“What if your plan doesn’t work?”
“Then you break away from us, get out from over their nets, and sink the damned machine where they’ll never find it. Understand? The most important thing is that none of them ever get their hands on the thing.”
“Yes. I’ve only one question.”
“Mm?”
“What’s the bidding up to?”
“More than they’d ever intend to pay.”
Mary looks up at the balloon flapping over her head, straining at the ropes. “S’what we all pay, in the end, ain’t it?”
Selling the donkey paid for passage for two on a steamer bound for Amsterdam. A senseless waste, in so many ways. Even now, just the thought of it digs cold claws into her heart, more deeply than anything else will ever touch her. It’s all she can do to shut Julia’s memory back in its box.
Once she reached Amsterdam, she shared a room with another English girl of unfortunate circumstances. They stretched a curtain across the room so one of them could rest while the other worked. And if Mary drank more than was healthy, what of it? She’d already lived longer than she’d expected, and longer than anyone knew.
She’d taken the name of the woman she had left in Whitechapel, the woman whose throat she’d cut. Her roommate. Her lover. Her soul. Now she was Julia, and Julia was Mary Jeanette Kelly on a coroner’s report, and splashed like blood across the newspapers. And if the Devil’s men or the Mongols still sought her after the mansion and the dead within had burnt to ash, had sought her and that hellish machine, that trail ended with Julia’s mangled corpse.
Sometimes it was easier to believe that the Ripper really had killed Julia. When she doubted, she drank.
Once when she had been drinking, her roommate—what was her name?—asked her why she left London. The girl had run half-naked, bruised, and bleeding into the street to escape Mary’s sudden rage. Mary dumped the girl’s belongings on the curb and locked the door. After that, there had been no conversations, no questions, just an endless parade of men buying relief, day after night after day, until the weeks melted into months.
One night, after a particularly unpleasant client, Mary drew the curtains to her room early and began drinking heavily. Was this it? Her life, alone and friendless in fucking Amsterdam? Is this what Julia had given her life for? There had to be an escape.
That was the night she began to put the machine back together.
Two months and part of a third she worked on the fucking machine, and not a single day went by that she didn’t curse the lack of foresight that led her to use the pages of the Devil’s notebook to fuel the fire that burnt his mansion to the ground. She’d saved the machine, but not the diagrams showing how it went together. What was the sense of that?
The truth was, she hadn’t saved the machine. She’d saved the donkey, overwhelmed by the horror of one more death, even that of a beast. The machine was just a passenger, strapped to the donkey’s back and forgotten in the panic. It was only as she fled the growing inferno toward her home, and to Julia, that she realized what she had.
She and Julia could have lived like queens. They could have had anything they wanted.
Why couldn’t Julia see that?
He was British, and an officer of the East India Company, and he paid in cash and opium. They passed the pipe between them, and she danced for him, slow and sinuous, before pushing him back against the cushions. And while she dreamed the dreams of poppies, it didn’t much matter to her what he did with her flesh.
She didn’t notice when he climbed off her flaccid body in search of a chamber pot, or when he exclaimed in shock when he walked behind the curtain that hid the Influence Machine. Even when he grabbed her by the hair and dragged her to the machine, demanding her name and how she had come by the thing, it took all her energy to bring herself to enough consciousness to respond.
And when it was done, she sank back into dream, and down into the blood that pooled around his body, the razor blade still clutched in her bleeding palm. Soon, she knew, she would need to do something about this. But soon seemed so very far away.
Before Mary could make good her escape from Amsterdam, the rumors already ran rampant. The man she’d killed was more important than she’d known, and his body was found quickly. Stories of the odd machine she’d kept, revealed by former clients under interrogation, quickly filtered through the city. How much information sold to the British, French, Company, and Mongol agents who trolled the underbelly of Amsterdam was real and how much was fabricated would never be known, but it was luck as much as anything else that got her on a train for Munich while another woman traveled north to Copenhagen with two trunks purchased for a song.
The Influence Machine itself Mary repacked in three smaller trunks, and she thought herself both clever and safe, until they reached the Stuttgart station.
As she waited for passengers to disembark, an older man approached her, frowning sternly under his elaborate mustache. He held his monocle to his left eye and squinted.
“You are Mary Kelly, ja?”
Mary shook her head. “My name is Julia.”
The German’s expression did not change. “You are Mary Kelly. You will come with us, now.”
A pair of armed guards stood at either exit to the car.
Mary took a deep breath. “Ja. Okay.”
The Germans escorted Mary and her luggage to a carriage, which took them through the Black Forest to a waiting train in Baden-Baden, which, in turn, carried them to Konstanz, on the south side of the Bodensee.
“Today,” the German said, addressing Mary for the first time since he’d escorted her from the train, “we saved you from Mongol agents. Rest tonight. Tomorrow we sail for Friedrichshafen. The Graf is most eager to meet you.”
The three fleets drift perilously close to one another as they jockey for position. Smoke rises from four ships, victims of an unfortunate breeze that brought them too close to the enemy. One of the ships has begun to tip as it prepares for its long slide into the depths.
Within the circling armadas, the Light Brigade bobs absurdly, a sailcloth balloon flapping half-filled in the wind, rising as tall as the mainmast, but not near enough to lift the gondola from the ship’s deck.
“You built this?” Mary asks.
Yaqub shrugs. “Just the engine. Petrol is more efficient than coal, and I can divert power from the heating coils to run the propeller. The engine spins a coil between two magnets which generates electricity—so it’s a bit different from your Influence Machine, which is an electrostatic...”
“That’s nice. You know how it works, then? And if it broke, you could fix it? Or make it, I don’t know, do other things?”
“If I had the right parts with me.”
Mary purses her lips. On the forecastle, Mr. Gibson waves flags in an elaborate semaphore. The negotiations still run hot between the Light Brigade and the others. In this case, it is the East India Company increasing their offer.
“Load up some parts, Yaqub. I have a feeling that we’ll be needing them.”
They lay like giant bratwurst across the surface of the lake, dozens of them, tethered to floating hangers. The ferry made its way between the silver behemoths and toward the docks just outside the town of Friedrichshafen. On the lake and on the dock, workers in both military and civilian uniforms scurried around and over the mammoth constructions.
Once on dry land, guards escorted Mary to a sturdy, utilitarian building. Some of the workers stopped briefly to give her an appraising whistle, and she flashed her ankles in return. There was never any harm in cultivating a bit of good will in a dangerous situation.
Mary’s escort stopped, knocked briskly at the door before opening it, and announced them. He spoke in staccato German, and she understood only Graf Zeppelin, which she took to be her host’s name, and the word mädchen, which she knew referred to her.
Inside, a man looked up from the schematics that spread out across his desk. He smiled under his bushy mustache and
stood. It looked like most of the hair from his scalp had burrowed through his head to hide under his nose, and to sprout like mad roots from his cheeks. In contrast, his uniform was immaculate, every decoration perfectly in its place.
“Ah, Miss Kelly, yes? You are even more beautiful than our reports suggest.” He wiped graphite from his hands onto a towel, then circled the desk to approach. “I am Ferdinand Graf von Zeppelin. You have heard of me, yes? No? It does not matter. You have seen my work, out on the lake. Soon enough, the world will know my name.”
“Pleased to meet you, Mr. Zeppelin, I’m sure.” Mary curtsied. “I saw them, but I don’t know what they are.”
“Please, this is the title. ‘Graf’ is in German like your English ‘Count,’ so I am Ferdinand Count from Zeppelin. But I must insist, call me Ferdinand.”
“Yes, your lordship. Sir.” Mary hesitated. “So what were those things?”
“Airships, my dear! Not simple balloons, but ships that will navigate the skies as ships now sail the seas!” The Graf put an arm around Mary’s shoulders and drew her away from his office, and down a path leading to a small bunker. The small contingent of officers who made up Mary’s escort followed, bearing her luggage. Ferdinand spoke with an air of confidentiality. “They are what Germany needs to push back the Mongols who even now plunder Prussia. When we command the skies, we will no longer need to bend a knee to the British, begging for support against the Golden Horde.”
“So this, this airship thing. It’s a surprise, right? A secret?”
“Of course. It does not do to advertise one’s capabilities before engaging the enemy. Why do you ask?”
“I’m just making sure I understand my situation.”
Graf Zeppelin held her at arm’s length and studied her. “We will not mistreat you during your stay.” He shrugged. “And if the gift you have brought us is anything like what we have heard, this war will be very short, and you will then be free to go. You have nothing to fear from me, Miss Kelly, or from the German people, and perhaps a lot to gain. Come, let us take a look at your machine.”
Only two people were permitted access to the bunker. Graf Zeppelin held the only keys to the complicated locks, and a half-dozen men kept guard at all times.
“Aren’t there dozens of men better suited to help you with this?” Mary asked, handing the Graf a screwdriver.
“Perhaps, but none so lovely.” Ferdinand stepped back from the machine. It was almost fully assembled. “And none who have seen this device assembled. Besides, I dislike executing good men.”
Mary swung one of the wooden chairs in front of her and straddled it, arms crossed over the chair back, skirts hiked to her thighs. The Graf’s eyes travelled to her legs, pale and lovely in the stark incandescent light.
“So, you were lying,” she said. “Earlier.”
“Tell me, you have seen this machine work. You have had it in your possession for months, and tried—unsuccessfully—to put it together. You have held all its parts, and you have watched me catalogue and construct this thing over these two weeks. Could you instruct someone else—anyone else—on how to build one of these? Do you know how it works, and on what principles it operates? Do you understand even the smallest aspect of what makes this Influence Machine different from any of the scores of electrostatic generators out there?”
“So I’m a good assistant for you because I’m stupid?”
Ferdinand sighed. “You are a woman.” He shrugged. “A woman can be strong and smart, but science and mechanics? A woman’s strength’s lie elsewhere.”
Mary loosened the laces of her bodice. “Is this what you mean?”
She didn’t hear his answer. Twin explosions rocked the earth beneath them, and through the concrete walls, the sounds of gunfire, muffled and indistinct, came like hail.
Graf Zeppelin’s men were not unprepared for an assault, only the scale of it. That the French had gotten a heavily armed band this deep into enemy territory without being noticed was a feat in itself. Had they scaled the Alps, as some of the Germans surmised?
“No.” Ferdinand’s face was broken with a deep scowl as he rapidly disassembled the Influence Machine. “They had assistance. They needed only to come here in small groups, if they had someone within the German army to procure arms for them.”
He and Mary heaved the partially dismantled sections into several wooden crates. He hammered them shut, then called his men in.
“Whatever the cost, we must protect this machine. So we must retreat with it until it is safe to return. Hauptfeldwebel Stern?”
A young officer snapped his heels. “Alles ist gut, Generalleutnant.” He gestured at the crates and the men carried them out. At their appearance, the gunfire intensified, but the French were unable to break through the German’s defenses. Only an occasional stray bullet threatened them.
Mary followed the Hauptfeldwebel out into shadow. A great, long shape hovered above them, obscuring the sky. Heavy horse-drawn wagons had pulled the airship from the lakefront; it loomed over the camp. The crates, attached by hooks to ropes, slowly rose into the air toward the airship’s cabin. Ferdinand locked the bunker behind them and then ushered Mary to a rope ladder that dangled from the great ship.
“Quickly,” he said. “It is not safe here.”
Bullets kicked up bits of asphalt, not a dozen feet away. Mary grabbed a rung and began to climb.
“You’ve gone to great lengths, your Excellency, for a free peek up me dress. It would have cost less just to hire me.”
The Graf’s laugh washed away in a chatter of gunfire. He started climbing behind her, and Hauptfeldwebel Stern followed. The rope swung and twisted dizzyingly. The soldier holding the ladder stable fell suddenly, clutching his chest. The ladder, tangled in the man’s arms, jerked to Mary’s left, and she lost her footing for a terrifying moment. Two other soldiers ran out into the line of fire to disentangle the wounded man and steady the ladder. Mary climbed faster.
Hands grabbed her from above and hauled her into the cabin. Graf Zeppelin was not far behind. He pulled himself over the edge and stood, then stumbled and collapsed, his legs giving out under him.
Blood merely spotted his chest, but ran freely from his back. He clutched Mary close.
“Go to Lüderitz. It will be safe there. Tell Wolfgang, go to Lüderitz.”
By the time Hauptfeldwebel Wolfgang Stern pulled himself onto the flightdeck, the airship had lifted up and away from the firefight, and Generalleutnant Ferdinand Adolf Heinrich August Graf von Zeppelin was dead.
It was a long journey to Deutsch-Südwestafrika. They crossed mountains and seas and deserts with dunes so great they may as well have been mountains, stopping only once, in Togoland, to refuel. Mary sat back in the cabin with a blanket wrapped around her shoulders and refused to look out the windows. Every time she tried, all she could see was Ferdinand’s body falling, spinning loose-limbed as it rushed toward the hard ground.
She couldn’t look at Stern either, without remembering the cold stone of his face as he searched his commander’s body before rolling him out the open cabin door with his boot. But she had little choice there. The Hauptfeldwebel demanded her assistance as he tried to assemble the machine according to the notes in the book he’d stripped from the Graf’s body.
And it almost worked.
Mary shook her head. “It’s not right. I kept telling Graf Zeppelin, but he wouldn’t listen to me. Those brushes don’t go there.”
“What do you know? You’re just a girl.”
“That’s what he said, but I am a girl, and one with a lot of hair. I know brushes.”
Still, it would have worked had Mary not stolen a couple small bits. The Hauptfeldwebel ranted about them, pointed them out in Zeppelin’s sketches. Mary shrugged.
“Maybe they’re still in the bunker. We were sort of in a hurry, you know.”
The sun was bright and the wind brisk on the day the pilot announced that Lüderitz was in view. At the Hauptfeldwebel’s command, the
airship swung out away from land to approach the harbor from the sea.
The sun beat down, hotter than summer, as they descended. Mary pushed aside visions of falling bodies and risked looking out the observation windows. She could make out individual buildings in the ramshackle colonial town, and tiny specks that she took to be people. Two ships were moored in the harbor. Quite a few more were further out at sea, sailing toward the harbor. The pilot expressed concern, and the other two crewmen hurried to look.
“Can you see who they are?” Stern asked, coming up behind them.
One of them raised a looking glass. “French!” he said. “And Mongol also!”
“Good,” said the Hauptfeldwebel. He raised his pistol and pressed it to the back of the crewman’s head.
The shot rang, deafening in the enclosed space. The window shattered and the crewman fell forward, flipping over the railing and out. Mary screamed. Stern fired two more shots, and the second crewman stumbled, still clawing at his holster as he clutched his chest. Stern aimed his pistol at the pilot as he kicked the dying crewman to the deck, and then rolled him with his boot under the railing and out.
“Shut up,” he told Mary, and then to the pilot. “Take us to meet the fleet.”
“I will not.” The pilot lunged for a control panel.
Stern fired twice, and the pilot grunted in pain, and then Mary tackled Stern from behind. She slid her knife between his ribs, seeking something vital. There was a hissing of gas, and two more shots, and then flames.
Mary hesitates, staring up at the balloon above her. “You know, last time I got in anything that flies, things didn’t go so well.”
Carrigan laughs. “I don’t know. Since you crash-landed that flying behemoth of yours right in front of us, we’ve been hounded halfway ‘round the world by Frenchmen and Mongols and Brits, matched wits with convicts on Devil’s Island and battled sea monsters in the Sargasso Sea. More adventure than any man deserves, and quite a bit that Mrs. Carrigan will thoroughly disapprove of when she comes to learn of it.” He waves his arm at the encircling armadas. “This is but a temporary inconvenience.”
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