for boarding school when I was eight and stayed for university. I only came home for holidays, so they barely saw me for nearly ten years. Lily was the one who would have noticed a difference, but she died while I was gone. After her death, I’m not sure Robert would have noticed if I’d returned acting like a circus clown. The children were too young to remember me from before.”
“Why bugs?”
“I’d always been interested in them. I’m not saying that if I had my choice of careers, I would have studied bugs, but I like them well enough that it wasn’t too painful to spend so much time talking about them. The charade was easier before Robert died. Then I only had to play the obsessed amateur scientist in public. When I moved in with the children, in a house full of staff, I had to begin living the lie.”
He saw a police carriage ahead and turned the corner. “We’re getting close now, aren’t we?”
“You know the old theater on Eighth, just east of Broadway?”
“That’s it? You’re sure?”
“I’ve been there several times.”
He gave me a sidelong glance, then said, “Your charity project a couple of weeks ago—you were on the Battery when the troops fired on the children, weren’t you? That was why you were so shaken when you got home.” It was a statement of fact, not a question.
I nodded, even though he was focused on the road and wouldn’t see. “Yes. We were acting on information I overheard when I was at the governor’s house for that dinner party. The rebels decided to counteract the governor’s show of force and prevent a confrontation by having children there. I don’t think anyone counted on the soldiers being so spooked that they’d fire on the children.”
“That was what made the difference,” he said softly. “I’d been playing at revolution before, paying lip service to the cause. But that changed things. I don’t want my brother’s children growing up in a world where that could happen.”
“You almost got caught last weekend, though.”
“We got reckless, and one of my friends paid the price. We’re having to rethink our strategy now that the authorites know magisters might be involved.” With a shaky smile, he added, “And you withheld information from the authorities for me.” He stopped the roadster on the side of a residential street. After a long, serious look at me, he said, “To be honest, I initially hired you because I thought it wise to keep you under my power. You’d be dependent on me for a job and think twice about turning me in if you did figure it out.”
“You were right.”
He smiled again. “But I also liked your spirit. You were the first person to fight back, in all the robberies we’d done. I had no idea how wise a decision hiring you would turn out to be.”
He got out of the roadster and came around to my side to help me out. “I doubt we can get much farther on the road. The barricades will be much tighter. We’ll have to figure out a way to get there on foot.”
“Leave that to me,” I said, taking his hand to lead him. We reached Fourteenth Street and crossed it, then I looked for a familiar door and hoped it would be unlocked. If it wasn’t, I had plenty of hairpins. But it opened, and we made our way through the basement, which was even darker at night—that is, until Henry lit our way magically. He doused his light when we reached the yard. The next door wasn’t locked, either, and soon we were within the rebels’ zone.
There were sounds of fighting and the flicker of flames in the distance, closer to the university, but this area seemed to be relatively peaceful. Then we rounded a corner and saw a group of British soldiers approaching. Henry pulled me into a doorway, where we hid in the shadows as the soldiers banged on a door across the street and shouted. When there was no response, they kicked the door in and rushed inside. While they were in the building, we left our hiding place and ran. We saw several more groups of soldiers making a systematic search of the area. They were coming uncomfortably close to the theater.
When we reached the theater, I knew I’d never get Henry past the lookouts at the main entrance. Instead, I led him around the building, looking for the alley where Alec and I