The Mislaid Magician (21 page)

“If those ancient wizards could actually create artificial ley lines—” I began, but Mr. Wrexton was already shaking his head.

“It’s not the same sort of problem,” he said. “Magical power behaves in certain ways, just as water does. We can dig canals—artificial rivers—but we can’t make water flow uphill. I can believe, just barely, that those ancient wizards knew how to create new, artificial ley lines. To work as a spell diagram, though, they’d have to be linked, and without something to contain the linkage, it would become unstable very quickly.”

“This is interesting speculation, to be sure,” Aunt Elizabeth put in. “But it doesn’t get us any further ahead with our current problems.”

“Maybe it gives us a place to start,” I said. I put my finger gently on the map I had been looking at, right where three of Mr. Morris’s heavily marked ley lines came together.

Aunt Elizabeth looked across the table. “I don’t see the significance, dear.”

“Well, I am not perfectly certain,” I said. “But I believe this is the location of the Dancing Weans.”

“What?” Mr. Wrexton said.

“The stone circle where James and I found the—found Herr Schellen. It’s just past Goosepool, a little way from the railway line, on top of a hill. And it does seem a bit of a coincidence that so many of Mr. Morris’s leys come together there, doesn’t it?”

“And look here,” James said, pointing to the next junction, southeast of Goosepool on the opposite side of the river. “That’s—”

“Haliwar Tower!” I said.

“And there is another stone circle built right into the tower walls,” James said. “I noticed it after the facing fell away in the earthquake.” He looked at Mr. Wrexton. “Would a stone circle be enough to contain your linkages? There are certainly enough of them scattered all over England.”

“I suppose it’s possible,” Mr. Wrexton said cautiously.

You may imagine the flurry of comparing maps that followed. There are several other junctions in the vicinity, so Mr. Wrexton, Aunt Elizabeth, and I are going to visit one of them tomorrow, to see what, if anything, is there. We decided not to begin with either of the places James and I had already been, as that might arouse suspicion. In a few days, if all goes well, we shall return to Goosepool, and eventually to Haliwar Tower.

Meanwhile, James continues his investigations into the finances of the Stockton and Darlington Railway (which, I must confess, I find nearly as tedious as all of the ley line mapping that the Wrextons and I have been doing this past week. I will be vastly relieved to be doing something different, even if it is only a sedate carriage ride through country scenery).

Your bored but busy,

Cecy

(in cipher)

My dear Thomas,

I had forgot that there was yet another of those ancient stones near Skeynes. I say “yet another” because in course of their magical inquiries, Cecelia and the Wrextons have unearthed a third stone circle of interest near Darlington. (The first two, your lamentable memory may remind you, were the one built into Haliwar Tower and the one near which we discovered the sheepdog.) The three of them rode out yesterday to investigate the spot where, according to Wrexton’s old maps, several ley lines of some importance came together. They returned with the news that a stone circle sits squarely atop the meeting place, but that they had been unable to examine it closely as the owner of the land has fenced off the entire area due to a strong dislike of fox hunts.

Wrexton is now convinced that there is some connection between the old standing stones and the ley lines that Wellington is so concerned about. I believe he means to write you in extensive technical detail, as a preface to requesting your assistance. He seems to think that any tampering with the leys is restricted to the north country, but since he has no basis for comparison, he cannot be certain. When I mentioned your adventures with that prowler at the Tingle Stone this morning, he conceived the notion of persuading you to provide the basis—that is, he means to ask if you will ride out to the nearest circle in your vicinity and make some observations. Let me add my pleas to his. Anything that can speed the end of this tedious business would be welcome.

For tedious it is, in the extreme. I have spent the last week poring over the financial records of the Stockton and Darlington line. I now know more about the shipping of coal from the northern fields than you would believe possible, and I am positively looking forward to my next meeting with that inquisitive bore Lord Cheffington. For once, I shall not need to hold back when he starts his interminable questioning.

Two promising lines of inquiry have emerged from this flood of involuntary education. First, I have finally got hold of a list of the stockholders in the Stockton and Darlington Railway. In addition to “Stephenson and his lot,” there are a number of persons associated with the Religious Society of Friends, or Quakers. Several of the locals have made recent trips to London; I have arranged a meeting with one of them this coming Monday, in hopes of discovering why they have developed such an urge for travel.

Second, there are plans afoot to provide the Stockton and Darlington with some direct competition. A man named Tennant has proposed building a second railway line from the coal fields to Stockton, along a route some fifteen to twenty miles north of the current system. He has been at work on this proposal for several years; indeed, the incorporation act comes before Parliament soon. The recent spate of accidents on the Stockton and Darlington may or may not work to his advantage. On the one hand, he can argue that he will do a better job than the current railway line, but on the other, the accidents give reactionaries like Sheridan and Fitzhenry the chance to point out that steam railways are unsafe.

Tennant’s proposal is also in competition with the corporation the Webbs have proposed. The more I find out about their scheme, the more absurd it seems. They intend to build a southern line, but both the docks at Stockton and the western coal fields are on the north bank of the Tees, so such a route would require building two expensive and unnecessary bridges. Nevertheless, they have scraped together funds and completed all the preliminaries in near-record time. Their bill of incorporation, too, is to be presented to Parliament this session.

I am in hopes that my meeting with Mr. Pease on Monday will provide some insight, if not some answers, in regard to both Tennant and the southern line. Mr. Pease has a reputation as a knowing one, and is deeply involved in the affairs of the Stockton and Darlington. He’ll have as much information about his competition as anyone, and perhaps more.

In the meantime, I must acknowledge that the years have improved young Daventer’s manners. I am in receipt of a note from him promising to persuade Mr. Skelly (the obstreperous Irish ley line expert) to take an interest in our problem, and no impertinent questions, either. He goes so far as to promise Mr. Skelly’s arrival within the month. This of course means that we shall be stuck fast in the north until then, but I have long since given over hoping for a speedy resolution to this affair, and am currently trying simply for a satisfactory one.

Yours,

James

(Enchanted by T. Schofield, his mark)

Dear Cecy,

How tiresome it is sometimes, losing one’s temper. I am still out of sorts with Georgy for the remark about my harder stamp, but I am more out of sorts with my own foolishness. I have come to try my hand at nursery life again, to see if the squabbles of the younger set can teach me anything about my own tantrum.

Please excuse the blotted page. Yesterday I put the pen down with too much haste when I went to answer the latest alarum.

Edward has inherited his father’s youthful fondness for heights. On this occasion, Edward attained the cornice over the dining room door. I think he must have climbed up the curtain of the nearest window and edged his way along the molding. When the servants were laying the table for dinner, he struck a heroic pose on his perch and declaimed one of the improving verses I set him to learn. This poetic outburst was unexpected, to say the least. Only one wine glass was broken. It’s a miracle the damage wasn’t greater.

Thomas gave Edward a fine scolding, partly for startling the servants but mostly for reciting verse. Thomas didn’t
say
he found it alarming that there may be a family turn for poetry, but given recent events, he doesn’t need to.

I have promised Thomas upon my honor that Edward will be given no more improving verses to learn. If there is a bent toward poesy, the poor child does not have it from me.

Except for another squabble about toy soldiers (Eleanor has commandeered all Edward’s favorites to stand guard over the twins’ famous Map of Skeynes), it has been peaceful in the nursery of late. I like it here at the top of the house. It’s comfortable to sit here by the fire, an impartial observer as the nurses direct bedtime preparations. I feel a bit like one of those domestic goddesses the Romans were so good at inventing, a very minor goddess. Perhaps they had a goddess of nightcaps, or hearth rugs, or candlesticks. I feel a little like that.

Oh, dear. Inspired by recent events, Diana has been moved to compose her first couplet. She proclaimed it proudly just now over her cup of warm milk:
Drina tells God / Arthur smells odd.
Diana appears to view this as an
adequate substitute for a bedtime prayer. Fortunately, I can leave it to Nurse to disabuse her of this notion.

I should seal this letter and give it to Thomas to enchant for me. Nothing else worthy of putting in a letter, even a letter as inconsequential as this one, has happened. (Arthur gave Edward a bump on the forehead with a battledore when they were playing shuttlecock this morning, but there was nothing premeditated about it.) Nothing seems likely to happen, either. At last we are enduring a break in our run of fine weather, the sort of day that we ought to have had back in March. It is raining in a sullen way, not hard but not stopping, either, which matches my mood perfectly. What a good thing this ugly streak of weather held off until now. Had it arrived during the races at Cheltenham, it would have ruined the gaiety. The king himself was in evidence. His horse did not distinguish itself, but His Majesty does not seem to have permitted that to interfere with his usual amusements.

Yes, it’s come to this. I have been reading the newspapers, and not just for titbits concerning the mysterious poetess. I have been reading them because there’s nothing else to do here. Nothing that I can accomplish with the moments snatched from the demands of “Only look, Mama!” that is.

If nothing else, such titbits of gossip are useful when I am taking tea with the Cramptons. They were in Cheltenham, ostensibly for the races, but in fact to get a look at the king. Their reward was also their punishment, for in addition to His Majesty, they also saw his brother and heir, William, Duke of Clarence. The Duchess of Kent was expected to be there, as well, the better for her daughter Alexandria to become better acquainted with her royal uncles. Unfortunately the duchess could not attend, for her daughter caught a streaming cold a few days before the event.

The Cramptons were voluble in their praise of the consequence and dignity of the king and his brother. I think that the presence of a young girl with sniffles would have lowered the tone of the occasion considerably, but the Cramptons seem disappointed to have missed a sight of her all the same.

I take back every word. To think he was laying his plans even as I wrote that last page by the light of the nursery candles. I could scream.

This morning, for the first time in weeks, I was not awakened at dawn by Thomas and the necessity to ride the bounds before we indulge in so much as a cup of tea. Indeed, this morning I woke of my own volition to find the sun well up and the household abustle.

Puzzled and not a little alarmed by this change in routine, I woke Thomas. This took some doing, I can tell you, and when I finally succeeded in bringing him to a sense of where he was and who I am, he buried his face in the pillow with such a groan that I contemplated sending for a physician.

Thomas emerged before I could take serious fright. “Forgive me, Kate,” he said, words I have never yet learned to hear with any degree of equanimity. Only think of the things Thomas wouldn’t dream of asking my forgiveness for.

I am asked to forgive him for being a half-wit, it turns out. To spare himself the inconvenience of my company last night, Thomas went out alone to watch for an intruder the gamekeeper alerted him to. (To do him credit, it has not even crossed Thomas’s mind to use the foul weather as an excuse for leaving me behind.) As he was alone, Thomas was quite unable to stop the intruder, who made a neat escape while Thomas was casting some sort of spell on the man’s garters. I may have that detail wrong. I freely confess I had given up listening closely by the time Thomas’s narrative had proceeded so far. Fury distracts me.

I held my tongue, over all but the absolute essentials, through the entire ride of the boundary. (Thomas assured me that his spell would lose little efficacy through his tardiness, though like most magic, it seems to work better the more discomfort the maker of magic endures.) By the time we were back in the stable yard, I was able to view the situation with a degree of detachment. Not a great deal. Enough to keep from giving Thomas a piece of my mind in front of the servants. But only just.

Were Thomas not possessed by a devil of self-indulgence, we might have captured the intruder and be possessed of fresh knowledge at this moment! I could tear my hair.

To ease my mind, I have taken up my customary post at the nursery worktable. This is viewed with tolerance by Edward, Diana, and Drina. Arthur, I fear, finds my presence a dampening effect on some scheme of his. (Need I say this only makes me the more determined to stay right where I am?)

Yours,

Kate