Though I was just a mathematics student and not ‘in trade’, even I knew I’d need capital to get my business up and running. I’d been at a loss as to how I could manage to collect the money I needed without relying on my parents or alerting them to my intentions too soon. It was while pondering that problem and tossing wrenches and other tools into their bins and onto hooks in the Bosch air shed while Max watched in astonishment that a method for generating ready money became apparent.
“Why don’t we have a little game, Ari?” Max had suggested.
“All right,” I’d answered, a little confused.
He’d drawn a dartboard on the wall of the shed with some chalk and pulled some darts from deep in a drawer. It’d taken him a couple minutes to explain the rules, and then we’d played. I beat him ten times in a row that afternoon. Once we finished, Max beamed with enthusiasm for his newest plan and I wondered what I’d gotten myself into.
Max sat all of us down a few days later. “I have a business proposition,” he began, “based on Ari’s newly discovered skills.”
“You mean getting involved in that aeronaut storefront plan?” Griff asked, looking thoughtful. “You come up with more little mechanicals or new navigational instruments?”
I opened my mouth to reply, but Max beat me to the punch. “Oh, no, my friends,” playing it like he was on stage and about to introduce a new act, “Ari has a talent for dart throwing.”
“Dart throwing?” Needle asked, “What sort of business can you start throwing darts? Don’t the pubs have it pretty much in hand?” Lizzie nodded in agreement, her face showing confusion.
Max pushed himself up from the table and motioned all of us to follow him back to the dartboard drawn on the wall. “Watch this,” he said and indicated I should throw the darts he handed me.
I did so, striking the center of the target one at a time, leaving a six-petaled dart flower blooming in the middle of the board.
Griff let out a low whistle. “That’s pretty good,” he allowed, “but she can’t hit a target like that every time, surely?”
Max grinned wickedly. “Ari, close your eyes. Needle, mark six spots at random with chalk along the walls and ceiling of the shed.” He walked over and tugged the darts from the wall. “Let’s see if she can hit the spots, shall we?”
Griff shook his head and moved to obey.
I groaned. “Max,” I complained. “I don’t—“
“Hush, you,” he ordered with a wink. “Convince the doubters assembled here, and then I’ll explain the plan.”
I grimaced and closed my eyes. Max put the darts in my hand. When he told me to open my eyes, I did so, quickly located the chalk marks and hit them square in their centers with the darts. Shocked silence rang in the shed.
Max rubbed his hands together and looked at us. “Now, ladies and gents,” he said, “let’s discuss the plan.”
****
After that, we travelled around the country one weekend each month and challenged people to dart games for money. We shared the winnings 50/50, with the crew using their part of the take for improvements to the ship. I saved my portion, along with what I could spare from my allowance and the sales of my devices, for the start-up funds for my business.
I didn’t want to consider what my parents would think of the plan. As the daughter of the Duke of Albemarle, after I completed my mathematical studies at Towson in June, it was entirely possible my parents would want me to marry. Going into trade and running a business wasn’t on the menu for someone of my station, but the idea of it thrilled me. I loved air travel. If I succeeded, I’d have a chance to live my life among aeronauts and perhaps someday have my own airship. I knew my devices would improve the overall safety and efficiency of airship travel, assuming I could generate enough capital to make a real start on the endeavor.
I just had to win every single dart game I played. So far, I had.
The Cap’n placed his shillings on the bar beside our own and took a long moment to look me up and down, now that he was close to me. I met his gaze and quirked an eyebrow, forcing a chuckle from him.
“You’re a bonny, green-eyed lass,” he said, the beer on his breath potent and slightly sweet. “Freckled, ginger and lovely as a spring morning, you are. It’s glad I am you’ve not been altered.” He turned to the patrons. “Clear a space, lads,” he bellowed. “I’ve three shillings to win!”
A flurry of activity ensued. The patrons moved the pub tables to create an aisle from the bar to the dartboard. Charlie placed a slate on the bar. “I’ll keep score, if it’s all the same to you, miss,” the barman said, holding up a piece of chalk.
I nodded. Then Charlie turned his attention to the many orders for pints of ale or stronger beverages, and several minutes elapsed while the crowd paid for and received their drinks. I removed my jacket and rolled up my sleeves while I waited.
Once everyone settled down, Charlie flipped a coin to see who’d go first. The Cap’n won. Someone handed me three darts with dark blue fletchings, and I saw that the Cap’n held three darts with red fletchings. He took his place at the line to throw, and in quick succession his darts sailed to hit the target. The game was one where we counted down from 301 points with the goal of reaching zero, and the Cap’n had made a very good start, based on the roar of the crowd.
“Atta boy, Cap’n!” someone yelled, “you’ll get your shillings in no time!”
“Give up now, girlie,” someone else commented, “we’ll not hold it against you!”
The room resounded with other similar encouragements, which I ignored. Then it was my turn.
Taking my place at the line, I looked down at my right hand holding the dart, and then up at the painted elm circle that served as the target. A calm focus descended upon me as it always did. My extreme concentration on the task at hand made my conscious mind fade into the background. I became a disinterested, somnolent spectator of my body’s actions. I saw only the target, and the only part of my body I was aware of was my throwing arm. In quick succession my three darts flew, but if the crowd reacted to what I had done, I wasn’t aware of it. I paid no attention to the score and didn’t care who played against me.
I distantly felt Max guide me away from the line when it wasn’t my turn, and then lead me back to the line when it was. Darts appeared in my hand, and with fluid motions struck the target. My mind drifted into a dream, punctuated by brief images of pint glasses, the flickering flames, laughing faces, and darts flying at the dartboard.
I don’t know how long I spent throwing, but it took a hard shake and a small measure of rum from Max to clear the fog from my mind. My shirt and underclothes were damp, my right arm ached, my red hair had fallen from its pins and my throat was raw. I looked in surprise at the patrons around the pub, who somehow had doubled in number and seemed ecstatic with the evening’s entertainment. The Cap’n tugged his forelock at me in salute as he left, and countless others jostled up to offer their congratulations.
The sheer mass of humanity around me was astonishing. The crowd of men and women pressed against the walls of the pub, spilled out the door and into the street in a loud, happily roiling cloud of faces and bodies. I nodded to the well-wishers in their apparent hundreds as politeness required, wondering where all the people had come from. I sought out my airship companions in the sea of unknown faces. Griff, Lizzie, and Needle stood near the door, beaming from ear to ear. Max winked at me from behind the bar as he tucked a wad of pound notes into his capacious inner jacket pocket. Charlie pumped Max’s hand with energetic thanks.
Griff surfed his way through the crowd and leaned in toward me. “Finish the rum, Ari,” he shouted over the voices. “We need to leave if we’re to get back to Cambridge by dawn.”
He was right, of course. The Towson house-mother, Mrs. Gildersleeve, thought I was away visiting relatives for the weekend, but it made no sense to press my luck much further. I downed the rum in one gulp, coughed as it blazed its way down my throat, grabbed my jacket and in a t
rice the crew of the Bosch was back in the Rover, clanging back to the ship and eventually, Cambridge and home.
Chapter Two
Once we got back to the Bosch, floating placidly at its farmhouse berth, Max, seeing my exhaustion, ordered me to the small cabin I shared with Lizzie while the others started the engine and prepared the ship for takeoff. I was too tired to argue and made my way down to the quarters. I hung my short jacket on a convenient hook and looked around.
There wasn’t much to see or do in the darkened cabin. I reached up and tapped the phosphorite globe that that hung from the middle of the mish-mash of wood and metal that served as our cabin ceiling. The swinging lamp flickered to life and illuminated a small fold-away wash basin, with two bunks that folded up into the wall and a Pirates of Penzance poster from the Savoy Theatre on the wall opposite the basin. I dropped down the bunk that was mine so I could sit, ignoring the two trunks that served as seats when the bunks were stowed. Other airships could afford bigger spaces for the crew, but as the Bosch was a low budget vehicle, we spent most of our money on the bridge and motive equipment like the hydrogen ballonets, the rigid airship frame, engines and steering mechanisms, not to mention the fuel. One didn’t make a rigid frame airship from scratch with the intent of spending time in the cabins. The goal was the air, the speed and above all, freedom.
The Bosch lurched into life, and I felt the lift of the air balloon and thrum of the propellers in my bones as the ship started our journey home.
***
I sat in the cabin for a few minutes watching the play of light and shadow across the walls and furnishings of the small room. I was very tired but didn’t know what to do with myself. I pulled my trunk out so I could grab a brush and attend to my unruly hair, which perversely refused to go back up in its pins. I resorted to braiding it, tying off the end with a bit of ribbon and letting it hang down my back. I put the brush back in the trunk, slid it back into place and sighed, wondering what else I could do. I was too tired to do any studying, and my mind was too worked up to allow sleep. If I stayed in the cabin I’d only end up pacing back and forth, so I made my way down the hall to the bridge.
I took a moment at the door to watch my crewmates work. Needle, tongue out as he concentrated on holding the ship’s wheel on course, piloted the Bosch in conjunction with my navigation equipment while Lizzie monitored the other ship systeMs. Phosphorite lamps swung above their heads, illuminating their stations without flames or sparks. Max moved around the bridge, his attention focused on the feel of the ship around him. The chadburn dial, a waist-high pillar next to Needle with a rounded top and various designations for locomotion indicated by a stout handle and black pointer, read ‘half full ahead’, and I knew the corresponding chadburn in the engine room mimicked the order. Griff was down there with his beloved engines, making sure everything was ‘Bristol fashion’ below. There was a speaking tube at Max’s station so he could speak directly to Griff if he wished, but other than notifying Griff of changes in engine speed it sat largely unused. Griff spoke most eloquently through the efficiency of his engines and didn’t like to make small talk while he worked.
I looked at my empty seat near the navigational and meteorological instruments which whirred and clicked as they monitored wind speed and direction, air temperature, altitude and barometric pressure, among other variables. The hydrogen in the ballonets reacted to changes in temperature and pressure, which in turn affected how well the ship handled. My instruments kept track of the changes and kept the bridge informed so the maneuvers of the helm compensated as necessary to keep the ship on course.
Max stopped his perambulations to stand near Needle, both of them peering out the front window of the bridge. The sky outside the window was dark and studded with feebly twinkling stars, the full moon’s brightness outshining the more distant heavenly bodies.
“Don’t let her blow too much to port,” Max said, turning his attention from the window to the binnacle, where the compass sat. “We don’t want to go so far west that we miss Cambridge, after all.”
Needle nodded. He turned the wheel to account for the wind and straightened our course. The Bosch shuddered for a moment and settled into its new direction, slowly swinging back and forth like a boat on a gentle sea. Max checked the chadburn dial, thought for a moment and decided to leave the needle where it was.
“Fuel level, Lizzie?” Max asked.
“Plenty to get us home, Captain,” Lizzie said, scanning the console in front of her, “but we’ll need to refuel once we get back.”
Max sighed. “Understood. What’s the status of that strut on the port side?”
I frowned. The strut in question helped to hold the oblong aluminum frame for the hydrogen ballonets to the areas of the ship we occupied, which included the cabins and the bridge, not to mention the engines and their vital propellers. A storm on a prior journey had twisted it, and though we were relatively sure it was still sound, we’d all agreed it should be taken out and replaced. It wasn’t the only strut we had holding the ship together, of course, but none of us liked the idea of leaving the twisted one in place.
“Holding her own,” Lizzie reported, “but I’ve got Griff’s word he’ll be finished with the replacement so I can make the repair by Wednesday.” She looked over and saw me. “Looks like the navigator’s on deck,” Lizzie said, indicating my location in the doorway with a lift of her chin. The others looked and beckoned me in to join them.
“I knew she wouldn’t be in her cabin for long,” Needle said sagely.
I stepped onto the bridge. A beaming Max moved to intercept me and then enveloped me in a bear hug that lifted me bodily from the floor. He was a naturally demonstrative fellow, coming from a big, very loving family. In my family, we were much more reserved. Mother disapproved of that kind of physical contact, particularly in public, and, as a result, it had taken me some time to get used to Max’s ebullient greetings.
“How goes it?” I asked, ducking my head into Max’s shoulder so it missed a low-hanging aluminum strut. “Is she handling well?”
Lizzie scoffed from her place at Needle’s right hand, keeping an eye on the engine gauges. “Course she is. It’s only a bit of a wind, after all. You know better than that. The Bosch is right as a trivet.”
Max laughed and put me down. “You did well tonight, Ari,” he said.
“I’ll say she did,” Lizzie agreed. “I’ve never seen anything like it.”
“You met every challenge. Some of the throws you made...” Max shook his head. “I’ve no idea how you do it. From across the pub, even blindfolded... you hit the mark every time. It was head and shoulders above what you’ve done before.”
I cleared my throat, a bit unnerved that I didn’t remember being blindfolded. How had I hit the target without seeing it?
“Good to know,” I said, covering my discomfiture. I rubbed my sore right arm. “Did they call the constable?”
Max laughed. “The constable was the one who paid to see you throw three darts blindfolded.”
“He lost a half crown with a smile on his face,” Needle added. “Never thought to see a Peeler happy to lose money.”
“In fact,” Max said, “I think he was the one who brought all those others into the pub. Charlie and the Crown made a pretty penny tonight, and no mistake. Nearly the entire population of Penzance saw you hit the mark every time.”
I nodded and rubbed my right arm. That explained the soreness, I thought. “How’d we do, then?”
“Including the money Charlie gave us in thanks for the increase in his custom? Ooooh, about twenty pounds, give or take.”
I gaped, my aching arm momentarily forgotten. “Twenty pounds?!”
His smile widened, and he pulled the wad of pound notes out of his pocket, dropping them on his desk. “That would be each, my dear. Twenty pounds for the Bosch and twenty pounds for you. Not a bad evening’s work.”
I nearly fainted in surprise. Forty pounds was unbelievable. If we made that much e
very time we went to a pub between now and June, with that amount added to what I’d already saved, I could start my aeronaut supply shop free and clear, far sooner than I’d hoped. I’d be able to give up the allowance I received from my parents and truly live on my own. The notion took my breath away.
Max pointed to my usual station. “Have a seat. I don’t think there’s much for you to do, and goodness knows you must be bone weary. But worry not, we’ll have you back at Towson before sunrise. All right?”
I nodded and moved to sit. Once I did, Max knelt down beside me. “You’ve never told stories before. I have to know. Where’d you learn them?”
“Stories?” I asked, confused.
“Oh, Ari,” Needle said, waving a finger at me with one hand while he turned a knob with the other, “You’ve been holding out on us.”
I blinked. “I have?”
Max nodded. “Charlie said he’d not heard those old stories since he was a boy... and the way you told them... none of us’ve heard the like in our lives.”
“They were amazing!” Lizzie cut in. “Poetic, magical... as the words flowed through the room, the story unfolded in our minds like a magic lantern show!”
“Folks stayed in the pub and drank just to hear your tales,” Needle added. “You told… what… five or six?”
“Oh,” I said, stupid with astonishment. I wracked my brain to review the evening’s activities, but I didn’t remember telling any stories. My throat felt like I’d talked a great deal, however. I didn’t understand what they meant. As a mathematics student, I didn’t know any stories – not like a History or Literature student did. I’d tended to react badly to stories growing up, which was why my parents had encouraged my scholarship in other areas. What had happened?
“Erm… what story did you like the best?” I asked. Perhaps if I knew what they’d heard, I’d remember what I’d said.
The Odin Inheritance (The Pessarine Chronicles Book 1) Page 2
