Spectre of War

by Kin S. Law

  The group was baffled, and in the space of the moment Arturo languidly sipped at his coffee. The early morning sun speared through a skylight, illuminating an imitation Dutch landscape of some New England hills. He did enjoy his drama.

  Cid was the one to break the silence.

  “Us,” he grunted calmly.

  “Precisely. Automata are fairly new. They require precision tuning, customized parts, and skilled technicians. All of it can be improvised in a city, but the rural states of America offer no such things. Once out of the city, the inspector’s pursuers will be limited as to how they may deploy their dastardly machines.”

  “But so will the inspector. Alphonse will likely be needing maintenance soon enough,” Hallow interjected.

  “Ah, but if we are to reach the inspector first? Then she will have the home advantage, so to speak,” said Arturo.

  Cid rummaged about in his satchel, coming up with a map run off a public library’s photogram press. The ink was still grainy from the impression.

  “What?” Cid protested. “I ran to the library while you lot jawed with the shop girl over the espresso machine.” He spread the rolled sheet onto the table. Everyone weighted the paper with their coffee cups, holding the world in place with copious amounts of caffeine.

  “Here, the South has little in the way of steamcrafts. They were far too dependent on their slave economy, and still have not recovered from the Civil War to produce an industrial revival,” Hallow pointed.

  “The rail lines run thick,” Arturo said. “The South is still one of the breadbaskets of America. It would be easy to run men or automata in to overwhelm our dear inspector.”

  “New England is much too industrial, too many ports,” Cid said. “Clemens and I often stopped to raid them of lobster and wenches.” When he noticed everyone leaning away from him, he amended, “The elder Clemens, I mean,” which helped not a jot.

  “She cannot possibly stay. Every steam-monger and alchemist has offices in New York. We must assume some of them are in the power of our enemies,” Hallow said.

  “There, the Niagara Falls! I have heard they are beautiful!” Cezette crooned.

  “Your Maman is no simpering, romantic buffoon,” Cid chastised.

  “It is a way to dispose of the Cook box,” Arturo mused. “Buried beneath tons and tons of surging water. Even the most powerful automata would be torn limb from limb beneath it….”

  “The box would be impossible to retrieve,” Hallow said. His brow creased, deep in thought.

  “But the falls are treacherous. Hargreaves is unfamiliar with the lay of the land. The inspector will not follow so obvious a route as the Hudson,” Cid pointed out. “And what if the seams were to burst?”

  For a while longer, M.A.D. sat grimly contemplating, none of them ready to admit not a single clue looked promising. Cid got up to try the coffee, muttering about the machine he had built when he was fifteen and comparing notes with the barista behind the counter. By all accounts, the review was favorable.

  Cezette struck up a conversation with a group of nearby youths. While they were shockingly dressed, adorned with polka dots, corsets worn on the outside, piercings and death’s head motifs, they were amiable, and soon a twitter of fashionable gossip drifted through the café. They seemed to be enamored with the stylings of a musical group named Heinous Anus.

  Hallow picked up a paper left on a nearby table. It was a late edition, already reporting on the wave of collapses throughout the city. One enterprising journalist had climbed a tall building, taking a far-seeing shot of the line of collapses. The article suggested a sewer line collapse all along one stretch of the city, already being leveraged politically against an infrastructure that had already been operating on shoe strings. There was also a piece on the continuing mine fire, out on the west coast, which had already consumed most of a town with flaming sinkholes.

  Suddenly, Arturo felt the tips of his sparkly up-do tingle with the beginnings of an idea. Or, rather, a non-idea, so daft it couldn’t possibly fail. He didn’t know what to call the opposite of an idea, even with his prodigious intellect, but it was rather a lot like trying to find one’s way in Whitechapel. It was pointless to look at the house numbers or the streets, plastered over with a dozen languages. Fighting the eau de toilet for your senses. Rather, you simply had to plunge in, sample the whore-boys, and drink the little bottles, trusting your hedonism to see you through and coming out the other end where you wanted to be in the first place.

  “What are you thinking?” Hallow laid down the paper, engrossed.

  “I’m saying we stop thinking, I say, the hole goes in one direction, why don’t we go that way?”

  “That seems absurdly simple and suspiciously like instinct,” said Hallow.

  “Why not? Municipal sewers follow very basic patterns. They’re shit pipes; they go where you don’t want to. It can’t be hard to figure out where their exits are, what’s big enough for an automata to get out. If we don’t find anything, we simply turn around and check the other end. But it gives us a direction.”

  “Why that’s so daft it might just work,” said Hallow, his nose crinkled in disgust.

  “Sometimes it is better to just start walking. We shall rendezvous with our dear Vanessa tout suite!” But of course the inspector wasn’t there to be annoyed by his French.

  The French did draw Cezette, who returned in a pinafore covered in printed cherries. She’d traded clothes with a native. Strangely, it made her blend in, with her cheekily cocked beret just another young metropolitan girl with a flair for the retro. At the same time, the espresso machine gave a gurgle and a bang, issuing a fantastic cloud of steam.

  “And that, my boy, is how you extract Blue Mountain. If you’ll excuse me….”

  “That would be our cue to exit,” said Hallow. Arturo thought he imagined it, but Hallow was looking up at him strangely.

  Having a plan was all well and good, but to get there was another issue. Once they returned to the cab, they discovered a cold puddle beneath the engine and a dry tank. Their cab had developed a leak, gored through and through in a vital pipe, and once the engine was cold there was no stopping the liquid water from escaping.

  “It’s an all-nighter,” Cid said, “I’ll have to scrounge the parts from shops, but the fastest we can do it is morning.”

  “But Maman is already on her way!” Cezette cried.

  Who knew what was following? Arturo thought.

  “Can we get a different vehicle?” Arturo proposed aloud, but he knew it was hopeless. A leased vehicle would leave a paper trail, as good as breadcrumbs for whoever wanted the Cook box. He was loathe to steal another engine, and draw the attention of local law enforcement. The sun was sinking fast between the tall skyscrapers, its golden glint coppery on the edges of airships drifting past overhead. Buying one outright was outrageously flashy, but if only they weren’t being pursued, would definitely have some appeal.

  “Alphonse needs fuel and water. Hargreaves is human, no matter what she may think,” Cid said. “Relax, lad. Have some fun. When do you get a chance to visit New York? We’ll rumble on out of here as soon as I get this patched.”

  “And I will help,” Cezette said, eager for engine work. “You get some rest.”

  The urgency was as palpable as the mysterious stinks on the streets, but Arturo saw the sense in their words. Cezette had fast fingers, and even as Arturo turned to look, Cid had half the pistons in pieces on the sidewalk. The old codger thrust a scrap of paper into Hallow’s hand as the lanky figure loped past.

  “We will need food, and sundry. This may be a long trip, and–” Hallow looked at Cid’s list “–there are some basics for Alphonse.”

  “I can get them,” Arturo said. “It is a good chance to put my ear to the ground.”

  “I will come with you. You will need help carrying it all, with your healing stomach,” said Hallow.

  “We will have need of expenses here,” Cid reminded the two of them. “Food, incid
ental parts, more coffee.”

  “Aye. Damn pirate,” agreed Arturo. He handed over a sheaf of dollar notes. “If you need rest, there should be enough to get a room nearby.”

  Arturo and Jean Hallow left Cid and Cezette to their tinkering, and headed towards a nearby market. Sundry was simple enough to procure, but for Alphonse’s specific items, New York was a walking city.

  “We will need to take the subway,” Jean Hallow said matter-of-factly, after Arturo had finished at a local telegraph office. There was a directory, and a map, and even a rudimentary calculating engine for finding one’s way in the labyrinth of the city.

  They descended into New York’s train system, only a short walk around the block. Arturo, with his keenly honed senses, could not help but admire the efficiency of the transit system. In a city of millions, there was an easily accessible, constantly running way of getting from place to place. Oddly, though the passengers closed in to Arturo’s sides, there were absolutely no destitute or beggarly people on the platforms or the cars. He would have been glad of it, if those same platforms weren’t devoid of the street performers, vendors, and musicians he had read so much about. Hallow stalked the platforms like a thing native to the dark, and the passengers seemed to part and flow around him.

  Once in the proper part of the city, finding a Ubique mercantile was no issue. Even at night, surrounded by New York’s glittering finery, the mechanical giant operated a storefront like a glowing beacon in a barren waste. The arclights in the forward display alone could have brought Rohan to Gondor’s aid.

  Inside, gleaming spanners lay in neat rows, bins were stuffed full of pressure pylons and folded piles of airship envelopes stacked by color. One could build an entire conveyance from the showroom floor of an Ubique. The parts Hallow needed off Cid’s list seemed common, stocked in large cubbyholes behind the counter.

  “Those look like parts we could have scavenged from the cab,” Arturo remarked of a knot of twisting pipes.

  “Essentially. Mordemere had to build his inventions so they could be easily repaired. He was an alchemic genius, but also a businessman,” replied Hallow. “To hear Cid tell of it, the vital parts of Alphonse are sealed in black boxes. We do the maintenance, but the instructions come from Leyland directly, and Glasgow, where he was assembled.”

  Arturo hadn’t expected Hallow to be so forthcoming. The scarecrow-like man examined the part with interest, manipulating the moving components and testing the metal by tapping it with a coin. He seemed unusually adept at it, for Hargreaves’ archivist. Then again, the man could operate automata with ease. He must have picked up a taste for motor oil from Cid.

  The Ubique mercantile was situated across from a grubby-looking eatery. Both Hallow and Arturo were worn out from jostling through the train crowds, and the smoky aroma wafting out the doors was an easy choice compared with the all-too-human smell of the train platform. Shopping was hungry work; the pair were famished.

  They clambered through with their paper bags and boxes in string to find themselves in a well-lit, relatively clean place. Arturo noted the sawdust on the floor, the skulls of livestock nailed to columns, and the butcher paper spread for tablecloths. He realized the dirt was simply an aesthetic reminiscent of the frontier west, a land tamed only on some politician’s map. Out there, the points of civilization were so far apart, even the long arm of the law could not string them together. Somehow it felt both comforting and terrifying, all at once.

  Arturo was pleased at finding a variety of barbecue options, named for different places of the country. New York City was a sort of nexus for everything American, and they had stumbled across a node of southern hospitality. Arturo was glad to find a wide selection of whiskey, while Hallow stuck to sweet tea. Neither was what they expected, but both were excellent. They ordered, but to Arturo’s horror, the waiter returned almost immediately with huge, sloppy plates piled high with dripping meats. Arturo rolled up his tightly clothed sleeves, looked around, and shrugged. He was simply too tired and hungry, and besides, he was in America. There was nobody to judge his attire here.

  With the first mouthful, Arturo was hooked.

  “Civilized!” Arturo proclaimed between bites of robust, smoky sausage. He had gone for the items most familiar to him: bangers and mash. The side of garlic potatoes was lackluster, but the meat was engulfed in a cloud of hickory smoke. He dipped into a sauce that made him feel like he just kissed the inscription on the gates of hell. All hope indeed abandoned—the stuff was addictive!

  At a more measured pace, the quiet Hallow sat eating a pulled pork sandwich with a knife and fork. He seemed well practiced at it, placing a small portion of bone-white coleslaw onto the cut section of sandwich, tucking in all the strands of meat before tapping at his puddle of sauce. Even though others around him were slathered in reddish goo, he went on calmly chewing at his meal, working through the mess methodically. He seemed unaffected by his surroundings.

  “That’s right; you’ve lived in this country before,” Arturo mentioned, as he mopped up the last of his sauce with a piece of cornbread. “You told me as much on the airship from England.”

  “Yes, I did,” Hallow answered. He hadn’t spilled a drop of sauce, and his plate was clean as a whistle. The napkin at Arturo’s neck was drenched, even though he was used to eating in frilly sleeves. “Though it was not in New York. I traveled quite a bit. My father paid to have me attend the finest schools in the country, after secondary school.”

  When Hallow fell silent, Arturo put his highball down and ordered another round.

  “Not all of them, I presume?” asked Arturo, when Hallow had his first sip.

  “No, no,” said Hallow. His scarecrow limbs hovered, flying clear of the tabletop. “But I had to change quite often. I am afraid not many of them were tolerant of my… behavior. It was hell on my poor mother.”

  “Come now,” began Arturo, but Hallow interrupted him by grabbing Arturo’s bourbon and downing it, two fingers, all in a shot.

  “That was precisely the problem,” said Hallow at last. He went on in a rush, a hurried whisper full of strain. “I do not mean to be indelicate, but surely a person’s preference in mates is his own business!”

  There was an uncomfortable silence. At first, Arturo meant to say something with a little more cheek, but he had realized, for quite a while now, what Hallow meant by ‘mates.’

  “They were… intolerant of you,” said Arturo delicately. “I am sorry. Did coming back here remind you of things that were buried?”

  “There are some things that ought not to be exhumed.”

  Arturo was intrigued. He had entertained the notion of seducing Jean Hallow ever since he caught a glimpse of the man, in Hargreaves’ office during a social call. The introverted, shy clerk had captured Arturo’s attention, not simply because of his slim, boyish figure or the grim cut of his jaw. Arturo had had plenty of that in Whitechapel, or more discreetly, in the parlors of London society.

  No, what caught his eye about Jean Hallow was the ineffable quality surrounding the man—a je ne sais quoi, as Cezettte Louissaint might have put it. Hallow was hiding a secret, some darkness in his past that clouded his every movement, made his step cautious and careful. It knit his brows and drew the corners of his mouth down, qualities only a practiced observer of Arturo’s caliber might have remarked as unusual. Yet, they told him nothing, which was the quintessential draw. Hallow was a puzzle Arturo might never solve, and it drove the spiky-haired detective crazy.

  Hallow was speaking once again. Arturo ordered more drinks.

  “We are born into this world expecting to have choices. The idea that we don’t is put into our heads, you know, by our betters. To be respectable in society. To succeed. Why do we tell our children to be lawyers, men of influence, or men of science? Or doctors.”

  “Your father was a medic,” Arturo recalled. “An army doctor.”

  “Yes, I have said. A country doctor, later in life, but a great name in the Pax Britannia as I
was being shunted from place to place in America. His name was influential enough for him to indulge in some… unorthodox practices.”

  “Wait… you don’t mean Jacques Johannes Hallow? The Snipper?” said Arturo. He hadn’t meant it, but the moniker had just slipped out. Doctor Hallow had occupied the spotlight during the War as a proponent of the most drastic kind of eugenics. Even his peers in America had thought his methods extreme. Thankfully, he did not find favor for long, and was denounced as a hack once the current Queen Victoria donned the crown and men who favored evidence over ideology were put into public service.

  “The Snipper. Yes, that was the name the British public gave to him. He hated my kind, yet he never knew… or perhaps he did. Ironic, isn’t it? Someone of my persuasion is guaranteed not to have children of my own, yet his method was uniquely targeted for the termination of progeny.”

  Arturo could imagine the young Jean Hallow, alone in a strange country, swooning over some dashing American boy. Finding out his father’s legacy through the teasing of other students and the disdain of the teachers.

  “Then again, he was convinced the passing of unfit hereditary traits had to be stomped out, by the knife and in polite society.”

  “The exchange of mnemonic propagations. Memes. Yes, I’ve read of this, the idea that ideas can reproduce of their own accord, very like natural life. It has been a popular topic these past months, with telegraphy so popular and ether wave devices becoming affordable. Albeit in a very different context. Those ether tablets are mostly used for pornography and photograms of cats.”

  “Like the ancient Egyptians before us, the worship of cats is once again in vogue. But, the exchange of pleasure is the very core of the mnemonic propagation. My father sought to terminate his ‘aberrations’ at their source—oh yes, they were his as well. I saw the way he touched his subjects, peeking through the doors of his laboratory when he thought nobody was looking. His tastes ran young, very young.” Hallow spat. “I have never wondered why my mother left us.”