Free Scarlet Devices by Delphine Dryden Page B

opportunity than anything else, and of course all that really mattered was making it to Pittsburgh before midnight. But one of the race organizers was an alumnus of the Academy and had managed to leverage the opportunity for publicity to the school’s benefit. The cars would gather on a field near the campus, there was to be a speech by the mayor and box lunches would be provided for the competitors to take along with them. It seemed a shame for Matthew to miss out, that was all.
    Her boiler rattled, complaining about the stop-and-start pace along the bridge. Eliza frowned at the water and heat gauges, willing them to remain within safe parameters. She risked a quick tug at the pressure release handle, and chuckled as the crowd jumped at the sudden, sharp whistle blast.
    Naïve, perhaps, but at first she blamed the startling whistle for the ugly expressions a few of the crowd members turned toward her. There were three of them glaring at her, all women about her mother’s age, dark-clad and grim-faced. One of them looked her in the eye, giving a sort of enraged smirk as she called to the other two, who followed her lead while still keeping pace with the slowly moving mob. Manic fervor in their eyes, they neared the steam car, waving their placards and shouting something Eliza couldn’t hear over the general hubbub.
    Nonplussed, Eliza looked frantically ahead of her, focusing on the car she was trailing and noting with relief that they were almost across the bridge and the crowd had cleared from the main road ahead. As soon as she was off the bridge, she could speed up and shake the angry women off.
    Mere feet before Eliza’s car crossed onto the road proper, one of the women in black slammed a red-printed placard against her side window. Eliza shrieked, to her mortification, and accelerated sharply, almost slamming into the black car before she caught herself and braked. The heavy brown bulk of a police horse brushed by, the animal nickering as it literally jostled the car, and for a moment she had a perfect view of the mounted officer’s polished black boot and blue-clad pants leg. A wide satin stripe ran down the outside of his leg. The boot left a squeak of black against the window.
    And then he was gone, pushing her assailant along with him, and Eliza was on the relatively open road again.
    Through her hind mirror, she saw two of the women rushing to the third’s aid, and she saw the signs they were waving. It took her brain a moment to register the lettering, reading it backward and in quick glances as she was. That delay didn’t lessen the impact one bit.
    RALLY OF VICE , screamed one of the signs. The other, as best she could see as it faded from view behind her, proclaimed the drivers to be the DEVIL’S SPAWN IN DEVIL- STEAMERS.
    The third placard seemed to have been broken in the fray, but Eliza already knew what it said. The sight of it was burned into her memory from that terrifying few seconds of it slapped against her window.
    SCARLET DISGRACE TO WOMANKIND !
    Harrisburg seemed much less charming than it had before she crossed the bridge.

S IX

    P OLITE SMILES WERE the order of the day at the Harrisburg Academy grounds. A bunting-draped pavilion and bandstand had been set up, bright flags snapped in the breeze and the mayor was gladhanding the crowd with all the easy expertise of a veteran politician. Matthew conversed graciously with a group of beaming Ladies’ Auxiliary members as he watched the mayor tickle another baby, but his real attention was on the gravel drive leading to the field on which the festivities were being held.
    At last a flash of red eased his anxiety. There was no mistaking Eliza’s steam car, coasting around the field behind a pack of other vehicles that included Smith-Grenville’s flashy blue torpedo. Handlers jogged out to meet the racers, directing the cars to their various cordoned-off billets around the central green and the pavilion. Eliza