TRAVERS RESTED COMFORTABLY in the center of his raft. He was surrounded on four sides by hulking men who trained rifles on the water, watching for ripples. “Calhoun. Mr. Houndstooth. Ladies.” Hero made a disgruntled sound, and Mr. Travers tipped his hat to them in particular with a cough. “Et alia. I look forward to hosting you on the Sturgess Queen—my finest boat. Only the best accommodations.”
“Oh, we couldn’t possibly—” Hero began, but Mr. Travers interrupted.
“It’s the least I can do in exchange for the immense services you’ll be providing to the government of this great nation,” he said with a thin smile. “I quite insist.”
Houndstooth was still for a moment, his eyes on the goons’ rifles. The Gate let out a ferocious squeal as the ranger pulled the lever to open it. It slid sideways, nesting neatly under the ranger’s post. The wake lapped at the hippos’ flanks, darkening the waxed leather of their harnesses.
“Well,” Houndstooth said to the rest of the hoppers. “I suppose it doesn’t change too much if we’re aboard the Sturgess Queen. Fewer fleas than the Inn, I’m sure.” His face was open, and spoke to a pleasantly surprising change in plans. His expression betrayed none of the risk he was being forced to swallow. None of the rage.
It took a full minute for the Gate to open. The five of them walked through abreast, Zahra trailing behind Stasia. As they passed below the ranger’s post, Hero flung the man’s hat high in the air. It spun like a discus, and the ranger leaned out to catch it. The moment Zahra’s tail had passed the threshold, the squeal began again, and the Gate closed behind them.
Behind Travers, the narrow passage of the Gate opened up into the waters of the Harriet. The humid haze of the day didn’t quite obscure the massive dam that dominated the horizon behind him, dwarfing the riverboats and pleasure barges that dotted the water. Here and there, a canoe-sized islet bumped up out of the surface of the Harriet. Houndstooth would have expected them to be covered with birds—but then, he supposed the ferals made this a dangerous place to be a bird.
Mr. Travers clasped his hands in front of his chest, staring at the crew with wine-black eyes. His slim, slick moustache twitched over his icy smile. “Welcome to the Harriet.”
* * *
Hero dropped their bag onto the floor of the presidential suite and took the room in. It was small as far as presidential suites went, but it was, according to Mr. Travers, the largest on the Sturgess Queen.
“Well,” said Houndstooth. “Seems cozy enough, this. If you like red velvet.” He ran a hand over the seat of the plush divan that sat under the window. Hero closed their eyes and breathed deeply. Their lips parted just a little, and Houndstooth nearly died with the effort of not noticing it.
“I do.”
Houndstooth jumped. “What? You, hm, you what?”
Hero opened their eyes and considered Houndstooth, who was perched on the edge of the divan, stiff-backed, holding his hat in his lap. They cocked their head and smiled.
“I do like red velvet.”
Houndstooth moved to the window and twitched the curtain aside. “What do you make of Travers, then? I don’t like that he made us check our guns. ‘Standard security procedures,’ indeed. I don’t like it. I don’t like it at all. And did you see the munitions he had stored down there? What, is he expecting a war to break out?” He cleared his throat, smoothed the front of his jacket.
“I think,” Hero drawled, crossing the room to join him, “that he’s the least of our problems.”
Hero stared out the window. Houndstooth stared at Hero. “What’s the worst of our problems?”
Hero smiled, watching the water below them. “Well, Winslow. There’s only one bed in here.” They turned their head, still smiling, and took in Houndstooth’s rich pink blush. “And last I counted, there’s two of us.”
Houndstooth stammered incoherently as Hero chucked him under the chin, then strolled out of the room, easing the door shut behind them. When the latch clicked, Houndstooth collapsed onto the divan. He stared at the bed, willing the heat to dissipate from his cheeks.
* * *
Archie and Adelia sat in the wood-paneled main lounge of the Sturgess Queen. Adelia’s feet rested on a low, claw-footed stool. A glass of ice water sweated in her hand.
“They sure know how to treat a pregnant girl, eh?” She grinned over her glass at Archie, who sat in a wide wicker-backed armchair opposite her, turning the feral bull’s tusk over and over in her hands.
“Why are you worried?” Adelia asked. “The worst thing that happens is they try to kill us.”
Archie continued worrying at the tusk. She muttered something under her breath.
“Que?”
“I said,” Archie replied deliberately, “that I’m not sure it’s them I’m worried about.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean they knew that we would be getting to the Gate today. They knew ’ow many of us to expect. They ’ad exactly six spots in the paddock, one for each ’ippo. And they ’ad enough rooms set aside for six people, which means they knew about . . . about Neville.”
“So?”
“So,” Archie said, her hands going still, “I think that someone told them about us. I think that someone told them what route we would be taking. I think—”
“What’s all this about?” Hero said, striding into the lounge.
“Archie thinks that we have a spy in our midst,” Adelia said with a crooked grin. Hero looked sharply at Archie.
“A spy?”
“Oui,” Archie replied, her brows high. “I inspected the Gate while ’oundstooth was talking to that ’illbilly ranger. It was sturdy, intact, no recent welding that I could see. And we all know that a ’ippo isn’t going to reach higher ramming speeds overland than in the water.”
“What’s your point, Archie?” Hero asked, not unkindly.
“My point is: if the Gate was not broken, then ’ow exactly did a single feral bull escape the Harriet and find us? Just the one? Not enough for us to notice and change course? I’ll tell you how: Monsieur Travers snapped ’is fingers, and that guard let it out. I’d guess that ’appened on the same day we ’it the road. The only question is, who was gone long enough to send a telegram?”
Adelia, Archie, and Hero looked at each other. None of them wanted to be the first to speak.
The doors to the lounge swung open, and Houndstooth strode in briskly. “Well! Why the long faces, you three? And where’s Calhoun?”
Adelia rattled the ice in her glass. “I’d imagine ’e’s at the blackjack tables,” she said, plucking out an ice cube and pressing it to her neck. “Ay, it’s too hot.”
“You alright, Adelia?” Hero asked.
“Si, si, it’s just—nobody ever told me that having a little girl would make me so hot all the time!”
Houndstooth, being a gentleman, said nothing; he kept his eyes averted from Adelia’s ripe belly. Hero, having no such compunctions, laughed heartily. “Get used to it, ma’am. We have a saying where I’m from—boys will make you cry, but girls? Girls will make you sweat.”
* * *
The lamps that lit the riverboat inside and out had come on by the time Archie found Cal on the casino floor. He swayed gently on his stool, and it was readily apparent that bourbon, rather than the rocking rhythm of the boat, was what moved him. Archie pulled up a stool beside him and mentally tallied the cash that rested in stacks on his side of the felt.
“’Ow are you doing, there, mon ami?” she asked softly. Cal swung his head around to her and grinned broadly. Blood was seeping through the bandage over his left ear. He had two toothpicks in his mouth. One was fresh; the other was chewed nearly to splinters, as though he’d forgotten to discard the old one.
“Archie! Or should I say, Regina?” He leered as he said her name, and she thought she could guess what pun he thought he was making.
“Actually, cherie, it’s Regina. Rhymes with Pasadena.”
His leer dissolved, and he became morose so quickly that Archie feared he would fall off his stool.
“You know Pasadena, oui, Calhoun? That is where you met our Adelia—on a supply trip for Mr. ’oundstooth, was it not? A decade ago, oui?”
“I don’t wanna talk about Adelia,” Cal slurred. “I miss Adelia so—” He hiccupped. “—so much, and I don’t wanna talk about her. She won’—she won’ even talk to me about the baby, Regina. After what I did for her? She came back to me and then, and then she left, an’—I don’t wanna talk about her, no, no thank you.”
“Ah, of course, of course—” Cal interrupted Archie before she could finish agreeing not to talk about Adelia.
“I met ’er in Pasadena, you know,” he said, having already apparently forgotten that Archie had said just that a few moments before. “I met ’er there and I loved—I loved her right away. I was so nice to her, but she just wouldn’t even lookuhme.” He slapped the table with the palm of his hand. “Wouldn’t go home with a ranch hand, no sir. Too good for that!” His too-loud voice suddenly wobbled. “Too good for me. But I showed her, I did everything he asked me to do and then some—”
Other patrons of the Sturgess Queen’s bar were starting to stare. Archie put a hand on Cal’s elbow. “Perhaps we should get you to bed, non? It would appear that you are winning. Best to quit while you are ahead, is it not?”
Cal shook his finger at her, squinting. “Not yet,” he said in a stage whisper. “Not yet. I’m not done yet.” He turned back to the dealer, who had observed this exchange with the removed patience of experience, and slapped the felt hard enough that one of his stacks of cash fell over. He left his hand where it lay, and his gaze swam up to meet the dealer’s eyes. “Himme.”
The dealer did as he was told, and Archie saw at once that she should not have allowed Cal to touch the table.
“Twenty-one. Again. Excellent, Mr. Hotchkiss.” The dealer smiled at Cal, but his smile did not extend to his eyes. He moved his hand as though to shift more cash to Cal’s side of the table, but at the last moment, he seized Cal’s wrist instead.
Archie sprang from her stool, her hand going automatically to her empty holster, as the dealer gripped Cal’s wrist and waved his other hand in a signal. Mr. Travers appeared as though from thin air, his hands clasped soberly behind his back.
“Well now, Mr. Hotchkiss. What have you been up to?”
The dealer lifted Cal’s hand, revealing a single card underneath it.
“This is the fourth card he’s swapped, Mr. Travers, sir. I wasn’t sure at first, but, well.” The dealer smiled at the small army of empty highball glasses that littered the table. “He got sloppy.”
Cal looked from the dealer to Travers’ unsmiling face, and then to Archie. His expression was that of a boy who has fallen into a well at dusk, and who has yelled himself hoarse with no answer but the rustle of wind through buzzards’ wings.
“Mr. Hotchkiss,” Travers said, reaching into his breast pocket and pulling out a bloody, folded pocket square. “I believe you’ll be needing this back.” He tucked the pocket square into Cal’s shirt pocket. Cal blanched and started muttering the word “no” under his breath, over and over, like an incantation.
“Mr. Travers, sir, Cal is drunk. Might I take ’im up to his room to sleep this off? He is not ’imself.” Archie’s voice was dripping honey. Travers regarded her with frank interest.
“Why, Miss Archambault. It is so refreshing to see someone willing to stick up for a friend. But I’m afraid that Mr. Hotchkiss here is a cheat. Ah, ah—” He held up a finger, cutting off her interruption. “He may be drunk, but he is still a cheat. He was a cheat before he was drunk and he’ll remain a cheat when he sobers up tomorrow.” He took a step away from Cal. The dealer did the same.
Cal bolted for the door. The band stopped playing to watch him pass. He was fast—but Travers’ security goons were faster. They caught him under the arms midstride, hauling him into the air with the brisk efficiency and remorselessness of experience.
“No!” he cried, his legs kicking in the air but finding no purchase as he was dragged bodily across the casino floor. “No, wait, Mr. Travers, sir, please! You can’t, you can’t—after what I did for you? After what I did to that British bastard for you? Please, sir, I won’t—I wasn’t—”
Travers laid his fingertips on Archie’s arm, as though to comfort her. “Watch now.”
And she did. She watched as Travers’ men paused at the window. Cal’s eyes roamed the room, sightless with terror. He screamed. He begged.
Travers’ men did not seem to hear. They swung him once—heave-ho, and his toothpicks fell to the floor—then hurled him bodily through the open window.
He screamed as he fell; the splash seemed to echo in the silent casino. Then, he screamed again. It was not a scream of terror, but a scream of pain.
After a moment, the screaming stopped—but the splashing continued.
Travers clapped his hands once in front of his chest, then addressed the now-silent patrons who filled the gambling tables of his casino. “Ladies and gentlemen, my apologies for the disruption!” He turned to the bar. “To make up for it, a round of champagne for everyone, on the house!”
Travers signaled the band, and the music started playing once again. He laid his fingertips lightly upon Archie’s arm once more as the casino floor erupted in cheers.
“I hope, Miss Archambault, that you can understand. Mr. Hotchkiss was a thief, and I cannot abide thieves.” His use of the past tense was not lost on Archie. “I, of course, would not even begin to consider allowing his shortcomings to color my opinions of the rest of your little hopper gang.”
Archie managed a smile, and touched his fingertips with her own. “I . . . I am so grateful, Mr. Travers. We ’ad no idea that Cal—” But she saw his wry, knowing smile and started again. “Of course, we knew that he was a scoundrel, but we would never imagine that he would besmirch your ’ospitality so.”
“Of course not, Miss Archambault. Of course not.” A waiter approached holding a silver tray of glasses, and Travers handed one to Archie before taking one for himself. He touched his glass to hers, making the crystal sing.
“Cheers, Miss Archambault. May you enjoy your stay on the Sturgess Queen, and the very best of luck in all your endeavors.”
“Santé,” Archie answered, and drained her glass without looking away from Travers’ twinkling eyes. Travers signaled the band to play louder, and they did—but the music couldn’t mask the bellowing of the ferals fighting over their feast in the river below.