As usual, Corbin took every opportunity to push me or smack me in the head and call me Dummy. I began to get the feeling that he not only liked beating on me and the other boys, but actually wanted one of us to get angry and try to hit him so he could really wallop us good. He seemed to be always on edge, and was quick to blame us for anything the professor didn’t like.
Each day I was moved to another section where I would learn about different parts and tools and assembly techniques until I became proficient. Finally, after two weeks, I started working at the steam station. I learned how to stoke the boiler and watch the gauges climb up toward the red as the pressure rose. I learned that each valve and lever controlled and channeled the live steam to different tools and machines around the shop. All the boys had to work the boiler on a rotating basis, but I was the youngest and the smallest, and it made me very nervous.
Corbin showed me how each valve and lever had to be set for the various configurations required for different machines, always with his customary look of annoyance.
“And this gauge is the most important,” he yelled over the noise. “If it moves into the red, you gotta turn this valve real quicklike. The steam’ll vent out the side there. Anybody standing in the way will get boiled alive. You got it?”
I knew better than to ask Corbin, but I just had to know. “What happens if I don’t open the valve?”
He grabbed me by the front of my shirt and got in my face so close I could smell his bad breath. “We all die, Dummy.”
I swallowed hard. Not because I was afraid of him, but because I didn’t want to blow up the shop, so I nodded and looked scared. Corbin gave me a satisfied, confident smile, then smirked and walked away.
I didn’t like working the steam station, and neither did anyone else. I had to wear goggles and heavy leather gloves and a leather coat that was ten sizes too big for me. The shop was already hot enough without all the extra leather, but standing so close to the boiler with waves of heat melting off it made things almost unbearable.
Every so often Algert would holler or send a boy over to tell me to open or close a valve for a particular workstation. I would adjust the valve and watch the gauges, keeping an extra-sharp eye on the main pressure. As the professor told me, “Steam is a living thing, capricious and unforgiving. If you make even a small mistake, she will burn you…or kill you.”
The next day, instead of shifting me to another workstation, Corbin hit me in the head and told me to go in to see the professor. I knocked and opened the door, not knowing what to expect.
“There you are,” he said, looking up from the drawings on his desk. “Come in and close the door.
“I’ve been getting good reports on you from Corbin and Algert. You seem to learn things quickly and pay close attention to detail. That’s exactly the kind of lad I need for my special project.”
He stood up and walked around to a corkboard filled with all kinds of diagrams, plans, and technical drawings. “How much do you know about steam engines and machines?”
“I used to help my da when he worked on the engine at the mine. He taught me as much as he could about the repairs.”
“Good, good. That’s a start, a very practical, hands-on education. As for myself, I was a professor for many years at university until I…um…left because of small-minded thinking from the dean. There I learned about steam from more of a theoretical standpoint. I had very little practical knowledge until I started this workshop.
“You see these charts here?” He pointed to several charts hanging on the board and along the walls, and seemed to swell with pride. “I created these at university. This one”—he walked over and smoothed his hand down the front—“is an enthalpy-entropy chart that I developed…along with Richard Mollier, one of my most promising students. It plots the total heat against entropy of a thermodynamic system. Invaluable in any research involving steam.
“But I must tell you, I have learned far more about steam since my retirement than in all my years at university, thanks to my shop. Here I can put theory to practice, and invite knowledgeable persons who have developed their own mechanized inventions.
“Such luminaries as Richard Trevithick, the leading expert on high-pressure steam engines, visited with us for almost a week. We had many interesting conversations, I must say. And Oliver Evans, who was kind enough to explain in detail his Oruktor Amphibolos, a marvelous digging machine, also was our guest. I only wish I could have gotten James Watt here before he died; even though his work is a bit old-fashioned now, I’m sure he would have had some fascinating insights.”
The professor clapped me on the back in a friendly manner. “And now you, my boy…you are about to embark on an amazing journey…a journey into the very Future of Steam Power!”
He pulled up a chair so that he could sit and stare directly into my eyes. His voice became more somber as he said, “But before we continue with your education, I must elicit a solemn promise that you will not go blabbing to others what you learn here. There are many things at the shop that must, for the time being, remain secret. One day,” he said, raising a finger, “yes, one day, we will tell the world and show all, but in order to, ah, obtain funding for my experiments we must keep things under wraps, as they say.”
The professor was in what we called “Lecture Mode,” so I could only nod to show I was listening.
“And I must tell you,” he continued, “there are many unsavory characters who would pay goodly sums to find out about our projects before they are finished. You must guard yourself, young man, guard yourself against them. Is that understood?”
“Yes, sir,” I said, realizing that it was time for me to speak. The professor had become more and more obsessed with secrecy over the past week; he reminded us each and every morning before we started work.
“Good, good. Now, on to the reason you are here. I have been working on reducing the size and weight of steam engines. The ones we use here at the shop are quite powerful, but also quite large. I’m sure you have heard or perhaps seen steam wagons moving around the city. Up until this point they have of necessity had enormous boilers, compression chambers, drive mechanisms, and heavy iron cogs and wheels. But what if we could design and build a steam engine that was no larger than, say, a traveling trunk? A completely self-contained power source that could drive gears and wheels and levers and all sorts of mechanical devices. What do you think we could do with such a device?”
Ideas began to swirl around in my head: pumps, not just for mines, but for businesses and homes; machines to lift heavy objects; conveyances of all kinds, big and small, some with wheels and some with legs. I had to shake my head just to stop the pictures.
“Yes, my boy, it is quite exhilarating. Now you know why I often appear so distracted! I have so many ideas and projects that I’m afraid I shall die before I can bring them all to life.
“But there is one project, a very special project, that exceeds all others. One that will bring us not only fame, but also much-needed cash to fund all of my other projects.”
The professor was in his mode and running strong. He had my absolute attention.
“What if you could build a suit of armor…powered by steam?”
The professor smiled at my reaction. “Yes, just imagine…full protection from all attacks, and yet able to lift great weights and move around without excessive effort. That was one of the problems with the suits of armor of old. They were heavy. A knight’s armor with chain mail and padding could weigh as much as ninety pounds and took great strength to move about.
“How much, would you think, a sufficiently thick protective suit of armor for today’s soldier would weigh?”
I began to figure in my head. “A hundred…two hundred pounds?”
“A good guess, but remember, we will need joints and levers, cogs and wheels, springs and gears and pistons, too.”
“Three hundred pounds?”
“Now, what about the steam engine itself?”
I thought of the
huge steam engine in the shop; there was no way anyone could carry that around. “The soldier would need to be tethered to a cart or wagon just to carry everything,” I said.
“Exactly…unless the engine and boiler assembly was small and self-contained!”
“Have you,” I said, leaning forward, “have you built one?”
“Yes!” The professor seemed delighted that I had asked the right question. “But we are still having a few problems. We are in the testing stage for the Steam Chamber, and although everything hinges on its ultimate design success, we still have gone ahead with building the suit of armor itself. At present, we are in the process of constructing the driving mechanism, and that is where you come in, my boy. In order to keep the size and weight down to a manageable limit, I have designed some very small and somewhat delicate pieces. So far we have been able to get most of the apparatus to fit together, but some of the attaching screws and bolts are, of necessity, inside the suit itself and require fingers and arms much smaller than my own. Even Corbin is too large for some of this very precise work.”
So that was it! That was why the professor had wanted a small boy like me.
“So now you see why I’ve had you on such a whirlwind tour of our workstations; you had to get practical experience in everything necessary to put together our suit of armor.”
The professor laid a finger alongside his nose and said, “Come along, and remember what I said about keeping secrets.”
He led me out of his office and though the maze of workstations and piles of materials to a special room off to the side. I had watched Algert and the professor and Corbin going in and out of this room but had assumed it to be for storage only. When we entered, I saw in the very center of the room, illuminated from the skylight above, a shining assortment of metal panels, plates, gears, and tubes arranged into a manlike shape. If the professor had not already explained the purpose of this construction, I would have thought he had built a mechanical man.
“As you can see,” the professor said, “we have most of our Clockwork Suit of Armor assembled, the bigger pieces, at least. All the joints work properly when articulated by hand, but we are having trouble getting some of the pistons and various clockwork mechanisms attached. Would you like to take a look?”
“Ye-yes, sir.” I was practically drooling.
I walked over to the apparatus and started looking in and around each arm, leg, and joint.
“Here,” the professor said, handing me a glass-and-brass tube with a thick cable coming out of one end. “Have you ever seen one of these?” I shook my head, my mouth open in wonder. “It’s a Ruhmkorff lamp, a portable electric lamp powered by an induction coil.” He switched it on, and a golden light shone out from inside the tube. “Light without heat,” he said. “We use it inside the suit to help see into the more hidden parts.”
I took the lamp and guided it up, in, and around the insides of the suit. I could see where several holes were awaiting screws or bolts, or perhaps pipes or cables. It was all very complex, and I could see where someone bigger than me would have a hard time just getting to everything inside. I experimented by guiding my hand snakelike in and around struts and braces, trying to imagine holding a small wrench. It wouldn’t be easy, but I thought I could do it.
I handed the Ruhmkorff lamp back to the professor and he switched it off.
“Well, what do you think, my boy?”
“It’s…wow!” I said, still starting at the lamp. “The…the suit of armor, I mean. And the lamp, too.”
The professor smiled. “Good to hear it. You start work tomorrow morning.”
Bright and early the next day, I began to help with the Clockwork Suit. I had to climb in and around the core, connecting every part that was either hard to get to or just plain impossible for someone bigger. I learned the purpose and function of each piece and how it was attached. I had to become a contortionist in order to get to some of the fittings and then spend sometimes an hour moving the wrench a small fraction at a time until I had the connection tight. It was slow, difficult work, but I loved it…except when Corbin was standing over me.
For some reason, everything I did seemed to get on his nerves. Nothing was good enough. “Hurry up, Dummy,” he said, kicking the hip strut I was lying in. “We got three more pieces to fit and I can’t do nothing till you finish. How long does it take to tighten a damn bolt?”
I was upside down and twisted around like a snake with my arm shoved up as far as I could reach, trying to get enough leverage to push the wrench one more time. “I’m almost done,” I said. “Don’t want…this…coming loose.”
We had been having trouble with some of the screws and bolts and compression fittings. Even when I was sure that they were tightened securely, the next day, Algert or the professor would find that some of them had somehow worked loose again. Corbin, of course, kept blaming me for it, saying I wasn’t strong enough, or lazy, or stupid.
But after a few days of checking and double-checking every bolt, I noticed that only the ones that were accessible to bigger boys and men were getting loose; the ones that only I could reach stayed tight.
I had just about decided to talk to the professor about it when he came into the special project room and said with a grand smile, “We finally have our appointment with the emperor. We have to get the suit completely operational within three weeks.”
The emperor! So that’s who the Clockwork Suit was for. I couldn’t believe I was working on something intended for the emperor.
“Three weeks!” Algert yelled. He had been working long hours the past few weeks, trying to get everything ready. “But we still haven’t had a successful test of the Steam Chamber.”
“Not to worry,” the professor said. “I’m sure that we are on the verge of great success.”
The Steam Chamber was one of the professor’s new inventions. It was a specially designed boiler that burned oil to heat the steam into a highly compressed state. It only needed a small amount of oil to keep the burner hot. And most of the steam that drove the power assembly was recycled with each compression.
Unfortunately, it had a habit of exploding before reaching the required degree of pressure.
I found out that we also had another problem. Schneider, another inventor with a large workshop, and the professor’s biggest competitor, had wormed his way into the good graces of the emperor and was working on his own suit of armor. But according to the professor, his suit design was greatly inferior, and relied more on magic tricks than science. “Schneider is nothing more than a talented con man,” he told me several times, “and will stop at nothing to secure the large advance offered by the emperor.”
So as the days passed and the time of our appointment grew near, the tension in the shop became as thick as vented steam. Corbin pushed and punched me two or three times a day. Once, I came close to hitting him over the head with a wrench I was holding, but instead, I thought of what Da would say, and how disappointed he’d be, so I just chewed my lower lip and held my anger. The other boys did their best to avoid talking to Corbin and stayed out of his way, but I was stuck in the special room working on the Clockwork Suit and had to take whatever he dished out.
More and more the professor had been staying in his office going over and over his figures, trying to work out the problems with his designs, coming out only when Algert had set up a test of the Steam Chamber.
One night after work, Russell and I were up in our attic room when he asked, “How are you holding up working under Corbin’s boot?”
“He’s really pushing me hard,” I said, shaking my head. “Someday I’m either going to hit him with a wrench or just quit.”
“Why don’t you?”
“Quit?” I said raising my eyebrows. “Nah,” I said with a heavy sigh. “Ma and Da are depending on me.”
“Too bad,” Russell said as he climbed into bed. “Maybe the next explosion will take care of him for us.”
“Yeah,” I said hopefully. “But he’s
probably too mean. The whole place could go up and Corbin would still be standing there yelling, ‘Dummy! I told you to watch that gauge!’”
“Or, ‘Bussell! Where’d you put my spanner!’” Russell laughed.
The last week before our appointment, and still without a successful test of the Steam Chamber, the professor decided to go with a less powerful chamber, one that didn’t have to hold as much pressure. Although the suit would function, it would not be as strong, or operate as long. “But,” as the professor said, “it has the advantage of not exploding.”
We checked and rechecked all of the cables and steam pipes attached to the clockwork drive unit, and made sure all the joints worked properly. The professor wanted one last trial before we secured the final plates of armor. He wanted to make sure that Algert could fit inside and walk around without falling down.
We put the suit on a hand truck and pushed it out onto the main floor. We cleared an area of ten or twelve feet so that Algert could move around. He and the professor filled the small boiler on the back of the suit and lit the burner, then waited for the steam chamber to charge.
When all the dials held steady, and nothing blew up, Algert squeezed himself inside the suit. Russell and I closed the breastplate, and the professor pulled down the helmet and visor.
Even without all the armor plates Algert looked dangerous and spectacular.
The suit really was ingenious; instead of using buttons and levers to operate the various pistons and gears, the professor had pressure plates placed at strategic spots within the armor that corresponded to Algert’s knees, feet, forearms, and more.
Once Algert was all strapped in, he pushed the control to ACTIVE and steam began to hiss out as gears started to whirr and clank. And then the suit began to move. Algert’s first step was tentative and awkward, but soon he was walking in a more natural gait. He moved around slowly, picking up various pipes and pieces of equipment, testing his strength, coordination, and balance. When he first tried to pick up something heavy, an axle assembly, he nearly fell over.
Clockwork Fairy Tales - A Collection Of Steampunk Fables Page 23