Curtsies & Conspiracies
Page 25

“That was you?” Madame Spetuna looked impressed. “Very nice touch, missy. And, of course, you could be lying to me about any of this, and I’ve no way of knowing.”
Vieve said, pertly, “I assure you, she is not lying.”
Soap followed this interchange with a look of skepticism. He was fond of Bumbersnoot. “Are you certain about this, miss?” he asked, as Madame Spetuna trotted away, clutching Bumbersnoot under one arm.
Sophronia watched the intelligencer disappear, nibbling her lip unhappily. “No, I’m not. We have to hope that Madame Spetuna and the flywaymen stick close. If they are after the Giffard test, then they’ll be heading to London, like us.”
Vieve was confident. “It will all work out in the end. Only think, Sophronia, how nice it will be to own all my gadgets.”
Soap pursed his lips. “Is that your bargain?”
“The things I do for gadgets,” said Sophronia.
Soap, fond of Vieve’s inventions himself, nodded sagely. “Now, miss, you let me know if you need any help getting that critter back, you hear?”
“Soap, what could you possibly…?”
“Why, miss, you think the flywaymen don’t have sooties on their big ships, too?” He gave her an almost evil smile. “My people are everywhere.”
“Soap, have I told you recently how much I adore you?” Sophronia’s heart lightened, her worries about Bumbersnoot allayed slightly.
Soap looked down at his feet and shuffled them in the coal dust. “Aw, miss, not again.”
Sophronia stood on tiptoe and kissed his dusty cheek. “Thank you. You’re a chum.”
Madame Spetuna departed the ship before breakfast the next morning, Bumbersnoot with her. Sophronia felt his lack keenly. She hadn’t realized how prevalent the mechanimal was in her life—puttering about her feet as she washed in the morning, blundering into the furniture while the girls gossiped, eating discarded gloves while they dressed of an evening. Her shoulder, without the weight of the lace strap from his reticule-disguised form, felt naked. She had only a few days to miss him, however, because they finally arrived in the great city of London.
Around midnight on a fine clear Thursday in mid-March, a lone cloud wafted over west London toward Hyde Park. There it stopped and hovered in a most un-cloud-like manner. It hesitated and then headed purposefully toward the grounds of the Crystal Palace, where the Great Exhibition halls were being torn down. It sunk low enough to touch the top of the center post, where once massive buildings had housed engines of industry.
No one observed this odd behavior except two gin-soaked gentlemen. They watched the cloud slowly part, revealing itself to be, in actuality, a massive dirigible.
“Did we visit one of the opium dens this evening?” inquired one gentleman of the other, trying to explain away this hallucination.
“Dens? Hens?” said the second, tripping over a mulberry bush.
The two gentlemen swayed where they stood, leaning against each other, transfixed while the dirigible undertook a series of transformations. Dark figures swarmed up to the squeak decks and then climbed over the casings of the huge balloons, scrambling about with the aid of rope ladders, but looking, to the befuddled watchers, like so many four-legged ants.
Eventually, the ants unrolled a canvas banner that stretched the full length of the central balloon and read BLENHEIM’S BUILDERS & SAFETY INSPECTORS. FOR QUEEN AND COUNTRY. The ants then proceeded to rig scaffolding from the ship’s decks down to the ground. After these adjustments the airship looked quite convincingly as if it were part of the Crystal Palace deconstruction operation.
In Hyde Park the only way to hide something as huge as a floating school was to pretend it was a tradesman’s concern, a business that functioned through the use of day laborers. Anyone of note tempted to look must instantly look away in humiliation. After all, persons of consequence did not pay attention to buildings going up or down—they were too exposed. Anything to do with construction was highly embarrassing.
When Sophronia awoke the next day and trotted out on deck to investigate, she couldn’t read the legend spread above them, but at breakfast they were told what it said.
There were a few cries of outrage from the young ladies. After all, they didn’t want to be associated with builders any more than the aristocrats strolling through Hyde Park.
Monique was particularly upset. “We can’t be seen to be here, on a ship emblazoned with an advertisement! It’s simply too shocking! What if someone observes us disembarking?”
“Well, you’ll have to be careful no one does, won’t you? After all, young ladies shouldn’t be around building sites regardless of signage. You are, as of this moment, restricted indoors. Is that understood?” Mademoiselle Geraldine was firm on this matter.
They all nodded.
Sophronia entertained herself by imagining what kind of disguise might best facilitate escape. She couldn’t, after all, look like a builder. She hadn’t the physicality for it.
“I guess if I want to wander around, I’ll have to pretend to be a sootie,” she muttered. After all, most industries required the use of small wiry boys in some capacity.
Dimity was shocked. “Sophronia, first men’s garb and now lower-class men’s garb? The very idea!”
Sophronia admitted, “It is daring. Luckily, I have no reason to leave the ship. Yet.”
“You will not be allowed off school grounds regardless, ladies,” continued Mademoiselle Geraldine. “It’s too dangerous to parade around London without an escort. Those of you who have families in town will make special arrangements. For the rest, this is an educational jaunt, not a pleasure cruise.”
Preshea was upset. “But the shopping! I have been given an extra allowance in anticipation of this trip!” She emphasized the final p so sharply it almost popped the eardrum.
“It will wait, Miss Buss.”
“But Monique’s party!”
“That’s enough, Miss Buss.”
Preshea looked sulky.
Monique was smug. Her parents were in town preparing for the ball. She would be allowed to shop as much as she pleased.
So they lodged in Hyde Park, and their classes continued despite the tempting activities outside the windows. The view included the aristocracy taking the air, hackney cabs rolling by, and the certain knowledge that, just out of reach, were all the luxuries and privileges afforded by town.
It was maddening, for everyone except Sidheag. Even Agatha, normally reticent, yearned to take in a theatrical performance. “Or perhaps an opera. I do adore the opera.”
Sophronia ruminated over whether the ban was intended to drive them into transgression, or if there was some serious threat to the students that warranted keeping them holed up. The teachers were not revealing any secrets, and with only a few attempted escapes by some of the older girls, the day passed smoothly.
The only odd occurrence was later that night, when instead of Professor Braithwope for evening lessons, they were put in with the older girls under Professor Lefoux. This was their first experience with Vieve’s aunt as an instructor.
Professor Lefoux was patiently brilliant and moved through the topic—industrial sabotage, tea, and supply trains—with such rapidity it left most of the class, regardless of age, utterly confused. Then she began to fire off questions in such a way as to make them all feel stupid. It was a traumatic experience and left them fervently wishing for the nice, easygoing, friendly vampire of their ordinary schedule.
Professor Braithwope was a dedicated teacher, and he didn’t like to change his routine. A monster of habit, the vampire. What, then, could possibly draw him away?
His place was empty at the head table at supper, as was a guest spot set next to it.
“He has a visitor,” said Sophronia, nibbling at some fried haddock.
“Oh, you think so?” Dimity was much less interested in the goings on of teachers than Sophronia.
“I do. An important visitor.”
Halfway through the meal, when the main course was to be brought out, Professor Braithwope arrived with a gentleman in tow.
The gentleman was tallish, not overly thin or overly fat. He wore proper dress to the height of style but nothing more elaborate. He had a long face with lines about the eyes that suggested exhaustion, not humor, and the general pallor of an invalid or an accounting clerk. The most remarkable things about him were his hands, which were long and elegant, mothlike in the candlelight. Mademoiselle Geraldine insisted on candlesticks for supper. Gas, she said, was too harsh for food.
The stranger sat next to Professor Braithwope as though it pained him to do so, and took no food, only a little port.
Sidheag, following Sophronia’s gaze, said idly, “So that’s why Captain Niall was so anxious.”
“Captain Niall was anxious?”
“About coming to London. I thought it only that werewolves don’t like town, except the West End. Now I suspect that it has to do with him.”
Sophronia examined their visitor, trying to determine what it was about this man that the school’s werewolf would find objectionable. “Why him in particular?”
“Don’t you recognize our dear fanged member of the Shadow Council?”
“Goodness, no, why should I?”
Sidheag had been raised in Scotland but nevertheless enmeshed in supernatural politics. “True, he likes to stay out of the public eye, but that’s him, all right.”
“Him who?”
Sidheag nodded, firmly. “Funny me having information before you.”
Now Sidheag was simply being obstreperous.
“Are you telling me that is the potentate!” Sophronia hissed the revelation. Things began to click into place in her brain. Not unlike the workings of the oddgob machine. Could this be the school’s mysterious patron? Not just a vampire, not just the government, but Queen Victoria’s pet vampire?
Sidheag chewed a bit of fricassee of rabbit and new potatoes. “Looks like.”
The potentate glanced up and directly at them, as if sensing they were discussing him, although even with supernatural hearing there was no way he could possibly cut through the suppertime chatter all the way to the back of the room. Or could he?
Sophronia raised her water goblet in salute. Sidheag ignored him. As Lady Kingair, she was allied with werewolves. Wolves might shun polite society, but they equaled vampires in status.
Felix, observing this interchange, said from across the table, “Very unpleasantly august company you keep here, for a ladies’ seminary. Now, where’s the pudding course?”
“It doesn’t look like your teacher is too thrilled,” replied Sophronia.
Professor Shrimpdittle was looking bilious. He had a bright paisley scarf tied high about his neck. He was focused on his mutton and spinach with single-minded intent.
Felix said, “In no way are two vampires better than one.”
Especially not if you believe you’ve recently been bitten. “Are you certain it’s not the political power he wields?” Sophronia asked.
“Why, Ria, are you speaking in riddles? That’s sweet. I might almost think you wished to lure me in.” Felix batted long lashes at her.
The meal came to a close, the millet pudding and Norfolk dumplings consumed with gusto, especially by Pillover. Sophronia held back while most of the students crowded out through the door, eager for their brief spate of spare time before night classes began. The teachers let them go, lingering over their sherry or brandy, as nature dictated. In the case of Sister Mattie, nature dictated barley water.
Alone, Sophronia inched her way toward the front of the room. She pretended interest in some leftover nibbles at one of the tables. She watched the teachers out of the corner of her eye.
Professor Braithwope stood to take his leave, and the potentate clapped him on the shoulder in a fair imitation of jocularity. There was no real friendliness to the touch. I suppose they are nervous; one is inside the other’s territory. This ship, after all, belongs to Professor Braithwope by vampire law. So the potentate is imposing, whether invited or not.
She heard the potentate say, “For blood, queen, and country, Aloysius. You take a grave risk, my boy, a grave risk. You are to be commended.”
Professor Braithwope replied, mustache under control for once, “Thank you, sir. I shall do my best.” This was said in the tone of a son to his military father on the eve of battle.
Feeling she was pushing her luck, Sophronia drifted toward the exit, only to find herself accompanied by Professor Braithwope.
“Sir,” she said, politely.
“I don’t like how obsequious they all get when he is around,” said the vampire, as though answering a question she hadn’t asked.
“He is a very important person.”