The Clockwork Girl by Anna Mazzola

Author:Anna Mazzola [Mazzola, Anna]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction, Historical, General, Romance, Victorian, Drama, European, French, Antiques & Collectibles, Clocks & Watches, Action & Adventure, Mystery & Detective
ISBN: 9781398703810
Google: XKcSEAAAQBAJ
Publisher: Orion
Published: 2022-03-03T00:00:00+00:00

14

Madeleine

Wednesday. Washday. Madeleine took some of Véronique’s shifts into one of the Louvre courtyards to dry. Another maid was already stretching cotton sheets over the rosemary bushes and nodded to her in greeting. As she worked, Madeleine considered the tree growing close to the wall. Could she somehow climb it and enter the workroom though the upstairs window? Three days had passed and still the door remained locked, still she remained in the dark. She’d seen little of her mistress, for she was forever at her lessons with Lefèvre or helping the men with their curious machine. When she returned she seemed tired and disinclined to talk. Madeleine felt shut out, the door closed against her. She’d been relegated again to a servant.

‘Victor has gone.’

Madeleine turned to see Joseph, his skin slick with sweat. She removed a peg from her mouth, her heart falling. ‘What d’you mean “gone”?’

‘I went to find him in the Rue Sainte Catherine and they told me he has not been seen for two days - that he’s run away.’ Joseph shook his head, still breathing heavily. ‘That boy has not run away. He’s been taken, just like the other children were.’

Madeleine’s felt her chest constrict. ‘Have they told the Watch?’

‘Oh yes, because they think he’s fled. But what do the Watch do? They do nothing about the other children. This is what people are saying.’

‘He could have run away though, couldn’t he? That bastard of a master of his—’

‘Trust me. He did not run away. He knows what they do to runaway slaves.’

‘What do they do, then?’

‘Branding, beating, whipping. If a person is not considered truly human then you can do anything to them.’

For an instant Madeleine remembered the footsteps behind her, being pulled to the ground as she tried to open the bedroom door, her fingers scrabbling at the wood. And then the smell of burning metal.

She put down the basket of washing. ‘We’ll go together, now, and search. Someone must’ve seen him, mustn’t they?’

‘Perhaps.’ Joseph took out his handkerchief to wipe his

face. She had a sudden urge to do it for him. ‘Or perhaps it’s already too late. He could be on board a ship. He could be anywhere.’

They hurried to the Marais district, past the elegant houses and high-walled Hôtel particuliers of the opulent Place Royale, to places Joseph thought Victor might have visited: the paperworks, the market, the Église Saint Paul, houses where servant friends worked. Madeleine had never walked out in the streets with Joseph, never seen before how others reacted to him, as though he were a different species, one at which they could gawp or laugh or spit. Oh, she’d had her fair share of glances in her time for her damaged face, her fair amount of jeers for just for being a woman, walking alone in Paris, but this was something new. And Joseph bore it all as though he was walking about in a full suit of armour. She wanted to say something, but she didn’t have the words.

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