Chapter 36 #2
“I—thank you,” I said, not having the slightest idea what I was thanking him for, nor how he’d come to know my name.
Was there another story in the Gazette? Some fawning biography of me or the shelter?
A few in the crowd called out to me—“How are the cats?” and “Any left? I have a bad knee,” which was followed by general laughter.
Many of the people milling about were carrying signs. Les Amis des Amis des Chats, some read. Others seemed to be opposing the bylaw—the one I was expecting to have brought down upon me at any moment in the form of the police slapping me and élise in handcuffs and dragging us back to prison.
That brought about a shiver of trepidation. Surely these people wouldn’t try to stand in the way when the police came. What if they were hurt?
“Agnes!” élise was pushing her way through the crowd.
“Let her through! It’s her sister!” a woman called—my mind boggled even more—and the crowd parted obligingly.
“élise,” I said, dragging her inside as soon as she reached me, then closing the door firmly behind her. “What the hell is all this?”
She waved a hand, pausing to lean over and rest her hands on her knees.
She was breathing hard, as if she’d run all the way, and laughter tugged at the edge of each breath.
She’d been gone only a few hours—after Havelock’s spell wore off, she’d gone home to Gabriel, who would have worried about her absence.
She seemed to have changed her clothes, but a little smudge of soot remained on her cheek.
“They’re protesting at city hall, too,” she said unevenly. “An even bigger crowd than this. People know the shelter’s a target of the new bylaw—Roger Fairwood keeps running stories about it, but even if he didn’t, the rumours about our enchanted cats have spread too well.”
“But why?” I demanded. “Not that I don’t appreciate all this, but what’s the point? Didn’t the new law pass yesterday? Laurent seemed certain it would.” I’d been far too occupied to check any of the papers.
élise shook her head. “Laurent clearly has an overly optimistic understanding of municipal politics. The council spent too long arguing about some construction project, and then they couldn’t get enough votes in favour of continuing past six o’clock—” She waved her hand, looking equally pleased and exasperated.
“You know how these meetings go. They put the vote on the bylaw off until this morning. But now, given that public opinion has shifted, Gabriel thinks they’re going to defer it. ”
“Defer it!” I exclaimed, because I was familiar enough with the workings of city hall, through Gabriel, to understand what that meant.
élise smiled, seeming to read my thoughts. “Exactly. ‘For further study and consultation.’ It will be six months before it’s even brought up again, but with the election coming up—Agnes, they’re just going to bury it.”
I felt my knees weaken and I caught hold of the windowsill as élise went on excitedly.
“Most of the councillors don’t want to touch the issue now that it’s become a hot potato, especially since the French papers have started covering our ‘mystical’ cat shelter—I saw an article on the front page of La Ville on my way over here.
And Gabriel says the councillor who proposed the bylaw is almost sure to lose his seat—some scandal about accepting free theatre tickets. ”
“Then—then we’re safe,” I said. I was finding it hard to believe.
Though the quiet murmur of conversation in the street outside paired with occasional cheers of support were comforting beyond words, it was difficult to accept that Laurent would not at any moment come knocking on the door with half the police department in tow.
“I think we are. So you can stop shaking, dear.” élise pulled me into her arms. When she drew back, she shot Havelock a glare. “Provided this one doesn’t start any more magical wars.”
Havelock looked exasperated. “As I keep saying, not that anyone is listening to me, I have no interest in wars, intrigues, plots, machinations, et cetera. If only people would leave me alone, none of this would have happened.”
élise gave a snort of laughter, though I could see she was too exultant to make more than a half-hearted attempt at her usual antagonism towards Havelock. “And I’m going to believe you are the innocent victim in all this?”
“No, you’re going to believe I feast upon the hearts of infants and sleep beneath a blanket of kitten hides, like you always have.”
“I almost wish you did,” élise said. “Agnes would have stabbed you to death a long time ago. Also, you look like you’re about to spontaneously combust. Agnes, should he be so close to the filing cabinets when he’s like that?”
Yannick, who had been quiet through all this, his hands pressed into his hair as if attempting to physically contain his astonishment, said, “I don’t understand.
Didn’t everyone see Havelock fighting Valérie outside this very shop?
Surely the public knows there’s some connection—why are they supporting us? ”
élise rolled her eyes. “I was hoping you weren’t going to mention that. Didn’t you read the signs?”
She drew one of the curtains back, and we crowded around the window. I had not been paying the signs too much attention before, but now I examined them more carefully, my mouth falling open.
Havelock Renard is not the enemy, read one. Another: Havelock saved my daughter’s life. And: Magicians are part of our community, too.
My initial impression hadn’t been wrong—most of the signs were about the cat shelter or opposing the bylaw. But there were far more signs expressing favourable sentiments towards Havelock than I would have anticipated, that number being zero.
“Havelock,” I called faintly, but he had already come to stand behind me at the window. He made an inarticulate sound of dismay and turned away to begin pacing from one end of the shelter to another.
“How did this happen?” Yannick said. He looked nearly as disturbed as Havelock did. “Did Roger Fairwood—”
“It wasn’t the Gazette,” élise said. “Or not only them. Haven’t you noticed that the papers have spent the past week talking about that battle between Havelock and Valérie’s apprentices?
Initially the reports said that Havelock was equally to blame, that it was another irresponsible street duel that got out of hand.
No one was even mentioning the shelter. But more eyewitnesses have come forward, all saying that Havelock wasn’t trying to duel Valérie, he was trying to stop her from tearing the shelter apart—and not only that, but he also used his magic to protect the crowd from Valérie’s apprentices. ”
I gave a short laugh. “I don’t recall that part. Though I suppose—” I thought it over. “I suppose you could interpret things that way. Those magicians were causing chaos, with no thought to bystanders, and Havelock did stop them.”
“Do they know this is his shop?” Yannick demanded.
élise shook her head. “I don’t think so, though some may suspect it.
The story I saw this morning in La Ville speculated that he lives in the neighbourhood and stepped in to stop Valérie out of samaritanism.
The paper ventured no explanation for why Valérie attacked us, but seemed to imply we are not only trading in enchanted cats, but Artefacts too. ”
I groaned. “Naturally. That’s what their police sources would have told them.”
Havelock hadn’t been listening to us. “No,” he said. “I—no. I refuse to be part of a neighbourhood. I will never be left alone. There will be people demanding not just charmed cats, but horses and umbrellas and all sorts of silly things. This is not some magical tinker’s shop.”
élise looked up, her jubilation becoming a malicious sort of glee.
“That’s right, they won’t leave you alone if they find out you are not the fearsome variety of villain at all, merely the crabby, antisocial sort, like some old witch who lives alone in the woods, cackling to herself.
I would say you owe the world a great deal of enchanted umbrellas, Havelock Renard. ”
He only rolled his eyes at her characterization, but then the import of her words seemed to sink in, and he looked ill. “It won’t be hard to make them afraid of me again,” he said. “I’ll just unleash a few illusions on the city. Dragons, wolves, perhaps a chimera or two—”
“You will not!” I cried. “This is all so ridiculous—Havelock, what you should do is shut yourself away in your workshop again and never come out. Pretend you aren’t here, like you did before. Let these people think the rumours of you are just that—rumours.”
He looked so relieved I briefly wondered if he would kiss me again, and an unexpected warmth climbed up my neck. “That’s a much better idea,” he said.
I had my eye on the clock. “Given that I’m not, at present, in danger of being arrested, we might as well open the shop for the day.”
Yannick pressed his hands to his head again, his expression so transparently despairing that I almost laughed.
I felt a great deal like laughing all of a sudden.
“Agnes, we can’t open,” he said. “What are we going to say to these people if they ask about Havelock? What about the rest of Valérie’s apprentices?
They weren’t all blasted by that lantern. We have to resolve all this before—”
“We can resolve it later,” I said, holding my hands up. “Right now, we have cats needing homes, and donations to collect.” I found my relief giving way to a jittery, triumphant sort of determination. “Something tells me we won’t fall short of donations today.”