Valour and Vanity (2 page)

Mr. O’Brien straightened his spectacles. Beside Vincent he seemed slight and scholarly, though he was a well-proportioned man. “The truth is, we shall miss you terribly when you go. You have made everything … so much smoother. I do not know if I shall—that is, Melody tells me I need not be concerned about her mother’s nerves, but— Well.”

Used to her mother’s histrionics, Jane was not often perturbed by them, but it was all too apparent that Mr. O’Brien wished he and Melody were coming with them rather than continuing to tour with their parents.

Vincent rubbed the back of his neck and offered the tight compression of his lips that was his public smile. “She is enjoying herself. Truly. You do get used to it.”

“I suppose we should get on with it, then.” Jane took Melody’s arm for the walk to the docks and let the gentlemen lag behind so that her husband could explain to Mr. O’Brien how to cope with the hysterics that had so often accompanied them on their journeys. Though Jane esteemed her mother, she had to own that Mrs. Ellsworth sometimes had more sensibility than sense, a fact that Vincent had struggled with a great deal in the early days of their marriage. It was a silent relief to see that her husband had found his place, and a comfort to see him sharing that with the newest addition to their family.

She had methods of her own for managing her mother’s expansive feelings, though today that had not worked so well as she might have liked. They arrived amid the bustle of the docks far too soon. Even at a distance, she could discern a familiar voice. With a sigh, Jane steadied her bonnet against the stiff breeze across the harbour.

“Lady Vincent! Sir David!” Mrs. Ellsworth’s voice cut through even the clamour of the docks. She insisted on using their titles, no matter how much Jane or Vincent protested. She was so proud of being able to say, “My daughter’s husband, Sir David Vincent, the Prince Regent’s glamourist” at every possible opportunity that it seemed cruel to deny her the fun.

Melody giggled. “You see.”

“You do not need to tease me. You will have her full attention soon enough.” Jane released her sister’s arm and went to meet their mother. “Mama, you should not have left the baths on our account.”

Her father, Mr. Ellsworth, had his hand at her mother’s back as though he were supporting her, but she walked with all the swiftness of a governess in pursuit of a small child. Jane was very much the focal point of her march across the docks. She was only thankful that Mr. O’Brien’s parents did not feel the need to indulge her mother’s humours. This threatened to be exactly the overwrought farewell that Jane had wished to avoid.

“You must not go!” Mrs. Ellsworth came to a stop in front of them with a hand pressed to her bosom. “Charles, tell them they must not.”

Jane’s father cleared his throat. His thinning white hair fluttered under his hat and, in the morning light, seemed almost like mist. “My dear. Your mother wishes me to tell you that you must not go.”

“You could make more of a protest than
that.
Lady Vincent, Sir David. I implore you to not take ship.”

“Mama! They must take ship. It is an island. One does not simply walk into Murano.”

“Just so, and Lord Byron is expecting us in Venice.” Vincent offered a bow to her mother.

This was the reason they had given for separating from the honeymoon party, though the truth had more to do with the glassmakers on the neighbouring island of Murano. That they were going there to work would have required explanation, and Mrs. Ellsworth was not given to discretion. If they told her that they had created a way of recording glamour in glass, the entire continent would know. Thank heavens that Lord Byron’s extended stay in Venice provided them an excuse to visit. The invocation of a lord was usually more than sufficient to distract Mrs. Ellsworth. Alas, that seemed not to be the case on the morning in question.

“But last night, one of the serving men at our hotel told one of the maids, who told our Nancy, that there were pirates on the Gulf of Venice. And then today! In the baths! A woman spoke of barber sailors!”

Mr. O’Brien was taken with a sudden fit of coughing. He turned that pink of embarrassment so peculiar to those with red hair. Clearing his throat, he said, “I believe you mean Barbary corsairs, madam.”

“There, you see! Mr. O’Brien knows that there are pirates.”

“I am afraid that I do not.” He removed his spectacles and polished them with a handkerchief.

Melody’s spectacles flashed in the light as she tossed her golden curls. “La! We have said as much before. The last of the corsairs were defeated by the American fleet. These waters are quite as safe as any.”

“Oh—oh, it is too much. Sir David, I implore you. After all that Jane has suffered already…”

Jane stiffened at the implication that Vincent had been the cause of any of the events of the last year. The words were simply careless, but she could not let them stand. She took a step closer to her mother, as though her proximity could protect her husband from Mrs. Ellsworth’s words. “What I have ‘suffered’ has been by my choice alone. I will thank you not to suggest that Vincent had any fault in it.”

Mrs. Ellsworth’s mouth formed a small O of astonishment.

Jane pressed on. “While I am grateful for your concern, we are in no danger. The passage via the
Ophelia
will be quicker than the overland journey, and we have told Lord Byron that we are coming. You would not wish us to be disrespectful to his lordship, would you?” It would be of no use to remind her mother that taking ship had been her suggestion.

Mr. Ellsworth patted her arm. “You see, my dear?”

Mr. O’Brien stepped forward and joined Jane’s father in soothing Mrs. Ellsworth. “If I might … The Barbary corsairs, even when they were sailing, were on the Mediterranean. This is the Gulf of Venice.”

“Oh, but—” Mrs. Ellsworth’s newest protestation was cut short by a cabin boy, who ran up to Vincent and bowed. In rapid Italian, he asked pardon for interrupting and let them know that Captain Rosolare wished them to board.

Vincent thanked the youth in Italian. Turning back to the party gathered on the dock, he offered a bow. “We must take our leave.”

The next few moments passed in a jumble of heartfelt farewells. Mrs. Ellsworth abandoned her attempts to prevent them from leaving, though she did make extravagant use of her handkerchief. After so long travelling together, Jane had to admit to some melancholy at separating from the rest of the party.

But it was with great relief that she followed Vincent up the gangplank and aboard the ship.

*   *   *

The departure from Trieste
had the familiar rhythms of any sea voyage, as sailors called to each other in voices that seemed brined from their time at sea. Ropes, thick as Jane’s wrist, got tossed from dock to ship as they cast off. For a moment, the
Ophelia
seemed to lumber as a tug pulled it away from the dock; then the sails rose, catching the air with their flutter till they filled.

The time aboard passed with more speed than Jane anticipated, as she stared over the water and relished these idle moments with Vincent away from the constant requirements of her family. The salt air carried her tension across the waves.

It seemed they had but just left Trieste when the captain announced that they were already half-way to Venice. She sat with Vincent in the bow of the ship, using a coil of rope as their bench. The ship skipped over the brilliant cerulean waves, tossing the salt spray back into their faces. The remnants of the nuncheon they had packed in Trieste sat between them, the crumbs of a pastry sharing space on oilcloth with dried figs.

Vincent lifted a silver travel cup of wine and peered at it. “One wonders what wine Homer was drinking when he spoke of the wine-dark sea.”

“Certainly a vintage no longer known, if it matched the sea.” Jane inhaled the sea air, pressing her ribs against her short stays. “That colour. I cannot imagine a glamour that could re-create something so vibrant.”

Forgetting for a moment the effect of travel on glamour, she reached into the ether and pulled forth a fold. The ship’s motion pulled the glamour out of her fingers before she could make even a single twist. It rippled like a film of oil before vanishing back into the ether. Jane blushed at her foolishness. It took enormous energy to work glamour while walking even a few steps, and here she had tried it on a moving ship. The inability to work glamour at sea was what had given Lord Nelson the advantage against Napoleon’s fleet during the blockade.

“Do that again.” Vincent set his cup down on the deck. His gaze took on the vacant stare of someone looking deep into the ether.

“Have you an idea?”

“Merely a curiosity, which might become an idea later.”

“You intrigue me.” Jane reached for the glamour again. It slid through her hands so that she almost could not catch it in the first place. She lost control of the fold. It tickled under her fingers and sprang free. Jane laughed in surprised delight at the rainbow, which spread and shimmered in the air.

“I have not had the opportunity to see glamour dissolve like this. Only read the theory.” Vincent reached into the ether himself. His fingers hooked on a fold, tightening. Then it sprang free. The coruscating colours flowed back in the ship’s wake. He turned to watch it, and a slow smile spread across his face.

He reached for the glamour again, snatching wildly like a kitten reaching for a feather. Again, it tugged free of his fingers. Vincent threw back his head and laughed. Giggling, Jane joined him.

She could only imagine what the Prince Regent would say if he could see his favourite glamourists essentially blowing soap bubbles with glamour. There was something delightful about the sheer wildness.

Jane pulled out another fold and spread her fingers as she released it, fracturing the rainbow into a half dozen pieces. “Look, the way you release it affects the shape of the … of the oil film.”

Vincent grinned. “Apt name. Perhaps an oil of light?”

“Oiled glamour?”

“Glamoil?”

“Perhaps not.”

He laughed and curved his hand so that the glamour slid over his palm in a patchwork cord of undulating light. “I recall Young experimenting with using multiple glamourists to try to stabilise the glamour.”

“Did it work?”

“Not even a little.” He pulled another thread, which evaporated as readily as its predecessors. “I wonder what would happen if we brought our
Verre Obscurci
aboard a ship. It worked when carried.”

Jane considered. The sphere they had created bent light in the same twists as a glamourist’s hands but did not require a glamourist to hold it steady. “That shall be something to try, if we can fashion a new one.”

The lookout shouted from the crow’s-nest, his words snatched away so that only his tone reached them. The ship’s crew suddenly sprang into action, raising sails as the boat became an explosion of canvas. Jane looked toward the horizon in front of them. “Not Venice, so soon?”

“No.” Vincent stood slowly, looking behind them. “It is absurd that my first thought is a desire to keep this from your mother.”

The look of dread on his face made Jane turn in her seat. A ship sailed toward them. Even to her untutored eye, the cannons upon its decks were obvious. “Is that…”

“A Barbary corsair. Yes.”

Two

Corsairs

Jane stared at her husband for a moment. Her breath felt as though it had been ripped from her body like glamour on a ship. “Pirates.”

Vincent gave her a small, tight smile. “May I ask you to go below, Muse?”

“You ask me to go below as though you are not coming.”

“I have some skill with weapons and might be of use in repelling the boarders.” He squinted at the ship behind them. In the few moments since it had first been spied, it had visibly gained on them.

“You do not mean to fight. Vincent, tell me that you do not.” She knew that he had more than just a familiarity with weapons. His father’s insistence on perfection in all the accomplishments required of gentlemen meant that her husband was more skilled with the sword than most of his peers.

“They take slaves.” He gave a grin that was half grimace. “I must defend you or your mother will never let me hear the last of this.”

Amidships, the captain directed his crew to try to increase their speed. The first mate, a slender young man with dark curls, raised his hands and bellowed to the other passengers, who moved about the deck in a circling, confused mass, very much in the way.
“Signore e signori, devo chiedervi di andare sotto coperta per la vostra sicurezza.”

For a moment, Jane was so astonished that she could not understand his Italian, for all that her music-master had insisted that she master the language in order to sing it properly. Then her senses restored themselves, and she understood him to say, “Ladies and gentlemen. I must ask you to go below deck for your safety.” No doubt he also wanted to get them out of the way of the crew.

Jane stood and gathered their nuncheon into an untidy bundle. She loathed the idea of leaving Vincent exposed on the deck, but was forced to acknowledge that she would only be in the way. “Very well. Promise me that you will be careful. Or at least as careful as one can be while holding a gun.”

“Likely a sword.” Vincent escorted her down from the bow. “I doubt any member of the crew will give a pistol to an unknown person. A sword, though … the captain will have arms for just such an event.”

“It disturbs me that you know this.” Jane tried to keep her tone light to mask her fear as they hurried across the deck.

“The benefits of a thorough education. They shall fire the cannon twice in warning. Do not let this distress you. They want the ship as a prize, so will be unlikely to harm it.”

“But the passengers aboard … You said they took slaves.”

“They … yes. They do. I would wish that unsaid.”

“But it would be no less true if you had been silent.” She gave a breathless laugh. “I hope I shall not have reason to be thankful that I am so plain.”

Vincent stopped at the ladder leading below deck. He turned her toward him and rested his hands on her shoulders. “I love you, Jane.”