Chapter 24
His panic faded halfway into the trip, and he felt like a fool the rest of the way. How could he hope to find them? He stopped at two downtown hotels and peeked into their conference rooms, but both were filled with men.
Getting back in his car, he thought of going home and focusing on the critically important task of anti-explosives. He didn’t have time to run around after his assistant.
But if anything happened to her, he wouldn’t have time for R&D.
If anything happened to her, he would never forgive himself.
Stop. Think. Or better yet, feel. In the stillness of the parking garage, he closed his eyes and tried again to sense something about Miss Harper.
Nothing came to him for several minutes beyond the nervous tension that he suspected—half-feared, half-hoped—was not entirely his. Where are you, he thought. Tell me where you are.
The Key Hotel occurred to him as a possibility.
He laughed at the thought, but then he realized Miss Harper might have shown the film to the owner to get him to honor the terms of the original contract.
Surely she would have realized what a bad idea that was—surely she wouldn’t put herself and everyone else from the League in a location where Dockett and all his employees would be easily able to do them harm.
He pulled out of the garage with a bit too much speed and took Light Street to Key Highway, cursing at red lights.
The hotel’s parking spaces sat behind the building.
When he strode to the front, he got a clear view of Schoen’s Sugar across the road and discovered with a start that his sixth sense had been off by just a few hundred yards.
The League had set up outdoors—outdoors—in a paved lot beside the factory, empty save for barge unloading equipment where land gave way to harbor.
A handful of women bustled around under a large canopy.
One of them was Miss Harper, wearing her red coat and a wide-brimmed hat, and it was such a relief to see her unhurt that he stood there for a moment, just watching.
Then he vanished himself with a murmur and hastened across Key Highway.
“—and it’s getting cold,” a Black woman with gray hair was saying to Miss Harper. “Oh, this has disaster written all over it.”
Miss Harper pulled a pin from her hat and speared it back in with alarming vim. “I suppose we should have gone with one of our many other options.”
The woman, who seemed vaguely familiar, shot her a quelling look. Clearly the Schoen’s Sugar location had been Miss Harper’s idea and the only one that had panned out.
“I’ll deal with the caterers—you find some way to make the speeches audible,” she said to Miss Harper. “Buy bullhorns if necessary. Ella! See to the tables.”
As a dark-haired woman rushed to comply with the last order, his assistant turned on her heel and marched from the tent. Peter fell in beside her.
“Miss Harper,” he whispered. “To your right.”
She nearly leapt out of her coat. “Lord Almighty!”
“What now?” the older woman called out. He definitely recognized that voice, whoever she was.
“Nothing!” Miss Harper said. She put out a hand and connected with his arm, her face betraying none of the revulsion he would have expected if she’d seen his dream—a strong indication that she had not. Under her breath, she said: “Is everything all right? Why are you here?”
The truth would sound like a lie, but he couldn’t think of a lie that would sound like the truth. “I was worried about you.”
She raised a skeptical eyebrow.
A change of subject seemed the best defense. “Where are all the conference-goers?” he asked.
“They’re being bused over any minute from another location. You remember Rosemarie Dane—over there, our former teacher?”
That was why she looked familiar. Miss Disdain, she of the biting tongue and high expectations.
“Well, she found a church that would rent us space, but only until four,” Miss Harper said. “The vote for our next president is at six.”
“Why didn’t you just do it earlier in the afternoon?”
She grimaced. “Because our current president has veto power over any scheduling changes. And she vetoed it.”
So there was more at stake in this conference than he’d realized. “Is your sister running against her, by any chance?”
“Bingo.”
“Too bad you don’t have a public-address system.”
“Actually, we do. But we don’t have anywhere to plug it in.” She glanced over her shoulder at Miss Dane and whispered: “Could you cast a spell on it?”
He chuckled. “You’d like some magic to help you put on this anti-magic rally?”
“Fervently.”
“I suppose it’s only fair, considering that magic-users are the reason you’re reduced to congregating outside. Where is it?”
“My car. Wait—where did you park yours?”
“Behind the hotel. Why?”
“Oh good,” she said, heading toward the nearest lot. “Rosemarie saw you crossing the road to the Key Hotel last night. Now she and Lydia are convinced you’re the one D.C. assigned to sabotage us.”
His expletive wasn’t entirely under his breath.
“Exactly,” she said, sounding aggrieved. “I insisted it couldn’t have been you in the film, but if she sees a silver Pierce-Arrow, she’ll know you’re here. Don’t you think—shouldn’t I tell them what really happened?”
“No!”
She paused at the passenger door of her car, a large sedan that—like her house—had the sad look of long-faded grandness. “Why not?”
“If my name is dragged into this, I’d much rather D.C. think I’m helping them than you.”
“Ah. I see your point.” She unlocked the door and opened it. “Well, I don’t think they’ll say anything. I threatened to yank the film if they so much as suggest you’re involved.”
That was surprising.
“Here it is,” she added, gesturing to the PA system.
He murmured a few words over the equipment. She switched it on, cleared her throat and let out a whooshing breath as the sound echoed back at her, magnified.
“Problem solved, Rosemarie,” she said into the microphone, bringing their former teacher across the lot at a run.
“How on earth?” Miss Dane said as she got within range of the car.
“Turns out it also runs on batteries,” Miss Harper said, as cool as you please.
“Well! That’s a relief.”
A bus rolled in from Key Highway, perfectly timed. As Miss Dane headed toward it, Miss Harper called out, “Not such a disaster after all, eh?”
“Fix the temperature and I might agree,” Miss Dane declared without breaking her stride.
“All right, I will,” Peter said in an undertone to Miss Harper.
“What?” she gasped.
“Warming spell. Simplicity itself. It lasts only an hour or so, but I’ll recast it again later. And while I’m at it, I’ll demarcate the area so I’ll be alerted if anyone else casts a spell here.”
“Oh,” she said, looking deeply moved, “I could kiss you.”
Then—as he winced at this innocent reminder of his dream—she flushed as red as a ripe strawberry. Oh God. She had seen it.
“I mean, thank you,” she said rapidly, “thank you very much, and I—I’d better get back to the tent.”
She fled. Which just made him think of the dream even more.
Patricia Gossard lost the coin toss to Lydia and had to speak first, one of the few lucky breaks of the day that didn’t involve magic—as far as Beatrix knew.
Gossard, a widow who was young for the old guard, perhaps forty, looked film-star striking in her fur-trimmed coat as she stepped behind the microphone.
They’d set up the makeshift stage at the edge of the lot, which left Gossard standing with the harbor’s basin stretching out behind her and hulking equipment a few yards to one side.
“Ladies,” Gossard said, “friends—I am here to ask once more for your support. I hope you feel I have upheld the principles of the League over the past four years. Magic stands opposed to everything our country was founded upon, and we have consistently spoken out against it.”
“Achieving nothing,” Rosemarie muttered as the audience applauded.
“Our annual petition to the president had the most signatures ever this year—ten thousand,” Gossard said, to more applause.
“A whole ten percent of the League’s membership!” Ella murmured, imitating Gossard in that uncanny way she had. “I’m sure President Abbott was ever so impressed!”
Beatrix turned her head to obscure her snort and realized her sister was no longer standing just behind her.
“Where’s Lydia?” she whispered.
“Oh, for Pete’s sake,” Rosemarie said. “Go look for her. Not you, Ella,” she added in a sharp whisper. “I need you here.”
Beatrix tried the buses first, suspecting Lydia wanted a quiet spot to collect her thoughts, but both were empty save for their drivers. She found her sister in one of the portable restrooms—throwing up.
“I’m fetching water!” Beatrix called out, and ran for the servers’ staging table. When she returned with a half-full glass, Lydia was leaning against the side of the restroom farthest from the crowd, face the color of chalk.
“What’s wrong? Are you ill?” Beatrix took the glass back from her sister before it dropped from her fingers. “Oh no—food poisoning—!”
“No.” Her sister’s voice was ragged. “I’m not sick. And I haven’t eaten since breakfast.”
“Lydia—it’s a wonder you had anything in you to bring up.”
“Bee, I’m not going to be able to do it.”
“Speak?”
“No, win. Rosemarie was right: The film didn’t make the traditionalists angry—it made them anxious.”
Beatrix put an arm around her sister. “It’s OK. It’ll be OK. Try again next time.”
“I don’t think I could stand it,” Lydia said—as if four years of waiting for a much-desired goal was impossible, instead of a fraction of the time Beatrix had spent deferring her own dreams.
She took a calming breath. She reminded herself that Lydia was sixteen (sixteen!) when she declared she would lead a women’s rights group and change everything. No doubt she felt she already had waited four years.
“Look,” Beatrix said, “you’ve revived a dying national organization. You’ve fought the wizards to a draw. Of course you can win.”