Maddie Hatter and the Timely Taffeta by Jayne Barnard

Author:Jayne Barnard [Barnard, Jayne]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Steam Punk
Publisher: Tyche Books
Published: 2017-09-16T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter Seventeen

THE FRUITLESS SEARCH dragged on through the night. Mist thickened to rain. Flambeaux fizzled out. Campi and calli emptied of revellers. Their masks in their hands and their hearts heavier than their sodden hems, Maddie and Serephene trudged toward home. As they turned the last corner toward Nonna’s doors, the street blazed to life. Footmen carrying lanterns scurried from the palazzo, scaring rats and casting crazed shadows up the high walls.

“Something’s wrong.” Serephene picked up her skirts and ran.

Maddie hurried after her, only to stop abruptly as a large man, his bare head showing the trademark teal streak of the AcquaTiempe, stepped out of Nonna’s front door. Serephene’s papa. If he recognized her . . .

In that brief hesitation, Lord AcquaTiempe reached his daughter. He snatched her into a fierce hug, then pushed her to arm’s length to yell at her in rapid-fire Italian. She gestured to Maddie, standing stock still among the dancing shadows. Maddie barely shoved her mask up to her face before he loomed over her.

“You,” he roared. “I don’t know who you are or where you have been taking my Serephene, but you are no relation of mine. I will summon the police and have you arrested as an impostor.”

It was surely an idle threat, for no police had leisure during Carnevale to investigate a woman returning an unharmed friend to her home. But Maddie could not risk being hauled into the light where he might recognize her face, nor present her newspaper credentials to the police without Madame Frangetti wanting her charged with spying on the fashion house. She backed away, trusting to Serephene not to betray her true identity, and darted down the nearest dark alley.

Twenty minutes later, having taken a circuitous route to the Gritti, she sank into a chair in her own bedchamber. Mud pooled from her boots and oozed from the soggy hem of her once-white underskirt. It was probably oozing from the black over-hem too, but she could not care. What a disastrous night! Everything Serephene had worked for was dashed away: her apprenticeship, her hopes of running her own atelier, her chance to marry where she chose. With her father on the scene, taking charge of the husband-hunt and supervising her every move, she could not even search for Scottie.

Well, Maddie could and would look for him. They wouldn’t hurt him, she was sure. Well, almost sure. His knowledge of the fabric formulas would keep him safe. Even if he told them everything immediately, finding spider-bats and setting up equipment to test his formula would take time. No, Scottie would be unharmed for days yet.

More vital was where to start looking? The matching Arlecchina, almost certainly that thrice-blasted Sarah, probably knew where he was. Who was she working for? Where was she staying? Without Obie to help, how could Maddie hope to find her in this island city awash in revellers?

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