by Jean Rabe
But not just any crews. Two giant, clockwork lifting-devices, each with eight legs and a clear glass bubble where their terrestrial counterpart’s head would have been, dragged blocks into place. Chance stared at them because, unlike the cranes lifting blocks from the nearby quarries, he saw no smoke or steam from the spiders’ engines. It wasn’t until he stepped right up to the window that he caught sight of the diversionary spillway, and the large Tesla-coil rising from a building beside it, that he understood what he was looking at.
His heart leaped and the resulting emotion surprised him, both for being recognizable and its strength. It had been so long since he’d felt joy—since he’d allowed himself to feel joy—that it staggered him. What he was seeing was something he’d known, in theory, was possible but. . . . Have I been gone from the world that long?
Gavrilis’ reflection appeared in the glass to his right. “Yes, Chance, this is but one of the things we have wrought. This is a dam on the Nile, deep in the south, near Aswan. We will be able to control the floods which, unacceptably, have destroyed Egypt’s cotton crops down through the aeons. We will do for Egypt what never before has been done in four thousand years of recorded history. It is our gift to this land of our forefathers.”
Chance bit back a laugh. Gavrilis was Greek, not Egyptian. Chance would have chided him over that remark, but then he remembered that Gavrilis had been a member of one of the secret societies at university. The Pharaonic Brotherhood of Ptolemy. It traced its origins to the last Egyptian dynasty, through fanciful lineages, just like any other Masonic-style order.
“But we are not above bestowing gifts upon those who will be of service.” Gavrilis reached around and plucked Chance’s eye patch away.
Something clicked in the eye-socket which had been empty for ten years. A round lens in a brass fitting, anchored in a larger fitting shaped to run midway around his cheekbone and brow. Again he tried to raise his hand to touch it, but couldn’t. He looked down, his hand straining against the cuff, then with three clicks, his hand grew huge, and the blackened grime beneath his nails appeared as wide as the river below.
“What did you do to me?”
“We have a great deal of money, Chance, surely you remember that. We retain the services of the world’s greatest engineers. That station below, a year ago we purchased it from Nicola Tesla, had it dismantled in Colorado and reconstructed here. Likewise, and anticipating our meeting again, we had optical specialists create this teleocular device. It is our gift to you, Chance, in hopes you will consider performing a job for us.”
“What job?”
“We want you to make this project run efficiently.”
“I’m not an engineer.”
“It is not for your engineering skill—at least not your construction skill—that you are needed. The project is behind schedule and running tight on budget. Given the cyclical nature of the weather, it is anticipated that 1902 will produce devastating floods. The only way we can finish in time to prevent that is if we increase the power from that station so our spiders can lift more and do it more quickly. Five percent would help, ten would be more than enough, and fifteen would result in a tidy bonus, the majority of which would be yours.”
Chance shook his head. “Money is trouble.”
“So true, but not in this case.” Gavrilis smiled broadly. “You see, Harrison Hudson has taken a number of futures contracts which are, in essence, a bet against this project. Finish early, and he’s ruined.”
Chance nodded. “No time to spare. Get me a wrench.”
The lift which had carried Chance away to be billeted and sent to work, opened again. Gavrilis glanced back over his shoulder. “So he didn’t hit you, Brinkworth?”
“No, sir, but he wanted to.” The slender secretary frowned. “Are you certain you can trust him, Mr. Gavrilis?”
“Foolish question. He will see what we wish him to see. If ever he sees what is truly going on, it will be far too late for him to do anything about it. But you are suspicious. Why?”
“I find it too convenient that he found his way to that particular bar—one which has served to entertain you in the past and me rather frequently.”
“You believe he was sent? By whom? Hudson? Other of our enemies?” Gavrilis’ jowls quivered with laughter. “Be assured of one thing, Mr. Brinkworth. The contempt Corrigan has for us is nothing compared to the loathing he has for them. ‘The enemy of my enemy is my friend.’ And given that truth, Chance Corrigan is, as of this moment, our very best friend in the world.”
During the next three weeks Chance Corrigan slept very little. Men on the crew came to think that he was as much a machine as the spiders. At least, that was in the first week. Over the next two they decided he was a genius, and likely a god, because everything he studied and touched ran more efficiently and safely. His first pass at dealing with the hydro-electric turbines in the spillway generation station increased output by seven percent. Those adjustments had been fairly simple—largely based around increasing the efficiency of the magnets being used. Chance had always found magnetism fascinating, and working on the turbines barely caused him to break a sweat.
The second turbine pass upped efficiency to eleven percent, and he would have kept on there, but the spiders—while not yet working at peak efficiency themselves—still performed so much better that the quarry could not keep up. He turned his attention to the ancient steam engines powering the cranes and cutting saws, enabling the crews to increase their pace.
Though the workers’ gratitude provided an open door for him to join them socially, Chance held back. From hilltops above the workers’ camps he could watch them around their campfire. His new eye did an admirable job of piercing the darkness. The crew—consisting of Egyptians, Nubians and a handful of Europeans—appeared quite happy, in spite of being worked slowly to death.
He looked from their camp glowing with firelight and back up toward the clock-tower atop which Gavrilis’ disk-shaped apartment perched. The lift shaft ran up through the clock’s base, right behind where an enormous pendulum swung. The clock’s face had replaced numerals with hieroglyphics, though if they had any significance it escaped Chance. An airship mooring mast rose above the apartment, with a small and elegant sky-yacht awaiting Gavrilis’ bidding. And there, centrally silhouetted, stood the stout man himself, his domain spread beneath him.
Chance marveled at how much work actually was getting done on the dam. The spiders, which stood twenty feet tall when working, would wade out into the water or scuttle along the top of the dam, to place giant stone blocks. They reminded him vaguely of the Martian tripods from that recent novel The War of the Worlds despite their lack of a heat-ray. Though a heat-ray would make cutting stone faster . . .
Developing a heat-ray was the least of the things Chance had to be doing. Inefficiencies riddled the whole project. Supplies came up the Nile on steamers, then were offloaded onto carts and caravans to make the trek up into the highlands. The larger, bulkier items would get loaded onto a pair of cargo airships, but Gavrilis retained them only when a suitable load had arrived. From what Chance had been told, the last-such shipment had been the grand piano in the large man’s apartment.
It struck Chance that laying a single iron track, magnetizing it, and likewise magnetizing the undercarriage of a sledge would use magnetic repulsion to eliminate friction. This would, in turn, allow draft animals to more easily haul supplies from the river to the dam. Magnetic levitation would require extremely strong magnets which operated at high temperatures. A super magnet.
He thought about it for a bit, and jotted down a couple of chemical formulations he might use to create one. As he made a note, he laughed. For the first time in a decade he was thinking of an experiment that would expand the envelope of knowledge, not just improve some existing technology.
Chance’s laughter, which had been accompanied by a sense of freedom, died as invisible chains wrapped themselves tight around his chest. The last time I experimented, men di
ed. He stood, shivering, and wandered off to bed. He hoped to sleep, and hoped not to dream, and got half of what he desired.
A week later as dusk approached, Brinkworth rapped on a spider’s cockpit shell. The tempered glass—sufficiently thick to withstand water pressure at the base of the dam—made his rapping into a tink-tink. Chance imagined that was what every goldfish heard inside a bowl. He finished tightening down the plate beneath the operators’ seat, then stood. He couldn’t quite straighten up fully, but easily grasped the hatch’s edge and pulled himself through. He sat with his legs dangling into the cockpit.
Brinkworth didn’t even attempt to hide his contempt. “Mr. Gavrilis requests the pleasure of your company at dinner.”
Chance pulled a rag from his back pocket and wiped grease from his hands. “I really ain’t . . .”
The fancy man’s eyes narrowed. “Mr. Corrigan, I am well aware of your history. Prep schools, Ivy League education. You may have spent the last decade consorting with the dregs of humanity, but you know better. Mr. Gavrilis deserves better.”
He pointed to the tower’s base. “You’ll find appropriate clothing and a showering facility in there. You will then enter the lift and ascend to join Mr. Gavrilis.”
Chance didn’t need the extra magnification a couple eye-clicks gave him to spot Brinkworth’s displeasure. “You can guide me up.”
Pure hatred lit the man’s face for an eye-blink. “I was not invited. It seems this is to be a dinner for old school chums.”
Chance frowned. “There are others here?”
“No, just the two of you.” Brinkworth snorted. “You are expected presently. Do not disappoint.”
The fancy man turned and stalked away, keeping his head high and spine straight right up to the point where he realized he had no place else to go. He hesitated. Chance lost interest in him and headed off to the tower. He made a detour to his tent, dropping off rags and wrenches, then showered and dressed.
Clothes had been laid out for him: a white cotton shirt, cotton undergarments, a silken vest of navy blue, along with a matching tie bearing their school crest toward the point; and a light tan linen suit. Brown oxford shoes completed the outfit. Everything fit perfectly, which might have surprised Chance, save he remembered being unconscious for the time it took to transport him down the Nile and implant the new eye. Brinkworth could have measured him in every way possible—probably had—and would find some more malignant way to use that information.
Gavrilis smiled, welcoming Chance with open arms—but never letting things get even close to a hug between them. “We had you measured as a precaution. . . .”
“Fitting me for a coffin?”
“Were the unfortunate to happen, perhaps.” The large man turned and waved Chance toward a table set for two by the window. “But everything that has happened so far has been most fortunate. We felt you deserved a reward, hence the clothing. And an opportunity for even more prosperity.”
Chance walked toward the table. “Such as?”
“Time to speak of business later, my friend.” Gavrilis paused at a sideboard and poured three fingers of a dark amber liquor into a pair of matched snifters. “We’ve been told you drink whisky. This is a Macallan from a cask filled before your War Between the States. We have two more bottles, one of which you will take with you.”
Chance accepted it and let his eye click closer. The Scotch drained on elegant legs down the sides of the snifter. The rising aroma warmed his nose. “To your health.”
“And that of our project.” Gavrilis smiled as their glasses clinked. “Please, let us enjoy our meal.”
The meal consisted of four courses and touched upon all of the dishes Chance had enjoyed at one time or another in the Hudson household. He’d not eaten such rich food in a decade, and the avidity with which Gavrilis tucked himself into the meal answered the question of how a man who had once been an Adonis had grown so corpulent. Gavrilis had gained every pound Chance had lost in that time and more; and while they both might tip the scales at the same weight, a decade of adventuring around the world as a mechanic—or anything else that paid—had left Chance lean, hard and scarred.
Chance did enjoy the food, but he forced himself to eat slowly and not finish everything. Gavrilis had chosen the menu to let Chance know he’d done his homework. He knew everything he needed to know about Chance and probably a bit more. He chose the food as an offering of friendship and even a bit of a seduction. Gavrilis was promising more of the same if Chance accepted whatever offer would be coming his way.
Chance realized one other thing about the meal. It was an illusion. It promised a return to the time before. He’d not forgotten that Gavrilis said he would help Chance destroy Harrison Hudson. That was really all Chance wanted. He didn’t need the dream that the opulence once denied him could magically be restored.
But Alexander always tried too hard.
After dinner and after several more whiskies, Gavrilis stood before the window, a cigar all the way from Havana clutched between thick fingers. “We are going to share with you a confidence. No one, save my family and the Pharaonic Brotherhood know it. We do remember that you never joined the Brotherhood, but we feel you to be a brother now. We have watched you, in all you are doing, and feel safe in sharing this because of what you have done.”
“What, exactly, have you seen me doing?”
“We have seen you caring.” Gavrilis turned, punctuating his remark with the stab of a glowing cigar cherry. “Even as just today, when you were maintaining the spider, you did more than attend to the engine. You made certain the machine would be safer for the workers. You care about the people.”
Gavrilis again faced the window, weaving slightly as he executed his pirouette. “As do we. You did not believe me when I referred to the people as our people, but so they are. My family is Greek, yes, but do you recall the last dynasty in Egypt? The Ptlolemaic Dynasty, founded by Alexander the Great, was purported to end with Rome’s conquest of Egypt. But the Emperors did not kill the last of the Pharaohs. Roman respect for antiquity prompted them to keep us alive. We are descended from Alexander Helios, Cleopatra’s eldest son by Marc Antony. In our veins flows the blood of the last rulers of this magnificent land.”
He puffed on the cigar, the red glow causing his face to reflect an infernal mask on the glass. “So these are our people. This project will be mildly profitable, but the prosperity of our people is our true goal here. This dam is but the first of many improvements which can raise Egypt back to its former glory. To do just that is our life mission.”
Chance sipped some of the Scotch but said nothing.
Gavrilis smiled in the glass, then turned. “So, to the business we mentioned. Sirius will be rising by the end of the month. That is the traditional start of the floods. The dam will hold back a significant amount of water before we have to open the spillway fully to relieve the pressure. We need as much stone on that dam as possible in the next three weeks.
“Business calls us to Cairo, and we no longer trust Mr. Brinkworth. We cannot have him running the operation. In our absence, we will put you in charge.”
Chance’s eye narrowed. Brinkworth’s fury had come because Gavrilis had already dismissed him. “I’m not an administrator.”
“No, but you are a leader. A leader is what this project needs. Time is of the essence. Once the rains begin we will be unable to do anything, so we need as much as possible done before the rains come. Brinkworth will do the clerical work. He will embezzle a great deal while he does it, but that is not your concern.”
Gavrilis raised an eyebrow. “Will you do this for us? For the people?”
Chance nodded. “For the people.”
Gavrilis swirled the last of his whisky in the glass, then drained it. “Thank you. We are mindful of what we promised you in payment. Complete as much of the dam as you are able, and we guarantee you will have much, much more.”
The shadow of Gavrilis’ airship momentarily eclipsed the sun. Chan
ce watched it sail away, its steam engine belching black smoke in a long tail. He’d already taken to his duties as project foreman, getting up early to organize the airship’s refueling. He stared after it until the sun’s heat and the glare of Brinkworth’s fury made him turn his attention to business.
Gavrilis had been correct. The men were willing to follow Chance, and not just because the big sahib had turned things over to him. Chance did not hesitate to leap in where work needed doing. He took his turn driving one of the spiders, dropping blocks in place, even daring to plunge his spider fully beneath the waters to nudge things into position.
Chance enjoyed working the spider. Though he found the combination of levers, cranks, and pedals cumbersome and clumsy, the device worked remarkably well. The steel-lattice limbs provided great strength, the gearing greater torque, and yet the brass, leather, and wood trim gave the cockpit a suitably elegant feel. A Swede, two Slavs, a Scotsman, and a Montenegrin constituted the rest of the drivers. Working the machine was exhausting, especially because the glass cockpit became a hot-house beneath the sun, so Chance added domed lights so they could use the machines at night. That saved the men from heatstroke and preserved them from Brinkworth’s spying from on high.
Work progressed even more quickly than even Chance had hoped. As Sirius made its first appearance in the east, he found himself again seated on a hill, halfway between worker camps and Gavrilis’ tower. Gavrilis had not yet returned from Cairo, but was expected within the week. He would return just in time for storms to come up from the south.
Chance sat there, a bit achy, feeling the heat drain out of the stone. He had worked hard, taking over from Swensen for a seven-hour shift. As much as he wanted to deride what Gavrilis had said, it felt good to be working on a project that would make life better for ordinary people.