Imogen Robertson - Circle of Shadows

‘I wish I could have stopped him.’

‘If the thief had found anything of value we should all be ruined, our project at an end. Our leader here is in constant communication with a network of superiors, our leaders across Europe.’

Is he now, Pegel thought. He said, ‘The thief had no luck then?’

‘No, the significant papers were very cleverly concealed, and found undisturbed.’

Pegel shifted in his seat to try and ease the ache in his leg. ‘So you know who the leader is now then?’ Florian shook his head, and Pegel rolled his eyes.

‘But it’d be so simple to find out! I told you, that fellow was running up from Fluss Strasse when I had my “encounter” with him, as you call it. All you need to do is wander down that way and ask in a casual manner whose house was broken into last evening, and there you go! They’re probably all talking about it.’

‘Jacob, you don’t understand. The society requires loyalty, obedience. I shall be introduced to him at the proper time.’

‘I thought you were a brotherhood. How can you be brothers if all these layers of secrecy are required?’

‘It is for the greater good.’

‘Greater good! Well, if you say so. So are there other bands of merry revolutionaries — sorry, visionaries — elsewhere in Maulberg? Do you actually have a chance of doing any good, or have my sacrifices been in vain?’

Florian shook his head again, and Jacob thought of a young horse, troubled with flies. ‘Oh no, Jacob. I told you much good has already been done. The leaders of our group first came together almost seven years ago. There are many of our mind who hold high positions at court in Ulrichsberg. So I have been told.’

‘But you don’t know who?’

‘Of course not.’

‘Can we eat?’ Pegel said, apparently losing interest. ‘Healing makes me hungry.’

‘When I talk of the greater good, Jacob, I mean something real. It’s not just an idea. I have something to show you. I thought of it as soon as I saw the equation you wrote out, and well … after what we’ve been speaking of.’ Florian reached into his pocket and took something out of it, then held it between his fingers, hesitating.

‘Oh, give it here then.’ Pegel took it and looked. It was the small medallion struck in silver. On its face was an owl holding open a book. On the pages were legible four letters: PMCV . On the reverse was an outline of the state of Maulberg.

‘Confident lot, aren’t you? Claiming Maulberg for your own already.’

‘It is just to show where we are from,’ Frenzel said earnestly. ‘There are many places in Europe where our members hold great power.’

‘Hmm. What does PMCV stand for?’

‘ Per me caeci vident .’

‘“Through me the blind shall see.” Interesting claim. Now you said you thought of it when I wrote out that equation. Does that make me the owl? Yet in talking about your owl it sounds like you think me blind.’

‘You just need to be led towards the light, Pegel.’ Florian looked confused suddenly and made to reach for the coin again. ‘I shouldn’t have given it to you; they are only for those who have taken the oaths. Give it back.’

Pegel held it out of his reach. ‘Hang on there, you can’t give a man a present then snatch it back.’

‘Please, Jacob, it was a stupid idea.’ Pegel looked at him. There were tears in his eyes.

‘All right, all right. Per me caeci vident , eh?’ He ran his finger over the raised body of the owl, then passed it back to Florian. ‘Then talk, owl, and I shall eat.’

Michaels set down the letter on the table. It was the short note from Beatrice that had brought Mrs Padfield to Ulrichsberg. ‘So you think this man Kupfel is the magus she wanted to learn from?’

‘He’s the only alchemist in town.’

‘You haven’t been to see him yourself?’

‘I intended to do so, but by the time I had found out his name, an attachment had formed between Colonel Padfield and myself. I did not want to risk his affection, which was foolish. I find I have married a generous man. And then …’

‘What, lady?’

She smiled briefly, sadly. ‘I was sure she would come to me. I married under my true name, and we always read the papers wherever we lived. She would have seen I had married well, and come to pick my pockets. She has not.’

Michaels stroked his jaw. ‘She could be anywhere by now. What’s to say she’s not in Spain, telling fortunes there?’

‘If you find signs she had gone there, I will not ask you to follow. But I am sure she would have written. I can only think she either has married very well indeed, so wishes to keep our past as secret as I do, or she is dead. I would like to know which. I hope you will help me, though I know there is no reason why you should.’

He considered, and thought of his wife and son, the mantelpiece in the kitchen where the family liked to spend their time with its pewter-ware laid out. ‘That ivory puzzle-ball you were playing with — I think my wife would like it. If I find you certain word of your sister, I’ll take that for her.’

‘Very well.’

Michaels got to his feet and his greatcoat knocked against the table and made the tea cups rattle. Mrs Padfield stood also and rang the bell for the maid.

‘Why now?’ he asked. ‘You lived with the not-knowing all this time. Why confess all to your husband, then me?’

She clasped her hands loosely in front of her. ‘I think I have been looking for a way to tell my husband the truth for some time. I am … very fond of him. Then I heard a man like yourself had arrived in court and it gave me hope.’

‘Any other way to know her, other than the name and the hair?’

‘She had a plain gold cross, with her name engraved on the back. A boy she liked gave it to her many years ago, and I never saw her without it after.’

The maid curtseyed at the door and Michaels made to follow her. Mrs Padfield offered her hand and Michaels caught the maid’s blink of surprise. No wonder she couldn’t go looking for herself if offering a hand to a man like him made the servants curious. ‘Thank you, Michaels.’

He nodded, and followed the maid out of the house.

It was a small and extremely inky child who opened the door. Harriet had elected after their discussion with Krall to find out what she could of the writer Bertram Raben and Krall had directed her to the shopfront in one of the smaller squares of Ulrichsberg where his works had been printed and sold, and where the official newspaper of Maulberg was written and printed. It was suggested that to avoid the sneers of the court, Harriet should take her maid. It irritated her, but when she saw Dido’s delight at an outing, even if it were walking three paces behind her mistress to a newspaper office, she felt more at peace, and a little guilty.

Harriet asked for Herr Dorf and the inky child jerked his head towards a young man in shirt-sleeves standing behind a desk in the back of the room. It was a crowded space and Harriet had a general impression of paper, noise and tobacco smoke. Four or five men, rather sloppily dressed, shouted instructions or requests back and forth. The man to whom they wished to speak looked up briefly and seemed to be in the process of readying himself to speak to them, when another man of roughly the same age, but double his girth thrust a sheet of paper under his nose. He spoke German, but with such weight on each of his words, Harriet found she could understand him reasonably well.

‘Look at this, Dorf! Look! Four Princesses at the Gala and the names of three of them are spelled wrongly! It will have to be altered, or we shall have all of the cats about our ears.’

‘Then speak to Flounders, Kurt. And you could learn to write more clearly.’ Dorf’s voice was calm but sounded deeply weary.