The Derring-Do Club and the Year of the Chrononauts (44 page)

“You’re only saying that because you know you’ll lose.”

“I most certainly am not.”

“En garde.”

“En garde.”

They both brought their swords up in front of their faces. Charlotte imagined the dueling machine, Uncle Edgar, and then kept a watchful eye on Earnestine, so that Earnestine didn’t take her by surprise and attack before she was ready. Earnestine had killed someone in a duel, she knew, so she was a formidable foe. But still she had to fight her elder sister. It was clear that Earnestine had been turned by the evil, but charismatic, Mrs Frasier.

So Charlotte attacked, a lunge, and Earnestine had to sidestep and parry to avoid it.

“Oh, you did apply yourself, Lottie,” Earnestine said.

“Yes.”

They cut and parried, moving sideways and then to–and–fro, each countering the other as if playing different Jacquard cards from their hand, one after another.

Snap!

Their swords clattered back and forth until–

“Ow!”

Earnestine leapt back, putting her left hand over her right where Charlotte had smacked it with the side of her blade. Charlotte realized just how much further she’d reached with the Dueling Machine than her sister.

“See… Ness, you can’t beat me, so you’ll just have–”

Earnestine slashed angrily catching Charlotte off guard. Her sword clattered to the ground, her left hand gripped over her right arm copying Earnestine’s earlier gesture, but this time vivid red blood seeped between her fingers.

They glared at each other.

It wasn’t a game anymore.

Earnestine leveled the point of her sword.

“Now, Charlotte, say sorry, put away this gunpowder and we’ll say no more about it.”

“Never!”

Charlotte leapt to one side, lurching into a cartwheel and as she went over, her heels and borrowed trousers uppermost, she picked up her fallen sword. When she landed, she was ready for a second bout.

They fought again with no love lost between them.

The stakes ever higher, Earnestine fought with renewed strength, but it wasn’t brute force that counted. Although the machine had more power in its fully wound springs than any person, Charlotte could still beat it.

She parried, blow after blow, but each attack from her sister, despite her longer arms, was wilder and clumsier. Charlotte just needed to wait for the best opening as her older sister tired.

It came soon enough.

Earnestine’s sword went down, strong and powerfully, going past Charlotte’s in an arc. The edge of Charlotte’s sword found its target and she drove the move home.

Earnestine’s yelped, her sword clattered across the floor and she put her right hand to her face. Blood spurted and then oozed between her fingers, dripping down and splattered bright red flecks on the ground.

“That hurt!”

“Sorry Ness.”

“I’m bleeding.”

“I’m sorry, Ness, really I am, but I win: you have to give ground.”

“No.”

“Ness, you have to ask for quarter, because I can just run you through.”

Earnestine lips tightened, but she had no choice: “Quarter?”

“Of course,” said Charlotte, genuinely disturbed by the injury she’d inflicted.

“NO!”

It was Mrs Frasier.

The woman put the toe of her boot under Earnestine’s sword and flicked it into the air. She caught it expertly.

“But I won,” Charlotte complained. “It’s two against one.”

“Don’t whine,” said Earnestine and Mrs Frasier together.

“There’s only one other person besides yourself here,” said Mrs Frasier. “We can’t help it if we came here twice. Ah ha! We can finally use the Royal ‘we’.”

“You aren’t Ness!” Charlotte roared. “You’re a fake. See! Ness will have a duelling scar and you don’t.”

Mrs Frasier put her sword to her cheek and pressed: when she took the blade away, a line of blood oozed and dripped.

“En garde!” she said.

She slashed forward, swiping at Charlotte, who parried giving ground.

“Don’t kill her!” Earnestine shouted.

They fought, Charlotte and Mrs Frasier, swords clashing, but for Charlotte it was her second bout. She might have beaten Earnestine, but her skills didn’t match those of Mrs Frasier. The older woman showed flair, a dramatic ability to cut and thrust, moving and skipping to change the angle of attack with confidence and aplomb.

Charlotte, used to a machine, couldn’t cope with the changes of pace. The speed and agility required were beyond her. With each attack, she had to back away, a step here, a shuffle there.

In a flurry of cuts, Mrs Frasier trapped Charlotte against the glass wall and, with nowhere to go, Charlotte’s defence was desperate, each parry more hopeless and more uncontrolled until, inevitably, she left herself open.

Mrs Frasier stabbed forward.

There were men running behind Mrs Frasier, hidden in the blur of tears and fear, but all Charlotte could see was the steel point coming in, past her own sword, closer than an arm’s length, striking her with utter conviction.

There was nothing Charlotte could have done.

Mrs Frasier let out a cry of triumph: “Ha!”

And Charlotte was still alive.

Charlotte wrenched her own arm around, twisting her wrist to bring her blade to bear, and then she stabbed with all her might. Her weapon went under Mrs Frasier’s corset, somehow finding a way through the ribs of whalebone to penetrate deep into the woman’s tightened internal organs.

Mrs Frasier let out an almighty bellow.

The woman punched Charlotte with her right fist, still encased in the cutlass hilt, and Charlotte felt the blow ring inside her skull. She toppled over, the darkness of unconsciousness rushing in just as she saw Earnestine on her feet, running towards her. Her sister was moving too slowly and Charlotte knew she wouldn’t reach her in time.

Earnestine’s mouth opened, a silent shout, words that Charlotte could not hear and then…

Charlotte hit the ground.

Chapter XXIX

Mrs Frasier

Mrs Frasier felt herself slipping from her body. She’d heard of that, a common description in séances, and for a moment she felt like she was looking down from above and that the candles were flickering.

Two figures stumbled down the corridor: one coughed, blood coming up, and the other pulled her upright. They made it to the court room. Everywhere else was chaos and confusion, clashes of metal, gunshots, the screech of ricocheting bullets and human screams.

There was no–one in the court room: the battle was in the Rotunda. Whoever held that, held the future.

Earnestine hauled Mrs Frasier towards the Judge’s office.

“No,” said Mrs Frasier. “I’m done for.”

“Come on,” said Earnestine, tears in her eyes. “We can make it.”

“I had the chance to kill her, but instead I locked her up. I couldn’t – she was like a sister – remember how she hugged me when she first arrived here? So sweet. She’s done for me.”

“Nonsense.”

“Cowards die many times before their deaths. The valiant never taste of death but once.”

Mrs Frasier slipped down and Earnestine, trying to hold on, went with her.

“I pulled the blow,” Mrs Frasier explained. “Instinctive.”

“You didn’t want to kill our sister.”

“No… it was… oh, this hurts so. Bloody stage combat… looks good, but useless in the end.”

“Please…”

“Mother said acting would be the death of me.”

“You’re an actress?”

“An actress can be… you can… Ness. Be anyone.”

“Me?”

“You were–” Mrs Frasier coughed, blood came up.

“Lie still,” said Earnestine, her left hand raising the fallen woman’s head and her right hand fluttering over the injuries as she agitated over what to do. Her own face must have stung and throbbed, but she ignored it.

“All those earrings to get my ear lobes to look like yours,” Mrs Frasier said. “You were my best part. I see myself, the girl I could have been, in you.”

“Lie still.”

They were alone in the court. All the seats were empty: the judge’s bench, the lawyers, jury and the Public Gallery. The paraphernalia of the drama, the grand set and the litter of props were just waiting to start up again for another act.

“My death scene…” Mrs Frasier laughed then, a cackle that slipped into a painful hacking. “And – typical – there’s no bloody audience!”

“I can get help,” said Earnestine, but Mrs Frasier could feel her lifeblood flowing out to make the stage slippery. She saw it now, a bright light above her, stronger even than limelight, but not as welcoming, and the edges of her vision were like a curtain slowly closing.

She gasped, clutched in her pocket: “Watches… Jerry gave them… I miss him… they’re yours.”

“No, I–”

“Silver is… the past and the other… the golden future.”

“No… please.”

“Take them.”

“Thank you.”

“I did it well, I convinced them all… for nothing. The dream, Ness, it will die with me. Ness… Ness… don’t let it… end. Prom… ise… m…”

Mrs Frasier’s eyes fluttered and then a most strange exhalation blew from her lips.

Miss Deering-Dolittle

“I promise you… Earnestine,” said Earnestine, moving aside a loose lock of Mrs Frasier’s dark red hair.

Earnestine was not sure how long she sat there with Mrs Frasier slipping from her arms and into her lap. When she looked up to find the source of a gasp, she saw a line of Temporal Peelers.

Scrutiniser Jones burst in, bleeding at the shoulder, full of energy and rage.

“They hold the north end, we must…” but then he saw the body before him. He stopped, deflated, the fight going out of him in an instant. He took off his top hat and held it in his big, meaty hands.

The others, one by one, took off their top hats too and held them to their chests with heads bowed.

“Not Mrs Frasier,” he said, and then he added: “We’re done for.”

“She was an extraordinary woman,” said Chief Examiner Lombard. “So bold, imaginative and she tried to change the world. She weaved this amazing story and we were taken in.”

“I heard Doctor Deering tell it, but she made you believe it,” said Checker Rogers.

Scrutiniser Jones leant down and, despite his great musculature, he acted with painstaking tenderness as he closed Mrs Frasier’s eyes, then, so carefully, he arranged her body tidily.

Earnestine shuffled away, still sitting on the floor.

“Aye,” Chief Examiner Lombard said, “she gave us a better script than you get on the number three tour.”

Earnestine felt numb: “Number three?”

“We’re all actors.
Were
actors. There just aren’t the roles. Charity… Mrs Frasier gave us a future, literally a future.”

Earnestine realised she was holding the pocket watches: gold and silver. They were slippery with blood. They represented a choice. She opened the gold one and saw an engraving on the inside cover:–

‘
For Our Future, J. J. D.
’.

“She treated me like a person and not just a boxer and strongman,” said Scrutiniser Jones. “She didn’t just promise a better future, she was going to deliver.”

“But why can’t we still create that future?” Earnestine pleaded. “Surely if everyone wants a better world, then it ought to be straight–forward.”

“People need to believe. That was the plan: pretend it was real, argue it in the courts and then it would become real.”

“It’s not over,” said Earnestine.

“She’s dead, there’s no–one else.”

Earnestine stood, faced them: “There’s me!”

“You?”

“If we can hold them off,” Earnestine said, “and set off the gunpowder, then the laws can still stand. It won’t be for nothing.”

“You’re just a child.”

“If she could pretend to be me, then I can become her.”

Earnestine brushed her dress down and held her head up, stretching, trying to become taller, to stand prouder, and to somehow fill the space vacated by Mrs Frasier’s exit.

“Different actors play the same parts,” she said.

The Scrutiniser shook his head: “You’re not Mrs Frasier.”

Earnestine rounded on him: “I’m not Mrs Frasier
yet!
”

Mrs Arthur Merryweather

Arthur Merryweather appeared before her.

Georgina saw his shoes first, singed trousers and damaged frock coat. He held his arm and winced.

“I thought you…” he began, but words failed him.

“Arthur?”

“I’m not.”

“No.”

The wounded were being brought in from the battle, a fleet of carriages pulling up outside the Club and stretcher bearers hurrying back and forth. Georgina had started to help, brought into it when someone practically dropped some poor young boy, not much older than herself, onto her lap. There were a few other women too, moving between the camp beds that had been set up in the hallway of the Club. There were screams from the billiard room, where an army surgeon worked on those who needed to be stitched up or sawn apart.

“Shame,” the lad said. “I’d liked to have been.”

“Your arm?”

“Broken.”

“Here…” she said, leading him to one side.

“Miss, he’s our prisoner!” Georgina noticed the two guards for the first time.

“It’s Ma’am! And he’s my patient.”

She sat him down and took off his frock coat gingerly. He flinched but didn’t cry out. She checked, frightened of hurting him, and then strapped his arm to his chest.

“How did you?” Georgina asked.

“That flying rucksack… tricky to land.”

“I imagine.”

“You said be careful.”

“Did I?”

“You’re the second person in my life who’s shown me any concern.”

Georgina fussed with the knot: “Surely not?”

“I had nothing and Mrs Frasier gave us hope: all the actors, pick pockets, con artists, the disenfranchised. She cared in her harsh way.”

“Much like my sister.”

“You know…”

“Yes.”

“That one moment, even though I was your enemy, even though I’d deliberately hurt you.”

Georgina said nothing, the pain was still too raw.