Part 2

Some soft whisper of danger in her dreams awoke Jameson. She raised her head from the pillow in the cabin, listening for something even quieter than the gentle creaking of the ship swaying feebly at the dock. After a moment, she slid the covers aside with a gentle sigh of heavy cloth and got to her feet.

She was dressed in an instant and stamping her feet into her boots. As she left her cabin, closing the door quietly, she heard the scrape of a boot-sole against the wooden decking. "Mr. Thomas?" she inquired in a whisper.

"Torres," came the answer, in a low voice. "'Dju hear that too?"

The captain touched her engineer's arm gently in the gloom and pointed toward the steps, and the two of them made their way quietly onto the deck.

Beside them, the beautiful, sleek yacht strained at her moorings as if longing to be away. The wind had freshened in the night, and it made the Intrepide look like a fretful filly, impatient to stretch her long, graceful legs in a gallop.

And someone was throwing rocks at her. Jameson watched, puzzled, as a child in trousers and a billowing shirt raised an arm and sent a rock into the side of the yacht with practiced ease. Torres took a breath to scare the kid away, but the captain touched her shoulder, and the engineer, after a baffled look at Jameson, subsided.

The door to the Intrepide's cabins opened forcefully, and a tall figure stormed out. "What the hell do you think you're doing?" she bellowed, and Torres and Jameson looked at one another in surprise.

"That's Mingeaux," Torres said.

"But that's not the Marie Celeste," Jameson added, leaning forward onto the rail on her elbows.

"Get away from the ship before I cut you up and feed you to the sharks," Mingeaux hollered at the kid, and Torres and Jameson exchanged another surprised look.

"She's got a temper on her," Torres whispered, impressed.

And if that wasn't the word of an expert--Jameson held a finger to her lips and pointed to the dock, where a couple of soldiers emerged from the shadows of a doorway, watching the scene before them with sleepy interest.

"Your captain sent me," the kid replied easily, sticking her hands into her pockets. Jameson tried to think of where she'd seen her before.

"And what does she want?" Mingeaux said with exaggerated patience, folding her arms.

"Spending the night in town," the kid called up to the deck of the yacht. "With her mistress."

Torres sucked in her breath, and Jameson elbowed her subtly as Mingeaux's head turned toward the stern of Discovery. "Shut up, for Christ's sake," the mate of the Intrepide called hastily to the kid.

"She sent me with a note," the kid said, and the soldiers picked up their muskets and approached the dock.

"You'd better come up, then," Mingeaux said with an impatient sigh. "Might as well bring those idiots with you," she said, gesturing toward the soldiers. "And the rest of the town, seeing as how you've told them already."

The kid glanced back at the soldiers, then turned back to Mingeaux without the slightest sense of urgency. "She said you'd pay me."

Mingeaux lifted her hands to heaven. "I can't guarantee you'll live to enjoy it," she groused. She bent to light her pipe, then turned to wait as the soldiers ranged themselves to either side of the kid and started down the dock.

Jameson watched with unparalleled admiration as the soldiers walked the kid up the gangplank and onto the deck of the yacht, which was no doubt exactly where Mingeaux wanted them to end up. The two crew members of Discovery were only a few feet away when Mingeaux held out an abrupt hand. "Note," she said.

"Half-crown," the kid told her, holding out a hand in turn.

"Give me the note," the soldier said, out of patience with them.

The kid seemed to hesitate a moment, then reached into the pocket of her vest and pulled out a piece of paper. The soldier yanked her by the collar, pulling her out of Mingeaux's reach, then unfolded the paper and held it up to the lantern his compadre held out. He ignored the kid's furious glare and peered at the note. After a baffled moment, he turned to the other soldier. "It's in English," he said, suspicion in his face.

Mingeaux blew a lungful of smoke into the soldier's face with subtle discourtesy and reached out a long arm to pluck the note from his grasp.

Something made Jameson turn her head; in the spillover from the lantern on the deck of the yacht, she saw Thomas and a wildly curious Mr. Sere behind her and Torres.

Mingeaux settled the note in front of her with patience, scanned it, and let another stream of smoke emerge from her mouth.

"Read it," the soldier snarled.

Mingeaux gave him a pitying glance and turned to hold the note into the light. She stuck her pipe into her mouth and used her free hand to point out the words as she read them. "'Staying the night in town to see if you are correct about the women of Haven,'" she translated, her tone neutral but dry. "'Appear to have found a delectable adventure in your little friend at the tavern.'"

The kid snickered, and Mingeaux raised her free hand in a cuffing gesture without looking at her. The soldier tightened his grip in the kid's collar.

"'Due in magistrate's office tomorrow morning for something tiresome,'" Mingeaux continued. "'Keep things in order till my return. Carlisle, The "Bonny Anne".'" She folded the note and handed it back to the soldier courteously. "There. That thought should give your master something to keep him warm tonight."

The soldier's jaw tightened, and Jameson wondered if Mingeaux had gone too far. After a moment, he handed the note back to her and jerked his head at the other soldier. The two of them stomped down the gangplank, and Mingeaux puffed placidly on her pipe until they were gone.

The kid grinned at Mingeaux. Jameson raised her head and scanned the horizon; to her surprise, it was close to sunrise.

Mingeaux took the pipe out of her mouth and addressed the kid without looking at her. "Tout va bien?"

"Oui," the kid answered.

"Et avec elles?"

"Oui," the kid said again, and Mingeaux nodded and reached in her pocket for a coin that flashed gold.

"Get out of here," Mingeaux murmured, and the kid dashed as quickly as she could down the gangplank. In a moment, she was lost to sight, leaving Mingeaux alone with four very interested observers on the deck of Discovery.

Mingeaux had her back to them, studying the wharf. "Good morning, Thomas," she said, raising her voice only a little.

"My friend," Thomas said, nodding courteously. "I should like to know if you will be free for breakfast."

Mingeaux sighed. "It would appear so," she said without turning around. "And I'll be hungry enough to swallow the devil himself."

Torres had what was doubtless an improper reply on the tip of her tongue, and Jameson elbowed her again, a bit more roughly than she had before. "Sorry, Captain," Torres murmured, wondering, for the thousandth time, how it was that Jameson appeared to know exactly what she was thinking.

 

* * *

Giuliana's first utterance that morning was wordless and heartfelt. She had tried to turn over, and the sunlight had hit her in the face at roughly the same time that every muscle and square inch of skin issued an immediate and powerful protest.

In an instant, the sunlight had faded, which made Giuliana's attempt to raise her arm as painful as it was needless. She opened grainy, underslept eyes to see the form of the tavern-keeper blocking the light from the window.

"Are you in pain?" Brandy asked softly.

"Not any more," the captain replied, settling back into the covers with a smile that was purest charm, and Brandy's eye gleamed with gentle amusement.

"Thank you," Brandy said, a bit subdued.

Giuliana put a careful arm behind her head and looked up at her. "For being grateful that such a brilliant sunrise finds me in the bedchamber of such a beautiful woman?"

Brandy looked away for a moment, busying herself with something at the sink. "I meant for Mingeaux."

"Is she all right?" the captain asked. She sat up hastily, which was a mistake, and held herself up for a moment until the aches settled into place.

"Yes," Brandy replied simply, and the relief was evident. "Thanks to you. And we'll hear about it if that changes."

Giuliana tried to relax, but it wasn't quite possible yet. She looked at the sleeve of the nightshirt, a bit curious; it was rather fine cambric, an odd thing to use for a nightshirt. "I assure you, Mam'selle, if it hadn't been for Mingeaux's speed and fortitude, you and I would not be having a conversation as pleasant as any I can remember." She looked around on the bed for some kind of a handhold to use getting up.

"You have a moment," Brandy said, making a stay-put gesture with her hand. "Don't rush anything."

"I believe we have an appointment at the magistrate's," Giuliana said with a frown, testing partial verticality and finding it acceptable. "M. de Nicot, isn't it?"

Brandy nodded and took a seat beside the bed. She put her elbows on the arms and folded her hands. "I don't think you have anything to worry about."

"As long as I continue to play your lover?" Giuliana asked, raising an eyebrow.

Brandy got up hastily, and Giuliana got out of the bed, stiffly, to follow her to the door. "Mam'selle--"

Brandy turned, her eyes trained at the floor. "I'm sorry," she said, and Giuliana could see the blush spreading over her face, downcast as it was. "I couldn't think of anything else that would explain--"

Giuliana put a gentle hand to the girl's face, which had the effect of making her look up. The captain took a quick breath as the green eyes met hers. "Oh, no," Giuliana said. "You misunderstand. I'm completely in awe of your cleverness. And how quick you are. And," she added with a smile, "how flattering your stories."

Brandy tried to turn away, and the captain put still-sore hands lightly on her shoulders. "Don't run," Giuliana said in a low voice. "The girl I know so well already never runs from anything."

Brandy raised her eyes again, and Giuliana could see that the tears were dangerously close. She couldn't let that happen; she'd cry herself. "I assure you, Mam'selle," she told her seriously, "I'll do anything I can to keep your friend safe. I owe her so much more than my pitiful little life."

"It doesn't look so very little to me," Brandy said in a low voice. She moved past Giuliana and picked up a comb. "Let me see your hands."

Giuliana spread her hands out obediently in the light streaming through the curtains and Brandy inspected them closely for a moment, putting her own hands underneath them, warm and soft. She nodded, satisfied, and announced, "Much better. They look like a sailor's hands, not like you've been prize-fighting on the docks." She dropped the captain's hands and Giuliana felt a sudden wave of powerful loneliness swirl about her heart.

"Excellent," Giuliana said lightly. "I would hate for the magistrate to think I could touch you roughly."

Brandy gave a little chuckle without looking up, and it made Giuliana smile to hear it. "Much better," she said, teasing the girl just a bit.

Brandy's eyes flashed up at her face for a moment, and there was a magical, silent laughter in them. "I had some of your clothes brought from the Intrepide," she said, pointing the comb at the chest at the foot of the bed.

Giuliana turned and saw a neatly-laid out outfit. She turned back to Brandy and bowed slightly. "My compliments to your network, Mam'selle."

"Get dressed," Brandy replied, picking up the captain's boots and turning them this way and that in the light. "We have someplace to be."

Giuliana pulled the nightshirt over her head, appreciating the exercise for her creaky joints, and reached for the shirt on the wooden chest. "I would love to say avec plaisir," she remarked, "but, in this case--" She shrugged the shirt over her shoulders and began to fasten the buttons.

"The magistrate isn't so very formidable," Brandy said, keeping her back turned with scrupulous care. "He's an old friend."

"Then I have yet another reason to consider myself in your debt," Giuliana remarked, slipping into her trousers.

"Coffee?" Brandy asked hastily, changing the subject.

 

* * *

Thomas noted a distraction in Mingeaux's play. He set the rook firmly into its new place, glancing up to see if the blank expression on her face would change. She puffed at her pipe, arms folded tightly, and studied the board. To her right hand was a neat stack of plates, which contained the remains (and not many) of their breakfast. Thomas had missed the excellent coffee one could get in Haven; it seemed that Mr. Nilsson was as challenged in a galley as Mr. Sere was around navigational instruments.

"Hm," she said finally, and moved her knight to counter his attack.

She hadn't foreseen the other one, and he moved his queen three squares. When he looked up again, she was looking at him blandly.

"I have acquired a new understanding of the game," he explained.

"Obviously," she said agreeably, the smoke drifting from her open mouth. She looked, with the pipe and the tattoos, like a pagan statue of a vengeful fire god.

A woman came skittering down the wharf, shouting. "Hey!" she hollered to the people on the docks, and the two chess-players turned from the deck of Intrepide to look at her. Around them, other sailors and dockhands turned to the woman.

"What do you think?" she shouted, excitement in her face. "Old Hook's been killed!"

Thomas got to his feet and put his hand on the rail. "The Dutchman?" one of the dockhands asked, and the woman nodded.

"Throat cut like another grin," she said, with an unfortunately vivid gesture. "Laid out at the meat-packer's." A couple of idlers on the dock got up from their casks and crates and ambled in that direction, eager for a sight one didn't see very often.

Thomas glanced at Mingeaux, who was smoking impassively, eyes on the woman, but not as if she were terribly interested.

"They're questioning the captain of Intrepide at the magistrate's this morning," the woman continued, dashing away in the general direction of town.

There was a scraping noise as Mingeaux's chair pushed back against the decking. When Thomas turned again, she was standing, her eyes narrowed in the direction the gossip had gone. "She had no call to announce it to everyone," Mingeaux said.

Thomas had never heard that note in gentle Mingeaux's voice before, and he wondered again about the captain of the Intrepide.

 

* * *

Brandy and Giuliana had started out from the tavern by themselves, but by the time they reached the magistrate's, there was an interested crowd swirling about them at a prudent distance. Brandy was annoyed; she had enjoyed the feeling of walking shoulder to shoulder with the tall, silent woman, and having a gaggle of spectators ruined the half-new, half maddeningly familiar feeling.

The captain was all business, long arms swinging as she made her way down the street. She took no more notice of the crowd than she did of the brilliant sunshine glittering on the far-off waves rolling into the harbor, dotted with masts.

Brandy took another sideways look at her strolling companion. The sense that she had met the captain before was driving her out of her mind; she knew she knew the answer to where and how, but every time she was just about to remember, it skittered away from her brain. Perhaps she had known someone from the captain's family? If so, where had they met? She sighed. Perhaps it had only happened in one of her increasingly feverish dreams.

"Mam'selle?" the captain inquired, looking at her courteously.

"Hm?" Brandy replied, distracted by the curve of the lady's cheek.

"You have been studying me as if through a microscope," Giuliana remarked, looking out toward the harbor, instead of the cobblestones at her feet. "Have I suddenly gone green?"

Brandy felt the blush going over her face and looked away. "No," she said shortly. Something in her compelled her to tell the truth, out there in the bright sunshine before God and what looked like every single one of her neighbors. "I was trying to remember," she said in a low voice, "where I had seen you before."

Startled, Giuliana turned her head. "Yes," she murmured, looking at the tavern-keeper in her turn. "I'm quite certain we've never met, but--isn't that the oddest feeling?"

Brandy's breathing quickened, and it wasn't the exertion of the walk. She could not have said why, but it sent a thrill through every nerve that the captain was feeling the same thing she was. "Odd," she agreed, and they turned into the street the magistrate lived on.

His house (which was also where he conducted his magistracy) was set midway up the long hill leading from the harbor, its white walls and iron fence peeking out here and there from the luxuriant tropical foliage that looked like it was trying to swallow the structure whole. The house lay some little distance from the bustle and liveliness of Haven's port, and it seemed a sanctuary in the midst of chaos, a place where the peaceable kingdom had gone to ground.

Pacing in front of the iron gates, incongruously stormy-faced in the sunshine, was Mingeaux. She nodded to the two of them, and Brandy felt a weak-kneed relief. It was going to be all right. It had to be. Both of them were here.

Giuliana threaded her way through the crowd of interested onlookers, all of whom got out of her way hastily, and announced her name to the gatekeeper. The gates swung wide, and Giuliana held out a hand to Mingeaux and took Brandy's arm at the elbow to lead them through the gap in the vines. The gatekeeper closed the gates behind them and folded her arms, staring out through the bars at the motley crowd awaiting further developments.

"This is a town," Giuliana murmured to Mingeaux, "that could benefit from a racetrack."

Mingeaux smiled and stopped to knock the ashes from her pipe, tapping it against her boot-heel. She gestured toward the broad steps leading up to the house, and the three found themselves at the front door before any of them was quite ready.

A servant opened the door, which jingled and creaked slightly, and bowed as she swept a dark arm toward the parlor. Brandy was surprised to see the pulse in the captain's neck beating rapidly.

She had no time to grasp the captain's hand in reassurance, because a large-bellied man in a powdered wig was approaching, holding out his hands. "My dear Gingembre," he said, beaming. "However are you?"

She took his hands with the smile that she could never avoid when she saw him. "Very well, Uncle, thank you. And you?"

He shrugged, and some of the powder from his wig drifted in the shafts of sunlight coming in through the windows. "Overpaid and underworked, as usual. Have you a kiss for your Uncle Bertrand?"

Obediently, Brandy leaned over to kiss his cheek, while Giuliana and Mingeaux exchanged glances over their heads.

"Your father sends his best," M. de Nicot said, taking Brandy's hand and leading her into the room. The magistrate was in a gorgeous, shimmering waistcoat that caught the light in colors that reminded Giuliana of the peacocks her brother insisted on having at the estate. "I had euchre with him Tuesday last, and he asked me how you were."

"It's very kind of him to remember me," Brandy answered. She seemed to have lost three inches in height and three years of maturity, and Giuliana was suitably impressed.

"Nonsense," scoffed M. de Nicot. "Any man would be proud to call you his daughter. But I am neglecting our other guests. Mam'selle Mingeaux, are you well?" he said, bowing to Mingeaux as though it was a common thing to have a tattooed six-foot woman in his drawing room. Mingeaux bowed in her turn, and M. de Nicot finally turned his attention to the cause of all the trouble.

"And this lovely lady," he announced, holding his hand out to Giuliana, "I haven't yet had the pleasure of meeting." He beamed and twinkled, and his wardrobe was far too elaborate for practicality, and his manner was affable, but Giuliana could see, deep in his eyes, a cunning and an intelligence that told her he would be a most dangerous man to cross.

"M. de Nicot," said Brandy formally, "may I present Mlle. Giuliana Carlisle, captain of the Intrepide?"

"Another woman captain," said the magistrate with seeming delight, pumping Giuliana's hand. "If this keeps up all the men will be out of work, eh? Have you met your counterpart, Captain Jameson of Discovery?"

"Not yet," Giuliana replied, adding with a slight smile, "I've been otherwise occupied."

"Yes, indeed," he said, growing serious in a moment. "This is a grave business, a grave business indeed. A man murdered." He indicated chairs with a wave of his hand, and Brandy moved without apparent haste to sit between Mingeaux and Giuliana.

De Nicot settled himself into his chair. Giuliana took a quick look at the baroque opulence of the desk: curlicues and gilt, fussy and elaborate. It was as though the room was designed to make M. de Nicot look harmless, which was a good indicator that he was anything but. She straightened her shoulders and put herself en garde.

"Are you enjoying Haven?" the magistrate asked.

It seemed a singular way to open a murder investigation, but Giuliana was hardly in a position to object. "Very much," she said, glancing to her right, where Brandy sat with her arms on the armrests and her hands folded. She gave Giuliana a quick, abbreviated smile that was almost as bright as the sunshine making its way into the room through the cracks in the shutters.

"It's a lovely place," the magistrate said, leaning back and placing both hands to either side of the desk-blotter. "Of course, it hasn't shown its best face to our new visitor. How distressing it is to me, Mam'selle, that you should be in Haven less than seventy-two hours before a body shows up in the street."

He raised his eyes to Giuliana's as he spoke. He could have been more direct, but it would have taken some work. "I assure you it hasn't spoiled my enjoyment of the town," she said lightly, with another glance at Brandy.

"Dominguez tells me," he said, keeping his tone as superficial and careless as hers, "that you and Mlle. Mingeaux left the tavern at half-past eight."

"I wasn't aware he could tell time," Mingeaux growled, and the others turned to her in surprise.

"Mingeaux," Giuliana said in warning.

"M. Houeck (or to be more accurate, his corpse) was discovered at shortly before nine," the magistrate continued, as if Mingeaux had not interrupted.

"We must have just missed it," Giuliana said blandly.

"Did you see anything?" the magistrate asked.

"Nighttimes here are a trifle dark for me to see anything," the captain replied. "I didn't hear anything. Did you, Mingeaux?" Mingeaux shook her head, looking stubborn and impatient, and Giuliana turned to Brandy with an inquiring glance. Brandy shook her head, solemn and wide-eyed.

"Why were you out?" the magistrate asked Giuliana, and she got wary.

"I was walking Mingeaux a bit of the way down the hill to the Intrepide," Giuliana told him. "I had a few instructions for her."

"Relating to--?"

Giuliana sighed. "Relating to my probable absence from the ship for the remainder of the evening." She turned to Brandy with a slight bow. "I beg your pardon, Mam'selle."

"That's not important," Brandy said in a low voice, staring at her lap.

"So," said M. de Nicot, turning to Mingeaux with bright, quick eyes, "you walked back down to the ship by yourself?"

Giuliana felt it go over her like a bucket of water from the North Sea.

"That's right," Mingeaux told him gruffly.

M. de Nicot nodded, looking at the blotter. "And there's only... one way down to the wharf...?"

As he had done with the captain, he raised his eyes to Mingeaux when he was finished speaking. Mingeaux looked back at him with an expression firm in its utter lack of expression. "If you're asking did I see anything, the answer is no," she said.

"Yes," said M. de Nicot, leaning back in his chair and steepling his fingers. "We've already heard that it was very dark." He glanced at the captain again. "Which is why I wonder that you were willing to walk back to the 'Bonny Anne' alone. It doesn't seem as though you would feel particularly safe doing so."

Giuliana sat forward in her chair. "Come, monsieur," she said, out of patience. "You can make anything we say fit any theory you like. I want to know whether you're going to issue orders for our arrest, so that I can make arrangements to send Intrepide on her way to complete her mission. Because I assure you, no matter what you charge me with, no one is getting my ship."

The silence in the room was immediate and ponderous. To Giuliana's astonishment, it was also short-lived. M. de Nicot burst into laughter, which sounded annoyingly genuine, and raised a languid hand in protest. "My dear captain! Do you think us common brigands here? No one here has any designs on your ship, lovely though she is. Or your crew, for that matter. I merely seek to establish the circumstances behind the death of M. Hook. I have my own ideas about it, and, to be truthful, I think there is very little way of solving this particular offense. No one saw anything, no one heard anything, and the only two witnesses we can place at the scene at the time it occurred were strolling in the feeble starlight discussing ship's business, without interruption by so much as a tsetse fly." He turned to Brandy, who raised her eyes hastily to his. "She has a temper, doesn't she?"

"Not around me," Brandy responded stoutly, and Giuliana wanted to kiss her.

M. de Nicot laughed again. "Brava! I shall have to tell your father that his daughter shares his quick wit." He pulled the chair away from his ornate desk and crossed his legs. "By the way," he asked casually, "what is Intrepide's mission?"

"I am looking for my sister," Giuliana explained for the thousandth time, "who was taken from the Phoebus six months ago."

M. de Nicot nodded, raising his eyebrows. "Indeed. Speaking of insoluble crimes."

Giuliana's heart thudded into the toes of her boots, but she kept her outward calm. "In what way, monsieur?"

M. de Nicot shrugged. "Unfortunately, mam'selle, it is a very large ocean."

Giuliana was just about to ask him to explain that remark, with no inconsiderable heat, when M. de Nicot rose. "Well, I've kept you here long enough," he said, "and you have a dinner engagement to prepare for."

Giuliana met his eye and spoke steadily. "It seems you are very well informed, monsieur."

He spread his hands with a charming smile. "But of course, captain. I am the magistrate!" That appeared to settle that, and he got to his feet and held out a hand for Giuliana to shake. "Thank you for your time, captain. I sincerely hope I shan't have to trouble any of you ladies again about this matter."

Well, that appeared to be good news, sort of. He came around the desk as they got to their feet and embraced Brandy warmly. "You, young lady," he said, looking into her face with his hand cupped under her chin, "don't let this one break your heart, eh?"

"I promise, Uncle," said Brandy, and Giuliana could have sworn she had suddenly grown dimples.

 

* * *

"And she said She had no call to announce it to everyone?" Jameson asked.

"Those were her exact words," Thomas said.

Jameson put her hand to her chin and paced the cabin. It was Discovery's laboratory, a surprisingly well-lit space directly below the main deck. The illumination came from thick glass pyramids set into the ceiling at intervals. The equipment, securely fastened to the tables which were firmly embedded in the floor, stood in pools of unnatural winter-colored light. Jameson came to rest beside the retort stand and stood, deep in thought. "Singular. What a singular thing to say."

"And the crux of her objection," Mr. Thomas went on, "appeared to be the public announcement that Captain Carlisle was being questioned by the magistrate this morning."

Jameson looked up, a flash of January light in her eye. "In connection with the murder. It must be."

"Although that was not explicitly expressed, the comment was made after she had remarked on the murder."

Jameson paced back and forth, slowly. "This Captain Carlisle is an interesting person. An amateur on the sea who commands her own ship, a devoted sister, a white knight on a rescue mission. And she lands in Haven and turns the place upside down in a matter of two days." She made a decision and turned back to him again. "The magistrate, where does he conduct his inquiries?"

Thomas thought for a moment. "It is likely at his house, as he has a name for indolence."

"And that's just off the way from Etienne's shop, isn't it?"

"Yes," Thomas said.

"I'll tell you what, Mr. Thomas," Jameson said, and that expression that always worried him was in her eye again. "Shall we stroll up to Etienne's to see if the sextant is ready?"

It was just one more thing he didn't really feel like doing, but after all, she was the captain.

 

* * *

In another part of Haven, Torres and Mr. Sere, unlikely companions, were heading down Cobbler's Lane, a side street off the main road that led down the hill to the harbor. The street lived up to its name; they had just been at the cobbler's, but not to have their boots repaired. Because fair weather meant there could be long stretches of inactivity on the part of Discovery's crew, they all had a list of housekeeping projects, one of which was leatherwork. Under one arm, Torres held a rolled length of soft, supple suede; it would occupy all of them during quiet days at sea as they made instrument covers, gear bags, and deck-gripping soles for their sea-boots.

A bag slung over Jack's shoulder held other pieces of leather, some intended for rougher uses than the roll Torres carried: waterproof bags, lashings for the furniture, thongs for clothing and shoes.

As they walked he whistled a happy, brainless little tune. It was one of many things about him that put blood in Torres's eye, and she was thinking about whether the consequences of pasting him one in the beak would be worth it.

She was just about to ask Jack his opinion of the matter when a carriage swept around the corner, its delicacy and sway contrasting with the heavy breathing of the sweat-flecked horses that drew it. The coachman drew it to a halt right in front of them, blocking their way, and Torres put her fists on her hips at the additional annoyance.

Oh, yes, she recognized the carriage. She most certainly did. And when the coachman leapt from the box, a bit stiffly, and opened the door, she was completely unsurprised at who stepped out.

"Torres!" called the woman from the carriage gaily, not looking down at her feet as she got out, even though she was in a heavy dress and delicate slippers. "How is my good friend?"

"I didn't know you had one," Torres answered, glancing toward the panting horses, whose necks and sides were stained with dark sweat.

The woman laughed. "Always that rapier wit, eh?"

Beside her, Jack had gone very quiet: no whistling, no motion. Torres gave him a quick look to make certain he was still breathing.

Jack was staring at the woman from the carriage. And well he might; she was a perfect height for him, a fragile-looking, slender blonde with dark eyes and carefully-disarrayed hair that made one think she had just arisen from a very active bed. She was in an eye-catching low-necked blue gown that fell in simple lines from her perfectly adequate bosom, and her hair, swept up into a knot at her crown, did nothing to spoil the long line of her neck as it turned into the line of her shoulder and became the curve of her arm. Her hands, while petite and sculpted, held a raw strength incongruous in a woman of her class, and you had to look deep into those brown eyes to see the madness there.

Torres closed her eyes briefly; she could feel a vicious headache coming on.

"But you haven't introduced me to your lover," the woman said, with a merry little laugh that only increased Jack's besotted stupefaction.

She knew she shouldn't, and she knew it was exactly what the infuriating woman wanted, but Torres was damned if she wouldn't. "He's not my lover," she snarled.

The lady gave Jack a polite, assessing look. "No?" she said finally, with a glance at Torres. She turned back to Jack and her eyes swept over him, top to toe, in a decidedly unladylike scan. "Then can I have him?"

"I'll see you in hell first," Torres shot back.

"Probably," the lady said abstractedly, taking a step closer to Jack. She held out her hand in a parody of femininity and twittered, "Aren't you going to introduce yourself, monsieur?"

Jack was obviously tongue-tied, but he did his best. "J-J-Jack Sere, mam'selle. Of his Majesty's Navy." He took her hand and bowed over it, his awkwardness never more apparent. "D-d-d-delighted."

She looked around his ears at the rolls of leather poking out of the bag over his shoulder and commented, "I take it you're ready for a bit of a holiday." She lifted her eyes to his. "I always think leather makes such a definite statement, don't you?"

Torres shifted the roll of leather under her arm, reflecting that it wasn't only bad food and liquor that could induce nausea. She watched the woman simper at him and felt her lip come up in an uncontrollable snarl.

"I," the lady announced, placing a ladylike hand to her bosom, "am Genevieve Ste. Claire."

"And I am the most fortunate man on the globe at this moment, mam'selle," Jack responded, drawing himself up.

"Oh, Torres, he's adorable!" Genevieve gushed. "Wherever did you find him?"

"Scraped him off my boot in King's Towne." Torres leaned patiently against a tree, waiting for the two to finish their unattractive flirting.

"The real story is, I joined Discovery in Port-au-Prince," Jack said hastily.

"So," said Genevieve with a purr in her voice, "you're assigned to Discovery permanently?"

"Yes," Torres said shortly, reaching out to grab Jack's sleeve. He was usually relatively easy to pull off balance, and this time, gratifyingly, was no exception; he stumbled toward the street.

"Adieu, mam'selle," he said, attempting to salute and smacking himself forcefully in the forehead.

"A pleasure, monsieur," she answered, her smile beaming gently, her eyes twinkling as Torres dragged him roughly down the hill toward the ship.

 

* * *

Emilie locked the case on the sextant and slipped it off the heavy cloth, turning to place it carefully into Thomas's outstretched arms. He cradled it with the tender, businesslike air of a man who has held more than his share of babies, and Emilie nodded in approval.

"Be nice to her," she said, shaking a finger at Jameson. "My darling's been through a rough time."

"I can't promise anything," Jameson replied. "She'll be on the same ocean with Mr. Sere."

Emilie frowned at the case and put a hand to her chin. "I still think," she said reflectively, "that he needs a lover."

"God forbid," Thomas murmured, holding the case protectively against his chest.

"Now, Mr. Thomas," said the captain soothingly. "There is no need to petition the Almighty for another man's unhappiness."

"I was merely thinking, Captain," Thomas replied, "of avoiding our own."

Jameson found this unworthy of reply and turned to Emilie with a concerned smile. "And how is your dear father?"

Emilie had just opened her mouth to reply when a bellow of "Not dead yet!" came from behind the curtain leading to the back room.

"I'm delighted to hear it," Jameson called, as Emilie petitioned the deity silently for some relief. She met Jameson's eye and they shared a bit of a grin. The captain continued, "And you'll be pleased to hear that we're shipping out again in two days."

They heard Etienne mutter, "Women in trousers."

"Don't fret, Etienne," Jameson said, unable to resist. "You'll have much more to object to when they permit us the vote."

His grumbling had subsided, so they weren't able to hear his reply, and Jameson thought that now would be a good time to leave. She picked up her hat and gestured for Emilie to precede them to the door.

When they were outside, the captain turned to the other woman. "Is he still suffering from the cold?"

Emilie held up her hand in a gesture that encompassed the soft, balmy air. "I can't keep the room warm enough for him. He says he moved to the tropics so that he wouldn't freeze to death, and now look."

Jameson placed a gentle hand on Emilie's shoulder, feeling how delicate the bones were. "You'll let us know if we can do anything to help, won't you?"

Emilie smiled. "You've already done so much... coming to us to repair your instruments, and telling me you'd rather we did the work than anyone... I can't thank you enough."

"The thanks are ours," Thomas replied. "Your work is extremely precise, and that is what we require."

"Thank you, Mr. Thomas," Emilie said, putting her hands into her sleeves as if she, too, were suddenly cold. "That means a great deal to Papa and me." She shook herself suddenly awake. "But I must go see how he is. It's probably time for another log on the fire."

"We'll be here for two more days," Jameson assured her, giving her shoulder one last pat. Distracted, Emilie nodded and vanished inside. Jameson and Thomas exchanged serious looks, then started down the street together. He went carefully, because of the sextant.

 

* * *

Outside the magistrate's, the crowd had grown. Giuliana lifted an eyebrow at Mingeaux, who shrugged. "No racetrack," she said, reaching in her vest pocket for her pipe.

The gatekeeper let them out with an elaborate bow, and they were standing in the street in front of the gate, the elegant house behind them. Around them, the interested group stood silently, at a respectful distance, and Giuliana reflected that human nature was reassuringly predictable.

Brandy glanced behind her to see M. de Nicot at the window, curtains drawn back so that he could watch them leave. "Captain," she murmured, and Giuliana turned, nodding to him briefly through the gate before turning to face the street again.

"You know him better than I," Giuliana murmured to Brandy. "Is he waiting for something?"

Mingeaux pulled out her tobacco-pouch and began to load her pipe. "If you ask me," she said unobtrusively, "he wants to know just how much of your alibi he can rely on."

Startled, Brandy stared for a moment at the tall woman with the pipe. Then, she turned reluctantly to the Captain. "I regret to say, Captain, that I believe Mingeaux is correct."

A corner of Giuliana's mouth turned up. "So we're supposed to prove it in public, eh?"

"No racetrack," Mingeaux repeated, staring into the foliage atop the gate.

"Mam'selle?" Giuliana inquired, and Brandy felt her heart begin to race. "The choice is yours," the captain continued.

Breathless, Brandy nodded, and Giuliana gave her a polite little half-bow before bending toward her.

The wind of possibility beat at her soul, and her heart leapt in response. The taller woman's hair brushed her cheek, and the first gentle, subtle touch of her lips, tender but not at all uncertain, blanked any doubt and hesitation from Brandy's mind.

Along with everything else. All of God's creation swept and sang in harmony around them with an exquisite sense of rightness, like a ship making fast to its home-port dock, like a mother soothing a lonely child, like... like...

Like the other half of her, something she had hungered and thirsted toward, only half-knowing, until this astonishing thing had swept into her life and turned it over and remade it.

The gentle hands descended on her shoulders again, almost as though Brandy were a bird that might fly if handled too roughly, and she put her hands around Giuliana's waist to pull her closer. She tried to be gentle in her turn, but it was very difficult, and the maddening, tender touch of the lips on hers was making it hard to remember, and she wanted it to go on forever and knew at the same time that she couldn't take much more.

Giuliana pulled away a fraction, and Brandy's soul cried out at the separation. She opened her eyes and blinked, and she was standing in the street, staring at the utterly neutral face of the captain.

"Very convincing," Mingeaux murmured, lighting her pipe.

It couldn't be. She couldn't be standing on this mundane little street in this horrid little town on this ugly little island. Not when her soul had been lifted gently from its cradle and sent on a journey through a field of stars.

"Mam'selle," Giuliana said, with another little bow. "At three?"

Stunned, Brandy nodded. That was all she could do, and Giuliana and Mingeaux turned to make their way through the crowd, heading down the hill toward Intrepide.

She remembered that she had lungs, and remembered how they worked, just in time to get some air into the body on the trembling verge of collapse.

Then she remembered what she and the captain were supposed to be doing at three, and her soul went to ice.

 

* * *

Through accident or fate, Thomas and Jameson managed to be just outside the magistrate's house when the party of three emerged. Thus it was that Jameson got her first look at the other woman in Haven who commanded her own ship.

Captain Carlisle was a good deal above average height for a woman; Jameson estimated that she was an even six feet. Only Mingeaux, an exceptional person in more than one way, was taller; seeing them together was like looking at two upright masts. The captain wore a blue, silver-buttoned jacket over a white shirt, a modest waistcoat, and fawn-colored trousers tucked into rich-looking knee-length leather boots, and she held a dark, low-crowned hat in one hand. She was not wearing a sword, but then again, neither did Mingeaux.

Sleek, silken brown hair spilled over the shoulders of the captain's coat, adding a note of random, attractive disorder to a trim, neat figure. She had a bit of conversation with Mingeaux and Brandy, then turned to scan the crowd. Her eyes, Jameson noted with interest, were a bright, unforgettable shade of blue. It looked as though she could threaten very well with those eyes, and also as if she had never cared to find out if they could turn soft and forgiving; say with a child, or a lover. Her face could have graced a delicate marble statue; her sober expression indicated she would have no interest whatsoever in appreciating such an artwork. She was, Jameson decided, far beyond pretty, and well into beautiful.

The girl at Carlisle's side seemed distracted by something, and when Carlisle turned to her, an almost palpable excitement went through the crowd. The tall woman bent to Brandy's lips with the ease of long practice and the insolence of insulation, and they kissed, lightly but with protracted interest.

Beside Jameson, Thomas drew a shocked breath. So Brandy was the "mistress" the child had told Mingeaux about the night before. Interesting. Interesting. Jameson kept her eye on the two of them, puzzled; it seemed almost as though they were putting on some type of a masque for the entertainment of the crowd. Something a bit too consciously subtle, a shade too casually aware.

Her eyes flicked up to the window of the magistrate's house, and she saw M. de Nicot, one delicate hand on the curtain, watching the two in the street with an expression of complete indifference. Brandy, if she recalled correctly, was his niece.

Very interesting.

The tall woman drew back from Brandy and murmured something to her, and the girl nodded, looking a bit poleaxed. Carlisle and Mingeaux turned and started down the street toward the road to the wharf. As they passed, Carlisle's eyes fixed on Thomas and Jameson, and Jameson nodded to her. Carlisle raised a hand to the brim of her hat in salute. The blue eyes were unemotional, but Jameson thought she detected ferocity, carefully hidden, in the expression.

Brandy took one look around at the assembled multitude, then seemed to come to her senses and gave them a brilliant, brave smile. It made Jameson want to laugh aloud. Brandy took a few steps toward the road that led up to the "Bonny Anne", and the crowd parted for her. As she walked, a number of children began to skip and hop, careful not to look like they were following her, and the crowd broke into twos and threes and began to disperse.

Singular, Jameson repeated to herself. Singular. She put a hand to Mr. Thomas's shoulder. He was not fond of public spectacle, and she could guess what was going through his mind right now. "Courage, my friend," she murmured. "Are you hungry?"

"Although I am devoid of appetite," he said, "I suppose this has only whetted your curiosity."

"Come, Mr. Thomas," she said, unable to resist teasing him just a bit. "Where's your spirit of scientific inquiry?"

"There is very little of science in what we've just seen," he answered, and she put her arm through his and led him to the road.

"Nonsense," she commented. "It's all a matter of chemical attraction."

"Indeed," he said, using the expression that she knew meant he didn't care to hear much more. "Where are we going?"

"I was just thinking," she said mischievously, "of how long it's been since we had a decent dinner, God bless Mr. Nilsson. And how excellent the cooking is at the 'Bonny Anne'."

"Why am I unsurprised at your intended destination?" he asked the heavens, and she laughed.

 

* * *

In the drowsy quiet of mid-afternoon, Emilie had the windows of the shop open to catch the breeze and the occasional noise from the now-empty street. Normally, it would have been prudent to keep them closed, lest blown-in smuts foul the instruments they were working on. With the departure of Mr. Thomas's repaired sextant, however, there were none, and she could enjoy the cooling breeze and work on their accounts.

She had maybe two minutes before Etienne complained about being too cold and she had to shut the windows. She longed to take off her skirt and about two of her petticoats; better still would be to wear trousers, but she supposed a woman had to be a sea captain or an engineer to earn that privilege. She leaned against the counter on one elbow, her cheek resting on her fist, and made notes in the ledger with the other.

Not too bad, actually, although she could see that the volume of business had fallen off with her father's illness. There were some clients, like Jameson's Discovery, who insisted on bringing their repair work to Etienne, regardless of whether he was capable of doing it. And a few more had come by in the past month. But it wasn't certain that they'd stay.

She blew gently on the last entry to dry the ink and set the quill into the dish with an engineer's exactitude, lest a breath of wind blow it onto the ledger and smudge the lines. Ah, well. If her father could no longer work, if the business closed, she always had a way to take care of him. Maximilian would see to it that he was as comfortable as his remaining years would allow, she was certain. And he was a good man; she could certainly do worse.

But--! She lifted her head to the breeze coming off the harbor, the scent of salt, seaweed, water, and possibility calling to her soul. Why in this wide world could she not do what Jameson did? And Torres?

She looked back down at the ledger, wryly. Because, in all this wide world, there was room for only one Jameson and only one Torres. Best to try to forget all about it and think about Maximilian instead.

Not that the prospect was appetizing, for some reason. And it got less appetizing by the day. Why? He was decent, sober, respectable, hard-working, handsome, even. They would have beautiful children and a lovely home and servants and--

And.

And she would never again touch a sextant.

That was it, wasn't it? She wouldn't slip the heavy, intricate brass instrument from its case, turn it this way and that, work the mechanism, study the gleam of the silvering on the mirror, squint with a practiced eye through the eyepiece, as if she were shooting the stars on a brilliantly clear night in the Azores, pencil and paper waiting on a table beside her on the deck of some lovely yacht--

Dream on, Emilie, she told herself, shaking her head. Such things are not for such a one as you. She thought she heard something in the other room and listened for a moment, but it was nothing, and she returned to the gloom of her thoughts.

Wife and mother. Not engineer. Not Torres's life. Not for you. She sighed and reached for the quill again, then pulled out her penknife to trim it. As the slivers from the quill fell soundlessly onto the table, she thought, For you, nothing to trim any more but vegetables. And your life gets whittled shorter and shorter. Whittled to a point. But what point?

She held up the quill and studied the point, frowning. Perhaps she could teach her sons to shoot the stars. She would never do such a thing to her daughters: let them hold the secrets of the Queen of Heaven in shining brass in their own two hands, then tell them, but this can never be yours.

She dipped the quill in the inkpot and bent to the ledger again. Very well, then, my girl. You shall live as a woman should, care for your father and honor your husband and love your children. And if it happens that all your dreams go to smash like so much crockery, well, then, you are no different from most--

The noise in the next room caught her attention. It sounded like glass breaking. She was on her feet and into the next room in an instant.

 

* * *

They were halfway to the wharf when Giuliana murmured to Mingeaux, "Who was that woman?"

"Jameson," Mingeaux grunted.

Giuliana nodded, as if to say, I thought as much.

They said nothing else on the way to Intrepide's berth. Mingeaux was just as glad; she wasn't certain what she'd have said if the captain had brought up the little tableau she and Brandy had played back at M. de Nicot's house.

Giuliana strode up the gangway and back to her cabin. Mingeaux followed, for lack of other instruction, and found herself in the amazingly spacious little room the captain lived in. The half-wall of glass at the stern was a luxury most vessels wouldn't have carried; Mingeaux remembered her apprehensive, unhappy surprise when she first saw it. She had to admit, however, that the boatwrights who built Intrepide certainly knew what they were doing: the trim, sleek little yacht hadn't leaked so much as a thimbleful on the crossing, and the sturdy, transparent wall must have been beautiful even in a storm, the foaming waves of gray-green water surging against the thick glass.

She took up a position leaning against the sturdy desk in the captain's cabin, watching with interest as Giuliana unlocked the wardrobe at the foot of the bunk. She pulled out a length of cloth and draped it in one swift motion across the bunk, then stood back and studied it, arms crossed and one fist to her chin.

It was a dress in a sumptuous, subtle blue cloth. The lines of it were as clean and spare as those of the yacht, and the shade was almost exactly the same as the captain's eyes, shadowed in thought. Mingeaux knew exactly what it would look like on a woman; it would sweep from her shoulders to her ankles, framing her neck and shoulders, outlining her bosom, offering a hint or two of a leg as she walked across a room with every eye on her.

Mingeaux raised an eyebrow. The dress was obviously new, and the color made her suspect that it had been chosen to set off the captain's eyes, one of her best features--not that she had any bad ones--Mingeaux tried to collect her thoughts and realized that she was looking forward to seeing Giuliana all dressed up.

"Low-cut, you said?" the captain inquired, with little more emotion than a farm wife selecting a hen to kill for supper.

"Is it?" Mingeaux asked.

"Very," the captain replied shortly, crouching to pull a wooden box out of the bottom of the wardrobe. She set the box on the floor, commenting, "In Paris last season, there were a few daring ladies who went bare-breasted."

Mingeaux put a hand to her forehead and looked out past the wall of glass into the harbor.

"They say," the captain went on, undoing the latches on the box and pulling out a pair of dress slippers, "that it will become quite the fashion."

Mingeaux took her pipe out of her pocket and busied herself fussing with it. "I must remember to spend some time in Paris soon."

The captain turned to her with a quick, feral grin. "Can you get this up to the tavern?"

Mingeaux shook her head, unable to keep from smiling. "Not with the same style as the daring ladies of Paris." She leaned out the doorway. "DiFalco!"

The captain stood again, dusting her hands. "I'm damned if I recall how you get into half this gear," she said. "I suppose we shall see whether Mlle. Tavernier is as resourceful as she is--"

"Yes?" said a voice outside the door, interrupting the captain just before she got to the end of the sentence that would have interested Mingeaux very much. The tattooed first mate turned her head; DiFalco was staring at the dress laid out on the bunk. "Holy mother of God," DiFalco breathed in Italian, her eyes wide. "What in the name of the devil's pissette is that?"

Mingeaux cuffed her gently on the ear. "It's a lady's dress, blasphemer, not that you'd know what one of those was. The captain's been invited to sup with someone who washes more than once a year, unlike you."

DiFalco gave the captain one horrified look, then gazed at the dress again, awestruck. "And you're--you're--"

"We need a donkey-cart, if your pea-sized brain can hold a thought quite that complex," Mingeaux told her genially.

DiFalco put a hand to either side of the doorway, riveted.

"Go," Mingeaux said, flapping a hand at her.

DiFalco gave the captain one last glance that mingled respect and lust, then turned to get the donkey-cart. They heard her bellowing for someone on the wharf.

Giuliana turned to her first mate, a light of excitement glittering in her eyes. "Well, if a rough-hewn sailor like our friend DiFalco here reacts that way, how much easier will it be with M. Aristide?"

"This color," Mingeaux said, gesturing with her pipestem toward the rich cloth spread on the bunk. "That wasn't just chance, was it?"

Giuliana shook her head soberly.

Mingeaux got to her feet. "My compliments to your dress-maker, then."

The captain's sight went far beyond the dress laid out on the bed. "I would do anything," Giuliana said in a fierce whisper.

There was a brief silence. "Let us pray," Mingeaux said heavily, "that it does not come to that."

She left to see what progress DiFalco was making with the donkey-cart.

 

* * *

Emilie got through the doorway in time to see Etienne trying to struggle back to his feet. She could see the tips of his ears, which were a nasty shade of purple. "Papa!"

She managed to haul his bulk into a half-sitting position against the bed. His hands clutched his collar, which made it difficult for her to loosen it, and his breathing was very loud and appallingly wheezy.

"Daughter," he began.

"Hush," she said, her hands shaking as she reached for the buttons at his collar.

"There's no time," he said gruffly, trying to catch his breath. His face was an ugly, mottled reddish-purple, and his chest was moving in a diseased-looking rhythm. She shook her head, not looking at his face, and concentrated on the buttons. He caught up her hands; she raised her eyes unwillingly to his. "Listen, love, listen," he whispered urgently, and she moved her hands away from his collar to rest gently on his shoulders.

"I'm listening," she said reluctantly, telling herself that by damn he'd know she was paying attention.

"Money," he said, jerking his head toward the fireplace, which was roaring in the springtime air. "Buy yourself a berth on Discovery."

She blinked in surprise, and unsuspected tears coursed down her cheeks. "I don't--"

"Go to Jameson. Go with Jameson. Tell her to care for my daughter like her own," he said, the words coming out of him with a fierce emphasis.

"But... you hate women at the helm," she said uncomprehendingly.

"That woman is your destiny," he growled. "Deny it and we spend my last minutes arguing."

"I'm listening," she said steadily, the tears spilling down her cheeks. It made it difficult to see him.

"Go to Jameson, and I can go to God," he said, the breath leaving him in a rushing gasp.

She remembered to scream for help just as his body sagged against the bedframe.

 

* * *

Giuliana and Mingeaux climbed the hill leading to the tavern in virtual silence. Beside them, a cart pulled by a sweet-faced, silken-eared gray donkey paced their footsteps. The donkey's human walked beside her, keeping a watchful eye on the boxes lashed into the cart.

Brandy was waiting in the yard of the "Bonny Anne", arms folded tightly across her chest, her face shut and expressionless. Mingeaux had seen that look once before, when Brandy spoke of her mother's last days, and her heart turned suddenly sick.

But she said nothing, and she helped take the boxes into the back room of the tavern, Brandy's bedroom, and the silken stuffs and delicate slippers and fragile-looking jewelry appeared here and there, laid out like ornate soldiers ready for battle.

She said little more as the small battalion of women from Haven poured steaming kettles of water into the bathing-tub, and as Brandy set out perfumes and oils and soaps, and they withdrew to allow the captain her privacy. Mingeaux had never known Brandy so silent, and her heart ached for her girl, struggling for the very first time with the thing that made adulthood so sweet and yet so bitter all at once, a tangle of soul and body and spirit that might well take the rest of her life to unravel.

And still she kept her silence, as she watched Brandy and the captain go through the complicated ritual of transforming a woman, a creature of flesh, into a lady, a delicate tracery of spirit. Mingeaux did any heavy lifting they required, knowing she was unsuited by temperament or training to perform the intricate task that seemed effortless to the two astonishing creatures before her.

They sat before the mirror in Brandy's bedroom, Brandy combing out Giuliana's hair gently, without apparent hurry, Giuliana thinking God only knew what as she allowed herself to be sculpted like a block of marble. And the cold, severe beauty in her face would have suited a block of marble, if it came to that. But beautiful nonetheless. Breathtaking. The kind of face, body, voice you could lose your soul to, and never regret it for a moment, no matter how long or in what misery you lived from that point onward.

And yet her girl's hands were steady, despite her shut face and obviously unsettled heart, and Mingeaux was proud of her for being able to touch so lightly the thing all of them knew she had no hope of possessing. It was ever so much more difficult, that brief taste, than worship from afar.

Mingeaux found herself looking at the transformed Giuliana Carlisle, in her form-fitting blue dress, with something that was much like fear. Nothing and no one on this earth had a right to such beauty. As Giuliana turned to go out into the road again, she raised her serious eyes to Mingeaux's face, and Mingeaux thought her heart would stop.

"He won't be able to resist you," Mingeaux said gruffly. She didn't add the rest of what she was thinking, which was, neither could the highest angel in heaven.

"That's my hope," Giuliana said forthrightly. She put a hand on Brandy's shoulder; the tavern-keeper couldn't meet her eyes. "Thank you," Giuliana murmured to her, turning this way and that to look into Brandy's face. "You've been of invaluable assistance." She looked back at Mingeaux with an expression that might have been an appeal for help. "Both of you."

"My pleasure," Brandy whispered, lying through her teeth and being truthful at the same time.

Mingeaux gestured toward the door, and Giuliana moved like a queen through the tavern, which looked somehow a bit shabby, a bit less than grand, as she swept through the room on her way to the road. Behind them, Brandy followed, unable to keep her eyes away from the magnificence. Mingeaux leapt for the door, trying to keep the dress clean and Giuliana's hair arranged perfectly, and she began to realize why being a lady was such an involved prospect.

Outside, stamping in the late-afternoon light, was a magnificent pair of jet-black mares in a gleaming harness attached to a spotless carriage with an imposing-looking plaque on the door. Dazzled, Mingeaux reached for the door, only to have a liveried footman get to it before she did. She winked at his serious expression and stood aside to offer Giuliana a hand. Between them, Mingeaux and the footman handed Giuliana into the carriage, and she took a seat carefully to avoid mussing anything.

Mingeaux turned to Brandy, waiting forlorn by the road, her eyes on the ground. "Well done," she murmured. "I'm so proud of you."

She could see the tears starting as Brandy nodded tightly, and her heart tore open afresh. "We'll be back late this evening," Mingeaux said. "Will you be here?"

"Nowhere else," the girl whispered, in fathomless despair, and Mingeaux squeezed her shoulder with what she hoped was reassurance. She turned to step lightly into the carriage, moving carefully around the vision of the goddess, and took a seat opposite Giuliana.

The carriage moved slowly up the hill toward Aristide's estate. Giuliana kept her eyes on Brandy until the carriage moved past the door; the girl didn't look up once. Giuliana sighed and turned to Mingeaux, who sat up hastily but with great care.

"Do me a favor," the vision of perfection remarked suddenly.

"Anything," Mingeaux responded instantly.

"Sprawl," Giuliana replied.

 

* * *

"Haul!"

As Discovery's crew strained at the lines, Torres kept light, anxious hands on the heavy crate on the deck.

"Haul!" The muscles tightened their slack; the only perceptible change was a slight upward motion of the crate in its cradle of rope. "Haul!" Torres called the cadence, reminding them over and over to be gentle. "Steady there, to port--bring it up a bit on that side." Carefully, she and Thomas shifted the boom over the cargo hatch in Discovery's deck, and the crew, who had been hauling on the lines, began to let them down with even more caution. The heavy crate moved in painful, yet smooth increments into the hold, and the three sailors below held up their hands to keep it upright and level on the way down.

Jameson watched from the doorway to the cabins, impressed yet again with the way the brusque woman could command a group of ill-sorted sailors and scientists--even the clumsy Jack Sere--and get them working together to protect a costly piece of equipment. It wasn't so much that Jameson couldn't afford another one; it was that this one had taken six months of custom labor, using resources little Haven could barely muster. And it didn't work yet. Not yet, but it would soon, she was confident. And then the ether evaporator would be available to add the power of freezing specimens to the tropics.

A miracle. To rework the very weather, as God Himself did. And Torres had designed the entire apparatus, working from vague three-year-old descriptions written by non-engineers, working out the complex technical details and adding refinements to make the brass-bound box tough enough to toss about on the ocean without damage. Jameson was awed at her talent all over again, and grateful that Torres had chosen to ship with her.

Not chosen, she reminded herself. Torres thought she'd had no choice. Did she even begin to realize how extraordinary she was? Unlikely; Jameson couldn't imagine any engineer she'd ever known being willing to talk to her, much less take seriously her innovative approach to instrument-building.

It could only have been better if Emilie were a member of the crew. Separately, they were formidable engineering talents; together, Jameson suspected, they could have duplicated the clockwork that drove the very stars. She sighed, studying her belligerent, defensive engineer. Emilie was tied to Haven as surely as a slave chained in the hold of one of the Arab ships that still plied the seas, despite the technical illegality of that hideous profession.

They had just stowed the evaporator with exquisite care when the crowd that always seemed to attend any action on the wharf parted and a child came running to the foot of the gangway. Jameson turned to face her, leaning over the rail, intrigued.

It was the same self-assured child who had carried the message of Carlisle's liaison at the "Bonny Anne" the night before. Now, though, the child was breathless, her shirt sticking to her with sweat.

"Captain," she called up to the deck. "Permission." Jameson nodded in the general direction of the gangway. The child pattered up the gangway in her bare feet and stopped on the deck in front of her, bending slightly with her hands on her knees to catch her breath.

"Mam'selle Emilie--she says--you're to come right away," the child said, laboring for air.

Jameson caught her by the shoulders. "What is it?"

"M'sieur Etienne--taken ill--at the shop..."

Jameson looked around wildly for Thomas. "Mr. Thomas," she called. "I need you."

He emerged from the cargo hatch, climbing carefully up from the hold, and stood at attention.

"Captain?" Torres called uncertainly.

"Etienne's ill," Jameson said.

"Emilie--" Torres exclaimed. She leapt out of the hold in a flash and turned to one of the sailors. "You," she said furiously. "If anything happens to that evaporator, I'll turn your hide into a drum-head."

"Aye, aye, Chief," the woman said, not threatened in the slightest. "You go see to her."

Torres was down the gangway before any of the rest of them. Jameson gestured to Thomas and Sere, and they moved at a more stately pace.

But still they hurried.

 

* * *

The carriage with Aristide's arms emblazoned on the doors climbed the hill rapidly, and it seemed that, with every foot of the journey, the air grew more still, the insects quieter, the birds less noisy, until they moved through a silent landscape of lush greenery and gently-waving blossoms, like a fabled underwater world.

And Giuliana, Mingeaux could see, grew more tightly wound, like a clock whose key rested in a nervous hand, the mainspring compressing more and more, until it snapped. She could not have said why; the elegant-looking white hands resting on the seats were languid, the flawless face bland and smooth, as if she hadn't a serious thought in her exquisite head. And yet...

Mingeaux longed to go to her knees before God. Gracious one, just give her her sister back... anything, I'll do anything... the misery was just too close, the pain too evident.

She ran her eyes down the fabric of the dress, hoping her attention would not be rude. But great God, how dress like that and not invite every eye in the race to linger on you? The soft folds of the rich cloth concealed as much as they revealed, in tantalizing glimpses, and the line of her bare shoulders was by turns tender, inviting, and strong. She could see why Brandy was so smitten; an angel, the breath of God, had dropped without warning into her world. It was a sobering sight.

The carriage moved through an arched gateway hung with wicked-looking black iron gates, and Mingeaux longed for her pipe again. The carriage swept smoothly down the road, which had begun to curve ever so gently, and Giuliana kept those occult, far-off blue eyes on the distance, waiting for her first glimpse of the house.

 

* * *

By the time Jameson and her crew had gotten to Etienne's shop, there was a crowd around it. Torres and Jack pushed their way through, she heedless and he polite, and they went through the crush of people into the back room.

Emilie was on her knees, staring sightlessly at the body of her father, which three men were trying to lift. Torres reached for her shoulder, then drew her hand back. Something in the motion attracted Emilie's attention, and she turned glassy eyes in Torres's direction. In a moment, she was scrambling across the floor on her hands and knees, and Torres went to her knees to catch the girl in her arms.

By the time Jameson entered the room, Thomas at her side, Emilie had her face buried in Torres's shoulder, her arms around her neck, silent in misery. Torres looked up at the captain, her eyes wide in shock, and Jameson gestured, hold her. Torres put her arms hesitantly around Emilie, and the girl finally broke into sobs. Torres rocked her back and forth, crooning in a low voice, and Jameson crouched beside her, sweeping the hair away from her face.

"Emilie," Jameson murmured. "I'm so sorry."

"Papa, Papa," Emilie wailed, sounding very young. Torres tightened her arms around Emilie, and Jameson caught her hand. Torres looked up, and her eyes met Jameson's, and she was certain she looked just as serious as the engineer did.

 

* * *

Although they had been in the carriage for more than an hour, the ending of the journey seemed breathlessly abrupt. In the suddenness of the stop, Mingeaux and Giuliana looked at one another. Then the footman leapt lightly from the box to get the door, and Mingeaux got out cautiously, then turned to offer a hand to Giuliana, who bent her head to avoid the doorframe. She raised her eyes to the house as she emerged from the carriage, and Mingeaux turned to look.

It was long, and low, and had pillars of brilliant white plaster festooned with greenery and slightly rose-colored in the light of the setting sun. A broad flight of steps led to a porch stretching across the entire front of the house.

On the steps stood Aristide, resplendent in a suit every bit as magnificent as Giuliana's outfit, and beside him was a woman Mingeaux knew well. She tried not to snarl as she took in the sight of Genevieve Ste. Claire.

 

* * *

A surge of sound brought a group of four idlers into the "Bonny Anne", and Brandy's nervous, overstressed heart went into a gallop. What now?

"Haven's becoming a place of fatality," one of the idiots called to Mistinguette.

Brandy caught her breath, and Mistinguette caught her elbow. Brandy nodded her gratitude, and Mistinguette turned to the idiot. "Explain, you moron," she demanded, "before she falls to the floor in a swoon."

"What I'd give to have that effect on you, Mam'selle," one of the other idlers remarked with a grin, and Mistinguette reached for the lemon-knife. The idler held her hands up hastily with a conciliatory expression.

"M. Etienne it is," said the idiot. "Taken with apoplexy this very hour."

Brandy leaned forward on the bar. "Etienne--?"

The idiot nodded. "Cold and stiff already. They've sent to Discovery for Jameson." He brightened, as if he'd thought of something funny. "Perhaps she's going to dissect him."

Brandy turned to Mistinguette. "That means that Emilie--"

"Go on," Mistinguette said abruptly. "She'll be needing you."

Brandy swallowed. "I--I promised--"

"I'll tell her to wait for you," Mistinguette said.

Brandy pulled at the strings of her apron and laid it on the bar. "Thank you. Again."

"I'm just grateful my life isn't a tenth as interesting as yours has become since that little yacht sailed into harbor," Mistinguette told her in a low voice. "Get on with you."

Brandy was almost out the door when she turned, one hand on the sill, and called back to Mistinguette, "Tell her I'll be back. I promise."

Mistinguette's nod was the last thing she saw before she was flying down the road toward Etienne's shop.

 

* * *

Aristide held out a hand to the woman beside him, and together they made a stately promenade down the steps. She was a blonde, Giuliana could see, and like much else about Haven, there was something annoyingly familiar about her.

The two approached, and Giuliana saw that the blonde was slighter than she had imagined at first. And much more muscular. Like Giuliana, she was in an off-the-shoulder gown, but with more volume than Giuliana's dress. It looked charmingly old-fashioned, but there was little of charm in the overall effect. It took her a moment to decide why; it was the expression of cruelty, almost insanity, deep in the dark eyes of the blonde.

"Welcome," Aristide said with a brilliant smile. His head seemed to be nothing but even white teeth. "May I present Mlle. Genevieve Ste. Claire." He held out her hand, as though she didn't have the brains to do it herself, and turned to the blonde. "Mlle. Giuliana Carlisle, captain of the Intrepide."

Giuliana reached for Ste. Claire's hand with great reluctance. "Mademoiselle," she said noncommittally. The hand in hers was firm and strong, and she wondered if they were going to play a game of trying to crush each other's bones. She disengaged her hand and turned to Mingeaux. "My first mate, Mingeaux."

"We've met," Mingeaux said shortly, folding her arms.

"Nice to see you again," Ste. Claire said in dismissal to Mingeaux, turning back to Giuliana with an almost hungry expression. "M. Aristide's descriptions only hinted at your beauty, mam'selle," she commented, her eyes sweeping over Giuliana's figure. "Not that mere words could do it justice."

"And it's my pleasure," murmured Aristide, "to sup with two of the most beautiful women in the islands."

Was everyone in Haven besotted with lust? Giuliana tried to be patient, keeping her eyes trained on the blonde's face. The direct dark eyes stared into hers, smoldering in the depths with an expression she found impossible to read.

"Shall we?" Aristide asked, holding out his arms to the two of them with another wide smile. He looked very much as though he was enjoying himself very much. Giuliana took one arm, and Genevieve Ste. Claire the other, and he turned to lead the two up the wide steps into his home.

Mingeaux stuck her hands in her pockets and strolled into the house after them.

 

* * *

Brandy fought her way through the crowd--honestly, was there no tragedy in Haven that wouldn't attract an odd lot of idlers, like flies swarming over a horse-clod?--and pushed into the front room of Etienne's shop.

They had made a hasty pile of what was on the instrument-table to one side, on the floor, and Etienne's body lay on the table, covered with a heavy blanket. Mr. Thomas of Discovery was just pulling the blanket up over his face. Brandy stopped stock-still just as the sound of Emilie's sobbing reached her from the back room.

Thomas looked up at her and nodded. "Mam'selle," he said politely.

Brandy dashed for the other room and stopped in the doorway, hands clutching the doorsill.

Emilie was half-sitting, half-lying on the floor, caught up tightly in the arms of Torres of Discovery. Beside them, Jameson crouched, stroking Emilie's hair gently. Emilie's face was hidden against Torres's body, but her shoulders shook with weeping. Jameson looked up at Brandy, then motioned her closer.

Brandy took a step closer and leaned down to place a gentle hand on Emilie's shoulder. "Oh, Emilie," she breathed.

Emilie raised her head to look at her, wincing as the light hit her swollen, tear-filled eyes. "Brandy--my God--"

Brandy felt the pain of her mother's death flood through her, as fresh as the day it had happened. "Oh, sweetheart, I'm so sorry. What can we do for you?"

Emilie caught her breath and tried to speak. Brandy looked around for a cup--a dipper--anything--and motioned to one of the onlookers to bring her the bottle she spied on the windowsill. The woman handed it to her quickly, and Brandy popped the stopper and sniffed it. Ah. This would do nicely. "Take a drink," she said, holding it out to Emilie.

Obediently, Emilie took a mouthful, then her face went the wrong shape as she tried to swallow it. Brandy gave her an encouraging smile and patted her hand. "Give it a moment," she murmured, and Emilie nodded, distracted, coughing just a bit against her hand.

"I didn't think--" Emilie began, and Torres loosened her arms just a bit to let her sit up. Jameson sat silently beside the girl, watching her face. "I didn't think he was that ill--"

"You never do," Brandy said softly, and Torres turned to her, face grim.

"I heard something break," Emilie said, gasping slightly.

"This it was," said the woman who had given Brandy the bottle, and she held up a long brass tube.

Emilie went very still. "His telescope--oh, no--Papa!" She went pale suddenly, then was in motion before any of them could stop her.

Brandy caught her hands as Emilie reached for the telescope. "Emilie, listen to me--"

"We've got to get you out of here," Jameson said decisively, and she stood up and reached for Emilie's elbow. In one efficient motion, she pulled the girl to her feet. Emilie looked at her, disoriented, as Torres popped up and gripped Emilie's other arm, holding her up. She slumped between them.

Brandy wondered how they were ever going to get her past the table in the next room. "I--I don't--" Emilie began, looking from Torres to Jameson.

"Emilie," Torres said, an unfamiliar emotion making her voice quaver. "You're sleeping on Discovery tonight."

 

* * *

Aristide was correct; his cook was indeed one of the finest she'd ever run across. She had obviously mustered some faith somehow that it was not his intent to poison her, and to her surprise, she had enjoyed the meal.

It was astounding how quickly putting on the dress had enabled her to slip back into the artless girlishness that seemed to go with ball gowns and dancing slippers. The conversation was no more deep than anything she'd experienced at a midsummer party in England. She smiled and laughed at their jokes and took part in their superficial conversation and listened to their stories, and all three of them were trying their best to charm the living hell out of one another. It was far and away the most genteel swordfight she'd ever been in, and she was more en garde than she could ever remember being, and also more composed than at any time since she found that her sister had been taken. It was an odd combination of feeling alert, yet light on her feet and ready for anything.

Just now, they were sitting in Aristide's sitting-room, an expanse of polished, pillared tropical wood with shuttered doorways to either end to catch the island's cross-breeze. The doorways were open, and the candle-flames fluttered in their glass chimneys as the cool air swept through in gentle, caressing gusts.

Mingeaux was vastly more comfortable, having finally had a chance to load her pipe, and she sat some distance away, puffing as she watched the three fence, deflect, attempt to injure one another. Either that, or end up in bed together, all three of them. A fascinating, sick display.

"Mademoiselle Carlisle," said the irritating, mad blonde, "what makes the goddess descend on our islands?"

It was about as subtle as anything Genevieve had said up to now. Giuliana turned to her politely. "I seek my sister, taken from the Phoebus six months ago."

Genevieve gave Aristide a glance that might have been either Told you so or Why didn't you tell me? "Taken?" she asked softly.

Aristide gave Giuliana a warning glance, a raised eyebrow. Now, just what in the name of God was she supposed to do with that? "Taken," Giuliana repeated firmly. "By slavers."

This time, the warning came from Mingeaux's lowered eyebrows.

"Slavers?" Genevieve said lightly. "In these islands?"

Mingeaux directed her gaze outside, where the tropical foliage tossed in the breeze, dark against the lighter darkness of the starlit skies.

"Closer than anyone suspects," Giuliana said implacably, nailing the annoying blonde with a cold eye, and this time Mingeaux shot her a much more direct look that said, Shut up, shut up now.

"You have a fanciful imagination, mam'selle," Genevieve said, and the anger was evident in her voice.

Do not provoke the viper, something wise in Giuliana hissed, and she ignored it. "I have no objection to half the world enslaving the other half," she said forthrightly, which was not precisely the case, "as long as my family is left out of it."

"It is difficult to lose a loved one--" Genevieve began.

"It is difficult to lose an employee, if it comes to that," Giuliana interrupted, turning to Aristide. "Isn't that so, monsieur?"

For a moment, he was speechless, then a smile started on one side of his face. "I presume you speak of the unfortunate Dutchman who was murdered last night? He was hardly my employee--"

"Hardly," Giuliana repeated blandly. "But even you, saddened at the loss of such a valued worker, can have little understanding of what I would do to get my sister back unharmed."

There was a short silence, then the tip of Genevieve's tongue poked out between her lips momentarily, for all the world like the flickering of a serpent's tongue tasting the air in the room. "And what would you do?"

"It would be better to ask, what would I not do?" Giuliana replied, looking her straight in the eye. "I don't know that there's an answer to that question."

The trail of tobacco smoke from Mingeaux's pipe stopped abruptly, and Aristide went motionless, like a statue. Genevieve paled at the same time that a slow smile spread across her face. "Well," she said, and there was a tone of respect and the acceptance of challenge in her voice. "Such... devotion... in a sister. How absolutely... inspiring."

Giuliana thought she had made her point and got to her feet. "I must be back to my ship," she said.

"And where are you headed next?" Genevieve asked softly.

Giuliana towered over her, the air of menace not much mitigated by the beautiful dress falling in soft folds around her exquisite body. "Where would you suggest, mademoiselle?" she murmured, in a voice that barely carried as far as Mingeaux's chair.

Mingeaux was on her feet in an instant, snatching her pipe from her mouth. "Captain--"

Giuliana held out a hand, not taking her gaze off the blonde's face, and Mingeaux tightened her grip on the pipe, but didn't say another word. Genevieve's eyes went over the gorgeous woman standing before her, insolent and possessive. "Santo Domingo," she murmured, her eyes resting on Giuliana's breasts, to Mingeaux's fury. "An island west of here about three days' sailing." She raised her eyes to Giuliana's face. "That is where I should head, were I a sailor."

Giuliana bowed slightly, the formal gesture at odds with the dress, and Mingeaux could see the pulse beating rapidly in the mad blonde's throat. "I'll be back," Giuliana said.

"I shall count the hours," Genevieve responded.

 

* * *

Brandy looked up into the sky anxiously as Mr. Thomas fumbled with the lock on the shop door. She tried not to beg, plead, shriek at him to hurry, she had to get back to the "Bonny Anne" and wait for the captain's return.

Mr. Thomas finally got the key into the lock in the darkness and turned it. The door opened soundlessly--of course, it was an engineer's shop--and they moved into the front room.

She raised the slide on the lantern and a beam of light caught the simple wooden crate on the sawhorses. It isn't a coffin, it isn't his coffin, it isn't, it's just an instrument case. She was much too anxious to be frightened, and they moved cautiously, respectfully past the table on which his body had rested into the back room.

She wondered only for a moment at the fact that the valuable instrument case was alone in the shop--but it was, after all, empty, and the door was, after all, locked--and they crouched before the fireplace. Brandy put out a hand to the bricks and jerked it away; it was still hot, even though the blaze in the hearth had died down hours before. She set the lantern on the floor, and Mr. Thomas moved it farther away from her dress. She murmured her thanks to him, studying the brickwork.

"Can you see anything, Mr. Thomas?" she whispered, and he shook his head.

"It is unlikely that he would have a storage unit built in so close to the source of heat," he murmured back. "Either paper or coin would be too easily damaged."

She nodded, vaguely surprised at the sense in his thinking. She ran her hands over the front of the fireplace cautiously, wary of the heat. "And as an engineer, he'd be interested in making it elaborate and undetectable. Perhaps... perhaps..." she felt of one of the bricks that seemed loose, distracted for a moment. "Perhaps it's hidden in plain sight."

"One wonders why he did not tell his daughter of its location," Mr. Thomas said.

"Maximilian," Brandy said wryly. "Emilie doesn't hide anything from anyone."

"She seems far too sensible to reveal such a thing to her lover," Thomas remarked.

"It wasn't her decision," Brandy whispered. "It was Etienne's."

Thomas nodded and began to run his hands over the bricks on the other side of the fireplace.

Nothing. None of them loose. She sighed, frustrated, and started at the top of the fireplace again, rocking each brick back and forth, one hand to either side. Beside her, Thomas began a methodical examination of the brickwork.

When it gave, it was sudden, and threw her slightly off balance; she was grateful that Mr. Thomas had moved the lantern so that her skirt would not brush against it. The brick popped sideways; underneath was a hidden spring. She touched the spring, and a section of the wall slide aside without a sound.

"Ingenious," Mr. Thomas murmured in quiet admiration, but her hands were already inside the cavity in the fireplace.

"Here it is," she whispered, pulling out several leather bags that jingled.

 

* * *

As they watched the carriage pull away, Aristide and Genevieve stood side by side, each lost in thoughts of the English captain.

"I told you killing her would be a terrible waste," Genevieve murmured.

"The woman's touch," he replied, turning to her with a grin. "And wouldn't it be nice to be the filling in that pastry?"

"It looks very much as though I may get a chance to find out," she said with a triumphant laugh that rang out into the night air like the cry of a bird of prey.

"And in the meantime--" he said, gesturing toward the house.

She caught his face in her taloned hands and pulled him close for a ferocious, hungry kiss. "I don't care what you're thinking," she whispered to him fiercely. "Because, you see, I'll be thinking the same thing."

They went up the steps together at a run.

 

* * *

The sleepy-looking man with the hooded eyes applied his keys to the lock, and the bolt slid away with a satisfying solid sound that inspired confidence. Brandy, holding shot-bags filled with money in her arms, tried not to dance with impatience at the delay. She told herself that the captain would wait for her. She had to.

The man gestured to Thomas and Brandy to follow him in, and she moved carefully lest she drop one of the bags.

"Brandy!" cried a young male voice, and she and Thomas turned their heads. Maximilian, Emilie's intended, was loping toward them down the street. Brandy gestured toward the inside, and she and Mr. Thomas got into the counting-house just as the sleepy-looking man lit a lantern and spread a heavy black cloth out on the counter.

Brandy had just put the bags down with relief when Maximilian, all youthful worry and responsibility, skidded through the door. "I've just come from her," he said without preamble. "Did you find it?"

"Yes," Brandy said, rubbing her arms.

"Good," he murmured, his eyes on the pile of bags, and Brandy's heart sank. This was Emilie's dowry, and as such of great interest to Maximilian--and even more, to his father. Well, there goes another dream, like mine of writing...

"She's on her way," Maximilian said to the man from the counting-house, and he nodded, reaching for a ledger. "With the priest," Maximilian added, and Thomas's head went up like a hunting dog's.

The man from the counting-house opened the ledger and picked up one of the bags, loosening the stubborn knot that held the thong around the top.

Brandy stared at Maximilian, appalled. "Tonight? Maximilian, I beg you to reconsider. She's just lost her father, for sweet heaven's sake!"

He shook his head sadly, with a gentle smile. "Father insisted that it be tonight. He says we've waited long enough, and he wants to see grandchildren before he goes the way Etienne did."

"But--but--give her time to mourn him, at least!" Brandy burst out.

Maximilian held up his hands. "You know what he's like when he gets a notion into his head, Brandy."

"He cannot insist that she marry you within six hours of losing Etienne," Brandy said. "That's inhuman!"

"Brandy," Maximilian said in desperation, taking her shoulders. "I promise you I shall love and comfort her. I shan't insist on her becoming my wife before she's had a chance to get over being his daughter. Even if it takes a--a month!"

"Well," Brandy said with heat, "that's a mercy, anyhow. I congratulate you on your gentlemanly restraint, monsieur."

"Brandy, please," he pleaded. "Father is on his way, and he's already in a temper."

The man from the counting-house finished one bag, Thomas watching him closely, and started on the next.

"Your father wants the shop," Brandy said, getting well into a temper of her own. "The shop she and Etienne built. And he wants her engineer's brain. Without having to pay for it."

"Women can't--"

"I am heartsick of hearing what women can and cannot do, Maximilian," she snapped. "Emilie is a natural-born engineer. And it's not as though you have enough gifted engineers in this place that you can afford to turn your geniuses into baby factories."

He drew his hands from her shoulders as if she had suddenly grown venomous fangs. She thought he was probably congratulating himself that his intended was the sweet-tempered girl, rather than the tavern-keeper.

"Brandy," said a low voice, and she turned to see Emilie, dry-eyed and pale, standing in the doorway.

Brandy was at the door instantly, ahead of Maximilian, who hung back, shy and fearful. "I'm sorry, Emilie. How are you?"

"Well," said Emilie in a low voice. "Thank you for getting the bags." Brandy took her hand. She could feel the girl trembling. Well, no wonder. She was to go from being a mourner to a wife in three seconds flat. And lose all her money, and her shop, and her prospects, to boot. Brandy was not far from shaking herself, but it was with fury, not fear.

"Maximilian," Emilie said steadily, and he bowed, the gesture made more striking, if not a little ridiculous, by his height. "I have asked M. de Nicot to witness the papers selling the shop to your father. I have them here, and all he need do is name his price and sign before witnesses."

Maximilian was almost as pale as Emilie, and Brandy kept a hand to her elbow, feeling how delicate her bones were. This girl--this keen mind--nothing, nothing but children and scrubbing? For the rest of her life? And what of the discoveries to be made by lesser minds in her absence? It wasn't fair, not fair to the whole damned race, but especially not fair to the fragile-looking girl trembling beside her.

"He's on his way," Maximilian said in a low voice.

"So are my witnesses," Emilie murmured, turning to Brandy. "Will you be one?"

Brandy's soul twisted within her chest, and she wanted to cry out, "No!" Instead, she swallowed and nodded in agreement.

 

* * *

Giuliana said nothing almost all the way back to the tavern. She stared out the window of the carriage into the darkness, thinking God only knew what, as Mingeaux steamed in silent rage opposite her.

"Santo Domingo," Giuliana said finally, her chin on her fist. She didn't look at Mingeaux. "Is that where you would have gone?"

Mingeaux tried not to sound temperish. "It's a good place to start," she admitted grudgingly.

"Then that's where we're going," Giuliana said, seeming to rouse herself from her reverie. "Tonight."

Mingeaux stared at the unpredictable, infuriating woman, wondering where her steady, reliable captain had got to. "Tonight?" she said stupidly.

"Is the ship ready?" Giuliana asked, and Mingeaux could only nod. "Where will the crew be?" the captain asked.

Mingeaux thought for a moment. "The tavern, probably."

Giuliana nodded with satisfaction and looked out the window again. "We'll collect them there."

Get her into a dress and she gets capricious, just like we were all reputed to do. Damn that Aristide, and damn that Genevieve, and may it soon be time again to clean out the nest of vipers that the French aristocracy represented. "Are you serious?"

"There's no time to lose, Mingeaux," the captain murmured, with as much emotion as if she were announcing that it looked like rain.

The carriage came to a stop outside the tavern, and a small, interested party tumbled down the front steps to watch them alight. The footman opened the door, and Mingeaux got out, holding out a hand to Giuliana. As the captain got out of the carriage, there was a stupefied murmur from the little crowd at the front door, and Mingeaux wanted to kick them into the middle of next month.

DiFalco stood in the middle of the group, stunned. Beside her, another of the sailors from Intrepide stood with his mouth open. "There, but for a wall of glass," he muttered, and Giuliana's gaze shot toward him just as DiFalco cuffed him soundly on the ear.

She was a gunner, and her aim was true, and the man stumbled down the steps. "Shut your yap, dickhead," she told him. "That's the captain you're yammering about." She turned her eyes to Giuliana with a visible effort. "I'll have him flogged, if you like, captain," she offered.

Giuliana waved a long, white hand in dismissal. "Collect the crew. We're sailing."

DiFalco was all instant obedience. "Aye, aye, captain," she said, catching the other crewman's ear in a tight, painful grip. "Give me an hour and you'll be on your way."

Giuliana nodded and went up the steps, and one of the other crew members jumped for the door, opening it. She swept into the tavern like a queen, and Mingeaux murmured something encouraging and exhortative to DiFalco as she passed.

Inside, the talk stopped in an instant. Mistinguette turned from filling a bottle to see why the commotion had ceased. Around her, sailors sat in attitudes of astonishment, cups and cards clutched forgotten in their hands, pipe-smoke swirling around slack-jawed faces. Mistinguette placed her hands on either side of the bar and intoned, "Good evening, captain."

"Good evening, Mam'selle," Giuliana said in the sudden silence. "Is Mam'selle Tavernier here?"

"Had an emergency," Mistinguette said, eyeing the crowd as if daring them to say anything. "She asked you to wait for her."

Only Mingeaux was close enough to see the captain's jaw clench. "When will she return?"

Mistinguette shrugged, looking impatient.

"This way," Mingeaux said hastily, catching Giuliana's elbow and leading her toward the back room. Mistinguette went back to filling the bottle. Mingeaux and Giuliana went into the back room, and Mingeaux shut the door as Giuliana pulled the pins from her hair.

"Will you wait?" Mingeaux asked.

Giuliana shook her head stubbornly and reached for a little knife on the dresser to pop the stitches Brandy had applied so carefully to the bodice of the beautiful dress when she had sewn the captain into it.

"Wait for her," Mingeaux urged, and Giuliana closed her eyes and shook her head again. She pulled the dress over her head. Mingeaux turned her back hastily.

"Why not?" she asked.

A puddle of petticoat slithered to the floor in a soft whisper of fabric. Giuliana reached for her shirt. "There's no time to waste."

From the sounds of things, it was taking a lot less time to get out of the dress than it had to get into it. "So we sail at first light."

"I won't miss Lucia by five minutes," Giuliana said implacably, slipping into her trousers.

"You'll definitely miss Brandy," Mingeaux said.

"Listen to me," Giuliana said, moving around Mingeaux and looking up into her eyes as she buttoned her shirt. "I am here to find Lucia. Now, either that means I locate her in whatever godforsaken hellhole they've got her in, or I find her grave and weep my life out right then and there. But I will not lose time. Not for your daughter. Not for anyone. No matter how important."

Mingeaux clenched her fists. "Break her heart," she growled down at the woman who was only fractionally shorter than she, "and I'll break your neck, captain or no."

Giuliana shook her head impatiently, and Mingeaux could see a long-buried pain deep in her eyes. "I've no intention of breaking her heart, Mingeaux. But we must be off. Now. Instantly. Tonight."

"For God's sake--" Mingeaux began, then sighed with a scowl. "Very well. But for the sake of decency, write her a note."

Giuliana nodded and reached for her boots.

 

* * *

The man at the counting-house wrote out a sum on a slip of paper and handed it to Emilie, who thanked him in a murmur and held it to her chest. She looked around: Thomas stalwart in the corner, Maximilian fidgeting, Maximilian's father leaning on his cane, puffing at his pipe with ferocity, the priest waiting patiently for his part of the ritual, Brandy's eyes glimmering with unshed tears, Jameson firm and upright in the corner, Torres gazing at her in ill-concealed agony.

Emilie walked over to Maximilian, and Brandy tensed. "My dear Maximilian," Emilie said in a whisper. "Forgive me."

His eyes narrowed in confusion as she turned to Jameson. "Have you heard the sum of the money my father had in his fireplace?"

"Yes," Jameson replied, looking at the girl in fascination.

"And the sum Maximilian's father has tendered for the shop and the instruments?"

"Yes," Jameson said.

"And is all of that," Emilie asked, her voice rising clearly for the first time in hours, "sufficient to buy a berth aboard Discovery?"

Jameson drew a lungful of air as Torres's face split in a grin.

Maximilian's father struck the floor with the tip of his cane. "What nonsense is this, girl? You cannot sail with these people!"

"Under maritime law--" Jameson began.

"To hell with maritime law," Maximilian's father interrupted. "This girl is going to marry my son."

"Under maritime law," Jameson went on, taking a step toward Maximilian's father, "Emilie does indeed have the right to request a berth aboard Discovery. And I have the right, as commander of Discovery, to consider it." She turned to Emilie. "The answer is yes."

Brandy's knees went weak with relief.

"Men," sputtered Maximilian's father, puffing out livid clouds of smoke. "Men have these rights. Women have no rights in these matters."

"According to the decision that resulted in the hanging of Maribel Hamilton for piracy seventy-three years ago," Thomas pointed out, "maritime law applies equally in these islands, regardless of sex."

"This is horseshit," Maximilian's father protested. "She's a woman!"

"And a remarkable one," Jameson said softly, putting a gentle hand to the girl's chin. Emilie lifted steady, dry eyes to Jameson's, and Jameson could feel the relief flooding her heart.

Maximilian's father was still blustering. "The question is--"

"The question is, monsieur," Torres interrupted, "whether you wish to have your interference with a ship under British protectorate come before the magistrate as a matter of law."

"Torres," Jameson said in warning, and Torres ducked her head in apology.

"I think," Jameson said, "that it's high time we got our newest crew member back to Discovery."

 

* * *

Brandy flew in the door of the "Bonny Anne" just as the last few stragglers were collecting their hats, none too steadily. She made her way around them, calling to Mistinguette, "Is she here?"

Mistinguette had an uncharacteristically sober look on her face. "Brandy," she said quietly, "Intrepide is under sail. They've gone. She left you this."

Stupidly, Brandy held out her hand, and Mistinguette put a little wooden casket and two letters into it.

She was on the road before she quite realized it, running toward the harbor as fast as her feet would take her, out of breath and disheveled after only a few minutes. A few minutes was all it took, it seemed, for the ship to sail, taking her heart with it forever.

As she got halfway to the dock, she stared out far into the moonlit water, where a couple of silvery-blue sails showed her the position of Intrepide. She stumbled her way to the watch lantern and pulled up the slide, opening the letter with her name in the Englishwoman's writing on the front.

Mademoiselle Tavernier, she read, when this reaches you we shall be far from you, and not by my choice. I have received information about my sister's whereabouts that I must act on immediately. It may be that I shall not return, but please know that I have very much enjoyed our brief acquaintance and appreciate all of your assistance in my attempt to find my sister. There is much in my heart that does not belong on paper, were there a way to express it, and so I shall pray that it pleases God to bring me within sight of your face again some day, when I hope I may be able to speak to you seriously. In the meantime, perhaps this little token will go a bit of the way toward reminding you of the admiration and friendship of

Giuliana Carlisle
Intrepide

Stunned, she turned the wooden box this way and that, looking at it in the light of the lantern. She looked out to sea again, where the sails of the pretty yacht glimmered in the moonlight, impossibly close, impossibly far.

She remembered the other letter, which bore Mingeaux's well-known handwriting. Brandy, it said, this idiot is almost as stubborn as your mother. There's no time to tell you everything. But I promise I shall bring her back to you, and she'll be alive, too, because by God no one is getting the pleasure of killing her save the two of us. My pride and love for you are immense. Mingeaux. P.S. I should wear her token, irritating though she is.

She looked down at the box, which had an intricate carving that she recognized as the initials of the blue-eyed demon. She worked to open it, fingers slipping in the sweat her hands had left on the wood, and eventually it popped open.

Inside was a spill of liquid moonlight, and she gasped softly at it, running her fingers over the surface. A chain. A silver chain, heavy and intricate, its pattern impenetrable in the uncertain, flaring light of the lantern. She ran her hands over it, already familiar, that maddening sense of almost-known that surrounded the captain like a cloud. She pulled it free of the catches in the box and held it up in the moonlight. Depending from the chain was a round locket with the captain's initials, GC, engraved on it. Spanish silver, from the rich look of it, wrought by a master. Wherever had the captain found it? And why had she left it?

For me. For me alone, she thought, and she stared unseeing out at the moonlit canvas that carried her heart's blood away from her, reaching up, as if in a dream, to buckle the heavy chain around her neck,. Half-aware, she ran her fingers slowly down the length of silver to grasp the locket in her hand, comforting in a way that no crucifix had ever been. She knew even then that only death would get it off her.

"Forever and ever, unto eternity," she whispered, staring out to sea.