The Clockwork Man

by William Jablonsky

  I replaced the linen cover and left the Master’s workshop as I had found it. Since then I have remained in the sitting room or the dining hall, never far from the window that I might welcome him when he returns.

  Though I ask your forgiveness, Professor Wellesley, I shall refrain from writing any more entries for the time being, and will resume once the Master and Jakob are safely home. I humbly apologize if my hiatus in any way devalues this text, but for now I can offer no further detail that might enrich it.

  14 January 1894

  7:43 p.m.

  My dear Professor Wellesley,

  I am sorry to be the bearer of disappointment, but I fear this entry shall be the end of my depositions. To put it as succinctly as possible, I cannot continue under present conditions, and have therefore determined that my existence must end.

  The Master’s home has been empty since his departure, but for one brief visit by Fräulein Gruenwald a week after he was taken. She collected some of Jakob’s things and then left as hurriedly as she arrived. I asked after the Master’s condition, but she only shook her head and said she did not know. She kissed my cheek and told me to keep the house ready for the Master and Jakob’s eventual homecoming: she insisted we would all shortly be together again and that life would return to this house. Then she took her leave, trudging away through the snow. She has not returned since, and I begin to believe I shall not see her again.

  I am overcome by a strange, empty sensation, which must be loneliness, or perhaps defeat—I have little experience with either and am unable to judge. It first came to me on the eve of the New Year, when in place of the raucous crowd of champagne-swirling friends that it has been the Master’s tradition to welcome since my inception, there was only the silent dark. While I have not seen much conversation since Giselle’s passing, the quiet is all the more oppressive now that this house has been abandoned.

  Now, in particular, her absence fills me with a void I had not previously thought possible. I must confess I have, from time to time, wandered down into the Master’s workshop and uncovered the stark replica on the bench. I have even talked to it, though it offers no reply. For a brief time I entertained the idea of studying the Master’s blueprints and continuing his work. By lantern light I have pored over his designs, but they have proven more complex than my own, and as I have mentioned earlier in this document, I possess limited knowledge of my own workings.

  And another thought strikes me—even if I were to duplicate his genius and complete the project in his stead, I would have but an imitation, a hollow shell of metal and wire. The very idea strikes me as obscene. For the first time I have begun to doubt the Master’s judgment—an intolerable state, no doubt brought on by my long isolation.

  I have considered disguising myself in my greatcoat, shrouding my face in my hat and scarf, and going into the city in search of Giselle’s murderer, perhaps even bringing him to some final and permanent justice so the Master might finally know peace. I did not think myself capable of entertaining such ideas, but they surface regardless. I find no relief in them; no retribution could return Giselle to her father, or to me.

  I do not think I shall recover from her loss, nor do I wish to. She is gone, the Master’s house empty, my purpose effectively ended. Therefore, I will shortly retire to her attic observatory and indulge in her memory until my ticking slows and I finally wink out and cease to be. I have left a brief note explaining my wishes to the Master, Fräulein Gruenwald, or whoever may find it in the days to come; I only hope their regard for me is sufficient to honor my request.

  I have also left instructions for the delivery of this volume, so that it may eventually find its way into your hands. Incomplete as it is, I hope the learned community might find some use in it.

  All apologies,

  Ernst

  III

  IN LIGHT OF PRESENT CIRCUMSTANCES

  Date unknown

  Time unknown

  Professor Wellesley,

  I do not know the circumstances which have brought me to this place—nor, in fact, do I know precisely what this place is. My internal timepiece read 4:19 p.m. when I awakened, but with no view of daylight I could not confirm this, nor had I access to a clock to reset myself. The reader must understand that, for a being such as I, this is an appalling state, akin to being in a play with no knowledge of the script. I cannot accurately tell how long I have been unconscious, but it has been forty-seven hours, thirty-eight minutes since my stark awakening, in which time I have discovered no details about my present situation. I can only assume a considerable amount of time has passed, as my suede skin has been tamped smooth and leathery; my tweed suit has become faded and threadbare. Apparently, this volume has not reached you, as I found it stuffed in the side pocket of my jacket; I will see that it gets to you at the earliest opportunity. The pages are yellowed and rather fragile, and I must apologize for their condition.

  I admit that my heart, metaphorically speaking, is not in thisexercise at the moment. I write these notes only to pass the time and, perhaps, to help sort out my current state of confusion. I might simply let myself run down again and return to the blessed darkness, but curiosity prevents it for the time being.

  I have but two memories, both clouded and fleeting, since my last posting. I might call them dreams were I capable of such things.

  The first: a dark and dusty space with a bare marble floor, a small crack of light peeking through a heavy door. My eyes came to life only for a moment, and I could not move or speak. The Master and two gaunt, dark-eyed, curly-haired men I did not recognize stood over me; he knelt beside me, touched my face, and smiled. His face was lined with cavernous wrinkles, hair gone wispy and silver, eyebrows a bushy, translucent white.

  “There now,” he said. “Rest, my old friend. He will never find you here.” Then, the heavy scraping of stone on stone, and darkness.

  And the second: a ceiling illuminated by long, flickering tubes of harsh light, unfamiliar faces entering and leaving my field of vision, peering into my eyes, opening my chest, and exposing my inner workings.

  “Does it still work?” someone said in what I recognized as English. Then, another voice: “Nope. Just wound him, and nothing’s happening.”

  My reawakening was as abrupt as it was unexpected. Sluggish after their long inactivity, my gears and cogs must have been slow to move; but when they finally did, I snapped awake in a flash of consciousness. After waking I could not move for some time, and so remained fixed in the awkward pose in which I had been placed, staring out at the people passing on the sidewalk until night fell and the store behind me emptied. Since then I have regained some of my motion, though it took a bit of practice to regain articulation in my joints. I fear mypenmanship may suffer because of it—my fingers are still slow to respond—and ask your patience until my coordination improves.

  The brief fragments of speech I have overheard suggest I am somewhere in America, though my exact location remains a mystery. I am in the display window of what appears to be a men’s clothing store, a shimmering red curtain behind me, facing out upon a busy street corner. At the moment this window is not backlit, allowing me to compose these notes without drawing attention to myself. In daylight nearly the whole of my view is taken up by a towering wall of reflective blue glass: the face of the building across the street—so tall I cannot see the top of it from my vantage point.

  During daylight hours I have witnessed many people passing my window on the sidewalk. Their clothing is of an unfamiliar style, and while fashion is quite fickle—in their day my own clothes were considered somewhat outdated, and Giselle often complained the Master had no sense of style—I do not think such radical changes come so rapidly. Some stop to peer in at me, pressing their faces up against the glass for a closer look; a few children have contorted their faces at me, perhaps hoping for a response, only to be brushed along by impatient parents.

  On the street outside I have observed many horseless carriages of the style He
rr Ford proposed, though sleeker, stouter, and far more colorful than his simple designs. A few even bear his name, and I must sadly acknowledge the possibility that Herr Ford has acquired me in some unseemly manner—though my current location seems strangely inappropriate if I am to be studied and copied. Perhaps the Master has sold me as punishment for my failure to protect Giselle. If this is so, and if my absence has brought him peace, I accept thisfate willingly. Whatever time has passed, the wound is still fresh.

  Thus far no one has entered this window display, and I have only briefly peeked outside the curtain in the darkened store just long enough to see the many racks of men’s suits and overcoats immediately adjacent to my window. On the wall beside the window frame is a small black box bearing a tiny lens, slowly rotating on its base. The Master once described to me a theoretical device he called an “electric eye,” which could capture the moving image of anything caught in its line of sight—the box bears a striking similarity. I seem to be out of its range, but I think it unwise to reveal my newfound locomotion for now; if my darkest suspicion is true, and Herr Ford has pilfered me through some underhanded scheme, I will not allow him that satisfaction.

  At present the store is empty, save for a single night watchman bearing a small, tubular lantern; from time to time I hear his shuffling footsteps and low hum. It is because of him that I am even able to write these notes, as he left a pen on the edge of this window, which I snatched when his back was turned. I am ashamed of my small act of larceny, but in light of present circumstances I feel it can be excused. Not long ago he lazily hummed the first few bars of “Ode To Joy”—only enough to be recognizable, and I suspect he does not know the rest—and for a moment caused me to think of Vienna, the Master’s hand on my shoulder, his contented smile as he listened to his magnificent clock work its magic.

  Thus far he has not pulled back my curtain, nor taken the slightest notice of me, even when I seized the opportunity to rewind myself—a rather noisy process to begin with, made worse by the newsluggishness of the key. But his footsteps draw nearer, and I think it wise to suspend this correspondence until a more opportune time. I shall return to it when I have something further to report. Until then, I will wait and try to bear my solitude with some semblance of grace. But the Master’s most precious gift to me remains; with but a thought she is with me again, asleep by my side in the attic, the soft warmth of her body seeping into my tin shell, her red-gold hair spilling over me. So long as I have that, I will never be alone.

  Date unknown (19 hours, 39 minutes since previous entry) Time unknown

  I write these lines with some apprehension, as I fear being discovered before I can glean the events leading to my current situation. Early this morning, quite unexpectedly, two young men, clad in white coats, entered my display window, lifted me from the floor quite awkwardly (my head struck the glass as they lifted me, and the pane buckled dangerously), and carried me off to a white room in the basement of the store. It was not unlike the scene in the Master’s basement, as the men from the sanitarium dragged him into their carriage; I feared a similar fate.

  They laid me on a wooden bench; the white-coated men sheared off my clothing with heavy scissors, covered my eyes with thick tape, sprayed me head to toe with a fine solvent, and proceeded to buff and polish every inch of me, stroking my suede skin with heavy brushes, coating my mustache with oil and wax. The experience was terrifying. Aside from the obvious indignity, I feared my internal ticking might give me away, but their chatter and the commotion oftheir work was sufficient to drown it out. And they were not gentle. I have undergone routine maintenance and modifications many times before—the Master upgraded my skin twice, and replaced my eyes with more advanced models nearly once a year—but his touch was always tender—that of an artist, even a parent, in a sense, and he would always talk to me as he worked so I would not be concerned. I saw no affection in their probing and prodding.

  Though I could see nothing, I listened carefully for any information as to the date or my whereabouts. Their voices I dimly recognized from my brief flash of consciousness. I learned nothing of value: their talk primarily revolved around an athletic team called the “Brewers,” toward whom they seemed both affectionate and highly critical, but who they are I could not discern. They made no mention of Herrs Ford or Edison, and it seems they do not know my true nature. The taller of the two, a rake-thin young man of about twenty-five with shaggy hair hanging over his eyes, asked his companion if people in my time had actually believed I was a real, thinking being.

  The shorter, stockier man grunted. “I guess people would believe just about anything back then. I think Linnhoffer was hoping he was the real thing.”

  Finally, when they were finished with my body, they uncovered my eyes and applied a smaller, moister brush to each one. One suggested that removing my eyes might make the task easier; had he attempted to do so I would have had no choice but to resist. The mechanisms behind them are extremely delicate, beyond many of the world’s most learned men, and only the Master knew the secret of their application. Fortunately, his colleague warned him he might not be able to put them back in. I dared not look at them, nor move in the slightest, lest I betray myself.

  After holding several suit jackets up to my bare torso, they dressed me in new clothes—a suit of heavy brown wool similar to my old attire but still rich in texture and color, a shimmering yellow shirt of a fabric I have never encountered, gleaming brown dress shoes, and a brown plaid bow tie. They polished my monocle and gingerly put it back in place.

  I grew concerned about this tome, as I had placed it back in the side pocket of my jacket, which they had let fall in a crumpled heap on the floor near where I lay. I began to fear it might be lost; it is, after all, my only connection to the world I had known, and I watched and listened carefully for the opportunity to retrieve it.

  “That’s better,” one of them said after replacing my monocle. “He’s looking good now. Let’s get the boss.” As soon as their footsteps faded from my hearing I sat up and, quietly as possible, leaned over and pulled this journal from its pocket, fitting it discreetly into the side pocket of my new coat. (In the future I must remember to store it within my chest cavity, which I can open myself with a bit of effort.) I quickly scanned the walls for a calendar, but they were bare. Then I heard slow, faint footsteps outside, and out of fear of being seen I lay back too quickly, and knocked one of the brushes to the floor. Sure I was about to be discovered, I averted my gaze to the ceiling.

  There were voices outside, too faint to recognize, but I feared in a moment I might look into the face of Herr Ford, who, despite his employer’s denouncement of me, knew I was not the “walking cuckoo clock” I had been labeled. If revealed, I would face him with dignity; if my suspicions were valid, and he had in some way pilfered me, I would demand to be returned to the Master immediately, and refuse to cooperate with his wishes.

  I did not recognize the man who entered.

  At first I could see him only through my peripheral vision, still clouded by remnants of the polish on my eyes. He was a tall, thick man in a gray suit and burgundy necktie. His rust-colored hair had receded to a sharp widow’s peak, and he wore thick spectacles on his face.

  The two who had worked on me—through their conversation I determined their names were Gabe and Barry, respectively—followed close behind, and one of them sang, “Ta-daaaa.” He leaned over me, his face perhaps a foot from my own, and looked into my eyes.

  “Well, Mr. Linnhoffer?” Barry, the taller of the two, said. “What do you think?”

  “Much better.” He peered closely, squinting, and for a moment I feared he had sensed some movement on my part. “Hello, Ernst. How do you like your new home?”

  At that moment I was too startled to move or speak, believing he had seen through my ruse, or that he had known all along. But he turned his attention back to his two employees and patted my chest. “Good job, gentlemen. Pity you couldn’t get him running again—people woul
d come in droves to see him.”

  “If you want, we can tinker with him,” the one named Gabe said.

  Herr Linnhoffer shook his head. “No thanks. Nothing personal, but I want a specialist for that kind of job.” He tapped on my chest again with a dull ping. “Just put him back in the display window when he’s ready.”

  “Yes, sir,” Barry said.

  Herr Linnhoffer walked off, his footfalls echoing in the stairwell. After he was gone the two gathered up my old clothes and stuffedthem into a shimmering black bag, swept the floor around my table, and wheeled me back to the window display. I allowed them to arrange me sitting in an orange suede-covered armchair, an aged copy of Moby Dick in my hands, my monocle stylishly positioned beneath my eye as if I were peering through it. I count myself fortunate that I am pliable enough to hold this position without the aid of wires—it would be impossible to move without disturbing them.

  Thankfully, I have not been disturbed since. This morning’s experience was, to say the least, harrowing, and one I would not care to repeat. And I find the idea that I am now mere window-dressing somewhat unsettling. But I have ended this day with a little more knowledge than I possessed the day before. It seems clear now that I have not been forcibly wrested from the Master’s hands, and that, contrary to my fears, Herr Ford has had no part in this. It is a small relief. But I will maintain my silence for a little longer. Revealing myself at this time seems imprudent, as those in whose custody I now reside do not know my true nature, and might be frightened by the revelation.

  For now, I will simply wait and hope for some inkling of what has transpired during my slumber. But the mystery remains; if neither theft nor extortion has brought me here, the Master may still have disposed of me willingly. And I find that possibility far more difficult to bear.