Asher's Dilemma (4 page)

“Silas insisted. He was brutal to the very end.”

“I—I don’t believe you. Father has many faults, but brutality isn’t one of them.”

“You don’t believe me?” Mrs. Nemo stiffened, temper flashing through her eyes. “When I asked Silas for a formal separation, he flew into a rage. Told me I would never see you again, that you were better off without me.”

“So you do admit to being my mother!”

Mrs. Nemo pouted with annoyance. “Why must you insist—very well, yes, I am.”

Emotion clogged Minerva’s throat. Her eyes stung. “I was only eight. I missed you terribly. Mother.”

The other woman let out a sigh as she squeezed Minerva’s frozen hand. “You must call me Isolde, Mimi.”

Mimi
. Her mother’s pet name for her. She hadn’t heard it in so many years.

“Oh, if only you knew what I’ve had to endure.” Crossing to the fireplace, Mrs. Nemo examined her face closely in the large mirror above the mantelpiece. Swift, practiced fingers darted about, tucking hair, smoothing lips, patting cheeks, straightening lace. “Mercies, I don’t look like anyone’s mother,” she said to herself. Then she turned round and addressed Minerva. “You’re upset, but your father was right. It was better for you to believe I was dead.”

No, it was the other way round, Minerva realized in a sudden burst of perspicacity. Her mother had been better off without her. Without her and Silas. Her beautiful, restless mother had grown tired of marriage and motherhood. So she’d embarked on a Continental sojourn, and then informed her husband she was leaving him. That, Minerva felt sure, was what had really happened, but she would never be able to verify that, because her father was no longer compos mentis. Following his ordeal at the hands of his kidnappers, her father had become as docile as a baby, and had little memory of the past. His health was fragile, his grip on reality even more tenuous, and she couldn’t contemplate questioning him about his marriage.

“Father’s not well these days,” Minerva said.

Mrs. Nemo’s eyes narrowed. “And how do you come to be knocking on my door?”

Minerva’s brain froze. The shock of meeting her long-dead parent had fuddled her wits. She couldn’t tell her mother about Asher. She wasn’t sure why, only that her nerves shrilled at the notion. Asher must know who Mrs. Nemo was—he couldn’t have failed to notice the resemblance—and clearly he hadn’t wanted Minerva to meet her. What business Asher had with Mrs. Nemo, Minerva was loath to speculate.

“I, ah, I must have given the wrong directions to the cab driver,” Minerva improvised. “I’m visiting a client here in London, you see.” Briefly she gave her mother the bare bones of her business.

Mrs. Nemo’s plucked eyebrows rose up. “Mercy me. So you’ve set up shop as an appendage-maker. I suppose I shouldn’t be all that surprised. You were always more interested in your father’s gadgets than your dolls.” She tilted her head to one side. “And so it’s pure coincidence that you ended up here?”

“Of course.” Minerva attempted a convincing tone. “Stranger things have happened.” She paused. It hadn’t escaped her notice that her mother had shown little interest in her father. “Father always said life was stranger than fiction.”

“Ah yes, your father. You mentioned he’s not well these days?”

“That’s right, I’m afraid. He’s suffered a mental breakdown and doesn’t remember much anymore.” Minerva expanded upon her father’s condition, but after only a few minutes she paused as she caught the boredom flickering across her mother’s face. She remembered that expression all too well from her childhood when she’d chattered on, desperate to cling to her mother’s attention, yet seeing her indifference grow with every passing second. She’d failed to hold her mother’s interest then, and her mother had left. Now, seventeen years later, she was living openly with a man who couldn’t be her husband.

“Is Herr Schick your lover?” she abruptly asked.

Derision tinged her mother’s smile. “Why, that horror on your face—you remind me of my own mama.”

“I have a right to know.”

Mrs. Nemo raised an imperious finger, her smile vanishing. “Before you say anything, let me warn you that I will not tolerate any sanctimonious preaching. Not from you, not from anyone.”

Minerva stared at her. “I’m not here to judge you.”

“No? The appalled look you wear says otherwise.”

Minerva swallowed. Who was she to judge? She herself had been prepared to be Asher’s mistress, and she’d never have regretted that. “Are you—are you in love with Herr Schick?”

Her mother’s mouth fell open. “Child, surely you’re not that naive?”

Humiliation knotted in Minerva’s chest. She hadn’t meant to sound so callow. She lowered her eyes to the carpet, unable to witness her mother’s amusement. Mrs. Nemo reached out and tipped up Minerva’s chin. She was smiling, but her smile was tinged with regret, not mockery.

“Oh, Mimi dearest. By your standards I’ve done some shocking, outrageous things. I admit it. I’ve taken several lovers, but never have I been a mere concubine. I enter these relationships on my own terms, with my own agenda, and I choose only those which are advantageous to me. My current arrangement with Herr Schick is no different.” She shifted her grip to Minerva’s shoulder and gently squeezed. “I’ll be candid with you now. I wish you’d never discovered I was still alive. It would have been better for you to remain in ignorance. But now you know the truth.” She continued to knead Minerva’s shoulder, her tuberose perfume heady as incense, her eyes fathomless blue pools. “We can be friends, you and I, but not if you sermonize and demonize. What say you, child?”

The constriction in Minerva’s chest intensified. A hot wave of tumbling emotion surged over her. The motherless eight-year-old in her yearned to rest her head on her mother’s bosom and find release in weeping. But the immaculate furbelows of Mrs. Nemo’s bodice offered no maternal comfort. They could be friends, acquaintances, yes, but never mother and daughter.

“I’d like that,” she murmured, forcing back her tears. She hesitated as she mulled over how a friendship with Mrs. Nemo would be conducted. “Will you tell Herr Schick about me?”

“Certainly not!” Her mother drew back in horror. “In fact, you must not call here again without prior warning.”

“But I…” Minerva trailed off. Herr Schick was neither the most agreeable of men nor the wealthiest, so why was her mother with him when she had just denied having any feelings for him? “I hope he doesn’t treat you poorly.”

Mrs. Nemo’s head tilted up regally. “I never allow any man to treat me poorly.”

And Asher Quigley? What was he to Mrs. Nemo? The sick feeling returned to Minerva. She didn’t want to speculate on what the connection was between the two, but sooner or later she would have to find out. Perhaps they had met through Herr Schick. Perhaps Asher had conferred with the German on some mathematical problem. It was possible, and certainly more palatable than any other explanation.

“And you share Herr Schick’s passion for mathematics?” Minerva asked. “I never knew you were so inclined.”

“Child, there’s much you do not know about me.”

For the first time Minerva took in her surroundings. The room, which she’d assumed was her mother’s private sitting room, wasn’t furnished in the usual way for a lady. Certainly there was a fine escritoire by the window and a velvet chaise longue with many cushions for reclining on, but the shelves were crammed with heavy tomes on botany, astrology, chemistry and alchemy, a side table held a collection of jars, glass tubes, slides and a microscope, while on the desk were numerous papers covered in detailed writing.

“Are you pursuing studies of your own?” Minerva looked at her mother with some awe. Not only did Herr Schick trust her with his analytical machine, it appeared she was also a serious scholar. “I would love to hear about it.”

“No, I’m sure you’d find it tedious.” Mrs. Nemo drew Minerva towards the door. “But come, you must be on your way now, and I have work to do. Give me the address of your lodging, and I will send round a note when I’m available.”

Minerva left the terrace, her mind still swirling. She might have uncovered the truth about her mother’s “death” but that was only the start of the puzzle. So much was unknown about Mrs. Nemo, but one thing was clear—she was concealing a great many secrets.

* * *

In a ferment of agitation, Asher of the future followed Minerva back to her lodgings. His entire body had vibrated in shock when he’d spied her emerging from Herr Schick’s terrace. And the sight of Mrs. Nemo waving her off had sent dread lancing through him. He’d barely had sufficient brainpower to instruct the driver of his cab to follow the carriage Minerva had stepped into.

What the devil was she doing here in London? Throughout the awfulness of the past fortnight, his one consolation had been the belief that Minerva was, for the moment, safely tucked away in Manchester. Every night, as he learned more and more of what he was up against, he found release in penning her letters, expressing all he’d felt for her in the past but never conveyed. She was both his anchor and his salvation.

But now she was here in the very thick of things, with no inkling of the danger she was in. From a safe distance he watched as she alighted from her carriage and entered her lodging house, looking tired and worried.

Asher held himself back from rushing after her, wishing to marshal his faculties before approaching her. He had no option now but to tell her the truth about himself. Indeed, he would even have to ask for her help. Time was running desperately short.

He got out of the carriage, telling the driver to wait for him. The man merely nodded and drew his muffler closer against the rising north wind. Over the past few weeks Asher had hired him frequently, and he’d grown accustomed to Asher’s strange behavior.

Dead leaves and litter eddied around Asher’s legs as he rapped on the front door of the lodging house. A tall, stout woman answered his knock and eyed him up and down suspiciously.

“Good evening, ma’am. Is Miss Lambkin available?” he asked politely.

“I don’t allow gentleman callers, especially at this hour.” The landlady folded hefty arms across her massive bosom. She had the build and countenance of a Saxon warrior.

“May I send up a note for her then?”

The landlady lowered her bull-like head into the generous folds of her neck. “I run a respectable establishment here, and I don’t approve of my female lodgers going out at night to meet strange gentlemen. If you wish to see Miss Lambkin, I suggest you call back in the morning.”

Asher’s blood started to hum. For a moment he contemplated thrusting past the Amazon and forcing his way in. But that would guarantee Minerva’s eviction, and how would he be able to explain himself in the subsequent hullabaloo?

Harrumphing in frustration, he turned away just as the mischievous wind picked up his hat and bowled it down the street.

Chapter Four

Minerva emerged from Mrs. Pettigrew’s house, her head swimming with ideas. She now knew why her widowed client had requested she travel to London, and she fervently hoped she’d be able to help her. Mechanical hands, arms and feet she had constructed before, and once even an artificial nose, but this would be the first time she’d be building a substitute eye. False eyes had been around for centuries, but Mrs. Pettigrew required more than just a glass eyeball. Ten years ago, her deranged and jealous husband had shot her in the head and then turned the pistol on himself. He’d meant to kill her, but the poor woman had survived, albeit with a gaping hole in her head.

It had taken Minerva considerable self-control to examine the injury without flinching, but sympathy had outweighed delicacy. In the end, Mrs. Pettigrew’s shocking disfigurement was no more than flesh and bone, and Minerva had quickly begun to see ways of designing a headpiece which would transform the mutilation into a thing of beauty. Mrs. Pettigrew had long wanted such a disguise, but had been reticent to approach a male craftsman. Eager to end her confinement, she had seen Minerva off with a handsome bank check to be used on the purchase of materials.

Minerva started off down the road, leaning into a stiff headwind. Overnight, the winds from the north had strengthened to gales, and the blustery street was aswirl with dead foliage and detritus. Minerva pushed on. She would return to her lodgings and flesh out the design she’d sketched out for Mrs. Pettigrew, and then—

“Minerva.”

The familiar voice stopped her in her tracks. She glanced up to see Asher alongside her, seated in a carriage. Opening the door, he beckoned towards her.

“Will you ride with me? I have something of great importance to tell you.”

Minerva’s meeting with Mrs. Pettigrew had distracted her from the tribulations she’d endured the previous day, but now the memories came thundering back. She stared at Asher. He looked so different from yesterday, so beseeching and anxious. But he’d been so cruel. She tipped her chin. “So important you feel the need to accost me in the middle of the street?”

“I came by your lodgings yesterday evening, but your landlady is something of a dragon.” He gestured towards her again. “Please come with me, Minerva. I will explain everything.”

He seemed so stirred up she couldn’t find it in her to refuse him. Cursing her weakness, she climbed into the carriage beside him. At least she was out of the wind for a while. As the carriage moved on, he drew down the blinds so no passers-by could see them, and the dimness made the cramped interior even more intimate.

Minerva gulped, suddenly reminded of another carriage they’d shared not long ago when they’d been in hot pursuit of the man who’d tried to kill both her and her father. On that occasion Asher had just rescued her, and their emotions had boiled over. Fervently they’d kissed and embraced, overwhelmed by rekindled passion sharpened by the tang of danger. But this time, though her feelings were roiling, Asher seemed more discomfited by her presence than aroused.

He brooded over her, his eyes peridot-green and uneasy. “Who is this Mrs. Pettigrew you’ve just visited?” he asked eventually. She opened her mouth to ask how he knew the widow’s name, but he forestalled her by adding, “I had the cab driver make some enquiries while I was waiting.”

While he was waiting?
She frowned. “You’ve been following me?”

“What is your business with Mrs. Pettigrew?”

He’d almost pleaded for her company, but now he was treating her like a suspect in the witness box. “Mrs. Pettigrew is a client of mine,” she retorted.

“Oh.” His shoulders relaxed a fraction. “So
that’s
why you’re in London.”

“But I already explained all of this to you yesterday. Did you not believe that either?” she asked bitterly. “Is that why you’re following me?”

He grew very still. The carriage jounced over a deep pothole as he continued to stare at her. “You explained all this to me yesterday,” he repeated in a stunned monotone. “You called round at my house?”

“Yes!” What was wrong? Was he ailing from something which caused memory loss? Her distress mounted as the events of yesterday re-assaulted her. “And you have some explaining to do yourself, Mr. Asher Quigley. Because I know full well why you were so keen to get rid of me yesterday afternoon. Oh yes. I saw your mysterious visitor entering your house, and what’s more I waited for her to exit and I followed her home too!”

Eyes flaring, Asher plunged his fingers through his hair. “Oh God.”

“Yes, I am referring to Mrs. Nemo!” Minerva’s chest heaved. “You must know who she is in relation to me! What I do not know, and am very keen for you to elucidate upon, is what she is to
you?
”

As her chin started to quiver, she clamped her jaw tight. Asher lifted a hand towards her, but then dropped it. “Is that all you did, follow her home?”

“I spoke to her, of course. And she introduced me to Herr Schick.”

His face grew ashen. “Promise me you will not contact Mrs. Nemo or go near Schick’s house again.”

She gaped at him. “I can’t do that. She’s my mother—”

“I’m sorry, but she has a less than savory reputation. The same goes for Schick. You must avoid both of them.”

“Don’t be ridiculous. I won’t—”

“Minerva.” He grasped her by the arms, his entire being burning with a white-hot intensity. “I am about to tell you something that will sound extremely ridiculous. Something that will have you doubting my sanity. But you must listen and not interrupt until I’m finished. Will you promise me that at least?”

The hairs on the back of her neck rose. She’d never seen Asher like this before. The compulsion gripping him seemed to flow through his hands into her, infecting her with his agitation. Numbly she nodded her agreement.

He didn’t speak at once, instead releasing her to rub his face and neck. The tension emanating from him was palpable. As if to buy some time he flicked the blinds open a crack. They were passing through a park now, she surmised from the glimpses of bare trees and brown grass she caught. The howling wind battered the trees, jostled the carriage and jingled the horse’s harness.

He began to speak, his voice tight and staccato. “You know how dear to my heart the millennium machine is, how much time and effort I’ve devoted to it. When your father stole the concept from me, it made me even more determined to solve the problems, to complete it, to claim it as mine. Well, you know I did, just three weeks ago, though I never admitted as much to you. I hinted that my invention would attract the wrong sort of people, that it was more of a curse than a help. That was because I’d discovered something wholly unexpected about my millennium machine.”

He paused to rasp his jaw, which was not as immaculately shaven as usual.

“You’re familiar with the basic concept of my machine. A ring of promethium magnets, properly arranged in the right position, produces a magnetic field which harnesses the energy of the aethersphere in the form of an endless supply of electro-magnetic current. Well, what if the process were reversed? What if an electro-magnetic current was passed through the ring of magnets? What would happen then?

“The aethersphere is a great unknown to us. It fills every corner of the universe, yet we can neither see it nor measure it. Still, many scientists have tried. Some mathematicians describe it as a multi-dimensional space, the so-called Riemannian manifold or hyperspace. In this hyperspace, time is just one of many dimensions, which means once you enter the hyperspace you can travel through time just as easily as we are now travelling through this park.”

He hesitated, and she sensed him gathering all his resolve to utter his next words.

“It’s not just a hypothesis, Minerva, because I myself have travelled through this hyperspace. I am not the Asher you called on yesterday.” He drew in a breath. “I am the Asher from the future. From eight months in the future, to be exact.”

In the ensuing silence the clip-clopping of the horse’s hooves drummed against the inside of Minerva’s skull. She felt her body swaying with the motion of the carriage, felt her fingers curling into the folds of her skirt, felt a shivering rage boil up from within her.

“You expect me to believe such folderol? Do I strike you as such an imbecile I’d swallow any codswallop you dream up? Stop the carriage. I won’t sit here a moment longer.”

She made to bang on the ceiling, but Asher grabbed her arm.

“Put aside your feminine outrage for one minute and utilize that keen logic of yours,” he retorted. “Think of everything about me ever since that day a fortnight ago when I stalked out of your house after you’d refused my marriage proposal. Think, Minerva. Are there not things that strike you as incongruous? Have I not behaved oddly at times, almost as if I am not the same man?”

“Behaving oddly is nothing new with you! You take pride in flouting conventions.”

“Oh, come now, Minerva. I know I am a vexatious man, but I’m never capricious. How did I behave towards you yesterday?”

“You know very well how you behaved.” She jerked her arm free and scowled at him. “You were cold and distant. You denied writing me all those letters—”

“Ah, because
he
didn’t write those letters,
I
did. Just as a fortnight ago he was the one who stormed out in righteous anger because you valued your independence, and I was the one who came rushing back minutes later begging forgiveness.”

A shocking possibility snagged in her thoughts and refused to be dislodged. Preposterous though it sounded, what if he was telling the truth? Hadn’t he been behaving strangely, out of character?

Fear and disbelief hitched her breath. She gulped once, twice. “That night in Manchester…you—you said, if need be, you would wait for me forever.”

The force in his eyes melted and became a hot glow. “Yes, I will.”

His face blurred; she bit her lip to stop the tears. “But yesterday you accused me of having another secret beau.”

“The bounder!” His expression altered. “You must make allowances for him, Minerva. He loves you passionately, but his pride has always been his downfall.”

“Stop it! Stop it!” Shielding her ears, she squeezed her eyes shut. “Stop talking as if…as if—” The frantic beat of her heart echoed in her ears. Choking, she dropped her hands to her lap. “I must be losing my grip on reality, because I’m starting to believe you.”

“Sweetling, I wish I didn’t have to burden you like this, but time is running out. I need your help.”

Sweetling
. His endearment, which he used in all his letters, made her heart tumble over. She gazed at him anew, noting the subtle differences between this Asher and the man whom she’d surprised yesterday. Feature by feature they were identical, but when she looked into his eyes the distinction was unmistakable. In this man she saw poignant regret in his gaze, the look of an injured soldier returning from the battlefield.

Reaching out, she brushed the tips of her fingers over the roughness of his cheek. It couldn’t be true. It had to be madness. Her rational brain railed against the impossibility, but in the end logic was no match against the heart.

“How can I help?”

* * *

As Asher spoke of what had to be done, Minerva’s face drained of all color. When he was finished, she protested. “I cannot ask him to do that. It’s too much! This is something he’s been laboring over for years. How can I ask him to throw it all away?”

Her blue eyes flashed with indignation. How she must care for the man, Asher thought. His jaw hardened against the unexpected pang of jealousy. Utterly ridiculous to be envious of himself. But there it was. He couldn’t deny it. She still loved that pig-headed man despite everything.

“You forget it’s my work too. I know full well how much blood, sweat and tears I’ve poured into it. How much it’s cost me—” He broke off, reminded of how his invention had come between him and Minerva when he’d falsely accused her of colluding with her father to steal his idea. Five years he’d spent separated from her. Blasted invention! How much more pain would it engender?

Minerva sat clasping and unclasping her fingers, her brow wrinkled in thought. “There must be another solution, some way in which Asher can continue—”

“No, this is the only way.” He grasped her hand urgently. “The safest way.”

Even through the glove her hand felt cold. “But why must it be this way? You haven’t fully explained the consequences. What will happen in eight months’ time if we do nothing?”

For a brief moment he shut his eyes. Weariness gnawed at him like a rat. During the past fortnight he’d barely slept, and he found himself longing to gather Minerva into his arms and fall into a deep slumber.

He shook his head. “I can’t tell you.”

“But why? Is it so terrible? Does…does something happen to you?”

Sweet Minerva, always concerned about others. No, he couldn’t bring himself to tell her the full horror of the future from whence he came. She deserved the truth, but he was too much of a coward to reveal it.

“Sweetling, I implore you to put your faith in me,” he said softly, “and trust in what I’m asking of you.”