Changeless (Page 22)

Madame Lefoux glanced up. She gave Alexia an appraising look. “I think Lady Maccon appears in fine health.”

“I think you are being fooled by her unfashionable robustness,” said Felicity.

Madame Lefoux continued as though Felicity hadn’t spoken. “You, on the other hand, Miss Loontwill, are looking a touch insipid.”

Felicity gasped.

Alexia wished, yet again, that Madame Lefoux were not so clearly a spy. She would be a good egg otherwise. Was it she who had tried to get into the dispatch case?

Tunstell came wandering in, full of excuses for his tardiness, and took his seat between Felicity and Ivy.

“How nice of you to join us,” commented Felicity.

Tunstell looked embarrassed. “Have I missed the first course?”

Alexia examined the steamed offering before her. “You can have mine if you like. I find my appetite sorely taxed these days.”

She passed the graying mass over to Tunstell, who looked at it doubtfully but began eating.

Madame Lefoux continued talking to Felicity. “I have an interesting little invention in my rooms, Miss Loontwill, excellent for enlivening the facial muscles and imparting a rosy hue to the cheeks. You are welcome to try it sometime.” There was a slight dimpling at that, suggesting this invention was either sticky or painful.

“I would not think, with your propensities, that you would be concerned with feminine appearances,” shot back Felicity, glaring at the woman’s vest and dinner jacket.

“Oh, I assure you, they concern me greatly.” The Frenchwoman looked at Alexia.

Lady Maccon decided Madame Lefoux reminded her a little bit of Professor Lyall, only prettier and less vulpine. She looked to her sister. “Felicity, I seem to have misplaced my leather travel journal. You have not seen it anywhere, have you?”

The second course was presented. It looked only slightly more appetizing than the first: some unidentifiable grayish meat in a white sauce, boiled potatoes, and soggy dinner rolls. Alexia waved it all away in disgust.

“Oh dear, sister, you have not taken up writing, have you?” Felicity pretended shock. “Quite frankly, all of that reading is outside of enough. I had thought that being married would cure you of such an unwise inclination. I never read if I can help it. It is terribly bad for the eyes. And it causes one’s forehead to wrinkle most horribly, just there.” She pointed between her eyebrows and then said pityingly to Lady Maccon, “Oh, I see you do not have to worry about that anymore, Alexia.”

Lady Maccon sighed. “Oh, pack it in, Felicity, do.”

Madame Lefoux hid a smile.

Miss Hisselpenny said suddenly in a loud and highly distressed voice, “Mr. Tunstell? Oh! Mr. Tunstell, are you quite all right?”

Tunstell was leaning forward over his plate, his face gone pale and drawn.

“Is it the food?” wondered Lady Maccon. “Because if it is, I entirely understand your feelings on the subject. I shall have a conversation with the cook.”

Tunstell looked up at her. His freckles were standing out and his eyes watering. “I feel most unwell,” he said distinctly before lurching to his feet and stumbling out the door.

Alexia looked after him for a moment with her mouth agape, then glared suspiciously down at the food set before them. She stood. “If you will excuse me, I think I had best check on Tunstell. No, Ivy, you stay here.” She grabbed her parasol and followed the claviger.

She found him on the nearest observation deck, collapsed on his side against a far rail, clutching at his stomach.

Alexia marched up to him. “Did this come over you quite suddenly?”

Tunstell nodded, clearly unable to speak.

There came a faint smell of vanilla, and Madame Lefoux’s voice behind them said, “Poison.”

CHAPTER SEVEN

Problematic Octopuses

and Airship Mountaineering

Randolph Lyall was old, for a werewolf. Something on the order of three hundred or so. He had long since stopped counting. And through all that time, he had played this little game of chess with local vampires: they moved their pawns and he moved his. He’d been changed shortly before King Henry absorbed supernaturals legally into the British government, so he’d never known the Dark Ages, not personally. But he, like every other supernatural on the British Isles, worked hard to keep them from returning. Funny how such a simple objective could so easily become adulterated by politics and new technology. Of course, he could simply march up to the Westminster Hive and ask them what they were about. But they would no more tell him than he would tell them Lord Maccon had BUR agents watching the hive twenty-four hours a day.

Lyall reached his destination in far less time than it would have taken by carriage. He changed into human form in a dark alley, throwing the cloak he’d carried in his mouth about his nak*d body. Not precisely dress appropriate for paying a social visit, but he was confident his host would understand. This was business. Then again, one never could tell with vampires. They had, after all, dominated the fashion world for decades as a kind of indirect campaign against werewolves and the uncivilized state shifting shape required.

He reached forward and pulled the bell rope on the door in front of him.

A handsome young footman opened it.

“Professor Lyall,” said Professor Lyall, “to see Lord Akeldama.”

The young man gave the werewolf a very long look. “Well, well. You will not mind, sir, if I ask you to wait on the stoop while I inform the master of your presence?”

Vampires were odd about invitations. Professor Lyall shook his head.

The footman disappeared, and a moment later, Lord Akeldama opened the door in his stead.

They had met before, of course, but Lyall had never yet had occasion to visit the vampire at home. The decoration was—he discerned as he peered into the glittering interior—very loud.

“Professor Lyall.” Lord Akeldama gave him an appraising look through a beautiful gold monocle. He was dressed for the theater, and one pinky pointed out as he lowered the viewing device. “And alone. To what do I owe this honor?”

“I have a proposition for you.”

Lord Akeldama looked the werewolf up and down once more; his blond eyebrows, darkened by artificial means, rose in surprise. “Why, Professor Lyall, how charming. I think you had best come inside.”

Without looking up at Madame Lefoux, Alexia asked, “Is there anything built into my parasol to counteract poison?”

The inventor shook her head. “The parasol was designed as an offensive device. Had I known we would need an apothecary’s kit, I would have added that feature.”

Lady Maccon crouched down over Tunstell’s supine form. “Run to the steward and see if he has an emetic on board, syrup of ipecac or white vitriol.”

“At once,” said the inventor, and dashed off.

Lady Maccon envied Madame Lefoux the masculine attire. Her own skirts were getting caught about her legs as she tried to tend to the afflicted claviger. His face was paper white, freckles stark against it, and there was a sheen of sweat on his forehead dampening his red hair.

“Oh no, he is suffering so. Will he recover soon?” Miss Hisselpenny had defied Alexia’s order and tracked them down to the observation deck. She, too, crouched over Tunstell, her skirts spilling about her like a great over-iced meringue. She patted uselessly at one of Tunstell’s hands, which were clenched over his stomach.

Alexia ignored her. “Tunstell, you must try to purge yourself.” She made her voice as authoritative as possible, disguising her worry and fear with gruffness.

“Alexia!” Miss Hisselpenny was appalled. “Imagine suggesting such a thing. How undignified! Poor Mr. Tunstell.”

“He must eject the contents of his stomach before the toxin enters his system any further.”

“Do not be a ninnyhammer, Alexia,” replied Ivy with a forced laugh. “It is just a bit of food poisoning.”

Tunstell groaned but did not move.

“Ivy, and I mean this with the kindest and best of intentions, bugger off.”

Miss Hisselpenny gasped and stood up, scandalized. But at least she was out of the way.

Alexia helped Tunstell to turn over so he was on his knees. She pointed a finger over the side of the dirigible autocratically. She made her voice as low and as tough as possible. “Tunstell, this is your Alpha speaking. Do as I tell you. You must regurgitate now.” Never in all her time had Alexia supposed she would someday be ordering someone to throw up their supper.

But the command in her voice seemed to get through to the claviger. Tunstell stuck his head under the rail and over the side of the dirigible and tried to retch.

“I can’t,” he said finally.

“You must try harder.”

“Regurgitation is an involuntary action. You cannot simply order me to do it,” replied Tunstell in a small voice.

“I most certainly can. Besides which, you are an actor.”

Tunstell grimaced. “I’ve never had cause to vomit onstage.”

“Well, if you do this, you shall know how if you need to in the future.”

Tunstell tried again. Nothing.

Madame Lefoux returned clutching a bottle of ipecac.

Alexia made Tunstell take a large gulp.

“Ivy, run and fetch a glass of water,” she ordered her friend, mostly to get her out of the way.

In moments, the emetic took effect. As unsavory as the supper had been to eat, it was even less pleasant going the other direction. Lady Maccon tried not to look or listen.

By the time Ivy returned with a goblet of water, the worst was over.

Alexia made Tunstell drink the entirety of the glass. They waited a full quarter of an hour more while his color returned, and he was finally able to attain an upright position.

Ivy was in a flutter over the whole incident, agitating about the recovering man with such vigor that Madame Lefoux was driven to desperate measures. She extracted a small flask from her waistcoat pocket.

“Have a little nip of this, my dear. Calm your nerves.” She handed it to Ivy.

Ivy nipped, blinked a couple times, nipped again, and then graduated from frantic to loopy. “Why, that burns all the way down!”

“Let’s get Tunstell to his room.” Alexia hoisted the redhead to his feet.

With Ivy walking backward before them and weaving side to side like an iced tea cake with delusions of shepherding, Lady Maccon and Madame Lefoux managed to get Tunstell to his rooms and onto bed.

By the time all the excitement had ended, Lady Maccon found she had lost her appetite entirely. Nevertheless, appearances must be kept up, so she returned to the dining cabin with Ivy and Madame Lefoux. She was in a mental quandary: why on earth, or in aether for that matter, would someone try to kill Tunstell?

Ivy walked into one or two walls on their way back.

“What did you give her?” Alexia hissed to the inventor.

“Just a bit of cognac.” Madame Lefoux’s dimples flashed.

“Very effective stuff.”

The rest of the meal passed without incident, if one ignored Ivy’s evident inebriation, which occasioned two spills and one bout of hysterical giggling. Alexia was about to rise and excuse herself when Madame Lefoux, who had been silent throughout most of the postpurge meal, spoke to her.