Betina Krahn (40 page)

Next door, Titus was having no better time of it. The reverend’s and brigadier’s vigorous snoring from the next
room kept him awake and for the first hour or two he silently cursed the surprisingly thin walls. When he eventually did fall asleep, he saw fish—thousands of them, all shapes and sizes—staring at him in despair, their eyes plaintive and entreating.

Just before dawn he awakened to fading sobs and found himself cradling a pillow against him, trying to comfort … It took a moment for him to realize that it was that fish again, the one with the marvelous tail. Only this time it had arms as well as legs … and hair … lots of long blond hair …

They were all relieved when the porter knocked on the door to awaken them. Everyone gathered in the hotel dining room for breakfast, but Celeste couldn’t make herself eat a thing. Titus reached for her hand and she looked up with her heartache visible in her eyes.

“I have to see Prospero and Ariel.”

Titus signed for their breakfast and ushered her toward the door. As they hurried across the lobby, Titus glanced back to see a line of Atlanteans trailing behind them. “They’re our sacred dolphins,” Nana said stubbornly when Titus questioned the wisdom of their coming along. “We’ve a right to see what those awful men have done with them.”

It took three hansom cabs to carry them all to Covent Garden, where they disembarked into a throng of people patronizing the shops and stalls and street entertainment. From there, they had to traverse a few blocks to come to the building where Bentley housed his dolphin exhibit. They stopped across the street, staring at the building and the long line of people waiting to get inside.

A few blandishments had been added to attract new customers since Titus’s last visit. Red and white striped bunting now draped the front of the building, and a barker’s platform had been added beside the ticket booth. There were two life-sized painted cutouts amid the cloth drapes; one a dolphin and the other a blond mermaid wearing a bodice made of two large mussel shells.

It was supposed to be
her
, Celeste realized. The Lady Mermaid. Humiliation burned her cheeks. There was no mistaking the place for anything but a cheap sideshow. This was Bentley’s idea of an important educational experience? An encounter between man and dolphin?

She started for the door, but Titus grabbed her hand and brought her up short. “They won’t just let you in,” he said. “We’ll have to buy a ticket.”

“I will not,” she declared, pointing at the place, her countenance blazing. “They have my dolphins in there—they’re trading on my name, my work, and my book—the least they can do is
let me in!
”

She pulled from his grip and headed for the door. The Atlanteans bustled along after her, huffing and puffing, while Titus groaned and ran to catch up with them. They charged straight past the indignant looks and glares of the people in line and nudged through the crowd at the door.

“Tickets,” the burly doorkeeper demanded.

“I don’t have a ticket,” Celeste said stubbornly. “And I do not intend to purchase one to see my own dolphins.”

“This is Celeste Ashton,” Titus hastily explained. “She is the Lady Mermaid … the owner of these dolphins.”

The fellow stared at him through narrowed eyes, as if recalling him. “These here dolphins”—he jerked a thumb over his shoulder—“belongs t’ Mr. Bentley. And don’t nobody get in fer
free
.”

“Well,” Titus said adamantly, “there is always a first time.” He started to push through the door with Celeste, but the fellow brought an arm as thick as a tree trunk down across the door opening.

“Naw, there ain’t.”

“Oh, but there is.” Nana’s voice came clear and strong. “Isn’t there, Brigadier?”

There was a clamor from the rear, and in a moment the streetwise tough was inundated by the Atlantean Society … chiding, shaking fingers and fists. No amount of cargo hauling or alley fighting or barroom bullying could have
prepared him for dealing with a determined gang of sexagenarians, led by a silver-haired grandmother, a brawny brigadier, and a scripture-spouting reverend.

Behind her back, Nana waved Celeste and Titus through, and they backed away and hurried down the entry ramp into the arena. Bentley’s minions had added lime and sawdust to the floors, hung a few canvas partitions to blot out some of the more unsightly areas, and draped more of those garish buntings on the railings. As before, there were the two large tanks and a platform along the top for viewing. But, unlike before, there was a rotten smell coming from the exhibit, and it worsened the closer they got.

Celeste headed for the platform, and Titus was hard put to keep up with her as she squeezed through the crowd and headed up the steps. All around her there was grumbling about the smell and the fact that the dolphins couldn’t be seen. Burrowing past elbows and ducking around shoulders, she made her way to the front and pressed against the board railing. She was stunned by what she saw.

There were the two large tanks Titus had described: crude metal contraptions, rough-edged and rusty in spots, filled with dingy-looking water that had an oily film and floating pieces of fish around the edges. With her heart pounding, she leaned out as far as she dared and searched the water for sign of a dolphin.

“Prospero? Ariel?” she called out, frantically. Then she thought to try a sharp whistle. The other patrons scowled, made comments on her manners, and even threatened to report her to the owner.

“The owner?” She felt bile rising up the back of her throat. “Go right ahead and call him. I have a few choice words for that despicable man.”

While the other patrons glowered and gave Celeste a wide berth, Titus worked his way through the press of bodies toward her. “Rap on the tank,” he called. “Get down on your knees and knock on the side of the tank!”

She ducked under the rail and stretched down to find the
side of the tank. Locating it, she used her knuckles to rap out her call. It wasn’t long before she got the response she had hoped for. A gray dolphin beak soon appeared and a head and eyes came after it.

“There it is!” a nearby patron called, from behind a handkerchief.

“Ooooo—it’s ugly!” declared another.

“What’s wrong with it? Is it bleeding?” came still another voice.

There were gasps and mutters as more of the dolphin appeared. One of the gasps was Celeste’s. The gash on Prospero’s beak and the bruiselike darkness around his eye both looked terrible and she could swear his skin looked thinner and duller than when she last saw him.

“Prospero?” she called, forcing his name past the tears collecting in her throat. “Here, boy! It’s Celeste—” She stretched out a hand as far as she could, but he didn’t respond. When she rapped again on the tank, he rallied and tried to follow the sound. “Prospero,” she moaned softly, “what have they done to you?”

He opened his mouth and gave a few caws and squeaks, and she sat up on her knees and looked wildly about for Titus. She spotted him nearby and looked over the edge of the platform, outside the round tank. It was at least ten feet to the floor. “I have to get down there with him,” she called, looking with dismay at the crowd blocking her exit.

“Wait.” He slid down the edge of the platform, grabbed the railing, and lowered himself over the edge. Then he dropped the last six feet to the floor. Dusting himself off, he hurried over to help her down. Together, they crept around the edge of the tank to the canvas partition that now formed a backdrop for the exhibit. Another platform stood at the rear, between the tanks, partly constructed and not yet connected to the ground by steps. Titus spotted a wooden ladder lying to the side and carried it to the platform.

There was commotion among the patrons when they saw her and Titus climbing up onto the half-finished catwalk.
The other patrons weren’t certain if this was meant to be a part of the “show” or not. Titus went first, walking along the planks that had been laid in place, then reaching for Celeste’s hand.

Soon, she was kneeling on the planking beside the tank, calling Prospero. The dolphin came to her rhythmic slap of the water and she rubbed and stroked his head with both hands, inspecting his battered eye and the cut on his beak. She couldn’t speak, could hardly see for the tears welling in her eyes. As Prospero pressed against her hands and tried to get closer to her, she struggled to swallow the lump in her throat. She stroked and reassured him, speaking to him in calm, earnest tones, telling him that she would find a way to free him.

Then she leaned over the tank, smacking the surface of the water, and Prospero rolled onto his side and waved his flipper. His injured flipper. Her heart stopped when she saw the gash, which seemed to be going bad in this putrid water. “They
have
hurt you,” she choked out. “Oh, Prospero.”

Titus took hold of her shoulders from behind. “Over here. I think this is Ariel.” She managed to turn and slide across the narrow platform to the other tank. Titus had rapped on the tank and brought the second dolphin to the surface.

“It
is
Ariel,” she said. She smacked the water and held her breath as Ariel swam listlessly toward her, then veered off at the last moment. “Here, Ariel, it’s me … Celeste.”

Again and again, Celeste called and coaxed her and she finally edged close enough for Celeste to touch. She stroked Ariel to reassure her, but the more she touched the dolphin, the more alert and frantic the dolphin became.

Suddenly Ariel began to dart around the tank … this way and that … bumping into the walls, disoriented and unable to right herself. Celeste called repeatedly, but when Ariel finally came to the surface again, she made strange little yipping cries that sounded like a lost child’s. Then she resumed her erratic swimming and banging into the walls.

Celeste looked up at Titus, her breaking heart visible in her eyes.

“She must be sick … she keeps bumping into the walls …”

Titus took her hands in his, keenly aware of the scores of eyes trained on them. “I’m sorry, Celeste. We’ll do everything we—”

“You up there!” an irate male voice shouted. “Come down from there this minute or I’ll have the constables on you!”

Surprised, they looked for the source of that voice and finally peered over the edge of the catwalk to the ground below. There stood P. T. Bentley in his dapper gray suit and silk top hat. Beside him was one of his hulking employees and a uniformed constable brandishing a nightstick stood at his back. When he saw Celeste, his eyes widened with what could only be called pleasure.

“Well, well … if it isn’t the Lady Mermaid herself.”

“
MR. BENTLEY
.”
CELESTE
clung to the edge of the platform to steady herself and watched Bentley stroll over to the bottom of the ladder and hold up a nattily gloved hand.

“Allow me to help you down, Miss Ashton. That really is no place for a lady.” His sardonic tone rasped her already frayed control. She jerked her skirts out of the way and climbed down the ladder without his assistance. Her feet had scarcely touched the ground when she turned on him.

“How dare you come to my cove under the guise of learning more about the creatures of the sea … in order to steal my dolphins?”

“Your dolphins?” He took a step back, affecting dismay at her accusation. “My dear Miss Ashton, I assure you, I have stolen nothing from you. After you declined my offer of a lucrative and mutually beneficial partnership, I merely entered into an agreement with another party and went in search of my own dolphins. These specimens were caught fairly … in open sea.”

“These
specimens
are called Prospero and Ariel … two dolphins from my group.” She felt Titus at her back, strengthening and supporting her. “I know their markings and their faces as well as I know my own. Even Titus—Professor Thorne recognized Prospero.”

“This is unconscionable, Bentley,” Titus said, his voice low and angry.

“What is unconscionable, Professor?” Bentley said, crossing his arms and raking them with a desultory look. “That I am making money hand over fist, despite Miss Ashton’s high-and-mighty rejection of my idea?”

“Money? That is what you’re after?” Titus’s mind began to race.

“And what is wrong with money, Professor? You British bear a curious contempt for anything that smacks of ‘commerce.’ Odd sentiment for a nation of
shopkeepers
, don’t you think?”

“Very well. If money is all that matters to you, then how much would you take to turn the dolphins over to us?” Titus said. “Five hundred pounds? A thousand? Two thousand?”

“A provocative question, Professor. However, I don’t recall saying that money was
all
that mattered to me.” Bentley strolled a bit closer to Celeste, running his gaze over her. “I intend to keep these dolphins.”

“Only to mistreat and abuse them, the same as you did the friendship Miss Ashton and her grandmother extended to you,” Titus said.

“The dolphins are getting sick in that filthy water,” Celeste said, pointing to the tanks with a trembling hand. “There are rotting fish parts floating in it—dolphins eat whole fish, not chum. They’re starving, Mr. Bentley,
starving
. Both have gashes and cuts that need attention or they will never heal in that foul water.”