Maggie turned to her cous—sis—to Lizzie, her mind struggling to find meaning in a sight so completely new. “What do you make of it?” she said at last.
“That’s a lot of engineering for potatoes,” Lizzie said in her practical way, her fascinated gaze taking it all in. “What is in those—that—goodness, I don’t even know what to call them. The metal coracles. What are they landing on Seacombe property?”
“We aren’t going to find out unless we get in there—and we can’t do it from here without swimming.”
“We shall have to approach from the inside—from the cellar.”
“Lizzie, there isn’t time for us to climb back up, gain the house, steal the key from poor Nancarrow, and go down that stair.”
“Why not? If that message is connected with this landing—and we must believe it is—it will take them some time to unload a thousand kilos of … whatever.”
Before Maggie could reply, the man in the rowboat hailed the sawan. “Halloo the boats!” he shouted. “What are you doing here?”
“How many times we got to tell you, these ain’t boats?” came a drawl they had only heard on the far side of the Atlantic, in the Americas. “and these here are the chaloops, known to regular folks as jolly-boats. Get it right, fer gosh sakes.”Neptune’s Maid is a naveer soo-maran
Navire sous-marin, Maggie translated automatically. Undersea ship. And chaloupes—jolly-boats—smaller boats that ferried people and things between shore and their larger host. Logical, if not very illuminating.
But very French. Why were French ships bringing cargo to the Seacombe beach? To avoid the harbor tariffs? For an operation this size, harbor tariffs would be nothing. What on earth was going on?
“If it’s in water, it’s a boat,” retorted the man at the oars. “What I want to know is, why weren’t we told?”
“You signaled. We came. That’s all I know. You got a problem, you talk to the boss.”
“But we’re not prepared!” the oarsman shouted, clearly frustrated. “How much is there?”
“Four hunnert fifty of good Kintuck bourbon and whiskey, and a thousand of china, tinned goods, Texican cigarillos, and cotton cloth.”
The air practically blistered as the Cornishman swore, and Maggie could see Lizzie committing a new word or two to memory for later use.
“You fools, if I row back and roust the men, there won’t be time for a proper job before the tide goes out!”
“What’s tide mean to us?” came the voice. “We’re below the tide—and we’ve worked on the beach before if we had to. Them chaloops got land wheels if we need ’em. Hurry up, then, we haven’t got all night. And by the bye, if you’d use a steam-powered craft you wouldn’t have to work so hard.”
The sound of laughter came out of the sawan as, cursing, the oarsman flailed one oar and brought his rowing boat around, then hauled on them both to take him skimming back toward the hamlet.
“We can’t go any closer,” Lizzie said, “and with more coming, it will only get more dangerous if we are discovered. We must go up to the house and wake Grandfather. At least we know what they’re bringing in, so we’ll have facts to present to him and the magistrate.”
“Lizzie—did you notice something about that conversation?”
“Besides the fact that at least one of those men is from the Americas?”
“Yes, besides that. Did you notice that they made no attempt at secrecy whatever? Once they were in the bay, out of sight of Penzance, the thing surfaced, and neither of those men lowered their voices. Why do they not fear discovery?”
Lizzie stepped out of the concealing darkness of the cliff face and leaned out enough for one eye to take in the proceedings. “Because they have permission to be here?” She turned back. “But surely our grandparents would not give it. They could not.”
Maggie’s mind was moving so fast that it was an effort to speak. Or maybe it was just that she did not know the effect her words would have on Lizzie. “Let us review the facts. A message comes notifying an unknown party of a certain cargo. A cargo matching weight and content is landed in a place that supposedly has not been used in decades. Claude notices that the books indicate a company much less solvent than is generally believed, and our grandfather flies into a rage. Yet our grandparents live in a style that only a much greater income could support.”
“There must be another explanation for that. Grandmother could have an income of her own.”
“If so, then why did Grandfather not give it? Why did he turn the argument on poor Claude to the point that he fled—Claude, whom I have never seen with anything but a smile on his face?”
Lizzie was silenced. Then— “The china,” she finally said.
Maggie made the connection in a flash. “With a dogwood pattern—a tree that is known to grow only in the Fifteen Colonies. And Grandfather’s drink of choice?”
“Kintuck bourbon. One can smell the stuff across the room.”
Maggie began to feel distinctly ill. “I am very much afraid that the conclusion is inevitable: Our grandparents are somehow involved in smuggling goods on French ships—goods from the Americas, at that. Which, as everyone knows, are forbidden to enter the country by order of Her Majesty except aboard Count von Zeppelin’s cargo airships.”
“Oh, Maggie. What are we going to do?”
If only she knew. If only the Lady were here to take charge. If only they’d never come to Cornwall and met these people!
Maggie took several deep breaths to steady her stomach. “Is it our business to do anything? This is obviously well organized—so well that either no one or everyone in Penzance knows of it—and of long standing. And it must be run at the highest levels, because I have never seen undersea dirigibles like that before. Who even makes them?”
But Lizzie waved this off as irrelevant. “Of course it’s our business! It’s our future. I don’t know about you, but I’m not keen on having to run an international smuggling operation simply to keep the dunner-men from the door.”
“Not that you couldn’t,” Maggie said loyally.
“That is not the point. The point is, this is no kind of legacy to leave one’s grandchildren. What if someone puts a foot wrong? Who wants a fleet of nasty navires sous-marins turning up every time one steps out of line?”
But Maggie was more concerned with the real dangers of the present than the imagined ones of the future. “We must notify the magistrate—that nice Sir John Rockland. He will know what to do.”
“Maggie, listen to yourself. He will arrest Grandfather for disobeying the Crown! Is that what you want?”
“N-no,” Maggie said slowly. “But now that we know of it, we are disobeying the Crown ourselves.”
“We are not landing smuggled goods.”
“Neither is Grandfather … exactly. He may be in the same position as we—knowing of it and allowing it. That does not make it less wrong, but at least he is not down there in the sawan in his shirtsleeves, unloading cigarillos. Look, this is getting us nowhere. We must send a pigeon to the Lady from Victory. She will know what to do.”
As a contrast to an untenable course, the thought of a mile’s run over field and stile at three in the morning seemed almost welcome.
And then Lizzie, whose hearing was acute, laid a hand on Maggie’s sleeve as she prepared to slip back into the shadows and along the cliff face. “What was that?”
“What?” Maggie could hear nothing but the wash of agitated waves and the subdued chug of the engines of Neptune’s Maid at idle.
“Can’t you hear singing?”
There were legends along this coast of mermaids who swam into coves and bays to sing the sailors into the sea, where they would attempt to take them for husbands—facing eternal disappointment at the sailors’ inability to survive under the waves. For one wild moment, Maggie wondered if there were mermen, too, with a penchant for young women.
“They could be singing as they unload those chaloupes.”
“No, not like tha
t. It sounds like someone is drunk.”
Together, they peered around the face of the rock to the outcropping of the cliff on the other side of the little bay. At the foot of it, wavering and stumbling, came a loose-limbed figure from the direction of Penzance, coat and cravat gone, shirt white and flapping in the moonlight.
“O where is my lover dear?
O where now is he-o?
The mermaid’s ta’en him by the hand
And led him out to sea-o.”
Maggie gasped. “It’s Claude! Drunk as a skunk and oh, Lizzie, he’s heading for the sawan. He’ll run right into those men—and then what will they do?”
19
The tide had ebbed enough now to leave a thin strip of wet sand at the foot of the cliffs, the rocks exposed and dangerously wet and slippery with weed. Claude lost his footing more than once, and finally settled for sitting like a child and sliding down the rest of the way, landing with a splash knee-deep in seawater. It was clear his intent was to get into the house unseen through the sawan, but equally clear was the fact that he had forgotten the cellar door would be locked. He splashed to the narrow beach and turned to look for the sawan’s arched and carved entrance.
At which point he saw the navire, its great glass dome rising from the water, the man who must be the captain watching the proceedings from the bridge.
“Halt!” he cried with a tipsy giggle. “Who goes there?”
The train of chaloupes issued out of the sawan, sitting much higher in the water now that they had been unloaded. “Hey!” cried one of the men in the lead one, which appeared to be the only one with a crew. “Who are you?”
“Might ask you the same question,” slurred Claude, “since I belong here and you do not. I say, what an interesh—interst—that is quite the boat.”
“Get your arse inside and wait for the next load. When are the rest coming?”
“Dashed if I know. Left most of them sleeping in the tavern.”
“Tavern?” The second speaker was the one who had sent the oarsman off to fetch the rest of his companions. “A fine kettle of fish! What are they doing in the tavern when they’re needed here?”
“He’s not with us,” the first man said. “Who are you, boy?”
Don’t tell them, Claude, Maggie urged silently. You’re just one of the locals, talking a walk to sober up before going home.
“Claude. Who’re you?”
“None of your business.”
By this time the uniformed man in the navigation gondola had issued from the top of the ship onto a kind of platform. The green light of the bridge illuminated him from below in an eerie way that made Claude reel back. “I say, what a fabulous contraption.”
“Claude?” the captain said, and Maggie stiffened. The jig was up. “Would that be Claude Seacombe, Howel Seacombe’s grandson? Allow me to introduce myself. I am Captain Paul Martin, and this is my crew.”
“Pleasure.” Claude took off one boot and poured water out of it, then did the same for the other. “Jolly cold water hereabouts, what?”
“Since it appears your grandfather has become reluctant to partner with us for the next stage, despite the profit he derives from our association, I believe some encouragement is in order. Claude, would you like a tour of our ship and something hot to drink?”
“Oh no. Claude, run, if you can!” Maggie moaned.
“Bloody civil of you, old chap.” Claude waved cheerfully. “And then I really must go in. Hell to pay if I’m late to breakfast, don’t you know.”
At a gesture from the captain, the chaloupe train reversed direction, ran up on the beach, and one of the bathynauts from the Americas assisted Claude inside the lead vessel with every appearance of hospitality and laughter and camaraderie.
“No, no, no,” Lizzie breathed.
It had been a long time since Maggie had felt so helpless, trapped as they were on the far side of the rocks and utterly unable even to shout a warning, much less grab their hapless cousin by the elbows and hustle him to safety. It was abundantly clear that what had been a criminal situation before had now become life-threatening.
She was quite sure they planned to hold him for ransom at least long enough to bring their grandfather back into line. Had Howel Seacombe finally seen the light and realized he was in over his head? But in what? Who were these people, and what did they want from him besides a conduit for colonial goods into England? What was the “next stage”?
The metal maw of Neptune’s Maid opened once again to admit the train, and when the chaloupes sallied forth once more, Claude was no longer inside the lead one with the bathynauts.
“What are we going to do?” Maggie wailed into Lizzie’s ear. “Even if we tell the Lady—or Grandfather—or the magistrate—we don’t know where that monstrosity is going.”
“France?” Lizzie hazarded. “But where? And even if we knew, no one can see it under the water. It could sit on the bottom of the harbor at Calais and no one would ever know it was there.”
A shout upon the water signaled the return of the local crew, crowded into the rowing boat and coming much faster with the help of more than one pair of oars. The girls were forced to shrink back into the shadows to avoid being seen, but while the unloading was taking place, at least Maggie got a chance to think.
“We must split up,” she said at last, watching the chaloupes chug their way back to Neptune’s Maid. “One of us must tell Grandfather and get a pigeon to the Lady, and the other must stop them from going until help comes.”
“What?” Lizzie choked on her own breath. “You can’t mean it. We must both run for help. If one goes to Grandfather and the other to Victory, it will come much faster.”
“And if we don’t get back in time, we’ll lose Claude somewhere under the sea. No, it must be this way, Liz. And since you’re the heiress if something happens to him, I must stall them and you must go for help.”
“No! Mags, it’s far too dangerous.”
“But we cannot leave poor Claude in their hands! What if Grandfather refuses to do what they want and they kill him?”
“What if they kill you, too?” Maggie could not see Lizzie very well in the dark, but there was no mistaking the horror and dismay in her tone. “What will I do then?”
“You will become a great lady, that’s what, and erect statues to our memory in the town square. Now, go, and quickly, before they finish.”
“But what are you—”
“Lizzie! Go!”
Her cousin was no fool. She could see that they had no choice—they must separate or Claude would be borne away under the water and at best, used as leverage against their grandparents. At worst? Maggie could not bear to think of it.
As the sounds of Lizzie’s hasty climb up the cliff path faded, Maggie turned her attention back to the sawan and surveyed the situation with all the keenness of a mind focused by fear. She did not care two hoots about this illicit importing business, but she did care deeply about Claude. Under that flippant and fashionable exterior was a kind and merry heart, and she would do everything in her power to save him from his own foolishness.
The tide was halfway out of the little cove now, exposing more rocks and sand. They could not stay much longer—the navire was already moving farther out into deeper water, which meant a greater risk of exposure. It would submerge soon. She left her safe hiding place in the dark crevice and crept down onto the beach, hoping against hope that none of the busy figures inside would look out and see that one of the shadows between the rocks was moving.
She reached the arch of the sawan and pressed herself against the damp stone, then took a breath and slipped inside. Her boots sank into the wet sand, and the smell of cold seaweed and strong tobacco assaulted her nose. She found half a refuge behind the coping of the arch, and squeezed as far as she could behind it to watch the frantic activity inside.
The sawan was lit by the chaloupes’ running lights and by a series of activated moonglobes set in niches above the landing. Already the s
tack of crates on the quay was taller than a man, and took up nearly all of the flat space. The chaloupes themselves no longer floated; they sat upon the sand on wheels that clearly retracted into their bodies when they weren’t needed. They were nearly empty, and as she watched, the fishermen hefted the last of the crates out of the third one, handing it up end over end in a human chain to be added to the larger stack.
Fascinated, Maggie studied them, plans and possibilities flicking through her mind. And then something caught her attention about the hull of the first chaloupe, which was closest to her, preparing to tow the others out into deeper water.
Its top half was constructed of thick glass, which divided along a brass seam to retract into the hull so that it could be loaded. An engine grumbled in the stern, where below, a heavy metal connector linked it to the next like a train car.
Something was stamped into the metal, the way pleasure craft had the name of the boat painted on the stern. Maggie squinted.
“That’s the lot, boys!” the man from the Americas shouted, and Maggie jumped and hit her head on the coping. Up on the landing, a bag exchanged hands, no doubt payment for an unexpected night’s work.
Rubbing her sore noggin, she watched as the Cornishmen ran their rowboat into the water remaining in the sawan, and then they shoved the oars in the locks and rowed out of there as fast as they had come in.
Now there were fewer men to see her, and the chaloupe lay between them. She crept closer to investigate. What did it say? Could it help them identify who these people were and where they might be going?
She crouched next to the rounded vessel, the ruffles on the bottom of her black petticoat dragging in the wet. Letters were stamped in the brass hull.
M.A.M.W.
Maggie drew in a long breath as memory swept over her in a wave.
A bullet casing from a shot that had nearly cost the life of a dear friend. A mechanical device within that dripped acid, eating through every organic thing it touched—including human flesh. A tiny stamp bearing initials just like these.
Magnificent Devices 6: A Lady of Spirit Page 14