A Star Shall Fall by Marie Brennan Page A

could manage. Segraine rapped smartly on the door, then waited with her hands folded behind her back. When a footman opened the door, she announced, “Mr. Theodore Dinley and Miss Prudence Dinley. We have an appointment with Dr. Andrews.”
    “Yes, sir, you are expected.” The footman bowed them in, took their cloaks, and led them upstairs to the drawing room. Irrith had little to compare it to, but it seemed an odd place; the furnishings were sparse, leaving one half of the room entirely empty except for the carpet upon the floor. This, she supposed, was where Dr. Andrews conducted his exhibition.
    Andrews himself came in a moment later. Seeing him, Irrith had to believe the reports of his illness; he was pale, with a hectic flush about his eyes. Old enough to look right in his gray wig, and thin as a birch tree, he could have dropped dead on the spot and she wouldn’t have been surprised. But he greeted them with pleasant composure, shaking Segraine’s hand and bowing over Irrith’s. “I am delighted to welcome you to my exhibition. You understand, of course—this is no simple spectacle for the common people. I am a scholar, and I aim to share with those of discerning minds the many wondrous permutations the world holds. Please, be seated. The display will begin momentarily. Would you like some coffee?”
    One servant poured for them while another drew the drapes, leaving them in semidarkness. Candelabras illuminated the bare space where the specimens were to stand. Irrith accepted her bowl of coffee with a grimace. In her opinion, the stuff was only slightly better than gin.
    The first marvel to come out, disappointingly, was not even alive. “A mummified pygmy of the African continent,” Dr. Andrews said, and began to drone on about its conformation. Irrith peered at it, wondering if it might have once been a faerie, but no; it seemed that humans really did grow that small.
    The Oronuto savage came in next. The dramatic candlelight of the shadowed drawing room seemed designed to give his pitch-black skin and foreign features a sinister air, but the man himself seemed bored, and went out quickly when dismissed. He was followed by more preserved specimens, these not even of entire bodies but only pieces, and Dr. Andrews forever looking to Miss Prudence Dinley to see if she was about to faint. Irrith peered with gruesome curiosity at a skull with a hole cut into it—according to Dr. Andrews, while the owner was still alive.
    Large sketches accompanied the young Red Indian sisters, who like the Oronuto were clothed according to their native practices, with some allowances for English sensibilities. The sketches depicted other pairs of twins born with body parts stuck together, and Dr. Andrews lifted the drape that covered the sisters’ hips to show his audience that their strange, awkward manner of walking, with their arms about each others’ waists, was no mountebank’s trick; their flesh truly did meld together. Segraine poked it with one finger just to be sure.
    And finally, just when Irrith had almost forgotten their purpose there, a servant ushered in the Olympian satyr.
    Her bones melted in relief. The sickly creature who limped to the center of the floor was no satyr, and had probably never been closer to Greece than the south bank of the Thames. His ginger hair made him look more like an Irishman. But there was something odd about his gait, and when Irrith looked more closely, she saw there was a strange deformity in his stocking-less lower legs, clearly visible below the button of his breeches.
    Deformity, but no goat fur; they were done. Segraine, however, had more concern than Irrith for their Dinley personas, and showed no sign of leaving. Dr. Andrews steadied the ginger man in front of them and began to explain about the warped bones of his legs.
    “Pardon me, Dr. Andrews,” Irrith said, interrupting him. If they weren’t leaving yet, she might as well have some fun. “Is this what you advertise