Dawn's Early Light (12 page)

She felt a tiny twinge of pain in her temples on admitting that.

“It's all about the details, isn't it?” Bill asked before motioning to the poop deck. “Now it's up to us to keep up appearances lest Crazy Captain Cornwich toss us both into the Atlantic.”

Grey plumes belched out from the stern, shrouding parts of the sky from view; and with what Eliza could only describe as a battle cry, Cornwich threw a few levers that shot the
Sea Skipper
forwards while the sudden lurch sent her back into Bill's arms.
I should be shrugging him off,
she thought, but she remained there a moment longer. Bill's smile was warm and unnervingly charming. The man gently pushed her forwards, back on her feet.

Silas handed out goggles to them all, barking up a few times to his dearly departed father, which slowed the process. Eliza considered the protective gear, which was as ramshackle as the airship itself. Over the keening of the wind, he shouted from the bridge, “We're meeting another airship just beyond the breakers. Can't risk landing so we'll be working airship to airship.” He then pointed to Eliza, “Greenhorn!” He threw her a pair of binoculars. “You're on watch.”

“But,” she began, fearing the answer, “we're not running with lights. What about our rendezvous?”

“She'll be running dark as well.” Cornwich saluted her. “Ye know what ta look for now!”

As Eliza slipped her goggles on over her face, adjusting them as best she could, she wondered idly if Wellington was worried about her. He was aware of Bill's intention to get the two of them into the smuggling channels of the Outer Banks. Perhaps it would bring them closer to agents of Usher. Wellington knew better than any of them what it meant to challenge them. Would he be worried for her?

She hoped he was. It was nice to have someone to worry about you. It meant that someone cared. For a long minute she tried to imagine the expression on his face if something went wrong tonight or—if the worst unfolded—if she were lost at sea.

Then she thought about Felicity. Would she distract Wellington from important things like worrying about his junior archivist? Would she
console
him in light of his loss? Eliza's hands clenched slowly into fists.

“Eliza,” Bill called to her, “what's got you all wound up?”

When he motioned to her fists, Eliza felt her skin, even amidst the cold chill of the altitude, prickle with heat. “Nothing. Just trying to stay warm.”

Bill shook his head. “Well, save it,” he whispered to her, and gave the nape of her neck a gentle rub. “This could be a long night.”

Suddenly she was able to direct her anger in his direction. Bill was the one who had gotten them on this stupid, rickety old airship that could well kill them both. If she wasn't the trusting type she might have thought that he was conspiring with Felicity, to keep her away from Wellington.

On that thought Eliza forcibly unclenched her jaw. Now she was starting to think like a giddy-headed schoolgirl—and that only made her angry at herself.

Yes, it was going to be a long night indeed.

“Look lively, lads!” the captain called as he turned back to the crew. “We are meeting some Frenchies out here tonight, willing to part with some of their fine cognac! Just no lighting any cigarettes until we're back upon God's green earth!”

Eliza looked up at the airbags creaking above their heads then back to Bill. “Do I even need to guess what is in those bladders?”

“Nope,” he said, cheerfully, “Hydrogen.”

“Well, this really shouldn't come as a surprise, now should it? It is after all cheaper to produce, lighter than air, easier for smugglers to obtain . . .”

“And flammable. I know these old ships have a protective coating, but that really doesn't do much.”

For a moment, there was nothing else that could be said, until, “You Americans are so quick to see a glass as half-empty, aren't you?”

He shrugged. “Easy to do when you're flying a bomb several hundred feet over the Atlantic Ocean.”

Bill has a point there,
she thought, turning her gaze to the port side of the ship. She managed to catch the tail end of a lighthouse's beacon before it disappeared into the darkness. Wellington was, no doubt, back in the hotel, fast asleep after Edison's “stirring” talk on science. Fast asleep, in the
guest
bed.

Alone.

Hopefully.

Across the celestial ocean before her, a patch of darkness caught her eye. There were no stars there, and this shadow was slowly growing in size. She brought her binoculars up to make out any kind of detail. Through the lenses, Eliza caught the faint flicker of deckhand lanterns.

“Contact!” she called. “Off the starboard bow!”

“Thar' she is!” called Silas, pointing to the shadow. “Man the grappling hooks and prepare the aeroplanks.”

“All righty then, curtain goin' up,” Bill said with a cheery grin.

With Cornwich and his crew focusing their attentions on the approaching airship, Eliza returned to the port side to focus her binoculars back to the shore. When the lighthouse flared to full brightness again, she could see tiny details emerge from the dark, such as the tower's unpainted façade. “So that's the Currituck Light?”

“That it is,” Bill said. “Time to see if anything about it strikes our fancy, peculiar, supernatural, or otherwise.”

A distant thrumming grew louder and louder in her ears as the incoming airship continued to block more and more of the stars above them. Cornwich and crew were not exhibiting any odd behaviours, their preparations typical for a business transaction from the looks of their firearms.

Her attention returned to the Currituck Light, its fixed white-red flash pattern apparently running on a ninety-second cycle. With the commotion growing around her and the drone of the approaching airship growing louder moment by moment, she was thankful for the binoculars. It gave her a bit of focus.

On entering a third cycle, the signal changed. The beacon was now a quickly pulsating scarlet.

“Bill,” she called, sharing her attentiveness between her partner and the glowing ruby suspended off port. “Are American lighthouses supposed to do that?”

Bill's mouth had just popped open to reply, when a solid, single beam of light shot out from the tip of the building, lanced out through the sky between the ships and into the distant dark of the ocean. Shadows quivered and trembled across both ships, the shaft of pure energy heating the air across the deck, throwing some of the crew into a panic and Cornwich into a complete and utter fit.

“What the hell is that?” Bill yelled after Eliza.

“Our job!” she shot back.

On the starboard side of the ship, she followed the curvature of the beam through the binoculars. “It's hitting something out there. I can't make out exactly what, but it's glowing white-hot.”

Bill leaned in closer to her. She looked over her shoulder at him, catching whispers of numbers. “That beam, if I'm calculatin' right, is reaching twenty miles. Maybe twenty-five.”

She offered Bill the binoculars. “A target buoy, maybe?”

“A bull's-eye from this range?” He lowered the binoculars, his face growing as pale as the beam of light between the ships. “That's mighty intimidatin'.”

The ships immediately winked back into darkness. The beam was gone. Eliza snatched back the binoculars and ran back to the port side. The Currituck Light was resuming its normal sequence, but she could just make out in the beacon's glare at least two men moving on a platform beneath the light. Both were motioning towards the two airships.

“Bill,” she called calmly over her shoulder, “we got to get out of here now.”

He looked down the side of the
Sea Skipper
to the dark, churning void hundreds of feet below them, then back to Eliza. “After you.”

T
he resort's modest theatre had been bulging at the seams with its guests, residents of neighbouring towns, and perhaps the odd scientist or two from nearby cities. The reception afterwards, however, was reserved for guests of the Retreat. That included Felicity and a rather anxious Wellington Thornhill Books.

Tonight's presentation had promised its audience—and Wellington could not help but smile into his teacup at the rather obvious pun—an electrifying evening, and it had been just that. The work that Edison and his employees specialised in brought the future ever closer to the present, and the possibilities of that future were limitless. Edison had stood at the front of the theatre, keeping everyone hanging on his words. He easily commanded attention and demanded respect. The talk painted an incredible picture of appliances in the home reducing arduous chores such as cooking and cleaning to mere minutes out of the day. Public transit systems, even personal motorcars, powered by electricity would whisk people across the frontier in a matter of days. For the grand finale of his seminar, the darkened theatre suddenly burst into a brilliance easily outshining what was the customary warm amber gaslight that had started their evening.

As Wellington joined the theatre in applause, he looked over to Felicity Lovelace who, much to his surprise and delight, wore an exceptional outfit for the evening. She was dressed in modest periwinkle blues accented with white lace. Her gloves seamlessly coordinated with her outfit so much in fact that it was hard to find where her gloves ended and the dress itself began. She returned his look to her, and the smile she was wearing brightened his world as Edison's light display had done only moments before. For a moment the archivist was struck by how breathtaking the librarian appeared.

From Colonials to Americans? Dear God, boy, you really are a man of low standards,
chided the ghost of his past.

Even fleeing across the Atlantic, he had not been able to shake his father's voice.

Still, he would not let the hauntings of his father spoil this evening. He had a beautiful, intelligent woman by his side, had just heard one of the greatest minds of science speak, and was currently mingling at an event that he might have only dreamed of attending a week earlier.

“It is a shame there are not more people here,” Felicity commented, looking around the room anxiously, “but if it increases our chances in having a brief audience with the man himself, I will not complain.”

“Indeed, Miss Lovelace.” Wellington smiled. It was a little off-putting that she was echoing his own musings. “But as we are guests of the Retreat, it's a privilege that we're getting this reception.”

“It really is fortunate happenstance that Professor Edison was presenting here in the Outer Banks,” she said softly, and lifted a glass of champagne from a passing server. After taking a sip, she continued, her voice slightly stronger, attracting a few glances from the other gentlemen. “Seeing as I'm here, vacationing from Richmond, Virginia, where I work as a science teacher.”

He nodded, glanced quickly around the two of them, and leaned in to Felicity. “A cover works at optimal efficiency when details are not shared openly.” He cleared his throat softly. “Or quite so deliberately.”

When he straightened up, the blush in Felicity's cheeks darkened. He raised his glass to her to show there were no hard feelings. It was a mistake easy enough to make.

“I'm sorry, Mr. . . .”

She really was new at this. “McPhearson.”

Felicity nodded quickly. “Yes, yes, yes, of course. I should have a better handle on our cover identities, considering how often I handle details for our . . . associates,” she said under her breath, chiding herself as she took a sip of her drink. Wellington hoped she was not going to drain the whole glass in short order. He did not want to deal with a tipsy woman again. He'd had quite enough of that working with Eliza.

“Tosh. I too am still learning exactly what is involved in this chosen profession of ours.”

“So very modest you are, Mr. McFarley.”

“McPhearson.”

She rolled her eyes. A rather endearing gesture on her part. “What I mean is, you have so much experience, and I can only imagine what additional stories you could tell. The Ministry only made a few choice cases available to us.” Her smile widened as she focused her gaze intently on him. “The things you could teach me.”

He took a deep breath and sighed. “Truth be told, I find myself trying to reeducate myself on a great many things.”

She tipped her head to one side, and blinked at him. “Such as?”

Now it was Wellington's turn to blush. “I had grown quite comfortable in my life in the Archives. Being here as a full field agent?” He forced a smile as he looked at her. “Not what I expected.”

Felicity gave a soft laugh and ran her finger down the stem of her champagne flute. “I suppose that is something else we share in common, Mr. Books.” And with that she set down her glass, opened her fan, held it up to her face, then quickly switched it from her right hand to her left hand, angled it lower, and then returned her gaze to his.

“McPhearson.”

Felicity shook her head quickly and gave an exasperated sigh. “Yes, yes, yes . . . of course.” And then she turned her attention back to her fan, checking her hand, assuring herself it was in her left hand, and that it was low enough that it didn't conceal all of her face.

“Miss Lovelace—”

“Felicity, Mr.”—she took a moment, and then spoke with great satisfaction—“McPhearson. Please. You British are so formal.”

He began again. “Felicity, is it too warm in here for you?”

“Whatever do you mean?”

“Well, it is most comfortable here in the parlour, and yet you have your fan out.” His brow furrowed. “Were you wanting to retire before meeting Professor Edison?”

“Oh, no! No-no-no-no,” she protested, collapsing her fan. She then waved the object in her left hand and smiled brightly. “Just a bit flushed perhaps. I will just go on and carry my fan. In my left hand.”

“Very well,” Wellington replied. “A bit odd, seeing as you are right-handed.”

Felicity tipped her head to one side and picked her glass back up in the other hand. “That may be, but I will be carrying my fan—for the remainder of the evening—in my
left
hand.”

“All right then,” he said, wondering what was driving her conviction in carrying it in such a particular manner.

Felicity gave an awkward nod, and polished off the champagne remaining in her glass. Her elation appeared to be yielding to frustration.

His mother had never lived long enough to educate him on the complexities of women, and his father had certainly never been bothered with the thoughts or concerns of the fairer sex. As for Eliza, she was as complex as she was alluring. On longer consideration, nothing really came easy when it involved the explosive Eliza D. Braun.

Wellington turned towards a bay window overlooking an elaborate light display illuminating the shore outside. The electric diorama, easily covering the same area as two cricket fields, depicted the iconic United States Capitol building, the White House, the Smithsonian, and an American flag. The coloured lights in the flag flickered to another position, and then flickered to a third position seconds later, cycling back to the original. Running between the buildings was a miniature steam locomotive illuminated by amber, blue, and green lights. Normally, such gaudy displays of splendour Wellington found to be a bit pretentious; but in this instance, basking in the brilliance of technology, he found himself breathless with wonder.

He was startled by the feel of a hand sliding into the crook of his arm. He glanced down to find Felicity nestled up against him. She tapped her fan in her left hand and grinned up at him.

Perhaps hysteria was contagious. There certainly seemed to be a lot of it about.

“For my next trick,” came a gravelly voice from behind them, “I will create a timer that will run the animation automatically. That way, I won't have to pay someone to sit out there and work the breakers manually. It will cut down on the display's costs.”

Wellington felt Felicity's grip on his arm tighten to painful levels as they turned in unison to meet their host for the evening. Even at fifty-three, Thomas Alva Edison carried himself with upright and stern confidence. Two large men stood behind him. One looked as if he had spent some time training for a bare-knuckles boxing match and the other—now taking a moment to really look at the man—was no man at all. Edison's second attendant was completely mechanical in design, perhaps adding to Edison's confidence no harm would befall him. While both bodyguards were opposites in basic nature, they did have one thing in common: a modest silver badge on their lapels that read
PINKERTON NATIONAL DETECTIVE AGE
NCY
.

Edison's gaze seemed to read them both, giving Wellington a moment's pause with Felicity as she was obsessively fiddling with her fan once more. Steeling himself, Wellington swiftly placed his empty glass onto a passing servant's tray and extended his hand.

“Reginald McPhearson, Professor,” Wellington began. “Words cannot tell you—”

“Speak up,” Edison barked, leaning towards him. “The incessant babble of this room is highly distracting.”

“Reginald McPhearson,” Wellington said a touch louder. “Words cannot tell you”—he looked around with some embarrassment; now he felt he was sharing his adoration of Edison with the entire parlour—“what a pleasure it is to meet you.”

Edison's handshake conveyed quite a bit; his grasp was firm, borderline uncomfortable. He used just enough force to let Wellington know that he was, in fact, the preeminent male in this room, and perhaps within several hundred miles. Over Edison's shoulder, the smartly dressed automaton looked at Wellington, then turned with a hiss of steam and symphony of clicks and whirls to look back over the crowd.

“A man of science, are you?” Edison's eyes twinkled with what might have been amusement. He reached over his shoulder and rapped his knuckle against the automaton. “I see you practically taking apart my Shocker here. Do I perceive correctly, Mr. McPhearson?”

“Strictly a tinker,” Wellington said, still speaking far louder for polite conversation. “Nothing on the scale of what you do.”

“No, I would not think so,” he stated firmly. “If you were, you would be delivering lectures, not listening to them.” And he waved dismissively to the crowd behind him as if they were merely flies come to sip his particular brand of honey. Maybe they were.

Wellington gave an awkward nod, noodling through what Edison had just said as best he could. Was that a slight against his pursuits? He could not dismiss a distinct impression that he had just been jabbed in the kidneys while his back was turned.

“IT WAS QUITE THE SEMINAR YOU DELIVERED TONIGHT,” Felicity bellowed, scattering Wellington's thoughts and, from the lull in the parlour, all of those attending the reception. “I WAS SO GLAD TO BE PART OF IT ALL.”

Edison, completely unfazed by Felicity's powerful volume, raised his eyebrows as he turned to look at her. His expression softened considerably. “A woman interested in the sciences? Now
there's
an invention. An oddity in fact. Like a monkey learning to dance.”

She gave a polite laugh—which also sounded far too loud to be proper—and gestured over at Wellington as she shouted, “YES, IT HAS BEEN QUITE THE EVENING FOR MYSELF AND MR. MCFERGINSON.”

“McPhearson,” Wellington and Edison spoke in unison.

Edison snapped his fingers and a waiter appeared with a tray of goblets. Wellington noted this man quite apt in avoiding the other attendees. When he tasted the drink, he understood why. This was, apparently, the host's personal stock.

“Dear lady, while I do appreciate your consideration, I am not completely deaf,” Edison quipped. He then patted her on the arm, much like one would a child if they had just skinned their knee on cobblestones in Hyde Park. “Perhaps if you loosened your corset a touch, it might reinvigorate blood flow to the brain.” He then gestured to Wellington. “Also might help you remember the name of this polite, dapper gent what's your escort.”

“Yes,” Felicity stammered. She appeared to be struggling against her blushing, but it was a totally lost cause. “Seeing as I extended the invitation to him for this evening. Highly forward, I know.”

“But so refreshing.” His eyes did seem to dip a little more than was appropriate away from her face, towards other, more corseted regions. “Thumbing your nose to convention, tradition, and manners, all in the name of science?”

“And progress,” she added.

His polite laughter abruptly ended as he suddenly turned on Wellington. “And her forwardness did not alarm your sensitive British manner at all, Mr. McPhearson?”