Sophronia stayed out of sight, tracking her friend effortlessly, knowing Dimity was headed to the back squeak deck. Sophronia had it easier. She used a small grappling rope knotted at stages for climbing, her own personal invention. It was undemanding to creep along the same level, but up and down could be a challenge on an airship hull. Sophronia had scavenged rope from the sooties and asked Vieve to build her a hook and the emission hurlie. The hurlie was a kind of turtle-shaped device that clipped to Sophronia’s wrist. Vieve was fond of things that clipped to wrists. Once Sophronia flipped the catch at the turtle’s tail, a spring-loaded release mechanism allowed her to fling the turtle’s shell, with the grapple underneath, and the rope followed behind. Best of all, Sophronia didn’t have to use the ladder from Lady Linette’s balcony every time she wanted to visit the sooties.
Instead of climbing up onto the deck after Dimity, Sophronia continued edging around to the very back of the ship. She reeled in her grappling hook and hung off the side, looking into the skies, hunting for an airdinghy. Above her, the squeak deck was abandoned under its great balloon, except for Dimity. Dimity’s view was obstructed by the smokestacks, mast, and propeller, but Sophronia could see around and between them. The school floated with the breeze, so the air around them felt still and windless.
Hours seemed to pass, and Sophronia was convinced that the letter was a hoax. Then she saw it, coming up from below—an airdinghy. There was someone crewing it, but she could make out nothing from her vantage point but its sail and four balloons.
Above, Dimity’s silhouette came to the rails and looked out, but she could not see what Sophronia saw.
Sophronia wondered how Lord Dingleproops intended to board without setting off any of the school’s alarms. The back was the safest choice, since teachers and staff slept in the forward section and students in the middle, but there were mechanicals everywhere. Several had protocols that had them do nothing but look for shapes in the sky and set off alarms in teachers’ bedrooms when they saw something.
Fearlessly, the airdinghy rose up until it was almost level with Sophronia. She heard Dimity give a glad little cry of welcome. When Sophronia could finally see into the gondola, there were two men, not the one boy Dimity expected. Sophronia had met Lord Dingleproops once at a party; he was a reedy, chinless, redheaded blighter, and while tall and strapping, he was not bulky. Both of these men were bulky. There was certainly something wrong.
As the airdinghy rose higher, Sophronia squinted, trying to make out more of the figures in the dark. Then she realized what was off about them. No top hats. No gentleman would ever meet a lady without appropriate headgear, even if that meeting was a joke. Whoever these men were, they were not noblemen. Plus Lord Dingleproops was a member of the Pistons, a social club. A Piston’s top hat was his marker, his sign of status; to travel without it was unthinkable.
Sophronia was not prepared to mount a defense, but she didn’t want anything to happen to Dimity. She threw her bread roll from dinner at the men. It hit one in the head but didn’t appear to do any permanent damage, even though it was a very hard roll. The man swore and looked up at her.
Sophronia cursed herself. All she had done was attract their attention, and one of them now pointed a pistol at her. Banking on the fact that he wouldn’t want to fire because of the noise, she wrapped one arm tightly about the railing that was her current anchor and pointed her hurlie at the airdinghy. She ejected the grapple toward one of the four balloons. The grapple sailed over, but on the pull back she felt the barb catch and tear through the fabric.
The airdinghy lurched to one side.
The man guiding the dinghy yelled. The other shot his pistol at Sophronia, who swung out and to one side, avoiding the bullet.
Above them, Dimity said, “What’s going on? Lord Dingleproops, is that you? Was that gunfire? You’ll wake the teachers!”
Sophronia shot her grapple again, catching another one of the balloons and gashing it open. Two ripped balloons was more than the airdinghy could manage, and it began to spin and sink, gaining speed as it went. The men inside were now more concerned with their own safety than with Sophronia or Dimity.
Dimity squeaked in alarm, calling, “Wait, come back!” But her imagined suitor was gone.
Sophronia yelled up to her, “That wasn’t Lord Dingleproops.”
Dimity was annoyed enough to actually speak with her. “Sophronia? What are you doing following me?”
“Keeping you safe.”
“By sabotaging my assignation?”