Airborne - The Hanover Restoration

by Blair Bancroft

  Oh, no. Surely I, too, was part of Rochefort’s dream. I had a right to be here.

  My speed unchecked, I raced around men tethering a rope to one of the sturdy metal rings, pushed through a crowd of bystanders, and flung myself into Rochefort’s arms just as his feet came back to terra firma.

  A grunt of surprise, and his arms enfolded me. Lips to my ear, he whispered, “I should beat you, you know, but I find I rather like it.”

  If only I could learn to control my blushes!

  He kept me there, tucked to his side, as he supervised the secure mooring of the airship and ordered the deflation of the balloon.

  “Will you not go up again tomorrow?” I asked.

  “Inflated balloons cry for someone to take a shot at them.”

  Of course they did. For a moment the successful flight had banished all fear of danger. Embarrassed by my thoughtlessness, I retired to keeping my eyes open and my mouth shut. In spite of the mysterious threats hanging over our heads, I reveled in the moment. Controlled flight. Papa would have been so thrilled, so proud I had a part in it. Even though I had fully intended to be the first to do it.

  Was this why Papa had been willing to sell his only child? He had seen Julian’s genius and believed he was doing the right thing? Clearly, I would never know, but today sheer joy overwhelmed my anger. Foolish to fight what was so obviously my rightful place in the world just because the decision had not been mine. Julian and I were well matched.

  If only he weren’t involved in treason.

  To the victor belong the spoils. Through all the celebrations that night, through Julian’s calm reminders that testing had barely begun, through Phoebe’s exclamations and Lexa’s far more controlled words of praise, my husband’s words kept popping up like jumping jacks, startling me at the most inopportune moments. Did he mean what I thought he meant? Or was I in for a grave disappointment?

  At dinner, a river of toasts flowed around Mrs. H’s delectable offerings. Toasts to Rochefort, to his many assistants, to the airship itself, to the new Age of Flight. And finally, daringly, when the wine had flowed too freely, a toast to the Hanoverian dynasty. To the monarchy.

  Blatant treason.

  I drank sparingly, anticipating what I hoped would be a late evening more special than the major excitement of the day, I noticed Lexa merely lifted her glass, but did not drink to the monarchy. Disapproval? I thought not. But that was a worry for another time

  To the victor belong the spoils.

  Dessert passed in a haze that had nothing to do with the amount of wine I had consumed. I stood, signaling the ladies to leave the gentlemen to their port and more gloating over today’s triumph. In the drawing room, I encouraged Lexa and Phoebe to play the piano, but Lexa, unaccountably gloomy, demurred.

  “Surely flight isn’t a bad thing,” I said to her, while Phoebe continued to play and the older ladies engaged in conversation. Frankly, she was such a solemn little thing, I expected her to say it was against God’s will.

  “It’s the reality of it all,” Lexa returned, not meeting my eyes. “I thought they were mad, and now I see it’s truly going to happen.”

  “It?” I echoed, hoping for enlightenment.

  “The plan they have devised. I believe Lord Rochefort was instrumental in its design.” Lexa’s voice trailed away as she seemed to realize she was saying more than she should.

  “All our guests are aware of this plan?”

  Lexa gave me an odd look. “Indeed. That’s why we are here.”

  Everyone but me. How dared he keep me in the dark? Angry now, I didn’t hesitate to do a bit of fishing. “Julian is very close-mouthed with his plans,” I admitted. “Surely there must be others involved. Our small group cannot mount a revolution alone.”

  Lexa sighed. “I, too, am told very little, but I believe the monarchist adherents are widespread. But it is your husband who has added imagination, produced the spark that should ignite the drive toward victory.”

  Dear God, they were really going to do it. Revolution.

  Should ignite, not will ignite. Lexa’s confidence seemed far from certain—which would account for her fear in the midst of triumph.

  I clasped the hands she had fisted in her lap. “I understand your fear,” I told her. All our heads are at risk, but I have faith in Rochefort. He will not fail.”

  Lexa’s clear blue eyes looked past me toward a destiny no one could predict with confidence. “They risk their lives,” she said, “for a concept I cannot completely understand, no matter how hard I try. The British monarchy had not been absolute for some time before its demise. Parliament rules, so what difference does it make if someone sits on the throne?”

  I suppose I shouldn’t have been surprised by a discussion of the rights and wrongs of monarchy leaping at me out of the blue in the Abbey drawing room, but it took a moment to settle into it. “The British people like a figurehead they can look up to and admire,” I managed at last. “Which is why Wellington was so easily able to overthrow George IV. “The king was generally scorned or hated, while everyone adored the duke for his triumph over Napoleon.”

  “A very great accomplishment,” Lexa murmured, her lower lip quivering.

  “But the old King George was a good man,” I pointed out.

  “He lost the American colonies and ended a madman,” Lexa countered.

  “Nonetheless, for many years he set a fine example for his people.”

  “And then came the Prince of Wales and Cumberland.”

  And how on earth had Lexa become an advocate for Wellington? “What about York, Kent, Clarence, and Cambridge?” I asked, naming the unlamented George IV’s younger brothers. “Surely, not bad men.”

  “York and his wife could not abide each other, leaving no children. Clarence had ten children with his mistress, yet was unable to produce a single live infant with his wife.”

  My temper flared. “What I’m trying to say, Lexa, is that while the country tends to rise in protest against profligate monarchs, it does not demand perfection. Just someone to provide a fine figurehead, someone who wears the crown with modesty while offering the masses the pomp, ceremony, and grand spectacle they love. “And all without spending too much money,” I added, attempting to lighten the moment. “I beg your pardon,” I said as I failed to raise a smile. “I had not realized how much of my father’s passion I absorbed over the years. But it’s true, you know. As Wellington ages, he becomes more and more a tyrant, inflexible, with no thought to the rising power of the middle class, let alone to the great mass of the lower classes. We are in dire need of a change.”

  I might have learned more from her, but at this crucial moment the men joined us. This time, Lexa played the piano when coaxed to do so by gentlemen whose spirits had been even more elevated by the passing of the port. But after the tea tray came in, we were a bit like the airship’s balloons after today’s flight, our buoyant spirits deflating into crumpled exhaustion. A series of good-nights drifted through the drawing room. Phoebe kissed me on the cheek before climbing the stairs to bed. To my surprise, the much more reserved Lexa did the same. Perhaps my impromptu lecture had accomplished something after all, affirming our friendship.

  “Good-night,” I said to Julian, imitating my friends’ formal curtsies, and turned toward the drawing room door.

  “Rather, au revoir.” His words followed me up the stairs and into my bedchamber where, heart pounding, I told Tillie to select my finest nightwear. Smirking, she did as told before hastily unpinning my hair and leaving it free, rather than braiding it for the night. When I gathered the courage to look her in the face, her eyes were dancing. I scowled.

  Undeterred, she winked at me before leaving the room. I climbed into bed and settled down to wait.

  If the man didn’t come, I was going to march into his room and . . .

  To the victor belong the spoils.

  Well, he wasn’t victorious with me.

  Not yet.

  Chapter 13

&
nbsp; Mind numb, I shivered. An absurd reaction for a woman only three months short of her majority. Most young women my age were married and with a child or two. So just because my marriage had come as such a surprise . . .

  Because my husband had bought me with all the thought to bloodlines he might give to purchasing a mare at Tattersall’s . . .

  Because my husband was more interested in his airship than in me—

  Unfair. Rochefort was a genius who had chosen me six long years ago. I should be flattered, not incensed. And what opportunity had he had to demonstrate whatever affection he might have for me? We had spent our wedding night bleeding into our respective bandages. And the nine days since, recuperating.

  Think of something else, silly goose.

  And so I should. The airship leaped to mind. While I had been struggling to make an engine lightweight enough not to drag Maia to the ground, Rochefort had been designing a craft strong enough to support a heavy steam engine. I could not fault his genius. Nor could I ignore the pride I’d felt this morning, nor the terror when the airship disappeared from sight. My fear had not been for the ship but for the man.

  My husband. Who was coming to me tonight.

  Instant chaos. Think airship, Minta. Airship.

  Julian’s creation needed a name. Yes, think name. I scrolled through the list of Greek and Roman gods my governess had forced me to memorize. After all, that was how I had named Maia. Not wanting a male name for my invention, I had turned to Maia, mother of Hermes, the Greek god of travel. As for Julian’s airship . . .

  Aphrodite? Surely the goddess of love and beauty would make a fine name. Athena, goddess of wisdom? Juno, the Roman queen of the gods? Perhaps Mercury, the messenger god? But, no, Julian’s airship must be feminine. Were not all ships of the sea considered feminine? Why not ships of the air as well?

  Aurora. Oh, yes, goddess of the dawn was a perfect fit. Were we not at the dawn of a new age? Aurora it would be. I could hardly wait to tell Julian—

  Devil it, I’d done it again. Julian’s ship, Julian’s right to name it. I was no more than a bride trapped at the heart of a revolution against the Lord Protector of the British Empire. A bride whose husband did not trust her enough to tell her the whole. A bride who had nearly been killed, then left to speculate about why.

  No wonder I was scowling when Rochefort walked through the dressing room door. He looked quite delicious, I had to admit. The glass-encased candle he carried illuminated his lean and rugged face, his tousled hair, and the dark eyes that masked so many secrets. As he came closer, I saw he was wearing a burgundy banyan with a paisley design in black. It suited him. All those intricate swirling lines—flowers, leaves, and stems—intertwined in endless convolutions. Black on burgundy. The dark twists and turns of a devious mind.

  He paused a foot from the bed, plunked his candle on the tallboy, and glared at me. “What now, Minta?”

  “I’m so sorry.”

  “Sorry? I’ve thought about his moment all day, even while fighting that lumbering behemoth from one end of Hertfordshire to the other . . . and you’re sorry?”

  Dear God, he thought I was refusing him. And just when I needed it most, my idiot tongue refused to form words.

  My arm did what my tongue could not, stretching its full length in silent supplication. After what seemed an eon, his long fingers closed around mine. I tugged, and he came to me, though almost as slowly as the airship left the ground this morning. He sat on the edge of the bed, looking not quite so fierce as he studied my face. “Explain,” he ordered.

  I called on a long line of determined ancestors and finally retrieved my voice. “This morning’s flight was glorious,” I told him, projecting all the sincerity I could muster, “but that doesn’t keep me from being frightened by the rest of it. Perhaps I would be less so if you told me the whole,” I added, weighting each word for emphasis. Chagrin flickered across his bronze face. Good. “And if I looked unhappy when you came in, it is because my fears were plaguing me, not because I did not . . . um, wish to see you.”

  He showed no sign of softening. His sharp gaze never left my face. He was waiting . . . demanding more of me.

  More than I was prepared to give?

  I grasped at a straw. Or was it merely a delaying tactic? “I thought of a name for your airship. “If you don’t already have one,” I added hastily.

  “Indeed. And what might that be?”

  Dear God, he sounded so ominous. “Aurora,” the goddess of dawn. The dawn of a new age,” I explained, feeling a complete fool. He would hate it, absolutely hate it, I knew he would. And hate my taking the liberty of offering a name.

  Silence enveloped us. Was he actually considering it?

  “Remarkable,” Julian said at last, his dark eyes unfathomable. “I confess we’ve been so busy building her we never thought to name her. An idiosyncracy of the male mind, I suspect.” He ran his fingers through his hair, his lips curled into a wry grin. “I might have wished you spent the past hour thinking kindly of your husband, perhaps even eagerly anticipating our delayed wedding night, but wishing to name my airship is at least a step in the right direction.”

  If only the bed would open up and swallow me whole. Mortified, I fixed my gaze on the clenched hands in my lap.

  “When you greeted my return today,” he said, “I thought you cared, but now I begin to suspect it was ship itself, the flight that mattered to you. I, but a means to an end.”

  Men! How could they be so obtuse? I drew a deep breath, frantically searching for words to soothe a wounded warrior. And he was a warrior, a man about to risk his life, his fortune, and his honor for his country. While I, surely, was the epitome of the foolish virgin.

  I drew a deep breath and plunged ahead, certain anything I might say could only make matters worse. “Listen to me, Julian. I thought nothing could be more glorious than the day Elbert rolled out of the workshop, but today I was so proud of you it’s a wonder my corset strings didn’t snap.” That brought a thin smile. “And, yes, perhaps there’s no way I can separate Julian, the inventor, from Julian, my husband, but it doesn’t matter. I am more than content with my lot.” I crossed my arms over my breasts and added, frowning mightily, “Except, of course, for being the wife who isn’t.”

  Eyes of steel softened to warmth, as if their charcoal color had been set alight. His fingers hovered above the small bandage that covered my head wound. “I think we might be able to do something about that,” he murmured.

  He stood, blew out my candle, picked up his own, and walked to the other side of the bed. One huff snuffed his candle. A whoosh of quilted silk as his banyan hit the floor. The bed sagged as he joined me.

  My heart was pumping so hard, I feared it might explode. My brain ceased to function. There had been just enough moonlight peeking through the draperies to reveal he was not wearing a traditional nightshirt. He was, in fact, wearing nothing at all.

  Did brides die of heart failure? I recalled overhearing tales of men who had died in flagrante, but women . . .?

  “A lovely gown,” he whispered in my ear, his hands busy elsewhere, “but it’s very much in the way.” And in shockingly easy fashion, he winkled it off.

  He was still chuckling with satisfaction when he kissed me, and my world gradually steadied. I was where I was meant to be. And no matter what trials awaited us, in Julian’s arms I was safe.

  The repercussions from Julian’s trial run were strangely muted, with most of his Hertfordshire neighbors long accustomed to his fits and starts. Or so Mrs. E informed me at our daily meeting the next morning. Most, she assured me, saw the airship as “his lordship playing at balloons,” but I already knew the waters were not as calm as she would have me believe. Mrs. H, Tillie had informed me as she served toast that had been burnt and scraped, was weeping and wailing and carrying on something fierce. “The work of the devil,” she exclaimed to anyone unfortunate enough to come within earshot. “The work of the devil!”

  I sighed. Though I s
uspected the vicar, Mr. Truesdale, was Church of England through and through and barely tolerant of Mrs. H’s evangelical faith, I wondered if we might expect a call. Hopefully, he was among those who thought Rochefort was merely playing at balloons.

  And then there was the problem of entertaining my multitude of guests. Which was precisely what I should be doing at the moment, but my heart wasn’t in it. I snuggled into a comfortable chair, upholstered in gold and white brocade, and gazed almost blindly at the cheerful morning room, suddenly lit to its full glory by the sun breaking through a cloudy sky. Surely a metaphor for what happened last night. So many clouds . . . and then the sun. Fire, assassination, treason, revolution . . . and in a few glorious hours Julian swept it all away.

  Not that the storm clouds wouldn’t come back, but my euphoria was strong enough to carry me through. No matter what happened, I was no longer alone.

  And surely I had ample reason to think my husband cared for me. Not that I knew much about wedding nights, but I rather suspected mine was better than most. Considerably better. But for this type of information Phoebe and Lexa were useless, and I’d cut out my tongue before I’d broach the subject with any of the other ladies in the household.

  I yawned. It had been a very short night. Of sleep, that is. Truthfully, I had no idea a man could—

  Guilt struck me. I had guests. Guests must be entertained, and there was no airship trial today. Julian and his minions were inspecting, adjusting, and generally tinkering with every aspect of the airship before it would once again take to the skies. Which reminded me . . . I rang for a maid and told her to find Drummond. A trip to the wine cellar was in order. Today there would be a christening.

  I wish I might have preserved the look of horror on Matt Black’s face when our rather large party of female voyeurs descended on the airship. He popped back inside the ship, and in moments Julian stood in the doorway, a bemused expression suffusing his weary face. He gave me a look, and I swear his lips twitched. “Ladies.” He nodded. “How may I help you?”