A force slammed into Sophronia, pushing her violently aside. She rolled with it, away from the tea table, coming up to her feet, still holding the fan at the ready.
While Professor Braithwope might be insane by most standards, his feeding instincts functioned fine. They would be the last to go in any creature, Sophronia supposed. Although his table manners did leave something to be desired. This was only a casual tea, yet he was positively animalistic in his slurping.
The prone Pickleman writhed and gurgled but could do nothing to stop the vampire. Even weakened from torture, and having been confined without sustenance, Professor Braithwope was more than a match for a mere human. Not to mention the fact that after losing blood himself to the wooden knife of this captor, his urge to feed must be overwhelming. Really, the Pickleman had brought this on himself.
Mademoiselle Geraldine joined Sophronia, carrying Professor Braithwope’s yellow banyan robe and looking on with complete indifference.
“It is troubling when a civilized creature becomes so gutfoundered he forgets technique. I had a fancy man like that once.”
“Oh?” Sophronia was wildly curious, but the headmistress left it there.
The two ladies watched silently until Mademoiselle Geraldine added, “One ought to look away in disgust, I suppose.”
“Agreed,” said Sophronia. “But the one is our enemy and the other mad—we must think to our own skins.”
“Well put, young lady.” Mademoiselle Geraldine spoke to her as if she were almost an equal. It was charming. “You have a plan?”
“Of a kind.” Sophronia handed the headmistress her spare knife, filched from the kitchen, and the remaining acid. “Keep an eye on things here for a moment, would you, please?”
Mademoiselle Geraldine nodded.
Sophronia nipped out, retrieved Bumbersnoot and his two charges, and returned, shutting and locking the door behind her.
“Do we let him feed the man dry?” The headmistress’s tone was conversational.
Sophronia frowned. “I trust to your judgment in this. I will say, however, that if we did so, a man would be dead, and you likely know better than I how many legal issues always arise from that.”
The headmistress sniffed. “He wasn’t very nice to poor Professor Braithwope.”
“Perhaps we should ask him, then.”
“Excellent notion.” Mademoiselle Geraldine shook the vampire by the shoulder. “Oh, Professor?”
No response. The Pickleman was extremely pale under that seedling beard and looking husklike from lack of blood.
“Please, Headmistress. Allow me.” Sophronia snapped open the lid of her flask of lemon-infused tincture and dabbed a generous amount onto the vampire’s nose.
Nothing happened for a moment.
Then Professor Braithwope sneezed violently, which forced him to unhook his fangs from the Pickleman’s neck.
“Professor, dear,” said Mademoiselle Geraldine, “I have your robe. Do put it on.”
The vampire straightened, dazed but now free of any evidence of torture. All his wounds were healed. One could see this, of course, because he was still without clothing. He turned to face them.
Sophronia and the headmistress got a good view of all matters at that juncture.
Sophronia couldn’t entirely hold back a squeak. It was so surprising. “Goodness. Well, I always told my mother this school provided a comprehensive lesson plan. It is a good thing she did not realize how comprehensive.” She did not turn away, however. A lady of good breeding wasn’t afforded many in-person anatomy lessons, not even at Mademoiselle Geraldine’s.
Professor Braithwope struck an Adonis pose. “I was sculpted in marble. Did you know? I was once thought quite the fashion.”
The headmistress smiled and draped the yellow robe about the vampire’s shoulders. “Unfortunately, my dear man, this is England in the modern age, and you really must wear clothing. How would we otherwise get any work done? Such a distraction. And what will I tell this young lady’s mother?” Even though the Pickleman was barely conscious, Mademoiselle Geraldine was careful not to use Sophronia’s name.
If Sophronia had lingering doubts about the headmistress being a trained intelligencer, they were now put to rest.
“You tell her that her daughter got a bang-up classical education,” replied the vampire.
Sophronia didn’t entirely understand the subtext, but Mademoiselle Geraldine found this hilarious.
The vampire shrugged into his banyan, tying its fringed sash tight about his waist. Sophronia breathed a sigh of relief. It had been a bit much.
Mademoiselle Geraldine moved the conversation on. “Forgive me, Professor, but your meal? What should we do about him?”
The vampire looked at the prostrate man. “I’m full now.” His tone was childlike.
Sophronia considered the problem. “We can’t leave him. He will eventually tell what he knows.”
“And what is that?” wondered Mademoiselle Geraldine.
“That I am here, that you two are free, that I’ve already eliminated one other man, and that I intend to eliminate more.”
“Ah. I see. Your thoughts, Professor?”
“Every man should fly once in his lifetime.” The vampire’s mustache had recovered from its faint and was puffy with malcontent.
“Out the window, you think? Well, if you would do the honors.” In an aside, Mademoiselle Geraldine said to Sophronia, “We have a good excuse, that way. He could have simply fallen off.”
The vampire lifted the prostrate Pickleman. The headmistress opened a large porthole on one side, behind a pile of leaflets, and without ceremony, the vampire stuffed him through it.
Sophronia preferred not to think about the man falling to the countryside below. Even had he survived the bite, he would not survive that. Death, she thought, laid at my door. Absurdly, her brain fixated on the man’s appalling grooming habits. At least she wouldn’t have to look at that beardlet ever again.
She then found she wanted rather badly to cast up her accounts. But her stomach was empty. She could only hide the fact that she was retching by turning away and covering her mouth with her fan. That only caused her to notice the blood on the blade. She cleaned it hastily with her red doily, the one they were always supposed to carry with them but were never told why.
“My dear girl, was that…? Surely not. Your first finishing?” The headmistress took her arm, solicitously. “Come, I believe there is a little tea left in the pot. You look as though you could use a drop.”
The teapot, on its side where the Pickleman had dropped it, did indeed still contain a splash of tea. It was enough for a much-needed, and very fortifying, tiny cupful.
Sophronia sipped it gratefully.
“There, that’s the color back in your cheeks.” Mademoiselle Geraldine patted her shoulder.
Professor Braithwope joined them, drawing up Sophronia’s former pouf and perching on it like an odd buttercup-colored walrus. He seemed utterly harmless in his yellow quilted robe, his mustache bristling with satisfaction.
Sophronia had a difficult time looking at him.
“So, my dear, what’s the occupation situation?” asked Mademoiselle Geraldine.
Sophronia felt better at the question. This was something she was prepared for, that she was equipped to handle with skill and training.
“I have a map for that.” She reached into her pocket.
NOT WITH A BANG BUT A WICKER
They had to study the map at length in order to formulate a satisfactory plan of action.
It was Mademoiselle Geraldine who called a halt to the proceedings. “We should move. They may send a runner up here to find out what’s happened to our airborne friend.”
Sophronia nodded. “They are less likely to search student quarters, although with two men missing, they ought to begin a room-by-room sweep. That’s what I would do.”
“Do they have the manpower for that?” asked the headmistress.
Sophronia g
rinned, looking feral. “Not if we keep hounding them.”
“I see why you were recruited, my dear.”
No sooner had she spoken than one of the young fresh-faced Pickleman runners appeared, banging on the door to the administrative room, demanding entrance.
Professor Braithwope made quick work of him, not with his fangs this time, thank goodness. Instead, he merely whipped open the door and bopped him on the chin with a fist.
“We can’t keep throwing them overboard,” objected Sophronia when the vampire lifted the boy to carry him to the porthole.
“Can’t keep them, either. Someone might find and release them.” Mademoiselle Geraldine was more bloodthirsty than anyone might have imagined.
“I’m not all that hungry.” The professor looked with mild interest at the young man’s white neck, exposed by his lolling head and poorly tied cravat. “But I’d be willing to try. Only you, dear ladies, could turn me to gluttony.” He sounded almost sane—his mustache looked disciplined.
“I have an idea.” Sophronia grabbed the length of rope previously used to tie Mademoiselle Geraldine to her chair. “Bring him along, please, Professor, and I’ll show you.”
They left the administrative room. Mademoiselle Geraldine carefully locked it behind them. She had recovered her keys from Deep Voice.
On their way to student quarters, Sophronia demonstrated how to bind, gag, and tie the young man outside, under the balcony of one of the classrooms. He was effectively invisible from all sides, except where the rope showed at the bottom of the rails. Unless someone stepped out onto a lower balcony and looked up, he’d be impossible to spot. He resembled nothing so much as a suckling pig trussed for roasting, dangling from under the eaves of a porch.
“That should do, don’t you think?”
“Indubitably,” agreed Mademoiselle Geraldine. “It’s a capital solution for the future, as well. If we can disable and truss every Pickleman, we won’t have to kill any more. What do you think, Professor?”
“All of them? Can’t I have a little nibble now and again, whot?”
“Of course you can, dear.” Mademoiselle Geraldine patted him on the shoulder sympathetically.
He brightened. “Jolly good.” Professor Braithwope was proving unexpectedly helpful. They could only hope his lucidity lasted.
“We’re going to need a lot of rope.” Sophronia led the way out toward the stern and the student residential area. She had her obstructor at the ready, in case they encountered malicious mechanicals, and her bladed fan open, in case they encountered malicious Picklemen. Mademoiselle Geraldine brought up the rear. The vampire walked between them so they could keep an eye on him.
Suddenly the vampire lurched at Sophronia.
“My bow!” he cried, fixated on the small crossbow dangling from Sophronia’s improvised belt.
“Now, Professor.” Sophronia scrabbled for some kind of logic he would understand. “Don’t you think it goes so much better with my outfit than yours?”
The vampire blinked, looking down at his own yellow sleeve. The bow, which was a dark mahogany color, did indeed go well with her leather-covered red-and-black dinner gown.
“Oh, very well,” said the vampire petulantly.
They continued down the hallway, finally reaching the suite of rooms set aside for Sophronia’s year group. She opened the door and gestured to the others to enter.
Sophronia hissed in an aside to the headmistress as she passed, “Do you have the codes as well as the keys?”
“Codes?”
“To activate the soldier mechanicals.”
“You think that’s wise? After all, the soldier mechanicals are still mechanicals, and the Picklemen are in control of them.”
“I don’t think Lady Linette would be so foolish as to install new valves in the school’s only major defense system. After all, it’s the valve that is the true danger.”
“That could be perceived as naïve, my dear. The valve is only their latest endeavor. They could have been planning this for a very long time, in which case even the most primitive models are suspect.”
The headmistress moved into the parlor and collapsed onto a small chaise longue while Sophronia locked and bolted the door. She also set up a noise trap, using a propped chair and Dimity’s hair receiver. When they roomed together, the ugly little pot used to drive Sophronia crazy. If it got broken when someone opened the door, so much the better.
“Should we go into my private sleeping chamber? Even safer there.”
Mademoiselle Geraldine extracted herself from the chaise with a groan and followed Sophronia into her tiny bedroom. Professor Braithwope trotted behind like an eager puppy.
That door safely locked as well, Sophronia relaxed a little.
She pulled out the map, pointing to the locations of the enemy and explaining her dots. She crossed out the dot that represented Deep Voice and one of the dots for the runners.
“Now, if Professor Braithwope could handle whatever is going on in the pilot’s bubble? I’m remembering how well he dances the support beam.”
The vampire was hopping after Bumbersnoot, wiggling his nose and making bunny noises. Bumbersnoot was not amused.
The headmistress said, “He will require supervision.”
Sophronia nodded and pointed to the squeak decks. “I was thinking you could take out the two up top. They have guns, so they are a bigger risk. Are you prepared for that?”
The headmistress nodded. “I think so. Physical attacks were never my strong point, and I’m afraid of heights—that’s why I stay inside all the time. But I’m willing to try.”
Sophronia couldn’t help being a little admiring. It was as if Mademoiselle Geraldine were an entirely different person. “Headmistress, you really are a remarkable actress.”
Mademoiselle Geraldine blushed. “Thank you, my dear. I might have been great, you know, quite great. But there’s more money and less risk in espionage work.”
Sophronia was startled. “Than the theater?”
“Oh my, yes, dear. Horribly dangerous, the West End. Have you ever spent any length of time in the company of dramatic artistic types?”
“Not unless you count Lord Akeldama.”
“Well, then, there you go.” Much to Sophronia’s disappointment, she didn’t elaborate.
So Sophronia returned to the plan. “I thought I would go after the dining hall contingent. We need to cut off the head—then chaos should result. That should make freeing the sooties much easier.”
The headmistress looked at the map. “But the dining hall is where most of the enemy is! I can’t let you do that. You’re only a student.”
“Ah, but I have the chicken.” Sophronia gestured at the exploding poultry, which was currently reclining on her bed in the wicker chicken version of a seductive pose. Sophronia grinned at her own thoughts—she was beginning to give it a personality.
Mademoiselle Geraldine was uncomfortable with the risk. She might be treating Sophronia as an equal, but she still harbored remnants of teacherly concern. “You should take Professor Braithwope with you. How about you supervise the professor and the bubble while I handle the squeak deck?”
Sophronia considered. “Then we all hit the propeller room and free up some sooties? Recruit them to our cause.”
The headmistress contemplated the numbers. “No, that leaves the bulk of the enemy with time to regroup. I think you were right with the first plan—the dining room and squeak decks must be first.”
The discussion continued on toward dawn, at which juncture two of the three conspirators felt like they had a plan. What Professor Braithwope thought was anyone’s guess. He had given up on Bumbersnoot hours ago and was humming to himself while looking through Sophronia’s dresses.
Sophronia’s eyes were heavy lidded.
Mademoiselle Geraldine yawned behind her hand.
Nevertheless, they persisted until the headmistress pointed out that Professor Braithwope had curled up inside the bottom of Sophr
onia’s wardrobe, on top of her shoes, and fallen asleep. He looked, as was the custom, mostly dead. The sun must be properly up.
With a shrug, Sophronia shut the wardrobe door. Best to keep out as much light as possible.
“Whatever else, we must be coordinated.” The headmistress gave a small sigh. “And we need the vampire.”
Sophronia nodded. “Agreed.”
“So we must hide out here for the day.”
Sophronia didn’t like that, for it left the sooties enslaved for that much longer. Not to mention that Madame Spetuna was in danger.
“You think they’ll search the ship again, with three gone and us missing?” Mademoiselle Geraldine moved the wicker chicken off the bed. “Make room there, handsome.”
“It’s possible.” Sophronia tugged up the low neckline of her bodice in a now ubiquitous adjustment. “Then again, it’s likely making them nervous, which means they’ll make mistakes.”
“We can only hope so. And now, you look dead on your feet, dear. Get out of that dress and get some sleep. I’ll take first watch.”
Sophronia wasn’t certain if she was happier to be out of the blasted ball gown or to be in bed. Both were accomplished rather more rapidly than delicacy dictated, but if Mademoiselle Geraldine chastised her for it, she didn’t hear.
Sophronia slept until well past noon.
Then she sat watch while the headmistress slept, waking her before sunset.
Mademoiselle Geraldine got out of bed with her red hair wildly tousled and her face paint smeared. She made some desultory repairs, using Sophronia’s small vanity and meager stores of rouge, but emerged looking somewhat like Lady Macbeth after the speech with the spoon. Or was it a knife?
Luckily, Sophronia still had the food she’d filched from the kitchen. Also, Dimity had a mound of tea nibbles set aside to take to the sooties. It was mostly cake, but better than nothing. They ate all of it, hoping they’d have an opportunity to steal more when they were out that evening.
Sophronia would have given a great deal for a decent cup of tea. She even contemplated sneaking down to the kitchen to brew herself a pot. She thought she could teach herself how. But even tea wasn’t worth the risk—dire straits indeed.
Manners & Mutiny Page 20