The Perilous Journey of the Not-So-Innocuous Girl (15 page)

On the morning of the second day of the voyage, the sun streamed into the girls’ cabin with full force. Marguerite wasn’t used to sleeping in such a small bed or a room without window coverings and was quite annoyed by the intrusion. She’d been up half the night trying to remember exactly what she’d said in her telegrams and imagining how they would be received. She tried not to think about the tears her father undoubtedly shed and chose to focus mainly on the joy that Claude would feel at knowing she had forsaken her life back home to follow him.

A knock at their cabin door added to her annoyance.

“Outil, please see who that is.” But Outil was already checking the peephole and opening the latch.

Marguerite heard soft voices then the door closed. Outil came into her bedroom and whispered, “Miss, the captain requests the pleasure of your company for breakfast on the observatory deck. He says it will be more suited to your tastes and will be served hot.”

Marguerite groaned and rolled onto her back. “I suppose I could go.” She didn’t feel quite as opposed to dining outside of the room today after last night’s meal of cold porridge. It was all Outil could scavenge without being reprimanded. And Marguerite could tell that for some unfathomable reason, the bot was wholly against breaking the rules for her.

A hot breakfast somewhere with a view sounded altogether pleasant, despite the company. “Very well. You can send word that I will be there as soon as I am ready.”

“He also invited Miss Vivienne, but I’m not certain she’s feeling up to going out just yet.”

Marguerite felt another pang of guilt. Why did she keep forgetting Vivienne was with her on this voyage? Probably because the poor girl had slept through the entirety of yesterday and most of the night.

Around midnight she’d cried out, waking Marguerite. At first her cries caused great alarm, but then Marguerite realized she was just dreaming and once she shook her shoulder and told her to be still, Vivienne drifted back into peaceful dreams.

“Yes, leave her be, I’ll be dressed and gone in a few minutes. Can you please devise some way of covering that blasted porthole though?” The sun coming up at the stern of the boat reflected off the brass fittings on the window, casting a golden beam across Marguerite’s pillow.

“Yes, miss.”

Marguerite was dressed and heading out the door before Vivienne even stirred.
How odd,
she thought,
to stay in bed for so many hours on end. I would surely lose my mind before I could do that.

It was true that she missed the girl’s company, but she was also relieved by the time to herself to process the past few days and prepare for the future.

The same steward she’d dealt with the day before was waiting for her when she emerged from her rooms. He was smiling from ear to ear.

“My, you do look lovely today, miss.”

Marguerite sighed to herself and looked ahead. Not used to being complimented by laypeople, she wasn’t sure how to respond. The steward took her silence as an invitation to continue.

“The captain will be mighty pleased to see you. He was quite disappointed yesterday when I told him you wouldn’t be joining him for meals.”

He was a very chatty sort of fellow; Marguerite decided to take full advantage of that. “Was he really? How do you know?”

“Oh, because he said so, miss.” The steward beamed at her, excited that he’d finally stumbled on something to interest her. “He was tellin’ us all last night at the ball that there wasn’t a woman on the ship as fine as you. He’d wager the Triumph on it. And that’s saying a lot, a young captain risking his first command.”

Marguerite felt a certain satisfaction at this revelation and smiled to herself.
Ah, ha! I win.
She continued to walk a little taller as the steward led her through a few passages, then up a flight of stairs that led to the deck above.

A circus of automatons busily performed odd tasks here and there on the polished wooden surface. In the center of the ship was a rectangular building with no windows. Cables and ties grew out of the top of the building and sprouted from the railings, outlining the circumference of the deck. They shot straight into the air several stories where they were attached in several different places to the main balloon, a perfectly round sphere of gas, that held the ship and all its crew aloft.

No detail had been overlooked in the construction of the Triumph. Marguerite could see that with her own eyes. Beautiful light brass fittings were everywhere. The teak deck boards were polished until they resembled a perfectly still pool of water. Even the bolts and rivets holding everything together were etched with images of flowers and fleurs-de-lis.

Marguerite would have liked to stay and admire all the fine craftsmanship, but the wind was whipping past at an incredible speed. She shivered at the chilly Atlantic air just as the steward presented her with a large fur coat. She accepted it gratefully, wondering only for a minute where he’d procured it.

The steward was yelling something at her now, but the noise from wind racing past in constant bursts and the roar of the mid-deck engines was so loud she was not able to hear his instructions. She decided just to follow his lead. They came to a smaller lift, similar to the one she’d used to board the ship, only this sat toward the bow. Marguerite put one hand on her head to hold her carefully coiffed hair in place as she crossed the deck, but had to let go to climb into the lift.

The steward joined her, then swung his arm around in a circle over his head; a bot appeared to close and lock the door. Another bot pushed a lever on a panel and they began to ascend. With the elements as wild as March hares, Marguerite decided the deck of the Triumph was a fine place to use automatons instead of humans for labor.
How long would a human last in this wind?
she wondered.

Marguerite took a moment to look around her now as they floated up into the heavens. All around her were giant white clouds, as fluffy as the goose-down comforters on her bed back home. They hovered on a backdrop of the most beautiful blue sky she’d ever seen. With their exhaust trails streaming behind them there was not a hint of steam or smoke clouding the atmosphere in their midst. She took a deep breath and cleansed her lungs completely, feeling like she was actually breathing real air for the first time.

Far below, the ocean was tipped with small white caps that danced, appearing and disappearing in a never-ending pattern of wild polka dots. Her heart felt as if it would fly right out of her chest and join the throng. She smiled to herself as her hair whipped wildly about her face and neck. Never had she felt more alive.

The steward pointed and hollered at her, apparently trying to relay facts about what they were seeing, but she didn’t care at all what the little man had to say. She pressed her gloved hands to her quite cold cheeks and smiled more completely than she had in years.

“This is why I left! This! Right now, right here! Flying over the world, as free as a bird!” she cried out to no one in particular.

“Huh?” The steward was in her face now, trying to figure out what she had said. She shook her head in a gesture for him to forget it. Sooner than Marguerite liked they were sucked into a small white building attached to the side of the balloon. Inside the shelter of the building, the wind immediately died to a whistle as they were pulled up through another floor. Eventually, the bottom of the lift came flush with the landing of a small passageway. A bot stood ready to unlock the gate for them.

The entryway was a blast of warm air. The steward offered to take back the coat he’d given her and she shook it off, glad to be rid of the smelly fur now that she was back in a tolerable climate. As she continued toward the door in front of them, she noticed a small mirror hanging on the left wall. She glanced at herself and jumped with surprise. Her face was a rosy red and her hair was a wild tangle of strands that seemed to whip around her skull like snakes in a pit. She pulled off a glove and immediately went to work trying to smooth the mess, hoping the color would go down a bit in her cheeks before she had to see Laviolette.

“Ma’am?” The steward had his hand on the doorknob and was growing impatient. Suddenly the door swung open, seemingly of its own accord, smashing the steward and almost hitting Marguerite. She jumped out of the way just in time.

“There you are!” Laviolette’s voice boomed with enthusiasm. “I heard the lift and waited but when you didn’t come in I feared it had become stuck, or worse! These new ships are still not all that they should be.”

“Excuse me.” She was taken aback by his friendly, forward tone. “I was just trying to put myself back together.”

“You look lovely! Windblown and fresh as the zephyr that calls us home!”

She stiffened, realizing she wasn’t sure what to make of anyone giving her these kinds of compliments. Laviolette offered her his arm. “This way then, your food is getting cold.” He smiled at her mischievously, yet again. Would this teasing never end?

“Thank you,” she finally managed to utter, the only thing she could think would be polite. Marguerite just wasn’t in the mood to spar today. Her spirits had been lifted too high by the ride to the observation deck attached firmly, she hoped, to the front of the balloon.

As they entered the observatory her breath was once again taken away. Here she could clearly see for hundreds— no, thousands of miles without impediment. All was still around her. Huge windows, polished so well you could almost walk right through them, kept the wind at bay, leaving eyes free to open as wide as was necessary to take in all the grandeur before them. Marguerite felt quite small and vulnerable all of a sudden, realizing they were just one small ship over a vast ocean of blue, surrounded by skies of blue and white with no land to save them should they fall.

Not that a fall to land from this height would mean you were necessarily safe.

“Would you care to sit?” Laviolette offered her a seat in a large armchair covered in rich green velvet at a small table in the center of the room. She was seated so that she could look out in all directions and see what she liked, a thoughtful detail that pleased her.

“Thank you,” she said again.

“It’s quite stunning, is it not?” He motioned to the view and sat back in his own seat across from her.

“Yes, it really is.” She felt more at home here than she had since she left so many hours before. She started to relax when her nose tuned into the smells coming from the food before her. She began to salivate and her stomach rumbled embarrassingly.

Laviolette heard the grumble and laughed out loud. “So tell me, what have you been eating holed up down there in your little rooms?”

“Don’t make fun.” She faced him without apology. “That is a ridiculous rule—no food in personal quarters.”

“If you’d spent any time at sea or in the air, you’d know that it wasn’t a ridiculous rule at all, but one of common sense and hygiene.”

“Please do explain.” She rolled her eyes as a female bot in a ridiculous pink apron served her tea and handed her a small plate to fill from the bounty laid before her.

“Food attracts rodents, and rodents attract disease. So the more we control the food, the more we control the vermin. Less vermin means less work for bots and less disease for humans. It’s simple, really.”

Marguerite began to protest but Laviolette cut her off again. “And why is it that you find the company of your fellow shipmates so disagreeable? You’re getting a bit of a reputation as a snob you know.”

“I’ve only been aboard one day and I already have a reputation?”

“Yes. I’m afraid so.”

“Well, if that’s true, it’s not my fault. I have been accosted twice by two different groups of girls, women, what have you, because I come from a better family. I’m afraid I’m just not cut out for a social setting with this type of
crowd
.” She said the last word as if she were speaking of cattle.

“Pity, there are some very nice young ladies I’d like to introduce you to, and you will most likely end up in this type of
crowd
in the new world.” He motioned to the food and started to dish his own plate. “Please, help yourself. We choose and serve our own food here.”

“How can you be so certain of the
crowd
I will end up in?” Marguerite was grateful for the opportunity to finally eat something hot and well prepared. Eggs, fresh bread, ham, and exotic fruit were just some of the items she recognized.

“Because I happen to know that you came on this little voyage without your daddy’s blessing. That means you are without your daddy’s money. It’s just lucky for you that old Moreau is as kind as he is greedy or he’d have you sleeping with the extra fuel cells in steerage.”

Marguerite choked a bit on a bite of toast. She coughed behind her hand, then chewed slowly, preparing her next response very carefully.

Laviolette didn’t give her a chance. “That’s right, good old Moreau gets a hefty finder’s fee for signing up noble blood and a decent allowance for commoners. He gave his speeches, took his payment, and caught an outrigger bound back to France as soon as he could.”

Marguerite’s face must have shown her shock plainly because he quickly followed with, “You needn’t worry, however, I saw your name on the manifest and made sure you were taken care of. I know people in Montreal who can help you find accommodations you are accustomed to. Plus there are still a few officers left who have not married. I’m sure you’ll be able to find one you can stand to dance with.” He smiled at her again.

“Are you enjoying this?” She looked him in the eyes, expecting to find malice there. Instead she found something else, something she wasn’t sure she recognized.

“What do you mean? Am I enjoying the food? Yes! Very much so. Your discomfort? Honestly, maybe just a little bit, but on the whole, no. I’m genuinely concerned for you. I’d like to ask you a few questions if you don’t mind.”

His face was serious now. She noticed the lines usually hidden by his jolly smirks were deeper than she first assumed. He was either older than she had guessed or he had been through more hardships.