Empire of Ruins Read online

  When the tea was ready, Mr. Socrates directed everyone to gather at the bow of the airship. Octavia brought a tray of teacups, graham wafers, and a hot teapot, cursing silently when the hem of her dress caught on the wicker siding. She had to be so careful in this contraption.

  As she served everyone it dawned on her that they were all gathered at the same end. Why hadn’t the thing tipped and thrown them to their deaths? It remained perfectly level.

  Her ponderings were interrupted by Lizzie grunting, “No coffee?”

  “The aroma of coffee would only spoil the view,” Mr. Socrates answered, sniffing the air. “My goodness! I feel twenty years younger.”

  “You look it, sir,” Modo said.

  He was quite a quillin’ suck-up some days, Octavia decided. A smack to the side of the head might cure that.

  “So you’re feeling ninety, then, sir?” Octavia asked sweetly.

  This got a smile out of Mr. Socrates and, more surprising, Tharpa laughed out loud. She’d begun to think the man was as humorless as a stone.

  “I appreciate your attempt at cleverness, Octavia,” Mr. Socrates said. “The truth is I’ve been out of the field far too long. I’d forgotten how exhilarating it is.”

  She glimpsed the man he must have been many years ago. A young officer. A conqueror. With thousands of similar men exploring, no wonder Britain controlled most of the world.

  Mr. Socrates slapped Tharpa’s back. “It reminds me of our time in Africa, remember that?”

  “Of course I do, sahib.”

  “This is Australia! And to think we’re traversing it by air. We’ve come along much faster than I had expected,” Mr. Socrates said above the engine’s noise. “Thanks to my propeller design! Oh, and Lizzie’s piloting, of course. You must sense the wind streams up here, you’ve done a marvelous job.”

  “Coffee would have been nice,” she huffed, and downed the last of her tea.

  They returned to their stations. Octavia, with little to do, paced the car, watching the sky and ground. She knew they were traveling at high speed, but it seemed as though they weren’t moving at all.

  She stole the occasional glance at Lizzie, watching her run the wheel and adjust the levers. Octavia couldn’t tell the purpose of much of the equipment.

  She found herself drawn to Lizzie’s facial tattoos. She would be an attractive, though hard-looking, woman without them. It took a certain amount of courage to mark your face permanently like that; to say, “This is who I am, take it or shove off.”

  She remembered the package Mrs. Finchley had given her, and dug in her rucksack until she found it. When she unwrapped the present and saw the contents, she couldn’t suppress a giggle.

  A pair of trousers! Perfectly sewn, khaki colored, and softer than any material a man would wear—but trousers! She read the note in Mrs. Finchley’s tidy handwriting:

  Dear Tavia,

  A dress has no place on an airship. These trousers will make your journey easier and safer. Do change back into your more elegant clothing the moment you see signs of civilization.

  Sincerely,

  Mrs. Finchley

  Oh, how she would hug the woman the moment they next met. Trousers!

  It was another hour before they slowed and lowered the ship to a mountain steppe to “use the facilities,” as Mr. Socrates so eloquently put it. She climbed out of the car and down the silk ladder, then changed behind a mulberry bush. The air was colder than she’d expected. She moved her stiletto sheath from her left thigh onto her belt. Mrs. Finchley had given her handy button-up pockets and loops for attaching things to—even a hidden pocket. With her dress thrown over her shoulder, she appreciated how much easier it was to get up the ladder in trousers. No one said anything about her attire, but Modo gave her an amused look.

  Soon the airship passed over a town in a green, mountainous region. It looked to be little more than a collection of rectangles and squares. “That’s Murrurundi,” Lizzie said.

  “Yes. Of course,” Mr. Socrates said. “We’re doing well, and five thousand feet seems a perfect height.”

  Octavia peered over the side. “Five thousand feet?”

  “Yes, Octavia, we’re flying higher than most mountains in Australia.”

  She couldn’t even make out any people in the town. She knew there must be some down there, staring up and trying to determine the source of that mechanical noise from above.

  Modo, his wooden mask now pulled tightly over his face, joined her at the starboard side of the car. She hadn’t noticed him put it on, but could see that he was more hunched over and shorter than before. His dark hair was thinner now too.

  She pointed over the side and down. “Imagine, Modo, the natives look up at us as though we’re gods. Of course, if we happened to fall out we’d be flatter than a farthing.”

  “Don’t remind me.”

  She laughed.

  “You’ve put on your mask, Modo. Does it protect you from the headwinds?”

  “It’s necessary, that’s all.”

  “How did that French spy react when she saw your face?” she whispered. She hadn’t intended ever to ask him such a question, but clearly her anger was still there. She’d thought she was done with all that.

  Behind the mask, Modo’s eyes met hers. “She turned away from me.”

  “I see.” Octavia paused, then asked, “Did you show your face to her willingly?”

  “I did.”

  “You did?” she whispered a little too harshly.

  He glanced over his shoulder at Mr. Socrates, then back at her. “Would you like to see it, Tavia?” he said quietly. “I could show you now.”

  “No,” she said, deciding suddenly that this was the right course. “I don’t care if I ever see it.”

  “Then that’s the way it will be,” he declared, and returned to his station next to the firebox.

  “Yes, it is,” she said hoarsely.

  She looked out at the skyline; the sun was getting lower. She was surprised to feel tears in her eyes. She wiped them away, relieved no one else could see them.

  A Speck in the Darkening Sky

  For Modo, the first night in the Prince Albert was nowhere near as comfortable as the Langham Hotel or even the Rag and Famish. First, they all had to “use the facilities” one last time before sleeping. That involved lowering the airship close to the ground, hooking the anchor in the gray limbs of a lone snow-gum tree, and climbing down the fifty-foot silk ladder. That in itself was an adventure, the silk being such a wisp that it was like grabbing air. Still, it held him and the other two men all at once.

  When they were finished, they climbed back up into the car and the women took their turns.

  Later, when everyone was aboard, they floated a hundred feet above the earth, sleeping in shifts. Modo had first watch, and stared into the darkness below or the sky above, not sure what enemy he should be looking for. He imagined natives climbing up the anchor rope and spearing them while they slept. Or, for that matter, convicts who’d escaped the prison islands could still be roaming around this bush. They might just open fire from the ground. Bullets could puncture the balloon. They’d be stranded.

  When he wasn’t squinting at the darkened landscape, he examined the moon and stars. They seemed closer. If only the airship could travel a few feet higher, perhaps he could reach out and touch them.

  He hadn’t been joking when he offered to show his face to Octavia. He would have done it. He was tired of her wondering what he looked like. Nor did it matter to him anymore that he wasn’t supposed to show his face without Mr. Socrates’ permission. Tharpa saw it every day. Mrs. Finchley did too. Why not Tavia? Since he’d met her eight months earlier, hiding his face from her had become a weight that he carried even when they were apart. She was always in his thoughts; in fact, at times it seemed that his every second thought was about her.

  Truthfully, when it came to Tavia he was being an impostor. He removed his mask, looked out at the world, and let the light of
the stars fall upon his face. This is the real me.

  Something creaked behind him, and out of habit, he quickly pushed the mask back on and flipped up his hood to hide his tufty red hair. He swung around, only to find it was Tharpa.

  “It’s my watch now, young sahib,” he said. “You sleep.”

  Modo rolled up his greatcoat as a pillow and lay down a few inches from Tharpa’s feet. It was cold—his breath was turning to plumes of frost, but the buffalo blankets were thick enough to keep the chill at bay. After several minutes he managed to fall asleep.

  It seemed only seconds later when he awoke to Mr. Socrates poking him with his walking stick.

  “You’re getting a little too comfortable, Modo. And you’re snoring.”

  “It’s his way of frightening away enemies,” Octavia said. “A useful skill, sir.”

  Modo grinned, blinking away the sleep, shielding his eyes from the sunlight. He eagerly accepted a cup of tea from Octavia, who said, “I added two spoons of sugar, exactly how you like it.”

  An unexpected attempt at a truce. “Thank you,” he said. And the tea was indeed exactly as he liked it.

  Soon, Tharpa lifted the anchor, Lizzie lit the boiler, and Modo stood at his station feeding the firebox. The steam engine shook and rattled loudly to life, the propeller began to turn, and they were sailing north.

  The landscape was forested and flat, the mountains long behind them. If Mr. Socrates’ calculations were correct, they were traveling at over twenty-eight miles an hour. Not as fast as a train, but then, they never had to slow down for tricky terrain or a town. In yesterday’s sixteen-hour voyage, Modo calculated, they would have traveled nearly 448 miles.

  By evening, the ground below looked like grassland and sandstone, with occasional shrubs tossed here and there. Modo spotted a hut with the spyglass, but there were no roads or other signs of inhabitants.

  “Deserted,” Modo said. “We could be floating over the moon.”

  “There are stock riders and duffers down there,” Lizzie said harshly.

  Modo couldn’t tell if her tone was defensive or if she always spoke that way. “And jumbuckers, too,” she added.

  “Yes, there are sheep down there and, one must presume, sheep herders,” Mr. Socrates noted. “Lizzie’s correct, but she sometimes forgets that we don’t all know the secret language of the bush.”

  “I’m sorry, Mr. Socrates,” she barked. “I shall use fancy talk from this point forward.”

  “Ah, Lizzie, that would be kind of you,” Mr. Socrates said. “I should perhaps have told you all that Lizzie is the first of her tribe to be educated. A grand accomplishment.”

  “But keep in mind, there are many different kinds of education,” she said, sounding a little hoity-toity. “And I’m half a breed, as polite society puts it. So perhaps it was my British side that took to the kind of education of which Mr. Socrates speaks.”

  “Fancy talk, indeed,” laughed Mr. Socrates, “but never mind your education. You certainly are one of the most accomplished navigators and balloonists I have known. I remember how you’d carry gold from my mine to Sydney via balloon. Not one failed flight or missed deadline.”

  “You were a miner?” Octavia asked Mr. Socrates.

  “I was a mine owner, and that’s a long story. But it was where I first became aware of Lizzie’s talent for floating through the air.”

  “It’s where I belong,” she said softly.

  That night they anchored themselves to a spindly tree in a nearly barren forest beside a giant salt lake. The land around was grassy, sandy, and arid. Absolutely no sign of human life. The only visible living beings were birds in the water: some sort of stork. Tharpa and Mr. Socrates shot two of the black-necked birds and the group dined on freshly cooked fowl. Modo was thankful that the night was much warmer than the previous. He dispensed with the buffalo blankets and used only a thin wool one.

  The next morning Mr. Socrates awakened everyone early. “We’re going to push right through to our destination.”

  Before the sun had crested the horizon, they were sailing through the sky again. After a couple of hours, mountains rose out of the earth and blue rivers flowed between them. Modo felt as though what was passing under him weren’t real. How could a mountain look so small?

  As each hour ticked by, Mr. Socrates became more excited. He kept checking his instruments and staring through the spyglass. “We’re nearing the Pacific!” he shouted finally, and at that moment the humid scent of the ocean wafted through the air. Modo was warm and tempted to take off his cloak, but that would have left his hump visible.

  By late afternoon the land below them was a beautiful shade of dark green, lush and thick. So thick that Modo couldn’t imagine how they’d land. Other than the occasional river, there didn’t seem to be even the slightest break in the foliage. He’d read about the creatures that lived in the rain forest. It must surely teem with life!

  The firebox was set for the next half hour, so Modo went to the bow of the ship and tried to glimpse the Pacific, but it wasn’t visible yet. He also kept his eyes on a gray wall of forbidding clouds that had gathered in the west. They looked powerful enough to blow the airship out over the ocean.

  Mr. Socrates unfolded the map to the Egyptian temple and Modo shivered in anticipation. After all this time and travel, they were finally this close!

  “Follow that river,” Mr. Socrates directed Lizzie.

  She turned the ship and they were soon floating over a river that ran through a gorge.

  “Everyone watch for lightning,” Mr. Socrates said. “We don’t want to be pinned on the end of Zeus’s bolts. We’d be blown to smithereens!” He said this with a chuckle, and Tharpa began to laugh.

  “They are reliving their youths,” Octavia whispered to Modo, elbowing him in the ribs as though they were sharing a joke.

  “So, see anything interesting?” she asked a moment later.

  He saw her, that much he knew; her slightly upturned nose, her look of guile, the eye-catching freckles on her cheeks—he saw all these things. Despite lack of sleep and no proper washing facilities, her beauty had not diminished in the slightest. And the trousers just made her more … he searched for a good word … jaunty? Daring?

  “All I see is the green earth and the blue—make that gray—sky,” he said.

  “Are you feeling more comfortable at this height now?”

  “I was never uncomfortable!” He kept his voice steady.

  “Ah, I know you better than that, Modo. Remember, I crossed the Atlantic with you, all wobbly-legged from seasickness. Your legs look steadier today.”

  “You judge me by my legs?” he said.

  “Well, the mask hides your face, so I cannot judge you by your smile. Besides, they’re a fine example of legs.”

  He blushed behind the mask. She was always playing games with him: one moment angry, the next joking, then his closest friend and a confidante. Their conversations felt like chess games, and he was constantly three moves behind.

  “Nice of you to notice,” he finally said. “Do you see anything out there?”

  “Well …” She turned her gaze away from him and it was as if someone had turned off a spotlight. “There’s a bank of dark clouds on our left.”

  “On the port side, you mean,” he corrected.

  “Yes, yes, port. My apologies, Captain Modo. Ensign Milkweed can be such a dunce at times! There’s no lightning that I can see.” She squinted. “How high did Mr. Socrates say we were?”

  “Right now? Three thousand feet above sea level.”

  “Do you know how high hawks can fly?”

  “No,” Modo said.

  She pointed at the clouds. “What’s that?”

  He followed her finger and for several seconds he thought she was seeing things. Then he spotted a black speck moving within the gray mass of clouds.

  “Mr. Socrates!” Modo said, his voice quavering a little. It couldn’t be a hawk. The shape was all wrong. “There’s an ob
ject in the sky. Directly to port and forty-five degrees up.”

  Mr. Socrates grabbed his spyglass. His face grew grim; his jaw tensed. “Tharpa, unlash the carbines!” he commanded. “We’re about to have visitors.”

  The Sparrow and the Hawk

  In the few moments it took Tharpa to load his rifle and join them on the port side, the object had disappeared into a fold of clouds.

  “What is it?” Modo asked.

  “Adjust our course, Lizzie!” Mr. Socrates shouted as he folded the map and placed it in his rucksack. “Thirty-five degrees to starboard.” He loosened the flap on his pistol holster. “An airship, Modo. Hard to tell what type from this distance.”

  “Were they flying a flag?” Octavia asked.

  “No. Enough questions! Octavia, grab a carbine. See if your target practice has paid off. Modo, run up the Union Jack. It may be another vessel in Her Majesty’s service. Snap to!”

  Modo snapped to. The flag dangled on a pulley rope that would draw it to the bottom of the Prince Albert’s car. He quickly pulled the rope and the Union Jack flapped in the wind, clearly visible about ten feet below the car. It seemed like flimsy protection.

  “Bring us up to four thousand feet!” Mr. Socrates commanded. Lizzie opened the valve that sent hydrogen into the outer balloon and they started to climb. “Eyes peeled, all of you.”

  “More coal!” Lizzie bellowed.

  Modo dumped coal directly into the firebox. He looked aft, scanning the clouds. No sign of the other vessel. He assumed the Prince Albert was climbing so that they’d have a better view of the sky, but if the balloon was pierced or otherwise damaged they’d have even farther to fall. Then again, three thousand feet or seven thousand—what would it matter? Either way they were dead.

  “Higher, Lizzie!” Mr. Socrates shouted. “Push the beast to her limits!”

  She adjusted a lever and the engine went from a rumbling roar to an ear-splitting thunder, steam and smoke spewing out of the stack, the propeller spinning madly. Modo had studied steam engines enough to know that the boiler could explode from too much pressure. How close were they to that? He’d be the first to be blown to pieces. Or at least thrown over the edge of the wicker car.