43
“Itold you it wouldn’t work,” Julia said for the millionth time as they stood around the kitchen the next morning.
“We know, Julia. Stop gloating—it’s annoying.” Antonia raised an eyebrow at her, then turned back to Aurelia. “Tonight we have a better plan. Two experiments in one, and neither one likely to make the characters shoo unexpectedly.”
“More experiments?” Julia asked, failing to keep the frustration from her voice.
“Yes, but two at the same time,” Antonia reminded her. “If these two don’t work, I don’t have any other brilliant ideas at the moment. What about you, Oliver?”
“These seem like the last best shot.” He caught Aurelia’s eye and added, “We don’t have to do it tonight if you don’t want to?”
“Good idea,” Julia said, biting into her toast. “Let’s put it off for a bit.”
“Julia!” Antonia exclaimed, exasperated.
“No, let’s try it tonight,” Aurelia said encouragingly. “What are you planning?”
“First, we’re going to set up a camera in the shop to see if we can spot them on film.”
Aurelia’s jaw dropped open, but Antonia didn’t seem to notice.
“Second, we’re going to ring the shop—you’ll have to answer, of course—and we’ll see if we can hear them better over the phone.”
“We can try the phone, but the camera…” Aurelia couldn’t manage to get the words out. It seemed like trying to capture aliens or ghosts on film, like putting over a trick on the characters.
“It’s kind of creepy,” Julia finished for her.
“It’s not like we’re spying on them in a dressing room or something,” Antonia said.
“Still—there’s something about it…” Aurelia didn’t finish that thought. If it worked and they could finally see the characters, she knew it was worth a try. “No, let’s do it.”
“Good. Oliver, you said you could borrow a camera from your brother?”
“Yeah, I’m sure Jack has one from his theater projects.”
Aurelia thought she saw a droop to his shoulders. That heaviness was back.
“Why don’t I walk over to his flat with you to pick it up?” she offered.
“No, you need to work on your edits,” he reminded her with a quirk of a smile. “Don’t make Louisa scold me again for distracting you.”
Aurelia smiled back. She wanted time alone with him to check in, but he was right; her deadline was once again looming. They’d make time for checking in later—she’d make sure of it.
“Saturdays are always busy in the shop, so you and Julia can stay here, and Oliver and I will go to Jack’s,” Antonia instructed them. “We’ll set up the camera after dinner and have everything ready before the characters arrive.”
Julia caught Aurelia’s eye and opened her mouth to speak, but Aurelia shook her head once and Julia closed her mouth over a frown.
Oliver and Antonia left on their errand an hour later, and as soon as the shop door closed behind them, Julia started in.
“Can’t you talk to them and tell them no more experiments?”
“No,” Aurelia said firmly. “I want them to be able to see the characters. Don’t you?”
“I do, but Sergeant Cuff said they can’t—and so far they haven’t been able to, so… Shouldn’t they stop trying?”
“We have to let them keep at it. If we were in their place, I think you and I would try hanging from the rafters to spot them.”
“There aren’t any rafters in here,” Julia said saltily, though she eyed the ceiling to confirm.
“No, but you know what I mean.”
“Alright… What should we tell the characters about trying to film them?”
“Hmm.” Aurelia wrinkled her nose as she thought through their options.
“Well, most of them wouldn’t even know what a camera is, for one thing.
It feels sort of creepy, like you said, but I don’t think we should mention it to them.
It’d be too hard to explain, and they might want to watch the footage back… It could get very complicated.”
“Actually,” Julia said, reconsidering, “if we show them the camera footage, then I could show Kitty her movie.”
“I don’t think so, Julia,” Aurelia said, her nose wrinkling again.
“I haven’t shown them my laptop, or the internet—I think some things are just too outside their norm to try and explain.
Some characters might be interested,” Aurelia added, thinking of Count Vronsky and his love of new technology.
“But others might actually get scared to see their lives on film. Or to see moving pictures in general.”
“And the phone? What are you going to do when they call the shop?”
“I guess we do need to prepare the characters for that one. Why don’t I explain it to Cuff while you keep the others occupied?”
“Okay.”
Julia picked up the duster and began listlessly moving it along the bookshelves. Aurelia was flipping through her notes about the last few chapters of her book, ready to get back to editing, when Julia spoke up again.
“Maybe I shouldn’t have told Mum.”
“Hmm?” Aurelia asked absently, still flipping through the notes on her desk.
“Maybe I shouldn’t have told her,” Julia said again, this time catching Aurelia’s attention. “Mum can’t see or hear them… Maybe it would have been better—nicer—if I’d just kept it to myself.”
Julia swiped the duster at another shelf, but Aurelia could see her head was bowed with worry. Aurelia let out a heavy sigh, wanting to take her time finding the right words to reassure her niece.
“I’ve been keeping this secret for years, lying and hiding the truth from your mum and Oliver.
It took a toll on me—and on my relationships with them.
I don’t think I’d really understood how much until these past few days.
I thought it was for the best, for me and for them.
But now… I’m glad they know. And I’m glad you know, too. ”
Julia had drifted over to Aurelia’s desk, and Aurelia turned in her chair to take Julia’s hand.
“Keeping the shop’s secret hasn’t been easy.
Trying to decide how much to share, how much to hide…
It’s been hard on me, but hard on the people I love, too, even if they didn’t know exactly what I was hiding.
And I’ll have to keep on keeping this secret—we will—from most of the people in our lives.
But letting your mum in, and Oliver, that’s something I don’t regret. ”
“Even though they’re not really ‘in’? Even though they’re a little on the outside, still?”
Aurelia thought about Oliver, that heaviness she’d started to realize crept over him whenever they talked about the characters. It was something they’d need to work out, but she knew with absolute certainty that working it out together would be better than hiding alone.
“Even so. And I think if you asked your mum or Oliver, they’d say the same. Let’s hope tonight’s experiments work. But if they don’t, let’s try to think of other ways to bring them as ‘in’ as we can. What do you think?”
Julia leaned down to give her aunt a hug as she said, “I think that sounds like a plan.”
Before midnight, Antonia and Oliver had set up the camera in an unobtrusive spot in the shop, and had gone over their plan with Aurelia and Julia so many times that Julia had finally exclaimed, “We know!” in her most exasperated voice.
Aurelia and Julia stood holding hands next to the Recommended Reads table, watching as the characters came to life before them. Aurelia held her phone in her other hand, ready for Antonia’s call at a quarter past midnight.
After greeting everyone, Aurelia took Cuff aside and explained the situation to him.
“I see.” He nodded. “Not yet finished with their efforts to detect us, then?”
“No, not quite,” Aurelia said. “They really wish they could see and talk to all of you.”
“I suppose I understand their curiosity. How frustrating to have a solution just out of reach, so close and yet—” He rubbed the fingers of one hand together and then spread them apart, as though letting loose some invisible, intangible element.
He and Aurelia climbed the stairs to the mezzanine and sat on the window seat just as the phone rang. Aurelia fumbled the phone in her hands in her haste to answer it and heard Julia downstairs explaining away the ringing sound to the other characters.
“Hi, Antonia,” Aurelia said when, at last, she’d managed to press the right button.
“Have you got someone with you?” Antonia asked, sounding eager.
“Yes, I have Sergeant Cuff here. Hang on.”
Aurelia held the phone to his ear, and he spoke into the mouthpiece just as she’d shown him.
“Good evening. How are you?”
Aurelia leaned toward Cuff and heard Antonia’s voice.
“Hello? Is anyone there?”
Cuff looked at Aurelia, a smile lighting his face at the wonder of speaking to someone through a rectangular piece of glass and metal. At the sound of Antonia’s voice, he spoke again.
“Yes, madam. This is Sergeant Cuff speaking with you.”
“I can hear someone’s there, but I can’t make out what they’re saying. Maybe they could speak up a bit?”
“Hello,” Cuff said loudly, drawing stares from the women below. “This is Sergeant Cuff!”
Aurelia could hear a sound of exasperation from Antonia and put the phone to her own ear.
“Antonia? He’s practically shouting—can’t you hear him?”
“No, it’s all muffled,” she said forlornly. “It’s the same as when we’re in the stairwell.” Antonia sighed dramatically. “Oh, well. At least we still have the camera. Are you going to stay in the shop?”
“I might,” Aurelia said, looking longingly down at the rest of the characters. “Would you and Oliver mind?”
“No, we’re fine up here. We’ll see you in the morning.”
Julia looked up as Aurelia and Cuff came down the stairs, and Aurelia shook her head to signal that it hadn’t worked.
She put her phone on her desk, then walked over to join Mrs. Jamieson, who was looking at several shelves of Dickens’ novels with interest. Perhaps the rest of the night could be salvaged, after all.