Changeless

“Really, Alexia, this is no time for levity! I am all aquiver, facing a ghastly emotional crisis, and you issue forth nothing more than scads of unwanted jocularity.”

Lady Maccon composed her features and tried to look like she was not amused at her friend’s expense, annoyed at her friend’s appearance, nor still glancing about her room in search of the missing dispatch case. “Let me hazard a guess. Tunstell has professed his undying love?”

“Yes,” Ivy wailed, “and I am engaged to another!” On the word engaged, she finally stopped squeaking.

“Ah, yes, the mysterious Captain Featherstonehaugh. And let us not forget that, even if you were not affianced, Tunstell is an entirely unsuitable match. Ivy, he makes his living as a thespian.”

Ivy groaned. “I know! In addition, he is your husband’s valet! Oh, it is all so messily plebeian.” Ivy rolled over on the bed, the back of her wrist pressed to her forehead. She kept her eyes tightly shut. Lady Maccon wondered if Miss Hisselpenny did not have a possible future career on the stage herself.

“Which also makes him a claviger. Well, well, well, you have got yourself into a pretty pickle.” Lady Maccon tried to sound sympathetic.

“Oh, but, Alexia, I am quite fearfully afraid that I might just possibly, maybe a little itty-bitty bit, love him back.”

“Shouldn’t you be certain of a thing like that?”

“I do not know. Should I be? How does one determine one’s own state of enamorment?”

Lady Maccon snickered. “I am hardly one to elucidate. It took me ages to realize I had feelings for Conall beyond abhorrence, and quite frankly, I am still not certain that feeling does not persist unto this very moment.”

Ivy was taken aback. “Surely you jest?”

Alexia cast her mind back to the last time she had engaged in a protracted encounter with her husband. There had been a good deal of moaning at the time, if memory served. “Well, he has his uses.”

“But, Alexia, what do I do?”

At that moment, Lady Maccon spotted her missing dispatch case. Someone had shoved it in the corner between the wardrobe and the door to the washroom. Alexia was quite certain that was not where she had left it.

“Aha, how did you get there?” she said to the missing accoutrement, and went to retrieve it.

Ivy, eyes still shut, pondered this question. “I have no idea how I allowed myself into such an untenable position. You must help me, Alexia. This is a cataplasm of epic proportions!”

“Too true,” agreed Lady Maccon, considering the state of her beloved dispatch case. Someone had tried to break open the catch. Whomever it was must have been disturbed in the act, or they would have stolen the case as well as her notebook. Her little leather journal would fit inside a vest or under a skirt, but the dispatch case would not. The villain must have left it behind as a result. Lady Maccon considered possible suspects. The ship’s domestic staff had access to her rooms, of course, and Angelique. But, really, given the state of the locks on board, it could have been anyone.

“He kissed me,” Miss Hisselpenny keened.

“Ah, well, that is something like.” Alexia decided nothing more could be determined from the dispatch case, at least not with Ivy still in the room. She went to sit next to her friend’s prostrate form. “Did you enjoy kissing him?”

Ivy said nothing.

“Did you enjoy kissing Captain Featherstonehaugh?”

“Alexia, the very idea. We are only engaged, not married!”

“So you have not kissed the good captain?”

Ivy shook her head in an excess of embarrassment.

“Well, then, what about Tunstell?”

Miss Hisselpenny flushed even redder. Now she looked like a spaniel with a sunburn. “Well, maybe, just a little.”

“And?”

Miss Hisselpenny opened her eyes, still blushing furiously, and looked at her married friend. “Is one supposed to enjoy kissing?” she practically whispered.

“I believe it is generally thought to be a pleasant pastime. You read novels, do you not?” replied Lady Maccon, trying desperately to keep a straight face.

“Do you enjoy doing… that with Lord Maccon?”

Lady Maccon did not hesitate, credit where it was due and all. “Unreservedly.”

“Oh, well, I thought it was a little”—Ivy paused—“damp.”

Lady Maccon cocked her head to one side. “Well, you must understand, my husband has considerable experience in these matters. He is hundreds of years older than I.”

“And that does not trouble you?”

“My dear, he will live hundreds of years longer than I as well. One must come to terms with these things if one fraternizes with the supernatural set. I admit it is hard, knowing we will not grow old together. But if you choose Tunstell, you may eventually have to face the same concerns. Then again, your time together could be cut short, as he may not survive metamorphosis.”

“Is that likely to occur soon?”

Lady Maccon knew very little about this aspect of pack dynamics. So she only shrugged.

Ivy sighed, a long, drawn-out exhalation that seemed to encompass all the problems of the empire. “It is all too much to think about. My head is positively awhirl. I simply do not know what to do. Don’t you see? Don’t you comprehend my cacophony?”

“You mean catastrophe?”

Ivy ignored her. “Do I throw over Captain Featherstonehaugh, and his five hundred a year, for Mr. Tunstell and his unstable”—she shuddered—“working-class station? Or do I continue with my engagement?”

“You could always marry your captain and pursue a dalliance with Tunstell on the side.”

Miss Hisselpenny gasped, sitting fully upright in her outrage at such a proposal. “Alexia, how could you even think such a thing, let alone suggest it aloud!”

“Well, yes, of course, those damp kisses would have to improve.”

Ivy threw a pillow at her friend. “Really!”

Lady Maccon, it must be admitted, gave little further thought to her dear friend’s dilemma. She transferred all the most delicate documents and important smaller instruments and devices out of her dispatch case and into the pockets of her parasol. Since she was already known as an eccentric parasol-carrier, no one remarked upon its continued presence at her side, even well after dark.

Dinner was a strained affair, stiff with tension and suspicion. Worse, the food was horrible. True, Alexia had very high standards, but the fare continued to be ghastly. Everything—meat, vegetables, even pudding—appeared to have been steamed into flaccid colorless submission, with no sauce, or even salt, to bolster the flavor. It was like eating a wet handkerchief.

Felicity, who had the palate of a country goat and tucked in without pause to anything laid before her, noticed that Alexia was only picking at her food. “Nice to see you are finally taking measures, sister.”

Lady Maccon, lost in thought, replied with an unguarded, “Measures?”

“Well, I am terribly concerned for your health. One simply should not weigh so much at your age.”

Lady Maccon poked at a sagging carrot and wondered if anyone would miss her dear sister were she to be oh-so-gently tipped over the rail of the upper deck.

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.