? Do the king and queen live

there too?”

“No. It hasn’t been used as a royal residence since the time of George II, a good eighty years ago.

Apart from housing your heroine” —he smiled at them—“it’s mostly used as a home for