you speak of it?”
“I wish we had. I would have liked a friend who understood. A colleague to share with.”
Annis sighed. “So many secrets. It’s sad.”
“You’re right. Secrets are kept because people—men in particular, but women, too—are quick to judge. To condemn.” Harriet lifted her amulet from around her neck and settled it against the candle. “Frightened people are dangerous.”
Annis took off her moonstone and set it opposite the ametrine, with the candle between them. It made a pretty tableau, the yellow-and-violet ametrine in its puddle of silver chain, the creamy moonstone surrounded by pearls, the white candle in the center. It looked as innocent as a decorative display in a curio cabinet, but she could imagine that someone observing what she and Harriet did, seeing the effect they were about to create, might be frightened by it. It was a shame. How many people denied their ability out of fear? How much magic was wasted?
She reflected, as she and Harriet began their rite, that Frances would never again do this. She would never again employ her knowledge or her ability to affect events or manipulate people, for good or ill. Frances’s power—Frances’s magic—was gone forever.
38
Harriet
With a freshly concocted and magicked salve in a tiny jar in Annis’s pocket, Harriet and Annis rode in a hired carriage to the commercial stable on Third Avenue and Twenty-Fourth Street. The Herald had reported that one Mr. Albert Neufeld had added Black Satin to his breeding stock. Sally wasn’t important enough to warrant a mention in the newspaper report, but they hoped to find out something about her when they arrived.
They had chosen their clothes deliberately. Annis wore her most expensive suit, cream linen with a peach-colored vest, a jacket embroidered in peach thread, and an elaborate hat with a peach-colored feather. She appeared the very picture of a wealthy young socialite. Harriet wore a walking dress in a summer print, clearly not new, with a modest straw hat.
Mr. Neufeld was the proprietor of a hired-carriage business, with an office adjacent to his stables. He clearly assumed, as they were ushered by his clerk into his private office, that Harriet was Miss Allington’s chaperone, and that the daughter of the owner of the Allington Iron Stove Company had come to rent a carriage.
He bowed to Annis and nodded to Harriet. “Miss Allington,” he said, actually rubbing his plump hands together. “A pleasure to meet you, after my happy association with your father. How can I help you? A landau? A brougham, perhaps, and a pair? I understand you have a grand wedding coming up!”
Annis curtsied prettily. “Thank you, Mr. Neufeld,” she said, skirting the issue of her wedding. “I’ve learned you bought my horse while I was abroad. I long to see him one more time, and I thought—I hoped—you might be kind enough to let me visit his stall.”
“Well!” This request evidently startled Mr. Neufeld, and the eager expression on his round face sagged into one of bewilderment. “Well, Miss Allington, of course I—I mean, the black is a stallion, and I’m not sure a young lady—”
“I do realize it’s unusual, Mr. Neufeld,” Annis said, with impressive smoothness. Her upbringing, Harriet could see, had prepared her for dealing with tradespeople. “It’s just that since I gave up riding my dear little pony, Sally—”
“I have your pony, Miss Allington!” Neufeld exclaimed, with an air of relief. “Her stall is just up on the second floor. Would you like to see her? I’ve already rented her out for two birthday parties, and all the children found her most amenable.”
“Of course, I would love to see Sally,” Annis said. “But, Mr. Neufeld, truly—I’ve been riding Black Satin for three years, almost every day. He knows me well, and he’s no danger to me. I promise you it’s perfectly safe for me to say hello, stroke him a bit. I just—I do so long to see him one more time!”
It was clear Neufeld was still uncomfortable, but after a few more exchanges, during which Annis became more and more tremulous, and Neufeld’s thick features drooped in confusion, they were on their way, up a cleated wooden ramp to the third floor of the stables. Neufeld stood close to the gate as Annis approached the stall, adopting a protective stance, as if he was afraid the horse might try to break free.
Tears glimmered in Annis’s eyes as she stepped forward, holding out her gloved hands to the horse. Black Satin threw up his head and whickered, and