The Cogspeare Conspiracy (The Cogspeare Chronicles Book 1) (16 page)

              “Declan and I put our heads together and made a new version of a hearing augmenter for Magnus’s last birthday. Not bad, eh? Feat of sibling ingenuity, what?”

              “Yes, quite nice,” Minerva replied. “Now, if you don’t mind, I think I’ll retire for the evening. Good night.” As she rose, Magnus mirrored her.

              “Yes, I think I’ll join you-” as the words left his mouth he regretted them, and wished he could bite out his tongue as she blushed and everyone else chuckled. “That is- I think I’ll go to bed too.” Just as they were leaving, Edwina called out,

              “Don’t forget your milk, dear!” Magnus slammed the doors behind them, drowning out the sounds of laughter.

Chapter 28:

“So Mother, you’re still drugging your eldest son?” asked Erasmus, suddenly slightly more sober than he had been only moments before. Sometimes it was hard to tell just how inebriated he was, and why he played at it at all.

              “We’re concerned that, what with moving back here and all the difficulties he’s facing, he might begin sleep-walking again,” replied Cornelius for his wife. “And we all know how that turned out the last few times.”

              Growing up, it had been good nights when the young Magnus had woken up screaming. Bad nights…well, they all tried to ignore them as Magnus evidentially did- though no one ever forgot.

              “And, as much as he says it doesn’t affect him, I do believe his conscience is suffering by working for Mr. Clinton and the SWSMC,” Quintus added, taking out a cigarillo. Raising his eyebrows in question, his mother nodded, and he proceeded to light it and take a deep breath of the fragrant smoke.

              “And who is she?” Declan asked, leaning back in his chair.

              “I met her while I was detained in goal two days ago. The moment we were tied together in that cell, I knew she would be good for Magnus, so I took the liberty, well…” her voice trailed off and she looked bashfully at her husband.

              “Yes, dear?” he asked, perfectly aware of her answer.

              “Well, you know that Magnus gets his valets from the same agency that we recommend our maids to, and I knew that his valet was about to leave. So, for a very reasonable sum, I may have intimated that a bit of sabotage would not go amiss.”

              It was difficult to tell if the gentlemen around the table were more shocked by her actions, her cool words, or her angelic face; it was probably the combination of all three, and they were all strongly reminded that, just like in chess, the Cogspeare queen was the most powerful player among them.

Chapter 29:

“I really cannot believe, Monsieur Bongout, that after all that trouble you went to with that hamper you went and forgot the glasses! Poor Master Magnus and Miss McFlynt had to drink from
the same bottle!
”

              “Ah, but Madame Bunsen,” the chef replied as they sat at the kitchen table, “it was by no mistake of neglect. After all, two lips that touch the same bottle are far from touching each other, eh?” He offered her a drink from his nightly bottle of champagne.

              “Oh, get away with you!” she stood up and they both laughed as they went to the carriage house across the garden.

As Steamins was locking up the house later that night, his sensitive ears pricked up at the sound of footsteps hurrying away from the back, servant’s entrance. But by the time he arrived at the nearest window, there was no one to be seen.

Chapter 30:

She was ushered into Clinton’s inner office by his nefarious personal assistant, James.

              “Well?” he growled from behind his desk.

              “It was almost laughably easy to get into the household. They’re so bloody naïve. All of the Cogspeare sons have arrived today. And may I say that they are a very odd bunch indeed.”

              “I don’t care about their familial dynamics. What about the barrister? What is the progress on the case?” She shook her head.

              “I can’t exactly make out what he’s thinking, but I do know that he’s been getting very sensitive information from a reporter at the
Daily Pulse
.”

              “Which reporter?” James demanded from the shadows.

              “Can’t remember. He was definitely Welsh, though. Shouldn’t be too hard to find.”

              “And Magnus? Is he loyal to us, to our cause? Will he keep his mouth shut if he finds anything?” She shrugged.

              “Don’t know. But even if he does, he won’t tell anyone because of his damn lawyer morality and confidentiality.”

              Clinton jumped up, shoving back his chair and strode over to grip her face painfully.

              “That ‘damn lawyer morality’ may be the one thing that keeps this from going bad to worse. We don’t need him finding out about why we really, how shall I say, needed to close down the mine, now do we?” She shook her head. “And if that were to happen, my dear,” he sneered as he grabbed a lock of her hair and yanked on it brutally, “you, my little actress will find yourself in a much worse place than the gutter where I found you.”

Chapter 31:

Down a dank, unmarked alley off Chancery Lane, a single light in a second-floor office burned well past midnight.

These were the ancient offices of Gray, Grey and Black, incompetent barristers and solicitors extraordinaire.

The rooms were furnished in the height of fashion, albeit from a century past, and all the surfaces were perennially covered in a fine layer of wig powder and scraps of frayed red ribbons. Files lounged about where the lax staff had left them with no concern for confidentiality. After all, they reasoned, anyone stupid enough or poor enough to hire Gray, Grey and Black wasn’t entitled to privacy.

But one desk was significantly tidier than the others, and it was here that a small, wavering desk lumination tube burned half-heatedly.

Gawain Dolts, a name due to his romantic mother and absentee father, was the newest addition to the Gray, Grey and Black firm. Hired some two years ago, the day he had been offered a place there, and nowhere else, was the first time that he had contemplated suicide. This evening was another one of those times.

Poor Gawain, a sallow youth with a bad haircut and two unmatched front teeth, had been assigned to the SWSMC miner’s case as a reward for doing his quarterly paperwork so well. Well, he knew what they were about; it wasn’t so much a reward as a punishment for suggesting that they modernize the filing system. Oh yes, he grumbled to himself, the senior clerk had gone into Mr. Gray’s office, closed the door, and returned not five minutes later saying that the boss had
personally
requested him for this case. Hah! Unless the clerk was moonlighting as a clairvoyant, the order had come from the senior assistant barrister, a man with a drippy nose and a chip on his shoulder.

              Gawain massaged his rheumy elbow as he rummaged through the piles of papers on his small, cardboard desk. Just as he had been about to leave, looking forward to a plate of his mother’s calves’ foot jelly, a message from the courts had come that not only was Grimsby & Associates the opposing firm, but that Magnus Cogspeare was the barrister. Gawain shuddered, and then ran to the gent’s to be violently ill. As he was leaning over the porcelain rim, ruminating at flushing water, he remembered that they were also filing a countersuit, and thankfully he didn’t have far to go as he was sick again.

              The nail in his coffin had come just an hour ago. He had suddenly heard a clicking, and for a moment thought it was the ghost of Mr. Gray- or Mr. Grey, or Mr. Black- come to give him some advice. But Mr. Dolt wasn’t so lucky; it was just the Pulse receiver. He had taken a break, stretched his slightly swayed back, and went over to the receiver pedestal, watching as the metal feet typed out the message.

Notice from Administrative Council of the Chambers of Justice

~Due to pressing nature of Case 2365, trial will be brought forward to commence tomorrow afternoon, 2pm, House of Lords.~

As soon as he realized that Case 2365 was his case, he barely had time to find a waste basket. His life was over, he realized as he retched. He was debating on whether to take poison, though that might be difficult as he always had digestive problems, or whether to hang himself, when there was a knock on the door. He decided against answering it, but the knocking became increasing louder, until he thought that he might as well try to yell at someone for the first, and last, time in his life. Bracing himself, he marched to the door and opened it determinedly, but was stopped short.

“Are you Mr. Gawain Dolt?”

He nodded.

“Good. I believe that you could use my help.”

Chapter 32:

Long after the Cogspeares and their guest had retired, after Edwina had dragged Cornelius from his laboratory to their bed, after Steamins had diffused the lingering smoke from Quintus’s cigarillos with an Inverted Aerifusion Device (a Christmas present from Declan two years ago), after Bongout had supervised the tamping of the kitchen fires and had his evening bottle of champagne, after Mrs. Bunsen had literally tucked in the three maids, the Monstrosity of Mayfair finally settled into slumber.

The hallway clock was just winding up to strike two o’clock when suddenly Erasmus and Amadeus both sat bolt upright in their beds and looked across their shared room at one another.

Wordlessly they jumped out of bed and wrenched their robes on just in time to hear the wails begin.

“Oh shit!” swore Erasmus as they ran out into the hall, turning on lamination tubes as they began to run down the large spiral staircase.

“I thought that this had stopped?”

“Apparently not,” called out Declan, steps behind them, followed closely by Sebastian. On the floors above, they could hear their parents getting up. Thankfully, the servants didn’t live in the house, but rather could get a good night’s sleep in the luxuriously remodelled mews.

They followed the increasingly loud cries into the dark drawing room

Amadeus was the first on the scene, one that he hadn’t seen for almost a decade.

As physically impossible as it seemed, Magnus had curled himself up under a small side table, hunched over his knees and wearing nothing more than his underclothes and a scarf. His eyes were wide and glazed, flitting from side to the other.

Declan quietly lit another lumination tube and turned it down so that the room wasn’t lit, but merely less dark.

“No!” Magnus screamed. “No, Stop! Don’t pour it in my ear! Yes, I have one, don’t I? Don’t tie me outside!” Tears streamed down his face as he clawed at his hearing augmenter.

“Gently now, boys,” said Cornelius as he and his sons slowly began to circle around Magnus.

“Keep them away from me!” he began to twitch.

Minerva had quietly slipped in the back door, expecting to creep up the stairs in a silent house, uninhibited by the servants out in the annex. Instead, hearing the screams from the parlour, she ran down the hall towards them.

“What’s happening?” Minerva asked, horrified and breathless as she came up to Edwina.

“Oh, dear,” she replied, hugging her fringed wrap around her, long red hair in a thick plait. “He’s having one of his spells.”

“Must…stay…warm!” Magnus shivered, though the house was warm enough.

Minerva desperately wanted to ask more questions, but she was mesmerized by the men as they, ever so smoothly, all crouched down around him.

“Now Magnus,” began Cornelius, “you’re at home, son, safe at home. You’re warm and safe.”

“The explosion and that school, it all happened years ago,” added Declan.

“And everyone was fine, Magnus,” intoned Erasmus and Amadeus together. “You saved us all. And those boys can never hurt you again.” It was obviously a well-practiced scene, and they knew exactly which words would work.

Magnus stopped crying and began to rock himself.