Chapter 21
Chapter
Twenty-One
Ashes in Bloomsbury
Iwoke to shouting in the street and the violent ringing of bells. For one disoriented instant I thought I was dreaming. Then came the unmistakable smell of smoke, and I jerked upright in bed.
Another shout echoed outside. Male voices. Running feet. Somewhere in the distance, horses. The darkness beyond my curtains pulsed faintly orange.
A sharp knock sounded at my door. “Lark?” Miriam’s voice. “Are you awake?”
“I am now.” I tossed back the covers and rushed to the door. Miriam stood in the corridor wrapped in a dark wool dressing gown over her nightclothes, her silver hair escaping its pins beneath an aggressively practical bonnet she had evidently jammed onto her head in haste.
“There’s a fire somewhere in Bloomsbury,” she said. “Cook claims half the neighborhood is in the street.”
As though to confirm it, another bell began clanging somewhere beyond the square. Not church bells. Alarm bells.
Sounds reached us from above where the staff quarters were located. Doors opening. Footsteps. One of the maids hurried past us clutching a shawl around her shoulders.
“Which building?” I asked.
“I can’t tell.” Miriam glanced toward the stairwell. “But it’s near Hartwell Lane.”
Something cold moved through me.
Hartwell Lane.
I took the stairs to the drawing room on the first floor and pulled back the curtain.
Smoke drifted through the darkness in long grey ribbons. Farther down the square, an orange glow pulsed against the low clouds. Figures moved below—servants, gentlemen pulling on coats as they emerged into the street, women in wrappers and shawls.
London always seemed held together by routine and exhaustion. But fire stripped the city down to something older. Primitive. Fearful.
Another shout rose from below.
“More water!”
“Move aside there!”
“Mind the horses!”
Miriam came to stand beside me. “You are not thinking of going outside.”
“I am.”
“Of course you are.” Her tone implied resignation to a longstanding affliction in my character. “I’ll come with you. Otherwise, you might get trampled by a fire engine.”
We didn’t bother to dress properly, but simply tossed on our coats. By the time we reached the street, the entire square teemed with people.
The air smelled of smoke, wet stone, and coal soot. Men hurried past carrying buckets. Servants clustered on corners craning for a better view. A baby somewhere nearby had begun wailing in terror.
The glow in the sky brightened as we moved toward Hartwell Lane.
Then came the fire engines.
The great horses appeared first, black and steaming beneath the gas lamps, their harness buckles gleaming wetly. Behind them rattled the engines themselves, iron-rimmed wheels thundering over the stones while men in dark uniforms shouted for the crowd to clear the way.
The Metropolitan Fire Brigade.
One engine was already at the blaze pumping water through thick hoses dragged across the muddy street. Another arrived moments later amidst a fresh eruption of shouting.
“Back!”
“Move back!”
“Give them room!”
Miriam seized my arm before I could be knocked sideways by a passing laborer. We turned onto Hartwell Lane just as flames burst through an upper-story window.
The building housing The Quill and Crown was burning. For one suspended instant, I simply stared.
Fire poured hungrily from the second floor. Smoke billowed into the narrow lane in dense black clouds while men shouted from below and others dragged crates, papers, and warped trays of printing type from the lower level.
My stomach dropped. This is where Lydia must have been headed. She had brought them the poem. And now the offices were burning to the ground.
“This was no accident,” I whispered.
Miriam looked sharply at me. “What do you mean?”
But before I could answer, another crash split the air as part of the upper facade gave way inward.
The crowd recoiled as one, fearful that some spark would set them ablaze.
A woman nearby crossed herself repeatedly while another began insisting the whole lane would go next. Somewhere glass shattered. Sparks rained across the wet cobblestones.
The sign bearing the journal’s name collapsed moments later, striking the street with a splintering crack.
I flinched, and Miriam’s grip tightened around my arm. I could barely drag my gaze away from the flames. “I think that was the publication Lydia intended to visit. I think she reached it. I think she delivered the poem.”
Her expression altered immediately. Not with surprise but understanding. “And now it’s burning.”
The fire engines pumped relentlessly. Water hissed against brick and flame. Men emerged from the lower level carrying armfuls of half-burned paper before disappearing again into the smoke.
One stumbled. The crowd surged instinctively forward before being forced back again by shouting firemen.
“Out of the way!”
“Leave room!”
A sudden gust of wind blew smoke directly toward us. Miriam coughed sharply and raised a gloved hand to her mouth. “That settles it,” she declared. “You have seen enough.”
“I need to know whether anyone was hurt.”
“And you need lungs to breathe.”
Still, she did not force me to leave immediately. Together, we watched as another section of the roof collapsed inward in a shower of sparks.
A printer emerged moments later blackened with soot from collar to cuff, coughing violently while another man clapped him on the back.
No bodies appeared. No stretchers. No physician.
The realization eased something tight inside my chest. “It happened late enough that no one was working,” I murmured.
“Thank heaven for small mercies.”
But mercy had nothing to do with it.
Someone had waited until the offices emptied. Someone had wanted destruction, not slaughter. Or perhaps merely enough destruction to make a point.
The thought chilled me more than the night air.
Miriam tugged gently at my sleeve. “Come home, darling.” This time, I let her lead me away.
By the time we arrived home, dawn had begun creeping pale and uncertain across the rooftops.
Miriam removed her gloves in the front hall. “I intend to consume an unreasonable quantity of tea before sunrise. I suggest you do the same. Smoke inhalation can kill you.”
“You deserve at least two pots.”
“Three.”
Bexley appeared from deep in the townhouse looking equally exhausted. “Shall I have breakfast laid out early, milady?”
“Yes, but not for an hour. We need to bathe and dress properly first.” I glanced at Miriam. “But send a pot of tea to Mrs. Selwyn’s room right away.”
We had scarcely stepped fully into the hall when footsteps sounded overhead. And then Linnet descended the staircase in her dressing gown, her dark braid loose over one shoulder.
She stopped midway upon seeing us. Her gaze moved from my soot-streaked cloak to Miriam’s hair blackened with ash.
Her brows lifted. Slowly, deliberately, she signed, “What on earth happened to you?”
For one absurd moment, after smoke and bells and burning paper, I nearly laughed.
“She slept through all of it,” Miriam said in disbelief.
Of course she had. She was deaf, although the smell of smoke should have awakened her.
“Through what?” Linnet signed.
“A fire. Several streets away.”
Her eyes widened. “Was anyone hurt?”
“Not that we could see,” I signed. “I’ll tell you all about it at breakfast. I need to clean up first.”