The last whole pane of Lucy’s heart cracked straight across as the library door clicked shut behind her.
Chapter Fourteen
Lucy arrived at the College building shamefully early—the only benefit of skipping an unwanted dinner—and decided to stop by Mr. Edwards’s laboratory before the lecture began. It would be quieter place to wait than in the auditorium crowd, and there was a chance that Mrs. Edwards would be there, with her kind smile and sympathetic heart. Lucy felt in desperate need of someone to guide her through the fog until her own heart was once again up to the task.
She would navigate by someone else’s star, until her own shone clear again.
She’d been to the laboratory once before, with Catherine, for a private demonstration, and had no trouble finding it now. Students, scholars, and amateurs alike crowded the halls, talking ceaselessly with a roar like a dry ocean.
It was only on the third or so turn down the corridors that Lucy began to realize something strange was happening. She caught odd sounds of snickering, and excited murmurs—but whenever she turned to look, the speakers averted their eyes and abruptly ceased talking until she’d passed.
Surely her being here alone wasn’t so much of a scandal as that? She was relieved when she finally pushed open Mr. Edwards’s door, and could take refuge.
The curtains on the tall windows were drawn back, and the wan autumn light flowed in and caught on the smooth curves of glassware. Elements and metals and substances of all kinds and colors were arranged precisely on the shelves—some in liquid form, some stacked or wrapped in paper, some carefully corked to preserve visitors from deadly fumes. The ghosts of past experiments seemed to haunt the air: faint, tantalizing scents of metal and fire and sulfur. Mr. Edwards himself was standing bent over the large central desk, staring intently at the papers in his hands as though they held the key to the workings of the universe. Which perhaps they did.
Lucy approached softly, hoping not to startle the other scientist out of his concentration. But when he looked up at her soft cough, his face went from intent and thoughtful to outright dismay.
Dread rang alarms on Lucy’s every nerve.
“Miss Muchelney,” he said. “I did not expect to see you this evening.”
“I am meeting Mr. Frampton to hear your latest thoughts on electrochemistry,” she replied. “Has something happened?”
His dismay grew, the pain in his dark eyes and mobile mouth abundantly plain. “Then you haven’t seen it?”
Lucy shook her head, and without another moment’s delay he handed over what he’d been reading.
It was the latest issue ofPolite Philosophies, dated only two days before. The most significant letter in the President’s estimation always opened the issue, and this one was no different. The headline was bold and stark in large type at the top:On the Likelihood of Miss Muchelney’s Translation.
And then in smaller letters:An enquiry into the possibility of an earlier draft of CELESTIAL MECHANICS by Albert Muchelney, FPSS.
The author: Richard Wilby. With the same set of letters after his name: FPSS. Fellow of the Polite Science Society.
Lucy looked up from the hideous page. “So they have officially voted him in.”
Mr. Edwards nodded.
Lucy’s hand shook, rattling the paper. She set it down hastily, appalled to be so transparent in her feelings. “And he is proclaiming me an imposter.”
“Yes,” Mr. Edwards confirmed. “It’s not true, of course.” His tone brooked no doubt, but his eyes...
Lucy almost cried out at the pity in those dark eyes. Mr. Edwards had been a Fellow long enough to know how poisonous a well-connected enemy could be. He knew just how this essay would blight Lucy’s future as a scholar. How the taint of suspicion would follow her through every theory and discovery and proof, for the rest of her life and even perhaps beyond. She wasn’t a Fellow, and had no official standing to counter the accusations leveled against her in the same forums where they’d been made. The theory was now a part of official Society record, and no counterargument would be enough to banish its effects. It would be like trying to empty a forest of snakes, one at a time: there would always be another one somewhere else, slithering silently through the underbrush—and the venom from the first would never be wholly expunged.
It was the ruin of everything.
Mr. Edwards said something else, but Lucy didn’t hear him. She took a step back, then another, then turned and flung open the door.
The mix of horror and fiendish joy she saw in everyone’s faces didn’t puzzle her any longer: people always flocked to the shore when there was a shipwreck to watch.
She ran around one corner—and the world kept spinning, her senses whirling and her head feeling like it was about to separate from her shoulders and float away high into the leaden sky...
She paused and leaned against a wall, shutting her eyes until the dizziness passed. It had been a mistake to skip dinner—worse than she’d anticipated. Her stomach churned, her pulse hammered in her ears, and everywhere around her was the sound of mocking, hateful laughter...
A hand on her elbow: a person, touching her gently. She cracked open her eyes to see Mr. Frampton there, his brow thunderous even as his mouth was pinched in sorrow. “Are you alright, Miss Muchelney?” he said softly. “Can you stand?”
Lucy nodded, gulping the air and pressing one hand to her stomach until the world came into focus again. “Mr. Edwards showed me the letter.”
She didn’t have to explain further; Mr. Frampton simply nodded and watched her closely, his eyes occasionally flicking to one side or another. With every person who passed, his face grew more and more steely. “There’s something else I have to tell you,” he said. “I spoke to Mr. Hawley yesterday.”
