Part 12 (1/2)

”At least I am smart enough to have an opinion,” snapped Felicity back.

Oh dear, thought Alexia, here we go. here we go. She wondered what a ”windle” was. She wondered what a ”windle” was.

”Oh,” Miss Hisselpenny gasped. ”I certainly do have an opinion about Mr. Tunstell. He is a brave and kindly gentleman in every way.”

Felicity gave Ivy an a.s.sessing look. ”And now here I sit, Miss Hisselpenny, thinking it is you you who is probably overly familiar with the gentleman in question.” who is probably overly familiar with the gentleman in question.”

Ivy blushed as red as her hat.

Alexia cleared her throat. Ivy should not have been so bold as to reveal her feelings openly to one such as Felicity, but Felicity was behaving like a veritable harpy. If this was a window into her behavior of late, no wonder Mrs. Loontwill wanted her out of the house.

”Stop it, both of you.”

Miss Hisselpenny turned big, beseeching eyes upon her friend. ”Alexia, are you certain you cannot see your way to allowing me to accompany you as well? I have never been in a dirigible, and I should so very much like to see Scotland.”

In truth, Ivy was vastly afraid of floating and had never before showed any interest in geography outside of London. Even inside London, her geographic concerns centered heavily on Bond Street and Oxford Circus, for obvious pecuniary reasons. Alexia Maccon would have to be a fool not to realize that Ivy's interest lay in Tunstell's presence.

”Only if you believe your mother and your fiance fiance can spare you,” said Lady Maccon, emphasizing that last in the hopes that it might remind Ivy of her prior commitment and force her to see reason. can spare you,” said Lady Maccon, emphasizing that last in the hopes that it might remind Ivy of her prior commitment and force her to see reason.

Miss Hisselpenny's eyes shone. ”Oh, thank you, Alexia!”

And there went the reason. Felicity looked as though she had just been forced to swallow a live eel.

Lady Maccon sighed. Well, if she must have Felicity as companion, she could do worse than to have Miss Hisselpenny along as well. ”Oh dear,” she said. ”Am I suddenly organizing the Lady's Dirigible Invitational?”

Felicity gave her an inscrutable look and Ivy beamed.

”I shall just head back to town to obtain Mama's permission and to pack. What time do we float?”

Lady Maccon told her. And Ivy was off and out the front door, never having told Alexia why she had jaunted all the way out to Woolsey Castle in the first place.

”I shudder to think what that woman will choose as headgear for floating,” said Felicity.

CHAPTER SIX

The Lady's Dirigible Invitational

Alexia could see it all in the society papers: Lady Maccon boarded the Giffard Long-Distance Airs.h.i.+p, Standard Pa.s.senger Cla.s.s Transport Model, accompanied by an unusually large entourage. She was followed up the gangplank by her sister, Felicity Loontwill, dressed in a pink traveling dress with white ruffled sleeves, and Miss Ivy Hisselpenny, in a yellow carriage dress with matching hat. The hat had an excessive veil, such as those sported by adventurers entering bug-infested jungles, but otherwise the two young ladies made for perfectly appropriate companions. The party was outfitted with the latest in air-travel goggles, earm.u.f.fs, and several other fas.h.i.+onable mechanical accessories designed to facilitate the most pleasant of dirigible experiences.

Lady Maccon was also accompanied by her French maid and a gentleman escort. There was some question as to the appropriateness of the gentleman, a ginger fellow who might have trod the boards on more than one occasion. It was thought odd that Lady Maccon was seen off by her personal secretary, a former butler, but the presence of her mother more than made up for this gaffe. Lady Maccon is one of London's premiere eccentrics; these things must be taken in stride.

The lady herself wore a floating dress of the latest design, with tape-down skirt straps, weighted hem, a bustle of alternating ruffles of teal and black designed to flutter becomingly in the aether breezes, and a tightly fitted bodice. There were teal-velvet-trimmed goggles about her neck and a matching top hat with an appropriately modest veil and drop-down teal velvet earm.u.f.fs tied securely to her head. More than a few of the ladies walking through Hyde Park that afternoon stopped to wonder as to the maker of her dress, and a certain matron of low scruples plotted openly to hire away Lady Maccon's excellent maid. True, Lady Maccon carried a garish foreign-looking parasol in one hand and a red leather dispatch case in the other, neither of which matched her outfit, but one must be excused one's luggage when traveling. All in all, Hyde Park's afternoon perambulators reported favorably on the elegant departure of one of the season's most talked-about brides.

Lady Maccon thought they must look like a parade of stuffed pigeons and found it typical of London society that what pleased them annoyed her. Ivy and Felicity would not leave off bickering, Tunstell was revoltingly bouncy, and Floote had refused to accompany them to Scotland on the grounds that he might be suffocated by an overabundance of bustle. Alexia was just thinking it was going to be a long and tedious journey when an impeccably dressed young gentleman hove into view. The leader of their procession, a frazzled s.h.i.+p's steward trying to steer them to their respective rooms, paused in the narrow pa.s.sageway to allow the gentleman to pa.s.s.

Instead, the gentleman stopped and doffed his hat at the parade of newcomers. The smell of vanilla and mechanical oil tickled Lady Maccon's nose.

”Why,” said Alexia in startlement, ”Madame Lefoux! What on Earth are you you doing doing here here?”

Just then, the dirigible jerked against its tethers as the ma.s.sive steam engine that drove it through the aether rumbled into life. Madame Lefoux stumbled forward against Lady Maccon and then righted herself. Alexia felt that the Frenchwoman had taken a good deal longer to do so than was necessary.

”Clearly we are not 'on Earth' for much longer, Lady Maccon,” said the inventor, dimpling. ”I thought, after our conversation, that I, too, would enjoy visiting Scotland.”

Alexia frowned. To travel so soon after opening a brand-new shop, not to mention leaving both her son and her ghostly aunt behind, seemed unwarranted. Clearly the inventor must be a spy of some kind. She would have to keep her guard up around the Frenchwoman, which was sad, as Alexia rather enjoyed the inventor's company. It was a rare thing for Lady Maccon to encounter a woman more independent and eccentric than herself.

Alexia introduced Madame Lefoux to the rest of her party, and the Frenchwoman was unflaggingly polite to all, although there might have been a slight wince upon seeing Ivy's eyeball-searing ensemble.

The same could not be said of Alexia's entourage. Tunstell and Ivy bowed and curtsied, but Felicity openly snubbed the woman, clearly taken aback by her abnormal attire.

Angelique, too, seemed uncomfortable, although the maid did curtsy as required by someone in her position. Well, Angelique had very decided opinions on proper attire. She probably did not approve of a woman dressing as a man.

Madame Lefoux gave Angelique a long and hard look, almost predatory. Lady Maccon a.s.sumed it had something to do with both of them being French, and her suspicions were confirmed when Madame Lefoux hissed something at Angelique in a rapid-fire undertone in her native tongue, too fast for Alexia to follow.

Angelique did not respond, turning her lovely little nose up slightly and pretending to be busy fluffing the ruffles on Lady Maccon's dress.

Madame Lefoux bade them all farewell.

”Angelique,” Lady Maccon addressed her servant thoughtfully, ”what was that?”

”It waz nothing of import, my lady.”

Lady Maccon decided the matter might wait for a later time and followed the steward into her cabin.

She did not remain inside for long, as she wished to explore the s.h.i.+p and be on deck to witness float-off. She had waited years to float the skies, having followed the development of airs.h.i.+p technology detailed in the Royal Society papers from a very young age. To be on board a dirigible at last was a joy not to be dampened by French mannerisms.

Once the last of the pa.s.sengers had boarded and been shown to their respective cabins, the crew cast off the rope tethers, and the great balloon hoisted them slowly into the sky.

Lady Maccon gasped to see the world retreating below them, people disappearing into the landscape, landscape disappearing into a patchwork quilt, and final, irrevocable proof that the world was, indeed, round.

Once they floated through normal air and were high up into the aether, a young man, dangerously perched at the very back of the engines, spun up the propeller, and, with steam emitting in great puffs of white out the back and sides of the tank, the dirigible floated forward in a northerly direction. There came a slight jolt as it caught the aetheromagnetic current and picked up speed, going faster than it looked like it ought to be able to go, with its portly boatlike pa.s.senger decks dangling below the ma.s.sive almond-shaped canvas balloon.

Miss Hisselpenny, who had joined Lady Maccon on deck, recovered from her own awe and began singing. Ivy had a good little voice, untrained but sweet. ”Ye'll take the high road,” she sang, ”and I'll take the low road, and I'll be in Scotland afore ye.”

Lady Maccon grinned at her friend but did not join her. She knew the song. Who didn't? It had been a forerunner in Giffard's dirigible travel marketing campaign. But Alexia's was a voice meant for commanding battles, not singing, as anyone who ever heard her sing took great pains to remind her.

Lady Maccon found the whole experience invigorating. The air up high was colder and somehow fresher than that of London or the countryside. She felt strangely comforted by it, as though this were her element. It must be the aether, she supposed, replete with its gaseous mix of aetheromagnetic particles.

However, she liked it far less the next morning when she awoke with a queasy stomach and a feeling of floating inside as well as out.

”Air travel takes some over like that, my lady,” said the steward, adding by way of explanation, ”derangement of the digestive components.” He sent round one of the s.h.i.+p's hostesses with a tincture of mint and ginger. Very little put Alexia off her food, and with the help of the tincture, she recovered a measure of her appet.i.te by midday. Part of the queasiness, she supposed, was the fact that she was readjusting her routine to that of daylight folk, after spending months conducting her business mainly at night.

Felicity only noticed that Alexia was getting new color in her cheeks.

”Of course, not just anyone looks good in a sun hat. But I do believe, Alexia, that you ought to make that sacrifice. If you are wise, you will take my advice in this matter. I know sun hats are not often worn these days, but I think someone of your unfortunate propensities might be excused the old-fas.h.i.+oned nature of the accessory. And why do you go gadding about with that parasol at all times of day and yet never use it?”