Page 62 of Confounding Oaths
For all the watchmen knew, Mr. Caesar’s list of names could have been a recipe for soup or the playbill of an unpopular theatre, but he delivered it with such hauteur and confidence that they released the captain at once and fell back to an appropriately deferent distance.
“Oh, comeon,” tried Mr. Ellersley, “you can’t actually—”
“And as foryou”—Mr. Caesar rounded on his former lover with a fury that came at least six parts from desperation—“go home. Or to your club. Or to Paris. Or to Hell for all I care. I amfinishedwith you, Thomas.”
Mr. Ellersley’s mouth remained hanging open for a few moments, then he snapped it shut, gave a stiff little bow and said simply. “Caesar.”
“Ellersley,” replied Mr. Caesar with a curt nod.
The clash of politesse lasted a few seconds more, and then Mr. Ellersley lowered his gaze and retreated, taking the watchmen with him. No sooner was he out of sight than the swell of aristocratic rage that had been keeping Mr. Caesar afloat abated and he slumped like an understuffed doll.
Captain James looked at him with two kinds of concern. “Where the fuck did that come from?”
“My uncle,” Mr. Caesar admitted. “And my mother, sometimes. Occasionally my grandfather.”
For a moment, the captain considered this. “I’ll be honest, it’s a little bit scary.”
Mr. Caesar nodded. “I know. I’ve been on the other end of it more times than I’m comfortable with.”
“Still. Good to have in your back pocket.” Captain James looked back towards the Etheridge residence, where a crowd of rich mortals was still in mid-gossip. “Now I reckon you should take the ladies home.”
The fact that hisothersister was also at that moment unaccounted for did not help with Mr. Caesar’s turbulent blend of emotions, but it was at least galvanising. He nodded and then, restricting himself to the manner of address that could be considered at leastdeniablein public, placed a comradely hand on the captain’s shoulder. “Of course. And—” But there was noand,not really. There was no corollary that would undo the fact that he had once again let down his family and his new companions both. “And thank you,” he finished.
“It’s fine,” replied the captain. “And thanks too. For sorting out those watchmen.”
Unaccustomed to being thanked, or at least to being thanked sincerely, Mr. Caesar couldn’t think of a sensible reply. Besides, with gawkers and rubberneckers surrounding them, there was little more that could be said or done, and so Mr. Caesar returned to the crowd to search for his other sister and Captain James set off for the Folly.
Mercifully—well, mercifully for Mr. Caesar, rather less mercifully for those of us with greater appetites for chaos—locating Miss Anne was rather simpler. She had elected to cling to Lieutenant Reyne, with whom she had danced twice and thus considered herself quite well acquainted. And the lieutenant for his part delivered the girl to her brother swiftly and without complaint, but expressinghis deep regrets that the evening had been cut so short. Miss Bickle, for her part, had mercifully restrained her urge to wander off, and rejoined the group as Miss Anne was saying her goodbyes.
Having accomplished as much as he reasonably could—and having failed to accomplish rather more—Mr. Caesar was just returning to the carriage with his various feminine charges when he was interrupted by the young Mr. Bygrave.
“Is she—Miss Caesar, is she safe?” There was genuine concern in his voice, although I suspected that a good proportion of that was lingering enchantment.
Profoundly not in the mood to entertain young gentlemen, Mr. Caesar glanced down. “I do not know.”
“Then should you not be searching for her?”
The practical answer was that he should not, because he had equal responsibilities to both of his sisters. The less practical answer was that he should, because the greater claim to protection lay with the lady in greater peril. The answer he gave was “I do not know.”
“Then shouldIlook for her?” asked Mr. Bygrave, and my hypothetical ears (I was still a raven, so I had ears of a sort, just not externally) pricked up at this. If he began roving the streets now, his chances of dying in an interesting way were excellent, and while it might prove tangential to the overall thrust of the narrative, your people and mine share a taste for unnecessary bloodshed.
Thus I was delighted when Mr. Caesar’s reply was “Do as you wish.”
As the Caesars’ carriage rolled off into the night, I took flight, tracing wide circles over London and—with bird sight and fairy sight both—observing each of my various subjects as they moved through the city.
Thus I saw Mr. Caesar and his charges returning home by a straight route, Mr. Bygrave wandering with little aim or purpose,further and further from the paths he knew, and Miss Caesar fleeing like—and I apologise profusely for this analogy because it is profoundly, as I believe those mortals of the generations born between the end of the twentieth and the start of the twenty-first century would call it,basic—Cinderella from the ball.
It was, of course, entirely outside my remit as a dispassionate observer to guide, direct, or (perish the thought)misdirectany of these wanderers. So I absolutely did not.
In the end, the carriage reached its destination before anything murderous happened to either of the other two, and so I reverted to mists and followed the occupants inside. There Mr. Caesar, Miss Anne, and Miss Bickle were met by the elder Caesars who, if I was any judge (and since I am the narrator I am, in a sense, the only judge who matters), had been waiting in the same spots without moving since their children had left.
They said nothing as the ballgoers entered, and they did not need to. There was only one question to be asked and only one answer to be given.
“We failed,” Mr. Caesar told them. “Ifailed. And Mary fled. Captain James and the others are looking for her now.”
Miss Anne flopped into the window seat. “It was ill done on all fronts. John was wrong to interrupt the ball and Mary was wrong to flee from it. Things could have beensofine had you left well enough alone.”
“Your sister being under an enchantment,” Lady Mary pointed out, “is notwell enough.”
