Chapter Thirty

“The Narrow Escape”

1.

They pushed in through the airlock door and onto the deck of Esmeralda, pulling off their helmets and gulping the air.

“Made it,” Fullbright grunted.

“Barely,” Holmes said. He was red-cheeked and drenched in sweat.

“Damned fine idea, Stone,” Fullbright said. “You’ve saved us.”

“I’m just glad it’s capable of retaining an atmosphere,” Nathanial said. “I’m afraid it won’t be good for much else.”

“It’ll serve our purposes,” Fullbright said.

Provost stood and dusted himself off. He pushed off from the entry platform onto the main deck and floated over to the viewport. He peered outside. “What now?” he asked.

“We wait a while and think,” Nathanial said.

Fullbright heaved himself to his feet. “All we’ve had is a secondary boiler to power the greenhouse. I’ll go stoke the main generators.”

“Excellent idea, Fullbright,” Holmes said. “I’ll see to galley. A nice cup of tea would settle our nerves.”

Nathanial went to stand with Provost near the window. He sat on the window seat and thought about Dolan. Had the man ever bothered to search for Annabelle, he thought, or had he something to do with her disappearance? He’d been hesitant to check the air ducts. Perhaps she was there. Alive or dead, Nathanial was going to find her. Now that the stabilisers were repaired, Peregrine could correct its course. The loss of Greenhouse Two would still force a partial evacuation, but that could be done in an orderly fashion. At any rate, Fullbright and the others could handle station operations. His work was done where the station was concerned.

“Do we have candles?” Provost asked suddenly.

Nathanial looked up. The botanist was staring upward toward Sunward Observation. Nathanial gestured about the room. The place was still more or less as they had left it, nearly two weeks before. Candles were everywhere. Provost hadn’t noticed them. “Yes. We’ve plenty of them, Uriah.”

“Good. I was thinking we might use your heliograph to flash Sunward Observation. What do you think?”

“That’s a capital idea!”

“I thought so. The flyer is too large to enter the docking bay, but I’m sure they could send out men with fresh oxygen tanks to get us inside.”

The men organised and drank their tea. A little respite was needed, following their harrowing journey across the station’s underside, but they could not wait long. Dolan was still on the loose, and he’d had half an hour at least to do whatever he had planned, whether it was seize control of the station for himself, free van den Bosch and Hague, or something else.

“I’ll have him in shackles,” Fullbright said. “The drunken fool! No doubt he’s working for van den Bosch, even now!”

“How could he try and murder us?” Holmes said. “What game is he at, do you think, and who does he work for?”

“It’s van den Bosch, I tell you!” Fullbright said.

“I’m not so certain of that, Fullbright,” Nathanial replied. Briefly he told them what he knew about the stabiliser mystery, about van den Bosch and Le Boeuf, Torquilstone, and Professor Wren’s death. Provost and Holmes were stunned to hear that such a struggle had been going on, under everyone’s noses, for several months. Years, if one counted the time before Peregrine Station was constructed in the aether.

“So that’s why we were in Hell the day of the explosion in the greenhouse,” Provost said. “You never really explained.” Nathanial thought he saw a look of relief flash behind the botanist’s eyes, as if to say he understood now that he was not merely larking about that day but working toward a key point in the mystery.

“And you believe Dolan could be working for Le Boeuf?” Fullbright asked.

“It’s possible,” Nathanial said. “I’ve been thinking about the entries in Wren’s journal. He says that Le Boeuf and his assistant, a fellow named Brennan, were smuggled aboard after the last resupply ship left. The timeline shows that they arrived before the station had been pressurised. As you know, the threatening notes began arriving around this time. I believe the notes were from Brennan, just as I believe it was Brennan who was causing the havoc aboard the station. I don’t believe it was part of Le Boeuf’s plan, and he killed Brennan before the man could cause any more destruction. Or, before we captured him.

“Now, someone had to have smuggled these two aboard, initially. True, Professor Wren might have done so, but it’s doubtful he could do it alone. He would need help. I say this could be Dolan, who, like Le Boeuf, has proven he’s willing to kill.”

“Yes, but towards what ends?”

“Torquilstone, of course. I don’t believe van den Bosch when he says Le Boeuf is here to destroy him. I believe Le Boeuf needed to be near the aether for some reason to perfect his machine, a machine that could have limitless possibilities. If Dolan is in league with him, they may have wanted us dead. Fullbright and I knew about Torquilstone, after all, and once we had found and repaired the stabilisers, it was safer for them that we die.”

“Then by what you’re saying, we won’t face Dolan at all when we return to Peregrine,” Provost said. He went to the heliograph, lit two candles and slid them into the cabinet below the mirror. Here, a series of mirrors would reflect the candlelight onto the heliograph when its shutters were opened. “In fact, it’s likely we’ll face the opposite. His compatriots have shown a willingness and ability to disappear into the woodworks like termites. It’s likely Dolan will do the same.”

Fullbright spat a curse. “I knew from the start the man was trouble.”

2.

They roused Esmeralda and took her upwards to the very end of her tether. Fullbright flashed a brief message to Sunward Operations three times before someone finally noticed. A moment of silence ensued while a makeshift heliograph was assembled, one that tapped out a message that help was coming.

Two men were sent out to determine the problem. Sunward had mistakenly believed workers repairing Annabelle’s flyer had run into a problem. When the men arrived, they were surprised to find Nathanial and the others on their second cup of tea, embroiled in an animated debate over the practical applications of Babbage’s analytic engine. Four fresh air tanks were fetched, and everyone returned to Peregrine Station, Nathanial and the others tense and ready to begin the monumental task ahead of them.

Holmes suggested they arrange the memorial service immediately, declaring that a “couple of bad seeds shouldn’t deter us from doing what is right”, to be followed by the partial evacuation. His logic was clear. By winnowing the workers to manageable levels, they could address the subject of oxygen supplies, send emissaries to Mars for supplies and to inform British interests there of what was transpiring so it could be transmitted to Earth, and to send more to help locate Le Boeuf and Dolan.

Fullbright returned to Sunward Observation to order Operations to fire the stabilisers at once. Word of his doing so circulated among the workers, and they gathered in the basilica to listen with excitement to the good news. Cheers rose up among them as it was explained the nightmare was over.

Dolan’s betrayal was not mentioned. As he was popular among the workers, it was considered best to leave him out of all mentions of their success outside Peregrine, lest some of the men become upset. Nathanial added that there might be men on the security staff more loyal to the Irishman than to the whole of Peregrine. If that was the case, it would be imprudent to mention his crimes, especially when those same men would be armed and potentially dangerous. Instead, Provost announced after news of the stabilisers that they were disassembling their security staff temporarily, and that the men should return their rifles to the armoury until further notice. Some showed confusion at this, but Provost explained that all would be made clear later.

Nathanial pushed through the crowd and went to Annabelle’s quarters. He could find no sign that she had been there recently, but he had not expected it. Instead, he searched her belongings, hoping to find one of her weapons. The contents of her steamer trunk were in disarray, as if someone had gone through it recently. Nathanial wondered who might have been here. Hague, probably, or could it have been Dolan?

Under Annabelle’s cot he found her Bowie knife still in its sheathe. He hefted it, amazed at how heavy it was. This was hardly the weapon for a woman, he thought. The blade was eight inches long and an inch-and-a-half thick. Its edge, he knew, was kept razor sharp. He had hoped for her derringer, but this would have to do. He knew very little about the use of such a weapon, but he felt if he could get close enough the damage he could do with it, even being an amateur knife-fighter, could be significant.

Nathanial left Annabelle’s quarters. He looked about. The main corridor between Austrian and British was deserted. The station was the most quiet he had seen it since his arrival. The men must be down in the dormitories, preparing themselves for the memorial. Annabelle was supposed to meet Dolan at the quartermaster, according to van den Bosch the day he confronted Annabelle in sickbay. He should check there first. Perhaps he could find some clue as to where she went. Perhaps it would also provide a place for him to enter the air ducts so he might begin his search. Now was the time to end this.

3.

The station hummed as the stabilisers fired. Fullbright was correcting course. Good. Nathanial decided to return to his quarters before going to the quartermaster. He had an oil lamp there and could use the station’s blueprints as well to find his way about. He had nothing that illustrated the ductwork, but he could make assumptions as to where he was and what he was likely to see based on the station drawings themselves.

At his door panel Nathanial slid his fingers into the skull’s eye sockets and pressed the latch. The door clacked, and slid to the side.

Nathanial’s breath caught in his throat.

“Hello, Nathanial,” Annabelle said.