The Transference Engine by Julia Verne St. John

Author:Julia Verne St. John
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: DAW
Published: 2016-06-02T17:34:50+00:00

Chapter Eighteen

A DRIZZLING MONDAY MORNING, June 22, 1837. King William IV had died a few days before. Victoria had already distanced herself from her mother and her mother’s lover. She’d gathered her Prime Minister and other advisers she trusted—meaning her mother didn’t trust them—about her like a tight cloak of protection.

I did what I always did on Monday mornings. I scrubbed my stoop. Violet was off to see her mother and hated getting her hands wet and dirty. So I did it myself, while I thought through the last week and what I needed to do to improve my business, to watch over the ailing Lady Ada, to observe patterns in the news both at home and abroad.

Already, after only a few days, I sensed the shifting of the power players in Parliament, and the money men. Caution all around as they weighed and assessed the nature of the new power on the throne. Would young Victoria become an independent thinker? Or would she become a puppet of the Prime Minister?

The sound of weeping, quiet like the crying child was afraid of being kicked in the ribs for the crime of hopelessness, off to my left, around the corner in the narrow alley, kept me on my knees and moving my scrub brush long after the slates were clean.

Patience, I told myself. Feral children were very much like cats, skittish and untrusting. They could lash out with flying fists or thrown stones in their hunger and desperation.

Slowly, I dropped my brush and drying cloths into the bucket of soapy water and levered myself up to my feet, moving as if stiff and sore. Well, I was; crouching on my knees and washing the grime of hundreds of muddy boots and shoes off of slate isn’t easy. But I still had enough ease in my joints to run, or fight if I had to.

The crying became muffled sobs. I suspected the lost one was aware of my movements and watched carefully, face covered by an arm, while trying to stop the tears that still controlled him.

Did I know for sure it was a boy? No. But I suspected. Girls learned early on that tears and wide-open eyes softened the heart of those who could take care of them. Boys hid their uncontrolled emotions as if they were a sign of weakness.

A lump of rags huddled in the dim alley—only wide enough to admit one person at a time. A big lump of rags that nearly filled the passage. One slow step at a time I edged up to him.

He dropped his face between his bent knees. I can’t see you, so you can’t see me. Very catlike.

With my back against the brick wall of my shop, I slid down to sit beside the lump.

He froze in fear.

“I won’t hurt you,” I said quietly.

“Yes, y’ will,” he mumbled.

“I have no reason to hurt you.”

“Yes y’ do.”

“What have you done?”

“No’what.”

“Then why should I hurt you?”

“’Cause.”

“Because what?”

“Old man give me somewhat for y’ and t’others stole it.

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