“Is it not just so, little niece? Is it not just right?”
I did not understand. Down the lever went again, and tendrils of blue electricity snaked between the poles, buzzing and crackling, oddly mesmerizing. I reached out a finger.
“No!” my uncle bellowed. “No, no!”
I jerked my finger back, again wracked with guilt. I really was not myself. I knew better than to touch one of Uncle Tully’s things. He was panting, his eyes very bright, but all he said was, “No, Simon’s baby. The lightning will hurt. You do not touch the lightning. Never, never touch the lightning.”
I put my hands behind my back while he made some minute adjustment to the wires and pushed down his lever. The bell rang instantly, and this time I hurried over to examine it while it rang, waving my hand in the air in front of it, looking for some kind of tiny string. But all I could find was a small wire, attached to one of the clear fluid-filled jars, the same sort of jar that was attached by wires to the lightning machine. And there was nothing else; the bell was ringing alone.
“How …” I stopped myself. Uncle Tully did not tolerate questions on “how” any better than he did touching. But somehow he was making that bell ring, making that blue spark fly through the air unseen. I wished Lane was here, seeing this. I wished I could have described it to Mr. Babcock. Once again, Uncle Tully had created something unbelievable, almost magical in its proportions. And this, I thought, was why Mr. Babcock had died. Because of Uncle Tully’s wonderful and astonishing mind. I held an arm across the ache in my stomach, and then I realized that the bell had gone quiet. Uncle Tully spoke from just behind me.
“You are not splendid, Simon’s baby, and neither is the girl. Did I do it wrong?”
I glanced back at Mary, who had been watching the bell with a handkerchief pressed to her mouth. I tried to smile, and then on second thought turned my face away. “You did it just right, Uncle Tully. The new toy is so very splendid. Where did you get the bell?”
“From the boat in the box with the other things.”
I remembered seeing that now, the box of tin toys in the corner. There had been several boats with bells, much like the one we’d found in my grandmother’s library at Stranwyne, the one Uncle Tully had made balance on its keel. Having the boats must have been important to him at one time, if Marianna had made sure to have them in Paris. But she was gone, just as Mr. Babcock was gone, and Lane was not here to help me either. How could I protect my uncle? How could I take care of everyone? So far I had taken care of no one at all. The knot in my insides was now an agonizing weight, the tears I could not prevent rolling freely down my cheeks. The clocks in the room struck a multi-note clang, marking the half hour. I felt a feather-light touch on my sleeve.
“Here, Simon’s baby,” said Uncle Tully. I looked down to see the brass flower sitting in his palm. When I waited, he pushed it into my hand. “Here. You like the flower.”
I took the intricate, shining thing, amazed at this freedom, feeling its weight like a bloom of pure gold in my hands. And Uncle Tully had given it to me to hold. He might as well have told me he loved me.
I woke once in the night, the moon shining down, making strange shadows in the workshop. A light shone from my uncle’s bedchamber, dim, and I could hear him puttering around inside the room with soft, metallic clinks. Mary had made a sojourn downstairs for nightgowns and spread us a pallet of blankets on the carpeted floor — we’d both deemed it safer in the hidden workshop than on the lower floors — and I could hear her heavy breathing from just beside me, feel her warmth on my back, immeasurably grateful that she was with me. I lay awake a long time, staring at everything and nothing, tears wetting my loose hair and the pillow. Never had I felt so alone.
A touch on my shoulder and I sat straight up from the pallet on the floor, clutching hard at the blanket, the sun streaming in from the high windows making me blink.
“I’m that sorry to wake you, Miss, but you’d best be coming downstairs right away. There’s a sight to be seen, Miss.”
I stumbled upright, a bit stupid with sleep, feeling a heavy ache behind my eyes. I pulled the blanket around my nightgown, running a hand over my wild hair, which I’d neglected to braid, and forced myself to keep up with Mary’s pace. She was fully dressed and in a hurry.
“Tell me what’s the matter,” I said, waking up enough to be frightened. But Mary only shook her head.
“Down here, Miss,” she said, leading me down sixty-six stairs and into the salon, where she went to the hearth and stood, arms crossed over her apron. I could not understand what was upsetting her until I saw that there was something new on the wall, a piece of wood, screwed firmly into the plaster on one side of the chimneypiece, little white shavings all over the floor. I touched the wooden plank. It was part of a chair. A small box was attached to the wood, and from the bottom of this box hung a brass bell, just like I had seen last night on Uncle Tully’s workbench. I turned to Mary in horror. Surely not. Surely Uncle Tully had not put that bell here? Mary’s face was grim.
“Did you go out of the storeroom last night, Miss? ’Cause I know I was locking the door.”
“I didn’t, Mary, I swear it. And I remember that you locked it.” I looked again at the innocent little bell. If Uncle Tully could make bells ring by themselves, I don’t know what made me think a simple lock and key could keep him in. I looked down into the open top of the box and found the clear jar and the wire, just like last night. But Uncle Tully couldn’t make this bell ring, not all the way downstairs? Could he? I looked to Mary, and her large eyes confirmed that he had, and he could.
“There’s another one in my room, Miss, and in yours, one in the dining room, and one next to the convenience.”
I dropped onto the settee. “Is he …”
“Sleeping like a lamb, Miss.”
“But have you …” I ran a finger over my temple and lowered my voice. “Have you seen the DuPonts?”
Mary’s voice followed suit. “That Mr. DuPont was creeping about early this morning, Miss, as soon as I came down the stairs.”
“Do you think he could have seen Uncle Tully? Was he acting normally, Mary?”
Mary rolled her eyes, and I acknowledged the idiocy of the question with a shrug. “Well, if he was, Miss, then Mr. Tully will be all caught up good and proper on the state of that first Napoléon’s health, that’s all I’ve got to be saying about it. We …”
Mary fell silent as Mrs. DuPont came into the salon, her expression unaffected by the sight of me sitting downstairs in my nighttime dishevelment. “Your breakfast is in the dining room, Mademoiselle.”
“Miss Tulman!” I said sharply, in no mood for niceties. Her mask of a face did not change as she held out a letter. I came to take it, she curtsied, and shut the salon door.
“Bat!” Mary blurted. “If it wasn’t for the girl I’d say toss her on her backside, that’s what.”
I ripped open the letter and began to read.
“And what are we going to be doing about them DuPonts, Miss? Mr. Babcock was the one that had all that in hand, and you know that man is about by his lamppost this morning, Miss, watching our doors as bold as brass, shiftless as you please. How to even be taking a bit of air without … What is it, Miss?”