The Shadow Conspiracy II

by Phyllis Irene Radford

  He hid his blush with chatter. “Your facial engineering is beyond anything I have ever seen — Erasmus, downstairs, doesn’t hold a candle to you for subtlety of expression. And your ankle here — you are familiar with the design principle, that the parts that get the most view and use are the better made? And yet your ankles are as precisely machined as your face. Do you know anything of your maker?”

  “No, I fear not. Eidolon design is quite beyond me. Suppose you recite more poetry to me instead. I adore poetry.”

  Mike blessed his tutor for forcing him to memorize verse — his little brother had entirely rebelled at the discipline. “Ellana,” he said, rolling the syllables on his tongue. “‘Thy beauty is to me as those Nicean barks of yore — ’”

  “Oh, lud! Not Poe — that American hack! Noel would kick him down the stairs. Some other versifier, if you please!”

  It was at moments like this that he remembered she was an automaton. Some slight unevenness in her data cards, perhaps, would account for the shift in her tone and speech. And who was Noel? She had a history of which he knew nothing. But all would be well. He would fix her up until she was perfect, and then he would keep her forever — a Maiden Mechanical, the perfect companion for a young genius.

  Quickly he switched back to the proven favourite: “‘Twas love, who first did prompt me to inquire; he lent me counsel and I lent him eyes. I am no pilot; yet, wert thou as far As that vast shore wash’d with the farthest sea, I would adventure for such merchandise...’”

  And, Juliet to his Romeo, she smiled again.

  As the very youngest member of his year, Mike was more closely supervised than the others. He was sound asleep, fully clothed and shod, on the sofa in his study — Ellana of course had the bedroom — when he was jerked awake by the pounding on his door. “Let me in, boy!”

  “Dr. Poston! What are you doing here?”

  “Dragging you to your lecture! Do you know you have missed two? And your paper on Differential Gearing was due last week!”

  “Research,” Mike squeaked. “A major project.”

  “Tosh! You are here, among other things, for a sound grounding in theory. Even a pupil of your calibre cannot just absorb the higher physics by osmosis. Here, your gown. Let us be off!”

  “But, but —” Before he could plead illness or an epileptic fit or a severe hangover, Mike was hauled off. As he stumbled down his stair with Dr. Poston’s large hand on his shoulder, the door of the ground floor suite opened a crack. Oh hell, Whitgift was awake! He gave serious thought to tripping up Dr. Poston in the quad and escaping, but another don joined them and he was trapped. The lecture, by a visiting Italian professor on the energetical properties of phlogistic fluids, would on any other occasion have enthralled him completely. But with Ellana unguarded in his room, he was unable to concentrate. The moment he could get away he raced back to the quad, his black gown flapping behind him.

  He burst into his study and breathed a sigh of relief. It was empty, just as he left it. But then, from the sleeping chamber, came a giggle. He tapped on the door. “Ellana?”

  “Go away, HoHo, we’re busy.”

  That was Whitgift’s voice! Mike turned the knob — locked. But these locksets were as old as the college; the jamb of ancient wood. A hard kick with the sole of his booted foot just beneath the lockplate broke it in. “You leave her be!”

  The two upperclassmen clutched at clothing; Muntley was down to his drawers and Whitgift had nothing on but a shirt. But it was the sight of Ellana that made Mike gasp. She was standing on the mattress of his narrow bed. She had not shed the dressing gown but it hung open. Between the long lapels her body gleamed like the inside of a shell, pink and white.

  “Gentlemen, you do not know what you are about,” he began.

  “Oh, don’t we!”

  “HoHo, you’re a bantling. Go away, and we’ll explain all the biology to you later.”

  Mike forced a laugh. “Muntford, this is no automaton. This is a real girl, a human soul transferred into a machine casing.”

  “Good God.” Whitgift stared at her. “That’s not possible.”

  With contempt Mike said, “Talk to her, instead of just admiring her charms, and it’s obvious.”

  “Mikey,” Ellana breathed. “You are so smart, it’s quite frightful.”

  He had the situation in hand now. He shut the ruined door neatly behind him and strolled over to stand with his back to the fireplace, his hands clasped behind him, prepared to crush his foes.

  “Anyone could see it, Ellana. You are widely read and obviously well-educated — unusual for a young girl of your period, which I judge is at least a generation ago. You spoke of acting in the Speech Room. That is a well-known venue for drama every year at Harrow. Your connection with the school might simply be through a Harrovian brother or father. But, judging from the glory and cunning of your engineering — I trust you are aware that your eidolonic manifold is a thing of beauty — I would make a larger surmise. To draw a bow at a venture, I suggest that you were born the daughter of one of the great Harrow engineers, probably a master at Druries. Some tragedy or illness — you have an aversion to flame, I note — forced him to save your life by transferring your soul into an automaton. This is illegal. He was forced to maintain you in the shadows until his demise, at which point —” He set his lips in a grim line at the thought of her transfer to and life in Xanadu. “As with slaves, your illegal status unfortunately allows your exploitation. Whitgift, Muntford — only your ignorance of her true age and station can excuse you. Judging from the appearance of the automaton —” Carefully he did not glance at her mons veneris, exactly at his eye level and hairless as his own crotch —”she cannot be more than twelve years old.”

  “Twelve! Sweet Jesus!” Blanching with horror, Whitgift shrank back.

  Muntford snatched up his trousers. “A revenant — dear Heaven!”

  But to Mike’s utter horror Ellana flung off the dressing gown and hopped down off the bed, completely nude. “Mikey! You are so amusing, I wish I could take you to my club!” Without a scrap of shame she stood before him, far too close, and patted his cheek. “Which blackballed me long ago, alas. This body was specifically crafted to look like a budding girl. I, myself, am no such thing.”

  With a distant agony Mike noted the jeweler’s perfection of her budding pink nipples — indeed, the parts that got the most viewing and use. “You are no girl. What are you, then?”

  “Well, that is a good question. I attended Harrow, as you so cogently reasoned. My name there was John.”

  “Oh god! oh my god!” Whitgift seemed ready to faint. “A man?”

  “I yearned to see what it was like to be female, and my fellow Harrovian Noel was able to satisfy my curiosity. Modern science allows one to do so many things! But, do you know, if you switch bodies often enough it gets confusing.”

  “Noel, better known as Lord Byron,” Mike almost whispered.

  “The Poet King!” Muntford snatched up a pointed fireplace poker. “Chaps, this thing is a monster, created by a monster and a traitor. It is our plain duty to disable it, instantly.”

  “Quite right,” Whitgift said. They both glanced at Mike. He made no reply — it should never be necessary to reiterate the obvious.

  “Callow schoolboys, against me?” At Harrow this John had evidently been trained in baritsu or some other combat discipline, and Ellana’s slim hands had machine strength in them. Almost too fast to see, she darted at Muntford. One twist and he yelled with pain.

  “She’s broke my arm!” Muntford reeled back. The poker fell to the carpet.

  Taller and a cricketer, Whitgift would have the strength to wield it, if Mike supplied a distraction. At the final crunch, it took brains as well as brawn to win the day. The creature had admitted that body-hopping clouded the mind. Hugely libertine propensities were a weakness to exploit. “So you are a modern Tiresias,” Mike said. “Able to answer the question of the ages.”

  “Which sex en
joys it more, do you mean?” Ellana’s smile was pure as an angel’s, a fearful contrast to her words as she turned to face him. “How I wish we had more time, Mikey dear. My research into the question has been extensive.”

  Behind her, Whitgift — good man! — soundlessly reached for the poker. Mike clawed to recall his Shakespeare. “‘Did my heart love till now? forswear it, sight! For I ne’er saw true beauty till this night.’” He realized that he was making an offer to John, not Ellana. There was no Ellana behind that heart-shaped face, only this unnatural chimera. He forced the words out past a rising gorge. “I — I have always wanted to emulate Columbus. An explorer of — of strange new lands.”

  “Words a teacher longs to hear!” She seized his hand before he could draw back and pressed it to one shallow perfect breast. Every nerve, every drop of blood in his veins, focused and oriented itself towards the shattering sensation of that sweet artificial flesh under his palm. He could not imagine what his face revealed — a thundering confluence of lust and revulsion, perhaps. She laughed at what he could not hide. “‘If love be rough with you, be rough with love; Prick love for pricking, and you beat love down.’ Mikey dear, to be your America —”

  Mike had forgotten that Whitgift also fenced for the University. Instead of bringing the poker down on the automaton’s head, he thrust as with the sabre. As it pierced her naked back Ellana shrieked thinly. The power cells in her abdomen, suddenly breached with a ferric object, exploded. The concussion knocked them all flat and shattered the windows. A white-hot fireball expanded in an eye blink, igniting the bedding and carpet.

  “Whitgift! Whitgift!” Mike grabbed his ankle to pull the fallen man clear. He almost fainted from the shock when Whitgift’s head stayed behind. Flying metal had beheaded him better than any guillotine.

  Near the wall Muntford bellowed for help. The entire room was afire. In nothing but drawers, he was going to be badly burnt. For that matter, Mike’s own academical was already alight. He dove through the blaze and dragged the injured man up. There was no time to find the door. He hoisted Muntford out the broken window, and jumped out after. Better the fall than the fire.

  Two weeks later, Mike had graduated to a walking cast and crutches, and was passed fit for punishment. He hobbled from the infirmary to the Dean’s office with great difficulty. Disdaining his desk, Dr. Whiddie loomed over his chair, a huge dark eagle in black clericals under a billowing doctoral gown. The Dean had been archdeacon of Barchester Cathedral before taking up his responsibilities at Queens, and wielded both a priestly and an academic authority that in combination was absolutely terrifying. His sermon lasted nearly an hour, with Mike as the sole member of the congregation.

  “...Muntford, as you know, has been sent down. But in consideration of the Whitgift family — Whitgift’s grandfather was Archbishop of Canterbury, you may recall — no mention is being made of moral turpitude or gross immorality. Muntford will not face prosecution for manslaughter. A lab accident, is what Whitgift’s people have been told.”

  Everything would be hushed up, Mike reflected bitterly. Only he would be left to face the music. Tears of fear and pain and shame brimmed in his eyes.

  “Finally, Mr. Holmes, we come to you.” The Dean’s deep funereal tones made Mike quiver. “I, at least, do give credence to your protestations of innocence and disinterested affection. That your scientific enthusiasms blinded you to the proprieties is understandable in view of your extreme youth and precocity. However, your situation is far more parlous than that of Muntford. You smuggled this monstrous construction into your College rooms, where it was cavorting unclothed. Your physical familiarities with the creature were seen to pass well beyond those of mere repair and refurbishment. And consider further: a male soul in a female eidolon? An automaton, crafted to look like a twelve-year-old girl but with the skills of a doxy? This is undeniable Depravity, sir!”

  Tears rolled down Mike’s cheeks unchecked. The Dean’s reasoning was unimpeachable, and flowed naturally into the peroration. “You must now take the very greatest care, young Holmes. Walk henceforward in the paths of light! At best, a stench of Byronic excesses with under-aged females will forever cling to the name of Mycroft Holmes. At worst — well, you are in peril of foreign exile or — I hesitate to even suggest it — prison. Muntford has only been saved by the influence of his uncle, Admiral Daggton; he will join the Navy as soon as his injuries permit. You can bring no such persuasion to bear. Your next error will surely lead to your utter destruction and downfall. Therefore, I suggest a period of rustication. Your broken leg will account for your absence for the rest of the year. Do not feel you need to return until Easter term if your medical needs call for a longer recuperative period. Use this time prudently, lad. Once they remove that cast, cold shower baths and long country walks will have an ameliorative effect upon the animal spirits. Muse upon the duties you owe your Creator and your Queen. Fortify yourself with daily Scripture reading, particularly the Epistles. Reflect upon the example you are setting for your younger brother — there is a Holmes minor, am I correct? — and repent!”

  “I will, sir.” It took all Mike’s strength to keep from sobbing aloud. “This will never happen again.” How to ensure this? With all his heart he yearned for a way to signal to one and all that he was done with women. No use taking orders in the Church of England, with its married clergy. An hermitical sect in the Syrian desert, perhaps?

  Dismissed at last, Mike hobbled painfully across the quad. The blackened ruins of his old rooms were covered now by canvas sheeting, pending retiling of the roof. Nobody spoke to him until he passed the buttery. Erasmus was just coming out with a tray of meat pies. “Now, young master,” the mechanical servitor said. “You look like you could do with some feeding.”

  It was one of the lines from Erasmus’s data cards, but even an automated kindness brought the tears to Mike’s eyes again — and a new thought. “Thank you, Erasmus, I could. In fact — could you spare four?”

  Shadow of Kilimanjaro

  Sue Lange

  London, England

  January 14, 1851

  My Dearest Baraba Ubongo,

  Our worst fears may be unfolding. I have received reports of certain activities implying the existence of self-motivating mechanicals in the region of the world that has not yet even invented the wheel. I’m writing specifically of an area in the lower continent, your place of birth, Africa. What can it mean?

  Let me present to you the cause of my worries and you shall determine yourself if my fears are well founded.

  Several years ago, a German missionary, Johannes Rebmann, claimed to have witnessed the existence of unmelted snow at the top of a mountain that sits on the equator in the very region I allude to. Because of this illogical claim, I suspect the entire area is home to imagination of great proportion.

  I do not believe any of it — neither Rebmann’s claim, nor the existence of these animated machines. Rather, I prefer not to, but I cannot take chances. Mr. Babbage and I are terribly busy taking hold of the consequences of our work here at home. Dis-ensoulment is an affront to God for which we will, I fear, pay when our days here are over. I find it hard to live with this terrible thing we have created. If this malady has spread further across the globe, my sin will be unforgivable.

  I wonder, do you remember your youth in the mountains at the Equator? Could there be truth in Rebmann’s claims? If so, perhaps there is veracity in the other reports of the mechanicals as well. I must have these mysterious matters investigated and you are the man to do it.

  Rebmann will be married in May and departs immediately after that to the area in question with his new bride and his younger cousin, Clara Hensel. He wishes to complete the missionary work he started there before it was interrupted by his fantastic discovery. Enclosed is a letter of introduction for you. Rebmann and I have several mutual acquaintances; he will recognize my name.

  Please go to him and offer your services as butler, cook, valet, or whatever will allow you f
reedom of movement in your travels with them. Your mission for me while in service to him is to interview the residents of the region to uncover phenomena of the type we are looking for. Your command of the German language as well as the vestiges of your own native tongue will serve you in this assignment.

  Go at once, in haste. Leave word only if you have missed this opportunity or you have proof that none of this exists: snow at the equator, or self-propelled mechanicals. If I do not hear from you, I will assume you are on your way to Africa.

  I shall be on pins and needles awaiting news from you.

  God speed,

  Lady Ada Lovelace

  I stared into the music box and everything became clear. Nacht und Traume unwound as the spindle turned and plucked at metal prongs. Each pluck was a note of understanding in the melancholy song that had previously meant so little to me. Now, its deeper meaning became clear.

  Return, holy night!

  Fair dreams, return!

  I remembered it now, the thoughts gelling with the tune.

  {Pluck.} You sink down.

  At first, I had feared the cloud on the horizon was something terrible, a contingent of the fearsome Maasai we had come across weeks previously, after leaving the security of the coast. No matter how Cousin Johannes had reassured me, I could not shake my fear and revulsion of those people. Their elongated earlobes; their way of puncturing cattle to extract blood for sustenance; the women with the loathsome disks around their necks. How could these painted savages be brought to light? And as they were godless, why would they not turn on the small group of us huddling against Eyasi?

  I hated Lake Eyasi. It is no Constance with her Bavarian waters and picturesque shoreline. In warm months Eyasi dries to a mudflat and leaves a scum of white soda everywhere. The ground is flat all around except to the north where it runs to the mountains.