5.4

They rode up the slope toward the spot where the dirigible was tethered. It offered a peculiar image in the early light, floating like a low-hanging cloud above the heather and the rocks.

"My god," Helen's father said with feeling. "I can't believe I am trusting my soul to that infernal machine."

Helen dismounted and handed her reins to young groom who had been drafted to help with the send off. He looked rather nervous which may have had as much to do with her father's reputation as with his horse's.

"Mind you keep a close eye on this beast," her father said as he turned the reins over to the timid young man. "Don't let him rip your arm off."

If the lad had looked frightened before, now he grew quite white. "Yes, sir," he managed to squeak as he stared at the snorting black beast, who—sensing an advantage—pawed the ground with a theatrical sense of menace.

"Don't worry," Helen said with a chuckle. "He seldom eats meat."

The young groom did his best to smile and looked a little relieved. Helen turned to regard the ship. "All ship-shape, signore?"

"All is well, captain," the Italian said, waving his bandaged arm at her. "Everything ship-shape. We are ready to sail into the winds."

Helen checked the assortment of luggage stowed around the gondola. "What's that?" she asked pointing to a rather large case that had not passed her inspection.

Her father leaned over the side of the ship to follow her pointing finger. "That? That's my town wear. I had Dennison pack my best."

"Oh, Papa!" Helen snorted. "There's no need for that. Signor Romano, chuck that over the side, would you?"

"You wouldn't dare!"

"Papa, you are not going to have to dress to impress anyone in Paris. We are not hobnobbing with the ton."

"I will have some business to engage with while I am there," her father said stiffly as he frowned at Romano as he struggled with the case. The young groom tried to lend him a hand after hastily tying the horses' reins to the nearby paddock's fence.

"Papa, do you wear these clothes when you conduct business here?"

"Sometimes…"

"Papa!" Helen scowled.

"Oh, all right. But don't blame me if I get snubbed in Paris and we lose a fortune. I hear they can be pernickety when it comes to sartorial effects."

"If it comes to that, Papa," Helen said with a sharp look, softened somewhat by a smile, "We can buy you some new clothes in the City of Lights."

"Needless expense," he muttered.

"They would be somewhat more fashionable than your current wardrobe."

Her father stood up straight and stared at her. "I thought I brought you up to flatter your papa."

Helen laughed. "I'm afraid we've failed then. Papa, you know it's unnecessary."

"Very well." He crossed his arms. "I know I'll feel the absence of that silk cravat."

His daughter ceased to pay any attention to him. "Signore, have we got the rest of the cargo distributed sufficiently well?"

The pilot stood upright once more examining the gondola. "We should be all right, signorina. If not, we should be able to shift things during flight." He looked over at Rochester with a dubious expression. "As long as we are cautious."

Helen ignored her father's snort of derision. "How do the seats seem?"

The pilot patted the nearest one with pride. "I think we will find them quite comfortable for the longer journey."

Helen's father leaned over the gondola. "Am I sitting on that?"

"Yes, Papa. We all are. At least when we're not busy with other duties."

"Duties! I thought this was a leisure trip."

"Maybe for you. I have work to do." Helen climbed over into the gondola. "Are you ready to come aboard, Papa?"

"Aye, aye, captain."

Off with the Fairies

Well, it's no less than you expected, is it? Back soon and back on track.

5.3

The laughter that filled the room came unexpectedly from Helen's mother. "Holiday? Well, there you are. Problem sorted."

Her father frowned. "What the devil do you mean?"

"It's a holiday. So that means you will enjoy yourself, you will not have to do any work, and you will leave Helen to manage her own work."

Fairfax looked disappointed. "Can we at least finalise the details on the Leeds project before you go off gallivanting across the channel?"

"Yes, yes, all right. But while I'm gone your mother will have to be consulted. And yes," he added with a smile that was perhaps a little too pleased, "You will probably have to explain some of the finer points to her."

"As I know nothing about the project," the mother in question added dryly.

"But she's got a great head for figures and far more sense than I have." As usual when he was complimenting his wife, Rochester's voice got gruffer as he went on.

Someone unfamiliar with him could easily assume that his tone indicated anger. His fire-ravaged visage recoiled with something that appeared to mimic pain, yet signaled something far different.

A fact his wife had long been aware of, naturally. She crossed over to his side and sat on the arm of his chair. "You need to get away. It's been far too long since you've wandered further than York."

"I don't need to wander," he said, putting a rough hand on top of her smaller one.

"Perhaps not, but I think you will find that you do need to get out into the world a little and stretch those long legs of yours somewhere other than this library."

"It will be a terrific adventure, Papa." Helen added. "You will find many things to amuse you and cause all manner of trouble."

He made a rumbling sound that was not easy to interpret. "But I can't bring the dog."

"Papa—"

"Oh, all right." Though he frowned theatrically, both his wife and daughter knew he was pleased.

In the morning, preparations began. Helen hopped out of bed at an early hour, waving away her maid Edith's well-intentioned attempts to help her dress. "I will have to dress myself on this trip, Edith. Only simple clothes, things I can easily slip in and out of."

The maid tutted. "You make it sound positively indecent."

Helen laughed. "There will be no possibility of anything indelicate with Papa along."

"Oh, Miss Helen, he's going to be no end of trouble to you, I expect."

"Nonsense," Helen said as she rubbed a smudge off her favourite goggles. "Papa will lend a sense of gravity to the adventure."

"And to the gondola," Edith added.

Helen threw back her head and laughed. "The ship has plenty of lift. It won't be a problem."

She was still chuckling when she headed out to the stables. Her father's voice rose in the distance, remonstrating with Thompson about some doubtless meaningful detail of Belial's maintenance in his absence.

"Not the common oats," he warned with severity. "The pressed oats with honey. Don't forget!"

"Of course not, sir," Thompson said. After many years he had become inured to the imperious demands of his employer and remained as phlegmatic as the elderly bay gelding he generally rode on errands. "The oats with honey."

"Mind you, don't over feed him. He can be a greedy beggar." Rochester thumped the huge stallion's neck affectionately and the horse nosed him just as roughly, forcing him to take a step back.

"Right, sir, not over fed," Thompson repeated.

"Papa, we really must get going." Helen pulled at his sleeve. "Signor Romano has the ship ready to fly."

"Yes, I suppose." He swung up on the horse as Helen climbed aboard her fat grey mare. "Did you say farewell to your mother?"

"Yes, of course. Did you?" Helen enjoyed seeing her father blush.

"Don't be impertinent. Let's go." Belial wheeled around and the two of them clattered off through the courtyard in the early morning light.

5.2

  "Now, Helen," her mother soothed.

"Hideous machine," Helen repeated. "He called my beautiful ship a 'hideous machine'!"

"I apologise," Fairfax said, "But you also accused me of speculating. I cannot allow my own sister to accuse me of speculation."

"All right, I'm sorry as well." Helen paused at the door, her hand on the knob. "You're just so infuriating all of the time with your highhanded ways."

"I don't know what you mean." Fairfax looked at her wide-eyed.

"That's why it's so irritating!"

"What the devil does any of this matter?" Their father glowered at the two of them from the depths of his chair. "I don't need to hear this kind of wrangling from my children. I'd like a little peace in my own home!"

"Things will be quieter in France, Papa."

"France!" Fairfax said. "You're going, too?"

"Against my will," his father muttered. "We can't have your sister running around the land of frogs with strange Italian men on her own."

"You're secretly pleased I think, Papa." Helen laughed.

"I think perhaps Fairfax ought to go with you instead," her father said.

"What!" The two siblings spoke in unison with equal levels of horror. Their expressions gave no doubt about the unsuitability of this idea to both of them. It was only when they noticed their father's barely suppressed mirth that they breathed a sigh of relief.

"You're a very devil, Papa," Helen said, shaking her head in disbelief.

"I wouldn't be at liberty to go anyway," Fairfax added, his voice sounding somewhat nervous yet. He rifled through the papers in his portfolio. "This land matter alone will require a great deal of attention in the next few weeks."

"Not from me, I hope," his father said, apparently somewhat daunted by the thought. While he liked to think of himself as a cagey manager of his estates, he actually much preferred to leave things in the capable hands of his son. Most of his conversations consisted of nodding in agreement.

It was a suitable charade as far as he was concerned.

"Well, if I must go, I suppose I shall have to reconcile myself to my fate," he grumbled.

Helen was delighted that they had moved past the impossibility of the trip to planning its details. "We shall have to find a suitable place to stay in Dover and in Calais, where we can keep the ship nearby."

"I'm sure we can arrange something suitable," her mother said, "though perhaps not as quickly as you might like."

"Can I bring Cerberus along as well?"

"No, Papa, there won't be room." Helen gathered up her drawings and plans, ready to head to her room for some thoughtful planning.

"We really need to discuss this Leeds plan—" Fairfax began, holding out a very daunting piece of paper toward his father.

His father ignored the paper. "Are you bringing Tuppence?"

"Of course!"

"Well, then I want to bring my dog." Her father folded his arms decidedly. The animal in question raised his head, as if aware of the debate. "It's only fair."

"Papa," Helen said, swallowing her irritation, "Tuppence is a bird and can fly beside the ship. Cerberus is an enormous dog and will take up too much room as well as being an unruly beast with no discipline."

"Unruly! He's a well-trained and magnificent beast."

"Papa, he doesn't even sit on command."

"He's sitting now."

As if he understood—and Helen reflected, it might be entirely possible that he did—Cerberus immediately stood up, wagging his tail gently as he looked at his master.

"Good dog." He patted his pet affectionately. "Well, what the devil am I going to do while you're pottering around with mountebanks and machinery?"

"You could look at some possible investments," Fairfax broke in.

"Hang me if I'll be working on my holiday!"

5.1

"Madame?"

Helen's mother looked up from her husband's face, still smiling. "What is it, Mrs. Hitchcock?"

"Mr. Fairfax has arrived."

"Oh dear," Helen said.

"Now, Helen," her mother scolded gently. "I'm sure if you start out irritated you will only get more so very quickly. Think soothing thoughts."

Helen laughed. "I will not ruffle his almighty equilibrium."

Her father snorted. "Why the one child of mine who has become a success should be the cause of such consternation, I don't understand. Fairfax is a fine young man."

"He's an insufferable prig."

"Nonsense: he's a respected capitalist," his father huffed proudly.

"Exactly." Helen began to gather up the sketches and notes she had spread across the library table.

"Mother, father," Fairfax said as he entered the room, a portfolio under his arm. "Helen."

It would not be entirely accurate to say that the siblings were cool too one another. They were simply too much alike to get on well. Both had their mother's open, intelligent face and no-nonsense movements. They differed only in their zeal for opposing goals.

Fairfax had taken command of the family fortune with a zeal that approached the missionary. He had taken his degree from Cambridge and immediately embarked upon an aggressive plan for expanding their funds with the empire.

Helen, denied a similar opportunity, focused on educating herself with the extensive library her father had gathered and her mother had expanded. Suspicious of the same hierarchies that barred her from formal learning, Helen's character had developed with a scorn for all the conventional attitudes that fueled her brother's work and connections.

Consequently, they did not much understand one another.

At times like this, the clash between the siblings caused a good deal of friction. When one concentrated on holding onto existing benefits and the other on exploring the unknown, breaking new barriers and plunging into new horizons, there were going to be sparks.

And so they began.

"I've just been looking at our latest figures on the Leeds investments…" Fairfax began, talking directly to his father and bypassing the two women in the room. "They're not as strong as I would like them to be but I assume we can make some alterations to the schema that will keep the margins within reason."

"And hello to you, too," Helen snapped at her brother.

Fairfax looked at her mildly. "I'm sure we will have time to chat after Father and I have finished dealing with these matters."

"Oh yes, the matters far too complex for female heads to deal with!"

"I never said that." Fairfax frowned. "But you have never showed much interest—"

"And you have never bothered to include Mother or I in your calculations that manipulate the family finances without regard to proprietary or ethics."

"That's not at all true," Fairfax countered. "You will recall that my training in ethics at Cambridge—"

Unfortunately, any mention of that august institution inevitably resulted in further animosity from his sister. One might think the young man would have learned by now to avoid that controversial topic, but the truth was that he seemed to bring it up with tedious regularity.

"Yes, we're all well aware of the stellar education you received in the ways of the Empire, the ruthlessness of the capitalist, the slippery 'ethics' of the speculator…" His sister grew pink with irritation.

"I am not a speculator!" Fairfax seemed startled by the suggestion.

"Your schemes are legion." Helen's fixed expression seemed to suggest that his crimes were public knowledge.

"The only 'scheme' I could be said to be engaged in of a dubious nature," Fairfax said, eyes, glaring with intense light, "would be funding your hideous machine."

"A marvel of engineering!" Helen said, her voice constricted.

"Now, children, please let's not argue." Their mother shook her head at them.

"I shan't say another word!" Helen said and prepared to depart.

5.0

"I told you it was goblins," Helen's father said with smug satisfaction as he threw himself into his favourite chair.

Her mother raised her eyebrows. "Goblins? Really?"

Helen rolled her eyes. "Of course not. But the folks in Whitby have complained about the proliferation of airships over their fair town and claim it is impeding the tourist trade."

"A fair assessment?"

Helen warmed her hands in the fire. "Unfortunately, I'd have to agree, especially after the Lintons' extraordinary conflagration."

"What the devil did they expect?" Her father growled from the depths of his chair, waking Cerberus who had been sprawled at his feet. The great black beast whined and tried to nose his master's hand onto his skull for a patting. Rochester looked down and gave the dog a rough tousle. "Do they think people are going to come just for the ruins of the abbey or to walk up all those infernal stairs?"

"Papa," Helen scolded gently. "People have long been drawn the beauties of that fishing town. It's romantic."

Her mother laughed. "You know your father has no sense of romance."

"The devil you say!" Her father said with an aggrieved air. "I'm far more romantic than your mother. She bewitched me. I was helplessly besotted."

The witch in question only smiled at her husband. "Am I to be accused of witchcraft anytime I do something you don’t anticipate?"

"Yes." Cerberus whimpered and he returned to scratching the dog.

Helen felt a spasm of irritated impatience even as she smiled at her parents' wrangling. "So I think I will fly down to Dover and then over to Paris."

This had the desired effect of startling her listeners.

"Is that wise?" her mother said.

"The devil you will!" her father said.

"It's quite safe. If anything, today's flight demonstrated just how much so. Despite the problems Signor Romano and I were well-prepared for the encounters and we succeeded in the face of all opposition," and possible interference, she thought to herself.
"I won't hear of it!" her father protested.

"Papa, you can't forbid me. It's my ship."

"You brother might have something to say about that."

Helen frowned. "I owe him the funds, not the ship. He will never realise his investment until I prove the worth of the vessel."

"Why do you have to go to that infernal land of frogs?"

"Weren't you once partial to that glittering city?" Helen's mother asked her husband who merely muttered something unintelligible.

Helen sighed. "Papa, I've explained. I need to work with Signor Maggiormente. The alchemical steam engine could revolutionise the entire history of flying machines. But we have to work together. We need each other's expertise."

"Well, why can't he come here? We could find room for yet another Italiano."

"He's in Paris for the Exhibition. I can't ask him to leave. Papa, I mean to go. This is the goal all my work has been leading toward. I can't wait any longer."

"We understand, darling," her mother soothed. "We're just concerned for your safety."

"And to have you gallivanting around with Italians! Can't be trusted, that much I know. Worse than Frenchmen." Her father scowled from the depths of his chair.

"Isn't that why we agreed you would accompany me?" Helen could not keep a smug smile from her lips as she delivered that piece de resistance. "I will be properly looked after and you will get out of Yorkshire for a while."

"I must have been drunk. Surely I never agreed to such an infernal plan. You're a witch like your mother."

A light in his eye suggested that he was not quite as averse to the idea as he made it seem. Helen decided to press the issue. "Papa, you know I won't feel entirely safe in a new country without you there to protect me."

Her mother laughed. "Now, you're overdoing it. Pretend to be put out a little while longer and he'll come around." She sat on the arm of her husband's chair and put her own arm around his shoulder. "Isn't that true, dear?"

"Witches," he muttered. "A fine pair of witches. Doubtless there will be all manner of goblinry, too. It's bound to be a fiasco of a journey."

Leprechauns

I think they are anyway; they are rather small, wear green and offer the most peculiar drinks and insist on a lot of dancing. Once I can make my polite farewells, I can get back to writing this story...