Page 25 of Confounding Oaths
Inside Miss Bickle’s mind, the possibilities unspooled themselves into a tangle of conflicts. “Did you insult a man’s wife? Seduce his brother? Quarrel at a club about whether a window should be left open? Have a stern disagreement over a horse?”
“It’s the major,” Mr. Caesar told her. “Which might perhaps have been a more obvious conclusion to reach than the thing with the window?”
“More obvious,” agreed Miss Bickle. “But much less interesting.”
As ever, Mr. Caesar knew he would regret it. As ever, he asked. “How is it less interesting?”
“Well, because you wouldn’t really be duelling over the window. That would just be the public pretence concealing what in fact would be a matter of the deepest personal passion the details of which are too devilish by far to be discussed by daylight.”
“Your imagination,” said Miss Mitchelmore, “is sometimes worryingly specific.”
Miss Bickle gave a solemn nod. “Reality so often disappoints one.” She didn’t know how right she was. You haven’t truly been disappointed by reality until you have been exiled to it.
“Well, then I am sorry my upcoming life-or-death struggle is insufficiently romantic for you,” replied Mr. Caesar, acidly.
Irony, however, was wasted on Miss Bickle. “Don’t be. It’s still the most romantic thing that has happened this month. After all, you struck a man in defence of a lady.”
“That lady was my sister,” Mr. Caesar pointed out. “I’m not entirely sure it counts.”
“You struck a man in defence of a lady, and were subsequently called out by him. Being no kind of shot or swordsman”—
“You’re making me look rather poor here, Lizzie.”
—“you threw yourself on the mercy of a gallant captain who has taken you under his wing and who I am sure will fall in love with you if he’s the kind of captain who is interested in gentlemen, which I am sure some captains are because, well, it only stands to reason.”
This was all too much. Even if Mr. Caesar had been the sort to share these kinds of flights of fancy (and he was not), even if he had been at risk of developing that kind of attachment to the captain (and he told himself he was not), now was the worst possible time to be thinking of it. At this juncture his and Miss Bickle’s mutual pacings brought them face-to-face, which gave Mr. Caesar ample opportunity to gaze his disapproval directly at his friend. “Lizzie. Stop it. Nobody is falling in love with anybody. Nobody is having any kind of grand adventure. My sister is missing and we need to do something about it. And since”—he pursed his lips, not quite able to admit he was going to have to say what he was about to say—“your theory about supernatural abduction is actually our best bet, that means finding some kind of magician. And I happen to know one who lives locally.”
Miss Bickle had already called for her pelisse. “Then what are we waiting for? We simply must find this magician of yours without delay.”
“There is nowehere,” Mr. Caesar insisted. “The gentleman I intend to consult is staying at an inn in St. Gi—”
He should have known better. Far better. Miss Bickle squeaked with delight. “Oh, John, are we to go to a rookery? To immerse ourselves in the grime and grit of real London?”
“Mayfair is quite real enough for me, thank you,” said Miss Mitchelmore. But, just as Mr. Caesar was beginning to relax, she added, “Still, I agree that we should go with you.”
This felt to Mr. Caesar like an issue on which he should stand firm. “St. Giles is not a place for ladies.”
“Are half its residents not ladies?” asked Miss Mitchelmore, arching an eyebrow. I suspect this was a habit she had acquired from her lover, like behavioural syphilis.
“Not ladies of quality.”
Miss Bickle was still grinning. “Oh, that’s perfectly all right then. I’m not a lady of quality, I’m just very rich. In terms of heritage I’m as common as a church mouse.”
This was not going the way Mr. Caesar wanted. Although were he honest with himself, he would have had to admit it was going the way he expected. And it was certainly going the wayIwanted, which is my chief concern. “I could not guarantee your safety.”
“Nor could we guarantee yours,” replied Miss Mitchelmore. “But we have both been in danger before, and if we bring Lizzie then we shall have the use both of her grandfather’s coach and of his large, heavily armed servants, who I suspect will see us secure enough.”
There was little counterargument Mr. Caesar could make to that. He had not been relishing the thought of returning to St. Giles unescorted and the kind of entourage the elder Mr. Bickle would insist upon providing for his granddaughter would be a comfort indeed.
So he relented, and the three set out for St. Giles with your humble narrator, in my shape of mists and shadows, trailing in their wake.
They arrived at the Folly a little before noon, the late morning light rather spoiling the atmosphere of malevolence that at least one of their number had come there expecting.
“It’s nicer than I thought it would be,” observed Miss Bickle, disappointed. “Although it also smells worse.”
Not having any sensical reply to that, Mr. Caesar led his lady companions, along with two of the four men who had come to guard them, into Lord Wriothesly’s Folly. To his concern, it was a mostly different crowd from the one he had seen the previous evening, although in truth he had paid little attention to the ununiformed patrons.
The one red jacket in the room belonged to a young man who was leaning on the bar and watching the world with an expression of laconic disinterest that Mr. Caesar and I both greatly approved of.
