Making History

by Rick Wilber

Ibn Tariq returned, far quicker than Tip had expected. Did they have speaking tubes that reached all the way to Al-Andalus? How was that possible? “Caliph Ismail agrees,” he said. “He’ll welcome three of your Englishmen at his palace in Córdoba.”

  “Good,” Elizabeth said. “I thank you.” She dismissed him, then turned to Lawton after he had gone. “I want you to be one of those men–you know something about these devices. And you –” She nodded to Tip. “You’ll go with him, as his servant.”

  Tip felt exultant. She was going to Al-Andalus, she would see the place where the engines were made!

  “A servant?” Lawton said. “If I’m to have a servant I’d rather have a homunculus.” Human workers had become cheaper as more and more of them were displaced by homunculi, and the very rich had started a fashion for homunculus servants, entranced by their novelty.

  “Don’t be ridiculous,” Elizabeth said. “He won’t be a servant, not really. He’ll be a spy, digging for the secrets of the Arabs’ devices. No one notices a servant, or a child. They won’t even count him–I’ll be able to send three men in addition to him.”

  The queen looked at each of them in turn. “And you’re both staying here, for now,” she said. “I want you in the palace, where I can keep an eye on you.”

  ***

  In the next few days tutors visited the queen’s workshops at the palace, demonstrating everything they knew about the Arabs’ engines to Tip and Lawton. Tip’s earlier supposition had been correct, though; no one in England understood very much. Still, she spent most of her time in the workshop, working with the cogs and wheels, tubes and gauges. A lot of her guesses about the devices had been correct, though some had been wrong. She didn’t mind about that; all she wanted was knowledge.

  Aside from the devices in the workshops all the engines in England had been shut down. Meals were late, rooms undusted, deliveries delayed or lost. Everyone in the palace was on edge; servants and courtiers argued at all hours, sometimes far into the night.

  The tutors also taught them the history and customs of Al-Andalus, something Tip thought was not nearly as interesting. The Arabs had conquered the Spanish peninsula in 711, and in the years since there had been hundreds of skirmishes between Muslims and Christians. Around three hundred and fifty years ago, in the mid-1200s, the Christians had nearly won a battle at Córdoba and had been poised to take over the rest of the peninsula. Then some king had died, and another had taken his place, and the Arabs had pushed the Christians back.

  She didn’t care about the history, though. All that mattered was that these people existed somewhere in the world–people who thought learning and discovery were important, who pursued knowledge for its own sake, who didn’t, like that old man Burghley, yell “Sorcery!” whenever they came across something they didn’t understand.

  She had another reason for not liking the history lessons: the tutors laughed at her for all the things she didn’t know. No one had ever told her, for example, that England was an island. Well, but what difference did it make? She had never had reason to leave it.

  But she was leaving it soon, so maybe it did matter. The Arabs were going to take the delegation to Al-Andalus in an airship. She had seen their airships overhead before, of course, but she had never been close to one. What would that be like? How did they stay up there, so high in the sky?

  Lawton stayed mostly silent at these lessons. To her surprise he understood less about the engines than she did. Many times she had had to wait for him to catch up, and with the manufactory closed he seemed lost, adrift.

  One day as Tip headed toward the workshop she peeked inside a room and saw the queen. Elizabeth sat surrounded by banks of winking lights contained in glass tubes, what Tip had learned to call vacuum jars. A box in front of her glowed with strange green light. Every so often a beeping sound came from the box, and once the queen laughed out loud.

  Tip moved softly into the room. Elizabeth turned toward the door. “I know what you are,” she said. “You don’t have to hide from me.”

  “What?” Tip said, startled.

  “I know you’re a girl,” the queen said, quieter now. “Did you think your disguise would work on me? I’ve had to disguise myself a time or two.”

  Tip could think of nothing to say.

  “And you need to learn something about courtesy, young lady,” Elizabeth went on. “You curtsy in front of a queen, first of all, and when you speak to her, you address her as Your Majesty.”

  Tip had never curtsied; she attempted something that made Elizabeth laugh. “What’s that box, Your Majesty?” she asked.

  The queen seemed to relent. “It’s a game,” she said. “See, I have to try to hit this ball here, with this racket, and then return it. Like tennis.”

  “I thought we wasn’t supposed to use the machines,” Tip said. “Your Majesty.”

  “Here’s another lesson for you–you must never, ever criticize a queen.”

  Elizabeth pressed a button on the machine and the green light faded. Tip watched it go with a kind of despair. At that moment she wanted more than anything to play that game, to feel the ball racketing back and forth.

  “Why did you disguise yourself, child?” Elizabeth asked.

  “To work in the manufactory, Your Majesty.”

  “But why would you want to do that?”

  “I–I didn’t have nothing else I could do. My parents died, and I’d’ve starved otherwise.”

  “How did they die?”

  “They was in a great explosion. In one of the manufactories, in Bishopsgate Street. My mother was waiting for my father to leave work, and then–then they was both dead.”

  Elizabeth was silent for a while. “I’m sorry to hear it,” she said finally. “Fortunately the manufactories are safer now–we’ve seen to that.”

  Tip opened her mouth to say something, then closed it, remembering just in time that she couldn’t criticize the queen. But the manufactories weren’t safe, she knew that much. Boys had been burned by steam and hot metal, had tripped over hoses while running to cool the homunculi, had fainted from the heat.

  “Didn’t you have relatives to help you? Someone who could have taken you in?”

  “I don’t know, Your Majesty. My parents was farmers once, but they left the village when the machines took over the farming.”

  Elizabeth shook her head, dismissing the subject. “Well, you’ll be on your way to Al-Andalus soon enough,” she said. “Burghley and the others think I’ve lost my mind, sending a child along on a diplomatic mission. But women pick up a good many things that men never see. I was third in line for the throne, you know, and there was no end to the things I learned, just by keeping quiet and listening.”

  Tip nodded. She knew all about listening, but she was surprised that someone as important as Elizabeth knew it too. “Are you going to tell Master Lawton?”

  Elizabeth laughed again. “That man? He’d faint if he knew a girl was looking after him. No, this will be our secret.” She turned back to her game. “Well, that will be all,” she said.

  Tip curtsied again and continued down the hallway to the workshop. Lawton stood ahead of her in a corner, talking quietly to a few men. He stopped speaking as she passed them, and looked at her suspiciously. What was he up to? Who was he talking to?

  She went into the workshop and saw that someone had laid open the insides of a water-clock. She hurried to the work table and picked up her tools and forgot all about Lawton.

  ***

  A week later Tip, Lawton, and two others chosen by the queen were driven in steam-cars to Finsbury Field. A silver airship nuzzled up against a mast there, rocking when the wind gusted. Arabic writing flowed across its side; Tip had seen that same writing on the engines at the manufactory.

  A young bearded man wearing robes and a red and gold turban bowed to them and said, “Welcome to the Buraq.” He led them up a swaying rope ladder and into a basket underneath the airship. When they were all inside he handed each of them a p
air of goggles and showed them how to put them on. He wore his just below his turban, giving him an owlish look.

  Workmen came carrying one of the homunculi from the manufactory. Wires trailed from its waist, and one of its arms reached out at a strange angle. Sunlight gleamed off its copper surface. Tip wanted to look at it some more, to study it, but they stowed it in a compartment with the other baggage.

  The airship lifted silently. The unfamiliar sensation brought Tip’s stomach up into her throat, but she ignored it and watched, entranced, as the ground dropped away beneath her. A roar started up close by, sounding like some huge creature, but it went on and on, never stopping for breath. “Those are the engines,” their guide said, shouting to be heard.

  Wind came up, billowing the Arabs’ robes. Tip adjusted her goggles and watched as the Thames dwindled to a road, a ribbon, a thread. Then they left London behind and flew out over the countryside. Fields and meadows passed beneath them, all different shades of green, like the palette of a painter in love with only one color.

  A while later the green turned blue, and she realized they were flying over the ocean. The land on the other side of the ocean looked like the English countryside, with every so often a town or city set down within it. Then, as if they had crossed an invisible line, the landscape changed: the farms became neat squares, the crops arranged in straight rows.

  “That’s Al-Andalus below,” their guide said, sounding glad to be home. She thought they were close then, but the airship flew on for a few more hours. Finally they began to descend, dropping low enough that she could see the long rounded shadow of the airship, rippling over small hills on the ground.

  A huge landing field lay beneath them now. Men hurried along the ground and caught hold of ropes dangling from the ship. There were other airships on the field as well, docked there or lifting off or landing.

  The noise of the engines stopped. The men on the ground worked to tie the airship to a tall mast. One of the crew threw the rope ladder from the basket; it swayed with the motion of the ship, but the Arabs began to climb down before it had a chance to settle.

  Tip came last down the ladder, her heart pounding hard. She was in Córdoba, city of marvels, the place she had heard about all her life.

  Their guide led them to a line of coaches at the edge of the field. They went up into the second coach, which had cushioned benches along both walls and a Turkey carpet on the floor. Windows lined the walls, their tops arched like horseshoes, and the ceiling was vaulted like the nave of a church.

  A deafening whistle came from the first coach, and then a loud roar, and the car jerked and began to move. Lawton glanced around nervously. “What –” he said.

  “Don’t worry,” their guide said. “It’s just a train. Carriages all in a line together, like camels in a caravan. Caliph Ismail’s father built it–he wanted a direct line from the airfield to the palace.”

  Tip knelt up on the bench and looked out the window eagerly. She saw well-paved streets with no open sewers, covered markets, silk flags, great domed buildings whose purpose she couldn’t imagine. Orange trees lined the streets, and another tree she couldn’t identify, something that looked like a feather duster turned upside down. A mechanical horse rode up to the train, and its rider turned a peg on its neck to stop it. A long train of airships passed across the sky, tied nose to tail like a string of ponies.

  The light outside the windows began to fade. Gas-lamps came on in the streets, and shone through the wooden lattices of the houses.

  Finally the carriage came to a halt and they stepped out into a small room. At first Tip couldn’t take in the richness of the decoration, every inch of the walls and ceiling covered in filigrees of stars and diamonds and moons and flowers. Pillars held up the ceiling, and the doors and windows were arched like the ones inside the train. And everything was brightly colored, gold and red and midnight blue, glittering like a hoard of jewels.

  They didn’t have time to look around, though. Another guide came to take them down a hallway past room after room, each one bigger and more elaborate than the last. Several doors were closed, with homunculi standing outside and guarding them with swords. Finally the guide opened a door and ushered Lawton inside.

  Almost too late, Tip remembered that she was supposed to be the man’s servant. She darted in after him, and the guide showed her into a little room off the main one. It was filled with wonders, but she found to her surprise that she was too tired to examine them. She dropped into a comfortable couch and fell asleep immediately.

  Lawton woke her the next morning, pounding on the door. “You! Tip!” he said. “Go and get me a chamber pot–I can’t find one anywhere!”

  Tip sat up, groaning. She had gone to bed fully clothed, and her breasts ached from the binding she used to flatten them. She couldn’t loosen it now, though.

  She went out into Lawton’s room. Just as he had said, there was no chamber pot anywhere. She opened another door leading off his room and peered into it blearily. A bowl like a large chamber pot stood there, filled with water–but why was it fastened to the floor?

  She looked up and saw a chain hanging from a tank above the pot. She tugged on it, and the water swirled away noisily. “Pull on this when you’re done,” she said to Lawton, pointing to the chain.

  He closed the door, and a while later she heard the roar of water again from inside the room.

  When he had finished she used the small room herself and then got dressed. A short while later the guide returned to take them to the caliph, stopping to pick up the other two members of the delegation. They passed through more bright rooms, now lit by the sun shining through their windows, then a courtyard with a pool in the center, the walls hung with silk banners rippling in the wind. The palace continued on the other side, and they went into another room, this one guarded by more homunculi. The guide spoke a word to them and they opened a door.

  “Salaam aleikum,” said a lean man seated on pillows at the far end of the room, and the guide translated, “Peace be unto you.”

  Lawton and the other men bowed, and Tip realized that this must be Caliph Ismail. She bowed quickly–too late, but fortunately no one noticed.

  “Sit, please,” the caliph said. He had a beard, like all the other men they had met, though his was longer, down to his chest, and streaked with gray. He wore a pure white robe embroidered in red and gold and embellished with jewels, and his turban was twisted up into spikes, like a crown. He smiled at everyone in turn, even Tip.

  There were no chairs at all in the room. One of the men lowered himself carefully to a pillow, and the rest followed.

  “Is it wise to have those here, Your Majesty?” the head of the delegation said, a man named John Gifford. He pointed to the armed homunculi standing in a semi-circle behind the caliph.

  The guide translated. “Of course,” Caliph Ismail said. “None of our homunculi have rebelled.”

  “They still might,” Gifford said. “We never thought that ours would.”

  “We believe that something went wrong with the homunculi we sent you. We are working on that now.”

  “But what? What could possibly make them do such a thing?”

  “We’ll take you to our workshops in a moment. For now, though, I insist that you take refreshment with us.”

  He clapped his hands, and more homunculi came into the room, each carrying a tray. One passed out plates piled with food, and another cold glasses. Tip was served last, and she wondered how the homunculi knew to do that.

  “My Lord,” someone said, awed, and Tip finally glanced down at her plate.

  Nothing looked familiar. The guide pointed to the food and gave the English words for them: “Watermelon, apricot, pomegranate. . . .”

  Tip tried the watermelon, then ate the rest eagerly.

  When they were finished the guide led them to the workshop. Tip followed, barely able to take in the surroundings in her excitement. Finally she began to hear the sound of metal grinding, of men calling
out to one another. They turned a final corner and came to a large room filled with tables. Tools and engines and scraps of metal were everywhere, and the noise was almost deafening now, engines screaming, men shouting, metal clanging on metal.

  The guide led them over to one of the tables. Someone came toward them as they approached, a stocky man with black skin, graying hair under his turban, and a short frizzy beard. Another thing she never had known, she thought–that people came in colors different than her own.

  “This is Akil ibn Suleiman,” the guide said. “He works with the homunculi.” Then to Ibn Suleiman, he said, “This is the delegation from London, Masters Gifford and Blunt and Lawton.”

  “Salaam aleikum,” Ibn Suleiman said, speaking loudly over the din. “This is the a’mil–the homunculus–you sent over from England,” he went on in English. He gestured to the copper torso, lying open on the table; it was packed tightly with large and small gears. “This is the main clockwork, here,” he said, pointing.

  “What about the head?” Gifford asked.

  “The head has more gears,” Ibn Suleiman said. He picked up the head and unscrewed it carefully, then tugged on it until it broke apart like a nut. “See? Like the torso.”

  “Is that how it thinks?”

  “It doesn’t think, not really. Its gears–the gears are constructed in such a way that it has to perform the motions it does. It follows the program we give it–it can’t come up with ideas on its own.”

  “Well, but it did,” Lawton said, speaking for the first time. “I saw it.”

  “Yes, and that’s what we have to work out.”

  Tip poked Lawton in the arm. He turned to her impatiently. “Ask him,” she said, speaking as softly as she could. “One homunculus can’t think on its own, but what about fifteen or twenty? What if they all joined up together?”

  “What?” Lawton asked.

  But Ibn Suleiman had turned to her while she was talking. “Yes, we thought about that,” he said. “If you put all the gears in all the homunculi together, and if you configured them the right way, well, maybe they could start to think on their own. But we haven’t seen any evidence that this one was talking to the others. How could it, after all?”