Red Dog Conspiracy Sets

Chapter 15

The News

I peered at Jon as the carriage continued towards my apartments. I’d been at the cottage three weeks. What happened whilst I was gone? Jon had said nothing about current events, and no newspapers arrived at the cottage. I’d surely missed my court dates, and I dreaded what Molly and Mr. Pike would have to say.

As we came closer to the city I began to feel afraid. What if Tony had me locked in the carriage as he did before, forced me to return to Spadros Manor after all? I’d never be allowed to escape!

Dread gnawed at me as we approached the outer road. But the carriage sped past 192nd Street, and I felt a huge sense of relief.

We stopped in front of my apartments behind Jonathan’s carriage, which had returned for him. Once we had alighted, I said to Jon, “Thank you for everything.”

“Rest well.” Jon tipped his hat, and climbed into his carriage.

I expected Amelia to answer the door, but instead Blitz did!

I drawled, “Blitz Spadros. Whatever are you doing here?”

He chuckled, and the look in his eye told me he remembered the night in the back of Vig’s saloon when I asked that very thing. Opening the door wide, he turned into the hall. “She’s back!”

I was pleased to see Blitz, although puzzled at him being here. Blitz was Tony’s distant cousin and our night footman. He claimed he never needed much sleep; perhaps he brought news.

I couldn’t imagine any news from Tony being very pleasant.

Amelia emerged from a back room; Mary Pearson followed. Mary was twenty and pretty, with straight light brown hair which in some lights looked blonde. She was a maid at Spadros Manor, and the butler’s daughter.

“Mary! This is a pleasant surprise.”

Blitz was grinning, which always reminded me of Tony.

I said to Mary, “I hope your parents are well?”

Mary seemed surprised. “They are, mum, thank you.”

Blitz put his arm around Mary. “May I present Mrs. Spadros.”

“Wait,” I said. “You got married?”

Blitz said, “We’re your staff.”

“How wonderful!” I always liked Blitz, and Mary too. “I never even knew you fancied each other!”

Mary blushed, relaxing into his side, and it was so sweet and charming that it warmed my heart.

Amelia said, “You’ve had a long, tiring ride. Would you like some tea?” So we sat in our parlor as Amelia brought in the tea-tray. “Before I forget, mum. You have a meeting with Mr. Pike on Tuesday at half past ten. The Court carriage will take you.”

“Thank you, Amelia.”

She wouldn’t sit with us. “You have need to speak with your housekeeper and butler, mum, and I have much to do.”

Once Amelia left, I said, “However did you come to be here?”

Mary looked to Blitz, who put his cup down, hesitating a long moment. “I’ve always supported and I dare say loved my cousin. But the night Mr. Anthony struck me for doing my best to follow his instruction, I knew we needed to leave. Your illness gave us the perfect opportunity.” He grinned at Mary. “We’d been wanting to marry for some time. Her father gave permission, and I don’t think Mr. Anthony much cared one way or the other.”

“So did you marry at Spadros Manor?”

Blitz let out a short laugh. “Hardly. They were still patching all the holes inside.” He glanced at me. “You know —”

Tony’s men attacked him inside Spadros Manor? I took a deep breath, feeling shaky. “So where did you marry, then?”

“Vig’s place.”

“Vig’s? How is he?” Vígharður Vikenti and I had been friends for years, and he owned a saloon not actually that far away.

“Much better,” Blitz said. “We helped him clean up the place. With Natalia doing the cooking, it’s about back to normal.”

Natalia was — as she said it — “of the Romani,” a bit older than I was. She wasn’t one of Vig’s “working girls” in back — I think she was a dancer. But she and Vig always seemed at odds; I never expected her to stay long. “Natalia’s — cooking?”

Blitz laughed. “She’s a better cook than his mother.”

Grief struck hard. Roy’s men destroyed Vig’s saloon — where he lived with his mother — as punishment for Vig refusing to inform on me to Roy. That night, his mother’s heart gave way.

It was all too much. “She helped me when no one else would.” I wiped my eyes, raising my teacup. “To Vig’s mother.”

“To Vig’s mother,” Blitz said. “May she receive better cards next time.” I don’t suppose Mary knew Vig’s mother, but she toasted her just the same.

I put down my teacup. “I thought Natalia would’ve left.”

“She tried,” Blitz said, “but between the Travelers’ Federation searching everything and the Clubbs searching everything, it’s hard for her people to travel as they want to.”

I stared at him, not understanding.

“They smuggle themselves in the cargo.”

“How very clever,” I said.

Lance Clubb was going to smuggle my Ma out, before the zeppelin exploded. Why didn’t I think of doing that? I could have been out of the city long ago.

But I wouldn’t have gone without Joe, and it seemed that Joe wouldn’t have gone with me in any case. I didn’t want to think about that, really, or I’d end up crying. “What must we discuss?”

Mary smiled. “It’s so small here there’s not nearly much to do.”

I said to Blitz, “Did Amelia tell you of the auction?”

“She did.” Blitz gave me a grin which said he knew exactly what I was up to. “We have a date: June 14th. It’s all set up.”

“Notify Mr. Blackberry of the Bridges Daily.”

Bridges Daily“Will do.”

“I’ve seen no news,” I said. “What’s happened in Bridges?”

“Oh, mum,” said Mary. “You have no idea.”

Not only had a group of Spadros men turned on Tony, even more refused to follow Roy anymore. “They’re calling themselves the Ten of Spades,” Blitz said, “and they vow to kill you.”

“Really.” For some reason, this didn’t surprise me.

“Well, not really. But if they had you in their sights they wouldn’t hesitate. They hate Roy, despise Mr. Anthony, and feel the Family’s left the old ways. They want new leadership —”

“In other words, them.”

Blitz laughed.

Sawbuck and his men had been in firefights with these rogues — who numbered much more than ten — several times in the past month. “They’re trying to show they aren’t afraid of us,” Blitz said. “Looks like Mary and I got out of the way just in time.”

“Do you think they’ll come here?”

“With all those police outside? I doubt it. But once the trial’s over … ?” He let it trail off with a shrug.

“Well, let’s worry about that later.” With my luck, I’d be hung before the rogues caught up to me.

“It’ll turn out, mum,” Mary said. “I know you didn’t do it.”

Mary brought out a box full of old newspapers and began reading to me. A steam pipe exploded in an abandoned home on West 6th in Spadros. Several homes were destroyed and a dozen killed. The power went down in Clubb for a whole hour at sunset, leaving several square miles in the dark at dinnertime.

People were angry at the Inventors’ Board for not maintaining the pipes and wires. “What do we pay them for,” one editorial said, “when they aren’t doing their jobs?”

The Inventors I’d met so far had an intense interest in the Magma Steam Generators. Inventor Maxim Call would probably say, “if the generators don’t work, you won’t need the pipes.”

Yet the Inventors directed the Apprentices, craftsmen, tinkerers, and assistants who did the real work. Had their minds become so fixed upon discovering how to repair the Generators that they’d lost focus? “Blitz, send word to Inventor Call. I’d like to speak with him.”

“Be happy to.”

The Clubbs — true to their word — had sponsored several editorials asking why the District Attorney persecuted a woman on such flimsy evidence. “Who analyzed the handwriting on these documents? Can we trust him any more than we trusted the so-called ‘Doctor’ who certified those ‘miracle gems’?”

“Oh, that’s a good one,” I said.

The Golden Bridges held a great deal of speculation as to why the trial hadn’t begun. Rumors I’d fled the city, rumors that they’d secretly hung me without a trial. A group marched on City Hall in protest of the latter, to be met by Bridgers, protesting that crime families should be running the city at all.

Golden Bridges“Was Jack really captured in the quadrant?” I never dared to ask Jon about it.

Blitz chuckled, a wry grin on his face. “I was with Sawbuck when he learned the scoundrel wished to enter. We let Master Diamond in, then followed to lay in wait. I felt surprised by how fast the neighbors converged.”

“I warned them about him. Was he badly hurt?”

“Nah,” Blitz said. “Just fists and boots. We took him before they went for bricks and pipes.”

I almost felt sorry for the man. Clearly Jack was mad to enter the quadrant again, especially after Tony threatened formal protest for his harassment of our merchants the first time.

Blitz said, “His father was not at all happy, I’ll say that.”

Mary laughed, as did Amelia, who had come for the plates.

I said, “I know the woman who owns the shop. Do you think they’ll let me go to her? She must have been terrified.”

“Not a chance,” Blitz said. “But they might let her come here.”

“Look into it.”

Blitz said, “What do you want to do for Midsummer?”

I felt melancholy. That was a holiday, but it was also Tony’s 23rd birthday. I doubted this Midsummer would be very happy for anyone. “Whatever you want is fine.”

Blitz sobered, no doubt realizing the same. “My apologies.”

I rose. “Thank you. All of you. For everything.”

I returned to my room and lit a cigarette. I sat at my tea-table smoking, desperately craving a drink. I always drank sitting here.

Amelia sat in the kitchen polishing the silver, springing to her feet to curtsy when I entered. I got a glass of water, returned to my room, and sipped the water, wishing it were wine. The thought of drinking bourbon made me more than a little ill.

A few moments later, Amelia came in with a tray holding a water carafe, some empty glasses, and another glass filled with tan liquid. “Your tonic, mum. The doctor said once a day.”

It was bitter, which seemed fitting. I’d ruined my poor liver as badly as I had my life. “For how long, once a day?”

“I don’t know, mum, you’ll have to ask him.”

After luncheon, Amelia gave me a tour of my apartments. Amelia and Mary had straightened my rooms, then cleaned and organized everything. “The auctioneer and banker are hired,” Amelia said. “We have furniture, awnings, a tent, and workers. It took some time to find ones who didn’t want money up front.”

The ball dresses hung in one room, the street dresses in another. Amelia and I stood in front of rows of walking dresses.

Gods, I thought, how is it I have so many things?

I had Amelia save aside four outfits for court, three dresses to wear inside, and my brown widow’s outfit I only wore on cases. I could only hope that someday, if I survived this, I might work cases again.

“The Spadros men said they’d build a place for the uppers to sit,” Amelia said, “and secure food carts for the crowds.”

“What about those who live here?”

“Mary went round already and told them of it. All on this block get to see your things for free, before the crowds do. Mr. Monarch thought that’d make them feel better about all that’s gone on.”

It sounded good. But I wondered if it would be enough.

In the large room upstairs, the lighter items such as hats and jewels lay displayed on tables and shelving. Everything had been tagged, categorized, and put in the order the auctioneer wanted it. I felt impressed. “You’ve done very well.”

Amelia smiled. “Mary’s been a big help, mum. She’s done a lot of this when the butler sleeps during the day.” She giggled. “Never thought we’d have two lovebirds here.”

I chuckled. “It is amusing.”

“Oh, mum, that reminds me. Do you want to sell the cage?”

I stood considering for a long moment, then nodded.

“Very well, mum. I’ll have Mr. Blitz move it up here.”

Then she pointed at the jewelry. “A Mr. Roman contacted me when he heard of the auction, asking for ‘the honor of evaluating the gems.’” She grinned knowingly. “He said it just like that. I don’t think he wanted anyone to devalue the things he’d made.”

“So they’ll let us hold the auction here?”

“I spoke with Mr. Roy’s men.” She peered at her hands.

My Family fees for May. “Who paid them? I must reimburse.”

She didn’t look at me. “There’s no need for that.”

“Nonsense.” I strode down to my room, returned, thrust the thirty-three cents into her hand. “In this home, you’re no servant to be exploited for my benefit.” At Spadros Manor, they would’ve taken the money without considering how it impoverished her. “You’re a free woman. You deserve to be treated as such.”

Where did she get the money in the first place? “You’re paid for informing on me, aren’t you?”

Her head drooped. “Yes, mum.”

“Take every cent. Maybe we can find some benefit in all this.”

“Mum,” Amelia said soberly. “Something you’ll want to see.”

She took me out front and to the right, to the small patch of ground beside the stair. Hoots and whistles rose from the barricades as we emerged. A flat gray stone the size of a dinner plate lay on the ground. “We put your bird here.”

I crouched down, heart clenching, to lay one hand upon the smooth cool surface, the other upon the rough wall before me.

I only wanted you to be free.

I struggled to hold back the tears, unwilling to cry in front of those men. “Thank you, Amelia.”

Amelia turned to face the street.

How I wished I’d never let my bird go the night I left! If not for that, it might be alive and happy still.

Was leaving Spadros Manor a mistake?

No. I was no tame bird, born to live my life in a cage.

If only there had been some other way.