“We must have,” Maria insisted. “We dumped all that cargo, and full speed, you said. Your true and proper ship is loaded down and moving slowly, or so you mentioned. Head start or none, I think it’s likely we’ve made it here first.”
She set her large tapestry bag down on the ground and laid the small handbag beside it.
“What are you doing?” Hainey asked.
“Reloading.”
Inside the large bag, beneath a layer of ladies’ underthings, stockings, and a second pair of boots, she revealed a long burlap bag stitched into pouches, like a workman’s tool belt. Inside each pouch was a stash of ammunition, divvied up into such an orderly fashion that Hainey was forced to marvel.
“No wonder you enjoyed shooting the Gatling. Get a hundred shots out without having to sift through your little bag for more bullets.”
“I don’t reload often,” she said without taking offense. “Because I don’t often shoot, and when I do, I don’t often miss. But I want to take a different set of guns into the facility-something with more kick and, in case of trouble, more capacity.” She hoisted a pair of Colts into the daylight and flipped the wheels open. While she thumbed bullets into the chambers she explained, “I don’t know what I’ll be walking into, in this facility. Twelve bullets are better than six, you know.”
“Oh, I know,” Hainey said, and he hesitated. “You said…I suppose. Well.”
“There’s nothing to suppose, Captain Hainey. I’m going into Waverly alone, because you have no business there. You came to Louisville for your ship, which may appear at any time. I came to Louisville to prevent a weapon from completion. Now, there’s nothing for either one of us to do but chase our own paths. You’ll wait here and watch the sky; and I’ll go inside to look for this Ossian Steen.”
“And what will you do when you find him?” the captain asked.
“When I get to that bridge, I’ll burn it,” she drawled.
She finished loading the Colts and holstered them on a belt. The belt had received an extra set of holes in order to accommodate her slender waist in a fashionable way; she strung it over her hips, fastened it, and tested the weight of both weapons against her hands before replacing them in the holsters. She slipped her arm through the handbag’s thin strap, and took the other one’s handle into her fist.
“Gentlemen,” she said. “I believe this is where our missions diverge. It’s been…it’s been a most peculiar…pleasure. Or at the very least, it’s been an adventure. I thank you for the use of your ship, and for your trust, if ever I earned any.”
Simeon said through a skeptical narrowing of his eyes, “Thanks for not shooting any of us.”
She nodded, accepting that it was all the friendly acknowledgment she was likely to receive from the first mate; she nodded also at Lamar, who hadn’t said a thing, even to wish her farewell; and she took a deep breath. She adjusted her hat, and then let it fall to rest between her shoulder blades, suspended around her neck by a red velvet ribbon.
And she said to the captain, “Well, Captain. Best of luck to you.”
He said in return, “And to you, Belle Boyd.”
As she walked away, down towards the building that reared up darkly through the woods, she heard him say behind her, “And that’s something I never imagined-not in all my life-that I’d ever say.”
She was nearly warmed by the sentiment, or by the thought that she’d deserved it; and she honestly wished them well, for all the strangeness of it.
Down at the bottom of the hill and across a walking bridge that crossed the stream in a tidy wooden arc, Maria made her way towards the dark spot-the hole made of a building, and stacked four stories up through the Kentucky bluegrass. The structure sucked everything towards it. The creek flowed to it, the trees leaned its way, and the earth itself seemed dimpled by the immense weight of the place and all its horrible contents.
She was drawn to it like everything else.
She strode through the forest away from the Valkyrie and up to the main road. She would conceal the gunbelt under a tied shawl, hold her baggage firmly and with purpose, and announce that she was there to apply for a position as a nurse. Maria scaled the low edge of the road and walked along it as if she had nothing to hide and no purpose at all which was not direct, friendly, and absolutely ignorant of military behavior or espionage of any stripe.
Out on the front lawn there were patients, here and there-or people masquerading as patients. And behind them, Waverly loomed.
It was a massive structure, made of brick from first floor to top, and crowned with four monstrous gargoyles, each one the size of a small horse. They were spread out along the roof’s edge, spaced evenly and facing forward, mouths agape, faces watchful.
Maria shuddered.
And she sturdied herself, standing straight, adjusting her luggage, and strolling up the walkway to the grounds. The main entrance was directly underneath the gargoyles, of course, and to reach it she was compelled to stroll along a gravel road that wound its way forward. Here and there, nurses, orderlies, patients, and perhaps a doctor or two gave her a quizzical stare; but she was determined to preserve her decorum so she strode along, head high and luggage toted with dignity until she reached the front door.
It was a doubled door with a round iron knocker and latch. She ignored the knocker and tugged the right-hand door open. She poked her head around its side and saw only a corridor that could’ve belonged to any sparkling new facility in any city, with any number of doctors, patients, or uses.
A pair of gurneys were left against a wall. A wheeled chair hunkered squatly at the end of a hallway; and here and there, a barefoot man or woman wandered from one room to another.
Maria let herself inside all the way, setting her carpetbag on the floor and clutching both her handbag and the shawl at her waist. She called out softly, “Hello? Is anyone here?”
None of the barefoot patients noticed her, or if they did, they did not feel moved to answer. But a nurse in a fluffy, ivory-colored uniform manifested to Maria’s left and asked with a nurse’s uncompromising firmness, “Can I help you?”
It was not a question, exactly. It was a declaration that the nurse knew Maria was somewhere she really shouldn’t be, and an announcement that the hospital was aware of her presence. It was also a warning, that this was a place of order and that disorder, and disorderly behavior would not be tolerated.
The nurse was a petite, sharp-eyed woman with yellow hair tied up in a bonnet. She did not look like the kind of woman who could cram so much meaning into four words, but she also did not look like the kind of woman who was accustomed to dilly-dallying or backtalk.
Maria neither dilly-dallied nor backtalked. She asked, “This is a hospital, yes?”
“This is a hospital, yes.”
“I’ve come in search of a job,” Maria said.
Without a beat, the nurse replied, “And I’m your mother.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“I know who you are,” the nurse said. “I’ve seen your picture more than once, most lately on a poster for a play in Lexington, a few years ago. Now tell me what you’re doing here, Belle Boyd?”
As Maria stared down at the small woman with the no-nonsense face, she considered her next move. She opened her mouth to speak, then closed it again. Finally she said, “I did not intend for my reputation to precede me. And I certainly don’t mean you any trouble,” she added, which was not quite a lie. It wouldn’t have mattered if it were an outright falsehood; Maria would’ve said it anyway.
Just then, a wild-eyed woman stepped forward from behind one of the nearest corners, and she stood very still perhaps twenty feet away. The newcomer’s feet were naked and her hair was the color of autumn leaves. The shift she wore was snagged and ripped, and from its sides dangled a telling set of straps.
Thus distracted, the nurse said, “Madeline, I don’t know what you’re doing out of your room, but you’d better return there before Dr. Williams sees you out and ab
out.”
Madeline said, “She’s here about Smeeks.”
Maria frowned and said, “I…I’m sorry. I don’t know anyone named Mr. Smeeks.”
“Doctor Smeeks,” Madeline said quickly, before the nurse could interrupt her. “And of course you don’t. You haven’t met him yet.”
“To your room, Madeline.”
The patient was careful not to make a move; she seemed to understand more about the situation than Maria did, and she did not remove her eyes from Maria’s-where they were locked into place more securely than she’d ever been restrained in a room. She said, “We aren’t what you think we are. Smeeks isn’t what you think he is. It’s Steen’s doing, really.”
“Steen,” Maria said to Madeline, and then to the nurse. “She’s on to something. I do need to speak with Steen. It’s Ossian Steen, is it not?”
If the nurse was cool before, her voice was glazed with ice when she said, “There’s an Ossian Steen here, yes. And if you’ve come to work with him, or for him, then-”
Maria sensed where the tirade was headed and she jumped in. “No. No, I only need to speak with him. About a professional matter.”
“A professional matter,” the nurse repeated with scorn. But suddenly something changed, and she looked at Maria with something new-some new thought had colored her assessment of the situation.
Madeline turned on her heel. Before she went back to her room as commanded, she said to the nurse, “You should speak with her. She will interfere with him, if she can.” And then shortly, she was gone.
A second nurse, an older woman in a billowing gray uniform that spoke of her rank, joined the first and said, “Anne, was there a problem with Madeline?”
“Not anymore,” she said, and then before Maria could offer her greetings she continued, “This is Maria, and she’s here to see about a job. I was only now going to speak with her, and see if we might have a position open. But we need to sit down and chat, and see what sort of employment might best suit her.”
The older woman cast Maria the same gaze she might’ve used to appraise a mule, and she said, “She’s got good height on her, and she looks sturdy. We’ll have to cover that better,” she gestured at Maria’s cleavage. “Some of the male patients can scarcely spot a knuckle without improper arousal and inappropriate behavior. This having been said, Anne, I trust you to assess her and assign her. I’m going to go make sure Madeline is where she ought to be. She’s a real pill, that one. You never can tell.”
“It’s a fact,” Anne murmured an agreement. “And thank you, Mrs. Hendricks. Come with me, Maria,” she said curtly. “We can have this conversation in the nurse’s sitting area, where it’s more private.”
Maria retrieved her bag and followed behind Anne, past the nurse’s station where the women gathered together and chattered like hens in their voluminous skirts and serious faces. They walked together past a laundry room where bundles of linens hung from the ceiling in bags as big as small boats, waiting to be emptied, sorted, and dried. Beyond the kitchen rooms they strolled, and around a final bend in the corridor until they’d reached a lounge that was empty except for a green-eyed cat who yawned, stretched, and ignored them.
Anne motioned for Maria to take a seat on the nearest padded bench, and then she positioned herself across from her, where she could lean in close and speak softly. She said, “You aren’t here to work with him, are you? You wouldn’t, I mean. Not for a man like that. Not against Danville, I don’t think.”
“You may safely assume it,” Maria told her. “Your accent, I can’t place it as precisely as I’d like, but I must guess you’re a native of Florida, or southern Georgia. Am I close?”
“Valdosta,” the blonde nurse said. “You’ve got an ear for it, don’t you?”
“So I’ve been told. And in the interest of utter honesty, I’m no longer acting in any official capacity on behalf of the Confederacy-which was not a decision of mine, I assure you. I’ve been cut loose and sent on my way, but my loyalties remain. And those loyalties bring me here, to a military scientist with a terrible project. This Ossian Steen is preparing to destroy my native land, and I wish to…” she searched for Madeline’s word and used it. “Interfere.”
Nurse Anne nodded hard and said, “Yes, good. Yes, I’d love to see it-and not only for myself, or for the Southern cause, or for any grand ethical pursuit.”
“Then why?”
“Because Steen is a wicked bastard. A fiend, and worse-but stronger language I’d shudder to deploy in front of the cat. He’s cruel and vile, and…”
Maria suggested, “Revolting? I understand he’s creating a weapon, applying his scientific prowess to ungodly research, and to the creation of a solar cannon that he intends to fire on our capital.”
“That’s true,” Anne said, “Though I think you’ve got him a bit confused, or doubled up. Steen isn’t a scientist, himself. He’s a bully and a thug, and a manipulator.”
“I don’t understand…?”
Anne hopped to her feet. “I’ll show you. Come with me. But don’t touch anything, and if any of the patients try to touch you, do your best to prevent them. They aren’t allowed to take liberties, though the prohibition doesn’t do much to stop them, sometimes.”
The nurse hastily led Maria down another hallway littered with medical detritus-bedpans, medicine trays, and assorted straps or other restraints. As they walked, Maria sought to clarify, “This is a hospital for the mentally afflicted, isn’t that right?”
“That’s right,” Anne said. “We’ve only been open for a year or two.”
“I thought perhaps this was only a cover for a weapons laboratory. Or so the intelligence I’d received implied as much.”
“That’s funny,” Anne said without any humor. “Down here.” She indicated a set of stairs leading down to the basement, and with a gentle lift of her skirts, she skipped down the steps to a door, which she opened.
She called out, “Doctor Smeeks? Doctor Smeeks, I’ve brought you a visitor.”
From within, they were answered by a thin voice stretched thinner still by exhaustion. It asked, “A visitor?”
“Yes, Doctor Smeeks. It’s me, Anne.” She motioned at Maria, drawing her down into the basement. “And this is Maria. She’s…she’s…” Unable to think of anything better or more concise, she finished, “She’s here to help.”
“Help?”
“Yes sir,” Maria said before she even saw the speaker. “Please, could I…” she looked to Anne for approval, and received it. “Could I speak with you?”
The nurse squeezed Maria’s elbow and whispered, “I beg you, be gentle.”
He crept around a table like a nervous rodent, eyeing Maria and Anne both with open suspicion. Doctor Smeeks was a white-haired man of an age past seventy, with loose-fitting clothes, a frazzled expression, and a pair of jeweler’s lenses strapped across his forehead. He said, “Hello?” and wrung his hands together. “Oh, Anne. You’re alone. Or rather, you’re not alone, but you’re not…you haven’t brought Steen. Or, or. Or the boy,” he added sadly.
“Sir,” Anne came forward to take his arm, leading him forward to meet Maria. “Sir, I’m so very sorry, but no. However, this is Maria-”
“And she’s here to help?”
“She’s here to help. Would you show her your work? She’s very interested in what you’re doing down here, and I promise you,” she added into his ear. “She is no friend of Steen’s.”
“No friend of…that man. What was his name again? Anne, I can’t remember his name.”
“Steen, sir. And it’s all right, don’t worry yourself. Just, could you show us your work?”
“My work?”
“Yes sir, your work. Will you give us a tour of your most recent piece? Remember it, sir? The one you’re building in order to bring back Edwin.” She patted his forearm and he nodded.
“For Edwin.” He glared up at Maria. “The army man. He took my assistant,” his lip trembled. “A fine assistant, a
nd a nice boy. He took him away from me, and I do believe he intends to harm the child if I can’t…if I don’t…”
He twisted his fingers into knots.
“Please, come this way.” He led the women deeper into his laboratory-a dark place brightened by lanterns, lamps, and the few thin windows that ran the length of the wall’s eastern rim. Glass containers of a thousand shapes, sizes, and purposes were stacked and piled from table to table, and tubes made of copper, tin, and steel were bundled like sticks for a fire. The floor was coated with papers covered in tiny, scratchy handwritten notes; and from the ceiling hung models of projects that had been, and projects that were yet to come.
But in the back corner, underneath the longest stretch of skinny window with watery gray afternoon light spilling down into the basement, sat a device almost as massive as the Valkyrie’s primary engine. It had been constructed of pipes, pans, and a vast array of complicated lenses, and it looked like a cross between a microscope and a telescope, melded with the steel-framed corpse of a suspension bridge.
The lenses varied in size from thumbnail-small to windowpane-large, with the biggest mounted before a seat and a console covered with complicated buttons and levers. Maria thought the airship looked like a wind-up toy in comparison to this astonishing machine-all the more astonishing because she had only the vaguest idea of what it was meant to do.
She asked, “Doctor Smeeks, is this…is this a solar cannon?”
“A solar cannon?” he removed the lenses that were strapped to his forehead, and pulled a pair of spectacles out of his front breast pocket. “Something like that. You mean the German doctor’s patent? The gentleman from the Washington Territories?”
“I believe so.”
“Can’t recall his name,” the doctor muttered. “He designed a solar cannon. It was made to be held in the hand, by a large man with exceptional motor skill control, I assume; it was a magnificent prototype, that’s to be sure. But it was no more harmful than a powerful gun, or perhaps a high-capacity cannon. At that size,” he began to say more, but lost his train of thought. “At that size, it was, it was only. A weapon for one man, to kill one man. Not a weapon designed to dash the masses. Not like…this.”
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