Mr. Impossible (The Dressmakers 2)

The journey was excruciating, though Miles’s captors made allowances for his inexperience, traveling no more than eight hours at a stretch. Yet even at this pace, with long stops between for rest and refreshment, they left Minya farther behind more quickly than they could have done by water. Instead of following the bends of the Nile, they rode straight across the desert. Furthermore, they could and did travel by night, without worrying about colliding with boats, sandbanks, or rocks. The only concerns, as Ghazi explained on the first night when they stopped to eat, were bandits and sandstorms. The sandstorms were God’s will. The bandits would quickly learn their mistake, he said cheerfully.

“I believe you,” Miles said. “I only wonder what the great hurry is and where exactly we’re going.”

“I sent men to take you from the boat,” Ghazi said. “They failed. This is why I had to come for you myself. But I have other matters to settle, to the south, and must go quickly to make up for the time I have lost.”

“And if you don’t?”

Ghazi laughed. “If I don’t —” He drew a line across his throat with his index finger. “Like that, or maybe not so fast, and with more suffering, ha ha. The man who fails, my learned friend, is the man who dies.”

Zawyet el Amwat, Monday 16 April

THE DAY FOLLOWING their arrival found Daphne on the opposite side of the Nile from Minya. A ways to the north behind her, a small cluster of hovels signified a village. Nearer at hand a larger and more extensive cluster of chapels and domed tombs signified the district’s burial ground.

She stood at a respectful distance from the cemetery proper, staring at a complicated arrangement of metal pieces whose operation Mr. Carsington was explaining.

He had one of the coveted Manton pistols in his hand and was telling her about breeches and priming pans and flints and cocks and such. She was beginning to understand how he felt when she talked about Coptic.

They had an audience. Nearby stood Udail/Tom, several crew members, and a pair of guards the kashef — the pasha’s local representative — had sent to accompany them. As usual, the Egyptians were all talking excitedly. She couldn’t follow their conversation. She had all she could do to follow Mr. Carsington’s explanation.

“Do I need to know how it works?” she said finally. “Can’t I just shoot it?”

“If you understand how it works, you’re less likely to make mistakes,” he said patiently. “If danger threatens, you will not have the leisure for trial and error or even for thinking.”

Daphne became aware of laughter behind her.

She turned that way. Udail/Tom was pointing at the gun, at Mr. Carsington, and at her, and talking too low for her to understand. The men were shaking their heads and chuckling.

She must have looked as slow-witted as she felt.

She turned back to Mr. Carsington.

She told herself that if she could learn Coptic, she could learn this. But it was hard to concentrate. He stood so near, and spoke so earnestly and enthusiastically — nay, lovingly — of the wood and metal thing in his hand. He even took out a handkerchief and wiped his fingerprints from the polished handle.

“I’ll load it for you the first time,” he said.

“Please let me do it,” she said. “I shall learn more quickly that way.” She would have the weapon in her hand and be forced to pay attention to what she was doing, instead of to the angle of his jaw and the arch of his dark eyebrows and the delicacy with which those large, clever hands caressed the pistol.

He shrugged and gave her the pistol and the cartridge.

“Where is the powder you spoke of?” she said.

He briefly gazed heavenwards, then reverted to her. “In the cartridge,” he said. “You have to open it first.”

The cartridge was made of paper, with the metal ball at one end. She needed two hands to open it. She tried to hand him the pistol, but he shook his head.

“You tear it open with your teeth,” he said. “Try not to swallow too much gunpowder in the process.”

“Why? Is it poisonous?” Would she explode? But no. The gunpowder needed a spark. He had just explained all that. What was the matter with her?

“I daresay it’s toxic,” he said. “But the point is, if you swallow too much, you won’t have enough left to fire the weapon.”

She used her teeth, as he insisted, and definitely tasted powder, which was horrid. She spat it out, but the taste lingered.

Then she simply followed his directions, carefully tipping powder into the priming pan, closing the pan, tipping into the barrel the remaining powder, then the paper cartridge containing the ball. Then she rammed it all home, using the tool he gave her.

She became aware of silence behind her.

She glanced that way.

The men were gaping at her. An instant later, they turned and ran back to the cemetery. She watched them take shelter behind one of the domed structures. Udail/Tom grinned and waved, then trotted after them.

“You were right, after all,” Mr. Carsington said.

She turned back to meet his deep brown gaze, serious now. “About what?”

“About learning to take care of yourself,” he said. “The Egyptians have been beaten down cruelly time and again. What reason have they to stand and fight to protect us — a lot of foreign invaders? It makes more sense to run away. You and I shall have to rely upon each other.”

She could hardly believe her ears. He had been so reluctant to teach her how to shoot. But these were words used between equals, words of trust — in her judgment, her skill — from a man. Her heart leapt — with pleasure or fear, she wasn’t sure. Perhaps both.

He pointed to a large mound some twenty yards away. There were many such mounds of rubble hereabouts.

“Don’t I need a target?” she said.

“Choose a spot to aim at,” he said. “For now, you mainly need to practice loading, aiming, and firing. Later we can work on your sharpshooting skills.”

He showed her how to fully cock the weapon. He stood behind her, and holding his arm alongside hers, showed her how to aim. The weapon was heavy, and she was more than a little afraid of it. These weren’t the only reasons her hand shook. She’d caught his scent. She was acutely aware of his nearness.

“Hold the pistol with both hands, if you need to,” he said.

She did so, and it helped, but the shakiness went deeper than unsteady hands.

Then he moved away, and her head cleared.

“Fire when ready,” he said.

She took a deep breath and pulled the trigger. There was a click and a little puff of smoke, then a blast so powerful that she nearly dropped the weapon.

“Excellent,” he said. “You hit the mound.”

The mound was the size of Bedford Square. Blindfolded, she could hardly miss it. Still, a wave of happiness surged through her. She wanted to jump up and down. She wanted to dance. She wanted to throw her arms about his neck and kiss him senseless — for teaching her how to do something, a useful thing that men knew how to do, a skill that even her indulgent brother hadn’t taught her.

“Try it again,” Mr. Carsington said. “This time, see if you can do it without any prompting from me.”

This time she went through the preliminaries a degree more confidently, aimed, and fired. Again the ball struck somewhere in Bedford Square.

She fired several more times, and it seemed the ball struck nearer and nearer to the spot she aimed for.

“It is not so very difficult, after all,” she said casually, while her heart pounded with happiness. “Now I should like to try the rifle.”

Chapter 12

SHE WAS VASTLY PLEASED WITH HERSELF, flushed and smiling, her green eyes sparkling. For a not-beautiful woman, she was amazingly handsome at times, Rupert thought.

She’d been pale at first — frightened, no doubt, as people unused to firearms so often were. But she wouldn’t let fear master her.

He’d noticed this about her the first time they

met. She must have been frightened in the dungeon. It was dark, and it stank of death and decay — and those were the more agreeable odors. Yet she’d beaten back fear for her brother’s sake.

Since then, Rupert had seen daily examples of her pluck. They all made him want to get her naked, naturally, but he had other feelings, too. He wasn’t sure what they were: a sort of fondness, a kind of affection, something oddly like what he felt for his brothers.

He hadn’t thought overmuch about it, though, and didn’t do so now.

At present he was vastly entertained watching her: the fierce frown of concentration while she loaded the pistol, the grimly determined stance as she held the weapon with both hands, and the reasonably straight shots she got off in spite of a not-quite-steady grip.

It was great fun teaching her, too, especially the parts where it was necessary to stand quite close, touching a little now and then.