Lord Henry nearly ran into us on the front steps when we returned to the house. He had his nose in a book, and an older man behind him caught him by the back of his coat in time to prevent a collision. Lord Henry didn’t seem to notice. The man with him nodded a “good day” to us before he released Lord Henry’s coat.

“That’s Matthews, Uncle’s valet,” Olive informed me. “Rollo says his job is to make sure Uncle remembers to eat, sleep, and get dressed and to keep him from walking into walls.” I got the feeling that one should never say anything within earshot of Olive that one didn’t want repeated.

As far as I could tell, Flora still wasn’t out of bed, but Lord Henry hadn’t mentioned any routine for her other than my engaging her in conversation, which we could do later, and her afternoon music and drawing lessons, so I decided not to worry about her. Up in the schoolroom, I set Olive to working on her handwriting by copying a page from the science text. While she worked, I unfolded the newspaper I’d bought from Nat. Now I understood why every newspaper I’d seen before had the royal seal stamped on it. This one definitely took a different editorial approach than the newspapers I’d read. The main story on the front page was about the steam engine winning a race against a magical carriage. The story went on to describe the implications of bringing mass transportation into a restricted area. The article was vividly written, with a perspective that could only have come from someone on that bus. The author’s name was Elizabeth Smith—the Lizzie who’d sat next to me, I guessed.

The other articles covered injustices in the city, the impact of taxes, and suppression of technological progress. I’d thought I was well-informed, but I had been entirely unaware of many of these issues. The only story this newspaper seemed to have in common with the paper Lord Henry and Rollo had discussed at breakfast was the Masked Bandits’ robbery, only this paper seemed far more in favor of it. Editorial cartoons depicted magisters wearing wizards’ robes and pointy hats covered in stars, and these magisters lived in remote castles, ruling from on high. I had to put down the newspaper when Olive brought her work to me. “Very nice, Olive,” I told her. “Now let’s do some math.”