Steampunk Prime_ A Vintage Steampunk Reader - Mike Ashley [129]
For a moment she lay there, lulled by the threnody of the gale, the shuddering vibration of the tremendous hull driven by its ion-motors, the sibilant hissing of the air-intakes as the vacuum chambers adjusted their lift to the needs of the ship.
“A tedious old world, indeed!” She repeated, closing her eyes with resignation; while the vast fabric of the liner, paced by the racing moon that fled before, roared westward, ever westward, swift and terrible upon the wings of night.
II
THE scraping of a chair at her side aroused her. She turned her head and looked. A line of annoyance drew between her brows. To be interrupted by the intrusion of a stranger, just when she had been feeling most comfortably pessimistic, was annoying.
She was about to resume her meditation when something in the newcomer’s face arrested her attention. Though it was shaded by a cap of silver fox-skin, she seemed to have recognized him. He looked undeniably familiar.
She studied him a moment. He seemed a man no longer young, nor yet old — a man “between two ages,” as the French say; forty perhaps. The wrinkles at the corner of his eyes bespoke observation, world-wisdom, sagacity, tempered by a saving sense of humor. His mouth, holding a pipe, showed strong lips; his chin was molded on lines that might perhaps, be just a little hard.
The girl appraised him with spurred interest. Indubitably a large man, well above the six feet that the human male now averaged, not even his heavy furs could conceal a certain lithe strength distinctive in an age of physical ease. Her eyes fell on his right hand, which was bare; a big hand, white, powerful, yet with fingers that bespoke the artist. He wore a single ring of dull gold; an unsymmetrical pattern — an eagle, one wing furled, one spread, with marvelously carven feathers. The eagle’s eye was fashioned of a diamond; its claw grasped another. A strange ring, thought the girl. A ring that somehow singularly befitted that white, virile hand.
She leaned back again, piqued at herself for the interest she had felt. The book in her lap slid off; it slapped the deck sharply. Stooping, the man removed the pipe from his mouth. He picked up the book and glanced at it. With an odd smile, he looked at her — and then she knew him.
“Norford Hale!” She exclaimed involuntarily, angry at the quickening of her heart, the burning of her cheek.
“Why, you’re my Romney girl!” Said he. “How did you know me?”
“Oh, I’ve known you for years and years,” she answered, seemingly without knowing just what she was saying. “Everybody does, I fancy. You are Norford Hale, aren’t you?”
He nodded, smiling still; and now she noted his sun-tanned face and steady eyes.
“I can’t deny it — Romney,” said he.
“Why do you call me that?” She demanded. “How on earth can you know my nickname, the name my friends all call me?”
“’Who could help it? I’ve had more than a few pictures of you, cut from magazines, these last few years. Who doesn’t know Romney’s portrait of Lady Hamilton? You must be a reincarnation of her, or something of that sort. At any rate, I’ve long been calling you my Romney girl. You don’t know it, but you were the heroine of my ‘Nights on Parnassus.’ Romney reminds one of gypsies and all that, too; I’ve always fancied you a wanderer, an unconventional, outdoor, woodsy kind of girl-are you?”
“Please don’t let’s get personal, on two minutes” acquaintance,” she remarked, rather severely.
“I beg you a thousand pardons!” He returned, with just a tinge of mockery that by no means escaped her. He held out the book. “Allow me to give back my latest — and worst piece of modern materialism.”
“It is bad,” she agreed, taking the book. “It’s nearly put me to sleep several times. I call it my soporific.”
He laughed heartily, showing fine teeth.
“Romney,” said he, “you’re the first frank and truthful human being I’ve met in years. My next book shall certainly