Saving the Scientist (The Restitution League #2)(79)

“A woman's preaching is like a dog's walking on his hind legs,” he said, his voice heavy with laughter. “It is not done well; but you are surprised to find it done at all.”

The swell of applause that greeted his remarks didn’t bode well for her presentation. But when did it ever? She tried to take a deep breath, but that only succeeded in making her stomach roil.

She drummed her fingers on the top of Edison’s automaton. The hostility of the crowd had long ceased to bother her. It was the infernal waiting that ate at her. Waiting to take her turn at the podium. Waiting for her bruised heart to scar over. Waiting for a killer to strike. The frustration ratcheted her nerves tighter and tighter until she thought something inside her might break.

Ada tapped her foot. Really, if the ancient old codger didn’t cease rambling, she might hook him with Meena’s parasol and drag him off the stage herself. Her fingers pounded down on the automaton, setting up a pleasing rain of sound.

Just as the speaker flung her a pointed look, Meena’s hand came down atop hers, silencing the rainfall. “Sorry,” Ada whispered stiffly, although she wasn’t. Not in the least.

“I’d like to teach him a thing or two about women’s capabilities,” Meena whispered.

Ada chuckled. “It would be a lost cause, but I’d love to watch.”

Finally, his so-called expertise exhausted, the man trundled off the stage to a swell of genteel applause.

Sir Beauford rose from his seat behind the podium. He sent Ada a hearty smile and stepped up to speak. “I should like to introduce our featured guest, Mrs. Ada Templeton. As many of you are aware, Mrs. Templeton has succeeded in harnessing the energy of certain chemical reactions, giving her the ability to fashion a stable dry-cell battery device, about which she will now enlighten us.”

The more he talked, the more detached Ada became. She felt as if she were moving about inside a glass bubble. It deadened sound, deadened the feel of her limbs, making her feel as if her gait was stiff and unnatural.

Tepid applause flowed from the audience. She forced herself to move across the stage and plant herself in front of the slender lectern. It was too delicate for her liking. She wanted something big, something tall and wide and massive to hide behind. Instead, she had was a narrow pillar topped by a square of lacquered wood hardly wide enough to hold a girl’s diary.

“Sir Beauford and esteemed members of the London Chemical Society,” Ada began. Her voice, thin and uncertain to start, grew in volume with each word. “I’d like to thank you for your kind invitation.”

The audience rustled in their seats. After the stultifying recitation they’d just received, she didn’t wonder. Though gaslights flickered along the walls and the back doors remained open, letting in a flood of afternoon light, the room was dim, making it difficult to make out individual faces.

One of them a killer.

Her knees trembled. Ada grabbed the edges of the podium, trying to wait out the wave of anxiety. He wouldn’t strike now. He needed her to disappear, not become a martyr.

He’d wait. He’d wait until she was as isolated as possible before he snatched her up.

The only thing to fear now were the cutting tongues of the mean-spirited souls in the audience who believed it was their sacred right as men to be the best and brightest.

Ada sighed, struggling to remain on topic as she peered out at the sea of strangers. Thick legs sticking out into the aisle, Stanton Grenville stood out among the strange faces. Though seated at the far back of the room, he seemed to feel her attention, offering one of his wide, friendly smiles and a bracing nod of encouragement. Not ten feet behind him, Spencer and Nelly waited, each positioned in a back corner, angled to best observe the assemblage.

Meena and Briar stood in the wings, flanking Edison’s automatic butler. Meena leaned on her parasol, and though she appeared to be unarmed, Ada knew Briar had enough knives stashed in her hidden pockets to stop a battalion of killers.

A dull ache that had nothing to do with public speaking twisted her guts.

How she was going to miss them all.

She cleared her throat, and dove into the speech she’d prepared. She touched on the battery’s development and expounded on the stability of its power.

If the audience wasn’t enthusiastic, neither were they the boorish crowd she feared. Mostly, she sensed polite—if skeptical—interest. Fair enough. She wouldn’t be inclined to believe her claims on their face, either.

Soon enough, it was time for the demonstration. She nodded to Meena, who aimed the automaton in her direction and flipped it on.

The whir of wheels and gears seemed louder onstage. Ada smiled at the gasps from the audience as the oversized teakettle rolled his way along the boards, pipe-stem arms rising out from his sides. When he reached the lectern, a tinny voice rang out, startling her.

“Hello. I am Brutus. How may I help you?”

Ada laughed. Though smaller, more contained, more metallic than his creator’s deep tone, Edison’s voice rang out from the small speaker.

Gasps of delight sprang up here and there in the audience.

Still smiling, Ada remembered to switch the automaton off.

“As you can see,” she said, “the chemical battery has more than enough power for locomotion… and speech.”

He must have added it last night. She pictured him on the floor of his workshop, cursing as he fitted a miniaturized gramophone speaker inside the mechanical.