The Derring-Do Club and the Year of the Chrononauts (25 page)

“Waterloo,” McKendry explained. “The Club famously won more medals than the Diogenes. They have a Nelson Room. We’re not so good on water.”

They settled: Earnestine sat with her hands neatly in her lap, Georgina was concerned about her sister, and Charlotte fidgeted.

“I have some news,” said Earnestine.

Caruthers nodded.

“It appears… that is to say… I am… I will become: Mrs Frasier.”

Caruthers let out a breath and fell back in his chair.

“Well, I’ll be…” said McKendry as he tugged on his chin puff beard.

“I suspected as much,” Caruthers said, recovering. “Mrs Frasier herself let something slip, you could see she feared she had, and she knows too much about us all. There’s been a rumour circulating. I don’t know where it started.”

Earnestine was shocked: “A rumour!”

“It was in the Standard,” McKendry added.

“Not the Times?”

“Perhaps the evening edition.”

“Then we are inextricably linked with all this,” Earnestine said. “I find myself at odds with the situation.”

“Mrs Frasier said you’d come round eventually.”

The silence that followed was palpable. No–one really knew what they were supposed to do, as if the other side in the game, if it was the other side, was allowed to dictate their moves and change the rules.

Charlotte broke the silence: “Do you know–”

Georgina hit her sharply across the arm, then said, “We’re worried about Uncle Jeremiah, Doctor Deering.”

Caruthers looked to McKendry.

“He was arrested last week,” McKendry added.

“In front of us,” Georgina added. “In Magdalene Chase by Mrs Frasier herself.”

“By…” Caruthers glanced at Earnestine and then nodded. “Who else has been arrested?”

McKendry took a sheet of paper from his jacket pocket and unfolded it.

“Colonel Jefferies, Lord Stockton, the Right Honourable James Foxley–”

Charlotte sniggered.

“…Doctor Deering, Chief Constable Rodman, Mister Mellers, our own Mister Boothroyd–”

“Poor Mister Boothroyd,” Earnestine said. “I met him in the future.”

“How was he?” Caruthers asked.

“Much older, repentant, and pleased to see me.”

“Older?”

“He’d been there for ten years at least.”

Caruthers brushed down his moustache as he reflected on this: “Not the same time in the future every journey then?”

“No.”

“Mac?”

“There are a few others,” McKendry finished.

“And the pattern?” Caruthers asked.

“They are all important, not high ranking exactly, and they are all supposedly involved in this conspiracy. We can’t see how.”

“Because there isn’t a how,” Earnestine said. “They aren’t involved yet.”

“You sound like Mrs Frasier,” said Caruthers, and then when he saw Earnestine’s expression, he added: “No offence.”

“And this conspiracy will destroy the world?” Georgina said.

“That’s the one,” McKendry confirmed.

“I’ve had those pictures developed,” said Caruthers. He reached into his inside jacket pocket and produced some daguerreotype prints. He handed them around, and Georgina had to wait patiently until Earnestine had seen them.

Charlotte reached out, desperate to see for herself, but Earnestine gave them to Georgina next.

There were images of a street quite unlike anything she had seen before, and then one of Earnestine standing in the foreground which gave the scene a sense of scale. She could see the Houses of Parliament in the far distance. The next one had Earnestine standing next to Mrs Frasier. They did look alike, so very alike, and yet Georgina could not reconcile their characters.

“So we’re right to support this Chronological Committee,” said Georgina. “Don’t snatch.”

“My turn,” said Charlotte.

“That’s the kit and caboodle of it,” said McKendry. “Our hands are tied by destiny.”

“Particularly as Miss Deering–Dolittle will end up in charge of it,” Caruthers said.

There was another longer pause.

“There’s nothing to be done then,” Earnestine said.

“We can find Uncle Jeremiah and defend him,” Georgina said. “At least mitigating circumstances.”

Caruthers nodded.

A cry sounded from the doorway: “There she is!”

A man dressed in formal evening attire with his bow tie awry and his white silk scarf in disarray, strode forward. He was flanked by another man in a frock coat,

Caruthers stood and faced the newcomer: “Foxley… Schofield, I know Club rules and all that, but I couldn’t leave them in the Ladies Drawing Room, it’s not decent. And anyway, Mrs Frasier says that suffrage and all that, and it’s retroactive, so we should perhaps move with the times and allow Ladies into some of the other rooms.”

“My brother was arrested by that creature.”

“I don’t know anything about it,” Earnestine replied.

Foxley’s face twisted and his tone was sarcastic: “Ignorance is no excuse.”

“Your brother?”

“Yes, the Right Honourable James Foxley, MP.”

“Oh, the man I saw at the brothel,” said Charlotte.

“That’s a damn slander!” the man spat, dribbling. “My brother is a paragon of virtue. He always supported bills in the house that promote family values.”

Caruthers tried to step between them: “Foxley, perhaps when you’ve sobered–”

“Go to hell!”

The man, Foxley, lurched over to the other, Schofield, grabbed something off him, and then Foxley came to Earnestine. She stood her ground as the man threw a glove into her face. It rebounded and flopped onto the floor.

“You are a monster!” Foxley shouted. “I challenge you!”

“I say,” said Captain Caruthers, “steady on. You can’t challenge a lady, it’s simply not cricket.”

“Ha! That’s where you are wrong. Mrs Frasier made it legal,” said Foxley. He changed his voice, twisting it to imitate Caruthers’ clipped accent. “Suffrage and all that, and it’s retroactive, so we should perhaps move with the times.”

He went to the wall and extricated two cutlasses from the display. He handed them to Schofield, who weighed them and then brought them over.

“Doesn’t the challenged party choose the type of weapon?” Charlotte said, helpfully.

“What would you like?” Schofield asked.

“Hockey sticks,” Earnestine suggested.

“Oh, be serious,” Foxley said.

“They can be jolly vicious,” Charlotte said.

“We can’t do this with the child here,” said McKendry.

“Quite right,” said Caruthers.

“Then get her out!” Foxley screamed.

“Charlotte,” said Earnestine, “I think–”

“Oh, but–”

“Don’t whine.”

“I could be your second.”

Earnestine picked a sword, experimenting with the grip. Schofield returned the other to Foxley, who lashed out, slicing the air angrily.

“Miss?” said Caruthers to Charlotte indicating the door.

“Oh, this is so unfair,” said Charlotte. She stamped her foot.

“Lottie,” said Earnestine, firmly.

“Edgar,” said Charlotte.

“I beg your pardon,” said Earnestine, “but who?”

“The…” Charlotte lowered her voice to a whisper. “Duelling machine.”

“Oh, that. Why is it called Edgar?”

“After Uncle… never mind,” Charlotte glanced at McKendry as he gently took hold of her arm and moved her towards the exit. “It’s not cricket.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“Men: they play cricket,” said Charlotte, “it’s all sportsmanship and gentlemanly behaviour. Duelling is like that.”

“I suppose.”

“Girls play hockey,” said Charlotte, and she winked at Earnestine in an overly obvious manner.

Finally, McKendry moved Charlotte out of the Wellington Room and into the corridor beyond: “Just stay there, please,” he said.

Foxley pointed at Georgina: “And the other one!”

“She’s my second,” said Earnestine.

“I’d rather… may I have your handkerchiefs please,” said Georgina, and she went to Caruthers and McKendry for their clean spares. “For the… blood.”

For Georgina, this was suddenly real, and the act of gathering materials to staunch blood brought it home to her. Earnestine was going to let her pride get her chopped up by this inebriated blackguard.

It shouldn’t be allowed: fighting women was clearly suffrage gone mad.

She went over to Earnestine and whispered: “Ness, don’t do this!”

“I must.”

“What did Charlotte mean about cricket and hockey?”

“She’s been practising on the Duelling Machine.”

“Duelling Machine?” said Georgina. “Oh, at the Patent Pending Office. She called it Edgar after Uncle Edgar, because it wobbled.”

Foxley, Georgina decided, didn’t look like Uncle Edgar or a Duelling Machine. Any contraption would be a cuddly child’s doll in comparison to this obvious bounder. Although he looked drunk and smelt of brandy, he was agile on his feet, unlike the real Uncle Edgar. It was obvious from his movements that Foxley was practised in the art of fencing.

“Oh, cricket! Playing by the rules, of course.”

“What?” Georgina asked urgently.

“I did learn one trick from the Duelling Machine.”

“Which is?”

“Ready?” Schofield asked.

“I need a second,” Earnestine replied.

The man shrugged: “Take as long as you like, a minute, two even – let’s just get on with it.”

“No, I meant a person to assist me. Captain Caruthers,” Earnestine said. “Would you mind awfully?”

“Not at all, Miss Deering–Dolittle,” Caruthers said. “I could get the Duty Porter.”

“Oh shut up, Caruthers,” Foxley said, spitting, as he brought his cutlass up to the ready position. “En garde!”

“En garde,” Earnestine replied, gingerly bringing the blade closer to her nose.

She bowed and, when the man followed suit, she stabbed forward, straight, like one does when one is skewering beef steak and the man jerked back, wrenching the sword from her grip. It vibrated side to side, stuck as it was in his chest.

He stared down, surprised, at the growing red stain that seeped angrily across his starched white shirt front, before his eyes turned as if he were trying to see the inside of his skull and then he toppled backwards like a felled tree. His cutlass clattered from his grasp to skitter across the marble floor.

“I say,” said Caruthers, “you can see why we’re not allowed to fight the weaker sex.”

“Yes,” McKendry agreed. “We wouldn’t stand a chance.”

“Excuse me!” said Schofield: “That wasn’t a legal move.”

“Oh,” said Earnestine, her voice soft, her eyes wide with innocence and her demeanour positively exuding the sense that butter wouldn’t melt in her mouth. “Is there something you forgot to explain to me?”

Schofield’s face muscles tensed: “Yes, there is.”

“Oh?”

“You are supposed to raise your sword thus!” Schofield brought his pointed finger in front of him like an angry teacher. “Swipe it to one side, and then fight.”

“Oh, silly me.”

“Silly–”

“Thank you for letting me know,” said Earnestine. “It won’t happen again.”

“It won’t– but… he’s dead now.”

“Yes, and a good job he’s not on any carpet. Blood is awfully tricky to scrub out.”

Caruthers coughed: “I think honour has been satisfied.”

Earnestine could see the Captain’s eyes twinkling with the effort of trying to keep a straight face.

Georgina was horrified: a man was dead and they, including her sister, were practically joking about it. She saw a side of Earnestine she didn’t like, a side that would become manifest when she turned into Mrs Frasier.

“Honour has not been satisfied,” Schofield insisted. “The Earl will want to… well, that is to say…”

“Perhaps next time he’ll pick on someone his own size, or at least over six foot, rather than on some slip of a young lady who’s only five foot eight,” Caruthers pointed out.

“Next time!? But he’s dead.”

“He was an Earl?” Earnestine asked.

“Was? Yes. I suppose his brother is the Earl now.”

“He’ll be pleased,” said Caruthers.

“Except that he’s been arrested and taken to the future,” said Schofield. “By her!”

McKendry coughed and shuffled forward to Schofield, taking him to one side in a conspiratorial way.

“I think we ought not to mention this,” he said.

“Why ever not?” Schofield demanded.

“There are plenty of witnesses to the late Earl’s rather unsporting behaviour. Fighting young ladies, not exactly on, is it?”

“She proved herself quite capable.”

“I’m sure the Earl wouldn’t want it known that he fought a young lady
and lost
.”

Schofield considered the dead body and Earnestine, and then he nodded.

“Best inform the Duty Porter,” McKendry said.

“Who’s the Duty Porter?” Schofield asked.

“Ted. There will be something in the rule book to cover this.”

Schofield nodded and left.

Georgina returned the handkerchiefs to Caruthers and McKendry, glaring at them to express her disapproval.

“We’re going to have to keep you all away from the public,” said Caruthers, folding his handkerchief back into his pocket. “What with tempers already inflamed, when this gets out…”

“If?” said McKendry.

“If, yes. We must keep our heads about us,” said Caruthers. “But things are getting out all the time.”

“Almost as if it’s orchestrated,” said McKendry.

“Where shall we take you?” said Captain Caruthers. “Will Kensington still be safe?”

Miss Charlotte

It was jolly tedious and unfair of Earnestine and Georgina – why should they have all the fun? She’d been sent out like a naughty schoolgirl. And she hadn’t done anything wrong this time. It would be lines next. She waited in the corridor as she’d been told for an absolute age and then she went to have a little look around.

The first room she came across was full of old men sitting around in comfortable armchairs reading boring papers and drinking port. When one of them, and then all of them, realised she was there, their faces became jolly comical as they tried to reconcile their outrage at the feminine incursion and the rule of absolute silence.

She went up to the bar.

“Excuse me,” she said. Her voice carried like a tornado, wrenching items from gentlemen’s hands and dashing them to the floor. “Could I have a lemonade, please?”