Home From The Sea: The Elemental Masters, Book Seven (16 page)

“Well, I’m counting on your history with the Wild Boy,” Alderscroft said carefully. “He made himself known to you; there’s something about you two that attracted him. I am gambling that the same will happen in Wales.”

Neville interrupted the conversation with a guttural laugh. Alderscroft turned to look at the raven. “I assume you have something to add, Neville?” he said.

“Sure bet,” the Raven croaked, and laughed again, as Nan blushed.

“But what do you expect us to do, my lord?” Sarah asked.

“Identify the new Master. Let me know who and where he is. Observe him, if possible, get close enough for an introduction, and
pass on the greetings of the Lodge.” Alderscroft accepted a lemonade from the manservant. “There is nothing so far to indicate that you would be at any hazard.”

“That’s comforting,” Nan said dryly.

Alderscroft raised another eyebrow at her. “After that rather hair-raising description you tendered me of knife-wielding? I would be more concerned for the welfare of this unknown than for yours, my dear.”

Neville laughed raucously as she and Sarah both flushed. Even Grey joined the laughter.

“You can consider this something of a test, if you will,” he continued. “You see, things are changing in this world. Once, a good, God-fearing Christian who didn’t already
know
about magic or psychical powers would as soon have spit on the Cross and declare himself a Satanist than meddle with such things. But now—” He shrugged. “Now there is a burgeoning interest in such matters and powers. Some of it is healthy, but not all. There are all manner of occult societies and groups springing up. Some are harmless. Some are idiots. But some will get themselves, or others, into trouble. As the Master of the White Lodge it is my duty to ensure the safety of the people of the realm against the ghastlies and ghoulies. I need agents, agents who can penetrate these groups, determine if there is any threat, and advise me if I need to continue to keep an eye on them.”

Nan nodded; she was aware that Memsa’b was doing something like that in a small way, investigating alleged mediums and some of the occult circles and determining if they were harmless, if they were frauds, and whether or not something needed to be done about them. She and Sarah had joined in her investigations at a very young age and fully expected to continue to be a part of them. The fact that they were
not
engaged in such an investigation at this moment, was, she suspected, largely due to the fact that even the greediest fraud tended to taper off his or her activity in the heat of a London summer—and Memsa’b did not tend to venture far from London out of necessity. Sahib’s business was there, which meant
he could not travel much, and of course, there was the school, which Memsa’b simply could not leave for any length of time.

But…

“Did you actually intend…” she ventured, and wasn’t sure how to go about asking the embarrassing question of
payment.

“Oh, this would be a very real job in every sense,” he assured them both. “But I am being cautious for both our sakes. Memsa’b thinks you two would make admirable investigators, and I could certainly use someone in that capacity, but I would like to give this a proper trial. For the job of looking into the Welsh affair, I will merely cover all your expenses. Should this prove successful, I will be prepared to offer you a proper salary as well as expenses.” He gave them both a very sober and penetrating look. “While the Club and the Lodge are closed to the fair sex, that has more to do with the prejudices of our members than mine. It will take some time to convince a great many of them that women are capable of vigorous action and rational thought.”

Nan considered being resentful, then remembered the one time she and Sarah and Memsa’b had been admitted to the Ladies’ Reception and Dining Room, and smothered a giggle. Yes, she could well believe that some of the old fossils that comprised the White Lodge had their brains firmly ossified in the last century.

“I find the two of you, my young friends, to be thoroughly unnerving,” he admitted ruefully. “I suspect that Master Kipling’s poem about the female of the species may well hold true in your cases, and I mean that in the most respectful way possible.”

Nan impertinently stuck a finger under her chin and bobbed a mock, seated curtsey. “Why, thank you, my lord,” she replied saucily. Then she sobered. “I do have a very real and pressing question, however. What is your estimation of the likelihood of us getting into difficulties? Given that the Elementals themselves have indicated that there is an interest in this person by a Power?”

“I can’t estimate it,” Alderscroft told her, and shrugged. “This is something outside of my experience. Normally Elemental magicians come from families who have produced many generations of
Elemental magicians. But you will be able to telegraph me directly if there seems to be a problem… and I hope that old Power who was interested in
you
may be of service as well.”

Nan and Sarah exchanged a speaking look. Neville cocked his head, and Grey bobbed hers. Nan thought she knew what they were thinking as clearly as if they were sharing the thoughts. Right now, the two girls could live on Memsa’b’s charity, idle and useless except for the instances where Memsa’b was investigating some occult problem or other. This was distasteful to both of them.

Or they could take some risks, accept this trial offer, and potentially find themselves not just with a rewarding sort of job, but one which would definitely send them all over the British Isles. She and Nan had discovered they both liked traveling. They already knew they both liked
doing.

Sarah nodded. Nan spoke for them both. “We’ll do it, sir.”

Lord Alderscroft beamed. “Splendid! Now what do you think your first steps should be? Remember, I am trying your paces, as it were. So I want to hear what your thoughts are.”

“Before we actually go anywhere, we need to establish
personas
, as it were,” Sarah said. “We’ll need to have an excuse to be where we are going, to be together, and to be unchaperoned.”

Nan snorted a little at that. “All I have to do is dress a bit more severely, and I could look as old as thirty,” she pointed out. “So I can easily be the chaperone myself.”

Alderscroft nodded. “Good, good. Go on.”

“Have you a good idea of
where
in Wales this is?” Sarah asked.

“Somewhere around about a little seaside town called Criccieth,” Alderscroft told them.

“In that case, I think I will be recovering from something unspecified, and sent to someplace cheap, on the sea, for my health, and Nan can be my older sister. We can be the daughters of a clergyman. That’s genteel enough to mix with the gentry if we need to, but egalitarian enough to mix with everyone else.” Sarah had gotten a little pink in her cheeks, showing her excitement. Nan just let her go—she was the one with the better imagination. “And if anyone asks
that might be inclined to ask questions elsewhere, I can tell the truth, that my—our—parents are serving at a mission in Africa. Our family has your patronage, so you are kindly taking care of my illness.”

Alderscroft rubbed his hands together with satisfaction. “Excellent. I’ll—ah no. I was going to say that
I
would take care of the details, but I have a better idea. I’ll have you work directly with my secretary. You can learn how to do this sort of thing yourself that way.”

Now it was Nan’s turn to feel excited. They’d done a certain amount of planning for their travel out to Africa and back, but the bulk of it had been handled by the Thomas Cook agency. Mostly things had gone well, but there had been that problem in Egypt… if she and Sarah knew how to deal with bookings and the like themselves, they wouldn’t find themselves in difficulties again.

Besides, she liked having the reins firmly in her own hands.

“Right then! We’re all agreed.” Alderscroft looked extremely satisfied. “You two put together the Sherlockian guises and work out what you will need for them. When you have your lists, come out here again, and you, and I and Whitely will go over them, then I’ll leave you with Whitely to make the actual arrangements. He’ll give you a list of Elemental mages that are nearest, and he’ll make you out letters of introduction to the local gentry in case you’ll need those as well.”

“That sounds excellent, my lord,” Nan agreed. “Better to have those in hand and not need them than need them and have to wait for them.” She paused. “I’ve just got one question, my lord. Why us and not some lesser Elemental magicians?”

“Because neither of you seem to have any gift for magic yourselves,” he said frankly. “That makes you—well, not
immune
, but certainly
resistant
to its effects. I feel much safer sending someone like you than I would a lesser mage. Furthermore, if the person we are trying to find is of a competitive nature, both by virtue of your sex and the fact that you are not mages yourselves, you will not be seen as a challenge.”

Nan and Sarah both nodded. “Smart bird!” Grey said approvingly.

“Ah! And that is the third reason, thank you for reminding me, Grey. You have protectors.” He nodded at the birds. “I very much doubt that this magician, no matter how powerful he is, will have seen anything like them—nor will he be inclined to test them, if he is reasonably sane and cautious.”

Neville shook his head and body vigorously, and snapped his beak, as a reminder that he was not just “armed” with occult weapons, he was armed with a very physical one.

“That makes me even more pleased to hear, if that were possible,” Nan said with satisfaction.

“Well then, my dear lady-Sherlocks! The game’s afoot!” If Nan had had any lingering doubts as to whether this was some sort of make-work urged on the Wizard of London by Memsa’b, his enthusiasm and obvious relief told her the opposite. She and Sarah were going to provide the Elemental Master with a much-needed service. “Now, since the hour has stretched well into the afternoon, would you care to join me for tea?” His eyes gleamed. “And perhaps a rubber or two of bridge with Whitely?”

Nan chuckled. “Still smarting from your defeat last week, my lord?”

“Bah! Unlucky hands is all!” he proclaimed. “I am sure that Sarah and I can best you and Whitely and give you the trouncing you so richly deserve.”

“In that case, my lord, I shall take that as a challenge,” Nan proclaimed, and Lord Alderscroft chortled in triumph and rang for tea.

Whitely and Nan defeated Sarah and Lord Alderscroft, but only by a hair this time. Alderscroft sent them back to the school in the soft twilight expressing himself very well satisfied with the results of the day. Memsa’b, too, expressed her satisfaction, so there was nothing more for the two of them to do than to work out the
who, what
, and
why
of the characters they planned to play.

Nan began to realize that this was a little like acting in a play—except, of course, that they would never be off-stage—which she had enjoyed very much while she had been a student. She had been excited about this whole project from the beginning, but this realization just added another whole layer to her pleasure.

Her first taste of acting had come during her very first year as a real student at the school, when a kind gentleman had offered Memsa’b the use of his country manor for the school for a summer holiday. Memsa’b had conceived of the notion of having the whole school involved in acting
A Midsummer Night’s Dream
as a way of keeping some of them out of mischief—and as a way of making their lessons into something less than onerous. Nan and Sarah were Helena and Hermia, natural roles for both of them. Nan had originally hoped to be Hippolyta, the Amazon Queen, more for the sake of the armor than anything else, but after she came to read through the text, she realized that Hippolyta’s role was rather flat and uninteresting next to that of Helena. Even if she
was
going to have to act as if she was all in a pash over a boy!

All the roles had been settled but that of Puck, which was proving difficult to cast, given their limited number of potential players and the limited abilities of all of them. Memsa’b, Nan and Sarah had gone out to a half-deserted part of the garden to rehearse their parts, and Memsa’b had used a pause in their rehearsals (in which she was playing Puck) to lament that very fact. That was when it happened.

“Ah, dear lady, and tender maidens,” said a bright voice from the doorway, making them all turn. “Perhaps I can solve this problem for you.”

There was a boy there, perhaps a little older and a trifle taller than Nan. He had a merry face, sun-browned, with reddish brown hair and green eyes, and wore very curious clothing.

At first glance, it
looked
perfectly ordinary, if the local farmers hereabouts were inclined to wear a close-fitting brown tunic and knee-breeches rather than sensible undyed linen smocks and buff trousers,
but at second glance there was something subtly wrong about the cut and fit of the garments. First, they looked like something out of a painting, something antique, and secondly, they looked as if they were made of leather. Now, the blacksmith wore leather trousers and the village cobbler, but no one else did around here.