The Stars Blue Yonder (25 page)

Jodenny stared at the Admiral's formidable nose and weathered face. He didn't look friendly. Then again, approachability wasn't a characteristic highly prized in British sea captains. She studied the lace curtains on the windows, the thin books of poetry on a side table, and the small clock ticking on the mantelpiece. The nineteenth century was quieter than a spaceship.

“She met me when I was at my worst, just after Homer left me here. Took me in,” Osherman said. “In addition to stray Team Space officers, she also takes in cats and dogs.”

Jodenny laughed at that, but only a little. Her heart was too full of other feelings to let amusement creep in. She sat down in a chair that afforded a view of the sunlit street.

“I can't be trapped here,” she said. “I can't, Sam. I can't sit here without
knowing what's happened to him. He could be out there, hurt. Alone. Needing help.”

Osherman said, “Or he could be dead.”

“Shut the fuck up,” she said, and it was the first time she'd ever said anything like that to him.

He moved to her chair and crouched down. His hands grabbed her fists. “Listen to me. He could be dead, Jodenny. At Kultana. He could be trapped in the future. He could be stuck traveling in that ouroboros, never finding a home. You don't know. I don't know. We might never know.”

She bowed into herself, grief like a heavy anchor.

“But I'm here,” he said. “I'm here, and I'm not going anywhere. Let me help you.”

Jodenny didn't answer—couldn't answer, not with so many words locked up in her throat.

The front door opened with a jangle, and a brown-haired woman in finery and jewels bustled in with a tall Aboriginal servant in tow. “Well, now!” she called out. “I'm home! I'm home and I've brought wonderful things for all of us! Where is everyone?”

She stopped in the parlor doorway to gaze at them in frank surprise. “My dearest Mrs. Osherman, why are you weeping?”

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

Jodenny rose out of her chair and wiped at her face. She was absolutely not crying, no matter what anyone said.

“Lady Scott,” she said formally. “Thank you for your hospitality.”

Lady Scott peered at her with watery blue eyes. Her face was deeply lined and her hair stark white. She was as tall as Jodenny, but much larger in the bosom. Her jaunty hat sported a peacock feather, her leather shoes had golden buckles on them, and there were enough frills and lace in her voluminous dress to make curtains for the entire house.

“My dearest Mrs. Osherman,” Lady Scott said. “You are welcome here in my home for as long as you'd like. The Captain told me how arduous the journey was for you, so heavy with child. It's a miracle you arrived in Australia unscathed. I trust that Lilly and Sarah have been seeing to your needs? What a fine dress you have!”

Jodenny smoothed down a sleeve. “It was yours.”

Lady Scott beamed. “Excellent choice, then. You haven't met Tulip. Tulip, this is Mrs. Osherman.”

The Aboriginal stepped forward. His clothes were common but sturdy, and he wore no shoes. He was forty years old, maybe, his hair gray at the edges. One eye was clear and focused but the other was damaged and milky. He had an armful of bags and packages that were no doubt the fruits of Lady Scott's shopping.

“Missus,” he said, with a nod.

Jodenny replied, “Pleased to meet you.”

Lady Scott clapped her hands. “I'm famished, aren't you? We must have dinner. And wine! We must have wine!”

She swept herself off with Tulip in tow and barked out orders for Lilly and Sarah. Within minutes Jodenny was sitting down beside Osherman at the dining room table, where a meal of cooked chicken had been set out along with cheese, potatoes, and fresh hot bread. There was wine and milk to drink, and Jodenny couldn't decide which was worse for Junior—alcohol or god knew what bacteria in the milk.

“Maybe just hot tea for you,” Osherman said.

Lady Scott was a chatterbox; she rambled on about the weather, the market, her visit with her banker, her visit with the doctor, and did she mention the gossip about the governor, and had she told them the charming story about the shoemaker's son? Osherman indulged the old woman with conversation while Jodenny ate around the dead animal on her plate and swallowed all of her tea. She couldn't believe this woman was her grandmother however many generations back; Homer had said it, but Homer couldn't be trusted.

“Dear girl, don't you like the chicken?” Lady Scott asked.

Jodenny squared her shoulders. “I'm a vegetarian, ma'am.”

“Vegetarian!” Lady Scott frowned. “I've heard of that. Strange beliefs about food and health, those vegetarians.”

“Actually, where I come from”—Jodenny started, and then felt the nudge of Osherman's foot against her shin. She ended with—“people have all sorts of ideas about food.”

“You have the strangest accent,” Lady Scott mused. “The captain here says you're from the American colonies. How is it, living in Boston?”

Jodenny was trying to think of a suitable response when Osherman said, “My wife's parents took her all over the world, ma'am. She has an accent reflecting global travel.”

“Very global,” Jodenny agreed.

Lady Scott lifted her glass of wine. “To global travel! It broadens the mind and empties the purse. Though for some I suspect it empties the mind as well. When you see too many marvelous things you grow jaded and cynical, don't you think?”

“Josephine is neither cynical nor jaded,” Osherman said, patting Jodenny's hand.

She wasn't sure exactly when she had become
Josephine
, but for appearance's sake she squeezed his hand back. Hard. “My husband speaks too well of me. He has no idea how cynical my heart has grown.”

Lady Scott smiled at her. “Cynicism becomes you, child. I was afraid you were a mere wallflower. This city needs more female leadership. More feminine grit and backbone. You must come with us next week to the governor's luncheon. He's sailing back to England soon, and this is his big farewell. I shall introduce you to the finest of society.”

“I couldn't,” Jodenny said immediately. She put one hand on junior's bump. “My condition.”

“Don't be silly,” Osherman said. “The fresh air and good company will do you good.”

Lady Scott said, “Exactly!”

Jodenny kicked Osherman and gave Lady Scott her most sincere look. “I grow anxious in crowds.”

“I do, too,” Lady Scott confided. “But the rooms at Government House are very large.”

Jodenny let the argument lapse. Surely, by next week, Myell would have already found some way to come for her, or Homer would have returned, or maybe she could just fake an illness. She could see that Osherman was going to be a significant problem. He was used to this place—perhaps he even liked it—but she had no intention of making this century her home.

Then again, she didn't suppose Osherman had money to support them, and Jodenny certainly had no income. The prospect of losing Lady Scott's hospitality wasn't a pleasant one. Not without a credit chit
to put them up in a hotel or some wild fortune to see them into their own house.

Not that she needed a house.

Myell would come for her.

Lady Scott wasn't unpleasant company, but she talked so much and so eagerly that Jodenny wondered if she'd run off all her friends and neighbors with the chatter. Granted, Jodenny had sat through many interminable meetings and some truly awful wardroom dinners, but this time the food was an additional horror. Her ears ached and her stomach roiled at the sight of the chicken, and without any warning at all Osherman was saying, “I think perhaps some rest is in order. Josephine, you don't look well.”

“I feel fine,” she protested, but that wasn't true. She was dizzy on the stairs and it was a relief when he got her to her room and the bed.

She stared up at the slowly rotating ceiling and said, “What's wrong with me?”

“That dress, the food, and traveling through centuries of time,” Osherman said. “I slept a lot my first few days here.”

Jodenny wanted to know more about that, but her eyelids closed on their own. She told her subconscious to conjure up Myell. Surely in dreams they could be connected. But her vision remained dark and dreamless, as if he'd never even existed.

True to Osherman's word, Jodenny spent much of the next few days sleeping. The most comfortable position was on her side, with a pillow wedged between her knees and another to keep her and Junior from rolling backward. Otherwise Junior's weight and position made her back ache and her breathing grow short. The heat was relentless, but Osherman kept the curtains drawn and had a hand fan to move the air around. He was very attentive, bringing her food and drink whenever she was awake. But lethargy was her most constant companion, dragging her under for hours on end to nightmares about burning ships and Roon carriers. It wasn't until the third morning that she woke up feeling as if she'd passed the worst of it.

She blinked her eyes in the predawn light and wondered why someone was snoring down near the floor. Jodenny peeked over the bed and
saw Osherman stretched out on a blanket and pillow. When he was awake, she asked him about that.

“Well,” he said, looking embarrassed, “this was my room before you showed up. There aren't any other spares. And everyone knows we're man and wife.”

“How long are you planning to sleep down there?”

He ducked his head and didn't answer.

“We can share this bed,” Jodenny said. “Unless you're afraid I might roll over and squash you.”

“You're comfortable with that?”

Myell wouldn't have been. Archly she said, “I'm comfortable as long as you stay on your side of the mattress, Commander.”

He offered her a rare, small smile.

Junior, meanwhile, was using all of Jodenny's sleep time to grow at some mutant super-speedy exponential rate. Jodenny was getting so large, and so ungainly, that surely labor was about to descend upon her at any moment. Luckily she had the Digital Duola in her head. Every day she consulted her brain for what to do if the baby was breech, if the bleeding couldn't be stopped, if the afterbirth didn't come out. She felt fairly sure she could handle any problems, with Osherman's help.

Somewhat sure.

Confident
. That was the word, bitter on her tongue.

She learned the routine of the house—breakfast, dinner, afternoon tea, and a light supper after dark. The girls went out every morning to do the shopping for the day. Lady Scott's social and civic obligations had her out of the house much of the time. She also had a suitor, a history professor named Wallace who kept a house just down the street. Osherman spent most of his days out as well, on business or visiting “friends,” and from the latter he often returned with glassy eyes and his clothes smelling like tobacco and cologne. She wondered if he had a girlfriend somewhere in the city that he didn't want to tell her about, or a men's club where he was playing poker and drinking beer.

“Sometimes I make some money at cards,” he admitted. “Mostly it's business—meeting the right people, making the right deals. Sometimes I just listen to people. Jodenny, we're travelers in an entirely different century. Aren't you interested in what they think? What they're going to do?”

“Not especially.” She was sitting in the largest chair of the parlor with her hands laced over Junior, her swollen feet propped up on a stool. Her back ached and her lower legs had been cramping all day. Piano music from a neighbor's house drifted on the breeze. Jodenny didn't recognize the melody but the notes were slow and melancholy. If she listened too hard she might start thinking about Myell, and then she'd start crying again.

His mouth twisted. “I don't think that's true. I think you do care. No matter where you go and what you do, it's your nature to care.”

“I won't be here long enough to make friends, Sam. And you know that when we go, they'll never even remember we were here. This world will evaporate. There's no use growing attached to any of them.”

It might be too late for him, having already spent eight months in this eddy. He was bound to have formed friendships and favorites. But their century awaited them like clouds on the horizon: Team Space, the Roon, Myell. Especially Myell.

To distract herself from the hollow loneliness in her chest she tried helping Lilly and Sarah with the housework. They were aghast at the very idea. While they were outside pinning up wet laundry she snuck into the kitchen and was happy to discover it wasn't crawling with maggots or bugs or other obviously unsanitary creatures. Still, there wasn't any ice in summertime to keep things cold and electrical refrigerators had yet to make their debut. The food they ate every day was fresh but spoiled easily, so she resolved to eat only food that had been thoroughly boiled.

“Your wife has a strange preoccupation with food,” she heard Lady Scott tell Osherman in amusement.

Osherman said, “She's had some unpleasant experiences.”

That was a lie. But she'd worked in Food Service divisions aboard spaceships and knew that salmonella, E. coli, and other microscopic dangers lurked in raw or contaminated food. It was bad enough that she could smell sewage in the air, both day and night. The smell of it sank into her clothes and hair and she had to douse herself with some of Lady Scott's perfume to keep her nose from turning up. Worse, perhaps, were the armies of flies, lice, nits, bedbugs, ticks, and rats crawling
the streets and walls and air, all carrying bacteria and viruses, with nary an antibiotic or disinfectant in sight.

“The bugs, they do bite,” Lilly said, unnecessarily, as she made Jodenny's bed up one morning. “We boil the sheets once a week and that kills the little beasties. Tulip, now, he's got himself a paste that he uses to keep the flies away. Lady Scott uses it, too.”