The Cogspeare Conspiracy (The Cogspeare Chronicles Book 1) (12 page)

“Well, let’s just get out of here and-” but just as they began to descend the stairs, Magnus saw Grimsby begin to ascend. He looked up directly at Magnus, and then there was assuredly no escape.

“Ah, Magnus!” said the barrister in a booming voice. “Good morning, good morning. And who is this pretty young thing?” He came up close to them, only a step below, and took Minerva’s hand, kissing it. She was going to pull away when Magnus squeezed her other hand, hard.

“This is, um, Miss McFlynt, Sir Nicodemus. Miss McFlynt, this is Sir Nicodemus Grimsby, the head of the firm.”

“A pleasure, madam. And to what do we owe your visit to us today? Or should I specify to Magnus. I thought, young man, that you were working exclusively on that special case of ours, hmm?”

“I- I am,” he began, but just as he pulled his comb through his hair, Minerva interrupted,

“Indeed, he was just showing me out after introducing me to another one of your brilliant associates.”

“Is this a case I should look into, my dear?” he leered.

“Alas,” she cringed, but made it look as though she were searching for a handkerchief, “it is so delicate and disturbing of a nature that this visit has simply worn me out, and I must be going. I’m sure a gentleman such as yourself will understand,” she practically tittered. 

“Of course, of course,” he nodded, and moved aside. Magnus gripped Minerva’s elbow, but just as they reached the bottom of the staircase, Grimsby called out,

“McFlynt…the name rings a bell. Yes, a bell…” Magnus thought that his boss emphasized
bell
rather sinisterly, but was too preoccupied with their exit to care. Minerva, though, blanched.

“Ah, well, I’m sure that it will come to me. Good day, Miss McFlynt.” He raised his hat and turned.

“I had no idea you were such a good actress, hiding you true pluck from Grimsby like that” Magnus whispered as he continued to pull his now unresisting companion past the reception, out the front door, down the steps, and nearly shoved her up into the hack. He jumped in, knocking on the ceiling to get the cabbie moving, and leaned back, sighing.

“But thank you,” he murmured, opening his eyes. “Somehow, I don’t think that Grimsby would appreciate knowing I was following your hunch all the way to Cornwall today.”

Minerva blinked, forcibly retracting herself from painful memories.

“Acting the twitutant has its advantages, the foremost being that people tend to dismiss one’s actions rather quickly.”

“Twitutant?” Magnus asked.

“What my friends and I call girls who are just out, debutants, and who have barely two thoughts in their perfectly coiffed heads.”

Magnus merely shook his head and smiled as they continued the rest of the journey to the station in silence.

              Racketing along Oxford Street, and continuing onto Bayswater, Paddington Station finally came into view. Through swirls of residual smog, sunlight glinted off the tall and elongated glass dome rising between the darkened stone blocks. Having been built in a time that had valued the simplicity of Grecian design some thirty years ago, it stood in stark contrast to its New Brass Movement neighbours.

              Their carriage drew up amongst the crowd of other hackneys in front of the station, and, after disembarking and paying, Magnus, with hamper, briefcase and Minerva in tow, entered one of the valves that connected the railway arteries of the city to the rest of the country.

              Passing under archways and pushing through crowds of people, they finally arrived at the main hub of the station. Above them soared a glass dome, keeping the billowing clouds of steam trapped within. And below, just a few feet away, stood the main platform.

              “All aboard!” called a willowy station official in a baggy blue inform with a high collar that held up his oddly round head.

              Magnus quickly went forward, but Minerva paused, staring at the STEAMer.

              It was one of the newest railcars, one designed to hover over the tracts. Older cars still hung on the rails for dear life, but, with the invention of Issy Rhealm’s magnetic rails, new cars hovered a good two feet off the tracks. Made only possible through the hotter, spesium-enhanced coals, they were officially named Spesium-enhanced Transport Elevated and Accelerated by Magnets, and known as STEAMers.

              “Miss McFlynt!” Magnus shouted above the dim from the crowds and trains, “it’s about to leave!” His words jolted her out of her frozen stance, and propelled her next to him as he handed over their tickets.

              “Up the stairs and to the right, please,” directed the conductor. Magnus preceded Minerva, who hiked her snowy skirts up to mid-calf and followed him up the steep stairs and into the carriage.

              All of the passenger cars were located on the second story, while the engines pumped out the blistering steam beneath them, allowing the cars to hover, as if traveling on a cloud of smoke.

              Though the third class cars were dark and only had hard wood benches, Magnus led Minerva into the nearly empty first class carriage. Mirroring the design of the station, the engineers had encased the entire first class carriage in a glass dome so that the views were interrupted only by the steel rods separating the panes of glass. The seats were plush maroon velvet and brass, with intermittent tables made of steel inlaid with copper.

              Magnus chose a table, set down the hefty hamper and briefcase with a huff, and lowered himself into a chair, smoothing his hair.

              “Is this your first time in a STEAMer?” he inquired politely, wondering at Minerva’s hesitation in the station. She grimaced.

              “No. Actually, I was born on a STEAMer. Quite literally.” Magnus’s eyebrows shot up in surprise.

              “I know,” she smiled, “Very odd indeed. My father was an engineer who worked with Issy Rhealm on the prototype for this model. They were taking it for a test run, and brought my mother along for an outing. She went into labour early, and here I am,” she lifted her hands as evidence.

              “I don’t remember it being in the news at the time.”

              “And why should you? We’re not that far apart in age, Magnus. And besides, my mother was a bit of a snob herself and she thought that it was vulgar for her daughter to have been brought into the world on an
experiment
.” Though her voice reflected mock horror, her eyes twinkled with humour.

              “Did your mother think that the
experiment
made you go to university and want to become a barrister?”

              “Actually, my parents died in a carriage accident when I was eight. The only other family I had was my great-aunt, and she sent me away to an unexpectedly progressive boarding school, which is where I became interested in the law.”

              “I’m sorry,” Magnus said. “And this is the great-aunt who just disowned you?”

              She nodded. Minerva divested herself of her cloak and hung it on the back of her chair.

              They settled into their plush seats just as the train slowly levitated and pushed out of the station. It gathered speed so quickly and silently that soon the city was a distant vision and they were surrounded by farmland.

              “Isn’t it remarkable?” Minerva mused. When Magnus tilted his head, she elaborated, “I mean, the technology that has allowed us in so little time to travel so far, so far. Who knows where it might take us next. And,” she pulled her eyes from the vista, “Your father has played such a crucial part in it!”

              When he didn’t reply, she pressed,

              “Aren’t you proud of him?” He nodded, grudgingly.

              “I am. I’m proud of my entire family, but they’re just so, so…odd. They don’t fit in well with the life I’m trying to lead.”

              Minerva tried to submerse her disappointment in the fact that at least he was being honest.

Chapter 23:

Quintus warily climbed the staircase to the top floor, and knocked on the steel plated door. Without waiting for an answer, knowing one wouldn’t be forthcoming, he entered.

              Cornelius’s laboratory took up the entire top floor of the house. Dim, red tinted light streamed in from a dozen windows, augmented with dozens of luminescence tubes hanging from the ceiling at different heights. There were steel-topped wooden tables everywhere, covered with glasses housing bubbling brews, burners alight with blue flames, and hundreds of odd-shaped bottles. The few spaces not being actively used for an ongoing experiment were piled high with loose papers covered in Cornelius’s messy scrawl, some with notes in Edwina’s careful hand.

              Looking about, Quintus finally saw his father ducking below a table near the back windows. Approaching him warily, ready to duck, he saw that Cornelius was poking some kind of red gooey substance.

              “Damn thing won’t react!” Cornelius said. “Would you take a look at my numbers?” He thrust a bundle of papers into Quintus’s hand, and kept poking the goo.

              Though Quintus had the delicate features of his mother, he was in temperament most like his father, even if he did affect a half-false frivolity. But instead of having a talent for chemistry, he was a wizard with numbers. Looking through his father’s notes, he quickly skimmed the complicated calculations. After a few minutes, he handed them back.

              “Take a look at the reduction numbers on the spesium-sublimation. I think you missed a decimal point.”

              “Thank you, son. Now, what can I do for you?”

              “What makes you think I need anything?” Quintus idly tapped a beaker. Cornelius pulled off his goggles and ruffled his blond hair.

              “The last time you came up here with that look on your face, you had written your math homework on the dining room table. In acid.”

              “Only because Erasmus dared me.” They both smiled, and Cornelius led the way over to a workbench set in the bay window. They both sat down, and Quintus sighed, letting the familiar, astringent scents settle his thoughts. Of the whole house, he felt the most comfortable among the chaos of the lab.

              “Father, I’d like to tell you that I’ve left Oxford, but that wouldn’t be entirely true.” Cornelius began to frown, but listened quietly.

              “I was working on a calculation, my final project, and my tutor came across my results. He published them as his own work, and when I came across the article in a journal I went to the head of the maths school and told him.”

              “Good for you! I should hope that the Head took your side?”

              “Oh, he did! But he also said that because of the hullabaloo and all, I would have to submit an alternate paper for my project. Apparently they don’t appreciate having to grade a paper that has already been published under someone else’s name.”

              “More like they don’t like to have to grade anything tinged with scandal,” his father grumbled, scratching his short beard.

              “Exactly! I worked so hard on the paper; it was going to be the basis for my dissertation next year. But…well,” he took a deep breath and plunged in, “I got into a bit of a row over that, and since the paper is contested, Oxford is just going to bury it, as if the whole thing never happened!”

              Cornelius picked up on the important part of that last bit.

              “A row with whom?” Quintus swallowed.

              “With the Head of the School. And the Disciplinary Committee. And the Vice-Chancellor.” He hung his head.

              “Have you been sacked?” Cornelius asked gently.

              “I’ve been asked to reconsider if Oxford is the place for me. And to consider that while I’m packing my bags.” Cornelius was very quiet. Finally, he brought out his small glass pipe, filled it with some mint leaves and water, and began to puff it.

              “Well, son, I suppose you’re just continuing the great Cogspeare tradition.” Quintus looked up, surprised.

              “You’re not furious?”

              “Of course I am! Those bastards should be drawn and quartered for not hanging that tutor!” Intellectual property was sacrosanct to Cornelius, and that was why, almost thirty years ago, he had made the process to make coal-syrup publically, and freely available.

“But what should I do now, Father? It’s as though, suddenly, I’m unfit for anything. And despite my cultivated air of
sang fois
and flippancy, I do want to do something!” Cornelius puffed and nodded in understanding.

“Well, I’m sure something will come along for you. Though London is the largest city in the world, it’s really a small village too, and someone will hear about the importance of your paper soon, published or not. What was it on, by the by?”

“I called it an Input-Output Matrix.” Cornelius blinked, and then grinned blankly.

“As for what you can do right now, I would suggest that you hound your brother to the best of your ability.” They both knew that they were talking about Magnus. Quintus couldn’t contain himself, and laughed until his eyes watered. “It’s time that boy grew up and took responsibility for his work and its repercussions. Support him, but don’t let him get away with anything.”