Brilliant Devices: A steampunk adventure novel (Magnificent Devices)

by Shelley Adina

  “Oh, blast.” She put her cup and saucer down and turned to Jake. “Dance with me.”

  “Wot?” He goggled at her as if she’d given him orders to fling himself off the top of the fuselage.

  “I don’t want to dance with Mr. Malvern, and he’s headed this way. It’s an act of charity, Jake. Get a move on.”

  “I dunno ’ow to dance, Captain!”

  “Just get me out on the floor,” she said between her teeth.

  He grasped her in a fair approximation of a waltz hold, and she realized that he had grown four or five inches while no one was looking. “One two three, one two three. Just move your feet. That’s it.” Well, this was a blessing. A lifetime of being nimble on his feet in order to survive seemed to be paying off—he picked up the rhythm much more quickly than she had in her few lessons in Edmonton. “Now lengthen your step—I want lots of people between us and him.”

  Within a few bars of music, he had done what she asked.

  “Well, done, Jake. Remind me to cut you hazard pay for this.”

  “Any pay ’ud be good, Captain … one two free, one two free.”

  “Point taken. Now see if you can—”

  “Excuse me, may I cut in?”

  A large body in a black dinner jacket levered Jake out of the way. She got a glimpse of the boy’s astonished face before she thought to look up at the man who had removed him so cavalierly—and so efficiently.

  “Evening, Alice,” Frederick Chalmers said as he waltzed her smoothly into the whirling stream of dancers circumnavigating the salon. “You sure do clean up nice.”

  Chapter 19

  Alice was so gobsmacked that even the swear words that might have been appropriate to the situation fled her empty skull. The best she could manage was a lame, “What are you doing here?”

  Chalmers—she would not think of him as Pa, she just wouldn’t—whirled her into a spin and caught her on the other side of it without missing a step. “I’m trying to find a way to apologize to my daughter without getting shot.”

  “I didn’t mean that. I meant, how did you get past the officers at the gangplank when half the camp thinks you’re responsible for the sabotage at the mine?”

  For six full bars of music he stared into her face as if he were trying to translate what she’d said from Navapai to Esquimaux. Finally, he said, “You’ve been here less than a day and you’ve heard this?”

  “Is it true?” If he could butt in on her nice evening with society folks, then she could butt in on his peace of mind. If he had any.

  “It is not. And I am sorry you had to ask. But it’s my own fault, isn’t it, for not providing you with a father you could trust.”

  Well, that took the gas out of her balloon good and proper. Maybe she should just shut up and hope that Andrew Malvern would come and cut in. Because getting to the end of this waltz seemed about as simple as flying back to Edmonton in the next three minutes.

  “Please don’t lift tomorrow,” he said quietly, his breath disturbing her hair. “I would consider it a gift to spend a few hours with you and find out what kind of woman you’ve become.”

  Alice tried to think of a scathing reply, but mostly she just wanted to pull out of his arms and find a pair of drapes behind which she could cry.

  “I never stopped loving you, dearling,” he said. “I know what they’re saying about me and the Esquimaux here, and I know Reggie Penhaven will probably have me arrested as soon as he knows I’m aboard, but it was worth the risk to find you and say my say while I could.”

  “Is there a price on your head here, too?”

  “As soon as they manufacture some proof, I’m sure there will be.”

  “But why? What have they got against you? The Dunsmuirs seem like decent sorts—they know who I am and they’ve treated me downright civil.”

  “So you’ve told them you’re related to me?”

  “Well, sure. That’s the whole reason I came all the way from Resolution. I tracked you to Santa Fe and then to Edmonton … and then here.”

  She felt like a fool for admitting it, but it was the truth. When he didn’t reply, she looked up, and was stunned into silence a second time by the expression in his eyes.

  His wet eyes, blazing with admiration, with grief, and … with love. For her.

  “You tracked me from one end of the continent to the other?” he breathed at last. “No wonder you were so angry. You went through all that, and I must have seemed like ten kinds of yellow-bellied coward for not being willing to do the same.”

  Another whirl, and she found herself being danced down a short corridor and into what appeared to be a galley. It was narrow, and cramped, and empty but for racks of dinner plates and cups.

  Frederick Chalmers released her, all except for her gloved hand, which he held the way some people held gold, in both hands.

  She had not been prepared for honesty. It was one thing for her to say her say and call things as she saw them. It was another altogether to have someone be just as honest with her. It left her nowhere to hide, no smart remarks behind which to take offense, no lies and affectations to poke fun at and gain the upper hand.

  It left only herself, in her silken finery, feeling lost and naked in the cold.

  “Yes,” she said at last. “That’s exactly how I felt. But that’s no reason for you to come here and risk getting tossed in the brig.”

  “They need proof for that, and since it’s all rumor and innuendo and third-hand information, it’s not likely they’ll find any by the end of the evening.”

  “But why? That’s what I don’t get. The Dunsmuirs don’t—”

  “It isn’t the Dunsmuirs. I don’t want to say any more in case I’m wrong, and to burden you with knowledge might harm you.”

  “I know a thing or two, Pa. I know that the Dunsmuirs trust the Esquimaux who work here, and the folks in your village. And I know there’s someone out there who doesn’t want Count von Zeppelin’s ships to land anywhere but New York City. And I know—”

  His grip on her hand tightened. “What do you know of that? Alice, keep your voice down. Men can be killed for saying things like that out loud.”

  “But it’s true,” she whispered. “Men have already been killed. They nearly got Claire and me—it was only chance that we didn’t get shot full of bullets with tiny propeller engines and M.A.M.W. stamped on ’em.” She tugged her hand out of his. “Ow.”

  “I’m sorry, dearling. You just—you surprised the stuffing out of me. Please tell me you haven’t said any of this to anyone.”

  “Just to Claire and the kids.”

  “Kids? Are you serious? Children are being burdened with this knowledge?”

  “They’re not ordinary kids,” she said dryly. “Those twin girls with us—they know everything.”

  “They can’t. You can’t. Alice, it’s worth your life to speak of this.”

  She eyed him. “You sound like some kind of spy. What are you really doing up here?”

  Now he slid the galley door closed and locked it. His voice dropped to barely above a whisper. “You’ve got your ma’s brains, and that’s a fact. So it has happened already? The count knows his life is in danger?”

  “Hard to avoid it, when a bullet creases your head and lays you out. But like you say, there’s no proof. Someone shot at us, and the bullets’ engine casings have those initials on them, but that don’t mean anything. Lizzie found something similar under one of the cargo ships, too, but—” She shrugged. Said out loud like that, most sane people would just roll their eyes and sidestep away.

  “On the contrary, it means a great deal. Alice, are you acquainted with the count? I mean, outside of being in the vehicle when the attempt was made?”

  “It does tend to bring strangers together,” she said dryly. “I guess I’m on speaking terms. He wants to talk with me about my automatons.”

  “I do, too, but it will have to wait for a sunny day and crisp snow.” She must have looked confused, for he smiled and
said, “It’s something Malina says. Alice, I must be quick. You must find a way to convince the count to leave here as soon as possible. By dawn at the latest.”

  “How d’you expect me to do that?”

  “I am sure you can find a way.”

  “But Pa, I can’t just waltz up to one of the greatest men in the world and say, excuse me, sir, but a suspected saboteur says you’re to leave pronto. Why would he do anything but laugh and pat me on the head?”

  “Because I have reason to think there will be another attempt if he stays much longer. If not tonight, then definitely during the tour of the mine tomorrow. They mean to blame it on poor management by the Dunsmuirs, thus discrediting the family and destroying the enterprise here. It might even—” He clamped his lips shut.

  “—start a war?”

  He stared at her, his face going so still it might have been turned to stone. “Where did you hear that?” he whispered.

  “Nowhere. Claire and Andrew and I were talking of it. Why start a bullet business on a continent where you can’t sell enough to keep it going? The only place you could sell them would be to countries who are at war.”

  He drew in a shallow breath, then seemed to force himself to breathe more deeply. More calmly. Finally he was able to speak.

  “Governments have fallen for saying such things.”

  “Lucky it’s just you and me and the plates and cups, then.” She waited for him to reply, and when he did not, said, “Pa, how do you know all this? What’s a man living in the back of beyond with a lot of Esquimaux got to do with anything?”

  He seemed to come back to himself with difficulty. “Thirty days from now I will tell you, when it’s all over.”

  “When what’s over?”

  “Alice, please just trust me. You must whisper in the count’s ear and get him to lift by dawn. Can you do that?”

  “I can probably whisper in his ear, but I don’t fancy he’s the type to ask how high when I say jump.”

  “Just do your best. It is all any of us can do.”

  Frustration and about a thousand questions roiled in her gut under the constricting corset. She stared at him, her lips compressed so she wouldn’t blurt out a bunch of swear words, and his gaze softened.

  “My dear brave girl. Have I told you how proud I am of you?”

  She shook her head. “You ain’t spoken to me in fourteen years, Pa.”

  “But I have. Every day. Every time I learned something new, I shared it with you in my head. Every time I saw a new landscape, I imagined exploring it with you. And every time the pigeons came back, I saw you growing and changing, and my heart broke a little more.”

  Now she really had to press her lips together, or she would break down and weep. As it was, the hot prick of tears made her blink. She must not cry. She must not let him see.

  “Alice.” He said her name like a prayer. “Whatever happens, I will find you when what the Esquimaux call the caribou moon—the full moon following the caribou migration—is at its brightest. Our time here is nearly over, anyway. I just wish—”

  She followed his gaze to the ring of delicately carved ivory on the fourth finger of his right hand. “Is that from Malina? Is she your wife?”

  “Yes. And yes. I am trying to steel myself to leaving her and the girls. The shadow side of my actions is that I have no funds to keep them with me. It is a simple fact that in doing my duty, I must leave them.”

  Alice raised her fingers to her hair, and touched what was fixed there. “You need money?”

  “Not here, no. But if I were to travel with my family, I would.”

  She was already undoing the clasp of the diamond watch pin that Claire had given her back in Resolution as thanks for helping her. She had offered to give it back to Davina, but the latter had only laughed and asked if she would like the earrings to match. The latter were in her ears at this moment, as a kind of security deposit against the future. “Take this. If you can get as far as Edmonton, you can exchange it for gold. It ought to get you wherever you’re going.”

  “I can’t take this from you. Was it a gift?”

  “It was. It used to belong to Lady Dunsmuir, and now I’m giving it to you.”

  “Alice, this is worth several hundred pounds at least—these three diamonds are a carat apiece, and all these brilliants set around them amount to one more. I can’t take the most valuable thing you own.”

  “The Lass is the most valuable thing I own. This is just something to put in my hair.” She put the pin in his palm and folded his fingers around it. “If this means you can be with Malina and the girls and me all at once, then it’s money well spent.”

  His other hand covered hers. “Just when I believe there is no hope for human nature, I meet the refutation of that belief in my own daughter.”

  “That’s a lot of twenty-five-cent words, Pa.”

  “I believe in getting my money’s worth.”

  “Will I see you again, really?”

  “Look for me by the caribou moon.”

  “How? I could be in Victoria by then. Or San Francisco. Or—or London, I guess, if I can find a cargo.”

  “You forget the pigeons. I will send one with you on the Lass. Just release it when you moor somewhere for more than a day, and I’ll come.”

  She could say no. She could drum up some righteous rage, and turn a cold shoulder and march out of this narrow little room doing double duty as a confessional. But what would that get her?

  More of the same, that’s what. More tears, and more empty skies, and a lifetime of feeling as rootless and vulnerable as she had coming in here.

  A caribou moon meant the end of one season … and the beginning of another.

  Maybe she should open her eyes … and her heart.

  “Alice?” He bent to look into her face. “Please don’t cry, sweetheart.”

  But it was too late. She threw herself into his arms and bawled like the little girl she had once been.

  Chapter 20

  “’Scuse me, c’n I ’ave this dance?”

  To Claire’s utter astonishment—and that of the young officer partnering her—Jake cut in and manfully attempted to steer her away from the young man and across the floor.

  “One two free, one two free … Lady, we gots to rescue Alice. She an’ some gent did ’alf a waltz and then disappeared down that corridor there, behind them frondy things.”

  “Those are palms. And Jake, there are occasions when a lady may be allowed some privacy.”

  He made a disgusted sound and tripped. His recovery was quick, though, and her skirts disguised most of it. “It weren’t that way. ’E weren’t one of us, nor one of the Margrethe’s crew neither.”

  “Describe him.”

  When he was finished, Claire patted him with the hand that rested on his shoulder. “The ocular device confirms it. That is Frederick Chalmers, her father. They had words in the Esquimaux village. Perhaps he has come to repair their relationship.”

  “P’raps. And p’raps we should make sure she’s all right, him bein’ a saboteur and all.”

  “I am convinced he has been unjustly accused, but to set your mind at ease, we will join them.”

  In seconds Jake had located which of the paneled doors along the short service corridor was the correct one, and Claire opened it, preparing a smile.

  She found Alice in tears in Frederick Chalmers’s arms.

  “Captain!” Jake sprang into the room. “All right?”

  Alice lifted her head and snuffled like a child, whereupon her father twitched a linen napkin off a nearby stack and handed it to her. “Yes,” she said, and blew her nose. “What’s wrong?”

  “I thought—”

  “Jake was concerned,” Claire said smoothly, when Jake came to an abrupt halt. “Mr. Frederick Chalmers, may I introduce Alice’s navigator, Jake Fletcher.”

  “Beggin’ yer pardon, Lady, but it’s McTavish,” the boy said slowly. “Snouts bade me keep it quiet from the others and use a diffe
rent ’andle. I’m ’is brother. ’alf brother.”

  “Jake McTavish,” she corrected herself, inclining her head in thanks for the information while wondering why on earth Snouts would require such a thing. “Mr. Chalmers, will you be joining us this evening?”

  “No,” Alice said. She balled up the napkin and stuffed it down the front of her gown. Claire tried not to wince. “He’ll be hightailing it off this boat as quick as he can, before Penhaven finds out he’s here.”

  “Or I can be polite and greet the Dunsmuirs and Count von Zeppelin.” He gave his daughter a meaningful glance. “And then, while the director is dragging me away, you might get a chance to speak with the count.”

  Instead of answering, Alice proceeded to brief Claire on the particulars of what she and her father had just been discussing.

  “I knew it,” Claire breathed.

  “You know nothing,” Frederick said sharply. “I have asked Alice to do one thing, and one thing only. Her friends are not to be involved.”

  “Gettin’ shot at don’t make us involved?” Jake asked. “Seems like we got bigger fish to fry than gettin’ the count clear of here. Wot ’appens if they go ahead wiv the sabotage anyways? More folks than just ’im could get ’urt.”

  “For heaven’s sake, I will not discuss such secret matters with children!”

  Jake eyed him. “Ent been a child in a long time.” Then, upon seeing Claire’s pointed gaze, reluctantly added, “Sir.”

  “Give it up, Pa. We’re involved and that’s that. You can be secretive about the rest of it, but meantime, it’s our friends in danger here.”

  Chalmers struggled with himself, and while he did, Claire thought aloud. “It’s safe to expect that Meriwether-Astor wants the Dunsmuirs to survive to bear the shame. Otherwise, why go to all the trouble of bringing the journalists? If they are killed, they become martyrs and the two-inch headlines will announce a state funeral instead of … whatever he is going to accuse them of.”