The Derring-Do Club and the Empire of the Dead (24 page)

Whistles blew outside, shouts, and there was some disturbance. The soldiers were flushing out various wrong–doers in their search. That would give them a few more moments. Earnestine clicked her fingers and pointed. Georgina quickly gathered their belongings. Luckily Merryweather hadn’t known what to purchase for two young ladies, so there wasn’t the usual mountain of paraphernalia strewn about.

They were in the last sleeping coach, and they couldn’t go forward because of the soldiers, so the only option was the baggage coach at the very rear of the train. Earnestine stowed their bags and looked about. The carriage was filled with trunks, expensive items of luggage, and a huge number of hat boxes. Further down, there were bags for mail and supplies.

Standing on tiptoe, Earnestine could just see through the tiny, barred windows. The line of activity seemed closer. Merryweather was standing on the platform casually smoking a cigar. There were other passengers: one portly woman in blue was berating a soldier. Merryweather glanced at the carriage, looked along and then stared at the baggage coach. Earnestine pulled back and then looked again. He couldn’t see her, the window was too small and dark, but he must know that Georgina and she were hiding there. He frowned, worried, and nodded towards the carriage. He must mean, Earnestine thought, that there were soldiers on the train moving along.

“Hide!”

Georgina immediately started searching for a place. Earnestine found a gap between the mailbags and the wall. No, this wasn’t going to work.

The door burst open, clattering, and Earnestine heard men bursting in.

“Achtung!”

“Ah, there it is,” Georgina said sweetly.

The soldier started barking orders at her.

“That’s all very well, but I’m afraid I don’t understand German.”

“Platform! Everyone!”

“Yes, I know.”

“Platform!”

“But I needed my hat. It’s such a sunny day and the sunlight affects my skin terribly.”

“Now! Now!”

“Of course,” said Georgina. Earnestine hunkered down as she heard Georgina’s footsteps move away and hobnailed boots clomp closer as the soldier started to search the coach.

“Door please!” Georgina commanded.

A soldier swore in German.

“If you would hold the door open for a lady: manners maketh man.”

There were some choice grumblings and Earnestine heard the door catch again.

“Thank you, most kind.”

The door closed: everything was quiet in the baggage coach.

Earnestine waited, convinced that a soldier was standing silently, waiting to ambush, but when she finally crawled out, she saw she was alone. The view through the small window was tantalising and uninformative.

Earnestine sat on a hat box, splitting it beneath her, and wondered what to do. She should hide, logically, and the baggage coach door made such a clatter when she went through, but she wanted to see what was going on: curiosity wasn’t a crime.

She quickly scooted into the rear passenger coach and tried the first cabin… the second along was unlocked. She thought it best not to go to their own cabin. Bent double, she shuffled to the window. When she looked out, she was careful to keep the lace curtain in front of her.

On the platform, Graf Zala pushed through the throng, barging Merryweather himself out of the way. The Captain’s fist clenched.

“Miss Deering–Dolittle,” the Graf exclaimed triumphantly.

Georgina kept her face away from him.

Captain Merryweather stepped out of the throng: “I say.”

There was a scuffle as Merryweather was bundled away and… the window didn’t afford an adequate view particularly when the Graf came right up to Georgina. Earnestine ducked down. Georgina was facing the window, looking straight at Earnestine, as the Graf blotted out the light above her.

“Fräulein?”

Georgina turned: what choice did she have?

The Graf faltered: “You are not Fräulein Deering–Dolittle.”

“No,” she said, “I’m… Merryweather.”

The Graf screeched at his men: Earnestine doubted even a German speaker would have been able to follow the actual words, but the meaning was clear. The soldiers actually cowered, slouching their shoulders and looking away. The Graf snapped off a few German phrases. The soldiers went about at the double.

“Fräulein Merryweather,” he said, “ich bitte um Entschuldigung.”

“I beg your pardon,” said Georgina.

“My apologies, Fräulein.”

“I should think so too.”

They bowed to each other and then the Graf clicked his heels and marched away.

A station porter began shouting in German, French and then, finally, English: “Back on the train, back on the train.”

They’d got away with it. Earnestine couldn’t believe it.

She crawled out from the cabin, jumped up and pretended she was supposed to be inside already. She’d simply be one of the first to get back on the train. She straightened a loose wisp of hair, realised that she probably looked dreadful and made her way to their cabin. Sooner or later, Georgina would appear, Captain Merryweather would kindly come to check they were all right and Earnestine would be sharp with him and tell him to wait in the restaurant. They could have tiffin, afternoon tea or… she had no idea of the time.

They were travelling west, so they were moving through the various European time zones, which was… oh dear. Jules Verne’s
Around the World in Eighty Days
had Phileas Fogg going east and he gained a day, so they must be losing hours. So starting at breakfast, Tiffin would be an hour early and afternoon tea, assuming the train made good progress to Paris, would be another hour earlier still. Her stomach seemed to suggest the opposite, but perhaps the recent excitement had given her indigestion.

She giggled: her hands were shaking.

Must get a grip before Georgina returns, she thought.

Where was she?

She’d have to go and look for her.

No – impossible.

The Graf hadn’t recognised Georgina, but his use of their surname meant he was looking for Earnestine herself. The Graf had seen her at the castle; he must know now that she’d escaped and come to the conclusion – correctly – that she knew something.

Georgina arrived: “Ness!”

“Don’t make a fuss,” Earnestine chided.

Earnestine sat down, held her traitorous hands together on her lap and pecked her head slightly to indicate that Georgina should take the seat opposite. Georgina sat, fidgeted and stood again.

Georgina opened her mouth: “Arthur–”

“Calm down,” Earnestine snapped.

“Captain Merryweather isn’t in the restaurant.”

“You went to the restaurant first?”

“Of course. He’s not there.”

“Then he’ll be in his cabin.”

“This is his cabin.”

“Oh yes.”

Georgina glanced out of the window: “Where is he?”

“He’ll be along shortly, I’m sure.”

The train clattered, doors banged shut, a shrill whistle filled the air and there were shouts.

“Arthur!”

“Gina! Sit down! We can’t do anything,” Earnestine said, putting her hand on her sister’s arm and gently, but firmly, pressing her back into her seat. “We would jeopardise our safety, our mission. And his safety.”

The steam engine hissed loudly, tugged, the carriages jerked back and forth before settling. Strasburg station began to creep away behind them.

Georgina looked out of the window, looked and looked, craning her neck from one side to another.

“He’ll be on the train,” Earnestine said.

“There was some commotion, some… The soldiers took him away!”

“He’ll be on–”

“They’ve got him!”

“Nonsense.”

Earnestine shifted over and looked out herself: suddenly, she was staring at the Graf and he stared back, his face a picture of surprise superimposed over the reflection in the glass of her own shock. Try as she might, she couldn’t break eye contact as the train pulled away, picked up speed, then his face was obscured by the lace curtain and the spell was broken. Through a delicate hole, Earnestine saw him shouting and pointing at the train. Men moved, jumping towards the train. Earnestine pressed her cheek against the glass, pushing as hard as she could to see the rear of the train, men running down the platform and a few reaching the door of the baggage train, pulling it open, jumping on: one, two, three, he stumbled and fell. A fourth made it and then the station was too far behind and the train too fast.

“They’re on the train!” she said. “Three. We’re out numbered.”

“There’s Arthur.”

“Yes.”

Earnestine opened the door, sliding it as quietly as possible. Despite the iron foundry racket of the wheels on rails and the roaring wind, the door’s slight squeak seemed to screech above the clamour. She stuck her head out, glanced right and left, and then right and left again: all clear.

Georgina went ahead, shuffling through those patrons who were still settling in their cabins.

Glancing back, Earnestine saw the soldiers coming into the coach at the far end, ducked away and then sneaked another glance. They were checking each cabin in turn and, Earnestine was relieved to realise, this would slow them down.

Moving from one coach to the next gave Earnestine pause. The gap between the metal footplates showed the ground whizzing underneath. Everything clattered and the coaches moved in relation to each other, so the step across was nerve wracking.

Georgina was coming back, when Earnestine met her halfway along the next coach.

“He’s not there,” Georgina said.

“I see,” Earnestine said.

“Where is he?”

If they stopped here, then the soldiers would find them. Earnestine shooed Georgina back towards the restaurant. Once they’d crossed the frightening divide, they were surrounded by genteel customers from all the nations of Europe: a fat Frenchman here, a moustached Belgian perhaps, a tall Englishman, an elegant lady from Vienna and so on, as well as the porters and waiters. Captain Merryweather was not amongst them.

“Ness, where is he?”

“I’m thinking.”

They were in German territory, so the soldiers would have some jurisdiction. What was she thinking? They had guns.

“Ness?”

“Don’t whine.”

There were three options: return to the cabin, stay here in the restaurant or go on. At the door to the restaurant coach, a soldier jostled with a patron.

Earnestine took Georgina’s hand and they went forward between the tables and through a menu of aromas.

There was another terrifying gap to negotiate before the next sleeping coach. The going was easier now that everyone had settled, so they reached the next frightening gap and the forward, longer coach, quickly. The one after that brought them into the forward baggage coach. Earnestine knew that they were just running without a plan.

This coach had luggage like the rear baggage coach, trunks, cases and even a set of golf clubs, but it also seemed to be full of chickens in cages and there was even a pig snorting around in a pen.

“This is hopeless,” Georgina said.

Earnestine thought so too, but it was her responsibility to put a brave face on it all, so she told Georgina off and jostled her forward. They reached the next gap and stopped. It was a dead end.

“Now what!?” Georgina shouted above the clatter.

In front of them was a black steel wall, the back of the tender, so there was nothing ahead, except tons of coal and then the engine. Glancing around: a ladder up to the tender, sky, the landscape rushing past at fifty miles an hour on either side, the rails whizzing past alarmingly below the coupling, and behind her seven coaches. Somewhere inside the carriages were three soldiers working forward towards them. She leant against another metal ladder on this coach and realised that there was nothing else for it.

“We jump,” she said.

“Jump!?!”

“We must get off the train.”

“You’re gulling me!” Georgina shrieked. “We’re travelling at a simply astonishing speed. We’ll be smashed to pieces by the air rushing past the train, never mind what would happen to us when we hit the ground. Have you any idea how much faster this is compared to a horse and carriage?”

“We must try.”

“Can we slow the train down first?”

“I doubt pulling the cord would do much,” said Earnestine. She was becoming rather fed up with Georgina’s constant complaining.

“We could surrender?”

“Oh for heaven’s sake,” Earnestine chided. “They killed that Princess because they thought she was a stowaway. What do you think they’ll do to young ladies who are spies – offer us tea and muffins? And besides, we’re British.”

“They can’t be far behind.”

“We climb up here and go along the roof.”

Georgina’s expression made it clear what she thought of that idea.

“Don’t be a baby,” Earnestine said. She gripped the rung at her head and pulled herself up. The wedge–shaped gap between the toes and heel of her boots fitted neatly almost locking her feet into position, so it was easy to ascend.

Above the edge of the roof, the setting sun was in her eyes, but she could still see well enough. The carriages gently curved to her right as the train navigated a gentle bend, and–

The blast of air threw her against the lip of the coach. Steam and sparks cascading on either side of her. She nearly fell.

“Come on!” she yelled to Georgina, and she hauled herself through the fiery gale and onto the top of the coach.

She began to crawl along but the wind caught the hem of her skirts, lifted them and inflated them like a balloon. She took off into the air, her fingers desperately scrabbled for purchase and she just managed to clasp the strengthening metal strut that spanned the length of the coach. She rose, upside down, and then the wind struck her from the side, squashed the balloon of her dress and dashed her against the roof.

“Gina, be careful!” she shouted, but the same wind that had blown her head–over–heels caught her words and swooshed them down the length of the train.

Georgina rose above the edge of the roof: her face white with fear and her brown hair swirling around her like waves churned by a white froth of smoke and fire from the engine. She crawled up.