Chapter 6
Beatrix was almost home when it struck her that Blackwell himself had once been poor—mother dead, father unknown, only a grandmother to care for him.
Odd how her childhood had faded to a half-remembered, impressionistic muddle, as if it were someone else’s past, while everything after her mother’s death was as crisp as a newly developed photograph.
Happiness oughtn’t to be so easy to forget.
Were Blackwell’s memories the reverse—a string of dour snapshots followed by hazy recollections?
She passed under the towering trees at the edge of her property, the ones that gave Cedarlawn its name, and crossed through her back-yard garden, making a mental note to weed the next day. The hens in their tiny coop made sweet, sleepy noises as she passed by.
She walked into the house through the kitchen and gave a start at the sight of Rosemarie, alone at the table. Frowning.
“Sit,” Rosemarie ordered, as if Beatrix were her tenant, instead of the other way around.
Beatrix did as she said, feeling thirteen again, about to be told off for talking back in class. Yes, Miss Dane. Rosemarie was no different in essentials now than when she’d been the sole teacher in the town’s one-room schoolhouse.
“You certainly took charge today,” Rosemarie said.
She shot Beatrix the look, the one everybody of a certain age in town had experienced at least once. The look was usually followed by the ruler. Beatrix had the crazy urge to sit on her hands to protect her knuckles.
She cleared her throat instead. “I didn’t see you in the crowd.”
“I stopped into Reed’s for lunch.” Rosemarie crossed her arms. “Didn’t it occur to you that this was not something you needed to fix?”
“What? The town was ready to riot!”
“Nobody was going to riot,” Rosemarie said dryly, “but they would be awfully disgruntled had it been handled less skillfully, and a certain omnimancer would have had his hands full dealing with all the hurt feelings. I can’t believe I have to remind you of this, but please remember you are not supposed to be making his life easier.
The harder his alleged job is, the fewer problems he can cause us. ”
“The magiocracy didn’t send him, Rosemarie. They’re not even paying him.”
“And your evidence of this is … what? That he said so?”
“Not everything is a plot against us, for God’s sake!”
Rosemarie pursed her lips. “Don’t waste this opportunity—and don’t be so na?ve.”
Beatrix stalked off to her bedroom, angry at Rosemarie precisely because there was no way to refute her arguments.
It was all well and good to say it wasn’t a plot, but something was off about Blackwell’s return.
If he’d come home to Ellicott Mills without official sanction, how could he hire an assistant?
And if he really was taking over the omnimancer’s job to give himself a break from D.C., shouldn’t he seem at least slightly happy to be back?
She slipped away from her sister and Rosemarie after church the next morning, certain they would spend at least fifteen minutes debating the Apostle Paul’s seen-and-not-heard exhortation about women with Pastor Hattington, and walked briskly across the street to the omnimancer’s mansion.
Before she could knock, its new occupant appeared from around the side of the house, brushing dirt off his hands.
“I hope you didn’t think I would go so far as to require your presence on a Sunday,” he said. “Pastor Hattington would be appalled.”
Beatrix couldn’t help but grin, despite her misgivings about what Blackwell was really doing in town. Ellicott Mills’ elderly Presbyterian minister went through life in a continually appalled state. She once counted two dozen uses of the word in a single sermon.
She sympathized, there being plenty in the world to be appalled about, but the verbal tic put her in frequent danger of bursting into laughter in the hushed sanctuary.
“You weren’t so concerned about Pastor Hattington’s opinion when you skipped his sermon this morning,” she said, then considered too late that a man used to people following his orders was probably also a man who did not appreciate jokes at his own expense.
“Ah,” he said, wagging a finger at her, “but you see, he’s on my waiting list. Thus, the best thing I can do to stay on his good side is to work through that list as diligently as possible, and for that, I need to get the greenhouse plants growing again.
Also, I wanted to stop by Mrs. Clark’s first thing. ”
Her heart gave a lurch at the memory of Mrs. Clark’s tears. A child in pain, and no money for a doctor. “How is her daughter?”
He sighed. “Miserable. I’ve got a concoction cooling inside that will dull the symptoms—that’s one of those afflictions we can’t do much about.”
“Mm.” She knew all about such infections. Her mother picked one up at the hospital while recovering from Lydia’s birth, and she was dead in under a week.
“So”—he held the front door open for her—“what brings you here?”
“I was hoping to borrow a brewing manual to look through today,” she said, since how exactly are you planning to pay me, assuming you’re not lying about why you’ve come home was a question best broached carefully.
“Let me wash my hands, and I’ll find one.”
She trailed behind him into the brewing room, which had to be the largest in the house if you didn’t count the cellar.
Floor-to-ceiling cabinets for ingredients lined two walls.
Expansive bookcases rose on either side of the doorway.
A sink and stovetop took up the final wall.
She glanced at the cooling brew—a dark chocolate color—and then at titles in the bookcases.
Magical plants: Efficacy, spell interactions, side effects.
The Spellcaster’s Handbook. Centennial of Modern Magic, 1913-2013.
“I’m afraid you can’t legally read most of those books,” Blackwell said, drying his hands.
She rolled her eyes. “It’s such a ridiculous law.
What harm could it possibly do if a typic like me looks through a spellbook?
And don’t tell me it’s about keeping them out of the hands of the Canadians, Germans and Japanese.
Surely most spellbooks don’t delve into anything they don’t already know. ”
“True, but that’s not the only reason.” He turned around, leaning against the sink.
“Magic isn’t an all-or-nothing proposition.
Someone with insufficient ability to become a practicing wizard might have just enough to be a danger to himself or others if he tries to cast a spell—that’s the official thinking, anyway. ”
“You disagree?”
He shrugged. “Hard to know how bad it really could be. Did you watch the wizarding exam for the boys our age in Howard County?”
Not just watched. Participated in. “I saw it,” she said, not trusting herself to look him in the eye.
“What do you recall?”
“Each boy had a five-pound weight he had to lift magically. Some didn’t budge at all”—hers included—“some rocked without making it off the ground, some rose six to twelve inches, and yours—yours went all the way to the auditorium ceiling. Everyone was rated typic except for you.”
She hazarded a glance. He’d raised his eyebrows. “Your memory is impressive.”
“Not really. That’s the sort of thing that sticks with you.”
She held her breath, half-expecting an accusation. She’d given her name as “Benedick Brown,” not realizing the boys would be lined up alphabetically and that would put her next to someone who saw her in school every day.
But he must never have suspected, because he swept on.
“Nothing went dangerously awry, if you don’t count one boy who lifted his weight a small amount almost dropping it on his foot.
But the law is the law, and that’s one the authorities take dead seriously.
Even a minor first offense is a year in jail. So don’t go sneaking my books.”
“All right,” she said, amused by his expression of mock severity. “Are you absolutely sure I can read up on brewing without landing in lockup?”
“Yes, because I’ve got a primer with no spellwords or casting instructions. It focuses entirely on plants, plant theory and plant prep.” He plucked The Brewer’s Bible from the bookcase and handed it over. “If you ever have any doubt, look for a huge red ‘CLASSIFIED’ stamped on the cover.”
She paged through the book, half-looking at the illustrations and trying to think of a way to steer the conversation to pay.
“Oh—before I forget,” Blackwell said, “bring old clothes with you tomorrow. Brewing is messy work.”
“Bring? Don’t you mean ‘wear’?”
“No, bring. I’ll work a spell into it. Unless you mean to revert back to your original policy of no magic cast on you or your possessions.”
This seemed to be a test. The full force of his attention was on her.
“I’ll make an exception for you,” she said, “since you’re doing so for me.”
His lips quirked. “I’m ignoring the fact that you’re trying to outlaw my profession, you mean?”
“No. Ignoring the fact that I’m not male.”
She’d meant it as a joke, but he winced.
“I ran into Mrs. Price last night,” he said. “She thinks it highly inappropriate that an unmarried woman is working for an unmarried man.”
Beatrix snorted. “I’d have been shocked if she didn’t think that.”
“Not a fan?”
“Lord, no. She’s a perfect example of how some women help perpetuate a system that keeps us from improving our lot.”
He leaned against the brewing table, crossing his arms. “She and your mother always seemed to be on good terms.”
“They needed to be,” she said, shrugging. “They ran the scholarship foundation.”
He glanced away, but she caught a glimpse of his dark expression. So he assumed her mother had been another Mrs. Price, did he? Nothing could be further from the truth.
“They weren’t friends,” she said, stressing the words. “I don’t care what Mrs. Price thinks. As far as she’s concerned, I’ve been highly inappropriate for most of my life. Why stop now?”
Blackwell looked at her again, this time with a grin. She couldn’t help but smile back. Then he sucked all the humor out of the situation by saying, “Am I forgiven for hiring you?”
“No,” she said—not bitterly, as she would have the first day, but with absolute sincerity.
He glanced at the book in her hands. “You can’t tell me you’re not interested in brewing.”
“I am,” she admitted. “But that’s beside the point.”
Something in his expression made her think he would apologize. But he merely sighed. “I’d better get back to the greenhouse—and you’d better leave before I’m tempted to appall Pastor Hattington and make you work on a Sunday.”
Tangential and badly timed though it was, this offered an opening, so she took it. “Speaking of work ... How are you able to pay me if you’re getting none of the usual supports and they’re not even paying you?”
“Oddly enough, you’re not the first to ask me that,” he said, letting her precede him into the hallway.
“Oh? Who was?”
“Mitchell Gray. Very interested in my affairs, that man. What’s his story?”
“State senator, chairman of a committee—I think he’s fairly influential. Certainly here. The most important man in town.” A thought occurred that nearly made her laugh. “I suppose you’re intruding on his territory.”
“Are you telling me to watch my back?”
“I really don’t know him well enough to hazard a guess about whether he’s the stabbing sort.”
“He had no such compunction against warning me about you.” Blackwell, opening the front door, rolled his eyes. “You are, I am to understand, likely to undermine me in every possible way.”
She could feel her cheeks flushing. That was precisely what her sister and Rosemarie wanted her to do.
“I would have told him to go to hell,” he added, “but it didn’t seem very politic. To answer your question, and his: Your paycheck’s coming from my bank account.”
“Oh,” she murmured in even greater embarrassment before hastening back to church.
Too bad she had no way of confirming that he was telling the truth.