eventually her tears and distance became too great and he was lost to view.
She initially thought Father would catch up with them in San Francisco and that they would wait there, but Mrs. Falleson had strict orders to get to England as quickly as possible, which was in line with her own heartâs desire. Their choices were limited. The much-touted transcontinental rail line was yet incomplete. Mrs. Falleson refused to inflict a long, dusty stagecoach journey on herself and her charge, convinced they would be slaughtered by Indians or robbed by outlaws (and then slaughtered) at some point along the way. The contents of various newspapers validated her avoidance of that route.
They could take a slow steamship around Cape Horn, make a dangerous land crossing of Mexico, or court death in the fever swamps of Panama. Alex had traversed Mexico on her first trip around the globe, but in a large, well-armed party. Her accounts of that journey were enough to send her chaperone on a hunt for smelling salts.
Mrs. Falleson, after a number of prayers pointedly asking the Almighty for a solution, picked an unorthodox alternative that delighted Alex.
The Americans were an enterprising lot when it came to commercial exploitation of their inventions, even the more terrifying ones. The San Francisco papers had been full of stories about the triumph of air travel. Mrs. Falleson read of the many successful flights achieved by the Aerial Navigation Company, particularly those executed under the command of a certain Captain Lucius Miracle, whose surname offered a strongly symbolic appeal to her spiritual side.
Taking it as a sign from above, she and Alex boarded one of the lighter-than-air ships to skim (barely) over the Rocky Mountains and beyond. Though not the first females to make the trip, they were enough of a rarity that their participation was of interest to the newspapers. Mrs. Falleson was more horrified at having her name in a common rag than by defying gravity in a frail-looking gondola suspended beneath three balloons shaped like fat cigars.
The ladies boarded swathed in veils and heavy coats, having been warned it would be cold, and at her request the captain of the ship gave false names to anyone who asked. Alex did not understand until her chaperone explained that a proper lady should only ever be mentioned thrice in a paper: when she was born, married, and died. Anything else was simply vulgar.
Alex had heard stranger views expressed on her journeys and learned to discount them without offence to the speaker. A nod and a polite smile usually sufficed, and so it proved again.
Their air transport was wanting in comfort, but peerless in speed. They rode the prevailing winds far above the wilder portions of territories claimed by the United States. For three days and nights Alex clung to the gunwales, gaping in wonder at the changing landscape below. Her eyes stung from the chill, her face hurt from smiling so much, and she grew hoarse asking countless questions of the crew and the captain. Mrs. Falleson prayed a great deal, only occasionally pausing in her orisons to admire the view. Alex tempted her often with that distraction, having the idea that God might appreciate the respite.
Their airship landed in St. Louis amid fanfare that included a brass band and jugglers. Mrs. Falleson once more resorted to obscuring veils and managed to get them away unscathed and unidentified by the local press. She found a respectable hotel and there they rested for two days before boarding a slower if more sensible train for Chicago, another to New York, and finally a clipper ship back to a country Alex barely remembered.
In London, the remarkable Mrs. Falleson tearfully delivered her charge to the Pendleburys and departed to seek out her own family, never to return. Though they did sometimes correspond, those occasional letters did not entirely mitigate Alexâs sense of having been dismissed again.
Thus ended her second
She initially thought Father would catch up with them in San Francisco and that they would wait there, but Mrs. Falleson had strict orders to get to England as quickly as possible, which was in line with her own heartâs desire. Their choices were limited. The much-touted transcontinental rail line was yet incomplete. Mrs. Falleson refused to inflict a long, dusty stagecoach journey on herself and her charge, convinced they would be slaughtered by Indians or robbed by outlaws (and then slaughtered) at some point along the way. The contents of various newspapers validated her avoidance of that route.
They could take a slow steamship around Cape Horn, make a dangerous land crossing of Mexico, or court death in the fever swamps of Panama. Alex had traversed Mexico on her first trip around the globe, but in a large, well-armed party. Her accounts of that journey were enough to send her chaperone on a hunt for smelling salts.
Mrs. Falleson, after a number of prayers pointedly asking the Almighty for a solution, picked an unorthodox alternative that delighted Alex.
The Americans were an enterprising lot when it came to commercial exploitation of their inventions, even the more terrifying ones. The San Francisco papers had been full of stories about the triumph of air travel. Mrs. Falleson read of the many successful flights achieved by the Aerial Navigation Company, particularly those executed under the command of a certain Captain Lucius Miracle, whose surname offered a strongly symbolic appeal to her spiritual side.
Taking it as a sign from above, she and Alex boarded one of the lighter-than-air ships to skim (barely) over the Rocky Mountains and beyond. Though not the first females to make the trip, they were enough of a rarity that their participation was of interest to the newspapers. Mrs. Falleson was more horrified at having her name in a common rag than by defying gravity in a frail-looking gondola suspended beneath three balloons shaped like fat cigars.
The ladies boarded swathed in veils and heavy coats, having been warned it would be cold, and at her request the captain of the ship gave false names to anyone who asked. Alex did not understand until her chaperone explained that a proper lady should only ever be mentioned thrice in a paper: when she was born, married, and died. Anything else was simply vulgar.
Alex had heard stranger views expressed on her journeys and learned to discount them without offence to the speaker. A nod and a polite smile usually sufficed, and so it proved again.
Their air transport was wanting in comfort, but peerless in speed. They rode the prevailing winds far above the wilder portions of territories claimed by the United States. For three days and nights Alex clung to the gunwales, gaping in wonder at the changing landscape below. Her eyes stung from the chill, her face hurt from smiling so much, and she grew hoarse asking countless questions of the crew and the captain. Mrs. Falleson prayed a great deal, only occasionally pausing in her orisons to admire the view. Alex tempted her often with that distraction, having the idea that God might appreciate the respite.
Their airship landed in St. Louis amid fanfare that included a brass band and jugglers. Mrs. Falleson once more resorted to obscuring veils and managed to get them away unscathed and unidentified by the local press. She found a respectable hotel and there they rested for two days before boarding a slower if more sensible train for Chicago, another to New York, and finally a clipper ship back to a country Alex barely remembered.
In London, the remarkable Mrs. Falleson tearfully delivered her charge to the Pendleburys and departed to seek out her own family, never to return. Though they did sometimes correspond, those occasional letters did not entirely mitigate Alexâs sense of having been dismissed again.
Thus ended her second
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