Chapter Seventeen
The next morning my attendant finished aiding me in my ablutions. As I gloomily contemplated another day of inactivity I looked up to find Kera at my window. “Doctor Twist and Mr. Ferrars have returned to London,” she informed me, offering a plate of Vanya’s latest creations. “The raid on the opium den yielded no less than forty young people, but they cannot tell whether Tatiana is among them. We are told they are in shock, or still drugged and an identification must be made. I wanted to go, but at the same time I knew that I have not earned everyone’s trust. Besides I did not wish to leave you.”
I covered my embarrassment by reaching for a bread ball. Kera captured my hand and kissed all my fingers. “At last you are beginning to look well again,” she said, set the dish on the windowsill, and fled.
Doctor Mac entered through the door this time and set about examining my wound. “You’re a faster healer than I imagined, Florrie,” he grinned. “Let’s have you up and slowly, carefully, walking around a little bit.”
Lanton returned to help me dress. I leaned on his arm and stepped through the French doors into the garden, right into the middle of the daily lesson by Madame Rose Campbell.
“I beg your pardon,” I murmured.
“Look, Prince Charming has emerged from his prison!” The irrepressible Madame Rose cried, clapping her hands. Dulcy awkwardly struck her good and withered hands together and the other children cheered and tossed tufts of grass and sticks my way, with the best of intentions celebrating my release. I could not resist smiling when Kera tossed a small wildflower my way. I caught it and tucked it into my buttonhole.
“Come and join our lesson,” Madame Rose invited.
“I pray you to excuse me this time,” I demurred. “I must walk out some of this stiffness if I am ever to walk again. Later, perhaps, I shall return.”
“Then you are excused,” Rose beamed. “But not the rest of you,” she said with mock severity to the children. “Back to the lesson, which is Rahab the Harlot.”
Instead of hobbling off, I froze, incredulous that Mrs. Campbell would share such a topic with children, and that she would be so insensitive to Kera’s past. I managed to get myself moving again but took my walk skulking behind the trees and hedges that were near enough for me to still hear. Rose brought out all the mentions of Rahab in the Bible and I realized I had entirely missed the rich blessing of this woman’s life. In the back of my mind I had known that she not only had hid the spies but also had been accepted into the community of Israel.
That she was in the line of Christ I had entirely forgotten. That she was an example of faith I had also let slip from my mind. So little was said about her harlotry and so much about how God had blessed and used her that I finally stopped hiding and squatted down among the children to hear the lesson to its end. I glanced at Kera on the other side of the collection of pupils and saw her rapt attention.
“Your highness, could I trouble you to close us in prayer?” Madame Rose asked. I hesitated only a moment.
“Heavenly Father, thank You for the examples of faith and forgiveness we find in Your Word. And thank You that You offer forgiveness to us, and teach us faith as well. Our faith is so small, and our gratitude so small, for all Your blessings. Amen.”
It took several of the boys along with my attendant to get me back up on my feet. Kera’s eyes went to my improvised boutonniere and she smiled. I presented her with a tiny nosegay in return and she smiled wider. I was not surprised to find a salamander in my watch pocket and spotted Sararati grinning behind his hand.
Luncheon with the crowd of children was a chaotic but enjoyable affair. Afterward I took a longer walk and was delighted to find myself pain-free and much less stiff. Doctor Mac joined him near the south wall surrounding the estate.
“I’ve lost another patient, I see,” he said good-naturedly. “You’re the only one I can even catch up to today. Archie headed back to London to answer the call of the Phoebe-Bird with Twisty and Edward. Kera is taking Rosie’s place in the daily game-time since she’s closeted in her study doing the accounting for taking care of the rescued young’uns. We’ll try to find their real families or homes if possible but sadly not all of them have an anxious parent waiting for their return like Tatiana.”
“I should have gone back to London with the others,” I fretted. “I need to know what’s happening with Trevor.”
“As Twist said, Tod enjoys flitting back and forth, apparently. I expect they will identify Tatiana and send her out here, and then you can hitch a ride back. If she’s not seriously in need of medical attention, Rosie and I are thinking of slipping out quietly and getting back on our way to the States, if you folk can stop hurting yourselves for a little while.”
“I feel as if we shall lose a valued member of our company when you do,” I smiled. “Pardon. Two valued members.”
“We’d rather just pay the bills,” Mac grunted. “Rosie’s getting so wrought up about the danger to all of you. It’s easier to be detached from a greater distance. At least I hope it’ll be easier.”
“Doctor Campbell -- Prince Florizel!” Lanton had moved some distance off to allow us privacy, but he sprang out of a nearby grove of trees and hissed a warning. “Please, come with me, quickly. We believe the estate is about to be attacked.”
The two of us hurried after him without a moment’s hesitation. We saw Kera and the children being herded inside by others of the security force, guns drawn and eyes wary. Everyone rushed inside and down into the storm shelter basement. Everyone, I realized to my horror, consisted of a gaggle of children ages twelve and under, Kera and Rose Campbell and the nursemaids and real servants. Pecos Bill, carried downstairs in his chair by two stout members of the security team, one elderly gardener and one young boy made up the only other males besides Uncle Vanya, myself and Doctor Mac. True, the members of the security force were able-bodied but I still felt very unprepared for an attack.
“You can shoot, can’t you, Florrie?” Kera thrust a pistol into my hand. “What about you, Doctor Campbell? Here, I only have two.” She held one out to Doctor Mac, who took it and checked the loading with a glance at his startled wife. I suddenly recalled that when Kera was still Visha Kanya she had left the hotel penthouse fully armed, and that she had come straight to the country from Uncle Vanya’s. She had already strapped on her Khanda sword and was fastening her gauntlet knife sheaths in place. They looked very odd with her simple yellow country gown.
“Not feeling quite so vulnerable now, are you, Florrie?” Kera smiled. That dichotomy of personality I had observed in her was back in full force. She was again the confident, rather careless creature I had been so baffled by. Still, I could not deny that it was good to be armed, and to have at least three people capable of putting up a fight down here among these women and children.
Faints sounds that were clearly gunfire popped above us and the maidservants erupted in a pandemonium of screaming and running around the close confines of our hiding place.
“Stop that at once!” Madame Rose snapped. “Unless they drop a bomb on the house we are safe enough. Even at that there is nothing to be gained by acting this way.”
The maids stopped and stared at tiny Rose as if wondering where that commanding voice came from.
“Keep silent,” Kera added sternly. “It is the only way we will have any idea what is happening and keep from being found if enemies make it into the house.”
The maids huddled in a whimpering knot away from Kera and her sword. Everyone listened to the commotion outside but some of the noises we could not even identify.
I found a narrow window set into the wall of the basement near the ceiling. A scrap of sky was all I could see but I started back when a shadow passed overhead.
“Has the airship returned?” Doctor Mac joined me.
“Oh no!” Rose exclaimed. “They will have no warning.”
“No, it’s not Twist’s ship,” Doctor Mac insisted. “It’s something smal
ler and it’s whizzing about like a dragonfly. How strange. Sometimes it seems as if I can’t see it at all. Look, Florizel, it’s got a man hanging underneath it.”
“It is a powered glider. I believe it is some sort of spy ship,” I ventured. “Perhaps it did not come to attack but just to look for signs of us, and did not think anyone would detect it. See, it is colored to blend with the sky.”
“I hope they shoot it down,” Kera murmured. “Dodge must not learn about all these innocents here.”
“It is evading the shots,” I reported. “Climbing higher, out of firing range.”
“But it’s not going away, Mac growled. “Has it got weapons, do you think? I see no evidence that it can shoot at our protectors. And it’s surely too light to carry a bomb of any size.”
The security team had stopped firing and were apparently trying to decide how to drive the spycraft away. Suddenly I saw Twist’s airship approaching in the distance.
“Now the airship is indeed coming. We must get rid of that thing,” I gritted. “It may attack Tod.” Kera and I reached the basement steps at the same time.
“I think I know what to do.” Kera put a hand on my arm. “We must get up on the roof.”
“Surely the security team has people up there already, trying to shoot it down. I know some of them have rifles.”
“I’m not going to shoot at it,” Kera responded. “I’m just going to distract it, to give Tod a chance to see it so he can defend the airship or take the spyship out if he is able to.”
I followed Kera up at a mad dash as she tucked her skirts up into her belt. Two or three security people let us pass with puzzled looks. Up and up we went until we were in the rafters above the attic.
“I hoped there was a trap door up to the roof,” Kera panted. “How are you, Florrie? Side bothering you at all?”
“Not so far.” We pulled down a thin service ladder and pushed open the roof trap door. I boosted Kera out and then followed her. The slender spycraft, we saw, was not painted blue, but had a strange, flickering surface that actually mimicked the sky and clouds, changing chameleon-like with every movement and frequently becoming disturbingly invisible.
“Where is it?” I demanded.
“Doesn’t matter, Florrie. Stand up straight, wave your arms and yell something. Dance up and down. Do anything you can to get his attention. He mustn’t notice the airship approaching. Hey! Hey! Over here, you drunken idiot! Don’t you know how to fly at all?”
Kera shouted and flapped her shawl like a signal flag. I saw a flicker and the spy-craft reappeared for an instant, dipping its long, gossamer wings lower and turning in our direction.
“Miss, what are you doing?” demanded one of the security guards, coming around a gable with a rifle in her hands. “Prince Florizel, please, won’t you take her back inside?”
“We can’t let it go after the airship,” I explained. “We have to lure it over this way and keep it busy.”
“Oh, I see,” the guard nodded. “Hey, you!” She added her voice. “Catch me if you can! Nah-nah-nah-nah-nah-nah!” She stuck her fingers in her ears and wiggled her hands.
I brandished my coat at the flier and it came even closer. Meanwhile Todd had begun his landing in the field just inside the west wall. We distracters on the roof screamed and jumped and kept the attention of the spy ship. I postulated that it was not quite close enough to make a certain identification of any of us, which, no doubt was its real assignment, but dared not get close enough to be shot at. We could still only intermittently see the thing, though it seemed to have a transparent fuselage above the pilot’s back filled with clockwork gears turning a rotor in the back. I doubted Tod had any idea it was there.
Suddenly the thing banked and flitted away from the roof. The guard with us got off a few hopeless shots and others on the ground fired into the sky as well, because it was clear now that the pilot of the spy craft had spotted the airship and was making a run toward it.
Some sort of disk-like objects erupted from the shimmer that was the spy ship. “They are like throwing discs,” Kera gasped. “If they hit the airship they will puncture the skin.”
“Is it really just a balloon?” I stared in frustration.
“I talked to that Tod fellow a little about it,” the guard volunteered. “It has a lot of chambers that the steam keeps filled up. Quite a few of them would have to be broken open but I should think a spinning disk with a sharp edge is just the tool to skim across the surface and do it a mischief.”
“How can we stop it?” I cried. “Look, I think Tod has seen it. He’s trying an evasive maneuver.”
Instead of continuing down, Twist’s airship veered to one side. A flicker of cloudy blue revealed the spycraft glancing off while discharging more disks.
“The airship’s taken a hit!” Kera pointed. Steam erupted from the port side of the airship and we could see Tod struggling to control the vessel. It yawed, labored into a half-turn, and floated, listing badly, right toward the house.
“It’s coming this way! He can’t control it!” The guard fired again at the spy craft but missed. The airship half-turned again and the steam leak seemed to be lessening. Tod clamored over the leather skin and threw his flight jacket into a hole, stuffing it and gaining some altitude.
“There it comes again!” The spy ship attacked with a half-dozen disks. Again Twist’s ship sank and lurched crazily in the sky, only a few hundred feet from the house. But as Tod spun it around it struck the spy craft and knocked it downward. The thing nose-dived. The guard with us on the roof shot her rifle at it and all of us heard a ping and saw the small ship pitch sideways.
“Hit it again! Hurry!” I shouted. But the woman found her gun was empty. Rapidly she reloaded the weapon. The airship was descending again. Steam burst from half a dozen holes and we saw that Tod could not get it aloft. The damaged spy ship still had more maneuverability but they were both coming too close to the house.
“He’s going to ram Twist’s ship,” Kera breathed. “They’ll both crash into the house and Mrs. Rose just might have her bomb going off.”
I ran along the edge of the roof as if I were looking for a shot. But I already knew my pistol was empty, useless, and the guard was trying to get around another gable to get a clear shot while staying behind cover. I had come to a conclusion a moment earlier that I dared not say out loud lest I be grabbed and thrown down on the roof by both women, but I knew what I had to do.
Just as the spy craft hove around the corner of the house, only a few feet away from the airship, I launched myself off the roof. The smaller ship disappeared and my heart leaped in panic at the thought of being sliced into quarters by the tail rotor. But my fingertips caught hold of a solid object. I found the fuselage of the spy ship and wrapped my legs around it. The thing slewed and spun and began to fall tail-first toward the green lawn.