Title: Harvest Time

Author: Sherry Thornburg

Author's Email: Thornburgs77 a gmail

Feedback: Yes, please

Permission to Archive: Privately only, with notice to me where it is.

Category: Family

Rating: K

Main Characters: Phileas Fogg and Passepartout

Disclaimer: SAJV and original characters copywrite Tailsman/Promark/etc. No infringement is intended.

Summary: Short Story. At the end of the road and the beginning of a new path, Phileas and Passepartout take their last trip together.

Interlude

In the beginning there was a beautiful dirigible named the Aurora that had been the gambling winnings of a disillusioned ex-secret service agent named Phileas Fogg. There had also been Jean Passepartout, the dirigible's engineer and pilot who had become the folly/valet of Phileas Fogg of London, England. But that was many adventures ago when the League of Darkness terrorized Europe and a young Frenchman named Jules Verne for his visions of the future.

Now was the end, or the beginning of the end, or the beginning of a new beginning, depending on one's point of view. Phileas Fogg was no longer so disillusioned or mercurial in his moods. He had settled down to the life of the lord of the manor with a happiness and contentment he would never have imagined possible in the beginning. Melody was at his side now as his wife, and that made all the difference.

Jules Verne had also settled himself. He was no longer a hunted, starving writer. Jules had married a respectable widow and had taken on the veneer of an established stockbroker to support his new family. He still wrote and was doing well in periodical magazines and various books. One day, he had promised his friends, when he had his first book published, there would be a grand celebration…and celebrate they had not long ago.

Sighs sounded about the Aurora's parlor.

That celebration had been but a year ago. Since then… They had all moved on.

Rebecca had advanced in position and experience and now supervised other agents. She didn't jaunt from place to place, keeping her cousin on pins and needles any more, and handled that position far better than he ever would have. As Sir Jonathan's second, she had plenty to do.

Phileas chuckled to himself over that. He called it Chatsworth's most intelligent career move in his many years of service.

But on the heels of those joyful events came sad news. Her Majesty's Government had given notice it would take back possession of the grand lady, Aurora. The dirigible had only been in Phileas's possession as a tribute to his service to the country, as long as he made it available for the queen's business. That had not been understood in the beginning, but it had since been explained to him. It had not been completely unexpected news. Phileas Fogg had held his wonderful airship as long as he could, but Rebecca's change in position lost him his last excuse to keep her.

Passepartout had been offered the option to remain the Aurora's pilot, but it would require him to become part of Britain's Secret Service formally. The offer had been generous, and as much as he hated to give her up, Passepartout had no wish to become an agent for the English Queen. He was a Frenchman in his heart and would always remain so. So, this was the last cruise through the night sky for both men.

When the Aurora returned to England, she would be stored away on government lands to await a new pilot and fresh adventures with a new generation of younger agents. But that was several days away. For now, Passepartout and Phileas were having a late night together, with excellent wine and bright stars to gaze at.

Outside at the stern, the moon was full and bathed the Aurora and the countryside below with silvery light. Inside, the Aurora's controls were locked, and her position was nearly stationary as the wind was light. Fogg poured himself another glass, refilling Passepartout's glass as well.

Unbeknown to his employer, Passepartout had about the same capacity for alcohol. Now, three bottles later, the cat was out of the bag and the two men were matching each other to see who would still stand when dawn came.

Thinking on it as he gazed out at the stars, Jean Passepartout acknowledged his long, very satisfying association with his English gentleman. It had been as varied and exciting as his life had been before taking the position. He had liked that and the quiet scheduled simplicity of Master Fogg's routine in between. The adventure would have been too much for him and the routine too boring, but together they had made a perfect balance, giving the Frenchman adventure and stability.

But lately, stability has been more important to Jean Passepartout. He was not so young anymore, but not so old that he had no prospects. Passepartout had reached his prime. He looked back on his life and found it good, but wanted something more. Something like what he saw when he watched his former master and Miss Melody as man and wife.

The present topic of reminiscing between the two men was the resurrection of their young friend's late teacher, now departed again along with his grief-stricken daughter. The two had been recounting adventures in between bottles.

Even now, Phileas wasn't sure what to think of Sir Jonathan attempting to resurrect the Prime Minister to continue negotiations for a treaty in India. "Surely someone could have taken over the negotiations. As much as one likes to think so, no one is irreplaceable in the grand scheme," Phileas said. "Time waits for no man."

The phrase passed through Fogg's wine sodden head as he looked out the windows at the full moon hanging in the western part of its course across the sky. "Chatsworth needed to have been reminded of that line," Phileas said. "Time and the tides and all of that; one's date with the Almighty cannot be postponed or put off. No matter what perverted science is called on to try. And the man has the audacity to call me arrogant?"

Passepartout remembered his own brush with eternity on that adventure. He had nearly frozen to death, stuck on the Aurora with her temperature controls set for artic conditions. He agreed completely with Fogg's assessment.

"To time and tides," he said with a bit of a slur, raising his glass.

Phileas raised his glass in response and drank. He had promised Passepartout his choice of destinations for their last voyage. That choice had sent them crossing of the French Alps on their way to Bombay for the beginning of the monsoon season. And now on the way back to England, they were headed for the countryside just north of Paris, which would be Passepartout's final destination.

"I would never have expected this of you," Phileas teased. He lounged, staring at the stars. "India, I had expected… Maybe even a visit to your friend the King of Montravia, or Paris itself in the end, but to a wheat field in the country? That doesn't seem your style."

Passepartout smiled and laughed. He was lying down on the chase lounge with his feet up, glass in hand. His English, which had improved over their association, had reverted to the broken odd diction of the past as the wine took hold. "Passepartout is man of cities, as is Master, yes."

Long ago, I spending much time in wheat fields. My auntie, Aunt Louisa, sending me here when a young boy of twelve and thirteen and fourteen… and fifteen, I think. Passepartout not always good, boy. Very mischief making and trouble finding. When Passepartout finding too much trouble, auntie sending me to cousin with large wheat fields. Passepartout spending many hours at harvest time sickling wheat. Is very hard work. By end of harvest, Passepartout coming back to Paris very, very, sorry, dutiful nephew."

"No doubt," Phileas said. His valet's aunt had similar ideas about handling mischievous boys as his father. Only for Phileas, there had been no wheat fields. His father had sent him to the woodshed to chop wood when the need arose. When Phileas's arms were so sore, he could no longer lift the ax, the session would be over. But until then he had stood there sweating and chopping wood while his father sat nearby, calmly lecturing him on proper comportment and behavior for a young man of his class and social position.

Over twenty years later, Phileas couldn't be sure what had hurt worse, the sore muscles or having to listen to his father drone on until his strength gave out.

"So, why come back?" Phileas said, slipping lower in his chair.

"Time working with cousin not all bad," Passepartout said. "I going back by choice every harvest after learning to be good nephew. I working with cousins and making many good friends before going to university.

After harvest every year there was great festival. Much food and wine and singing…"

"And pretty girls to dance with," Fogg finished, picking up similar memories from his own boyhood. "Shillingworth Magna used to host a county fair when I was a boy. The fair still exists but has been moved to another site."

"Yes, many pretty girls… and one…"

"Do I detect a lost young love?" Fogg said. Excellent wine and stories of past romances seemed to go hand in hand on a moonlit night. "Go on, tell me about her. You have my complete attention."

A melancholy air tainted Passepartout's voice. "Young love, lost, yes. Rena, very, very, pretty girl. Eyes blue like sapphires and hair the color of wheat fields. Passepartout very fond of Rena. But… Rena's father… not fond of Passepartout. When Passepartout going to university for auntie, Rena was given to landowner west of father's farm. It good arrangement for Rena, but bad for Passepartout."

The valet paused, holding his glass on his knee, studying the cuts in the crystal. In his mind, he saw wheat fields blown in the wind and a young woman with hair almost indistinguishable from the flowing grain, looking up at him with brilliant blue eyes. The last time Passepartout had seen her, Rena had been holding her first-born infant daughter. She had been happy in her marriage and had told him so. But those eyes, they looked at him as if to say, she could have been just as happy with him.

The memories of men in their useless efforts to change God's ordinances on life and death had reminded Passepartout of his Rena and what might have been. He knew her to be a widow for over a year. His cousin had written to him saying so. He had written Rena with his condolences and had received several very nice letters in return. In their rounds of correspondence, she wrote invitations for him to come to the country to see her when his duties allowed.

Passepartout's duties to Master Phileas Fogg of London, England, were now over and it was harvesting time again in the wheat fields of France. Rena was a propertied woman with two children. Would there still be smiles in her eyes for Passepartout? He wondered about that and prayed it would be so.

Passepartout had written of his resignation to Rena with her sapphire eyes in mind and hopes in his heart. It was time for Passepartout to go back home to France. It was time to see what could be harvested from his past for the future.

The End