looks empty,” she muttered to the dictaphone. “Forward ho.” She walked around to the front of the house, where the snow was banked in deep drifts before the doors and blank-eyed wooden window shutters. Nobody had been in or out for days, that much was clear. There was a short uphill driveway leading to a road, imposing iron gates chained in front. “Damn. How do I get out?” She glanced round, saw a plaque on the front of the house—BLACKSTONES, 1923. A narrow wooden gate next to the pillar supporting one of the cast-iron gates was bolted on the inside. Miriam waded toward it, shivering from the snow, shot the bolt back, and glanced round one final time to look at the house.
It was big . Not as big as the palace in Niejwein, or Angbard’s fortress, but bigger than anything she’d ever lived in. And it was clearly mewed up, shutters nailed across those windows that weren’t boarded, gates chained tight. She grinned, gritting her teeth against the cold. “Right, you’re mine.” Then she slipped through the wooden door and onto the sidewalk. The street here was partially swept. On the other side of it lay an open field in the middle of what was dense forest in world one and downtown Cambridge in world two. She could see other big town houses on the other side of the field, but that didn’t matter. She turned left and began walking toward the crossroads she could see at the far corner of the quadrangle.
Her teeth were chattering by the time she reached the clock tower on the strange traffic circle at the crossroads. There was almost no traffic on this bitterly cold morning. A lone pony-trap clattered past her, but the only vehicles she saw out and about were strange two-deck streetcars, pantographs sparking occasionally as they whirred down the far side of the field and paused at a stand in the middle of the traffic circle. Miriam blinked back the instinctive urge to check her watch. What day is it? she wondered. A sign in heavy classical lettering at the empty tram stop answered her question: Sunday service only. Oh. Below it was a timetable as bemusingly exact as anything she’d seen at an airport back home—evidently trams from this stop ran into the waterfront and over something called Deny Bridge once every half hour on Sundays, for a fare of 3d, whatever that meant. She shivered some more and stepped inside the wooden shelter, then fidgeted with the handful of copper change that she had left. Second thoughts began to occur to her. Was it normal for a single woman to catch a tram, unaccompanied, on a Sunday? What if Burgeson’s shop was closed? What if—
A streetcar pulled up beside the shelter with a screech of abused steel wheels. Miriam plucked up her courage and climbed aboard. The driver nodded at her, then without warning moved off. Miriam stumbled, almost losing her footing before she made it into the passenger cabin. She sat down without looking around. The wooden bench was cold but there seemed to be a heater running somewhere. She surreptitiously examined her fellow passengers, using their reflections in the windows when she couldn’t look at them directly without being obvious. They were an odd collection—a fat woman in a ridiculous bonnet who looked like a Salvation Army collector, a couple of thin men in oddly cut, baggy suits with hats pulled down over their ears, a twenty-something mother, bags under her eyes and two quietly bickering children by her side, and a man in what looked like a Civil War uniform coming toward her, a ticket machine hung in front of his chest. Miriam took a deep breath. I’m going to manage this, she realized.
“I’m going to Highgate, for Holmes Alley. How much is it, please, and what’s the closest stand? And what’s this stop called?”
“That’ll be fourpence, miss, and I’ll call you when it’s your stop. This is Roundgate interchange.” He looked at her slightly oddly as she handed him a sixpence, but wound off a strip of four penny tickets
It was big . Not as big as the palace in Niejwein, or Angbard’s fortress, but bigger than anything she’d ever lived in. And it was clearly mewed up, shutters nailed across those windows that weren’t boarded, gates chained tight. She grinned, gritting her teeth against the cold. “Right, you’re mine.” Then she slipped through the wooden door and onto the sidewalk. The street here was partially swept. On the other side of it lay an open field in the middle of what was dense forest in world one and downtown Cambridge in world two. She could see other big town houses on the other side of the field, but that didn’t matter. She turned left and began walking toward the crossroads she could see at the far corner of the quadrangle.
Her teeth were chattering by the time she reached the clock tower on the strange traffic circle at the crossroads. There was almost no traffic on this bitterly cold morning. A lone pony-trap clattered past her, but the only vehicles she saw out and about were strange two-deck streetcars, pantographs sparking occasionally as they whirred down the far side of the field and paused at a stand in the middle of the traffic circle. Miriam blinked back the instinctive urge to check her watch. What day is it? she wondered. A sign in heavy classical lettering at the empty tram stop answered her question: Sunday service only. Oh. Below it was a timetable as bemusingly exact as anything she’d seen at an airport back home—evidently trams from this stop ran into the waterfront and over something called Deny Bridge once every half hour on Sundays, for a fare of 3d, whatever that meant. She shivered some more and stepped inside the wooden shelter, then fidgeted with the handful of copper change that she had left. Second thoughts began to occur to her. Was it normal for a single woman to catch a tram, unaccompanied, on a Sunday? What if Burgeson’s shop was closed? What if—
A streetcar pulled up beside the shelter with a screech of abused steel wheels. Miriam plucked up her courage and climbed aboard. The driver nodded at her, then without warning moved off. Miriam stumbled, almost losing her footing before she made it into the passenger cabin. She sat down without looking around. The wooden bench was cold but there seemed to be a heater running somewhere. She surreptitiously examined her fellow passengers, using their reflections in the windows when she couldn’t look at them directly without being obvious. They were an odd collection—a fat woman in a ridiculous bonnet who looked like a Salvation Army collector, a couple of thin men in oddly cut, baggy suits with hats pulled down over their ears, a twenty-something mother, bags under her eyes and two quietly bickering children by her side, and a man in what looked like a Civil War uniform coming toward her, a ticket machine hung in front of his chest. Miriam took a deep breath. I’m going to manage this, she realized.
“I’m going to Highgate, for Holmes Alley. How much is it, please, and what’s the closest stand? And what’s this stop called?”
“That’ll be fourpence, miss, and I’ll call you when it’s your stop. This is Roundgate interchange.” He looked at her slightly oddly as she handed him a sixpence, but wound off a strip of four penny tickets
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