The Sweet Far Thing

Page 73

Our carriage clippity-clops down the drive behind the others. I look back at Spence—at the men on the scaffolding mortaring stones into place, Mrs. Nightwing standing like a sentry at the front doors, Brigid helping girls on their way, the thick carpet of grass and the bright yellow of daffodils. The only threat is a band of rain clouds moving in. They puff out their cheeks and blow, sending shrieking girls after their hats. I laugh. The magic has me in its warm embrace, and I feel that no harm shall come to me. Even the dark clouds pressing against the silent gargoyles can’t catch us.
Without warning, my blood gallops hard inside my veins till it is all I can hear—thrum-thrum-thrum-thrum. Outside, the world’s merry-go-round gathers speed too. Storm clouds slither and stretch, dancing in the sky. I blink, the sound a cannon in my ears. The crow is in flight. Blink. It settles on the gargoyle’s head. Blink. Sharp as a whip, the gargoyle’s head twists round. My breath catches, and in that instant, the gargoyle’s sharp teeth come down. My head feels light. My eyelids flutter, as frantic as the crow’s wings.
“Gemma…” Felicity’s voice carries as if underwater, and then it’s clear as day. “Gemma! What is the matter?”
My blood settles into its normal cadence.
Felicity’s wide-eyed. “Gemma, you fainted!”
“The gargoyle,” I say, trembling. “It came alive.”
The two other girls in the carriage regard me cautiously. The four of us crane our necks out the windows and peer up at the school’s roof. It’s quiet and still, nothing but stone. A fat raindrop hits me squarely in the eye.
“Ow,” I say, sitting back. I wipe the rain from my face. “It seemed so real. Did I really faint?”
Felicity nods. Worry creases her forehead. “Gemma,” she whispers. “The gargoyles are made of stone. Whatever you saw was some hallucination. There’s nothing there, I promise you. Nothing.”
“Nothing,” I echo.
I chance a last look behind us, and it’s an ordinary spring day before Easter, a patch of rain moving in from the east. Did I really see those things or did I only think so? Is this a new trick of the magic? My fingers shake in my lap. Without a word, Felicity places her hands over mine, silencing my fear.
It is said that Paris in springtime is a glory to behold, that it makes a man feel as if he shall never die. I should not know, for I have never been to Paris. But spring in London is a wholly different affair. The rain pitters and patters against the carriage’s roof. The streets are choked equally with traffic and gas fog. Two young boys, crossing sweepers, have barely swept the muck and filth from the cobblestones so that a fashionable lady might pass when they are nearly run over by an omnibus whose driver curses them quite heatedly. The driver’s curses are nothing compared to what the horses leave for them to clean away, and despite my misgivings about what I shall find in Belgravia, I am eternally grateful I am not a crossing sweeper.
By the time we reach the house, I’m bruised from the carriage’s incessant bumping and my skirts wear mud an inch thick. A parlor maid takes my boots at the door, saying nothing about the large hole in the toe of my right stocking.
Grandmama emerges from the parlor. “Good heavens! What on earth?” she exclaims at the sight of me.
“Spring in London,” I explain, pushing a limp lock behind my ear.
She closes the parlor doors behind her and leads me to a quiet spot beside an enormous painting. Three Grecian goddesses dance in a grove by a hermitage whilst Pan plays his flute nearby, his little goat feet stepping merrily over clover. It is so ghastly as to take one’s breath away and I cannot imagine what possessed her to purchase it, let alone display it proudly. “What is that?”
“The Three Graces,” she tuts. “I am quite fond of it.”
It is possibly the most appalling painting I’ve ever seen. “There is a goat-man dancing a jig.”
Grandmama appraises it proudly. “He represents nature.”
“He’s wearing pantaloons.”
“Really, Gemma,” Grandmama growls. “I did not pull you aside to discuss art, of which it is apparent you know little. I wished to discuss your father.”
“How is he?” I ask, the painting forgotten.
“Delicate. This is to be a peaceful trip. I’ll have no outbursts, none of your peculiar habits, nothing to upset him. Do you understand?”
My peculiar habits. If she only knew. “Yes, of course.”
After I’ve exchanged my muddy dress for a clean one, I join the others in the drawing room.