Chasing the Star Garden: The Airship Racing Chronicles (Volume 1) (9 page)

Since the men were settling in, I was alone. I took a drop of laudanum and stood in the opened doorway overlooking the canal. Gondoliers poled passengers and crates up and down the green-blue canal waters. As one singing gondolier passed, he tipped his hat at me and called out what sounded like a compliment. I blew him a kiss, and he smiled. Moments later, Jessup and Angus burst into the room behind me.

“Can you believe this, Lil?” Jessup said excitedly.

“My màthair would not believe her eyes,” Angus added, pulling Jessup and me both into a hug as we stood looking out at the Canal.

“Gents, just think. If we can start pulling first place wins, we could really live like this from time to time,” I said.

Angus and Jessup both turned serious. “If we place first in Valencia and then in Paris, and if Cutter drops to third at least once, we can pull it off,” Jessup said.

“Cutter doesn’t race well in Valencia. This year we might take him,” Angus added.

“We need modifications,” I said. “I saw Souvenir in Zurich. He was getting work done to his ship. We need to consider what we can do to reconfigure the
Stargazer
. Truth is, we need more speed.”

Sal, who had been leaning against the door frame and listening to the conversation, spoke up. “In Master Vogt’s workshop he showed me a reconfiguration of one of the propulsion gears which requires less muscle to give speed, using centrifugal force over raw power. May I draw it and show you, Angus?”

Angus looked at Sal, and the look on Angus’ face told me that in that moment he’d finally figured out what Sal was all about. Sal
was
arrogant. And Sal
did
offer more suggestions than were needed, but Sal was also a genius.

“Let’s have it. In fact, why don’t we adjourn to the drawing room and further consider the matter,” Angus said, putting on a mock sophisticated accent that made us all laugh.

With that, the four of us spent the next two hours huddled over a table as Sal and Angus considered what could be done to reconfigure the
Stargazer
. The smell of food wafting in from the kitchens on the first floor had my stomach aching. When Vittorio returned to tell us it was time to eat, I was grateful.

Vittorio opened the doors to the dining room to reveal a table heaped with a sprawling array of Venetian cuisine. Footmen dressed in grey uniforms with silver buckles seated each of us. Vittorio presented our meal. As he went over each dish, a footman poured us all bowls of brodo di pesce, a fish soup with saffron, and glasses of white wine. At the very center of the table was what he called an antipasto de frutti de mare, a massive plate of seafood from the lagoon dressed with lemon and Italian olive oil.

“A favorite of Lord Byron,” he told us.

Also on the table were Venetian style sardines, carpacci, muscles cooked in wine, heaps of fresh fruit, bread, and a dish called baccalà manteceta. “You might like this one, Scotsman,” Vittorio told Angus. “It is salted cod minced with oil, garlic, and herbs.”

Angus looked hungrily at the food, eyeing the salted fish dish in particular.

“Let us toast,” Sal said. We all raised our glasses. “To the lady with a kaleidoscope mind,” Sal said, referencing the line written on the kaleidoscope.

I smiled knowingly at Sal.

Angus looked at Jessup who shrugged, and they called “Cheers.”

Jessup and Angus ate excitedly, commenting on everything. I noticed that Angus asked the footman again and again to put more of the baccalà manteceta on his plate. I sipped my wine and took in the scene. I felt happy to see them happy. Whatever the harlequin had died for, it had led to this pleasure: good people enjoying a rare treat, something they surely worked hard enough to deserve. I
would
find the meaning of the kaleidoscope and discover the lady of the kaleidoscope mind—but not just now.

Chapter 11

T
hat evening, Angus and Jessup, exhausted, overfull, and excited to try their rooms, headed to bed. Promising Sal I would be by later, I went to the small garden terrace on the roof. Once there, I found a comfortable wicker chaise and laid back. I pulled out my pipe and opium supply and lit up. I lay smoking as I looked at the stars. Air transport ships and gondolas, their lanterns blinking, passed overhead. The sounds of the canal gondoliers singing as they rowed past filled the night air. It was warm with a soft breeze coming in from the sea. The air smelled sweet and salty with a hint of a fresh seaweed scent. I gazed up at the early evening sky and noticed an extremely bright star located just beside the moon. In fact, it seemed almost brighter than the moon. I had not noticed it the night before.

I pulled out my spyglass to look at it more closely. It was exceedingly bright. Digging in my bag again, I pulled out the kaleidoscope. I hoped the starlight would illuminate the colors. When I centered the kaleidoscope onto the star, I was surprised. In fact, I was so surprised I jumped up, knocking over the glass of wine I’d brought with me. It shattered on the floor. Very clearly reflected in the kaleidoscope were a series of numbers. The colors of the kaleidoscope had rotated so the purples and blues fell together and clearly wrote out numbers: 36.6858. I dug around in my bag for one of Sal’s beautifully tinkered fountain pens. Unable to find paper, I wrote the numbers on the hem of my shorts. I looked again to be sure I had noted the digits correctly. I panned the kaleidoscope to another part of the sky only to see the numbers disappear. They only appeared when pointed to that bright star. Kaleidoscope in hand, I ran back downstairs.

I ran to Sal’s room, flung open the door, and rushed to his bedside. “Sal,” I whispered, shaking his shoulder. “Sal, wake up,” I said again, jostling him.

“Ahh, my Lily, here you are,” he said sleepily, raising his hand to stroke my hair.

“No, no, no. Not that. Sal, come on, I’ve seen something in the kaleidoscope! Please, get up! Come on,” I said, pulling him out of bed.

Sal rose sleepily.

“Sal, you’re naked,” I said with a laugh.

“Ah yes, I thought to save time,” he said smiling as he pulled on a robe. Sleepily, he followed me upstairs. “Ah, what a sight,” he said when we entered the terrace.

“Careful,” I said, guiding him around the broken glass. I thrust the kaleidoscope at him. “There,” I said pointing. “Aim it toward the bright star beside the moon. Tell me if you see it.”

Sal yawned then lifted the kaleidoscope toward the sky. After adjusting it a bit and moving it toward the bright star, Sal sighed an excited “ahh,” his eyebrows rising.

“You see it? The numbers?”

“Oh yes. 36. Is that a dot? 36.6858. Lily, did you write it down?”

“Of course. What is it? What does it mean?”

Sal was still gazing upward. After a moment, he lowered the kaleidoscope. “That is Venus as the evening star. She’ll sink from the sky in an hour or so,” Sal said.

I pulled Sal down onto a chaise beside me. Once we settled in, I lit the opium pipe again and took a toke. I handed the pipe to Sal and then drank a slug from the bottle of wine I’d brought with me earlier.

“What are the numbers? A combination?” I looked back up at the sky with a naked eye. Venus’ bright light held steady.

Sal coughed heavily as he smoked then set the pipe down. “I’m not sure,” he replied. I noticed then his eyes had taken on a glossy sheen. He examined the numbers I had written on my hem. “I’ll need to consider it a bit.”

I lifted the kaleidoscope again and shone it at the night’s sky. I centered on the moon and a few other stars; there was nothing. Only with the backdrop of Venus, the evening star, did the numbers appear.

Sal watched me move the kaleidoscope across the sky. “We must seek Venus. She holds the answer,” he said.

“Seek Venus? Like the Goddess Aphrodite?”

“As the Greeks called her, yes.”

“We all seek Venus, don’t we?” I joked.

Sal kissed me sweetly on the cheek. “Yes, we do,” he whispered in my ear.

I curled up into his arms and lay looking at the stars, the kaleidoscope hugged tightly to my chest.

We both must have slept then because I woke up on the chaise the next morning still lying against Sal. We were covered in morning dew. At a nearby palazzo, I heard the voices of workers and the sound of boxes being unloaded. It was just past sunup. Lingering pink light was fading from the sky.

I woke Sal who was still groggy and led him downstairs and back to his bed. Settling him in, I pulled his covers to his chin and kissed him on the forehead. I stroked his silver-streaked hair away from his face. How sweet he looked.

I then wandered back to my room where I startled a maid who looked like she’d been looking for me. She spoke some English so I tried to explain I had slept on the terrace. She seemed puzzled but told me to come with her. She was waiting to help me with my bath.

She led me to the small bathing room where an arsenal of oils, astringents, perfumes, combs, and two more handmaids waited. At once, I felt ill at ease. My mind, startled by the smells of the bathing oils, went back in time to my first day at Mr. Oleander’s and Mr. Fletcher’s alley flat on Neal’s Yard just off Covent Garden.

“Now Lily, this is Nicolette,” Mr. Fletcher had said. “She will get you cleaned up. We thought we were getting a boy so the only clothes we bought are men’s fashions, but you’ll be more comfortable on the
Iphigenia
dressed like that anyway,” he continued. “Oh yes, and Nicolette is French. She doesn’t speak English very well.” With that, he left me in a small room in their flat with a blue eyed girl who was about fifteen years in age. The girl looked at me like I was a rodent.

“What is the
Iphigenia
?” I asked her.

“Take off your dress,” she said in a heavy French accent as she began to pour water from a pan over the fireplace into a washing tub. “It is their air transport.”

“Like a balloon?” I asked.

Nicolette nodded then helped me pull off my shift. She then lowered me into the hot water. “I thought they were getting a boy,” she said.

I didn’t know why Nicolette seemed so annoyed. I was so happy to be out of the orphanage that I decided I didn’t care if two old men had been my saviors. I was going to make the best of it. “I’m sorry,” was all I could think to say.

“Non,” she said, “it’s only… well, we’ll see. Come, let me clean your hair,” she said then poured warm water onto my tangled and dirt-covered tresses. She worked soap into the hair then rubbed in sharp smelling oils, lemon and lavender, trying to break the tangles free. “I will need to cut some,” she said, taking the scissors from the fireplace mantel. With a snip, she rid my hair of about six inches of length. I fingered my hair which now sat on my shoulders. “I’m sorry,” she said then threw the hair into the fire. The smell of burning hair filled the room.

“You speak English just fine,” I told her.

“Don’t tell them,” she said with a smile as she combed what was left of my tresses.

I was confused. After she got done scrubbing a year’s worth of dirt from me, Nicolette plaited my hair into a braid and helped me redress in the clothes the brothers had purchased: tan trousers, black suspenders, a mandarin colored shirt, and black socks and boots. She looked at me and frowned. “You are looking too pretty even dressed like this,” she said and then sighed. “Come. They will want to see.” Taking my hand, she led me back to the sparse sitting room where the brothers sat at worn wooden table looking over some papers. Light shone in from two dirt-stained windows at the front of the flat.

“Monsieurs,” Nicolette said with a curtsey, her eyes downcast.

I looked at the two men. Mr. Oleander rose to take a better look at me. “Well, look at the alley cat now,” he told Mr. Fletcher who laughed. “She looks like a girl again, don’t you, pretty kitty,” he said, tickling my chin.

Nicolette stiffened.

I tried to turn my face but his sharp fingers followed, poking at me.

“Now, now,” Mr. Fletcher chided Mr. Oleander, who sat back down.

“Can you read, Lily?” Mr. Fletcher asked me.

“Yes, Sir.”

“You see, even British orphans can read. French girls only look pretty,” Mr. Fletcher told Mr. Oleander.

“Well, Nicolette earns her keep on her back, not at the books,” Mr. Oleander replied as he poured himself a drink.

Both men laughed.

Nicolette’s face had gone pale. She looked at the floor and said nothing.

“You’re excused, Nicolette. Please go get Lily’s trundle ready. Come here, Lily,” Mr. Fletcher called and then motioned for me to come beside him. “What does this line say,” he asked, pointing to a sentence written in a book which otherwise contained lists of numbers.

“Fares for the month of May,” I read.

“Ah, very good. You know your numbers?”

“Yes, Sir.”

“Then read these lines,” he said pointing to a row of figures which I read off.

“Can you do mathematics?”

“Only a little.”

“I’ll teach you.”

“We didn’t go to get a bookkeeper. I need a galley monkey,” Mr. Oleander said and grabbed a few tools from his toolbox. He was about to set them on the table when Mr. Fletcher stopped him.

“Not where we eat, brother,” he said.

Mr. Oleander nodded and motioned for me to come to his tool chest. “Which ones do you know, pretty kitty,” he asked.

I recognized most of the instruments but only knew the names of the wrench and mallet. “It’s a good start,” he told me, then schooled me on the names of the remaining tools. I paid close attention, wanting to impress my new caregivers. When he was done, he quizzed me, asking me to name the tools again. Thankfully, I was able to remember them all. “She’s a good choice,” Mr. Oleander finally determined.

“Indeed,” Mr. Fletcher said then leaned back in his chair and took a long, hard look at me. “Run off now, Lily. We’ve work to do,” he said and leaned back to look at his papers once again, pushing his small glasses up his nose. “Tomorrow we’ll take you out to the
Iphigenia
,” he added as I scampered back to the room where Nicolette had gone.

I found her sitting in my cold bath water. She looked like she had been crying.

“What’s wrong?” I asked. The room still smelled strongly of lemon and lavender. She shook her head but said nothing. The answer would become all too evident soon enough.

“All done, Signorina Stargazer,” the maid told me, interrupting my thoughts. She handed me a mirror. She had bathed me thoroughly and rubbed my skin with sweet smelling basil and rose oils. My hair was dressed in the same fashion I had seen the Venetian women wearing; it was woven into a bun at the back of my head and wisps of loose ringlets fell around my face. I gazed into the mirror. I felt like I was looking at a stranger.

“Beautiful. Thank you,” I said. I suddenly felt sick to my stomach. She offered to dress me, but I declined and hurried back to my room. I closed and locked the door then sat down on the bed. My damp skin prickled with cold. Tossing the lid aside, I looked at the contents of Byron’s dressbox. I pulled the lily pin from my pilot’s cap and affixed it to the satin top hat. I then took a drop of laudanum to build up my courage.

After I dressed, I went downstairs. I could hear the others in the dining room. The door to the room was shut. I took a deep breath and opened the door a crack. The men went silent.

“Lily?” Sal called.

“Promise not to laugh,” I said.

“At what?” Angus asked.

I stepped into the dining room. “At this,” I replied, entering in Byron’s chiffon gown.

Jessup set down his bread. Angus stared. Sal rose and took my hand. “Truly, a lily,” he said, kissing my hand. He guided me to my seat.

“Where the hell did you get that?” Angus asked.

“Byron. It was a gift.”

“You look like a dessert,” Jessup told me.

“Doesn’t she always,” Sal said with a wink, making me grin.

“I don’t like it,” Angus said.

“Well, we need to go into the city today, and I can’t wear my normal clothes,” I replied.

“Why the hell not?” Angus asked with a frown.

Vittorio entered before I could answer. “Ah, Signorina Stargazer, out of your traveling clothes I see. I have arranged for a gondolier. Signor Colonna suggested you might be going out?”

“Yes. Thank you, Vittorio.”

He nodded then exited.

I sighed. “Well, gents, ready to see Venice?”