A Proper Education for Girls (15 page)

“Miss Talbot!” shouted Mr. Blake, flinging down his equipment
and rushing forward, directly into the flight path. “Come down from there. I insist. It's far too dangerous—”

“Mr. Bellows, release the mechanism!” cried Alice. “Mr. Blake, stand back!”

“Miss Talbot—”

“Stand back, sir! Mr. Bellows?”

Alice felt the wood and canvas frame of the flying machine vibrate about her. It shuddered on its narrow wheels as it shot across the roof, hurtled up the ramp, and with a final thrumming sound from the vulcanized rubber band, was jettisoned into the air.

The wind buffeted her face and stopped her mouth so that for a moment Alice thought she was unable to breathe. But then her breath came in great gasps, and she found herself shrieking with laughter in fear and excitement. She looked over the side. Already the house was behind her, Mr. Blake (who had been obliged to throw himself to the ground in order to avoid being mown down by the flying machine as it careered toward him) a tiny figure running to the edge of the roof. Alice pulled out her handkerchief and waved.

A
LTHOUGH SHE WAS
a few inches shorter than Mr. Bellows, Alice's seat within the flying machine was cramped and uncomfortable. Her elbows jarred against the sides and she had difficulty reaching some of the levers and pulleys Mr. Bellows had described to her. The machine held a steady course, but its wings creaked alarmingly so that at first Alice feared they would snap off altogether. When this did not happen she relaxed a little. She looked over the side at the treetops and hedgerows far below. She felt no fear, just exhilaration. No panic, just a thrilling sensation in the pit of her stomach. She laughed and kicked her feet in delight.

Soon, Sodgers Hill began to appear considerably closer. Alice gazed hopefully at the row of levers ranked before her. Which one would assist in her descent? She could not remember. She looked out once more at the hedges of hawthorn, the thickets of gorse and
broom. A cow stared up balefully as she swept overhead. Did the ground seem nearer? A little, perhaps. She reached for one of the levers. Mr. Bellows had asked her to observe and report back; it was no less than her father would have expected of her. She looked along the wings and noticed a flap rise halfway along as she pulled. The machine began to sink rapidly toward the trees. Alice hauled on another lever. The machine righted itself as another flap opened on the underside of the wing. Another lever gave her the sensation that she was gaining height; a further one had no perceivable effect at all.

The meadow that led up to Sodgers Hill came into sight, beyond the oaks at the end of the park. She was now quite clearly descending. Had Mr. Bellows given her any specific instructions for landing? She was certain that he had but could not recall what they were. Besides, it was too late now as the ground was coming toward her faster than she could think. She seized the one lever she had not yet tried … The machine lurched and shuddered. Alice was jerked violently in her narrow seat as the wheels touched the ground. And then she was racing through willow herb and groundsel, bouncing painfully against the sides of the flying machine so that her teeth rattled in her head and she felt as though her neck must surely snap in two, her arms break like twigs. Even if she had noticed the log that lay directly in her path there was nothing Alice could have done. She felt only the vicious jolt as the wheels smashed into it and then she was flung forward, against the rim of the casing and into nothingness.

M
R.
B
LAKE WATCHED
the flying machine bear Alice off across the park. Behind him, Mr. Bellows shrieked and cackled in delight. “I knew it would work,” he shouted. “My calculations were perfect. She should be with Sluce in no time at all.”

“Sluce is not there,” shouted Mr. Blake. “I saw him in the house just now. He said he thought it was tomorrow.”

“My arm,” whimpered Mr. Bellows.

“Miss Talbot could break more than that, thanks to you,” snapped Mr. Blake. He seized a scrap of the vulcanized rubber strap that lay beside Mr. Bellows's toolbox and turned it into a sling. “Keep your arm supported like this. I shall see to it when I come back.”

“Where are you going?”

“To find Miss Talbot, of course.”

“But what about me?”

“I shall send Sluce to help you. You'd just better hope he doesn't think I mean tomorrow, or you'll be up here all night.”

M
R.
B
LAKE SET
off directly for Sodgers Hill. The wind had not changed direction, and he had last glimpsed the flying machine heading precisely along the course Mr. Bellows had planned for it. Should he go by road, or should he take what appeared to be the more economical route across the park itself? He decided on the latter. It soon became clear, however, that this was a mistake. The terrain in the woods was uneven, the ground covered with nettles and briars that stung his hands and tore at his clothes, and the trees confused his sense of direction. Cursing himself and his stupidity, he retraced his steps. He climbed over a fence and sank up to his knees in thick brown mud. He slipped on a cow pat. He turned his ankle on a molehill and then turned it again and again on every uneven sod of earth in his path. But at last, breathless and sweating, his clothes plastered with mud and grass stains, his boots filled with sludge and water, he staggered onto the meadow where Mr. Bellows's flying machine had landed. He could see it on the slope that led up to Sodgers Hill. It seemed to be leaning to one side. There was no sign of Alice.

“Miss Talbot?” He gasped as he ran. “Alice?”

He saw then that she was still inside the machine. Her head was forward and a trickle of blood had seeped from beneath the cooking
pot and dried against her temple in a black sticky mass. He pressed his fingers to her throat. The pulse was strong. She stirred slightly at his touch and murmured something indistinct.

Alice's head lolled against Mr. Blake's hand. “She's dead,” she murmured. “Oh Lily she's dead.”

“No one is dead, Miss Talbot,” said Mr. Blake, adopting what he hoped was a tone of life-affirming briskness. He suddenly remembered the bottle of ammonia salts he habitually kept in his pocket for when the fumes of the dark tent threatened to overcome him completely. Taking a quick fortifying sniff to clear his own senses, he wafted the open bottle beneath Alice's nostrils. How glad he was that he had finished—almost—his medical training.

Alice's head jerked. “Oh!” she cried, holding her hand to her nose. She blinked, her eyes registering shock and surprise. Then she frowned in pain. “My head!”

“You struck it on the edge of the machine. Whatever possessed you to make such a journey?” Mr. Blake gently removed the scarf and the makeshift helmet. “Does that feel better?”

Alice turned slowly to look at him. “I can see two of you. Two Mr. Blakes.”

“Take my hand. Can you manage to climb out?”

“I think so.”

As Alice struggled to extract herself from the restricted confines of the flying machine, Mr. Blake suddenly realized that he had left the great house in such haste that he had neglected to tell anyone but Mr. Bellows where he was going. How he was to get Alice back there if she was incapable of walking he had no idea. She was halfway out, like an insect emerging from a pupa, when she suddenly slumped sideways.

“My head,” she murmured. “You'll have to help me.” She reached toward him. But her sense of balance had deserted her. Her voluminous skirts lifted in the wind, almost turning inside out like a huge umbrella. He caught a glimpse of long white legs, a flash of sturdy cotton underthings, and then they were both sprawled side by side on the grass.

“Please excuse me!” said Mr. Blake.

Alice sat up and put her head in her hands. “Did I reach the hill?” she said at last.

“You did.”

“How long was I unconscious?”

“A few minutes, perhaps. You were coming to, even before I administered the salts.” The photographer adopted a confident tone—“May I feel your pulse again?”—and took her wrist. He stared at his watch but found himself scarcely able to concentrate. In his mind's eye he saw the flash of her legs, felt the warmth of her body as she tumbled out of the flying machine into his arms. He had also noticed that the bodice of her dress was torn at the shoulder so that a wide triangle of white flesh was exposed. His gaze fixed upon it hungrily. Her skin was luminous against the dark fabric. It would feel silky beneath his fingers, he knew. Or beneath his lips. He tore his eyes away. “Why did you do it?”

“One has to live,” said Alice. “Exhilaration is not something one finds much of in my father's house. The opportunity presented itself so I took it.” She smiled. “It was spectacular!”

Mr. Blake's heart was pounding, his stomach fluttering. Could it be that he was about to faint with the combination of desire and admiration that was, at that moment, seizing hold of him like a paralysis? Would it be unmanly to take another prophylactic whiff of his own smelling salts?

“You might have been killed.”

“I might have been. But I wasn't. Besides, you came to save me.”

“Hardly that.” Was she teasing him? He found he didn't care.

A
LICE WAS WOKEN FROM A SHALLOW SLEEP BY THE
sound of laughter in the hall below. A woman's laughter. Her father must have returned from London with the Cattermoles. As his daughter, she would be expected to be present. She looked at the clock on the mantel; she had been asleep for two hours. Fortunately, she and Mr. Blake had returned to the house in greater comfort than they had left it. Sluce had gone up to the roof soon after Mr. Blake's departure and (despite Sluce's objections) Mr. Bellows had sent out the carriage. A wagon had brought back what remained of the flying machine. Mr. Bellows had seemed indifferent to Alice's injuries, being merely concerned lest concussion make her forget what she had observed of the machine's behavior. It was Mr. Blake who had insisted that she take a warm bath and get some rest.

Alice put her hand to her head. It was throbbing where she had struck it, but at least she no longer felt dizzy. The cooking-pot helmet had taken the main force of the blow, and the gash to her head was not as bad as it had first seemed. Once the blood had been washed off it could hardly be seen. Her father would never notice. Not that he looked at her much anyway. She pulled on her dress and went downstairs to escort her aunts in to dinner.

In the hothouse, the lamps were lit, glowing eerily through the overgrown foliage like campfires in the jungle.

“Alice, my dear, where have you been?” said Aunt Lambert.
“Mr. Blake was asking for you. He's in the temperate house. He was here earlier, but he didn't stay long. One game of whist and then he was gone. I think he finds the heat rather oppressive. And the foliage, perhaps. It is getting rather out of control, you know. And there's a distinct draft. I suspect one of the plants has broken through to the outside, my dear. It must be stopped.”

Alice nodded. The place seemed as warm as ever to her, but the arthritic joints and stiff backs of the aunts were as efficient as barometers in the detection of changes in the hothouse atmosphere.

“Mr. Blake didn't really want to play whist,” said Aunt Rush-ton-Bell, shuffling her cards listlessly. “He was just being polite. Such a pleasant young man.”

At that moment the photographer himself appeared. “I thought I heard your voice, Miss Talbot. How are you feeling?”

“I'm quite well, thank you,” said Alice. “We were about to go in to dinner. Will you join us?”

“I don't think so. I have some work to do—”

“Come, Mr. Blake, a man must eat,” cried Aunt Statham, wagging a finger. “You work far too hard. And an old lady like me must have an arm to lean on.”

Mr. Blake looked at Alice, but she had already turned away. With Aunt Rushton-Bell on her arm she began to make her way through to the house. Aunt Pendleton, Aunt Lambert, and Old Mrs. Talbot followed in procession behind.

“I think you are fond of Alice,” said Aunt Statham in an undertone, seizing the photographer's arm and steering him after the others. “I can tell, even if no one else can. I'm an artist, you know. I have an interest in physiognomy and I can see it in your face.” She blinked at him myopically “As a photographer you must know how expressive the face is—despite the fact that your chemical portraits render just about everyone cross-eyed and peevish looking.”

Mr. Blake smiled.

“No doubt you think me outspoken.”

“Not at all.”

“It's an old lady's privilege, of course.”

“Indeed.”

“Well then.” Aunt Statham tightened her grip on his arm. “Let me say this to you: have a care, Mr. Blake. If you break Alice's heart, you shall have me to contend with. I'll not have that girl sent off to India, cast away from her family like her sister.” She produced a lacy handkerchief and dabbed at her eyes. “Lilian and Alice are twins—well, triplets, but the third one died, as you probably know. To separate them like that, why, it's cruelty! I'll never forgive Edwin for it, never.”

“But Miss Talbot's sister got married. That was why she left.”