Dawn's Early Light (9 page)

She refilled his glass and nodded. “Where did you see this?”

“Off Corolla, near the lighthouse,” he grumbled.

With a heavy sigh, she slid the bottle within his reach. She eyed the god-awful bourbon for a moment, hoping he would have no recollection of their talk, or much of anything else for that matter. “Keep an eye out for Blackbeard. We need alert folk like you around here.”

The old man nodded excitedly, and downed the shot glass in his grasp. Turning on her heel, she strode back to Bill and the collected locals. One glance into Bill's glassy eyes and she knew that this evening was just going to get longer.

“We need to go,” she whispered to Bill.

The men around him whooped and whistled. “Gonna get something sweet tonight, Billy boy!” one of the sailors blurted.

Perhaps the melancholy of the old soldier had sucked the evening's amusement from her. Because Eliza could not stop herself from rounding on the offending sailor. “Why don't you just shut your flapping gums, mate!”

Laughter coupled with feigned shock at her retort filled her ears. The sailor stepped up to Eliza, his jocularity turning sinister in an instant. “You gonna shut them for me, missy?” he snarled. “I can think of
one
way to occupy my mouth with you.”

Bloody Americans. They really didn't know a warning when it bit them in the arse. “Now how can you follow through with that,” she began, “when you have a split lip?”

He leaned in closer. His breath stank. “What split lip?”

Bill, the collected sailors, and the assorted deckhands never saw Eliza's palm heel strike, but they did see the sailor's head snap back, his mouth and chin covered in his own blood.

“That one,” she spat.

The men surrounding them were no longer smiling. Bill burst into a hearty chuckle as he gave Eliza a playful rap against her corset while the circle of sailors slowly closed the space around them. “Now settle down, Lizzie. We're just havin' a laugh. No harm. Right, boys?”

“Your little missy
,
Bill, needs to learn her place,” another sailor spoke, his eyes fixed on Eliza.

“Mate,” she seethed, “if you even tried—”

The man exploded, sending his glass hard to the floor.
“Am I talking to you, whore?”

Now the silence was thick, pressing against Eliza's sides, threatening to squeeze her last breath out of her. Every eye was on them.

Bill hooked his thumbs in his belt buckle, shaking his head ruefully. “I was about to do that, Enoch,” he said, “but you had to go on and be rude.” He looked over at Eliza and she gave a little gasp. The glassy eyes were now quite clear, quite focused. “How about you apologise?”

“How 'bout you go to hell?” he snapped, stepping free of his group. His stance was hardly steady. Must have been trying to match Bill shot for shot.

“Just apologise to Little Lizzie and everything'll be back to the way it was,” Bill urged, taking off his hat.

Eliza's gaze jumped from Enoch, back to Bill. Did this horse's ass call her “Little Lizzie” just now?

“Why? She somethin' special?” he growled back. “This trollop got a special way of sucking—”

Bill's head launched forwards and the crunch of Enoch's nose was clearly heard, providing those in Quagmire's their only warning before he flipped a nearby table, sending glasses and bottles flying everywhere. A single shot glass slapped into the OSM agent's grasp, and he threw it at a dockhand reaching for a pistol, knocking the man off balance. Bill then leapt on a lone chair left behind by the toppled table, and jumped into the throng of men with whom he'd been sharing convivial drinks. His battle cry—Eliza had heard it called a “Rebel Yell”—served as a ceremonial cannon, signalling the beginning of tonight's entertainment.

A few of Enoch's friends closed on Bill in quick order, but there were others around that were either siding with Bill in defending “Little Lizzie's” honour or simply itching for a good brawl. By the time Bill was free, thanks to a few gallant strangers, Enoch was back on his feet, towering over the OSM agent. Bill hooked the tip of his boot under a bottle at his feet, and kicked. The glass slapped into his hand, which he in turn slapped across Enoch's face. If this had been a comedy troupe at a music hall, the bottle would have shattered for comic effect. As this was a tavern somewhere on the American East Coast, the thick glass remained intact. The dockhand's jaw wobbled inside the man's skull as rivulets of blood shot out of the man's mouth.

The blow
should
have landed the man out cold, but Enoch spat free a tooth and then brought a beefy fist round to Bill. Enoch's uppercut lifted him off his feet and sent him back to a chair that collapsed under him with a loud snap. Eliza winced a fraction, hoping what she had heard had been the chair and not Bill's back.

Bill certainly wasn't stopping to check. He bounded to his feet, grabbed up the closest empty chair—most were empty as the brawl now held everyone's immediate attention—and swept it in a wide arc, knocking the four men charging at him back a pace or two.

Ministry orders dictated, as this was a goodwill operation, that Eliza should have jumped into the growing chaos and helped her fellow agent out, but their first meeting in San Francisco gave her a moment's pause. That, and she was quite enjoying watching from outside the event how Agent Bill Wheatley handled himself. The man was quite a machine.

Her enjoyment was interrupted by massive arms wrapping around her from behind. Whatever kind of clumsy attack it was, it was over as her boot heel drove down hard into the attacker's foot, earning her a whiskey-accented scream into her left ear. She then turned and slammed her fist into the man's nose. Brief as the skirmish had been, it attracted the attention of a table full of dockhands. One of them, a man with slicked-back blond hair, drew a bowie knife similar to Bill's from his jacket.

Now, officially, she was no longer
watching
the fray but following orders.

Eliza loved a good bowie as much as the next woman, but the knifeman was just waiting to join the evening's diversion a little too enthusiastically. She took a step back, and felt her own foot brush against an empty bottle. Considering Bill's fancy footwork, Eliza hooked her toe under the bottle, kicked it up into her hand, and threw it at the man, all in one swift sequence. This time, the glass did shatter against the man's head, and he dropped the knife with a yelp—which turned into a scream when Eliza took three quick steps and side-kicked him backwards into his friends.

The thunderclap froze everyone in place. Eliza turned to see Merle crack open the blunderbuss-style shotgun, ejecting its spent shell that rolled across the tavern floor to disappear in the dingy shadows.

“The girl was kind enough to buy me a drink,” he announced as he slipped in a replacement shell. “Now I'm a drunk war veteran with a loaded blunderbuss. That makes me dangerous.”

“You got two shells, old man,” a sailor mocked.

“Keep talkin' and I'll just have one,” he warned. “Consider this a southern gentleman's thank-you, miss. Now I think you and the beau ought to leave.”

A night out with a colleague, a bar brawl, and a lead. The night with Bill had not been a complete loss.

“Well, this has been delightful,” Eliza said brightly against the quiet. She turned back around. “Bill,” she called, “you done?”

Bill's left cheek was a dark red, leaning with every moment to purple. The sailor behind him bent down, picked up Bill's Stetson, and shoved it into his shoulder, crushing the hat's crown.

“Jus' a minute,” he slurred, forming his crumpled Stetson back into shape. Once his hat was resting as he thought it should, Bill thrust his elbow behind him, sending the sailor to the ground. “Okay, I'm done.”

She jerked her head towards the exit. By the time they were back out in the night, music had resumed, conversation was returning, and Bill's demeanour had gone from aggravated to extremely satisfied. Outside a blast of ice-cold wind hit them in the face, but after the humid dark of the public house, this was quite refreshing. Eliza led the way back up the sandbank, and towards the road they had walked down earlier in the evening.

“You Americans are making me homesick, you know that?” With a look back at Quagmire's, she turned back to where Bill's horse waited patiently. “Well, come on, Bill, we've got a morning ahead of us tomorrow.”

“Hold on,” Bill said, trailing behind her. “The old man was really on to something?”

“I know that look. Merle may sound crazy, but he saw something. Tomorrow morning, we do what we do best.”

He motioned with his thumb back to the pub. “I thought
that
was what we do best.”

The clouds slipped away from the moon with timing that Bill could not have worked better if he had placed an order for it. The smile she caught from him, even with the swollen jaw, was both charming and wicked. She stretched. “That, my heavily bruised counterpart, was merely a prelude.”

“I look forward to the opening act,” Bill said, his voice low and husky.

Eliza could not help herself as she laughed into the night. “You know, Bill, I am starting to like you . . .”

He tilted his head up and laughed, matching her stride for stride. “All part of my wicked plan.”

“A
nd exactly how much alcohol had this supposed lead of yours enjoyed last evening?” Wellington asked, engaging the motorcar's hand brake.

Eliza tilted her head, considering. “He was on his third, maybe fourth, shot . . . from my bottle . . .”

“Hardly seems reliable,” Felicity offered from the tumble seat.

Wellington watched carefully as Eliza shut her eyes and took a long quiet breath. Meticulously, she placed the goggles around her neck, which he knew did not bode well. They both turned to Felicity, who was wearing the pink driving cap Wellington had donated to keep her curls in check. She looked silly, but quite endearing.

“Were you there last night, Miss Lovelace?” Eliza asked, her voice steady.

“No,” the librarian replied.

“Then I suggest you refrain from the assessment of the investigation before you hear all the facts.” Eliza turned back, with her eyes narrowed in a dangerous fashion. “Both of you.”

“Felicity has a point,” he dared. Even as her ice blue eyes bore into him, Wellington continued. “The man is a war veteran, and I have no doubt he suffers a great deal with what he's seen in the battlefield.”

“You weren't there, Welly,” Eliza stated.

“No, Eliza, I wasn't,” and then he paused, wringing a hand lightly on his steering wheel, “on that particular battlefield.” He was pleased to see her gaze soften slightly. “What I'm saying is that battlefield trauma can affect one's perception of the world. Introduce a liberal amount of alcohol into said perception—”

The rhythmic hoofbeats of Wheatley's horse interrupted his thoughts, and soon enough the chestnut mare appeared alongside the motorcar.

Wellington shook his head at the state of the American. While Bill was slightly better presented than he had been the previous night, he still looked as if he had been on the wrong side of an argument with a cricket bat.

Deciding not to comment, Wellington reached out, opened his door, and offered a hand to Felicity. As he assisted her down, he looked back to Eliza.

“As I was saying, add libation to someone as unstable as this Merle, and you—”

“Actually, it's Major Brantfield,” Bill slurred.

“Merlin Brantfield?” Felicity asked, her hand going to her chest.

Eliza turned towards the librarian, her eyebrow crooking slightly. “You know Merle?”

“CSA Major Merlin Brantfield is known on both sides as the Magician from Manassas,” Felicity said. “He was promoted to the rank of major shortly after the second battle there. It was thought he'd be the next General Jackson or Lee.”

“That shell of a man . . .” Eliza blinked. “So what happened to him?”

Felicity became sombre, casting a quick glance to Bill, who was also slightly ashen. “Sherman's Carolina Campaign.”

Wellington understood then. He had studied the controversial “scorched earth” strategy of Union Major General William Sherman. Somehow, this man with whom Eliza shared drinks had survived it all. That must have left deep scars indeed.

“Very well,” the archivist said, tugging the lapels of his coat. “I believe then that just past these dunes is the beach?”

“Yep,” Bill said, slapping saddlebags over his shoulder. “And somewhere out there is a wreckage, or evidence of such.”

“Bill,” Eliza said, “Merle told me the bodies were gone by morning.”

“And if Merle isn't seeing things, those corpses didn't just get up and excuse themselves. If they did”—Bill paused, taking stock of his pistols and how many bullets he had—“we got bigger problems than disappearing ships.”

“Let's go about it then,” Wellington replied.

Once clear of the dune, the four agents stood with the open expanse of the Atlantic stretching off to the east, the deep violet of night slowly receding. Even with the promise of a dreary day, their view was stunning as the sea crashed against the shore, the tendrils of its foam stretching deep up the sand.

“So,” Wellington said, placing his hands on his hips. “Which way?”

“Just give us a minute, Johnny Shakespeare,” Bill insisted as he removed the bags from his shoulder.

At first, Wellington thought the objects Bill removed were large books—about the size of the registers one would find in a town hall. The American passed one to Felicity while he took the other. From their spines, the agents extended antennae, then unclasped the cover to reveal a collection of gauges and buttons rather than text. Bill spun a small hand wheel a quarter turn then hefted the book in front of him, while Felicity mirrored his actions.

“Airship and sailing vessels all carry onboard small wireless beacons. During normal travel they serve as handy ways to keep track of a ship's bearings,” Bill said, checking the gauges as he began walking along shore in the direction of their resort. Felicity was walking in the exact opposite direction. “In case of a catastrophe, there should be enough water in the boiler to keep the beacon active for four days.”

“So if what Merle saw was real,” Eliza concluded, “then there should be a signal.”

“Unless,” Felicity said over her shoulder, “the boiler suffered a breach. It is hard to—” Her words cut short as she looked up from the gauges. “Bill!”

Her partner closed his own book and shoved the device into Wellington's arms as he passed. Wellington glanced over at the Americans before daring to open the book. Dials and needles stared back at him, all unmoving until he turned in the direction of Felicity and Bill. He only managed a few steps until one of the lights at the top flickered with the tiniest of sparks. He turned the hand crank to the left and the casing grew warmer in his touch. That was when the needle in the gauge marked “Signal Strength” bounced lightly.

“Oh, this is ingenious,” Wellington whispered as the needle moved again, then once more, clearly in some semblance of rhythm.

“How strong?” Bill asked.

“Faint from here, but we're definitely getting a signal,” Felicity replied. “Maybe a mile in this direction?”

“Right then, back to the motorcar?” Wellington offered, closing the tracking device.

“Afraid not,” Bill said, casting his glance down shore. “The mechanics of your fancy ride will gum up the works of our trackers. We are gonna have to hoof it.”

Bill took the tracker out of Wellington's arms, much to the archivist's dismay. He would have liked more time with this OSM innovation. While their own ETS worked on a private network of wireless transmissions, this device apparently was able to tap into all manner of æthercommunications and focus on a specific signal. He wondered how it was doing that . . .

His question, it seemed, would go unanswered as Bill took the devices and slipped them back into the saddlebags.

“After you and Bill returned last night from Quagmire's,” Felicity spoke up, “I took the liberty of accessing recent traffic, both air and sea, so if this ship that Major Brantfield claims was taken down exists, we should be able to see if it is listed as late or missing.”

“Had any vessels disappeared before our arrival in Norfolk?” Eliza asked.

“Two,” Felicity said, “the
Cherie
and the
Alexandria
. Both airships.”

Wellington turned to look out to sea. “It's possible then, if Brantfield saw either ship that night, the wreckage out there awaits us?”

“Possible.” Felicity shrugged. “But considering the lead . . .”

“Better get walkin',” he said, then tossed his duster to Eliza. “Just in case it gets a bit too chilly. Carolina winds tend to fool you into thinking you'll be fine, right before they start bitin' to the bone.”

Wellington straightened up at Eliza's grin as she slipped on the long coat. He did not care for that particular look on her.

In silence, the four continued down the shore, the sky above now decorated with bands of clouds slowly forming a featureless sheet of steel grey. The temperature sank lower and lower with each step.
Eliza was probably particularly cosy in Bill's jacket,
Wellington found himself thinking.

He frowned. Why could she not see right through the American? She was usually much more savvy than this. The wind pushed back a few locks of her hair, and Wellington couldn't help a slight smile. Something about being by the ocean made her even more beautiful.

Thinking on that made him almost run into her when she stopped suddenly. Wellington's gaze followed where she was looking.

“Miss Braun, I stand corrected,” he said as they all took in the dramatic wreckage in the distance.

Fluttering in the breeze was the remains of a half-inflated balloon. There were mizzenmasts and yardarms, snapped as if they were kindling meant for a fire. Scorch marks pitted and marred the hull of the long gondola that would have hung underneath the envelope. Wellington looked around them, and sure enough what appeared at first to be merely driftwood half-buried in the sand was actually a body. He soon enough found more.

“Why haven't the authorities been here?” he said sternly.

“We're in a pretty remote area,” Bill said, apparently taking count of how many bodies had washed onshore, “and this didn't happen two nights ago.”

“When do you think?” Eliza asked

“Last night.” Bill dropped to one knee for a closer look at the nearest dead body. “After Lizzie and I were at Quagmire's.”

“That certain, are you?” Wellington asked, looking around at the wreckage.

No reply came. He turned to Bill, who was now holding his Stetson over his heart, looking up at Eliza. “Yeah. I am.”

The three of them drew closer, and Eliza gave a quick gasp of recognition. “Enoch?”

The man was massive, his jaw quite swollen and nose slightly crooked as if struck with something hard. From their early morning's repast, he did recall Eliza regaling him with stories of a rather large man who Bill had attempted to fend off with a bottle of alcohol.

As they drew closer to the derelict, Wellington surveyed the area to see if they were alone, but no ships, air or otherwise, hovered over the choppy waters. The dunes reached higher than he liked, towering over them by at least two stories. He paused, tapping his fingers against his hips as he surveyed the terrain.

“Something amiss, Welly?” Eliza asked, motioning to his less-than-elegant stance. “Ready for trouble?”

“Just . . . just . . .” he stammered, suddenly feeling the stress of her regard,” . . . getting a lay of the land is all.”

To his surprise, she nodded in approval. “I don't like the dunes either. There's just too much opportunity to pin someone down from there.” She playfully rapped him on the arm. “Excellent instincts.”

Suddenly, the cold seemed less bothersome. He smiled back at her. “Shall we get a closer look at your lead?”

“Oh,” she said, slipping her arm into his, “a walk along the beach to the site of a shipwreck. You really know the way to a girl's heart, don't you?”

They drew closer to the major damage that must have brought down the vessel. Much of the hull had been blasted away, one hole in the keel and a larger breach where an engine and propeller array would have been. Wellington gave a gentle pat of her arm before slipping away to get a closer look at the smaller damage point.

Felicity, returning from the bow, gestured along the hull as she said, “She's christened as the
Delilah
. There's no record of this ship either coming or going in the past week.”

“Really?” Eliza asked. “Not even for a moonlight cruise?”

“I would have seen it,” she stated. “The beacon we heard could be a standard distress signal. Even the illegal ones carry those.”

“A ship not registered in any logs, incoming or outgoing.” Bill followed the ship from stern to bow. “Smugglers?”

“That stands to reason,” Eliza concurred. She turned back to Felicity. “Maybe you can run down any previous history this ship has with the local law?” Felicity nodded, produced a pad from inside her coat and quickly jotted down a note. “Bill, when you and Felicity looked at the recent disappearances, did you notice if any of them were unregistered like the
Delilah
here?”

“No, but I guess Felicity has something else to add to that list once we get back to the Retreat. Don't ya?”

Felicity glanced up from her pad. “It wouldn't kill you to make an aether transmission, or maybe crack open a ledger now and then.”

Bill rolled his eyes. “Darlin', that is exactly what your job is—cracking open them books.”

His partner shook her pretty head. “If this particular vessel is a pirate ship, that would explain the lack of action from local and state government,” Felicity said. “But this still does not explain what Major Brantfield claims to have seen.”

Wellington continued to stare at the hole in
Delilah
's keel. “But Brantfield saw something. We're staring at what we've never had until now—evidence.” There was something about the keel damage that he was missing. “Still no closer as to why it's happening.”