Bloodline (Whyborne & Griffin Book 5) (9 page)

“Those bloody refrigerated ships,” Theo muttered angrily.
When Christine gave him a curious look, he flushed pink. “Forgive my language,
Dr. Putnam.”

“Not at all,” she responded drily. Christine could swear a
sailor into the ground in both English and Arabic. “I only wondered at your
grudge against refrigerated ships.”

“They’ve destroyed the economy in England. At least for the
old estates.” Fiona answered for her brother. “One of the reasons so many of
the nobility find themselves looking abroad for rich wives.”

“Ah, yes, Kander mentioned it,” Christine said. A tiny smile
touched the corner of her mouth, and her eyes went unfocused. “I confess I was
too distracted at the time to pay much attention.”

“The missing ships?” Griffin prompted.

Fiona inclined her head to him. “Ships vanish all the time,
of course. The ocean is still a vast place, even if now we can cross back and
forth in a matter of days rather than months. The number was unusually high,
however, and uncorrelated with any reports of storms or other natural phenomena
to account for their loss. When Guinevere announced her plans to return to
America for a visit, it seemed the perfect opportunity to investigate more
closely. We’d met socially a few times, and so it was easy enough to convince
her to allow us to accompany her, under the guise of wishing to meet our other
distant cousins.”

“The mystery of the
Norfolk Siren
seemed to confirm
our worst suspicions of the involvement of otherworldly forces,” Theo finished.
“And now you say poor Guinevere is dead, and it has something to do with the
ship?”

“Yes,” Griffin cut in. “But we vowed to Niles we’d tell no
one of it without his permission.” He shot me a dark look.

“Griffin, you’re being terribly unfair,” I protested.

“I’m being honest.” Griffin turned to Theo and Fiona. “Word
of her death must
not
go beyond you two. Do you understand?”

“Of course,” Theo said immediately.

“We won’t tell a soul.” Fiona caught my eye and offered a
smile. “After all, we’re used to keeping family secrets.”

I spent the next morning listening to Christine complain
about the director, from whose office she had just come.

“The man has done some appallingly stupid things before,”
she said. “I pointed out, tactfully, this Hallowe’en nonsense was a job for the
curators and having two senior staff members work on it was absurd.”

I suspected her idea of tact simply meant she hadn’t yelled
at him. Or not yelled at him much. “And what did he say?”

“He said we would assemble the list of objects and give
orders to the curators, but my experience with the Egyptian Gala meant I was
the perfect person to arrange the private showings.” Her teeth ground together
alarmingly. “I told he him was quite right, if he meant the gathering would be
attacked by thieves and madmen halfway through the evening.”

I suppressed a sigh. “I imagine that went over well.”

“The man is impervious to logic. And to spring this on us
with no warning, and barely a week to work on it! Bah!”

“Dr. Gerritson has a cursed pearl we can use,” I offered.
“Kills Polynesian chieftains, or something.”

“Hmph. A good thing
some
of our colleagues can be
called upon to help.” She rose to her feet. “With any luck, the thing really is
cursed and will do in Dr. Hart.”

Once she had departed, I downed another cup of coffee,
splashed some water on my face, and checked the clock. Close enough to lunch.

The omnibus took me to High Street and let me off a short
walk from Whyborne House. Fenton looked unusually pale when he answered the
door, and dark circles showed under his eyes. The sight shocked me, almost as
badly as if he’d been naked. Fenton’s job was to represent the dignity of the
Whyborne family, and it was a charge he took with great seriousness. To see him
display human frailty…I couldn’t recall such a thing ever happening in my
lifetime.

“Your father and Stanford are in the study, Master
Percival,” he informed me as he led the way inside.

In truth, I’d hoped to avoid both of them. “I’ll speak to
Mother, first. Is Miss Emily in?”

“No. She has the day off. I believe she went to visit
family.”

Before I could turn my steps toward the stairs, the sound of
raised voices echoed from the direction of the study. “That is my final word,
Stanford.” Father’s voice drew steadily closer, and a moment later he crossed
into the foyer. “Fenton! Bring around the motor car.”

“I won’t be dismissed like this!” Stanford shouted. His face
was flushed scarlet, and his eyes narrowed into slits.

“I have other things to attend to,” Father snapped back over
his shoulder.

Stanford stopped, hands clenching into fists. “Go on, then.
Make whatever paltry deals you want. But remember today, when I’ve taken
Whyborne Railroad to heights you can only dream about.”

Stanford spun on his heel and stalked away. Catching sight
of me, Father stopped. “Percival. Mr. Flaherty was already here this morning.
Is there some new development?”

“No.” I considered asking what he and Stanford argued over,
but from the sound of things, it was some business affair of which I had no
interest. “I’ve come to see Mother.”

“I see.” Father left without saying anything further.
Relieved at my escape, I hurried up the stair.

Mother’s chambers lay on the uppermost floor of the house,
away from the hustle and bustle of daily life. Bookcases lined the walls, save
where enormous windows let in light. A cheerful fire crackled in the hearth.
Above the mantel hung a portrait of the Lady of Shalott, painted using Mother
as a model long ago in the days of her youth.

Mother sat at a table, holding herself rigidly in her chair.
On the table lay a large crystal bowl filled with water and a leather-bound
book. The book I recognized, as she’d read it to me many times in my childhood:
Wolfram von Eschenbach’s
Parzival.
Percival
, in English.

As I entered, she spoke a word, and the candles set about
the room leapt into flame. The light guttered wildly for a moment before
settling into a soft glow, which helped alleviate the October gloom.

“Mother,” I said by way of greeting. “How are you?”

She didn’t look at me, only stared at the bowl in front of
her. Her face was haggard, even beyond the ordinary ravages of her long
illness. Had she slept at all since Guinevere’s death?

“I’ve been practicing.” She indicated the bowl, the candles.
“Every spell you taught me. It makes me feel a little less useless.”

The grief in her voice wrung my heart. “You aren’t—”

“Yes, I am!” The crystal bowl chimed in response to her
anger. “I want to be out there, looking for whoever murdered my daughter.
Instead, I must sit here and wait for news, while others do the work.”

What could I say? Even if she’d had her health, society
would never have allowed her to investigate Guinevere’s death. She would still
be here, waiting for someone else to either capture the killer or fail.

Doubtless, she knew the bitter truth better than I. So I
only said, “I’m sorry.”

She rose from her chair and went to stand at the window. One
hand lifted, resting on the cold glass, as if she longed to touch the world
outside. Did she see this room as her refuge or her prison? Or both?

Griffin’s question the night of the party returned to me.
“Why did you stay here, once I left? Instead of retiring to a sanitarium?”

“I considered it.” She trailed her fingers over the glass
panes. “Told myself that once all of my children were grown and gone, I’d depart
as well. But when the time came, I couldn’t bear to leave. I’ve lived my entire
life near the sea. I know it’s near, even if I haven’t seen it with my own eyes
for twenty years.”

“There are health resorts and the like which take advantage
of the fresh ocean air,” I pointed out.

“Perhaps. But Widdershins suits me, far better than Boston
or anywhere else I’ve ever been.” She cast me a rueful smile. “Surely you
understand. You might have gone anywhere after university, yet you chose to
return here.”

“The Ladysmith is a fine museum.” And the town was familiar,
comfortable. I disliked travel and new things.

That was all. There was no otherworldly reason such as Miss
Lester had suggested to Griffin. Widdershins was just a city like any other,
even if it had been built over lines of arcane power. To think it could want
things or keep people from leaving was the height of absurdity.

“You are my one consolation,” Mother said with a small, sad
smile. “If I cannot leave this room and bring justice to Guinevere’s murderer
myself, at least I can send you out in my stead.”

“Griffin and I are doing everything possible,” I said. “And
Christine.” Should I tell her of the Endicotts? They’d not sworn me to secrecy,
and yet they hadn’t given me permission to speak, either. “And others,” I
finished, a bit lamely.

“I know. But it’s still difficult.”

Uncertain what else to say, I picked up the book. “Reading
an old favorite?”

“Yes.” She crossed the room and took the book from me,
turning it over in her hands. “Your father meant to name you Ulysses, after
President Grant. But when you were born so sickly, he didn’t think it
appropriate.”

I made a face. “It’s probably just as well. I can’t see
myself as a ‘Ulysses.’”

“Everyone thought you would die, like your poor sister. The
doctors, the midwife, everyone. They were all so certain.” A little smile
touched her lips. “But you defied them all. So stubborn, to refuse to leave
this world once you’d tasted it. This was the first book I ever read to you.”

“In German.”

“Of course. You weren’t even a week old, but I thought it
would be a good start on your education.” Her smile faded as she stared
thoughtfully at the worn leather binding. “I asked Niles for permission to name
you. And I chose the best of all Arthur’s knights, the one who found both true
love and the Grail.”

“Until he was replaced in later versions of the story by
Galahad, at any rate,” I pointed out ruefully.

“I was
not
naming you after some bloodless virgin. I
rather hoped you’d have a more interesting life.”

“Perhaps I can borrow one of the suits of armor downstairs.
And find a white charger somewhere. Griffin would fall down laughing.”

“Hmm, I don’t know. I think he’d find you quite the striking
figure.”

“Mother!” The tips of my ears burned with embarrassment.

“It was merely an observation.” Her brief smile slipped
away. “Thank you, Percival. For coming to see me.”

“Of course.” I stepped forward and embraced her carefully.
She felt painfully delicate, as if her long illness had hollowed out her bones
like those of a bird.

I took my leave. As I reached the second floor landing, a
voice spoke from the shadows of the corridor.

“If it were up to me, you wouldn’t even be allowed to set
foot in this house.”

I froze, my hand on the bannister. Stanford stepped in front
of me, blocking my way forward.

Memories of childhood surged from the dark places to which I
usually consigned them. Dangling from the third-story balcony, screaming in
terror as Stanford laughed and threatened to drop me to my death on the marble
far below. Hiding in a linen closet, only to be dragged out and forced to eat
some noxious concoction my brother and his friends had made. Struck about the
legs with a stick, until my shins were mottled with bruises.

And when I went to tell Father, to beg him for help, he’d
put his hand on Stanford’s shoulder and smiled benignly down on my brother.
Phrases such as “boyish high spirits” and “you must toughen up” and “no one
likes a tattletale” floated past my ears, all of them meaning the same thing.

No one will ever help you. Nothing will ever change.

I swallowed hard against the sudden pounding of my pulse. I
was no longer that boy, that youth, weeping into my pillow and praying either
Stanford or I would die in the night. “A good thing it isn’t up to you,” I said
coolly. I tried to step around him, but he moved in front of me.

“I could almost tolerate you, before. At least you knew your
place.”

I wanted to ask “before what,” but I already knew the
answer. Before sorcery and cults and monsters forced me to act, rather than
passively allow life to happen to me.

Before Griffin.

“You think you’re so high and mighty,” Stanford went on.
“Prancing around with your catamite. You think you have Father on a leash, but
you’re just a disgusting sodomite. Jail is too good for you perverts.” The look
in his eyes was beyond anger or annoyance, or even disgust at what he saw as my
perversions. It was hatred. “They ought to cut your balls off and force you to feed
them to each other, before they hang you from the highest tree around.”

Bile scalded the back of my throat, and my skin flushed hot.
My hands clenched, the scars drawing tight on the right one. The air currents
shifted, stirring my hair. “Don’t you dare threaten me.”

“I didn’t. Just said what I thought the law
ought
to
be.” His lip curled. “Touchy as always.”

Arcane words burned on my tongue. I’d read more spells in
the
Arcanorum
than Griffin realized, dark things I told myself I’d never
actually practice. But at the moment, I longed to unleash them against
Stanford, to fill his mind with shadowy horrors and drive him screaming to the
madhouse.

“Get the hell out of my way,” I said, voice trembling with
rage.

His smile told me he’d mistaken anger for fear. “Have it
your way.” He stepped aside, clearing my path to the stair.

I certainly wasn’t going to trust him at my back. I returned
his stare, and he retreated just far enough I didn’t think he could lunge
forward and give me a shove.

I descended the stair with more haste than usual, but he
made no move to come after me. Nevertheless, I felt the scorching heat of his
gaze on my back, until the door of the house finally shut between us.

~ * ~

An hour later, I sat in my office, still trying to rid
myself of the sour taste of the encounter with Stanford. We’d never been
friends, quite the opposite. But although he’d always viewed me with contempt,
his feelings over the last two years had turned into outright hatred.

Perhaps he’d never before realized my true inclinations
toward my own sex. Certainly it was nothing I’d ever spoken of directly to
anyone in the family, although Mother had most likely always known, and Father
strongly suspected. Did the new intensity of his dislike stem from revulsion
toward a love he no doubt considered unnatural?

No matter the cause, how dare he say such things to me? To
anyone? Had he no shred of decency left?

A soft knock on my half-open door distracted me from my
angry thoughts. “Dr. Whyborne?” Miss Parkhurst asked, peeking around the edge.
I forced myself to give her a genial smile, despite my foul mood.

“Yes? What can I do for you?”

Her cheeks pinked and she ducked her head, “Um, there’s a
Mr. Endicott here to see you, sir.”

I couldn’t imagine why it would occasion her to blush. Perhaps
she found him handsome? “Oh, yes. Please show him in.”

A few moments later, Theo strode into my office, hand
outstretched. I rose to my feet and shook it. “I must say, the museum is
amazing, old chap! Absolutely amazing.”

“Shall I bring coffee?” Miss Parkhurst asked from the
doorway.

“No thank you.” I hoped to go to the library, and Mr. Quinn
would probably cut my heart out with a letter opener if I dared bring food or
drink within its hallowed walls. Miss Parkhurst departed, looking faintly
disappointed at my refusal.

“Fiona sends her regards,” Theo said. “She lacks the
patience for books, I fear.” He hesitated delicately. “We were surprised to
receive your note this morning. Mr. Flaherty didn’t seem particularly eager for
our assistance.”