The Steam Mole (3 page)

When he finally awoke, weak and exhausted but in his right mind again, it was in the palm-thatched “hospital” of Denong prison camp. He was somewhat cloudy as to how he'd got there, but he remembered some things very clearly. He remembered the part about Duke Malcolm and being a pawn not to be killed early.

It had to be true. The hospital, such as it was, and the medical help, such as that was, were for the warders only, not for the prisoners. The prisoners had even fewer facilities, and mostly just died where they fell.

Jack Calland, the Irish rebel, didn't know what his ex-wife Mary had done to make Duke Malcolm, the feared head of British Imperial Intelligence take a personal interest in her. They'd divorced on anything but amicable terms when he'd been arrested. As far as the Imperial Intelligence Service knew it had been very ugly, and Jack's value as a pawn there was nonexistent. Of course, he and Mary knew differently. Or at least, Jack hoped and believed that she did. They had a daughter to care for, and if the Imperials had thought his wife might be involved, or might even be sympathetic…well, Clara would have been left alone.

For Clara they would both have done anything. And she was their jewel.

Jack was terribly afraid that Duke Malcolm had worked that part out—terribly afraid he might have betrayed something in his delirium. He remembered they'd brought him paper. Made him write. That was all right, Mary knew their code. She'd know that it wasn't something he'd write of his own free will. But the fact that Duke Malcolm wanted him as a lever…that was worrying.

It meant he had to do one of two things: He either had to escape, or he had to die.

Only…here in the deserts and steaming jungles of Northern Queensland, to escape was to die.

Being Jack Calland, he decided he might as well do that, then.

“Mrs. Darlington, can't I at least talk to my mother?” asked Clara, doing her best to be polite and not sound desperate.

“But my dear, you spoke with her only two hours ago. She was delirious and confused. The hospital says she's asleep now. What do you need to talk to her about, my dear?”

The question flatfooted Clara. She couldn't tell this woman—who was the wife of someone important in the Westralian government—the truth. “Um. I'm just terribly worried about her.”

The truth she couldn't tell took her straight to the gas-lit halls of Hansmeyers Emporium, the finest department store in Ceduna, and possibly all of Westralia, exclusive suppliers of all the finest drapery, haberdashery, ladies footwear, fabrics, and fine linens, as well as things of lesser importance. Clara had been relieved to be spared the ironmongery and other departments Mrs. Darlington considered barely worth noticing. One could get anything in Westralia, Imperial embargo or not. The prices could make a girl's eyes water, though. Either everyone was rich or no one bought anything. Mrs. Darlington plainly did, though, and she thought it a high treat bound to distract Clara.

It might have done so, too, on another day, when Clara didn't have such worries on her mind. Mrs. Darlington had been distracted by various shades of pale lilac cotton chiffon, and Clara had wandered off a little, lost in thought, among the roof-high towers of rolls of fabric. A rat-faced little man stood just at the end of the stack. He beckoned to her, looking about as if afraid a cat might suddenly arrive. Clara backed off.

“I have a message for you,” he whispered. “Come over here.”

Everything about him made her hackles rise. “From whom?” she asked.

“Jack Calland,” he replied, holding up a small envelope.

She couldn't help herself. She reached forward and grabbed it. As she opened it, the furtive little man said, “If you want to see him alive, you'll meet me here tomorrow at nine. We can make arrangements. He's in Queensland.”

Clara was too busy staring at the grubby piece of paper to answer him…or notice that he'd disappeared. She was torn from rereading the letter from her father for a third time when she was forced to shove it hastily into her reticule by Mrs. Darlington's summons.

He was alive. And in a prison in Queensland. And if she cooperated, she could see him again.

Clara knew the rat-faced man with the ginger whiskers must be a spy. An Imperial agent. She knew it was a trap. She also desperately wanted to see her father. She wanted him so badly, now, with mother sick. And she had not been able to get to the rendezvous with the spy. Rat-face probably didn't know that had been her only chance to see her mother, and that she'd been with Mrs. Darlington the entire time.

He probably thought she didn't believe the letter.

She did.

She knew Daddy's writing better than she knew anyone's. She'd read his few letters to her to pieces. This letter…it was his writing, just not his normal way of saying things.

The other letter made it clear that they were offering her father's freedom in return for her cooperation. In other words, in exchange for her mother's secret method of making ammonia from the air…something that Clara couldn't tell them how to do, even if she were willing to.

Mrs. Darlington sighed. “Clara, my dear, I don't quite know how to put this to you, except quite bluntly, but you're quite a big girl now.”

Clara gritted her teeth, determined not to say anything. If she
were a boy, like Tim, she'd have been out and working by now. The plump, elegant, perfumed, terribly kind Mrs. Darlington continued, not noticing the effect her choice of words had on her young guest, “There is, sadly, a real chance your mother won't get better, dear. The doctors and the hospital are doing their best, giving her the best care possible. And you will be looked after. I promise.”

Clara ought to have been upset and shocked. Instead she looked stonily at the ground, refusing to let herself cry, because it was no surprise, and she'd cried herself dry last night. And as if she cared about being “looked after…”

She wanted
them
looked after. And while Mother had half the doctors in Westralia fussing about her, her father had nothing. She needed help. Someone she could rely on, someone she could trust. “Mrs. Darlington, can I…can I get hold of Captain Malkis? Or Lieutenant Willis?” She didn't say “or Tim Barnabas,” because this woman would never understand.

“Who…? Oh, the captain of your submarine! I'm afraid they're out in the desert right now, Clara. You could write to them, I suppose. But really dear, you'll be well looked after, I promise.” Her tone said what she thought of nasty, rough submariners.

I will not scream at her. She thinks she's being kind
. “How could I obtain their addresses, Mrs. Darlington?”

It had all happened so quickly after the
Cuttlefish
had been towed into the quayside. The Westralian officers might have been wearing strange, broad hats and uniforms the color of sand, but they looked like officers and they had gold braid on their shoulders. Mother still hadn't been ready to trust them, but Captain Malkis had vouched for the Westralian major, and before Clara had been able to say “Jack Robinson,” let alone her proper farewells to the crew and to Tim, they'd been whisked away, promising to come and see them all soon.

After all, the submarine wouldn't be going anywhere in a hurry. Clara knew the boat would have to have major repairs before she could leave.

Clara hadn't guessed then that her mother would fall sick and be put in quarantine. She'd assumed they could come back tomorrow, and the next day…and, well, until the submarine left, which was somewhere in a future she hadn't thought of.

Clara found she'd been right about the submarine not going anywhere for months, but by the time she'd been able to get Mrs. Darlington to take her down to the quays, she found that the
Cuttlefish
had been moved, and that although the submarine might not be going anywhere for months, her crew were already scattered, working, while their boat was repaired and refitted. Westralia had no place for people who didn't work…except for her, it seemed.

“My dear, you're looking a little pale. Are you feeling all right? I know you've had a terrible shock, and I know dear Dr. Leaming examined you, but are you feeling quite all right? Health-wise, I mean.”

Clara could almost see the perfumed and powdered lady lean away from her. No one yet knew quite what disease Mother had picked up, or how infectious it might be.

“I'm feeling fine,” Clara said. “Just worried. And a little hot. Can't we go outside for a little?”

Like most of the houses in Ceduna, this one was made of corrugated iron, with wide verandahs. During the day it was shut up to keep the heat out, and they only opened the big sliding windows and drapes at night. Clara was used to the enclosed air of the submarine, but when they'd got out onto the deck the air off the sea had at least been cool. Not so here. The town and port, and most of all the desalination plant, had huge sand walls to stop the Royal Navy from shelling them—thus keeping the sea breeze out and only letting in the hot wind from the interior.

“It's nearly a quarter past ten in the morning, dear,” said Mrs. Darlington. “We don't want to go out now. You'll get heatstroke, and the sun is so bad for your complexion, even with a parasol.”

Clara gritted her teeth again. Welcome to Australia, where people sleep in the daytime and work at night. The “day” started in
what her body clock said was the middle of the night, when it was cool enough. It was spring now. Clara didn't even want to think about summer. In Ceduna the people lived on the surface. In the interior of Australia, far from the cooling influence of the sea, it got even hotter, and anyone who lived there, lived underground, like moles. She was feeling like a mole herself, blind and digging. “Can you please ask someone for the addresses for the
Cuttlefish
crew, ma'am? It would only be polite if I wrote to them to thank them.”

This obviously impressed Mrs. Darlington. “Of course. So good that you've been a well-brought-up little girl. I wish you'd learn from her, Linda. ‘Bread-and-butter' letters are so often neglected. I'll call Maxie, and he can have them dispatch one of the black boys to run over with a list.”

Maxie—Mr. Darlington—seemed to work as many hours as he possibly could. And the black boys…well, she'd seen them. They were aboriginals, and it seemed it was all right to ask them to run in the heat.

Across the world, in London, Duke Malcolm looked at the report in his hands, looked out at Pall Mall Canal outside his widow, pursed his lips, and looked back to the medical man in front of his desk. “Dr. Weltztraimer, just what is the prognosis?”

The doctor looked uncomfortable. He always did, but the duke had him fast in his web. Weltztraimer had already killed before Duke Malcolm caught him and made him provide poisons for Imperial Security instead. “She should be dead, Your Grace. That amount of aconite should have killed her. I can only assume that somehow she did not get the full dose.”

The duke sighed. “I know Dr. Calland should be dead, Adolphus. The point is, she isn't. So what are her chances of recovery?”

“Good, if she can avoid any more of the poison,” said the doctor.

“And if she doesn't? I have arranged for further small doses to be administered.”

“She is, by all reports, not far from death, Your Grace.”

The duke nodded. “There's no knowing how much she was able to tell them before it took effect, but still, hopefully the damage will be limited.”

The duke's brother Albert, the Prince of Prussia, came striding into the stateroom, not even bothering to knock.

He smiled, and that was enough to irritate Duke Malcolm even more. “I hear nature succeeded where you failed, little brother.”

“What do you mean?” asked Duke Malcolm, keeping a rein on his temper.

“That scientist. The chemist. What was her name? Calland? The one with some breakthrough with nitrate synthesis that you were trying to stop from escaping. She's got some disease. Delirious, apparently. That buys us a little time, and with any luck she'll die. I have ordered my scientists to redouble their efforts.”

Duke Malcolm gave Dr. Weltztraimer a warning look.

The doctor kept his silence, but Albert hadn't finished talking. “I thought you had some plan for her husband.”

“I did,” said Duke Malcolm, who disliked revealing too much to anyone who didn't need to know, and didn't like the doctor being party to this conversation. “It will be called off. We've just had some trouble with our radio-telegraphy into Queensland.”

“I might tell you that our dear brother has actually interested himself in matters down in Queensland. The other project.”

Duke Malcolm blinked. Thank heavens Albert was being at least a little cryptic. Their older brother almost never concerned himself with anything more than fashion. But he was the King, the emperor, the commander-in-chief of the Imperial forces. “You may go, Weltztraimer,” said Duke Malcolm.

The doctor bowed and left at a hasty scuttle. When he was safely
out of earshot, Duke Malcolm turned to his brother. “I didn't even know Ernest was aware of it. What's going on here, Albert?”

The prince's responsibilities in the emergency interim government—convened when the Melt disaster had destroyed governments across the British Empire, and House of Windsor-Schaumberg-Lippe had stepped in to save the British Empire—included almost everything no one else wanted to do.

“What is it ever with Ernest?” the prince asked.

“Money,” Duke Malcolm replied, rolling his eyes. Their brother managed to waste vast amounts of it on palaces, boats, pavilions, and clothes, but resented expenditure on unimportant things, like intelligence or the Royal Navy. “What's he on about? The cost, or the prize?”

“He's got wind of the silver in your prize, and he wants it.”