The Consequences of Champagne and Murder

Chapter Twenty-One - Oh.

They were everywhere. Clocks fashioned from intricately molded gilt-bronze were lined up along the room’s many shelves. Clocks decorated with pastel figures of birds and mythological creatures were arranged on the desks. And what looked like an entire clock graveyard was scattered across the floor, cogs and springs and other bits I didn’t know the name for spilling from the wooden bases like metallic entrails. 

Everywhere I stepped, I was in danger of knocking into unpainted chunks of porcelain, buckets of glittering powders, or decorative bronze pieces in the shapes of crowns, vines, and flowers. The air was warm and thick with dust and wood shavings, coating my throat whenever I dared to take a breath.

The room wasn’t merely meant to display clocks—it was an entire workshop. 

“This is awful,” I said at the same time Jacqueline gasped out, “This is wonderful.” 

I gave her a disbelieving look, but she was turned away from me, making her way to a row of jewel-colored mantle clocks on the wall. 

“They’re all so lovely,” she said as she ran her hand across a silver clock adorned by a lacquered sun and moon. Then she stopped. “This is my design. All the clocks on this wall are my design.” 

“Your design?” 

Jacqueline waved me over to where she stood in front of a clock with a swooping gilt base, golden leaves and vines jutting out from the bottom and ending in porcelain rose buds, each painted a different shade of pastel pink. 

“I designed these clocks and gave the designs to Monsieur Duvaux,” she said. “They all must have been stolen from his workshop earlier.” 

“You designed them?” The details were so complex and delicate, I couldn’t imagine anyone spending the time to design them, especially not someone who I’d seen wield a dagger while spitting out insults like they were shells on a pumpkin seed. “I thought you were an apprentice.” 

“I’m not—I mean, I am, but my actual job is to design the clocks for Duvaux’s shop. I only pretend to be an apprentice because no one will accept a design done by a dark-skinned woman. It’s Monsieur Duvaux’s and my little secret.” She bit down on her lip. “Well, it was our little secret before I ruined everything.” 

For the second time that afternoon, my mind flashed back to Jacqueline sitting on the street, chest heaving with ragged breaths. For years, I had felt completely alone in my struggle. Mother never cared enough to help. Father was always busy gambling away the family fortune. Étienne and Renée tried, but it was clear they couldn’t truly understand. It was always just me—by myself—wondering if there was something wrong with me, if people would consider me a huge joke for the rest of my life. 

But then I met Jacqueline, and for once, I didn’t feel so broken.

“Jacqueline—” I started, but she plucked her clock off the shelf and walked over to a worktable covered in wood shavings and golden powder. She flipped the clock over, picked up the turnscrew next to her elbow, and began prying the back open. 

“Wait!” I said. “Don’t break it.” 

She continued working at the screws on the back of the clock, not bothering to glance up as she said, “I’m not going to break it. I need to see something.” 

“We came here to find the journals, not to tear apart clocks.” 

“Then you look for the journals.” She let out a heaving sigh. “There are two of us here, you know.” 

I hadn’t thought of that. 

“I don’t know what they look like.” 

“They look like journals, Olivier.”