Between grad school, teaching, and trying to write I’m finding very little time to read. I’m still working my way through Royal Harlot by Susan Holloway Scott. It’s not my usual type of read, but I’m enjoying it well enough. Of course I’m reading it on my Sony Reader, having downloaded it from the Sony eBook Store.
Chapter Four: Wherein we make decisions about our supper
When we were not two hundred yards down the road, I let Hysteria drop to a trot, for in truth I did not expect anyone to follow us into the night, daring wild animals, bandits, or hobgoblins regardless of how fine a pie smith Mistress Gaston was reported to be. A few hundred yards beyond that, she dropped of her own accord to a walk and I expect she was beginning to feel a bit mopey because of the slap the orphan had dealt her. At that moment I was less interested in her mental condition than my own physical one though, because I was holding a cast pie pan in each hand and they were both heavy and still quite warm.
“Here.” I turned in the saddle and handed one pie to the orphan. “We can eat while we ride. If we wait until we find a campsite, the pies will be cold.”
“Do you have a fork?” the boy asked.
I mused that this seemed an unlikely request from any boy, most of whom I have found uninterested in tableware on the best occasion, and especially from an orphan whom one might have supposed to have been forced by necessity to dig into all manner of food scraps with his hands. However it was not a question to which I needed to reply in the negative, for I always carry a fork in the inner left breast pocket of my coat, which I call my fork pocket. I gave the orphan my fork and pulled my knife from my boot to use on the remaining pie.
“This is a very nice fork,” said the orphan.
“Of course it is,” said I. “That fork came from the table of the Queen of Aerithraine herself.”
“You stole this fork from a Queen?”
“Impudent whelp!” cried I. “That fine fork was a gift from the queen, with whom I once had the pleasure of spending a fortnight.”
“What kind of queen gives a man a fork?”
“A kind and gracious one.”
That apparently satisfied the boy’s curiosity for the moment and for the next few minutes we concentrated upon the pies. I am not one to mourn a lost pie and that is well, for the pie that was lost to me on that night, as I have previously mentioned, was a pie for the ages. A fine pie. A beautiful pie. A wonderful pie. This new pie was almost as good though. It was a crabapple pie, which was a common pie to come upon in winter in those parts, which is to say Brest, as cooks used the crabapples they had put up the previous fall. This pie was an uncommonly good pie, with nutmeg and cinnamon and cloves and butter. I had more than a few bites by the time the boy spoke again.
“What kind of pie is that?”
“Crabapple,” I replied. “What pie do you have?”
“It is a meat pie.”
“A meat pie,” I mused, as I thought back upon how long it had been since I had eaten any other meat than the dried venison I had in my saddlebag. I had eaten a sausage a week before, but it had been a fortnight and half again since I had eaten mutton stew with potatoes and black bread in Hammlintown. That had been a fine stew and the serving wench who brought it to me had been nice and plump and had smiled quite fetchingly when she had set down the tray. Stew is a wonderful food and even when it is not served by a nice and plump serving wench, it always seems to give me the same feeling when I eat it that a nice and plump serving wench gives me when I see her.
“What are you doing now?” asked the orphan.
“Pondering stew,” said I.
“Well stop it. Rather ponder this instead. You eat half of your crabapple pie and I will eat half of my meat pie. Then we can trade and eat the other halves of each others pies.”
“Alright,” I agreed. “But this will mean that I have to eat my dessert first and my supper after.”
“Just pretend that the meat pie is your dessert and the crabapple pie is your supper.”
“A crabapple pie could be a fine supper. In fact I have been to countries where the most common part of a supper is crabapple pie.”
“Fine then.”
“But a meat pie is in no country a dessert.”
“Then trade me now.”
“How much have you eaten?” I asked.
“About a fourth. How much have you eaten?”
“About a fifth.”
“Then eat another twentieth,” said he. “Then we will trade pies and each eat two thirds of what remains and then trade them back. At that point, we will each eat what remains of the pie we originally started with. That way you can think of the first portion of the crabapple pie as an appetizer, the portion you eat of the meat pie as your supper, and the final portion of the crabapple pie as your dessert.”
“You are a fine mathematician for an orphan,” said I. “But it suits me. Will it not bother you that your appetizer and your dessert are of meat pie and your supper is of crabapple pie?”
“I have decided that I will make this sacrifice,” said he. “Since it was you that provided the meal.”
Tom Swift and his Electronic Hydrolung
Imagine an aqualung so small it fits on your belt, and so powerful it will allow you to swim the entire Atlantic Ocean without coming up for air. Not as sophisticated as some recent young adult books, Tom Swift never the less still holds up. This Tom is the son of the orignial Tom Swift and has very cool inventions and adventures of his very own. So far I have only seen two of the Tom Swift Jr. books available free, but his dad’s are everywhere. Get Tom Swift and his Electronic Hydrolung in a variety of eBook formats here.
Patience’s eyes flickered, and then her arms and legs moved straight in line with her body. She stayed in that position for a moment and then turned and sat. With a single swift motion, she stood up to her full height.
“You are Michael Winston Smith?”
“Patience? Are you alright?”
“You are Michael Winston Smith?” She looked at him, seemingly without recognition.
“Yes. Yes, it’s me.”
“I am Daffodil serial number 55277-PFN-001-XGN-F0103. My software is up to date. The primary setup procedure requires approximately six hours. During this period, I your Daffodil, will be unavailable for other activities. It is recommended that during this time period you make a few basic decisions. What initial duties do you wish me to have? What clothing, if any, do you wish me to wear? What name would you like me to answer to?”
Patience became quiet. Mike watched her anxiously for at least twenty minutes, then realizing that her primary setup would not hurry just because he was actively watching her, he went to the family room and sat down. He didn’t read and he didn’t watch vueTee. Dinner time came and went, and it was only when his stomach made a loud swirling noise that he decided he would get up and eat something. He stood up and turned around to come face to face with Patience.
“The primary setup procedure is complete,” she said. “I your Daffodil, will not require a secondary setup procedure.”
“Are you alright?”
“Yes, Mike. I am fine.”
Mike jumped forward and hugged her fiercely.
“You remember me?” he asked her.
“Yes Mike. I remember you. My experience memory is write only.”
Mike forgot about eating, but his stomach didn’t and made several more loud noised. Patience quickly made him a sandwich and served it to him along with potato salad that she had prepared that morning. Afterwards, they went to bed. Though Mike held her until he fell asleep, they didn’t have sex. He just needed to remind himself that she was there.
The man in the blue jumpsuit leaned over and poked Mike in the chest. “This is a known issue.”
Pain shot through Mike’s chest. Horrible, terrifying pain. Mind-numbing pain. The kind of pain that makes one realize that there really is an end. He opened his eyes. He was lying flat on his back in his bed, bathed in sweat, clutching his chest. No, not again! Please, not again! He reached to his left and grabbed Tiffany’s arm, as another bolt of pain shot through his chest.
“Honey, argh!”
“What’s the matter?” asked Tiffany. “My God, Mike. You’re white as a sheet.”
“It’s my chest,” said Mike. “I think I’m having a heart attack.”
“Come on,” she said. “I’m taking you to the hospital.”
The next half hour was a terrifying blur. Trying to don shorts, while at the same time fighting the pain. A fast car ride. Rushing through red lights. Sitting in the hospital waiting room. At last he was lying in an emergency room bed. A male nurse was giving him a shot in the stomach that gave him a bruise the size of a football. The pain was going away. Where was Tiffany? He looked around. She had been here a moment ago. Then he saw her.
Lying on the bed next to his was Tiffany’s broken body. She had a blood all over her. Her arm was mangled. Her legs didn’t look quite right and Mike knew it was because her pelvis was shattered. None of that had killed her though. It was that tiny bump on her head. It didn’t look like anything at all, really. It certainly didn’t look like something that could kill a person. It was. It did and it was.
“No, this isn’t right,” said Mike. “This isn’t how it happened. This was eleven years ago. You were lying here eleven years ago. You died eleven years ago. That’s not the same time. I had a heart attack way before that. When was it? Fifteen years ago?”
Then Harriet burst into the emergency room. “Daddy!”
Mike’s eyes popped open. He was still in bed. He turned his head slightly and felt as though his head was going to explode. He looked for Patience, but she was no longer in bed. He got up and walked to the bathroom. Opening the medicine cabinet, he pulled out a bottle of aspirin and tossed four into his mouth. Then he chewed them.
Something landed heavily on Mike’s shoulder. He jumped and spun around. Patience was standing there. The arm that had been on his shoulder was still outstretched. He grabbed her and pulled her to him. Cupping her face in his hands, he covered it with kisses. Dozens of tiny kisses spread across her face turned into one deep kiss on her luscious perfect mouth, which she returned.
“Are you alright?” he asked.
“I am still alright, Mike.”
“No. I mean are you really all right?”
“I am still waiting for the software patch,” she said. “But that only affects rebooting. All my systems are in good working order.”
Mike clasped Patience’s face once more between his hands and kissed her deeply. Then she frowned.
“You have a fever, Mike,” she said.
“Yeah. I feel like shit.” He staggered slightly.
Patience led Mike back to the bed and tucked him in. Then she brought him a glass of juice. When she was sure that he was as comfortable as he could be, she lay down in the bed beside him, and brushed his hair with her hand. She stayed with him until he dozed off once again.
Mike spent most of the day in bed, eating very little, but at Patience’s insistence drinking plenty of juice and water. He felt annoyed, because it seemed to him that Patience was the one who had been truly ill. She should have been resting. She insisted though that she was fine and informed him that he had likely picked up some kind of parasite at the beach.
“That water was not very clean,” she said, as she handed him two antiparasitics.
By evening, he was feeling much better. He got up to shave and take a hot shower, then went back to bed and read “The Tales of Beedle the Bard” until he was drowsy. With Patience once again lying in bed beside him, Mike went back to sleep. He spent most of the night with his hand on that perfect body beside him. The next morning Mike felt well enough to take his morning walk, Patience right beside him of course, urging him to keep up the pace. Driving to the walking track, he started on the long oval. Even though the sky was overcast and the weather had turned decidedly blustery, they walked the full five miles, shaded by the massive sunscreen above the track. They walked at a quick pace, but instead of feeling as though he were going to pass out, Mike felt rejuvenated when they returned. He shaved, showered, and when Patience brought him his breakfast, along with more antiparasitics, he ate and felt great.
“Do you feel up to going furniture shopping today, Mike?” Patience asked.
“I think I do. Do we need furniture?”
“We do if we’re going to make Harriet’s old room into a guest bedroom. Some of the other furniture is so worn that it should be replaced too.”
Mike put on a new pair of slacks and a grey sweater. He thought that he looked pretty good. Of course he realized, when Patience walked into the room, she would still look completely out of his league. She had on a dark blue peasant top, a pair of tight fitting Capri jeans with sequins along the bottom of the legs, and a pair of black high-heeled shoes with flowers on them that she described as “Bocaccio round toe pumps”.
They hopped in the car and headed for the Pico Mundo mall. Once there they went to Modern Furnishings.
“Do you have a splitback lounger in reddish brown leather?” Patience asked the clerk.
“Um, just what you see,” he said.
Mike didn’t know what it was that Patience had asked for, but they ended up picking out a nice leather couch with clean lines that was pretty comfortable. The also found a nice double bed and a pair of nightstands. He paid for them and scheduled delivery. They had lunch at Gyro Time. Then, before leaving, Mike insisted on stopping at Venus to buy some more clothes for Patience. He was finding that he enjoyed seeing her dressed up in her sexy clothing almost as much as he did seeing her naked. Patience certainly seemed to enjoy showing off new clothes to him. This time she selected something called a Marylin-collar sweater dress, which completely covered her from neck to mid-thigh, but showed off every curve and, Mike was happy to see, every bump too. As they walked across the parking lot toward the Chevy, Mike stopped suddenly and looked at Patience.
“What is it, Mike?” she asked.
“I’m falling in love with you, you know,” he said.
Patience smiled happily. “I thought you might be, Mike.”
“Really?”
“At first I didn’t know for sure. But once I got to know you and your needs, I believed that it would be only a matter of time. I am for you, Mike.”
“Yes,” Mike mused. “Yes, you are for me.”
Tarzan of the Apes by Edgar Rice Burroughs
One of the most underrated books of all time, this is a great adventure, a great love story, and a brilliant story. Get it for free in a variety of eBook formats here. This link will take you to Feedbooks, but the book is available at Manybooks.net and other perveyors of free books.
Bleak House is one of my favorite Dickens novels. It’s full of suspense, tragedy, irony, and whimsy, not necessarily in that order. While you can always say you’ve read a Dickens book even though you haven’t– you really should read at least one, you big fat liar. Click here and get this book in a variety of eBook formats for Free. This link leads to feedbooks, but you can also find it at Manybooks.org and other distributors of public domain literature. Read it. You’ll be glad you did.
Well, it’s been five months today since I submitted The Steel Dragon (and prior to my decision to change the title) to Baen Books through their website. Five months is a long time to be waiting on tenterhooks, but according to their site it will be at least nine more months before I hear anything back.
In the meantime, here is the definition of tenterhooks from worldwidewords.org:
It’s been so long since anyone has seen either a tenter, or the hooks on one, that the word and the idea behind it are now quite mysterious, so much so that it sometimes appears as on tenderhooks, which sounds as though it ought to make more sense. But at one time, the phrase on tenterhooks would have evoked an image that was immediately understandable.
It comes from one of the processes of making woollen cloth. After it had been woven, the cloth still contained oil from the fleece, mixed with dirt. It was cleaned in a fulling mill, but then it had to be dried carefully or it would shrink and crease. So the lengths of wet cloth were stretched on wooden frames, and left out in the open for some time. This allowed them to dry and straightened their weave. These frames were the tenters, and the tenter hooks were the metal hooks used to fix the cloth to the frame. At one time, it would have been common in manufacturing areas to see fields full of these frames (older English maps sometimes marked an area as a tenter-field). So it was not a huge leap of the imagination to think of somebody on tenterhooks as being in an state of anxious suspense, stretched like the cloth on the tenter. The tenters have gone, but the meaning has survived.
Tenter comes from the Latin tendere, to stretch, via a French intermediate. The word has been in the language since the fourteenth century, and on tenters soon after became a phrase meaning painful anxiety. The exact phrase on tenterhooks seems first to have been used by Tobias Smollett in Roderick Random in 1748.
God, I love the English language!!!
Iolanthe Dechantage, as she had every evening since leaving home on the H.M.S. Minotaur, held a dinner in her cabin. The cabin, which the Captain of the ship had vacated for her use, was quite tiny. It barely had enough room for a bed, a desk and chair. But it had a small private dining room attached, capable of seating eight for dinner. A rotating list of guests arrived each evening to be served Iolanthe’s favorite dishes prepared by Mrs. Colbshallow and served by two of her wait staff—for the room was only large enough to allow two waiters. Tonight’s guest list included Captain Gurrman. The captain was always included, after all it had been his cabin and he was nominally in charge of the ship. On those evenings when he was unable to attend, he sent an alternate. Iolanthe usually invited a second officer. This evening that second officer was Lieutenant Staff. The rest of the guest list included Professor Calliere, one of his assistants Mr. Murty, Father Ian, and Iolanthe’s two brothers Augustus and Terrence.
The meal this evening was roasted chicken with roasted potatoes, boiled broccoli, savory pudding, and thick brown gravy. It was a rather ordinary meal, but the necessities of travel required certain sacrifices. This would in fact be the last of the fresh produce until the ship made its stop at the island nation of Enclep. Iolanthe had seen to it that the colony to be established would have plenty of food. Modern packaging made it possible to supply food for a thousand people for an entire year. Granted, it was processed, canned food, but the colony wouldn’t go hungry. They had also brought huge quantities of seed in order to establish farms and plantations. But fresh vegetables were limited and had to be consumed anyway before they went bad.
“The meal was delicious,” said Father Ian.
Father Ian was a big man in his late fifties. He was six foot two and nearly three hundred pounds. He carried most of his weight in his stomach and chest. One might certainly call him fat, but he was also large in some indefinable way. Men who were taller, and even men who were heavier, were dwarfed when they stood next to Father Ian. He had white hair and a friendly, clean-shaven face, with somewhat rosy cheeks, that stood out above his black clerical robes and his white collar. When one shook hands with him, one couldn’t help but notice his long, but slender fingers and well-manicured nails. They seemed to point to him as an individual unlikely to take off on the great adventure of conquering a new continent and establishing a new colony. On the subject of his devotion, there was no word. Only a few had heard him pray, and none, to Iolanthe’s knowledge, had seen him perform the miracles that marked the truly favored in the Church of Kafira.
“Simply wonderful, Miss Dechantagne” agreed Lieutenant Staff.
A young man about the same age as Iolanthe, Lieutenant Staff was tall and blond, with the freckled face of a man far younger. His white naval dress uniform was starched and perfect, with a row of brass buttons running up the front, a stiff leather collar around the neck, and stiff leather epilates on each shoulder. Iolanthe was quick to notice that he smiled appreciatively whenever his gaze landed upon her.
“If you keep this up, Miss Dechantagne,” said Captain Gurrman. “My officers will be ruined for normal navy food.”
The Captain might have been Lieutenant Staff’s father. Nearing sixty, he still had a boyish face and boyish charm. His white naval dress uniform was a little tight in the middle, but made up for it by being heavily decorated with gold brocade. A thick white beard minimized his heavy jowls, and thick white eyebrows almost hid his green eyes.
“From what I can see Captain, navy food would ruin anyone,” said Professor Calliere.
Everyone paused to see what the Captain would say, but he just chuckled heartily. Iolanthe pursed her lips. Even a sheltered academician should know better than to belittle the navy aboard a battleship. She had spent a great deal of time with the professor just before and now during the journey aboard the Minotaur, and she had to admit that she found his keen intelligence engaging. He wasn’t bad looking either. But the long period of inactivity seemed to have brought out in him a certain looseness of etiquette that simply could not be tolerated.
“It’s been two days, Captain.” Augie suddenly interjected. “What’s the news on the murder investigation?”
Iolanthe looked at her brother and narrowed her aquamarine eyes as she thought about the events of the previous morning. She had stepped into Augie’s apartment on an errand to discuss the supplies to be purchased upon arrival at Enclep, and found him lying naked on his bed. The room had reeked of alcohol. Iolanthe had grabbed the closest thing she could find, which were a pair of Augie’s trousers and beat him about the head and shoulders with them until he fought back.
“Kafira’s cross, Iolanthe!” He had shouted. “What? What do you want?”
“Go get cleaned up and dressed, Augie. I need to talk to you.”
Augie had jumped up and grabbed a pile of clothes, and as Iolanthe still whipped him with his own pair of pants, he had dashed out the hatch and down the hall to the water closet, which on the ship was called ‘the head’. While she had waited for his return, Iolanthe had looked around the tiny room in disgust at the mess. There had been clothes strewn everywhere and open and empty bottles of whiskey on every horizontal surface. Then she had noticed something in the corner. It was a pair of women’s bloomers, and peeking out from under them was something strange.
Iolanthe had bent down and picked up the bloomers, holding them at arm’s length, then retrieved the item of clothing beneath them, and examined it carefully. It was a man’s shirt, and on its front were two handprints, in what appeared to be blood. It was as if a man, his hands drenched, had wiped them on his front. Cognizant of the fact that a murder had been committed the night before, and mindful that Augie had been present at the site of a previous murder in the great city, she had quickly decided that this was a piece of evidence that could not be allowed to be found here. She had rolled up the shirt inside of the bloomers and then exited Augie’s cabin and walked through the hallway to the hatch on deck. Once there, she had quickly determined that she was alone on deck, and then had tossed both items of clothing over the side, watching them until they landed lightly upon the water and then trailed away into the distance. She didn’t believe that Augie could be guilty of murder, so any time spent investigating him would have been a waste, but murderer or not, it was in bad taste to bring it up at dinner.
“I’ve left the investigation in the capable hands of Lieutenant Staff,” said the Captain, and turned to look at his subordinate.
“And the investigation is proceeding with the help of Father Ian and Wizards Labrith and Kesi,” said Staff. “Beyond that, I’d rather say nothing.”
“Yes, quite,” said Terrence.
Iolanthe nodded in agreement. It was obvious to anyone who paid attention that this murder was related to murders, at least three, which had occurred in the great city. It was also obvious that if this fact became known among the passengers, there would be widespread panic and that could not be allowed. Better to keep the entire thing quiet, or if necessary, let on that it was an isolated incident—perhaps a crime of passion.
“Do we know the woman’s name?” asked Mr. Murty, in his unpleasant nasal voice.
“She was a Miss Astley,” said Staff.
With the decision that “The Steel Dragon” is going to be a series, and that the series is going to be called “Senta and the Steel Dragon”, I needed a name for the first book in the series– the one I was originally calling “The Steel Dragon”. Here it is. “The Voyage of the Minotaur” So those excerpts you’ve been reading from The Steel Dragon have been excerpts from The Voyage of the Minotaur. Look for another one tomorrow.
