Of Mist and Mirrors

by Rebecca Connolly

“Have you been to Paris recently, Madame?”

“Do you prefer to converse in French rather than in English?” Galveston asked as the dance began, taking the few skipping steps towards her.

“Would you live in France if you could?” she ventured to ask as they walked in line with the other couples. “Yes,” he replied without any hesitation. "I wouldn't be in England at all if I didn't have to be there."

"No sir. My husband and I feel the same way you do

The only question now would be if she and Griff escaped for their exploration of the archive room before supper or after. Splitting the evening between both missions was not ideal for either of them, but there were little other options, considering the guests in question and their own host.

“Hang on these walls”

He folded his arms, his smile going shamelessly crooked. “I’ll test the armor theory, if you like. For the sake of being thorough.” “Must you always play the rake?” She kicked her skirts moodily.

Once completely out of view of those in the ballroom, they moved quickly, Minerva hiking her own skirts above her ankles and rushing through the corridors towards the archive room.

Minerva’s petticoat satchels had proven invaluable as a means of transportation for what had been located,

Could she separate his mission from hers while she worked, or were they combining into some greater conspiracy in her more wayward thoughts, as his thoughts were?

He wanted to unearth everything that made Minerva who she was and have every one of her secrets laid bare. He wanted… He wanted to tell her everything about himself and his life, his missions, his fears, his thoughts. He had never wanted to be known by another living soul, but suddenly he wanted that with Minerva.

Why wasn’t he an ordinary man who could afford to spend time dwelling on such a woman and such a simple thing as finding himself attracted to her?

“Do you think Martin is really missing?” Minerva asked in a very low voice, as though she was concerned about being overheard. Griff leaned back on his hands, looking at her intently. “What makes you think he isn’t?” She shrugged. “Missing people have a trail, don’t they? They aren’t meant to disappear completely, in record and in life. It all seems rather intentional.” “It does, doesn’t it?”

No current missions of the League had been compromised, no intelligence missing.” “Current,” Minerva interrupted softly. “What about previous missions?” Griff gave her a crooked smile, laughing softly to himself. “I asked the same question.” “And?” He shook his head. “The only thing that could even possibly have been missing, according to them, was a few of the old Hawks Company missions.” Minerva’s brow cleared in surprise. “The Hawks? But that’s practically ancient now. What use could any of those be to them?” “Those are the missions that Trace himself admitted to confessing details about when he was imprisoned by the pirates,”

“He has all the subtlety of a bull. It feels planted, which is why I am looking at Chorlton and Miss Pryce. Less clumsy and more intense. I think Galveston might be their more recently arrived French associate, while they are British recruits.”

Even so, Partlowe had told Griff that he had been the only last-moment addition to the group. Everyone else had sent their acceptance days before the event.

What if there is a connection between Martin and the Faction, and they are looking for the same proof?” She immediately scrambled from her curled position to sitting on her heels, her jaw tight. “To obtain it for themselves? Or to destroy it?” “Either,” Griff barked, running a hand through his hair. “What if we are all looking for the same thing here?” Minerva shook her head, gaping at the thought. “We have to check, Griff.” She scooted closer and put a hand on his arm, gripping hard. “We have to know. If they are looking for him as well, or information about him, the investigation becomes that much more dangerous and important.” “I know.”

They would come to the corridor of the archive room at the next corner, and there was no telling what they would find.

But one female servant? He could threaten her, and you could identify him secretly. Did you?” Griff nodded, his eyes tracing every single aspect of her face for sheer memorization. “Chorlton.”

Minerva looked a trifle surprised. “All right… Shall we tidy up, then?” Griff shook his head. “Not yet. I need to hold my wife a little longer and absorb her calming influence.” She snorted and laid her cheek against his chest. “Partner,” she corrected. “Whatever,” he replied, curling his arms more securely around her. “Whoever she is, I feel better with her in my arms.

“All right, fine. I’ve asked Sketch and Sphinx call upon us to discuss what we’ve found and their insights for us moving forward.”

but no partner enjoyed being forced to witness without acting.

Of that, Minerva had no doubt. She had sat with Hal, code named Sketch, upon her return from Paris, and she had been shocked to hear that the operatives, who could not have been more different, had chosen to remain married in actuality. Somehow, amid the stresses and strife of the mission, they had found love and affection beyond the partnership.

And for Sphinx, arguably the most reserved man Minerva had ever met, to find the fiery and independent Hal his perfect match…

“Are you both aware of our missions?” Sphinx nodded, flicking his fingers in Griff’s direction. “Mist gave us a quick overview before you came down. You are looking for some of the Faction sympathizers or associates based on the information we uncovered in Paris, if not some of the actual people we encountered. Mist is looking for the missing London League clerk.”

“Well, well,” Hal murmured as she finished, looking at the sketch as a whole. “I do believe we have now seen Monsieur Degarmo on British soil.”

enough did that it was unlikely Chorlton and Pryce were known in the ranks.

And if Minerva needed to feel any worse, she caught a faint hiss from Sphinx when she said she had signaled for Griff to stay back even with a pistol to her head. Thankfully, Hal had no reaction to the sequence of events.

“Well, this document is a forgery, for one thing.” The room went utterly silent as all eyes turned to Hal, holding one of the records in hand.

“I’ve seen dozens of military records,” Hal informed them as she finally raised her eyes to them all. “All sorts of forms. This one, the discharge report? The formatting is wrong, and the order of personal details is incorrect.

“He got his assignment in the Foreign Office based on that,” Griff murmured, eyes wide. “He had been supported through schooling by the Foreign Office to become an operative, but they wanted him to pursue military action beforehand. You are telling me that this is not his report?” Hal shook her head. “It is not. I can say with absolute certainty that whatever Mr. Martin did in the military, this is not it.”

Hal slowly shook her head. “This is legitimate. We can certainly say that Mr. Martin did enlist in the military and was first sent to join the regiment at Maidstone. But we can safely say that these are not his discharge papers.”

He joined her, taking up her arrangement of Eton and Oxford to one side and military on the other. “I’ll take schooling,” Minerva said, shoving the military ones towards him. “You take the regiment.”

“I see the trend in his studies that attracted the Shopkeepers, which makes me wonder who their asset in the education ranks is, but beyond that, he is the most unremarkable student.

He was injured in a skirmish in September of nineteen. He joined the Foreign Office in eighteen twenty, but there was no mention of a fault to his gait or his bearing.”

“Aylesford? That’s not exactly known for its recuperative settlements, is it? Surely the doctors would have kept him in Maidstone for recovery, so his commanding officers might be better informed of his progress.”

Strangely, it seems that he disappeared some days later. Simply vanished from his cot.” “What?” Minerva sat up sharply, her eyes going wide. “Disappeared? How did they lose a patient?”

Did he ever return to his regiment?” Griff rifled through the remaining pages, his eyes darting across words for the particular ones he sought. “No, not that I can tell. And yet, in here, it says that they received notation of his discharge with the proper paperwork in London.” “And they accepted that?” Minerva cried. “How could he be discharged from his regiment if his regiment did not sign the paperwork? And after being labeled a deserter?”

“Discharge papers,” Griff announced as he reentered, holding the pages aloft briefly. “Which we now know to be a forgery. His reason for discharge is injury, though it does say wholly recovered. And the signature of the authority figure is illegible, naturally.” “How could they not question an illegible signature?” Minerva demanded. “That would be…” She trailed off and looked at Griff closely. “Could it pass as being Palmerston?”

Forged documents of discharge, his reputation was in question before that due to suspected desertion, which was out of character, being sent away from the regiment to heal from his injury—against wisdom…”

“Stocky sort. Decent size, and he would have filled out the uniform nicely. Average height.” It was a strange experience to have a realization steal his breath from his lungs, rather as though the organs themselves had been removed from his chest and only a quivering emptiness remained. And yet, there was, with the emptiness, a shrieking new awareness of his limbs in illuminating aspects. All from seemingly insignificant information suddenly becoming connected into a larger puzzle and bringing the answers alive. “Martin has always been described as gangly,” Griff said, his voice almost a whisper. “From the moment he was discharged and returned to his family and his work with the Foreign Office. He was gangly and ill-suited to the uniform, according to an eyewitness.

“Here. Are these numbers possible when compared with those numbers?” She took the paper and compared the two, shaking her head almost at once. “No. Not unless he had experienced a significant period of dramatically ill health, which would have raised questions at his discharge.

So our Charles Martin, the one we seek, is no Charles Martin at all. The real Charles Martin is probably dead, killed for his identity, buried in unconsecrated ground somewhere between Aylesford and London years ago. Our clerk must have looked enough like Charles Martin to pass for him, even within family,

“If the real Charles Martin is dead, and the Charles Martin you’ve been investigating is not him… Griff, that means that we know nothing about him. We know he is a fraud. We know he was likely not abducted but left for his own nefarious reasons. But we know nothing about him.”

Where do we begin to look if we have no idea where we ought to look?”

“You’d be surprised what the lower orders can remember when they wish to,” she said, almost to herself.

He was a man of fortune and status, but he was also a man who was not defined by those things.

Even when you are not in character, you have that barrier up between you and the world.

Even the you that I know is a version of yourself rather than the truth of yourself.”

I was absolutely certain that you were the most perfect woman God had ever placed upon this Earth and felt particularly blessed to have crossed your path in such a grand collision of a course.”