“It wasn’t me! Bierce wro—”
He jumped too late. The whip caught his ankles. He toppled to the desktop, more alarmed than hurt.
“You’ll respect a lady, you guttersnipe!” She drew back the whip.
He raised his hands. “Wait!”
I grabbed her arm, gave it a twist, and yanked the whip away as she spun to face me.
I was staring into the furious eyes of Elise Holt.
She didn’t recognize me. Or maybe she did. Without hesitation she launched a most unladylike kick at my groin. It had impressive extension, a dancer’s, high and flamboyant. I stepped back barely in time, caught her foot on its way down, held it, and moved backward. She followed, hopping, her blue eyes blazing.
“Sam Fowler, remember?”
Tossing her head angrily, she twisted toward the man on the desk and hiked her skirts over the leg I held, revealing pale pink tights to her upper thigh. “Is this the ‘wretched material exhibited’?” she demanded.
I regarded it critically, seeing nothing wretched; in fact, it was curvy and provocative. The tights and black boots could have graced Police Gazette.
She flounced her skirt down and shoved her hands under her breasts, swelling the blouse and short jacket. “Is this ‘no figure at all’?”
A wave of pink washed Marriott’s face. His gray-streaked hair hung in his eyes; his suit was rumpled. Though he looked mortified by present circumstances, it didn’t keep him from staring at Holt’s up-thrust breasts.
“May I descend?” he said finally, in British accents.
“And you’re English!” she shrilled, struggling to free herself. “That’s too bleedin’ much for any—”
She lost her balance and started to fall. I released her foot and wrapped my arms around her corseted waist. Her bustle squirmed provocatively against me. I smelled her perfume.
“As I tried to inform you,” Marriott said, climbing down warily. “I do not write the Town Crier column which so upset you, Miss Holt. Nor do I edit the Advertiser. I am merely its publisher.”
I nearly laughed at that, but Holt seemed to be calming. Or at least accepting restraint.
Marriott regarded me. “Who are you, sir? I’m grateful for your assistance.”
Elise’s old friend,” I said, drawing a painful pinch on my arm. Actually, I dropped by to see how Avitor stock was doing.”
Oh, you mustn’t draw conclusions from what has just transpired,” he said quickly. “You’re an interested investor?”
“Interested,” I said. “Probably not an investor. I’m with the Cincinnati Enquirer”
Alarm tightened his features. Holt looked up at me. “You are? How grand!”
She seemed tame enough. I let her go.
“The Aerial Steam Navigation Company is being capitalized quickly,” Marriott said. “I expect Bill Ralston—Bank of California, you know—to become a primary backer. You’ve seen the Avitor, haven’t you?
“Not yet,” I said, turning to the door. “By the way, Twain sends his greetings.”
“Is he behind this? Was this Clemens’s prank?”
“No prank here,” I said, glancing at Holt. “This was entirely serious.”
In the corridor outside she gave me a long look. “How’d you happen in there? You follow me?”
“Just coincidence, but you should be thankful. If not for me you might be headed for jail.”
“Speaking of thanks,” she said tartly.
“Yes, thanks for getting your note to me. I hope it didn’t cause you problems with Morrissey.”
“None I couldn’t settle.”
“I’ll bet.”
She squeezed my arm and pressed her breast against me. I glanced down and caught her smile. She knew exactly what she was doing.
“Let’s find this bloody flying machine,” she said.
The Mechanics’ Institute Pavilion covered ninety thousand square feet and was topped by a dome illuminated at night by thirteen hundred gas jets. A sign at the entrance told us that the Seventh Mechanics Fair was in its tenth day. People stared at Elise as we entered.
We passed a number of displays until we came to a long hall containing a roped-off oval track. At the far end the Avitor was in flight. Two men dogtrotted along the track below, holding guy ropes fixed to it.
I scrutinized it as it passed overhead. Basically it was a forty-foot cigar-shaped balloon encased in a cagework of cane. On either side a five-foot wing extended, and whirring on each wing was a two-bladed propellor driven by a small steam furnace heated by an alcohol lamp. Toward the rear was a steering rudder with four planes, like the feathered end of a dart, to direct the craft up or down or to either side. The rudder was tied in place now to keep the Avitor in an orbit corresponding to the track.
Well, it was flying, I had to admit. I wasn’t sure how I felt about it. Impressed. Disappointed. The craft was by necessity so light that I couldn’t figure how it would handle any wind whatever.
“How fast is it going?” I asked an observer.
“Six miles an hour.”
“That its top speed?”
“The valves are entirely open, yes.”
When the Avitor set down a few minutes later another drawback became evident: it held enough fuel to stay aloft only about fifteen minutes. To lift larger boilers and fuel tanks—not to mention passengers—would require an enormous balloon. And there just couldn’t be enough thrust generated to keep it from being at the mercy of winds. A for effort, I thought. Materials and technology aren’t here yet.
“Gonna invest?” I asked the man.
He shook his head. “In my view the pneumatic tube will supplant railcars as high-velocity transport.”
“Really?” I remembered reading somewhere about a twentieth-century Japanese “bullet train” which shot cars through enclosed tubes at hundreds of miles per hour. Amazing that it was already conceptualized.
“Cheaper and more realizable than aerial carriages,” he said firmly. “Wait and see.”
We headed back to the pavilion entrance. Elise drew stares and whisperings. Mostly her skirts, I supposed, although to me they weren’t particularly racy—they reached the bottoms of her calves. And of course there was her makeup—a “painted woman,” no question. Quite a package.
“What are you thinking about?” she asked suddenly.
“You,” I
