Airship Shape & Bristol Fashion (20 page)

I nodded and smiled more. I could wait until the second or third glass of sherry, beetle back in here on some female pretext, and then have the Lovelace & Knuth out of sight before Mrs. Engels could say ‘knife’.

“Finally, no bunking off when my back’s turned. I need you on best behaviour while I persuade the War Ministry to keep faith in the elephants.”

I looked daggers at him. My father shook his head.

“Not today. Mr. Lyons has assured me that they’re on the right track and that your Knightsbridge…”

“Muybridge,” I said.

“ … whatever the blasted fellow is called. Your Muybridge idea is entirely unnecessary.”

I’d tried charm and logic. Then I tried tears and sulking. Shouting and throwing things didn’t work, either. Girls couldn’t debug steam elephants. Here endeth the lesson.

I sulked my way through two-thirds of a garden party, my mood only lightening when I beat some red-nosed artillery officer hollow at croquet. He was partnered with some chinless wonder of a junior officer who kept staring at me like I’d grown a second head. My own partner was a quite biddable curate who was introduced to me as Elmstone Hardwick. I mused very briefly on the notion of being Mrs. Hardwick before being horrified by the realisation that he’d loom over me like a top-heavy bookcase. I treated the not-quite-reverend Hardwick with much less reverence thereafter.

I dawdled away from the croquet lawn on the off-chance that I’d get a clear run through the rose garden and into daddy’s library without anyone seeing me. However I was somewhat startled by the appearance of Mr. Hardwick from the greenhouse door. He looked suitably horrified when I emitted an unladylike squeak and I allowed him to flap about like someone trying to fix an umbrella in a high wind. After a while, he subsided to waving a small parcel about as if conducting a Salvation Army band. I grabbed his wrist when it whistled past my nose for the third time and inspected the packet. There was an address, partially obscured by his thumb, but I could read ‘Mayfield Park, near Bristol.’

“Is that for father?” I said.

He peered at me like one of those people who seem to think that women are exotic creatures who’re only rarely taught to speak and then are terribly surprised when they happen across a talking example. He glanced around, as if looking for another man so as to be able to explain things properly, without resorting to mime or having to chew his own arm off in order to escape. I glared at him, only semi-patiently. The whole business of dealing with men had become irritating by the time I was sixteen. He blinked again and moistened his lips. Clearly it was arm-chewing time.

“The parcel,” I said it slowly and clearly, as if dealing with a particularly dopey Labrador. “Is it for Mister Butler?”

“Oh. Er. This is … Er. Yes.” He wouldn’t even look me in the eye, gazing steadfastly at my bosom instead.

“Splendid. Then I shall see that he gets it.” I twisted the parcel from his grip, turned on my heel and steamed off in the direction of the library, cast-iron excuse for being there in hand.

There was no-one about. It appeared that daddy had herded the great and good across the paddock to the experimental works, while Mrs. Engels and the housemaids had retired to the kitchens to polish off the leftover sherry. I turned the parcel over and over in my hands. It really had been jolly carelessly wrapped; one good slice with a letter-opener and it would just fall open.

A set of photographs scattered across the blotter. I craned over the desk to peer at one of them, before rolling my eyes in my own general direction, scooting round the desk and taking up residence in daddy’s chair in order to view them properly. They seemed to be a collection of views of the Stothert & Pitt crane works in Bath, taken from the northern side of the river. I was stacking the photos together in order to return them to their wrapping when I noticed that they were numbered. I laid them out on the blotter as if preparing for a rather strange game of patience and studied them properly. After a while, I hunted out a magnifying glass and considered each picture in turn. When I sat back several minutes later, Elmstone Hardwick was leaning against the French windows. His whole demeanour now seemed much less curate-like and much more military.

“Mr. Hardwick,” I said. I was going to be in a really quite remarkable amount of trouble.

“Miss Butler.” No hint of ifs, buts or arm-chewing now. “They’re rather interesting, aren’t they?”

That made a change from being told not to worry my pretty little head about anything more interesting than getting on in society. I tapped the third picture in the sequence.

“I thought I was looking at a selection of views of Victoria bridge, but it’s the cranes under test that’s the interesting part, isn’t it?”

He nodded, brow furrowed. I went on.

“And until you look at them in the right order, you wouldn’t notice that two of those cranes appear to be playing catch with a bale of cotton, which is obviously impossible.”

“Obviously, Miss Butler?” He strode to the chair on the opposite side of the desk and sat down. There was a metallic creak when he propped his left ankle on his right knee. I didn’t realise I’d started at the noise.

“War wound,” he said. Then “Why ‘obviously’?”

“Stothert & Pitt won’t have Jacquards, and even if they did… “ I stared into the middle distance. I was being consulted for my technical knowledge, by a man. I was more than half convinced that the entirety of the garden party would burst in at any second, roaring with laughter at the absurdity of it all. The red-nosed chap would lead the charge, loom over the desk and huff sherry fumes at me. I could feel the shame burning across my shoulders and up my neck, and hear Mrs. Engels’ gleeful chiding about ‘knowing my place’.

“Miss Butler?” Hardwick had to have been in on it. The whole wonky curate act and the artfully faked photographs. I refused to give them the satisfaction. I stacked the pictures together, returned them to their wrapping and stood.

“I’m sorry Mr. Hardwick, but I am feeling quite unwell. Should I call for one of the maids to see you out?”

He leaned across the desk, scooped up the packet and levered himself upright.

“No, thank you, Miss Butler. I shall find the rest of the party myself. Across the paddock, wasn’t it?”

I nodded. There wasn’t anything I trusted myself to say. I waited until he was crunching across the gravel before sliding Lovelace & Knuth under my arm and retreating to my bedroom.

A week later, daddy was regarding me over his half-moon spectacles and the remains of a substantial kedgeree.

“Olivia, d’you recall that curate chap from last week? Radnor? Herdwick? Something to do with flocks and tending.”

“Hardwick, father.” I barely glanced in his direction.

“That’s the fellow. It seems he’s inspecting a parish in Bath or somesuch and would be delighted to have the honour of your company.” Here he waved a letter as evidence. “Ordinarily I’d not hear of it, what with Mrs. Engels visiting her sister in Gloucester, but since you’ve been moping about the place like a wet Wednesday and him being a curate, well…”

Curate. Parish in Bath. A nice, safe, son-in-law. Not too far away, and the doing of good works would keep me busy. I could see how daddy would find that ideal.

I glared at him for form’s sake. He had no real need to know how Hardwick had come by a tin leg.

“You’re not really looking at parishes, are you?” I looked up at Hardwick as we walked out of the GWR station and turned left towards the Lower Bristol Road.

“I am. It’s just that specific parish is mostly the crane works. I’m afraid I may have dropped your father’s name in order to be offered a tour,” he said, striding in an annoying manner.

“So I’m to look decorative and not throw a fit of the vapours when confronted with big strong men working the steam hammers or the rolling mills?” I wasn’t going to break into a trot to keep up. He could whistle if he thought that would happen.

“If you let on that you know about anything other than knitting and kittens, the game will be very much up.”

“Ha.” I took a deep breath and reminded myself that the sun was out, Bath smelled only mildly of sewage and coal gas and that I was getting a free tour of a crane works. Even though I couldn’t let on that the last part was anything other than a massive imposition that I was bearing with all the fortitude expected from one of my station.

Naturally, I bunked off as soon as I could.

I considered sneaking about the place in order to discover secret goings-on or work of a rum or suspicious nature, but that would involve lurking behind piles of coal and getting a dress I rather cared for mired with filth. Instead, I just pretended that this was daddy’s factory and strode about as if my family owned the place. After about ten minutes of striding I was contemplating some sitting, when I rounded a corner to discover a factory-hand pushing a cart that resembled several bicycles brazed together. The push-cart was carrying a collection of what looked like glass globes about the size of someone’s head. I spotted the door let into the nearest building at about the same time as he slowed to turn round and open it himself. On a whim I hurried forward to pull the door open for him.

“Thank you, Miss,” he said without really looking at me. Society women in factories were a rare sight and not to be spoken to carelessly lest they take fright and run off into something dangerous, thereby putting production back and ensuring all concerned had to put in extra hours to make up the shortfall. I hovered in the hope that he’d assume I belonged to someone else and return to his cart-pushing.

“Will you be looking for our Mister Handlander?”

I blinked. This place was full of surprises. I decided to agree with the man. People in general are much more likely to be helpful than devious.

“Er, yes. I am. Thank you.”

“He’ll be in processing waiting for this new batch.” Here he nodded at his cart-load of glass globes. Close to, I could see that each globe was ringed with a number of bright metal bus-bars that ended flush with the inner surface of the globes. The bus-bars had threaded holes at the outer ends, allowing them to be bolted securely into some unknown apparatus.

“Can you find your own way, Miss? I’m late as it is…”

“Oh. Yes. That way, yes?” I waved down the corridor that ran down the inside wall of the building. There was a sequence of frosted glass panes set into doors running its length that presumably ended with that of the processing department.