Ether & Elephants by Cindy Spencer Pape

Author:Cindy Spencer Pape [Pape, Cindy Spencer]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: Fiction, Science Fiction, Steampunk, romance, fantasy, Action & Adventure, General
ISBN: 9781459290259
Google: LDo6CQAAQBAJ
Barnesnoble:
Goodreads: 20646647
Publisher: Carina Press
Published: 2014-12-31T13:00:00+00:00

* * *

Gander wasn’t much different from any other small English village. There was an old stone church, not remarkably old or dramatically beautiful, just squat, stone and functional. The High Street was lined with two- and three-story Tudor buildings, and a neat, grassy square marked the center of the buildings. It wasn’t as full of black soot as London or even Cambridge, but it was foggy enough to warrant masks, unlike the villages near Hadrian Hall or Black Heath, which had adopted the use of air scrubbers in all their chimneys and smokestacks. Nell couldn’t wait for the day when Wink’s invention became universally employed throughout the realm. She hated breathing masks, even the miniature ones Wink had developed for ladies, but as a singer, she would never risk her voice by going without one.

Tom pulled the car to a stop in front of the village pub. “I’ll go in and ask, unless you’d rather?”

“Go ahead.” So, he was in a snit about her getting the information from Bartlett. Even raised by Merrick and Caro, he was a man in a man’s world. Why did it have to be so hard for him to accept help from a woman? Perhaps it was just her. He didn’t want to be bested by sweet, helpless, useless Nell.

She was done being the family mouse. Being demure had never gotten her anywhere. It was time to be her own woman.

Tom returned to the car, pale and nearly quivering with tension. “She’s alive. Her cottage is just a few blocks from here.”

“You want to walk or drive?” The walk would give him time to channel that nervous energy building inside him at the thought of meeting his possible mother-in-law.

“Let’s walk.”

Nell had already let herself out of the car.

Tom caught up to her in a few quick strides, before she’d had the chance to turn one way or the other in front of the pub. “Left.” He took her arm and steered her in that direction. “I can’t believe we never found her mother before. I swear, I thought I’d investigated as thoroughly as possible.”

“Perhaps the time just wasn’t right.” She’d wondered much the same, but in the past few days had begun to take a more fatalistic point of view. “But also, you didn’t have as many different sources of information then. It’s where those paths cross that we found the clues pointing us here. Without Wink’s engines, without Professor Wiggins, without knowing about the prince—” she dropped her voice to a whisper on the last word “—we’d never have come to the conclusions we did.”

“I could have checked with the other publicans. In fact, I swear I did.” His walk was stilted, letting her know how hard it was to slow himself to her pace. Too bad. He could suffer. She wasn’t ill-bred enough to run on a public street and she wasn’t feeling that sympathetic toward him.

She wasn’t totally without heart so she squeezed his arm. “I’m sure you did. And they may have given different answers back then, especially to a young man, unaccompanied.

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