Starcross (28 page)

‘But why choose the
Sophronia
?’ I demanded. ‘Of all the aether-ships they could have loaded those hatboxes aboard, why her? It’s awfully rotten luck, isn’t it?’

‘She is the only ship they know,’ said Delphine, turning her blank face to us. ‘Remember, they have ate the thoughts of Munkulus and Grindle and the crab, Nipper. That is how
they knew where your
Sophronia
was moored, and that is why they chose her to take them to England. For I am sure you are right, Jack; those Moobs are bound for London town.’

‘Not if I have anything to do with it!’ declared Jack, reaching for his sword, but Delphine held him back.

‘Not here!’ she said. ‘There are many, many Moobs in those white boxes. If you attempt to rush the ship, they will catch us all.’

‘Then where?’ demanded Jack, looking fiercely into Delphine’s eyes, and then recalling that it was not she to whom he spoke, and glaring at her hat instead. ‘Those are my crew! My friends! I have to save them!’

‘We must fetch help!’ exclaimed Myrtle.

But we were too late. The last of the hatboxes had been loaded aboard, and the song of the
Sophronia
’s engines was gathering strength. I saw Yarg and Squidley heave the cargo hatch closed, and the cart horses in the traces of the wagon tossed their heads restlessly as the old ship started to tremble and rise skyward.

Jack stared, and scowled, and said something which made Myrtle go, ‘
Jack! Language! Please!
’

The
Sophronia
lifted into the sky, and the curtains of the fog swayed and stirred in the wind from her flapping wings,
while her engines trilled like some other-worldly choir.

‘’Erbert!’ wailed Mrs Spinnaker. ‘They’ve gone off with my ’Erbert again!’

Jack, looking grim yet resolute, said, ‘Mrs Spinnaker, you must go directly to the authorities, and tell them what has been happening. Take care to trust no gentleman wearing a top hat.’

‘If he is a
real
gentleman,’ my sister said, ‘he will remove his hat in Mrs Spinnaker’s presence, and then she will know it is not a Moob. But, Jack, would it not be better if we all went together to the authorities?’

Jack shook his head. ‘No time. We’re going back to the
Liberty
to chase those thieving Moobs and tackle ’em upon the open aether!’

‘But, Jack, how can we?’ I complained, hurrying behind him with the others as he started running back across the harbour towards the
Liberty
’s berth. ‘If we go aboard the
Sophronia
those Moobs will leap upon us and take control of our thoughts!’

Myrtle, agreeing with me for once, said, ‘I for one do not relish the prospect of being a mindless slave for evermore, let alone a mindless slave who wears a gentleman’s top hat with a bathing costume!’

Jack stopped and turned and stared at her. I thought for a moment that he had finally seen sense and realised what a ghastly blister she was, such was the look of dawning revelation that broke across his features. But he said, ‘You’re right, Myrtle,’ and then, turning to the Threls in their disguise, ‘How much wool do you fellows have about you?’

Mrs Grinder’s head vanished inside her poke bonnet and a great deal of muttering came from within her black bombazine bosom as her various portions debated among themselves. Then her head reappeared and said, ‘About four balls each, we reckon, plus Corporal Boke’s swiped a couple of lovely jumpers we can unpick.’

‘That should be enough!’ cried Jack.

‘Enough for what?’ asked Delphine’s Moob, and I should dearly have loved to hear Jack’s answer, but he was already haring away through the fog towards the
Liberty
and calling out for the rest of us not to dally.

We parted from Mrs Spinnaker at the foot of the
Liberty
’s gangplank, where the dockhands, still quite overwhelmed at finding the Cockney Nightingale in their midst, vowed to take her post-haste to the Governor. Ten minutes more
found us soaring into the aether once again.

I had been afraid that even ten minutes would give the
Sophronia
time enough to escape, but the approaches to Modesty and Decorum are treacherous, and there is really only one channel between the various asteroidal shoals and reefs. It is marked out with buoys, whose gas lamps gleam in the dark like a road of lights, and far ahead of us along that road we could see the
Sophronia
’s stern-lanterns twinkling as she sped towards open space.

Not that I had very much time to keep a lookout. Myrtle and I were forced to work hard, jumping to obey Jack’s orders whenever he needed something done. For the Threls who had helped him work the ship before were now all busy, sitting cross-legged in a circle in mid-air and knitting for all they were worth. Honestly, to see the way their needles flashed, you would think they could have finished their World Cosy long ago and knitted nice scarves and mufflers for half the other worlds as well.

And all around us, quite drowning out the clickety-click of the speeding needles, the
Liberty
’s engines sang their strange song, and the old ship’s timbers creaked and grumbled as she drove swiftly onward through the aether. But not swiftly enough! Jack left me at the helm and
scrambled aloft with his perspective-glass, returning a few moments later with a worried look upon his face. ‘We need more power,’ he confided. ‘The
Sophronia
will be out in open aether soon, and riding the Golden Roads, and if we can’t follow her there, we’re lost.’

He shouted down the speaking tube for the Moob, and after a few moments more it popped up the wedding chamber companionway on top of Delphine’s head.

‘I’m sorry, Jack,’ it said, through Delphine’s mouth. ‘I cannot go faster. I have done my best, but perhaps I did not learn Alchemy as well from Will Melville’s thoughts as I believed. Perhaps there is something he kept hidden from me, or something that he himself did not know.’

Jack pondered upon this, setting one hand against the
Liberty
’s timbers to gauge the vibrations from the alembic. ‘We were going faster before,’ he said, ‘when Myrtle was running things down there.’

My sister looked thoroughly pleased with herself, and then suddenly alarmed, as she realised the meaning behind Jack’s words. ‘Oh, Jack,’ she declared, ‘you must not expect me to let that thing squat upon my head again! I have already told you that I think it most improper!’

‘You think
everything
most improper,’ Jack told her. ‘But
the fact is, there was some truth in what Delphine said, wasn’t there? You’ve got a talent for Alchemy that Delphine ain’t, and the Moob used it somehow. Between you, you’ll get enough speed out of this poor old tub that we’ll catch up with the
Sophronia
in no time.’ He pushed himself away from the helm and flew to where Myrtle was floating, taking both her hands in his. ‘Please, Myrtle. For me.’

I could tell that Myrtle was moved by his plaintive yet manly appeal, for she turned an entertaining colour and her spectacles grew misty. ‘Oh, Jack,’ she said. ‘Oh, oh,
very well
. But I must insist that the Moob turns itself into some more ladylike item of apparel.’

The Moob on Delphine’s head bowed, and then seemed to melt and spread, becoming a sort of wide-brimmed sunhat, then a smoking cap, and at last turning itself into a very passable bonnet, decorated with black flowers. It left Delphine (who tottered sideways with a most comical expression of perplexity as her thoughts became her own once more) and sailed
through the air to settle upon Myrtle’s head. ‘Oh!’ said Myrtle, and then Moobishness overcame her and her eyes turned blank and glassy.
²⁵

‘Do her no harm, you hear me?’ Jack told the Moob-bonnet.

‘I will not,’ it replied through Myrtle’s lips, and she turned about and swam deftly to the companionway, and down it into the wedding chamber.

‘Whatever is going on?’ asked Delphine, one hand to her brow, staring about in confusion. ‘Where are we? What is Myrtle doing? Why are you all knitting?’

‘Part of the plan, Miss Beauregard,’ replied Sergeant Tartuffe, not even troubling to glance at her. ‘Now keep quiet, if you would; you’ll make us drop a stitch.’

‘What plan?’ demanded Delphine angrily. ‘Whose plan? Sergeant, put down those knitting needles and take up your gun! You are a soldier of France!’

‘
My
plan,’ said Jack Havock, fixing her with his coldest stare. ‘I’m captain of this ship now, and the Threls have agreed to take my orders till the menace of the Moobs is dealt with. And you’ll do as I say, too, or be confined.’

I clutched the cutlass Jack had issued me back on
Modesty and tried to look as though I wouldn’t mind using it should Delphine prove argumentative. But Delphine seemed to know when she was beaten, and she asked for nothing more than a quick account of what had happened. I told her about the goings-on at Starcross, and the Shaper engine which Sir Launcelot had caused to be set up beneath his hotel, and I am pleased to say that she looked quite green as she realised that there had been a far greater prize than her wormy old
Liberty
, and that it had been right under her nose all this time!

Then, while Jack recounted the things which had just occurred at Modesty, I crept down the companionway and peeked into the wedding chamber. I was rewarded with the surprising sight of Myrtle mixing powders and potions and stuffing them inside the alembic as confidently as any alchemist.

Hearing me, she looked up from her work, and said, ‘Your friend Jack was right. Myrtle’s mind is so much more attuned to the currents of the aether and the laws of Alchemy than the other young lady’s. Finding the right proportions and ingredients is as easy as pie when I am sat upon her head.’

I was not sure quite how to respond. I am well-used to
hearing Myrtle talk through her hat, but it was somewhat unsettling to hear a hat talking through her. I mumbled some pleasantry, and went back above, where the Threls’ knitting flapped like woolly flags all across the cabin.

‘How’s it coming?’ Jack demanded.

‘Nearly out of wool,’ said Sergeant Tartuffe regretfully, holding up the loose scarf-like garment he had knitted. ‘The colours ain’t very nice, and I should have liked to put in a spot of cable-stitch, or some pom-poms to liven it up …’

‘It will serve its purpose something admirable,’ said Jack, and, without waiting for the Threl to ‘cast-off ’, he took the item and wrapped it around and around his own head to form a huge woolly turban, which he used the knitting needles to pin in place. A decorative flap or panel hung from the back of the garment, and tied about his neck.

‘I should like to see the Moob that can control my mind through all this,’ he vowed, and the rest of us began to fashion turbans of our own.