Under Her Brass Corset (11 page)

Giant tentacles of a sea creature slapped down hard over the bulkhead and onto the deck. One tentacle flopped back and forth near Jasper while a second coiled around the rigging and yet another crept toward her.

“Move,” Jasper yelled, struggling to get his breeches back up his legs from around his ankles.

“What is it?” She backed away, but the thick, slimy gray tentacle followed.

“An octopus, and by the size of it, I’d guess it’s the reason for lost ships in this area.”

She bent slowly in preparation to defend herself against the monster and reached for the knife in her boot. Her fingers touched her bare leg, and she realized she wasn’t wearing her boots. She had no weapon.

Jasper grabbed her by the arm and pulled her toward the mainsail’s engine. “One of us needs to go below and add fuel to make steam.”

“You said we’re all out of wood and coal,” she reminded him.

“Coal, yes. But the whole damn ship and practically everything on it is made of wood. Break up some furniture and feed the pieces into the boiler.”

“But I wouldn’t know what was important to you.”

“There’s only one thing on this ship I can’t replace. Now go.” He pushed her toward the doorway leading down to the cabin with the furnace.

“What if I can’t break anything small enough? I don’t know how your furnace works. You go.”

“I have to open the sails as soon as the steam pressure rises enough.” He looked up at the creature’s tentacle moving higher on the mast. “He’s going to turn us over.”

Abigail glanced at the handles on the machine. She had turned both; it wasn’t that hard. “The big handle or the little one?” she asked.

“You’re not staying up here,” he said, grabbing his boots and tugging them on quickly.

“It’s the practical thing to do. You know how to make the steam. I don’t. Oops!” The ship rocked her off balance and she fell against Jasper. “I have managed to operate both gears on the sails. Now, is it the little handle or the big one? Or would you rather we argue this out a little longer?”

Jasper hissed a reluctant sound. “The big one.”

“Oh, why did I know you were going to say that?” She sighed. “Everything always has to be the difficult way.”

She marched toward the contraption of cogs and wheels.

“There’s a pressure gauge on the engine,” Jasper yelled from the doorway leading below.

“I saw it before,” she told him.

“Start cranking as hard as you can until it reaches the red line. Don’t worry. If the sail snaps open fast and hard enough, we should be able to break his hold on us. Are you sure you want to stay up here? Maybe you could—”

“Please hurry, Jasper.” She shoved him to go.

While he broke chairs and crates below, she danced around the tentacles slithering in all directions feeling around for her, she assumed.

“Hurry up down there,” she yelled, trying to crank the handle a little to test her strength.

She watched the octopus but kept glancing at the gauge, waiting for the needle to rise.

Come on, Jasper.
She found herself praying.

Once the needle on the gauge began to rise, it quickly moved to the red line.
Just go up.
She grabbed the handle and put all her strength into cranking.

As Jasper had predicted, the sails snapped out and dislodged the octopus. Unfortunately the tentacle on the mast was flung in her direction, hit her in the arm and knocked her down.
Damn.
Stunned, she stared blurry-eyed at the tip of the feeler latching on to her leg. She kicked hard to free herself from the creature dragging her across the deck. A strong sour odor wafted around her as it pulled her closer. Her thoughts went to the smells she had encountered in the fish market—strong and salty.

“Let go!” She struggled to no avail.

A
rat-a-tat-tat
of gunfire became a welcoming sound when the bullets cut the sea monster’s gray arm from its body. She pushed the slimy, suctioning flesh off her and lay down, exhausted.

“Abigail, are you hurt?” Jasper’s steel Gatling made a loud echoing
clunk
as it hit the deck.

He knelt next to her and wiped her wet hair from her face. Concern in his tone and his expression made her feel warm and tingly all over.

“Tell me we’re not going to see anything like that again.” She took hold of his arm and let him help her sit up.

“You’re all right.” A pronounced sigh relaxed his bunched-up shoulders, and then he smiled. “You’re having one hell of an adventure, aren’t you?” He tucked his hands under her arms and lifted her to her feet.

She stared at him, thinking about the day she met him, or rather, the second day of their meeting. She liked adventures. When he’d set sail with her, she felt wonderfully free from her dull life. Their meeting offered her a chance to explore beyond the drudgery of her everyday existence. She still hoped to find the treasure and save her house from the bank foreclosure, but life with Jasper seemed to magically ease those worries.

“You have a faraway look in your eyes.” His voice pulled her from her thoughts. “Were you wishing you weren’t here?”

“I was just remembering that night you walked me home and we met that little man—the troll. It makes me wonder what else there is in the world that I don’t know about?”

“A lot.” He walked away from her.

She followed. “I’ve had this feeling you’re keeping something from me.”

“Like what?” He cranked the sails back into an upright formation.

She put her hand on his arm to get him to look her in the eye. “Even if it’s bad, I can handle it, Jasper.”

His shrug and his sudden avoidance concerned her. When he walked away again, she let him. He kept something from her—something important. Again she had that uneasy feeling he was deceiving her. Her reckless journey would undoubtedly end with him stealing her treasure, just as he had stolen her snow globe.

She watched him climb up to the quarterdeck and fiddle with his navigational instruments. He looked preoccupied with the working of his ship. Then he glanced at her. The brief, unsettling flash of his gaze turned away almost instantly. What did he hide?

Not ready to confront him again, she picked up her brass corset and went below to change into dry clothing. Once dressed, she sat on a chair and gazed out the window at the fish. She studied their movements, keeping in groups until something disturbed them. With their course of direction changed, they made a new formation and moved along as one again.

She took her usual stroll around the cabin, examining oddities. The driving goggles caught her attention. She wondered why he had them, but shuffled the question away with the others as she picked up the handkerchief that lay beneath them.

“I’m immortal.” Jasper startled her with his declaration from the cabin doorway.

“This is mine. How did you get it?” She held up the embroidered white silk with her initials interwoven in the design. “And what did you say?”

“I’m immortal.”

“You’re what?” she asked, unsure she heard him right.

“I can live forever.” He propped his hands on his hips as if punctuating his statement with his stance would make her an instant believer.

“No one lives forever,” she scoffed. “That foolishness won’t get you out of telling me how you got my handkerchief. I haven’t carried this particular one in months.”

Jasper walked to her and snatched the lace-edged silk from her fingers. “I’ve been watching you for years.” He waved the handkerchief at her. “And you unknowingly dropped this while walking in the park with Mr. Randolph Humphries.”

“You’re the one?” She staggered back and bumped into the wall. The coolness of the window’s glass seeped through her clothing, chilling her back.

“The one what?” he asked, staring at the small cloth in his hand.

She watched him rub the silk between his fingers and then place it back on the table next to the goggles.

“I’ve always felt as if someone had been following me—watching my every move. You’ve been looking for the opportunity to get the Crystal Compass for a long time, haven’t you? But my father and I were in the way, weren’t we? Once he was dead—”

Abigail had trouble voicing the horrible thought that struck her. Jasper couldn’t have killed her father. He wasn’t mean or evil—or was he? A chill moved down her spine as she realized that, despite their lovemaking, she didn’t know him, not really.

“You didn’t have anything to do with…You…My father…”

She flinched when he rushed forward, not sure what she expected from him. When he grasped her arms and tugged her close, she looked up into his eyes and saw a pained expression.

“He was a friend, Abigail. I had nothing to do with your father’s death.” His fingers tightened. “Whatever you may think of me, I’d never do anything to hurt you or your family.”

She wanted to believe him. Yet how did she overlook the deceitful ways he had used to get close to her? If she had time away from him, time to think, maybe she’d find that things weren’t as bad as they sounded. Confused, she hurried to the door. She heard the loud stomp of his boots following as she scurried up the first set of stairs and then the second. With nowhere to go, she stopped midship and turned around. The longboat caught her eye and she went to it, ready to release it into the water.

Then a shadow fell on the deck. She looked up, expecting to see a dark cloud. Instead, a hot air balloon hovered. From it a hung a rope, and on the end was a grappling hook. She turned away just as the heavy iron came close to colliding with her. Then it swung back and caught hold beneath one of the buckles of her brass corset. A whooshing sound coincided with the balloon’s sudden rise, lifting her off Jasper’s ship.

“Abigail!” He ran and leaped toward her.

His fingers grazed her boot as he fell to the deck. She struggled for release until she was too high for a safe landing. As if a bird in flight, she sailed through the air dangling on the end of the rope. She watched Jasper standing at the railing below. Her escape from him wasn’t as planned. She looked up at the basket hanging from the balloon. Eric’s grinning face loomed. She knew then that she was in worse trouble than staying below with the conniving pirate.

Jasper watched Abigail dangling helplessly from Eric’s hot air balloon. They continued to rise and float away. The rope holding Abigail retracted, pulling her up and eventually over the edge of the basket, out of his sight. He saw her safe from falling, but not so safe from Eric. Her cousin would have little use for her once he learned she neither had the map nor the knowledge of where the treasure was buried.

“Damn him.” Jasper pushed away from the rail.

He hadn’t realized how resourceful Eric had become over the years. Jasper’s only option was his newest device—the pedal bird, a combination of bicycle and canvas wings. He hadn’t practiced flying the contraption too often. Today he’d test his skills.

He opened the hatch to the cargo hold and tossed the rope hanging from the yardarm into the darkness. Then after climbing down the ladder and looking around at his assortment of many years’ worth of objects he had tinkered with, he threw back the tarp covering the pedal bird. Pushing the bicycle to the opening, he tied the rope to the big front wheel and tugged to hoist his small flying machine from storage. He returned to the deck and moved the bicycle from the hold’s opening. There he untied and prepared the vehicle. Once he had the wings expanded, the gears oiled and the canvas inspected for rot, he went below to his cabin. He retrieved his gloves and goggles. He picked up Abigail’s silk handkerchief and held it to his nose as he did before. The scent of her had long disappeared from the small piece of fabric. It didn’t stop him from remembering the scent of rose it had carried.

He looked at the open wood tray containing her adornments: her father’s watch, her cameo and the ring of keys. Then he grabbed a shirt from a chair and hurried back up to the main deck. He donned the shirt, fetched a gun from a cabinet at the helm, slipped his gloves on and wedged the strap of the goggles over his head. He tucked his shirt into his waistband and dropped the handkerchief inside his collar. The silk tickled his skin as it settled into place, and he thought of Abigail being that close again. He cleared everything in his path from one end of the ship to the other. The gangplank worked well for a ramp. After that he went back to the pedal bird.

“What do you think you’re doing, Merlin?” The cat sat in the basket attached to the handlebars. “There isn’t anything you can do to help.”

Merlin gave him his usual indifferent expression and settled into place inside the wicker.

“Very well, but if you get in the way, out you go.” He pushed the bicycle to the end of the ship and mounted the high seat from the step of the quarterdeck. For a second he took a relaxing breath and focused on his mission. What were his return trip plans, land on Eric’s ship and take possession of Abigail? Then what? After the trouble Eric went through to get her, it was unlikely he’d let them leave.

“I’ll worry over how to get back later.” He pulled the goggles down over his eyes. “If Eric gets in the way, Merlin, I’ll kill him.”

Jasper pedaled hard and fast, riding his homemade vehicle up the gangplank. Speed was essential. He hadn’t much test time on the contraption other that the short lifts and touchdowns he’d made on the ship. As he neared the end of his runway he put a great effort in imagining himself as light as a feather and as confident as a bird. He rode up the ramp and over the end. The wings creaked and crackled, flapping up and down. It seemed smooth sailing as he glided out over the water, until the pedal bird tipped forward. He pedaled harder and leaned back to balance out his weight. The maneuver leveled him out.

“Almost looked as if we might nosedive into the drink.” He chuckled, glancing at Merlin in the basket. “But no worries, ol’ chap. All has worked out as I knew it would.”

It took a good deal of strength in his legs to keep the cumbersome wings flapping, but the job got easier the higher they rose. He searched for stronger air currents to take the stress off him to provide total power.