The Hidden Goddess (12 page)

“Fortissimus.”
Emily grumbled the word like a curse. Yes, she knew exactly what Rex Fortissimus was like. The most prominent presentment arranger in New York, Fortissimus supposedly knew more about credomancy than anyone besides Emeritus Zeno. He had been retained at an extremely handsome rate to arrange the Investment, promote Stanton’s public image, and advise him on decisions of importance. He’d been making a nuisance of himself for weeks, mostly by claiming whatever share of Stanton’s time was not already claimed by Zeno. “I don’t like him.”

“Well, like him or not, I need him. It’s a big leap for someone in my position to become Sophos.” He paused thoughtfully. “Actually, tonight might not be a bad night to get yourself in front of the Emeritus. Fortissimus is throwing a beefsteak for me at Delmonico’s, and he won’t be around to bother you. Try after nine.”

“Then you’re not coming back to the Institute?” Emily tried unsuccessfully to hide her disappointment. “I swear, I don’t know why I always get left out of things! Why shouldn’t
New York see my face once in a while? Is there something wrong with it?”

“There is nothing wrong with your face.” Stanton lifted a hand to stroke her cheek. “But it is Fortissimus’ considered opinion that it’s best to keep you under wraps just at the moment. And even if I were to take you around, it certainly wouldn’t be to a beefsteak. There won’t be any ladies there, just lots of cigar smoke and politicians and—as one might suppose—beefsteak. Hideous.”

“I still don’t understand why I have to be kept under wraps, as Fortissimus puts it. Won’t it seem strange when you marry some complete unknown out of the clear blue sky?”

“Fortissimus has a plan for that, too,” Stanton said. “Ninety-two percent of New York society thinks you’re a daughter of one of those eccentric California cattle barons with a fortune in gold.”

“And the other eight percent?”

“We’re paying them to keep their mouths shut.”

Emily drew an outraged breath, but before she could say anything Stanton chucked her under the chin in a way she thought she could grow to dislike. “My dearest beloved darling, you’ll be able to go around with me all the time soon enough. After we’re married, people will take you as a fait accompli.”

Emily didn’t know what a fait accompli was, but she was certain she didn’t want to be one.

“But even after we’re married”—Stanton raised an infuriatingly patrician index finger—“
Especially
after we’re married, in fact, I don’t intend to take you to a single beefsteak.”

“Oh, fine,” Emily said. Stanton smiled at her again, as he often did when she was annoyed. Apparently there was something in the set of her nose when annoyed that he found charming.

“Cheer up. The Investment is tomorrow, then all of this nonsense will be over.” It was clear that Stanton was looking forward to the end of the nonsense as much as anyone else. “Meanwhile, let’s make the best of the time we do have, shall we?” Leaning back on the rough concrete abutment, he drew her against his chest so that her body rested against the length
of his. His hands smoothed along her waist, his mouth dipped to the hollow of her throat, lips traversing the curve of her clavicle. Gasping, she brought her head close to his and growled something softly into his ear.

“Miss Edwards!” he scolded, his breath quickening.

“Don’t tell me the thought hasn’t crossed your mind.”

“Yes, I know that there are plenty of nice hotels in New York. And yes, you’ve made it clear—painfully so—that you might reluctantly consider shedding your virtue prior to the wedding.”

“I could be convinced,” Emily said, letting her hand wander over parts of his anatomy to accentuate the point.

He captured her hand with desperate quickness and held it tight against his chest. “But the issue, my beloved, is not
your
purity. It’s
mine
. It’s very important that I remain chaste prior to the Investment. Once I’m Invested, all bets are off. But before the Investment …” He let out a heavy sigh. “Well, let’s just say there’s a reason the Pope is celibate.”

Emily stared deeply into his eyes. “Let’s leave the Pope out of this,” she said.

“Tomorrow,” he said. “After tomorrow, everything will be better.” He clenched her hand firmly over his heart. “I promise.”

“And I’ll get to see you once in a while?” she whispered into his throat, closing her eyes and savoring his smell of bay rum and collar starch.

“Anytime you like,” Stanton said, his voice soft and rumbling, his breath hot in her ear. He tried to pull her closer, but she slipped nimbly from his grasp—a trick made neater by the fact that she managed to hit him in the face with her hat feather as she did it.

“Until then, Mr. Stanton, let’s not drive each other to the madhouse.” Emily sat up primly and made a great show of straightening her costume. “It’s getting late, and I believe you have a beefsteak to attend.”

Stanton looked at her for a long moment. “There’s a word for ladies like you,” he said.

She grinned at him. “In which language?”

“All of them. And in Chinese, too, I bet,” Stanton said.

“Engaged?” she asked, waggling her ring finger at him. The otherworldly diamond glittered like an explosion of stars.

“That wasn’t the word I was thinking of,” Stanton said, rising swiftly and offering her his arm for the rugged descent back to civilization.

CHAPTER SIX

Treachery

Emily and Stanton went their separate ways in separate carriages. Emily’s went one way and Stanton’s went the other; hers would carry her back to the Institute, and Stanton’s would return him to his family’s brownstone on Thirty-fourth Street, where he could change for his beefsteak.

But even if Emily and Stanton had both been returning to the Institute, they would have taken separate carriages in the interest of propriety. Emily was continually amazed at the mealymouthed prissiness of these New Yorkers. Engaged to be married, yet it would be indecent for them to be seen climbing out of a carriage together—as if carriages were rolling dens of iniquity. But then again, the way Stanton’s kisses had made her feel, perhaps the New Yorkers did have a point. Oh well.
Tomorrow
. Tomorrow Stanton would be Invested, things would settle down, and all this foolishness would subside. And
then
she could get him up to see her etchings.

She stared out of the window of the hansom. Daughter of a California rancher with a gold fortune! Oh, brother.

When Emily got back to the Institute, she found that the last-minute confusion had intensified. Caterers screeched through the sober marble halls, rolling carts of food to be stored in the Institute’s cool cellar kitchens. Dodging a fast-pushed cart, she headed for the stairs. She was looking forward to returning to the comfort of her deathbed just as quickly as possible. She gave the admissions clerk a conspiratorial wink as she ducked under a dangling streamer. The man lifted a finger.

“Miss Jesczenka was looking for you. She said that if I saw you, I was to send you to her immediately.” He looked sober, as if Miss Jesczenka had said quite a bit more than that. “She’s presenting a class right now, in the tutorial wing. The green lecture hall.” The admissions clerk offered her an obsequious arm. “Would you like me to help you there?”

Emily sighed. “I can find it.” Reluctantly, she turned her steps toward the tutorial wing. There was still hell to pay for her trip to California, and this tryst with Stanton would surely compound the interest due.

Emily found Miss Jesczenka finishing up a presentation to an advanced group of students. The room was hot; the high windows had been opened to let in whatever coolness the early-evening breeze contained. Even though the air was close and stifling, the young male students all wore dark suit coats, neatly buttoned. The title of the lecture, written on the chalkboard wall behind Miss Jesczenka, was “Appearance Manipulation.”

“… thus, the proper choice of professional name is of vital importance.” Miss Jesczenka looked up as Emily took a guilty seat at the back of the room, but did not miss a beat of cadence. “A well-designed professional name will have power both literally and numerically, effective on a variety of levels. It will evoke favorable images in the minds of those who hear it, and those images will only be unconsciously reinforced if it also adds to a propitious numerical value …”

Having a notable dislike of lectures, Emily stopped listening almost immediately, concentrating instead on the way Miss Jesczenka spoke, the lustrous timbre of her voice, the elegant movement of her slim white hands. It always puzzled Emily how none of the men in the Institute ever noticed how pretty Miss Jesczenka was. A negligible old maid in tortoiseshell glasses, that’s what Emily saw in their eyes when they looked at her. For a bunch of Warlocks who were supposed to be masters of the minds of men, they sure didn’t seem to know much about women.

At a pause in Miss Jesczenka’s presentation, a hand in the front row shot up.

“Professor, could you inform the class why you’ve never chosen a more credomantically correct professional name for yourself?” Emily tensed, expecting giggles, but there were none. The students awaited the answer soberly, steel-nibbed pens at the ready.

“Oh, certainly I’ve
considered
it.” Miss Jesczenka’s dark eyes sparkled playfully. “Potentia La Grand, perhaps? Madame Dangereuse? Sagacia Maxima de Luxe? I welcome your suggestions, gentlemen; thinking them up is exceptionally good fun.”

Miss Jesczenka impaled the young man with her calm, questioning gaze. When he lifted a hand to tug at his collar, she looked away abruptly. “In magic, just as in life, females must play by a different set of rules. When a man is presumptuous or forward, it is taken as a sign of drive and determination. When a woman behaves so, she seems merely ridiculous. As seeming ridiculous is the most perilous situation a credomancer can face, I’m sure you can see how it is to my advantage that I practice under my own name, humble as it is.” She looked down at her lectern, released a small sigh. “That’s all for today, gentlemen. Thank you.”

When everyone had gone, Emily came down the steps to where Miss Jesczenka stood neatly putting her papers in order.

“So that’s why so many credomancers have names like Mirabilis and Fortissimus,” Emily said.

“The late Sophos Mirabilis’ birth name was Japheth Beckenbauer. Hardly propitious in a nation where Jews are still generally reviled.”

“And Rex Fortissimus?” Emily leaned in close for an answer.

“Ogilvy Creagh Flannigan,” Miss Jesczenka returned in a low voice. She paused. “So. You snuck off to meet Mr. Stanton, didn’t you?”

Emily blushed. “We didn’t ride in any carriages,” she offered, as if to mitigate the misbehavior. “Did Mrs. Stanton come by?”

“I told her you were contagious,” Miss Jesczenka said. “It now appears that you have a case of the plague.”

Emily frowned. “And how, exactly, am I to get over the plague before the Investment tomorrow?”

“That’s
your
concern.” Miss Jesczenka picked up her papers and climbed the stairs toward the door. “Come along, let’s get you dressed for dinner.”

Emily rolled her eyes. Of all the social customs of New York, dressing for dinner was certainly the most preposterous. Change out of a perfectly good dress, into a fancier dress, just to eat dinner? Who came up with this nonsense?

“Oh, not tonight, please.” Emily fanned herself with her hand as she followed. “It’s too hot to get all dressed up all over again. Honestly.”

“Miss Edwards, these things get easier once you get in the habit of them. You can’t kick against convention forever. You must get used to swimming with the current.”

“I’ve always gone my own way,” Emily said. “There never was any current. So I’m not used to swimming with it.”

“Well, there is a very strong current here. And I’d hate for you to find out how dangerous the undertows can be.” Miss Jesczenka’s voice was surprisingly stern. But after a moment of silence, she gave Emily a sympathetic little smile. “Never mind. If you’d rather not dress tonight, we’ll not stand on ceremony. Besides, you’ll have your fill of dressing tomorrow.”

Emily wasn’t sure if that was a promise or a threat.

Miss Jesczenka had arranged to have a table laid in Emily’s room. It was spread with crystal and white damask and a full complement of strange-looking forks. Emily sighed. She recognized all the signs of one of Miss Jesczenka’s “teaching” dinners.

One of Miss Jesczenka’s duties, since Emily’s arrival, had been to inculcate Emily in the finer points of using forks, the elegant management of her napkin, and how to drink the right amount from the right glasses. Each of these points had presented a challenge to Emily. The forks were indecipherable, the napkins (always large enough to serve as towels at need) unwieldy, and as for the glasses, Emily drained hers of wine far too quickly for Miss Jesczenka’s liking.

Emily looked at the covered plates of food waiting on a wheeled tray, and then at Miss Jesczenka.

“What’s it to be tonight, then? Cracked crab? Pâte à choux? Corn on the cob?”