“Sorry,” Beth said, but then realized Hippolyta was in fact not looking at her. Following the woman’s glare, she saw that Herr Oberhufter had joined Devon Lockley at the tearoom entrance. A deathwhistler feather protruded jauntily from his bowler hat, and smoke from his cigar made a little cloud for it.
Beth did not hate anyone, since that would take mental energy away from thinking about important things, such as birds, and quality paper, and how to keep that paper dry while hiking over foggy moorlands to sketch birds. She made an exception for Klaus Oberhufter, however. The man might rescue dangerous thaumaturgic species from communities who would like to kill them (granted, to stop the birds from killing the community first), but he also readily sold them to aviaries that were little more than tourist ventures and that cared nothing for the birds’ quality of life. Hippolyta was more scrupled—she only sold to people who could provide the birds with a deluxe haven, since they were the only ones who could afford her exorbitant fee.
“Villains,” Beth muttered as the two men began to cross the tearoom to a thankfully distant table.
“Bamboozlers,” Hippolyta agreed. “I hear he’s some kind of academic wunderkind.”
“Really?” Beth asked without much interest, stirring her tea with a dainty silver teaspoon. “I’d have supposed Herr Oberhufter too narrow in his thinking to allow for genius.”
Hippolyta snorted. “I meant the other one. The bird thief.”
Immediately, every overeducated instinct in Beth’s body perked up. She studied Devon Lockley anew, as if she might assess his intelligence from the unhurried way he followed Herr Oberhufter.
“Really?” she asked again, her tone still nonchalant but her interest becoming so rich she could have bought a small nation with it.
Just then, Devon Lockley glanced over. His dark gaze met Beth’s with a small, crooked smile that implied he’d known exactly how long she had been eyeing him up—and therefore that he’d been eyeing her up too. Villain, indeed!
And academic wunderkind? Ha! A strident little voice inside Beth’s mind, hidden behind stacks of apologies and reminders to open doors for other people, urged her to march across and inform the man of her academic honors, including that time Oxford’s chancellor had called her “worryingly clever” (which almost certainly had been intended as a compliment). British women had enjoyed tertiary education ever since Queen Charlotte had developed such an admiration for the astronomer Caroline Herschel that she’d convinced universities to enroll women (herbribesdonations had helped), but Beth was the country’s youngest professor regardless of gender. WhereasDevon Lockley must have been at least a whole two, if not three, years older than her—and merely a professor of Cambridge, to boot. She pinned him with a stare to rival that of the basilisk owl, which could turn a person to stone.
He winked in return.
“Why don’t you give up,” Hippolyta suggested wryly, “and drink out of your saucer?”
Beth looked down at her teacup and discovered she’d bashed the teaspoon around its interior so much, she’d made another flood. While she mopped and apologized, Hippolyta entertained herself by pressing macaron crumbs to a finger and sucking this finger noisily until clean. But both ladies were diverted from their culinary concerns when suddenly a cloud of floral perfume engulfed them.
“Why, if it isn’t Hippolyta Spiffington-Quirm, as I live and breathe! I heard you were lost in the Spanish jungle!”
The ladies stared up at what appeared to be a perambulating wedding cake. White froth, lace, and flounces were topped with a flower bouquet in service as a hat. Amid all this was a round dark face beaming in happy assurance of its humanity. Beth smiled at her, but Hippolyta was less welcoming.
“Lady Trimble,” she said, managing to pack at least two insults and an innuendo into the name. “I daresay a few beech trees do not a jungle make. But of course you would not know that, since you specialize inurbanbirds.”
Beth winced. Hippolyta had just outright called Lady Trimble a quack.
Lady Trimble’s smile tightened. As the wife of a baronet with an unplumbed castle and several lifetimes’ worth of debt, she outranked Hippolyta, a mere millionaire’s widow, but could not mention this without lowering herself. Beth foundsuch social intricacies ridiculous (although if the women were birds, she’d already have her notepad out so as to record their every move). Bored even before Lady Trimble said another word, she began thinking back to the deathwhistler’s flight pattern—
“Egad!”
Beth jolted. At the neighboring table, Misses Fotheringham, elderly twin birders, were chattering excitedly over a newspaper.
“Good gracious!” Hippolyta complained. “Such uncivilized behavior!”
Suddenly, the Fotheringhams leaped up, causing their table to clatter and a spoon to fall on the parquet floor. The entire population of the room gasped. Miss Fotheringham and Miss Fotheringham paid no heed, rushing out as fast as their elaborate dresses would allow.
Hippolyta shook her head in disgust. “Some people have no dignity,” she said, dunking half a macaron into her tea. Lady Trimble moved back hastily to avoid the consequent splashes. “In my day, ladies took dainty steps when in public.”
Beth kindly refrained from mentioning that, at thirty-one, Hippolyta was not only still enjoying her day, but indeed spent most of it striding hither and yon in search of birds, tea, and lucrative publishing deals. Lady Trimble, however, had no qualms about saying so, judging from the gleam in her eye. “I suspect—” she began.
“Mon Dieu!”
As the shout rang out, teacups everywhere went down in saucers with a concertedly outragedclink. Monsieur Tarrou, president of the Parisian Ornithological Union, was staring openmouthed at a newspaper that he held open with one handwhile, in his other hand, marmalade dripped from a slice of toast. Suddenly, he flung the toast to the table, grasped hat, gloves, and newspaper to his heart, and dashed from the tearoom.
“Something’s afoot,” Hippolyta said with remarkable perspicacity.
“Maybe it’s about the latest news from the International Ornithological Society,” Lady Trimble suggested. Smirking, she produced a folded newspaper clipping from within her purse. But before she could name a price for handing it over, Hippolyta snatched it from between her delicate fingers. Snapping it open with one brisk shake, she rapidly scanned the news.
“Upon my word! IOS is announcing a special contest!” She held up the clipping long enough for Beth to glimpse the wordscalling all birdersbefore lowering it to read again. “A caladrius has been sighted in England! Whoever finds it will be named International Birder of the Year!! Regardless of their work thus far!!!”
She and Beth stared at each other wide-eyed.
