Mother Mary nodded, and Alice wondered how she had crept up on them with no one hearing.
“I’ve sent for Stella and Gretchen upriver—the two girls who left with Captain Stan’s party to spy out the dam. I’ll want a report from them before we put our heads together.”
Alice wasn’t sure what she had in mind, but she nodded anyway.
“You may join us in church if you want,” Mother Mary said, “and the evening meal is at sunset. The others should be here by then. We don’t have much time. I don’t mean to hold an axe over your heads, your being allies and friends of Betsy’s and all, but we won’t be able to put our minds to your ship until we come up with a plan to set the Californios dead to rights.”
“Now, see here—” Ian began, but she cut him off with an upraised hand.
“There are four of you, and hundreds of us,” she said simply. “If you help us, then you have my word we will help you. Until the river is out of danger from that dam, I must think of las brujas first.”
Of course there was nothing to do but be gracious and assure the woman who commanded these lands that they would do everything they could to help.
When she and Betsy were gone, Ian folded himself onto the hammock bed and drew Alice down beside him. In the safety of his arm about her, Alice could almost be positive about what waited for them outside.
“I wish I knew what they needed our help with,” she murmured, her head resting on Ian’s shoulder. “If they plan to declare war on the Royal Kingdom, I’d rather not be mixed up in that. I’d rather go after Gloria.”
“Married to a stranger,” Ian marveled. “I cannot believe it. I knew she was a woman with a strong will and iron principles, but I would not have expected they would carry her to such an extreme.”
“I hope he’s an honorable man,” Alice mused. “I wouldn’t like to think of her tied to a scoundrel, or someone who would hurt her.”
“A woman who can escape a party of mercenaries and form an alliance with a nation of witches is not likely to allow a man to hurt her, dearest.”
“But still. She’s only as big as a minute, though I have to say she’s the best dressed and the finest shot of all of us. What she doesn’t know about her father’s guns would probably fit in a teaspoon.”
“The guns will stand her in better stead than the clothes, I must say. Let us hope her new husband is a poor shot.”
Alice bumped his shoulder with a fist. “You are not helping. You know it wasn’t so very long ago I thought Gloria would be a better match for you than I.”
He tucked her more securely against his side and gazed deeply into her eyes in that way that always made her shiver inside. “I am very glad you no longer think so. If I am to be stranded in the desert with only my wits to save me, all the wealth and fine clothes in the world are worth nothing. But with a woman like you at my side—a woman who can outfly, outshoot, and out-invent me—a woman I can depend on when the chips are down? My dear girl, I would rather be with no one else.” He punctuated these happy facts with a kiss that emptied her mind of what could have been and filled her with delight at what was.
“You forgot one thing,” she said, snuggling into him in a glow of complete satisfaction.
“And what is that, my darling outlaw?”
“I know how to make two people comfortable in one of these hammock beds. Want me to show you?”
They were almost late for dinner.
* * *
Alice saw by the expressions on Jake’s and Benny’s faces that the evening meal had far exceeded their expectations. After his third helping of pork and chile stew rolled up in a corn pancake, Benny’s eyes rolled back in his head in an expression of complete satisfaction. Clara, who seemed to be second in command in the village and in charge of foodstuffs in general, beamed at him.
“I like a youngster who appreciates good cooking.”
“I ent had food like this since I left Carrick House,” he assured her, wiping his mouth on his sleeve. “I never would’ve suspected this landscape could produce such a meal, ma’am.”
“And polite, too,” Mother Mary murmured.
“The land does part of it—the chile, the hogs, the corn. But we enjoy trade with parts up and downriver to round things out. In the winter sometimes, pickings can be slim, but we’ve never starved yet.”
“But this is the winter,” Benny objected. “It’s March, though you’d never know it. I’ve never been in a place so warm in March. Beats London and the Canadas both.”
“It can be plenty cold, with snow to boot. But the village is warm and with the hydraulic heating system, we don’t need to burn valuable wood to enjoy it.” Mother Mary looked down the table toward the two young women who had been eating with great concentration, as though they’d been rationed for the past while. “Stella and Gretchen, we’ll have your report on the dam now, if you please.”
With a gulp, a girl with long, dark hair twined up with silk roses swallowed the last of her corn pancake and swigged from her clay mug some kind of clear spirits diluted with what Alice had been told was cactus nectar.
“We spent two days spying out the dam, Mother,” she began. “On both the north and south sides, though the access is better from the south.”
“Which we know because two soldiers shot at us, and when we returned fire, we had to go dispose of the bodies before the birds gave us away.” Gretchen tossed a long blond braid over one shoulder. “Salvaged two rifles, four pocket pressure bombs, and two nice uniforms, in case we ever need the disguise.”
Alice saw with a tingle of realization that the girl was wearing a clean white shirt with gold suns on the collar points. She had only a nodding acquaintance with Californio insignia, from having done some trading and deliveries in Reno, but if memory served, that meant the previous owner of that shirt had been a new recruit. Inexperience had likely led to overconfidence, and then death.
Mother Mary nodded. “Good. Go on.”
“They are putting every man they can conscript, impress, or shanghai into the work.” Stella took up the report. “The dam is now forty or fifty feet high, and they’ve built a release valve in the base of it to allow the river to flow freely while it’s under construction. Even with the valve only a quarter closed, the river is rising … as we see here.” She looked over her shoulder a moment, where on the opposite bank the water was lapping against a sheer face.
Alice saw that the stone had been marked at regular intervals. So they were recording the speed of the waters’ rise, then.
“How many days before the village is flooded?” she asked. When Stella looked surprised at the interruption, Alice said, “I’m sorry. But I see that you have marked the water’s rise, and I imagine each interval means something.”
“Yes,” Stella inclined her head. “I did that this afternoon. Each mark is one day, with smaller markings for each quarter that the valve is closed. At one quarter closed, the river will flood the village in thirty days. Fully closed, about seven, I think.”
“You mean if someone takes it into his head to close that valve all the way, we could be flooded out of here in a week?” Clara exclaimed.
Stella nodded slowly. “That is exactly what I mean. While it is under construction, we are fairly safe, because the dam is low. But there is a new problem—el Gigante.”
“The what?” Mother Mary said sharply.
“A mechanical giant has been put to work. Before he died, the soldier told me,” Gretchen said. “He thought he would frighten me, poor boy. The work is proceeding at three times its previous pace, because they use this thing as a crane, placing girders higher and higher, and moving gigantic boulders to backfill and strengthen the dam.”
“You mean they’ve replaced the Gatling gun and the cannon with—with hands?” Alice exclaimed. “But it was made for war!”
“How do you know what its arms were?” Gretchen’s stare was the kind that Alice would not want to face at the business end of a rifle—even across a wide river.
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“There are two of them, aren’t there?” Alice didn’t answer her. Instead, her mind was already leaping ahead. “Or did Gloria say they’d ordered only one of those monsters?”
“We saw only the one, and it was being used for construction, not war.” Gretchen’s tone was stiff, as though she appreciated neither the interruption nor the implication that her information was faulty.
“Only one.” Alice turned to Ian. “Do you see what this means? We found no trace of Evan or the behemoth in Resolution, yet we know for a fact they were both there, shooting at us.”
“Do you think—surely not, Alice.”
“Evan is alive?” Jake finished his sentence. “Alive, and operating that monster for the Californios?”
“He can barely shoot a gun, never mind walk about the country in a battle machine,” Benny said. “It can’t be him.”
“It fits the facts,” Alice insisted. “I don’t know how or when, but we know that someone is operating that thing—and it’s not the original operator. They would never put a Californio officer to manual labor.”
“I think that hope is making you jump to conclusions,” Mother Mary said. “Gloria knew nothing of this Evan. She thought he was dead.”
“So did we,” Ian told her. “But enough of that. We know where the behemoth is now, and what it is doing. Who is inside it is not really pertinent.”
“Quite so,” Gretchen said frostily. “But we need more information, and we need it quickly.”
“Ella will see to that,” Mother Mary said. Then, at Alice’s questioning look, added, “She is my daughter. She went with Gloria to act as her maid, but she will be sending us information as she can.”
“Not fast enough,” said one of the crew of the Colorado Queen, seated at the far end of the table. “And too easily pinched. We need feet on the ground. I’ll go.”
“You’ll be captured and pressed into the building work, and of no use to us,” Stella said. “We know what we know, and we’ll have to make do with it. We are going to have to destroy the dam from this side. There is no time for anything else.”
“From this side!” Mother Mary sat back in her carved chair—the only one besides Clara’s that possessed a back. “How are we going to do that? The water is rising every moment.”
A picture unfolded itself in Alice’s mind. “How deep is the water behind the dam?” she asked. “Right there, I mean, not upstream.”
“The dam is fifty feet high, so there is perhaps the height of a person between the top and the water’s surface. It is backing up quickly—much more quickly than here.”
“Forty feet of water will hide quite a bit,” Alice said. “What we need is one of Gloria’s undersea dirigibles. Swim right up to it and toss a bomb into the release valve, and it’ll bring the whole thing down.”
“Along with all the men working on the other side,” Gretchen pointed out. “Innocent men who have been captured, including men we know.”
“Do you have another solution?”
“I do not think you have one.” Gretchen glared at her, and Alice felt her hackles rise. “It is all very well to talk of undersea dirigibles when we have neither sea nor dirigible to hand.”
Alice gazed thoughtfully at the Colorado Queen, tugging at her mooring ropes several hundred yards away.
“No,” she said slowly. “But we might have the next best thing.”
Chapter 12
There was no better way for a nation to isolate itself than to make travel so dangerous that no one would come to visit.
Gloria gripped the wooden bench in a first-class compartment that made train travel not only beastly uncomfortable but downright painful, and watched in suspense as the soldiers that traveled with every train dealt with a band of mounted brigands. The latter had dragged a wagon across the track, forcing the train to stop, but clearly had not counted on the passengers being at least as well armed as the soldiers. Two or three of the desperadoes lay abandoned where they had fallen off their horses, while their companions pounded across the desert and up into the barren hills, followed by parting shots. Her husband and some of the other men dragged the wagon aside so that the train might get back underway with no further loss of time.
They were scheduled to arrive in San Luis Obispo de Tolosa tomorrow before sunset. Though the captain had assured her there would be accommodation in the town, Gloria fully expected that they would be locked out of the mission’s gates and left to fend for themselves if they arrived after dark. For all the monks knew, they could be brigands themselves.
How did any civilized person live in such an archaic society? How was it possible it had survived for two hundred years without falling apart from the sheer weight of inconvenience? Perhaps she would ask the Viceroy when she was finally able to speak with him.
Captain Stan fell into the seat beside her, wiping the sweat from his face. “Are you all right, Gloria?”
“Of course,” she said. “I was not the one running off bandits and dragging wagons from railroad tracks. Are you hurt?” His shirtsleeve had been torn partly out of the arm’s eye, and his waistcoat was soaked with what she devoutly hoped was sweat.
“Not at all. I tore my sleeve trying to make my tussle with José look convincing.” His eyes crinkled at the corners. “From your tone of wifely concern, I gather I succeeded.”
“My concern is very real. What on earth do you mean? Who is José?”
He leaned against her and whispered in her ear, “The attack was very real, too, except for José’s and my little tussle. He had news for me and that was the only way he could convey it—while I had him in a head lock.”
Gloria got her mouth closed with difficulty. “You mean—you mean those poor men died for nothing?”
“Oh, no. They were dead set on robbing the train. Their families are starving while the men are forced to join the rancho musters of soldiers and dam builders. The caravans, at least, provide a temporary means of getting food and coin.”
“Barbaric,” Gloria whispered. “But what news could possibly come at so high a cost?”
“The Viceroy is on his way south,” he breathed, his lips practically touching her ear.
She shivered and moved away just enough to let him know she would not permit such a liberty. Though it felt wicked. Delightfully wicked. She crushed her wayward thoughts with the certainty that it was a trick he likely used on desert flowers and cancan girls alike, and no respectable woman would allow it.
“Why?” she whispered back.
“José didn’t know. But think how this changes our plans. What are the odds that we might meet in the middle, at one of the ranchos?”
“I am sure you know better than I.”
“Approximately one in fourteen.”
“Good heavens, captain. Your mathematics instructor would be proud,” she said in a normal tone.
“It isn’t mathematics at all. There are fourteen missions with ranchos associated with them between here and San Francisco de Asis, the capital. The question is, what can we do to increase those odds enough to put us in the right place at the right time?”
“Hope that there are no more bandit attacks?”
“That will certainly help to keep this train on schedule. He left the capital yesterday on a private train—quite a marvel of engineering, I understand.”
“For this country that is astonishing. Though the train on which I was conveyed here—Silver Wind—was certainly a marvel. It could travel overland without tracks. It possesses two sets of wheels, you see, and…”
She forgot the rest of what she’d been going to say. He had frozen, his relaxed posture tensing as though he was about to leap to his feet. He bent his intent, green-eyed stare upon her and she felt rather like a rabbit under a raptor’s eye.
“What was the name of the train?”
“S—Silver Wind. Captain, what have I said?”
“You came out here on Silver Wind?”
“I was kidnapped here on Silver Wind,” she cor
rected him with some asperity. “It was the train from which I escaped into the witches’ church. Do you not remember? The Ambassador to the Fifteen Colonies, His Excellency Augusto de Aragon y Villarreal, was transporting the mechanical horses and the behemoth to the Royal Kingdom when we tried to stop him. In the resulting battle, I was knocked unconscious and brought aboard. Instead of the locomotive being trapped on a spur line, it simply let down a second set of wheels and the Ambassador and all the soldiers and mercenaries left alive departed the battlefield in perfect comfort.”
He stared at her in astonishment. “I can see that my musings as to your past have been wildly off the mark.”
He had mused about her?
Never mind. “The point is, I spent two days aboard that train before I was able to escape. If only I knew how to operate the wretched thing, I would steal it myself and go home.”
His astonishment melted into a smile. “I would not put it past you.”
“But how did you know of it?” she asked. “As soon as I mentioned its name, your face changed and you looked rather dreadful.”
“I only know what anyone knows of trains,” he said with irritating vagueness. “I expect it wasn’t built here, though.”
“It was not. It is a Fremont train—my father commissioned a number of them from Stanf—”
Oh, dear Lord in heaven. How could she have been so stupid? No wonder his name had sounded so familiar!
“Stanford—” She tried again, but her mind was going at such a pace her mouth could not keep up. “A Stanford Fremont train,” she finally said. “Your father is Stanford Fremont.”
“I thought we had already established that.”
Ooh, she could just whack him with her pocketbook! If she possessed a pocketbook.
“Now I remember.”
“I would prefer you did not.”
“But—but—”
“Gloria. I mean it. I neither use that name nor wish to be reminded of it.”
She could barely breathe, and it was not because of her very comfortable corset, either. “But you are the missing heir!” she finally hissed. “They have been searching the entire country for you for years!”
Fields of Iron: A steampunk adventure novel Page 12