Rose (11 page)

“Her boat?” Rose asked, a sudden sharpness in her voice.

Miss Lockwood lowered her handkerchief and blinked. She wafted the lacy scrap about, as though at more flies. “Yes—Maisie remembered the afternoon she lost her parents. She was sailing a toy boat. So sad. Her mother was in floods of tears as Maisie told her; she hadn't thought she would remember. And Maisie had on her little pink coat, her favorite. Mrs. James had to borrow a handkerchief when Maisie told her of it.”

The boat! The boat that Rose had invented—it couldn't be true! She had been certain that she had
made
that
story
up
! And it was true all along? Perhaps she had pulled it out of Maisie's baby memories somehow…

Rose sat staring at the polished floorboards, trying to make sense of it all. She felt that same sense of shame that had gripped her outside the orphanage. She had been the one with the exciting news! She had been coming to tell Maisie all the wonderful things that were happening, and now Maisie wasn't even here! She'd gone off and found herself a home! Rose felt absurdly disgruntled.
You're being stupid and selfish
, she told herself crossly.
Maisie
must
be
so
happy
.

“I don't suppose I'll ever see her again,” she murmured.

Miss Lockwood shook her head sympathetically.

“Probably best not, dear. It's a new start for Maisie now. Alberta, I should call her, of course.”

“Alberta?” Rose wanted to giggle. Skinny little Maisie just didn't look like an Alberta. “Alberta James,” Rose murmured. It sounded real. A real name. She blinked, her eyes strangely hot, and then shook herself crossly. She was getting as sentimental as Miss Lockwood.

The little clock on the mantelpiece chimed, and Rose jumped up. “Oh, I must go, miss. I have to be back. Thank you for letting me visit and giving me the news. Please, will you tell the others I was thinking of them?”

“Of course, dear.” Miss Lockwood stood up with a rustle of skirts.

Rose walked around to the door, glancing idly at the strange collection of scraps of paper, little portraits, and assorted tatty jewelry that lay in the glass case.

“Do come back and see us again, Rose,” Miss Lockwood told her graciously as she opened the front door for her.

She was still standing at the top of the steps watching when Rose looked back at the corner of the road. She waved her handkerchief and then frowned. Clearly the flies were still bothering her. Some of the girls had said that Miss Lockwood kept gin in the little silver milk jug in her office, and Rose had never believed them. But today she certainly had been behaving rather strangely.

Rose walked home slowly, thinking about Maisie. Alberta James. They would grow her hair, and she'd be plump again, like she had been as a little girl in her pink coat. It was hard to imagine it—hard to believe it, either. There was something not right. She could only picture Maisie in the storeroom, the chain of her locket wound around her fingers, staring at it with hungry gray eyes in a grayish face.

Suddenly, Rose stopped dead in the middle of the pavement, causing a smartly dressed nursemaid pushing an enormous stroller to nearly run her over. Rose apologized mechanically and drew to the side of the pavement, her heart thudding with panic.

The little girl in the pink coat. The locket.

Rose
had
invented that coat because she'd seen it the afternoon she'd told the story—Sunday, only ten days ago, on the girls walking past.

And the locket—she could see it now, dangling from Maisie's hand—
had
still
been
in
the
cabinet
. Lying there just a few minutes ago, grubby and tarnished, with its broken chain. Maisie wouldn't have left without it, would she? Her most precious possession?

And come to think of it, if Maisie had been accidentally lost, not abandoned, why did she have the locket at all? Rich little girls didn't have that sort of necklace. A string of seed pearls, perhaps, or a gold cross. Real gold. That locket was the sort of cheap little thing several of the orphans had, left with them when their mothers brought them to St. Bridget's. Mothers who hadn't been able to afford to keep them.

There was something very wrong here.

Maybe Miss Lockwood hadn't been drunk—she'd been lying.

Rose leaned against the park railings, thinking furiously. She was right. She knew it. It
had
been too good to be true. But that wasn't what was important—where was Maisie now? And why would someone go to all that trouble to steal an orphan? Rose clutched at the silly little amulet that Mrs. Jones had given her. She kept it in her pocket, like she'd been told, even though she was sure it did nothing. Maisie was another missing child now. Another stolen child.

She didn't have time to think about it properly—she really did need to get back to Mr. Fountain's house. But all the time she was hurrying back, scurrying down the steps, and politely answering Mrs. Jones's inquiries about her visit, the questions were turning and fidgeting in the back of her mind.

Freddie appeared suddenly in front of her as she carried the tray back from Miss Isabella's supper. She hadn't eaten most of it, and Rose had had to clean the rice pudding off the nursery wall. She nearly had to clean it off the floor of the corridor too, but Freddie grabbed the tray as it slid from her hands.

“Why do you always have to pop up like that?” Rose snapped. He'd frightened her, and she was jumpy with worry anyway. “Don't you ever just walk up to people like a normal person?”

Freddie looked hurt. “I wanted to see you, that's all! There's no need to shout at me. I only wanted to know what you thought of Miss Sparrow, since you had to run off before.” He scowled. “You're far too rude for a housemaid, you know.”

His cold, grand voice was back again, and Rose realized she'd gone too far. She wasn't sure if it was his feelings that were hurt, or if he was angry that she had stepped out of her place. She hardly cared. She sighed and rested the edge of the tray on one of the wide windowsills. “I'm sorry. Something's happened. It wasn't your fault.” Miss Sparrow—it seemed an effort to call the woman back into her mind, which was too full of Maisie's disappearance. “You're right, I didn't like her either—she made me shivery.” Rose rubbed her hands over her face wearily. What was she going to
do
?

Freddie took the tray from her, and Rose glanced up at him in surprise. “You looked like you were about to drop it again,” he explained, putting it on the floor and sitting down on the windowsill instead. “Come on, sit down. What's wrong with you? Did you decide you preferred the orphanage?” he asked worriedly. “Do you want to go back, is that it?”

Rose blinked at him. “Are you stupid?” she asked sharply, before she could stop herself. “Of course not!” she continued, more politely. He really had no idea, she supposed. He couldn't help it. Slowly, as she tried to make sense of it herself, she told him about the afternoon and the Maisie mystery.

“You can make pictures?” He sounded fascinated. “I've never heard of that before!”

“That isn't what's important now!” Rose reminded him angrily. “I'm sure Miss Lockwood was lying. She was behaving really strangely, I told you.”

Freddie shook his head. “I don't think so.”

“But she was! Didn't you understand about the coat? I made that up, that bit of the story! I know for certain I did. So Maisie's mother can't have remembered it. It's all lies, and something awful's happened to Maisie!” Rose wailed.

“I'm not saying it's true. I'm saying Miss Lockwood wasn't lying! Just listen, can't you? You said you thought she was lying because she kept being strange and flapping that handkerchief around—”

“Like she was nervous,” Rose put in, nodding. “So?”

“But she thought there were flies!” Freddie said triumphantly. “Buzzing around her head. Come on, Rose, don't you see? Something strange going on? Something suspicious? A buzzing noise? It's like I told you earlier! She's been enchanted. Someone's come at her with a glamour. A pretty massive one too, I should say, if she's still got the side effects now.”

Rose stared at him, her mouth open. She was too used to thinking he was plain silly to admit he was right all at once. “Someone made her see what wasn't really there,” she murmured.

Freddie nodded smugly. “Probably they did it to Maisie too, to make her go with them.”

Rose gulped. “She would have wanted to believe so badly,” she told him drearily. “She'd have spilled out that stupid story about the fountain and her toy boat as soon as they walked in the door. I just made it easier for them to take her.”

“Why though?” Freddie asked. “Why her?”

Rose frowned. “That's what bothers me. She—she wasn't special. She was my friend, but she was just an orphan.”

Freddie glanced uncomfortably at Rose. “Maybe that's it. Just an orphan.”

“What are you trying to say?” Rose's voice was small. She had a horrible feeling she knew what he was trying
not
to say.

“Well, no one would miss her, would they?” Freddie looked at the floor. “The orphanage thinks she's got a new life, and they don't want to remind the new little rich girl who she was. No one else is going to come asking, are they?”

“Except me.” Rose glared at him. “They didn't know about me, did they?”

“Heaven help them,” Freddie mumbled. Rose ignored him.

“What would anyone want to steal orphans for? Because I bet she isn't the only one! And there are all these other children—Mrs. Jones keeps telling me about them, from the newspaper, and there were two in the prayers at church. Two girls.” Rose stood up, her fists clenched. “I have to find out. I didn't mind never seeing Maisie again when I thought she was going to be Alberta James and have a pony and a doll's house and…and a family! But no one's just going to steal my best friend!”

Freddie blinked. “Well, quite,” he murmured, rather nervously. “Umm. What are you going to do?”

“I don't know.” Rose sat down again, looking shrunken. “I haven't the first idea. Can you think of anything?”

“We could try scrying for her, I suppose…” Freddie said doubtfully. “I've never done it before, but I know it's in Prendergast, so it ought to be doable. Maybe we could persuade Gus to help. He's good at things to do with seeing—his eyes, you know.”

“You'd really help?” Rose stared at him in amazement. “Why?”

Freddie gave a helpless sort of shrug. “I don't know. You saved me from the elemental spirit. I'm obliged.” He frowned. “I shouldn't be obliged to a servant, and I need to repay the debt.” His shoulders slumped a little, and he didn't look at Rose as he went on quietly, “And you talk to me. Mostly to be rude, but no one else does at all apart from Gus. Even old Fountain hardly sees I'm here, and when I go home for tea, all my parents do is tell me to work harder. If you go off and get stolen too, I'd—I'd miss you!”

Rose glared at him. “Don't go getting silly!” she warned him firmly.

Freddie shook his head vigorously—his smooth blond hair didn't stir. Rose was more and more convinced that it was stuck to his head with magic. “I'm not! But I've had months of really only talking to a cat, and Gus can't help seeing things differently. He's a bit mouse focused.”

“I suppose.” Rose nodded. “So, what's this scrying thing? Is it like glamours?”

“No, it just means looking for her. I don't know if it'll work, though—I'd have thought someone would have already tried it for those other children. I don't think the police approve of magic, maybe that's why.” Freddie looked around. “We'd need a glass or something like that.” He looked thoughtful.

“Like a magic mirror?” Rose asked doubtfully. Half the time she still suspected Freddie was teasing her.

“Ye-es, but you don't talk to it, you just look. Or we could use water. Anything shiny. Flames work for some people.”

Rose stared at him. It sounded very like what she'd been doing back at the orphanage, making pictures on shiny things. Maybe she'd be able to do it. “Can you scry into the past?” she asked slowly.

“Some people can. But it's difficult, and they charge enormous amounts of money for it, so it's not done very often. One of my father's cousins can read the past, and he spends half the year on his estate in Scotland now. Salmon fishing and seeing things in rivers.” Freddie smiled dreamily. “Of course, if you can see into the future, you can just name your price. Hardly anyone can do that.”

Rose shuddered. “I'd hate it. What if you saw something you didn't want to know?” Then she looked down at the tray and gasped. “Mrs. Jones'll think the stairs have eaten me!” Snatching it up, she scurried down the corridor, glancing back over her shoulder.

“Can you meet me in your workroom tonight?”

***

If the house was odd in the daytime, after midnight and by candlelight it was positively eerie. Rose edged along the corridor by feel, trying not to imagine what the strangely sticky patches were. The white porcelain of the door handle was a welcome relief. The door slid open noiselessly, and Freddie looked up from the hand mirror he was staring into. The candlelight made his face whiter than ever, with heavy smudged shadows around his black eyes. He looked like a ghost in striped pajamas. The workroom was dark around the edges, the light only spreading across the big table. The strange apparatus cast flickering shadows, and the liquids gleamed oddly here and there. Rose wrapped her hand protectively around her candle flame. She really didn't want it to go out in here.

“Oh good, we've been waiting ages! I persuaded Gustavus to come, but you have to give him extra cream—you can manage that, can't you?”

Rose smiled smugly and unfolded a small, rather smelly handkerchief-wrapped parcel. “Mr. Fountain's supper. He didn't eat it all.”

“Crab sandwiches!” Gustavus surged along the table. “Dear child,” he murmured, in between mouthfuls. “I would do
anything
for crab sandwiches.”

“Good. Tell us what we ought to use, then,” Freddie demanded. “I've got a mirror and this funny old bowl. I've put some water in it, look. Or we can light one of the good candles if we want. Rose says she's seen things in boots, but I don't think it was proper scrying.”

“That funny old bowl, as you put it, Frederick, is a ritual object, dating back to the time of the druids,” Gus told them rather thickly. “I dread to think what they used it for. No more sandwiches, I suppose?” he asked Rose in a hopeful tone. “Oh, well. Mmm. Try the mirror. It's the easiest way for beginners.”

Rose stared into the mirror, which lay flat on the table. Her hair looked even darker next to Freddie's whiteness. “What do I do?” she asked him.

“Prendergast says to try to see beyond your own reflection,
into
the
mists
of
the
otherworld
,” Freddie told her helpfully, consulting the book.

“And what does
that
mean?” Rose asked. “I don't see any mists. I just see me. Oh!”

“What? Did you see something?” Freddie peered eagerly over her shoulder.

“It went dark. Was it supposed to do that?” Rose looked closer, her nose almost touching the mirror. “I can't see Maisie or anything. Only black.”

“Interesting.” Gus's whiskers tickled the glass as he looked too. “Try thinking about this girl. Imagine her. Remember the last time you saw her.”

Rose tried. Perhaps she was confusing Maisie as she had really been with the little girl in the pink coat and Alberta James who never was, because nothing came into the glass, however hard she thought.

Gus huffed expressively, and his whiskers danced.

“A child surrounded by darkness. I don't like it. You need an artifact. Something of hers to focus on. Like a dog sniffing for a scent. Have you anything?”

Rose shook her head. “No, nothing.” She tried again to force a picture of Maisie into her mind, but it slipped and shimmered and wouldn't stay. Rose clenched her teeth. Her face was as pale as Freddie's now. The mirror was only dark, but it seemed dangerous. The blackness felt malevolent and cold. And it seethed—like thousands of spiders all squashed together behind the glass. She straightened up at last, abandoning the mirror and blinking at Freddie and the cat. The candlelight was warm and soft after the icy dark of the glass. “It's not working. I'll have to go back to the orphanage instead. There must be some record. Something saying where they took Maisie. Don't you think? A clue?”

They stared back at her doubtfully, and she sighed.

“Well, there's nothing else. I won't just give up.” She brightened a little. “And I could get the locket! Then we could try this again.” Rose cast a reluctant glance at the mirror. She really didn't want to. “Maisie loved that locket so—the scrying would be sure to work better then?” Her voice was pleading.

“Perhaps…” Gus nodded.

Rose curled up on a chair, tucking her feet into her nightgown for warmth. The chill of the mirror seemed to be running through her blood. “I'll go back then, next week.” She bit her lip anxiously. “A whole week, though!” If that blackness
was
anything to do with Maisie, she didn't want her there a day longer. “I don't suppose they'll let me take my afternoon off any earlier, will they?” she murmured, half to herself. “'Specially as I can't explain why.”

Gus snorted delicately. “I should like to see you explaining to Mrs. Jones that you've seen your friend in a mirror surrounded by darkness. She'd probably dose you with senna pods. Silly woman doesn't really believe in magic, for all it pays her wages.”

“But what am I going to do? Do you think I might be able to go there when they send me out on an errand? Maybe if I ran, I could get to St. Bridget's…”

Freddie shook his head slowly. “That won't help you, though. You can't just walk in and rifle through the records, can you? And how are you going to explain wanting the locket?”