The Story of Cirrus Flux Read online

“Your duties will be to clean the Crisis Room each morning before the clients arrive,” said Mr. Sorrel, taking short, shuffling steps ahead of her, “and to see to it that the Mesmerism Tub is filled daily with freshly magnetized water.” He stopped and eyed her up and down. “I hope you will be strong enough. The bottles are quite heavy and the last girl was not up to the task.”

  Pandora swallowed the lump of uneasiness in her throat and assured him that she was stronger than she looked.

  “Otherwise you are not to disturb Madame Orrery during her sessions,” said Mr. Sorrel. “Her patients are of a highly sensitive disposition and are easily unnerved.”

  They had arrived at a dingy corridor at the top of the house. Walking to the far end, they entered a shabby room with a sloping ceiling, a tiny grate and a bare bed.

  “This is where you are to sleep,” said Mr. Sorrel. “There are some bedclothes in the chest, should you require them, and some water in the jug. I shall expect you downstairs presently.”

  He closed the door behind him.

  Pandora stood in the middle of her room, uncertain whether to rejoice at having her own space or to cry at the dreariness of her surroundings. From her window in the girls’ dormitory, she’d had an almost unbroken view of fields, but here the only light coming in was from a solitary window, high in the wall, its glass curtained with grime.

  She pushed the chest up to the wall and stood on it so that she could see outside. An endless succession of rooftops and chimneys stretched away from her. Almost directly opposite was a small white church tower with the statue of a saint in knight’s armor on its ledge. He was piercing the belly of a dragon with a spear. His round shield glinted in the light and reflected what could be seen of the street below. She tried to open the window, but could only raise it an inch.

  Dispirited, she got down from the chest and decided to put away the clothes she had deposited on her bed. In addition to an extra pair of stockings, there were two white linen shifts, a handkerchief and a second dress trimmed with red ribbon—the foundling’s uniform.

  She picked them up and was about to place them in the chest, when something fluttered to the floor.

  A scrap of paper.

  Her heart lifted. Had Mr. Chalfont written her a letter? Excited, she unfolded the piece of paper, but was disappointed to find the word Instructions printed at the top in stern letters.

  YOU ARE PLACED OUT, APPRENTICE, BY THE GOVERNOR OF THIS HOSPITAL. YOU WERE TAKEN INTO IT VERY YOUNG, QUITE HELPLESS, FORSAKEN, POOR AND DESERTED. OUT OF CHARITY YOU HAVE BEEN FED, CLOTHED AND INSTRUCTED …

  The words started to blur and she skipped a few lines.

  YOU MAY FIND MANY TEMPTATIONS TO DO WICKEDLY, WHEN YOU ARE IN THE WORLD; BUT BY ALL MEANS FLY FROM THEM.…

  She glanced at the window, feeling like a bird trapped in its cage, and then, unable to contain herself any longer, flung herself on the bed in the corner and buried her face in a pillow that was soon damp from her tears.

  Mr. Leechcraft

  “Have you no sense, child? Come here!”

  Cirrus, fearing another haircut, dodged to the far side of the table and then ducked as Mrs. Kickshaw lunged toward him. Her hands clapped the air above his head and a shower of flour sieved harmlessly to the ground. Bottle Top nearly fell off his stool; he was beside himself with laughter. High, piggish squeals leaked out of him.

  “You can cease your jabbering, you foulmouthed monkey,” said Mrs. Kickshaw, who had scrubbed his cheeks so hard they shone. “Do not think I am unaware of your tricks. I can see the devil lurking in your eye!”

  She stooped to pick up some buns that had tumbled to the floor and scooped them into the folds of her skirt. As soon as her back was turned, Bottle Top tried to pinch another from a heap that was cooling on the table.

  Mrs. Kickshaw was too quick. She planted a vicious smack across his brow.

  “ ’Tain’t for the likes of ye,” she said. “They be for good children, who do as they’re told. Honestly, you’re each as bad as the other. I’ve never known two such lazy, gadabout boys in my life!”

  Despite her outburst, her face plumped into a smile and she turned her attention to the remaining mounds of dough on the table. She began pummeling them with her fists.

  “So what did you two boys discover in them fields today?” she said. “Anything of interest?”

  “A nest,” said Bottle Top. “In the Gallows Tree.” He caught Cirrus watching him from under the table and grinned. “There’s a bird made of fire in it.”

  “Is there now?” said Mrs. Kickshaw, only half listening. She flicked away a weevil that was crawling toward the mix.

  “And a gentleman, too,” said Bottle Top. “Cirrus says he’s been watching the hospital.”

  “What sort of gentleman?”

  “A highwayman,” said Bottle Top. “He was carrying a pistol!”

  Suddenly Mrs. Kickshaw reached down and grabbed Cirrus by the collar. She dragged him, squirming, to his feet. “Is this true?” she asked him, staring fiercely into his face.

  Cirrus struggled to free himself, but her grip was too strong. “We didn’t get close enough to see,” he said, standing on tiptoe and gasping for air. “He was holding something. Could’ve been a pistol.”

  Mrs. Kickshaw scowled, then released him. Her skin had been baked as brown as a piecrust from years of working in the kitchen, and her cheeks were burned to a crisp where the pox had scarred her.

  “If this be one of your tricks, meant to frighten the young ’uns,” she said, “I’ll box your backsides to kingdom come!”

  “No, mum,” said Cirrus quickly. “It’s the truth.”

  He glared at Bottle Top, who was munching on a bun, which he had successfully stolen from the table.

  Cirrus hated disappointing Mrs. Kickshaw. She was the closest thing he had to a mother. He had spent all of his early years under her wing and care. He loved the sights and smells of the kitchen: the way bread fattened in the oven, flies quarreled over the milk pails and currants littered the floor like mouse droppings.

  Mrs. Kickshaw frowned. “Well, just to be safe, you’re not to go larking about in them fields no more. Do ye hear? They’re dangerous! Why, only the other day there was a burglary at the Blue Lyon and Molly says that several sheets of linen have gone missing from the laundry.”

  A bell clattered against the wall and Cirrus looked up, grateful for the diversion. Bells were always ringing at the hospital—summoning them to prayers, calling them to lessons and chasing them off to bed. Bells seldom led to anything pleasant.

  Now was no exception.

  “That’ll be the Governor,” said Mrs. Kickshaw. “ ’E’s been expecting ye. Another master’s come to take one of ye boys away.”

  Bottle Top straightened.

  “A new master?” he said, brushing the crumbs from his jacket and running spit-polished hands through his hair. “Why didn’t you say?”

  “You wasn’t here to tell.”

  Cirrus felt his insides shrink. The last gentleman to visit them at the hospital had taken one look at his unruly hair, tidied especially for the occasion, and dabbed a scented handkerchief to his brow. “Why, sir, a wigmaker must have a graceful and comely appearance,” he’d appealed to Mr. Chalfont, who was in charge of the boys’ apprenticeship, “of which this boy lacks all but a … ah … are those devil’s horns, perchance, or hair?”

  Bottle Top had not fared much better. As soon as he had opened his mouth to speak, the visitor had backed away in disgust. “Whatever do you feed them here, sir?” he said, spying Bottle Top’s teeth. “Glass?” Eventually, Aaron had been apprenticed—and only then because his head had been shaved on account of nits.

  “Come along, Cirrus!” said Bottle Top, who was at the door, impatient to be off.

  But before Cirrus could get away Mrs. Kickshaw had screwed the hem of her apron into his ear and was scrubbing hard.

  “There, be off with ye now,” she said, dusting the flour from his curls. “Percha
nce, this time, you’ll be lucky.”

  She guided him to the door and pushed him after Bottle Top, who was already scuttling past the chapel on his way to the gallery, where new masters came to inspect potential charges.

  Cirrus took his time, trailing his fingers along the redbrick walls and twirling them round the newel of the giant staircase, which climbed all the way up to the dormitory at the top of the building. At last he came to the Weeping Room, where mothers waited for their babies to be examined for signs of sickness. Jonas had once told him that if you pressed your ear close enough to the door, you could still hear their ghostly wailings on the other side.

  “Ah, there you are,” said Mr. Chalfont, filling the opposite doorway with his ample frame. “Just the boy I was looking for.”

  He ushered Cirrus into a room full of oil paintings and curtained windows overlooking the fields at the back of the hospital. Eight boys had been arranged in single file on a rug before the fire, in descending order of height: from Jonas at one end to Bottle Top, wriggling and squirming, at the other. It was like a visit from the Bug Doctor—only, instead of the repellent figure of Mr. Mudgrave, whose blackened fingers inspected the boys each month for lice and nits, there stood a cadaverous gentleman in a purple frock coat with frilly cuffs. He was carrying an amber cane.

  Cirrus backed away, instantly taking a dislike to him, but bumped into Mr. Chalfont, who was standing like a father behind him. He clasped Cirrus by the shoulders and positioned him beside Jonas at the head of the line.

  “Now then, lads,” said the Governor. “Mr. Leechcraft is a gentleman of great learning, a natural philosopher who has traveled to the ends of this earth. He has seen things you can hardly imagine exist. And now he has come to select one of you fine boys as an assistant for his museum in Leicester Fields.”

  The boys shuffled uneasily and glanced at the impeccably groomed gentleman. Even more startling than his frock coat and frills was the savage necklace that circled his throat: a loop of shells, beads and bits of bone, plus some sharp incisors from an unknown species of animal.

  “Sharks’ teeth,” he said, answering the boys’ fascinated looks of horror. His face was long and thin, and crowned by a dark gray wig.

  Very slowly, he began to pace up and down the row of boys, swinging his amber cane. “I am looking,” he said in a reedy voice, “for a boy to shine like a star in my firmament. To be the attraction in my Hall of Wonders. He must be a child of rare courage, discipline and, above all, Virtue.”

  Something about the way he said this last word sent a shiver down the young boys’ necks.

  As if sensing this, he gravitated toward Cirrus and planted his fingers on the boy’s head. An odor like the Gallows Tree seemed to hover over him and Cirrus noticed tiny trails of dirt on his skin.

  Summoning all of his courage, Cirrus glanced up into the man’s face and said, “Begging your pardon, sir. What is a natural philosopher?”

  Mr. Leechcraft let out a hiss of irritation and leaned even closer, emitting a blast of bad breath. “A natural philosopher, boy,” he said, “seeks to understand how this great Universe of ours works. He studies the forces of nature and apprehends the laws of God.” A flash of arrogance lit up his eyes and his voice purred with pride. “It is not for feeble minds to grasp.”

  He released his grip on the boy’s head and continued his inspection of the other foundlings. Then, almost hungrily, he set his sights on Bottle Top, who was staring, transfixed, at the necklace.

  “Ah, such a seraphic child. Who could resist such a face?” he said. “This boy, what is his name?”

  “Abraham Browne, if it please you, sir,” said the Governor, leaping forward. “Though I do believe the other boys call him Bottle Top on account of his teeth.”

  “And would you say that this child is of high spirits?” asked the gentleman, extending a finger to stroke the boy’s cheek, which still shone from Mrs. Kickshaw’s aggressive treatment.

  “The highest, sir,” said Mr. Chalfont. “Why, Bottle Top—Abraham, I mean—is always climbing things. The trees in the garden, the stalls of the chapel. He has even been known to slide down the banister of the great wooden staircase.”

  Bottle Top’s mouth cracked into a grin.

  “Though, regrettably for his teeth, he fell off,” added Mr. Chalfont, hastily closing the boy’s lips.

  If anything, Mr. Leechcraft seemed even more pleased by this information. “A brave boy, a daring boy,” he said. “Not afraid of a little discomfort.” He studied Bottle Top more closely. “His teeth, of course, can be replaced. There is just one thing more I need to consider. His Virtue.”

  Conjuring a pair of silk gloves from his frock-coat pocket, the man slid them over his hands and began rubbing his cane quite vigorously, until it gleamed in the firelight. Then, with a flourish, he raised it above the boy’s head.

  The most amazing thing happened. Bottle Top’s flyaway blond hair floated straight into the air, as if alive. Thin tendrils curled round the rod and made a faint crackling noise as Mr. Leechcraft brushed it back and forth between the grasping hairs. The other boys watched, astonished.

  Mr. Chalfont was not so delighted. “Mr. Leechcraft, I do protest, sir! Whatever are you doing to this poor boy?”

  “I am merely determining the quality of his Virtue,” said the gentleman. “All of God’s creatures are invested with a quantity of Aether, which escapes from their bodies in the form of electrics. Or, as I prefer to call it, Virtue. It is quite painless, I assure you.”

  Mr. Chalfont’s face was a picture of concern. He knelt down and examined the boy minutely. “Abraham, are you hurt? Speak to me, child!”

  Bottle Top tried unsuccessfully not to giggle. “It tickles, sir,” he said, jogging from one foot to the other. “It feels like there’s a spider dancing in my hair.”

  Mr. Leechcraft’s smile widened into a grin. “Splendid!” he said. “This boy will do nicely, Mr. Chalfont. I have made my choice.”

  Cirrus felt a knife twist in his stomach. He had seen many boys come and go during his time at the hospital, but he had never expected Bottle Top to be among them. He had always imagined they would be apprenticed together. What would become of their plans?

  He watched helplessly now as Mr. Chalfont beamed into the startled boy’s face.

  “Well then, Abraham. It appears you have a new calling,” said the Governor. “A fresh start in life. You must do everything Mr. Leechcraft asks of you, do you understand? You must serve him well.”

  Bottle Top glanced uneasily at Cirrus and then nodded his head, too dumbfounded to speak.

  “A child who can keep his counsel,” said Mr. Leechcraft. “Even better.”

  He played the puppeteer for a moment longer and then whisked the rod away and tapped it once on the ground to break the spell. Bottle Top’s hair fell back into place, though even messier than before.

  Mr. Chalfont dismissed the other boys, who gloomily dispersed to their lessons, and then led Mr. Leechcraft, with Bottle Top in tow, to the adjoining study to prepare the necessary paperwork.

  Cirrus stumbled to a hard wooden bench outside the Weeping Room and sat down, feeling numb and dizzy. Bottle Top was his only friend, the one always leading him on larks and adventures. How was he going to cope without him?

  “Looks like it’s just you and me, Flux,” said Jonas, strolling past. “The oldest ones left.”

  Cirrus kept his head down, trying to ignore the sick feeling spreading inside him.

  Shortly afterward, Bottle Top rushed up to him. “Mr. Leechcraft says he’s going to buy me a brand-new set of teeth,” he said, his face shining with excitement. “And some fancier clothes, too!”

  Cirrus tried to imitate a smile, but his heart wasn’t in it. He wondered how Bottle Top could sound so eager to get away. What would happen to their friendship? He was about to say something when he became aware of the dark-wigged gentleman advancing toward them.

  “Come along, you,” spat Bottle Top’s new mas
ter. “We have important work to do. You’re going to make my reputation.”

  He led the boy down the steps to the front of the hospital. Cirrus followed, a safe distance behind, watching as the man’s grip on the boy’s shoulder grew tighter the nearer they came to the outside world. And then, before Cirrus could say goodbye, he saw his friend disappear into a plain black carriage and drive off toward the city.

  Cirrus turned and ran back to the kitchen, alone.

  “A quack, if you ask me,” said Mrs. Kickshaw once he had told her everything that had happened. “I’ve heard of his kind before. No better than a charlatan, a rogue! Pshaw!” She spat into the fire. “The Governor ought to know better than apprenticing young boys to scoundrels!”

  She caught the worried look crumpling Cirrus’s brow and pulled him into an embrace—so tight Cirrus could smell the overpowering stench of her yeasty brown apron. “Now, don’t ye worry about Abraham,” she said, rocking him back and forth. “He’ll find his own way in the world, I promise.”

  “And what about me?” he asked weakly.

  She looked down at him and smiled. “There now,” she said, mopping away the tears that had sneaked into his eyes. “Your day will come, too, Cirrus. Your day will come. Someone will come looking for ye, too.”

  The boat drifts up to the stairs off Strand Lane and two men disembark. One is dressed in a dark blue naval uniform, which fits him snugly round the chest; the other is clad in a heavier fearnought jacket. Above them rises the massive edifice of the Guild of Empirical Science: a crown of architecture on the shore of the Thames, its hundred or more windows lit up against the night by a galaxy of candles.

  They each press a coin into the outstretched hand of the ferryman, who stands at the prow, and then hurry up the stone steps, away from the river. They pass through a dim passageway into a cobbled courtyard and from there enter the Guild: an enormous hall lined with columns and marble busts. Blank-eyed visionaries stare down at them from their plinths along the walls.

  The two men pay little attention to their grand surroundings, but follow a footman up a wide staircase to the top of the building, where an impressive doorway stands before them. The doors are made of ancient oak, and a godly hand can be seen emerging from a bank of clouds carved into the center of each panel. A Latin motto runs along the top: Ligatur mundus arcanis nodis—“The world is bound by secret knots.”