Goblin Moon (10 page)

But Caleb had passed beyond any interest in the Duke
of Zar-Wildungen or his gold. “Gottfried . . .” he said, in a
trembling voice. “Where did you come by the
sperma viri
?”

Jenk turned on him a look expressive of the utmost
disgust “Surely you do not suppose that I . . . ?”

Caleb shook his head. “No, Gottfried, no, I didn’t
think nothing like that. You’ve fathered a child; she’s dead, but
you’ve got young Sera to take her place. But I . . . I’m fond of
Jed and the girls, but they ain’t my own.

“It weren’t through any disinclination that I never
wed, you know that,” he continued earnestly. “I just never had
nothing to offer a woman, not until Joss’s little widder come along
with her three hungry babbies, worse off even than I was. I was
glad to take them in, to play pa to her, and grandpa to the
children, but it weren’t nothing like having little ones of my
own.”

As his former servant spoke, Jenk’s expression had
softened considerably. “I know, Caleb, I know,” he said gently.
“And I know, too, though you do not reproach me, to what extent I
was responsible for your poverty, the ruin of your early hopes. But
even supposing that your seed were still vital—which is by no means
certain, my friend, for you are no longer young—it will be a freak,
an artificial creation, with no more humanity or claim on humanity
than an ape or a four-legged brute. Were that not so, I would not
think of sending one so casually to the Duke. Were it not so—“

“Send this one to the Duke,” pleaded Caleb. “It’s
plain enough you don’t care what comes to it. And I don’t reckon it
has no father likely to take an interest.”

Jenk pulled up a chair, sank wearily down on it. “Its
father—if you might term him such—was a felon, a gallows-bird. An
involuntary reaction at the moment of death and a man hired to
stand beneath the gibbet and collect the semen while it is still
fresh—“

Caleb waved this explanation aside impatiently. “Well
then. Your little man, he’s got no living father, and you ain’t
inclined to own him, I can see that plain. Send him to the Duke, to
do with as he likes, but the other one . . . we could keep it
ourselfs, we could treat it kind.”

Jenk put a gentle hand on his old friend’s arm. “You
would be dooming yourself to almost certain disappointment. The
mandrake may not quicken. And even if it does, and we bring it to
term . . . it may know nothing of human affection, naught of joy,
or fear, or any other emotion. You might acknowledge the homunculus
as your own—but would the bond between you mean anything at all to
the creature itself?”

Caleb did not reply at once. Then he gasped and gave
a startled cry. “It moved. I seen it move!”

Jenk started to his feet. But then, common sense
returning to him, he shook his head and resumed his seat. “I
believe you are imagining things, my friend. You want so much to
see it come to life—“

“I seen it move,” insisted Caleb, clutching his arm.
“Look for yourself, you don’t believe me.”

Jenk bent forward, peered into the egg of glass. The
homunculus was utterly still, giving no more sign of life than it
had before. And yet . . . and yet, it almost seemed to Jenk that
the color of the skin had changed, had acquired a more lifelike hue
than—

“It’s moving now, you can see for yourself,” breathed
Caleb.

As the two old men watched in astonishment, the
little creature began to stir, to move sluggishly as if awakening
from a long slumber. His skin assumed a rosier hue, and a pulse of
life passed through his tiny frame. The little head moved slowly
from side to side, and the eyes fluttered and opened.

Caleb was shaking from head to foot. “You done it,”
he said. “You done created a thinking creature.”

Gazing into the face of the homunculus, Jenk could
only nod in wordless agreement. The little man stared back at him
with wide-open eyes—eyes which revealed neither the blankness of an
idiot nor the innocence of a child.

Jenk struggled to master himself, to force out the
words. “May the Father of All forgive me,” he whispered hoarsely.
“I believe I have created something unspeakable.”

Chapter
8

In which Sera falls into the Clutches of a
villain.

Once or twice in every fortnight, Sera paid a visit
to her grandfather at the bookshop and spent a pleasant afternoon
drinking tea in his little sitting room under the eaves. If the
weather was fine, Sera walked; if it was wet, she stayed at home,
or spent her meagre pocket money on a sedan chair rather than risk
Clothilde’s displeasure by requesting the use of one of the
carriages.

On the thirty-first day of the season of Leaves, Sera
dressed carefully, donning the old gown of black bombazine which
she had recently refurbished with yards of white lace. Then she
paused to study her reflection in the long mirror over her dressing
table. She wished to appear happy and prosperous, lest she give her
grandfather any cause for concern. Yet even with all its fresh
trimming of lace, the gown was sadly out of date.

But Grandfather knows nothing of
feminine fashions, and I’ve nothing else suitable for an afternoon
call except for the bottle-green poplin.

There was nothing to do but to make the best of it.
And with white net mittens—and the flowered shawl—and her Sunday
bonnet with red silk roses—and a little gold brooch nestled in the
lace—the black bombazine did not look so ill. Sera picked up her
reticule and left her bedchamber.

She met Elsie and her mother on the stairs, just
coming in from an afternoon call. Clothilde Vorder came first,
stalking up the stairs with her head held high and a look of
vexation upon her florid face, while Elsie trailed dismally
behind.

At the sight of Sera, dressed to go out, Mistress
Vorder bridled. “And where do you suppose that you are going,
miss?”

For Elsie’s sake, Sera tried to control her temper.
“To visit my grandfather. You said that I might.”

“I do not recall,” said Cousin Clothilde, “anything
of the sort. I had counted on you to write the invitations for my
supper party. Indeed, I distinctly recall telling you—

“—that you required my services tomorrow afternoon!”
said Sera. “It is no use pretending otherwise, for Elsie was there,
and so was Cousin Benjamin, and rather more to the point: my
grandfather is expecting me.”

Clothilde’s hand twitched, rather as though she would
have liked to slap Sera, but Cousin Benjamin’s study opened on the
landing above; and the door stood ajar. Though Benjamin Vorder was,
as a general rule, too lazy and too neglectful to take issue with
Clothilde’s bullying mistreatment of his kinsman’s daughter, both
women knew well that he would not countenance any physical
abuse.

“You are a bad, insolent girl,” said Clothilde. “Do
not suppose that we shall not speak of this later. And just see
that you are home before supper, or it will be the worse for you!”
And she continued on her way in high dudgeon.

Sera put out a hand to stop Elsie as she walked by.
“My dear, what is it? Have you quarreled with your mother?”

Elsie nodded. At first glance, she looked sweet and
fresh, in a dainty white dimity gown and a wide straw hat trimmed
with velvety pansies and pale Spagnish lilies. (
Like a bride . . . or a corpse,
thought Sera—then
scolded herself for being so fanciful.) A closer examination
revealed an unnatural glitter in her eyes and a hectic flush on her
cheeks. To Sera’s mind, she looked feverish.

But that was Clothilde Vorder’s way: to exhaust Elsie
by dragging her along to teas and afternoon calls and picnics when
she was genuinely ill and ought to be resting, then to torment her
with doctors and unnecessary medications when she was otherwise
perfectly well.
She parades Elsie and her
infirmities as some women make a show of their gowns, their jewels,
and their carriages,
thought Sera.

“I told Mama, in the carriage coming back, that I did
not intend to visit Dr. Mirabolo ever again,” said Elsie. A second
visit to the establishment on Venary Lane had been as shocking as
the first, and far from benefiting from the demonstration, she had
spent the next three days in a state of nervous collapse.

“And so she is cross with you . . .” said Sera.
“Never mind it, my dear. She can rail and plague you as much as she
likes, but she cannot force you to go there against your will.”

Elsie looked at her doubtfully. “Can she not? I think
that she might. Mama has such—such a forceful character.”

Sera took her hand and squeezed it. “You are sixteen
years of age and no longer a child. She cannot whip you, or lock
you in your room. And we live in a civilized country; you are not
the daughter of some wicked foreign potentate. Your parents won’t
immure you in stone, or cast you out for undutiful behavior,
or—well, I suppose they might disown you, at that, but not for
anything so trivial as this. And I cannot see Cousin Benjamin in
the role of tyrannical father. No doubt he would find it too
strenuous for a man of his sedentary habits.”

Elsie smiled weakly at Sera’s attempt at humor. “No,
I am not likely to be cast out, or anything so dramatic as that.
But she might, Sera, she might send you away, as a way of punishing
me.”

“Yes,” Sera agreed, with a sigh, “she might do that.”
The threat was a very real and present one. Whenever Sera spoke or
acted to disoblige Cousin Clothilde—whenever she supported Elsie in
resisting her mother’s wishes—always there was the risk that
Clothilde would send her away, that she and Elsie would be parted.
“But to do that, she would also require your father’s permission,
and I do not think that Cousin Benjamin would be willing to oblige
her.

“And anyway,” she added, tossing her head, “I would
sooner be sent off, sooner go to live with my grandfather—which I
should not mind at all, if it did not mean parting from you—rather
than stay on to be used as . . . as another means of making you
docile.”

Sera left Elsie lying down in her bedchamber, with a
book in her hands, and a shawl of Mawbri silk cast over her like a
blanket, and a maid-servant in the room to look after her during
Sera’s absence. She left the house and set off at a brisk pace, for
the walk was a long one and she had delayed too long already. She
knew that Cousin Clothilde would find a way to punish her if she
came home late.

It was a fine day, and the cobblestone streets were
crowded with sedan chairs and open carriages, horsemen and
pedestrians, costermongers and peddlers of all sorts. Those who
rode in carriages and chairs did not scruple to hold up traffic by
stopping to examine the goods or to make a purchase. But Sera
enjoyed the bustle, the color, and the variety.

The season was nearing its end, The country girls,
who had been selling rabbits four or five weeks earlier, were now
selling caged mockingbirds and goldfinches. Sera spotted an old man
selling the tiny wooden dolls in white dresses, which, adorned with
rosebuds and scarlet ribbons, would accompany the young girls of
Thornburg into church on the first day of Flowers, ten days hence.
Rose-Brides, these dolls were called.

Sera had no time to visit her godmother, Granny
Harefoot, as she had originally planned. Granny Harefoot sold
curios and other odd bric-a-brac in a little establishment three
doors down from Jenk’s bookshop; the old dwarf was a great friend
of Sera’s, being the only one of her thirteen godparents who took
the role seriously. And being also something of a force in the
neighborhood, she was an invaluable source of information
concerning the comings and goings, the doings and the general
well-being, of all her neighbors. Sera decided to postpone her
visit to the curio shop, but she did stop to buy buns and cider
cake from a street vendor in a calico apron. She did not like to
arrive at her grandfather’s empty-handed.

A long procession, apparently one of the guilds,
blocked her progress at Church Street. Sera was forced to wait,
with rising impatience, until after the parade passed. By that
time, the traffic was so dreadfully snarled, it seemed best to take
the long way around.

There will be no time for a
proper visit . . . Oh, dear, why did I leave so late? If I hadn’t
been there when Cousin Clothilde came in, I wouldn’t be in such a
dreadful hurry now.

She was walking on Dank Street, which was blessedly
empty, when a carriage pulled up beside her and a familiar voice
called out her name. “Good day, Miss Vorder. Out for a little
stroll, are we?”

Sera looked up to see Lord Krogan, an intimate of
Cousin Clothilde’s—a gentleman of that sly, insinuating sort which
Sera so particularly disliked. Yet there was no point in being rude
when the question had been civilly phrased.

“I am going to visit my grandfather, sir. He is
expecting me for tea.”

Lord Krogan flourished his whip. He was fat,
middle-aged, and (so Sera had been informed) as bald as an egg
under his wig, but he fancied himself both dashing and a sportsman,
dressing accordingly. “Perhaps you would care for a lift, Miss
Vorder. We appear to be heading in the same direction.”

Sera opened her mouth to decline, but then she
reconsidered. She was late—she was already growing tired—though she
disliked Lord Krogan too much to go driving with him under ordinary
circumstances, there could be no harm in accepting a ride in an
open carriage. “You are very kind. I would be very much
obliged.”

Lord Krogan stopped the carriage and leaned over to
offer her a damp hand up. Sera allowed him to assist her, then
settled down in the seat beside him, with her reticule and her bag
of buns and cider cake in her lap. She gave Lord Krogan the
direction of her grandfather’s bookshop and explained the shortest
way to get there.