"Hi, Kid What brings you in?"
He met her beside a glass case containing lace-and-lawn caps, feathered and plain fans, plus silk, leather, and cloth gloves while Margo emitted the most outlandish sounds he'd ever heard a female make off a mattress.
"What do you think?" he smiled, nodding toward the enraptured girl pawing through a rack of ball gowns.
"Margo, of course. I'm sending her down the Britannia Gate with Malcolm. Sort of a trial run just to get her feet wet, give her a taste for time travel."
"Good idea. Hang on a sec, would you? These feathers itch."
She lifted off the headdress. The glossy black hair came with it. She shook out her own hair, then vanished into the back. When she returned, the kimono had gone as well, replaced by a set of cowboy-style leather chaps, worn over woolen drawers and a boned corset. Occasionally Kit had known her to change clothing five times during the course of a twenty-minute conversation as she tried out various new creations. Across the room, Margo noticed. She stared for a full thirty seconds, round-eyed, then returned to her window shopping with another silly squeal as her attention rested on something else utterly wonderful.
"Very becoming," Kit drawled.
Connie laughed. "They`re hideous and the corset is cutting me in half, but I had to be sure the busks and side steels were bent to the right shape before I had William stitch the cover closed."
"And the chaps?"
"The customer said they chafed him. I'm testing them out to see what the problem is."
"Uh-huh."
Kit, like most 'eighty-sixers, had eventually realized that when she was working, Connie Logan was completely unconcerned about her appearance. And since she worked most of the hours she was awake "What do you mean, do something fun for a change? I love designing clothes!"--Connie Logan was at first glance the most eccentric loon in a time station crammed full of them.
Kit thought she was the most charming nut he'd ever known.
Even he deferred to her encyclopedic knowledge.
"London, is it?" Connie asked, peering toward Margo, who had discovered the Roman stolas with their richly embroidered hems. "What's the program? Simple tour? Teaching experience? Test-run scouting trip?"
"All the above. I leave the outfitting choices to you and Malcolm."
"But not to Margo?' Connie smiled.
He rolled his eyes. "Let's see what she picks on her own and judge from that."
"Fair enough. Rent or buy?"
"Rent what's rescuable when they get back. I'll buy what's ruined."
"Okay." Her glance traveled beyond Kit's shoulder to a group of tourists selecting accessories for the dresses they carried. "Oh, damn..." She bolted past Kit's shoulder. "No, no, no, not that fan, that's an evening fan for the opera, what you have there is a morning dress for strolling and paying calls. You'd stick out like an idiot, carrying that around London. Here, what you need is this, or this, or maybe this ...And that pair of slippers is completely wrong, what you need are these side-button boots. Size six? Hmm ...a little narrow, I think. Try this six-and-a-half."
The astonished tourists gaped at the figure Connie made, her girlish pudginess stuffed into a lawn shift, woolen combinations peeking out from under several layers of petticoats, the tightly laced corset which created unsightly bulges both above and below, topped off with the leather chaps-tied on over the petticoats. The Roman "boots" were icing on the cake.
"Uh ...thank you..."
They accepted Connie's choices a bit reluctantly, but obediently sat down to try on the boots.
Connie came back shaking her head. "If they`d just read the signs ...You have to watch 'em like hawks. Let's check on Margo. Oh, Lord, she's already in trouble ...."
And Connie was off again, before Kit could open his mouth to add a single comment.
"No, no, Margo, not that, you've got a charity schoolgirl's cap paired with a lady's tea gown ...."
"Malcolm," Kit waved to get the guide's attention; "get over here! Connie's on the warpath and we need some decisions!"
Malcolm, looking for all the world like a truant schoolboy caught in a candy store, hastened over. "Sorry. Just catching up on the newest down-time styles.
There've been changes in top hats since last season, they're more tapered from crown to brim-and the new dress lounge coats are magnificent, with that new rolled collar. But did you see those hideous woolen jersey Jaeger suits?" Malcolm shuddered. "They wore those things in July and August, even while exercising. No wonder people died of heatstroke."
"Malcolm, I didn't know you were a clothes horse," Kit teased
The guide-currently dressed in faded jeans and a cheap T shirt grinned. "Me? Never. But I'd better update my wardrobe before I step through the Britannia Gate or I'll look like an old fuddy-duddy."
"You are an old fuddy-duddy," Kit laughed, "and so am I. Let's get this over with. Gad, but I hate shopping."
"Only when you're not stepping through the gate," Malcolm smiled.
"Too true. Now, about what she'll need-"
An animal scream lifted from Commons, high and piercing, followed an instant later by a woman's shriek of terror. Kit and Malcolm jerked around, then ran for the door. Surely another new gate hadn't opened? The warning klaxon hadn't sounded and Kit hadn't felt the telltale buzz in his skull bones. Someone started cursing. Then Kit rounded an ornamental garden plot and found a woman in medieval regalia staring at the ceiling and sobbing in rage.
"They killed her! Goddamn them, they killed her!"
The men with her, also dressed in medieval garb, were struggling to soothe terrified, hooded falcons on their arms. One bird had already sprained a wing trying to escape its jesses.
"Who killed whom?" Malcolm blurted.
A few spots of blood on the concrete and a couple of feathers gave Kit the clue. "I'd say those two bird things Sue couldn't identify made lunch of this lady's falcon."
The lady in question affirmed Kit's guess in most unladylike language. Malcolm coughed and turned aside to hide a grin. Pest Control came running, Sue Fritchey in the lead
"What happened?"
The woman whose valuable hunting falcon had just become a paleo-hawk's dinner told her-scathingly.
"Uh-oh. I was afraid of something like this. Where are they now? Ah ...there. Okay. Jimmy, Bill, Alice, we need capture nets and tranks, stat. We let those things keep feeding, we won't have any pterosaurs or Ichthyomises to study. And maybe a tourist will get hurt."
That last had clearly been an afterthought. Kit hid a grin. The tourist who'd lost her falcon began demanding reimbursement. Someone called Bull Morgan to mediate.
"C'mon, Malcolm. Looks like the fun's over. We have a trip down time to plan."
Margo, not surprisingly, hadn't even heard the ruckus. She was still flitting from rack to rack, cooing and all but drooling on the clothes. Even Connie was laughing at her. Kit shook his head. An unlimited expense account in heaven ...
"Well, let's see what our prodigy's chosen, shall we?"
"Don't I get an opinion?" Margo demanded. The three faces ranged against her grimaced simultaneously. If Margo hadn't been so flaming angry, it would've been comical. "Well, don't I? I'm going to be the one wearing these"