“We’re headed to Swiffle-on-Exe. There’s a play on. We’ll be allowed to attend alongside Bunson’s,” said Sophronia.
“Gracious, aren’t you in the know?” Sidheag arched an eyebrow and turned away. Today her dress was of plaid, as if she were a housekeeper.
Dimity sidled up to Sophronia and said, under her breath, “Plaid! Can you believe it?”
They followed Sidheag out to where the debuts stood waiting.
Dimity, with a mercurial gleam in her eye, said, “Sophronia claims we’re headed to Swiffle-on-Exe to see a play with Bunson’s.”
Instantly the others all began to chatter excitedly.
“Really? What kind of play?” Agatha was, for the first time in Sophronia’s experience, animated by the prospect. Agatha, so shy it was almost disruptive, never seemed to get excited about anything.
“Bunson’s? You mean boys?” Preshea’s pretty face narrowed into covetousness. Sophronia thought she looked like a partridge with a plucking disorder.
“Now, Preshea,” reprimanded Dimity, “it’s no good choosing your first husband from a school for evil geniuses. Much too difficult to kill.”
“Why do you know any of this?” Monique demanded of Sophronia.
“Why, Monique, surprised I learned it first?” said Sophronia, minding her recent lesson on not revealing information unnecessarily.
They made their way through the passageways and out onto various decks toward the dining hall. Sophronia grabbed Monique by the arm, holding her back. Dimity gave her a confused look, but took the cue and concentrated on shepherding the other three forward, giving Sophronia some privacy.
“A word, if you would, Monique?”
“What do you want?”
“Shoddy business, tittle-tattling on me like that. I thought you didn’t do that kind of thing. Did you go to your pet teacher?”
“I have no idea to what you are referring.”
“Oh, very nice—denial. Lady L said I ought to have applied it better myself. I’ll remember that in future.”
“Do you think you might make sense at some point, or are you merely trying to annoy me?”
Actually, thought Sophronia, she’s pretty good. Monique’s blue eyes were guileless, even as they narrowed in exasperation.
“Not that I really wanted to go to the play,” Sophronia added.
Monique shook her off. “You’re mad, did you know that? But what can one expect from a covert recruit? Do refrain from socializing with me henceforth, will you?”
“With pleasure.” Sophronia walked off.
“Well? What did she say?” whispered Dimity.
“She denied everything.”
“Of course she did.”
They arrived and took their seats at table.
The murmuring of talk and consumption of comestibles hushed when the headmistress stood and stepped forward, her hair a wild pouf of red. She took a deep breath and opened her arms wide, bracing her back and pushing her tremendous cleavage forward. “Ladies, ladies, your attention, please! We have changed direction toward that other school, Bunson and Lacroix’s Boys’ Polytechnique. There is a small troupe in residence at the moment, performing a highly instructional play, An Ideal Bathtub. We thought you ladies deserved a treat. Now, remember, if there is gossip to be garnered, garner it. If there are new dress styles to be imitated, imitate them. If there are hearts to be broken, break them. That’s my girls.”
“Gossip? I thought she didn’t know about us, you know, gathering information?” Dimity was confused.
“I think she is actually implying social gossip,” said Sophronia.
Mademoiselle Geraldine continued. “We will be on course for Swiffle-on-Exe for the next three days. Regular lessons will proceed smoothly during the interim. Now remember, ladies, this is a privilege, and attendance will be revoked at the professors’ discretion. In one case, it already has been.”
A flutter of ooohs swept through the hall, and everyone pretended not to glance in Sophronia’s direction. The thing about a finishing school that trains intelligencers, thought Sophronia, is that everyone knows your business, sometimes before you do. And occasionally they’ll make it up simply for entertainment. Whether she liked it or not, word was certainly out about her punishment, if not her crime. The speed of dissemination was impressive, if slightly embarrassing.
Everything was a fervor of excitement and preparation for the next three days. Despite what Mademoiselle Geraldine had said, things were not as before. Lessons changed to focus on proper dress and manners for the theater. Lady Linette spent two solid hours on opera glasses alone! Even Captain Niall switched from knives to garrotes. Much easier, he explained, to kill someone with a garrote at a seated event; only make certain you sit directly behind your quarry. “Very inconvenient,” he said, “to try to kill someone when you are seated in front of him.”
You’d think we were visiting the queen, thought Sophronia, watching Preshea try on yet another possible dress for An Ideal Bathtub.
The girls were assembled in their common parlor on the evening prior to their arrival at Swiffle-on-Exe. It was the only spare time they had, before bed, and they ought to be practicing walking properly in heeled boots. Instead, they were picking through each other’s wardrobes and planning their accessories.
Sophronia was the only one practicing. She was tottering about, pretending she wasn’t interested in outfits, since she wasn’t to attend. She was intrigued to find, however, that Agatha had the most expensive gowns and nicest jewelry, much to Monique’s annoyance. Dimity’s outfit, on the other hand, came in for pitying glances. It wasn’t so much the fabric, although that was bad—purple and teal stripes—as the cut of the dress, which was nowhere near as elegant as current fashions dictated. Sophronia shuddered to think what they might say of her one and only evening gown. She was shocked at herself for such shallowness. I’m turning out just like my sisters!
Into the madness of a parlor strewn with dresses, wraps, and gloves, not to mention girls prancing about in assorted fripperies, came a loud knock.
Sidheag, who was standing off to one side observing the chaos with an eye to the ridiculous, went to answer it. Whoever was there was too short to be visible on the other side of Lady Kingair’s lanky form.
A small voice with a French accent queried cheekily, “Is Miss Sophronia mucking about?”
Sidheag looked down for a long moment and then turned around, eyebrows arched, and addressed the room. “Sophronia, you have a, erm, caller.” Then she resumed her languid pose, watching the other girls cavort with the look of a scientist observing the actions of a newly discovered species.
A few of the others glanced over to see who was at their door, but the visitor garnered very little attention after that first assessment.
Sophronia, still in the heels, teetered over.
“Good evening,” said Vieve, grinning up at her. Vieve, as it turned out, did indeed have green eyes. His hair was pitch-black under his cap and he was looking quite at ease with the world, in the manner of most chronically ill-behaved children. He was dressed respectably, if a bit on the newspaper lad end of the spectrum, and was at least clean.
“Oh, Vieve, how are you?”
“Topping. I’ve come to meet your… you know…”
“Oh, yes, of course. I forgot.” Sophronia turned around to face the other girls. “Would you mind if Vieve came in?”
Dimity said, “Who?”
The others barely looked up.
Vieve took off his cap, clutching it self-consciously to his chest, and sauntered into the room.
“I wouldn’t pair that hat with those gloves, miss, if I were you,” he said, rendering judgment on Preshea’s choice of accessories.
The black-haired girl noticed him. “Oh, you wouldn’t, would you? And what would you know of such matters?”
“I am French,” replied Vieve with a shrug.
“Good point, that,” said Dimity, grinning.
“You’re
nine years old and your guardian is an intellectual!” protested Preshea.
To be fair to Vieve, Sophronia privately agreed with him about the hat and gloves. The gloves were magenta and the hat pea green. “I wouldn’t get involved if I were you,” she said to the boy.
Vieve followed her through the chaos toward her room.
Dimity called after her, “Remember your reputation, Sophronia. Keep the door open!”
Monique let out a trill of unpleasant laughter. Agatha made her way over to Dimity to whisper something in her ear.
“I’m good with accessories,” protested Vieve to Sophronia once they were safely away from the bedlam.
“I’m certain you are, but there is no point in arguing with Preshea. She always wins, even when she doesn’t. And here is Bumbersnoot. Bumbersnoot, this is Vieve.”
The little dog was sitting expectantly at the foot of Sophronia’s bed, waiting for lights-out. He’d fled the parlor after Monique kicked him when he ate one of her hair ribbons. He now had a little dent in one side.
Vieve’s green eyes lit up with pleasure at seeing the mechanimal. “May I?”
“Of course. Here you are.” Sophronia picked up Bumbersnoot and presented him to the young boy.
The lad examined the creature closely, popping open various hatches and spending a good deal of time studying the tiny steam engine inside Bumbersnoot’s stomach. “Incredible. Such intricacy. But he needs to be serviced, I think. Has he been squeaking at all?”
“As a matter of fact, he has.”
Vieve nodded. “I’ll come by tomorrow, when everyone is groundside, with some oil and bits of kit. Give him a spiffing up.”
“That’s very kind.” Sophronia wasn’t certain how she felt about a nine-year-old taking apart her pet, but she wasn’t about to turn down the offer, either. If Bumbersnoot needed a look-see, Vieve was the closest she had to an expert.
“It’d be a pleasure. He’s quite the little beauty, isn’t he?”
Bumbersnoot had a long, sausagelike body, and while he was mostly bronze, it was clear he had some brass and iron parts, so that he was rather a patchwork. Fond of him though she was, “little beauty” was not a phrase Sophronia would have used to describe him. “If you say so.”
Vieve put Bumbersnoot back on the bed and doffed his hat. “Until tomorrow, then, miss?” Such an odd child.
“Until tomorrow. Shall I show you out?” Sophronia fell back on her recent training in how to dismiss a gentleman caller without rancor.
“I think I can manage on my own.” With which the boy left through the parlor, doffing his hat to the girls as he did so.
Dimity appeared in the doorway, glaring at her. “Who on earth is that? Or should I say, who in the clouds is that?”
“Vieve.”
“So I gathered, but Sophronia, you never told me you had befriended Professor Lefoux’s eccentric niece!”
“Niece?”
LESSON 11: ON THE IMPORTANCE OF PROPER DRESS
Vieve was as good as her word. Her word. Sophronia still could not quite believe it. It seemed that Professor Lefoux’s nine-year-old niece liked to dress as a boy and fraternize with sooties. And that apparently Professor Lefoux let her!
“What-ho, Miss Sophronia,” said the girl, standing at the door and clutching a chubby reticule before her.
“Good evening, Miss Genevieve,” replied Sophronia formally. “Won’t you come in?”
Vieve didn’t look at all embarrassed at being found out. “So you know, do you?”
“Why on earth would you want to go about as a boy?”
“Boys have it far more jolly.” Vieve gave one of her dimpled grins. “I assure you, I find female dress fascinating. I simply prefer not to wear it myself. It’s very confining.”
Sophronia looked her guest up and down. This evening the girl was wearing her customary cap paired with an oversized man’s shirt with the sleeves rolled up, a brown vest, and brown jodhpurs. “You’ll forgive me if I don’t entirely trust your judgment in matters of appearance.”
Vieve laughed.
“There is your patient.” Sophronia pointed to Bumbersnoot, who had taken advantage of the absence of Sophronia’s fellow denizens to lounge in the parlor under the tea table in a position of prominence he wasn’t normally permitted.
Vieve dumped the contents of her reticule onto the top of the tea table. Her kit appeared to be mainly mechanic’s tools and a few unlabeled glass bottles with corks. The girl coaxed Bumbersnoot out from under the table, sat down on the settee, and lifted him into her lap.
“Can I do anything to help?”
“Don’t think so. I take it you got caught climbing during shutdown and that’s why they banned you from attending the play?”
“I didn’t get caught; someone saw me and told.”
“That’s not on!” Vieve tipped the mechanimal upside down, opened up his stomach, and began tinkering and poking about with a sort of long squiggly stick made of iron. She picked up one of her little bottles, uncorked it, and poured a drop of some dark, viscous liquid down the stick so it went directly where she wanted it to. Vieve really was remarkably adept for a nine-year-old.
“So you’re Professor Lefoux’s niece?”
“That’s what she tells me.”
Sophronia sat back on the settee and tried to look casual. “Know anything about this prototype?”
“Now, miss, why would you think that?”
“You like mechanics and inventions, and so far as I can gather, the prototype is both.”
The girl looked up and smiled, looking far more her age than when she was concentrating on Bumbersnoot. “It’s for a special communication machine.”
“A what?”
“Ever since the telegraph failed, stymied by the aether currents, they’ve been working on this new idea for communication over long distances—one station to another. Unfortunately, there seems to be some difficulty making them transmit back and forth. The researchers at the Royal Society in London came up with a new prototype to fix this. They made two: one for London, and one to come here, to Bunson’s.”
“Why Bunson’s?”
“Well, that’s where the other communication machine is located, of course. Anyway, something happened to that prototype.”
“Monique hid it.”
Vieve looked impressed. “Really? How do you know that?”
“I was with her at the time. That’s when I was recruited.”
“It was her finishing assignment?”
“Yes. And she failed.”
“That explains why she’s bunking down with debuts. And why she wasn’t allowed to attend the play either.” Vieve’s dimples disappeared and she once more looked unnaturally serious for a nine-year-old.
That little bit of information was news to Sophronia. She’d sent Dimity off with strict instructions to keep a very close eye on Monique. Instructions that Dimity would find very hard to follow. “Monique didn’t go? Why isn’t she here in quarters?”
“Skulking about the teachers’ section, ain’t she? Nasty piece of work, that one. And gets away with it, what’s worse.”
Sophronia pursed her lips. She didn’t have time for Monique’s tomfoolery at the moment. “So do you know where it is?”
“The prototype?”
“No, the communication machine at Bunson’s.” If I could get a look at it, I might learn why everyone thinks it’s so important. Besides, I’d like to see inside Bunson’s, where girls aren’t supposed to go, on principle.
Vieve looked up at that, her green eyes narrowed. “I can see why you keep getting into trouble. Are you sure you’re a girl?”
“That’s rich, coming from you.”
“You don’t act like a girl.” Vieve cocked her head. “You want to go after it?”
Sophronia nodded. “See what all the fuss is about.”
This didn’t appear strange to Vieve. “We’re going to need help. Can’t get on and off this airship that easily.”
&n
bsp; “Good thing we’re friendly with the sooties, then, isn’t it?”
Genevieve Lefoux dimpled down at her work. “Good point. Right.” She put Bumbersnoot back on his feet. “That should do it.”
The mechanimal shook himself, like a wet dog might, and trotted about the room. His tail wagged excitedly, ticktockticktock!
Sophronia watched him. “He’s moving much easier, and he doesn’t seem to be squeaking. You do good work.”
Vieve blushed. “I try. He might… oh, there he goes.”
Bumbersnoot crouched down in one corner of the parlor and deposited a pile of ash in a small mound.
“Oh, dear. Bad mechanimal!”
Vieve defended the dog. “He is a tiny steam engine. There’re bound to be a few deposits.”
“What about his capacity as a storage device?”
Vieve said, “About the size of your fist. Any larger and it might get stuck.”
Sophronia nodded, hoarding the information away for future use. “So are you any good at climbing?”
“Yes, but fortunately, we don’t have to.” The girl held out her wrist. On it she had strapped a wide leather band with what looked like a small brass jewelry case affixed to it. She flipped open the lid and held up the gadget for Sophronia to see.
At first Sophronia thought it might be a music box, but when she looked closer, she saw there were all sorts of dials and wheels and small knobs.
“What is it?”
Vieve grinned. “I call it my anti-mechanical mobility and magnetic disruption emission switch. Soap calls it the obstructor.”
It took only five minutes for Sophronia to badly want an obstructor of her own.
Vieve simply marched out into the hallway, and when a maid came trundling threateningly in their direction, the girl pointed her wrist at the mechanical and clicked a switch with her free hand.
The maid froze in place. Steam stopped emanating from the base of its carapace, and the gears and dials where its face ought to be stopped moving. It was as though the mechanical had seen something scandalous and been seized by a fainting fit. Ingenious!
“Come on!” Vieve grabbed Sophronia by the hand and dragged her past the mechanical. “The effect wears off in six seconds. I’m trying to figure out how to extend it, but that’s the best we’ve got at the moment.”
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