Mercedes Lackey - The Fire Rose

She bore her prizes off to the bathroom, and spent a rapturous hour "Putting herself together." When she was done, she surveyed the result in the mirror, and was more than pleased with the result.

Just as importantly, she was no longer self-conscious about meeting with her employer. Clothing was a kind of armor, really, and her armor had been patched, weak, and dangerously thin before. Beautiful clothing was, in a way, invisible-but people noticed when one was poorly or shabbily dressed, and acted accordingly. Now she could face any man or woman on the face of the globe and feel confident that she would be judged on her merit, not the state of her clothing. Her self-confidence increased with every passing second. Now she was herself, now she was Rosalind Hawkins, scholar and Doctoral candidate, and the equal of anyone in America, even Jason Cameron! After all, she had something he wanted, and that made her the seller in a seller's market.

She left the bathroom and entered the bedroom The silent, invisible servants had struck again. The bed was made, the havoc she had wrought among the clothing had been tidied away, her wrapper and nightdress whisked off to who-knew-where.

How are they doing this? she wondered, with mingled admiration and irritation. I haven't been deafened by all the noise of the locomotives, have I?

She moved on to the sitting room-and the breakfast things had vanished also. But there was a new addition; a pile of books lay on the table beside the couch, a reading-lamp had been lit, and the end of a speaking-tube was laid beside the books. On top of the books was another note.

Something about this sent a chill of apprehension running down the length of her spine, though she could not imagine why it should be so. She stepped carefully over to the table and picked up the note. Her hands shook as she opened it.

Dear Miss Hawkins, it said. Now I must make a confession to you. You have been brought here under false pretenses.

She almost dropped the note there and then, but something made her continue reading.

There are no children; I never had a wife. I do require the abilities of a remarkable scholar, the exact abilities and skills that I outlined in my missive to your mentor, Professor Cathcart. I am an invalid and an accident has left me unable to read the books that I require for my own research. In addition, I am imperfectly acquainted with medieval German and Gaelic. I desire your services, both as a reader and a translator.

She blinked at the letter, jaw dropping in a most unladylike expression of amazement. Of all of the possibilities, this was the one she would never, ever have guessed at.

The salary will remain the same; the hours will perhaps be longer, and extend deep into the night, for it is at night that I require the distractions of work to free my mind from pain. I fear that you will not be able to make as many excursions into San Francisco as you would like, but that is only because the journey is of three hours in duration, and you would probably wish to stay overnight. At the moment my need of your services does not allow for this; in a month or two, I shall take pains to arrange such an excursion. In recompense for this curtailment of your freedom, I offer my apartment in the city for the eventuality of such a trip, and the use of my box at the Opera or Tivoli Gardens, whichever shall present the choicer entertainment for that evening in your mind.

She felt breathless, and hardly knew what to think, now.

I personally pledge that you shall hear Caruso, even though my own needs must then take second place.

How had he known how much she wanted to hear Caruso sing?

You have the freedom of the house and grounds, although I am afraid that you will probably find it rather dull. I entertain no one, and my servants are as reclusive as their master. You will, however, encounter my secretary, Paul A Mond, from time to time. He will see to obtaining whatever you need, if it has not already been provided. If you are shy of communicating some personal need to a strange male, simply write it down and leave the note with your meal tray; my housekeeper will then attend to it.

She sat down on the couch, feeling suddenly dizzy If this was a form of imprisonment, then it was the oddest sort of imprisonment anyone had ever imagined. And for what purpose? That she should read books?

My accident has left me disfigured in a way that I would not inflict upon one who did not know me before. You will therefore be reading to me through the speaking-tube, and I will make my requests by the same manner.

Not even the fevered and disordered brain of a Mary Shelley could have created a plot like this one! Surely even the publishers of dime novels would balk at such an unlikely situation!

You can, of course, refuse your services, and I will have you transported to San Francisco with all your belongings immediately. It was unfair of me to bring you here under false pretenses, and I apologize most humbly-but ask yourself this: if I had communicated the truth, would you have believed it? I think not. I believe that even Conan Doyle and Rudyard Kipling would have blushed to pen such a wild tale.

He had a point. If she had been presented with this situation in Chicago, she and Professor Cathcart would have discarded it as the fantasies of a lunatic.

She could leave, now, this moment. He had said as much. She did not need to stay here a moment longer.

But if she chose that escape, it meant to be set down, with two dollars to her name, in a strange city. That was not the best option open to her at the moment. Here-if Jason Cameron was more lunatic than this note suggested-she was subject to the will of one man, two at the most. Thus far there was no evidence that either Cameron or his man had any interest in any part of her but her mind. There was no reason to believe that she wasn't perfectly safe here. There were bolts on the doors, she could lock herself in-and although secret passageways and hidden doors in the walls were a hallmark of dreadful cheap novels, she knew enough about architecture to be aware that it was extremely difficult to construct such things, and even more difficult to conceal them.

I will be waiting to hear your decision in person, the letter concluded. Merely say what you will into the speaking tube, and I will abide by your decision. But please take into your considerations that if you accept this employment, you will be granting a crippled and disfigured man an entry into a world of scholarship he had thought was lost to him, and a way for him to forget, for a few hours, his pain.

It was signed, simply, Jason.

Oh, that was manipulative! That last was clearly an attempt to win her sympathy; quite calculated to appeal to every noble instinct she might possess. And as such, it succeeded, even as she recognized it for what it was. She actually found herself admiring a man who had the strength and audacity to use his infirmity as a weapon. Most men would never have admitted to needing anyone or anything-Jason Cameron was clearly a craftsman who did not scruple at using whatever came to his hand, including his own weakness.

But she was also very much aware of the fact that of her two options-to go or to stay-this was by far the most attractive. There was no reason to suppose that this time, Jason Cameron was telling anything other than the truth. His tale was so fantastic that, strangely enough, it rang truer than the tale of the two precocious children.

He had treated her well up to now; why should that cease? He clearly had wealth; what would he want with her other than her services as a scholar? Money would gain the cooperative company of a professional courtesan for even the most hideous man in the world. He would not get that from her by any means other than coercion. All the arguments she had used back in Chicago to persuade herself to take this position still held true.