The Girl in the Steel Corset (16 page)

“Indeed. Fortunately, there are always those who will pay the admission fee simply to see the site where the figure was when it was stolen. Humanity, I’m sure I do not have to tell Your Grace, is a strange animal.”

On that point Griffin couldn’t agree more, and he said as much as Mr. White led them directly to the royal display. Prince Albert’s likeness stood alone, forever frozen as he looked at the time of his death. It would be odd to see this man, who had been in his prime, standing next to the queen as she looked now.

“Did anyone witness the theft?” Griffin asked Mr. White.

“No. We have a night watchman, but the poor man was knocked unconscious by the thieving wretch. Took a nasty blow that split his head open.”

The curator had a strange expression on his face—as though he were working over a puzzle. For a second, Griffin wondered if the watchman had been privy to the theft, but he quickly discarded that theory. Stealing a waxwork figure was hardly worth the loss of a position, and if he’d been paid to let the thief in, it was unlikely he would have sustained such a serious injury, if one at all.

“Was anything else taken?”

“No. That is what led Scotland Yard to believe it was nothing more than a harmless prank.”

“I doubt your watchman would agree with that assumption,” Griffin remarked. “Could you give us his direction? I’d like to speak to him when we’re done.”

Another benefit of dukedom was rarely being questioned or told no. Mr. White was obviously curious as to why Griff would want to speak to the man—what Griff’s interest was in this whole debacle—but he kept his questions to himself.

“Of course, Your Grace. I will get that for you directly.”

The curator didn’t hang about once he’d shown them where they wanted to go. He had to man the front, of course, and copy the watchman’s address, but he asked Griffin to summon him should he require anything—anything at all. Then he bowed and took his leave.

Jasper waited until the man was gone before asking, “You ever get tired of folks puckerin’ up to your backside?”

Griffin faced him with mock gravity. “Yes. It is deuced tiring, people doing whatever I wish. Makes my life so very disagreeable.”

With an arched brow and wry smile, Jasper shook his head. “I sure do feel sorry for you.”

“Indeed, and for your information, I don’t enjoy having people trip all over themselves to please me.” Griffin frowned. “They usually want something in return. It makes it very difficult to know who my real friends are.”

“You live with them,” Jasper reminded him.

That was true, but there was no need of him to say that since Jasper knew it, as well. Griffin ducked under the velvet rope that surrounded the display and crouched beside the spot where the queen’s likeness had once stood.

Who would do this? And for what purpose? He scanned the area, seeing nothing, not a hair nor scrap of clothing nor…

There was something. He took glass slides and a small blade from his inside coat pocket.

“Jas, come look at this.”

His friend drew closer. “What is it?”

“Oil.” He scraped the blade through the globule, taking care not to scratch the floor. He smelled it. “The same texture and scent as that found at the automaton crime sites.”

Jasper bent over his shoulder for a better look. “The Machinist?”

Griffin smiled slightly. He had no reason to feel pleased at being correct in his assumptions, but he did. It felt as though they were closing in on the criminal even though they still had no idea where or who he was. “Indeed. Our devious friend has been busy as of late.”

“Why the heck would he want to steal a wax dummy when he obviously prefers metal?”

“I don’t know.” Griffin sandwiched the oil between two glass slides. He’d take it to Emily for further analysis.

Jasper scowled at him. “If you don’t know, why do you look so pleased with yourself?”

Griffin flashed a lopsided grin. “Because we’re going to find out.”

Mr. White returned at that moment with the watchman’s direction. Griffin thanked the curator and then he and Jasper swiftly took their leave, returning to their cycles and setting off to the watchman’s neighborhood.

A short time later, after weaving in and out of traffic at the highest speed they could obtain and still avoid pedestrians and horses, they knocked on the door of a small, but clean and cozy little house in Shoreditch.

“Long way to travel for work,” Jasper commented as they waited on the step.

Griffin shrugged. “The underground makes it much easier for Londoners to commute these days.”

Jasper made a face at his mention of the subterranean railway. The cowboy didn’t like tight spaces any more than Griffin did.

“No,” Griff remarked with a small smile. “I don’t like it, either.”

The door was opened by a stocky man, shorter than Griff but easily twice as broad. Griffin consulted the card Mr. White had given him. “Mr. Angus MacFarlane?”

“Aye,” the man replied, appraising Griffin’s fine clothes and the pistol partially concealed by Jasper’s duster. Ginger
brows lowered over sharp, blue eyes. “How can I help you gentlemen?”

Griffin offered his hand. “Griffin King, Duke of Greythorne. This is my associate, Jasper Renn. We would like to talk to you about the Tussaud’s robbery.”

MacFarlane didn’t look impressed. In fact, he looked downright wary. “Mind if I ask to see some identification,
Your Grace?
”

Jasper tried unsuccessfully to hide a chuckle. Griffin shot him a wry look as he produced one of his calling cards for the man.

The big Scot looked at the card, finely printed on the best stock and obviously decided it—and Griff—was the real deal. He stepped back from the door. “Come in.”

“Thank you.” Griff crossed the threshold first, followed by Jasper.

“I’d offer you a drink, but I haven’t anything the likes of what you’d be used to.” MacFarlane made it sound as though Griff was the one at fault. This was nothing new. With the knowledge that being a duke would open many doors for him, also came the knowledge that not everyone would like him for it.

“We have no desire to abuse your hospitality, Mr. MacFarlane,” he said, all charm and smiles. “In fact, we will take as little of your time as possible. Mr. White said you did not see your attacker. Is that correct?”

“Yes, Your Grace. Snuck up behind me, the bounder did,
and coshed me brainbox but good. Woke up covered in me own blood.”

Griffin frowned at the man, who had no bandage, bruising or even swelling anywhere to be seen on his nearly bald skull. “You seem to have recovered remarkably well.”

MacFarlane shifted uncomfortably. “That’s just it, Your Grace. A little too remarkably. ’Tis the damndest thing, pardon my French.”

Still frowning, Griff asked, “Might I see where you were struck, sir?”

The Scotsman shrugged, obviously chalking this entire encounter up to aristocratic eccentricity, and turned so that Griffin had a good view of the side of his head. He could see the man’s scalp through the thinning, short expanse of orange hair.

The light in the room was good, and they were near a window. Griffin took a magnifying glass from his pocket and raised it so it hovered over MacFarlane’s large skull. There, just above the man’s slightly cauliflowered ear. “Were you a boxer, Mr. MacFarlane?”

“Aye, Your Grace. When I was a young man. Never made much of a career of it, and all I have to show for it is me bashed-up ear. You see what you’re lookin’ for? Just above there.”

Griffin did see it. A thin, pink line of newly healed skin just above that battered ear. It made his heart go cold. “I see it, yes.”

“Now you understand why I’ll be wearing a bandage when next I go to work.”

Yes, he did. Anyone who saw this would think MacFarlane was either abnormal, or that he hadn’t been injured at all. Griffin was surprised the man even showed him the spot.

“Were there any strange substances near the wound?” he asked, tucking the glass back into his pocket. “I realize it might have been difficult to tell with all the blood.”

MacFarlane looked at him, then at Jasper and back to Griff again, as though trying to decide how much to tell them. Griffin didn’t blame him, the man’s story was already damn near impossible to believe. “There was oil, Your Grace. Like the kind we use to keep the museum’s automatons moving smoothlike. I thought it would get into me head and make a mess of the wound, but it…it healed.”

Griff schooled his features as a slow panic rose within him. “And a good thing for you, too, sir. I think you are wise to wear the bandage, and I assure you that your secret is safe with me.” He smiled. “We’ve trespassed long enough on your hospitality. We’ll see ourselves out. Good day, Mr. MacFarlane. You may keep the card, and feel free to contact me if you remember anything else.”

Once they were safely outside, beneath darkening clouds that threatened rain, Jasper turned to Griffin. “That man’s wound healed just like the one I had that Miss Emily put her special salve on, the stuff your grandpa found.”

Griffin nodded, his mood grim as he swung his leg over the bulk of his velocycle. “The Machinist has Organites, and he’s figured out a way to use them.”

Emily’s laboratory was like nothing Finley had ever seen before, or was likely to ever see again.

It was like some kind of macabre toy shop, or a mad inventor’s lair. All around her were parts of automatons, bits of gears and machinery. Tools lay scattered over the bench that ran the entire length of one wall. The air smelled of hot metal and oil mixed with various medicinal odors. On the far wall, beakers and burners waited to be used. High shelves held differently colored liquids stored in clear bottles, while bottles of rich cobalt blue and dark amber glass contained chemicals and concoctions sensitive to light. They looked very pretty set up there—like gems of different shapes and sizes.

In one corner sat a large, gun-metal-gray cat. It looked like engravings she had seen of exotic jungle felines, only
made of metal. It was beautiful and slightly…wrong, all at the same time.

On a long table near the center of the room lay a slightly tarnished brass automaton with its front panel removed. It resembled one of those surgical engravings in the medical books Silas sold in his shop, but it was metal instead of human flesh—thankfully. The spindly machine Finley had wrecked at the circus sat on another table. Sam was right to think of her as dangerous, she thought as she saw the damage her own hands had wrought.

The waxwork of Queen Victoria was on the table closest to her, looking so lifelike it sent a chill down Finley’s spine. It looked like a corpse—a poor old woman divested of her clothing, as well as her life. So realistic it was that she felt almost as though she should mourn for it, cover it with a sheet and say a brief prayer over the lifeless form.

But it was little more than a doll, she reminded herself as she came closer. Wax, not flesh, not human at all. Still, her hand hesitated a second over the form before she could actually bring herself to touch it. She poked it in the ribs, the wax was hard and unyielding. She let out a little sigh of relief.

Emily smiled at her from the other side of the table. “Were you thinkin’ she might sit up and bite you?”

Finley chuckled, a little embarrassed, but not so much that she couldn’t laugh at herself. “I didn’t get much past the sitting-up part.”

“She is unsettling. Reminds me a little bit of my nanny O’Brien.”

The fond smile on Emily’s face did more to squelch Finley’s unsettled nerves than the knowledge that she could destroy the figure fairly easily should it do anything odd. She let her gaze roam over the statue, finally seeing it as a harmless thing.

She frowned. The thief had placed enough humanity on the figure to leave it partially dressed—to leave it with some dignity attached. Yet, it had been left in Whitechapel, a place dignity forgot.

“Why did he take the figure’s gown if his only intention was to leave it on Jack’s doorstep?”

“Ooh, Jack, is it?” Emily’s voice was rife with teasing. “Are the two of ye intimate acquaintances now?”

Finley grinned, she couldn’t help it. “You’re a fine one to tease when you have both Sam and that pretty cowboy dancing attendance on you.” Her gaze fell back to the wax figure, and all humor vanished. “Uh, Emily? I think I might know why he took the whole figure.”

The redhead came round the side of the table, and looked where Finley pointed.

“Oh, aye. I noticed those were gone first thing.”

Where the figure’s glass eyes should have been were nothing but empty wax sockets.

“You can see where they were pried out,” Finley said, gesturing along the lash line. God, but it was unsettling
to look at. “Now, what would someone want with glass eyes?”

“Any number of things. People wear them, dolls have them. They’re used in sophisticated lifelike automatons, as well.”

Finley’s head whipped toward her. “I’ve heard nasty stories about what those machines are used for.”

Emily made a face. “Don’t believe everything you hear. I know of several machines that are very humanoid that are treated with the greatest respect by their owners.”

“Do you think The Machinist took the figure for its eyes?”

“Possibly—either for his own work or to sell. I’ll send a note ’round to my supplier, ask if he’s heard about anyone trying to sell a pair of Victoria-blue eyes. I would imagine they’d fetch a good price, considering they would have been made to match Her Majesty’s.”

Hand on her hip, Finley gazed at the smaller girl with considerable respect. “You’re a very useful person, Emily O’Brien.”

The Irish girl preened under the praise. “You’re not so shabby yourself.
I
could never get into a boxing ring with Jasper.”

“Yes, well, I reckon Jasper would have other things in mind if the two of you were in any kind of enclosed space, alone.”

Pink filled Emily’s cheeks. “He just likes to tease me. He doesn’t mean it.”

Finley rolled her eyes. “A girl as intelligent as you cannot possibly be that dense. Has he tried to kiss you?”

“No! Of course not.”

Finley leaned her elbow on the table near the wax Victoria’s shoulder and grinned. “How about Sam, then?”

The blush in the other girl’s cheeks deepened. “Nor him.”

She shook her head. “That’s inexcusable. Two handsome fellows vying for your attention and you haven’t kissed either of them. Of course, were I you, I’d slap that Sam for being such a brute. Kiss Jasper. He’s much more charming.”

“Charming with every girl he meets,” Emily replied none too charitably.

Finley arched a brow. “Jealous?”

She shoved a pale hand against Finley’s shoulder with enough force that Finley’s upper body leaned a little. “What about you? Did you kiss Dandy?”

“No.” She straightened. An image of Jack Dandy’s face filled her mind. “Do you suppose he’d be a good kisser?” Before she would have blamed these thoughts on her darker nature, but now she wasn’t so certain.

“I think he’s had enough experience that he’d be a very fine kisser.” A sly light brightened Emily’s eyes. “What about Griffin?”

Finley feigned ignorance and pretended to notice something of interest on her fingernails. “What of him?”

“Has he kissed you?”

“He has not.” She made a face. “Lord, I’m a charity case to him—a female whose life he feels responsible for. Nothing else.”

Emily didn’t look convinced. “I’ve seen the way he looks at you, and how you look at him. He’s thought about it. Trust me.”

A tiny smile flittered across Finley’s lips. She leaned closer, just in case the machines could hear her, and confided, “I’ve thought about it, too, but I don’t think it would be an intelligent thing to do—not while he’s trying to help me. It would only complicate things.”

“Then you might as well go back to Dandy.” Emily’s tone was heavy with teasing as she studied the figure’s wax left hand. “I’m sure he’d be more than happy to let you practice on him. Maybe that will make Griffin realize he wants you for himself.”

“No, thank you. I won’t be practicing on anyone. I can’t juggle two admirers like you can.” But even as she spoke, Finley felt a strange confusion in her chest. She liked Griffin, and thought him very handsome, but she also felt something for Jack Dandy. Oh, the two feelings weren’t nearly the same, but they were similar in the fact that she found both of them attractive in their own different ways.

She had no business thinking that way about either of
them. It wasn’t proper and it was just plain wrong to be thinking about kissing when obviously there was someone out there trying to ruin her life by making her look like a criminal.

“What are these?” she asked, pointing to the small grooves she had just noticed in the wax on the side of the figure’s face.

Emily frowned. “I don’t see anything.”

It took Finley a moment to realize she wasn’t imagining things, but rather she saw the “queen” the way her darker nature would see her—with preternaturally sharp eyes. “Look closer. There are marks in the wax.”

Still frowning, Emily slipped her goggles over her eyes and covered both lenses with the attached magnifiers. She turned a small knob on the either side, fiddling with both as she bent slightly to study the figure’s face. Still adjusting the knobs, she studied one side of the head, then the other. “They look like caliper marks. Someone was measuring Her Majesty’s face.”

“Could it have been someone at the museum when they made the figure?”

Emily shook her head as she gently searched the rest of the waxwork for more marks. “These figures are made by taking molds and measurements of the actual person whenever possible. The queen would have sat for all those things before they made her likeness. These, I suspect, were made by our thief.”

“Again I ask, why?” Straightening, Finley folded her arms over her chest. “What is this mad bugger up to?”

“I don’t know,” Emily murmured, clearly as baffled as Finley. She lifted her goggles once more. “But he wanted to blame you for it, so maybe we should ask a different question.”

Her gaze locked with the smaller girl’s, Finley could only nod her head in grim agreement. “Who is he? And how does he know me?”

“She’s trouble and no one else can see it.” Sam was in a decidedly petulant mood as he sat sprawled on the sofa in Leon’s apartments in Russell Street. “Scotland Yard came to the house to talk to her about the murder of the son of her former employer, and everyone’s all
‘poor Finley
.’” He said the last bit in a falsetto dripping with disgust and mockery.

His older friend came into the small sitting room from the small kitchen area and handed him a cup of coffee. Sam accepted the cup with thanks, wincing as the hot pottery burned his flesh. Leon’s metal hand hadn’t felt the heat, of course, but Sam’s—even the one with metal underneath—did.

He set the mug on the low table in front of him and glanced down at the welt on his palm. It lingered for a moment, stinging and then gradually began to fade until it was little more than a slightly pink itch and then nothing at all.

“That’s quite amazing,” Leon remarked, seating himself in a chair beside the sofa. He looked every inch the gentleman in his immaculate silk waistcoat and brushed wool jacket. “Have you always healed so quickly?”

During one of their conversations, Sam had confided to Leon his strange strength and healing abilities, which had intensified as of late. “Not quite so quickly, no,” he replied. “Usually it took some of Emily’s salve to make wounds heal completely.”

“Ah, yes.” Leon smiled slightly. “The brilliant but Machiavellian Emily. What did she put in this ‘salve’ you speak of?”

Sam hesitated. It was one thing to tell his secrets, but he had sworn to Griffin that he would never divulge the truth about the Organites. “I’m not sure,” he replied, looking down at his hand again so he didn’t have to lie to his friend’s face. “She never told me.”

There was a moment’s silence as Leon took a drink of the hot, strong coffee.
Café-espress
he called it. “Tell me more about this Finley person. She sounds quite extraordinary—and dangerous.”

“Yes,” Sam agreed wholeheartedly. “Since Griffin took her in, there’s been nothing but trouble. She comes and goes as she wants, consorts with criminals, is suspected of murder, and now… Now she may be involved in a matter Griff is investigating. Even if she’s not to blame, she’s up to her eyes in it. I know it.”

“The stalwart Duke of Greythorne.” This was said with a hint of mockery. “He is just a boy, Samuel. I dare say he’s infatuated with the girl and refuses to see her as anything but perfect.”

Sam grunted, lifting his cup to his mouth. The coffee burned his tongue but tasted good. “He knows she’s not right,” he remarked. “He’s seen what she’s capable of, but he thinks he can fix her.”

“Some people are beyond fixing.” Leon set his cup on the table. “From all you’ve told me, I would think you would not care if the duke were made a fool of after all he’s done to you.” He meant, of course, what Griffin and Emily had done to him. Made him a freak. “You could simply walk away.”

“They’re still my friends,” Sam admitted. “I don’t want to see anyone injure them.”

“My dear boy, if you are concerned with the safety of your friends, you have to do something about this girl.”

Sam’s scowl gave way to an expression of confusion. “Like what?”

Leon shrugged, making the gesture sophisticated as Sam suspected only people from the continent could. “Make them see her for what she truly is. Force her to show her true colors.”

Brow furrowed, Sam thought about it. “How?”

The older man smiled patiently. “There isn’t a devious bone in your body, is there? How very noble. You push
her into a corner. You said this…affliction of hers tends to reveal itself when she feels threatened. Threaten her with the truth, make her tip her hand to your friends. Then they will see that you were right all along.”

Sam thought about it. Leon made it sound so simple. “You’re right.”

“Age does have its benefits,” his friend quipped with a smile.

They talked a little while longer about other things, until Leon finished his coffee and announced that he had to call their visit to an unfortunate halt. “I’m afraid I have an engagement, but we will see each other again soon, no?”

Sam rose to his full height, towering over the other man. Despite his superior size and strength he felt young and foolish next to this worldly man who had accepted the metal part of himself with grace and ease. Maybe someday Sam could do the same and not think of his new arm—of his heart—as something alien and wrong, as a betrayal by those he held so dear.

“Of course,” he replied, accepting the handshake. He didn’t even wince when Leon closed his chromium fingers over his, engulfing Sam’s hand in both of his. The metal was warm where it had cradled the coffee cup but cold everywhere else.

“Thank you,” he said as they walked to the door together. “I appreciate you taking the time to see me and offer advice.”

The older man smiled. “I am here whenever you find yourself in need of a friend. I hope you always know that. You are a good man. You’ll do the right thing where your friends are concerned, and they will thank you for it.”

Sam smiled. How long had it been since he’d felt as though someone understood him so well? “Good day, Leon.”