Iron and Blood

by Gail Z. Martin

  “Thank you, I do have another errand to run before I return to the house. Promise you’ll let us know if you find anything out?”

  Renate took Nicki’s hands. “I promise. Now, be careful. Not all the threats are magical, or from Veles. Keep your wits about you!”

  Nicki slipped out of the house with a cautious glance in both directions. The rain had become a light drizzle, still enough to keep much of the normal foot traffic indoors. That made it easy to spot the man from the streetcar, who was lingering under his umbrella near a newspaper stand.

  “No helping it; I’ll just have to lose him later,” Nicki muttered to herself, setting out at a brisk walk for her next destination. She made certain to remain on the opposite side of the street from her stalker, and used a purse mirror to check that he was keeping his distance.

  Just a little ways further up Woodland Road stood an imposing brick and stone mansion replete with turrets, dormers trimmed in gingerbread molding, balconies, and bay windows. It had once been the home of a prominent banker. Now it housed the Pennsylvania College for Women. The very name made Nicki smile.

  A glance in her mirror let her know that she had not lost the man shadowing her. She sighed, and hurried up the mansion’s steps to ring the bell.

  “I’m here to see Cady McDaniel,” Nicki said to the housekeeper who answered the door.

  The woman stepped aside, allowing Nicki to come in out of the rain. “And there’s a man following me,” Nicki said, hoping to give her best impression of a vulnerable young lady. “Thank you for letting me in; he’s been behind me since I got off the trolley.”

  “Really? We can’t have that. I’ll get the gardener after him.” The housekeeper chuckled. “John’s put the fear of God into many a chap who overstepped his bounds. Don’t you worry, miss.” She paused. “Is Miss McDaniel expecting you? Whom shall I say is calling?”

  Nicki dug out another calling card. “Please, tell her Nicki is here.”

  The housekeeper glanced at the card and nodded. “I’ll do that. Wait here, please.” She smiled. “And then I’ll go talk to John.”

  Nicki fidgeted in the vestibule. She pulled back the lace curtains that hung at the windows, glancing out cautiously. The man waited across the street at a discreet distance, but there was no mistaking the fact that he was watching the building.

  “Miss McDaniel will see you now,” the housekeeper announced, and led Nicki down a long hallway to a comfortably appointed library. The room was as large as many a formal dining room, with a massive oak table that could have easily seated twenty people. Bookshelves lined the walls, and a cozy fire dispelled the chill. Nicki sighed and wished time allowed for her to find a book and settle into one of the chairs near the fire.

  “Nicki!” Cady McDaniel, the college’s head librarian, jumped from her chair and ran to greet Nicki with a hug. Just an inch shorter than Nicki, Cady still stood on tiptoe for the embrace. Her dark chestnut hair was pinned up in a prim bun, and a pair of eyeglasses framed her brilliant green eyes. Taken together with her modest shirt and suit, the hair and glasses toned down, but could not quite hide, Cady’s pretty features and curvaceous figure. Nicki had seen Cady dressed for a ball, and knew that away from the library, she could easily turn heads when she wanted to do so.

  “Hello, Cady,” Nicki replied. “I couldn’t pass up seeing you when I’m in town.”

  Cady gave her a skeptical look over top of her glasses. “You should be in mourning, unless I’m mistaken.”

  Nicki feigned wounded innocence for a moment, then smiled. “Yes, that’s true,” she confessed. “But there’s a little bit of research I need your help with.” She dropped her voice to a whisper. “It’s quite literally a matter of life and death.”

  Cady flashed a grin. “Count me in.” She reached up to pat her hair, assuring it was still tidy. “Sorry I’m so flustered,” she said. “We have a famous person coming in to give a speech next week, and there are a million details to take care of!”

  “Who? Tell me!” Nicki said excitedly. “Anyone I’ve heard of?”

  “Ida Tarbell, the journalist,” Cady said. “She’s from these parts, you know. Born and raised in Titusville, first woman to graduate from Allegheny College, and now she’s over in Paris, writing for McClure’s Magazine. She’s made quite a name for herself!”

  Nicki looked thunderstruck. “Mon Dieu! That’s my Aunt Catherine’s friend! She just said an old friend from her college days was coming to town—from Paris.”

  Cady shrugged. “It wouldn’t surprise me that Miss Tarbell knows Mrs. Desmet. We Association of University Women members stick together!”

  “Hasn’t she caused some fuss with her articles?” Nicki asked as Cady showed her the plans for the event. “She wrote about President Lincoln—and Emperor Napoleon!”

  Cady nodded. “And she’s had a few articles that were rather critical of powerful people, or about companies that aren’t on the up-and-up. That put some noses out of joint, especially in society circles. I can’t wait to meet her!”

  Nicki looked at Cady’s desk, neat and tidy despite her workload. She smiled as she saw one of the many code puzzles Cady adored. “Cady McDaniel! That’s a page from the Pall Mall Gazette! It’s a gentleman’s magazine—what on earth are you doing with it?”

  Cady tossed her head and made a dismissive gesture. “They run the best puzzles!” she said. “That’s a nilhilist cryptogram by a Mr. Schooling. He says no one can solve it—but I’ve worked it out and I intend to send in the answer and claim the prize.”

  Her defiance softened into an impish grin as she took Nicki’s hands and led her to a chair by the fire. “Now, pray tell, what’s going on?”

  “I can only stay a minute,” Nicki said. “I need to be back before the men get home from the funeral. But I’m hoping you can look into something for me. I need to know anything you can find out about a man named Karl Jasinski.”

  Cady raised an eyebrow. “A prospect?”

  Nicki give her a dour look. “More like a suspect. You heard about Uncle Thomas’s death?”

  “Yes, of course. I’m so sorry.”

  Nicki nodded. “Thank you. But you don’t understand; he was murdered.”

  Cady gasped. “I had heard it was his heart.”

  “That’s the official story. But we have it on good authority that magic was involved. There have been other attempts on Rick and Jake—I was there.” She met Cady’s gaze. “I think there’ll be more, unless we get to the bottom of this.”

  “And the police don’t like dealing with magic,” Cady said.

  “Exactly. And there’s something else I need, but it’s a little strange.”

  Cady’s bold grin returned. “I count on you to be a little strange, Nicki, and I mean that in the nicest possible way.”

  “What can you tell me about the Night Hag? Some might call her Nocnitsa.”

  Cady frowned. “‘Night Hag’? Sounds like something out of a fairy tale.” She thought for a moment. “It might be something our literature professor has heard of. I’ll ask.”

  The clock on the mantle struck eleven. Nicki’s eyes widened. “I’ve got to get going. Thank you so much—I knew I could count on you.”

  “You’re staying with the Desmets?”

  Nicki nodded. “Just send your card, and I’ll know to come back when you’ve discovered something.”

  Cady made a dismissive gesture. “I can pay a call. That wouldn’t be unusual.”

  Nicki leaned forward and took Cady’s hand. “I’m quite sure the house is being watched. Please don’t put yourself in danger.”

  Cady gave Nicki’s hand a squeeze. “Don’t worry about me. I can take care of myself.”

  When Nicki returned to the vestibule, there was no sign of the housekeeper. She looked out the window, but the dark-clad man was gone. Gathering her skirts and summoning her courage, Nicki grabbed her umbrella and started back toward the trolley stop.

  A few blocks from Murray Avenue, a black
carriage suddenly pulled out of an alleyway to block her path and a man lunged from the shadows to grab her wrist as the door to the carriage swung open.

  “Get in if you know what’s good for you.”

  Nicki took a swing at the man with her umbrella, rapping him smartly on the temple as she brought her boot down on his instep. With her right hand, she reached into her purse and grabbed the derringer, managing to squeeze off a shot through the fabric of her handbag. The bullet struck the man in the foot and he let out a cry that startled the horse.

  “You shot me!”

  Before anyone else could spring from the carriage to detain her, Nicki pivoted and ran across the busy street, barely avoiding being run over by a milk wagon. The wagon swerved, careening into the path of the carriage and overturning, spilling bottles onto the road that shattered in a spray of white. Behind the milk wagon was a grocer’s cart loaded with produce, and the sound of smashing glass spooked the cart horse so that it bolted, strewing cabbages and potatoes in its wake. A crowd was gathering. Some pushed closer to the wreck, while others filled the street, picking up armfuls of spilled produce.

  Nicki fled, dispensing with propriety and grabbing up her skirts to run without tripping. She tried to recall any identifying marks about the carriage; it might come in handy later. She dared another glance at the carriage, and saw a small crimson bird painted on the side of the coach, but then the crowd shifted, and she could not make out the symbol plainly.

  Out of the corner of her eye, Nicki glimpsed the black-clad man once more. He was watching her, but the crowd was too thick for him to follow. She did not waste time staring at him. A trolley was coming, and with the crowd’s attention still on the wreck, Nicki broke into a sprint before dropping her skirts and strolling the last little bit to board the trolley as decorously as if she had just gone out for a morning of shopping. As the bell clanged, she saw police running in the direction from which she had just come, but whether it was to clear the wreckage or see to the man she had shot, she did not know.

  “I wonder what’s going on down there?” the woman beside her whispered with a nudge and a nod of her head toward the chaos.

  “I have absolutely no idea,” Nicki replied, smiling as if she didn’t have a care in the world.

  RICK BRAND LOOKED up at the turreted front of the building most people called ‘the Castle’. The massive Renaissance Revival/Romanesque building looked more like a European manor house than the headquarters of a company founded on the brilliance of Nikola Tesla and George Westinghouse. The building’s stone walls, turrets, and huge clock tower dominated the landscape of the town.

  The Tesla-Westinghouse building never failed to amuse Rick, who had seen more than his share of real castles in Europe. Finding one here, in Wilmerding, housing one of the most innovative companies in America, seemed so completely out of place that it always made him chuckle and shake his head.

  Just as he headed for the steps, a large black carriage drew up behind him, and the driver scrambled down to open the door for a well-dressed man in his middle years to alight. Rick was certain he had seen him before. It was difficult to overlook the expensive, bespoke suit, the imported shoes and the fine top hat crowning a head of blond, curly hair. Stocky and broad-shouldered, the man elbowed past Rick to be the first up the stairs to the front door.

  “We’ll have the carriage waiting, Mr. Thwaites.” The man nodded curtly, his attention on other things.

  Intrigued by the ostentation and annoyed at the man’s rudeness, Rick climbed the steps and headed for the receptionist’s desk. Thwaites waited impatiently to one side, tapping his foot as if whomever he was there to see should have been waiting for him. Rick bent over the receptionist’s desk. “Can you please let Adam Farber know I’m coming?” he said quietly.

  The receptionist looked up, alarmed. “You can’t just—”

  “He’s expecting me,” Rick said with a smile. “I know the way. Rick Brand—check your ledger; I’m listed.”

  And with that, Rick slipped out of the waiting room just as a man he recognized as the head of Tesla-Westinghouse’s laboratories hustled in to greet the aggrieved Mr. Thwaites. Wishing he could have stayed to hear their conversation, Rick took the stairs to the basement before entering an elevator.

  “Hello, Mr. Brand. Mr. Farber is waiting for you,” Lars, the elevator operator, said. His voice had the scratchy quality of an Edison cylinder recording, making Rick glance up into his brass face as the mechanical man manipulated the buttons to send the elevator smoothly on its way.

  “Good to see you, Lars,” Rick said. One of Adam Farber’s mechanical wonders, the metal man—dubbed a ‘werkman’ by Farber—was someone Rick could count on to be unfailingly pleasant and polite. Lars was made that way.

  The elevator buttons only showed the upper levels of the headquarters. Lars flipped open a concealed control panel, revealing the means to reach the subterranean levels that housed Tesla-Westinghouse’s confidential and experimental projects. When the elevator doors opened, Lars swept out an arm toward the lab. “Enjoy your visit.”

  Adam Farber was waiting for Rick. He was dressed in a white lab coat that hung off his lanky frame like a scarecrow.

  “Good to see you, Rick,” Adam said, grinning broadly as he shook Rick’s hand. “Glad you could come by, I’ve missed you. But I know you’ve got a lot going on. Sorry about all that.”

  Rick grimaced and shrugged. “Yeah. It hasn’t been a good week. But you saved our butts at the cemetery. And I can’t stand not knowing about your latest grand projects. Sorry I haven’t been by sooner.”

  Adam ushered Rick into a wide expanse filled with tables covered with half-completed projects, strange metal casings and tangles of wires and tubes. Scattered throughout were empty coffee cups, Farber’s fuel for the long hours he spent tinkering in the lab. Adam poured himself a fresh cup of coffee from a nearby urn as they passed by.

  “Want a cup?” he asked, fairly vibrating from caffeine even before he downed the liquid in a gulp.

  “No thanks, I’ll pass,” Rick said with a chuckle. He sobered, remembering the blond man in the waiting room. “I saw a guy named Thwaites up in the lobby. Pushy sort. He was at Thomas Desmet’s funeral. Who is he?”

  Adam’s face fell. “Again?” He muttered a curse under his breath. “That’s Richard Thwaites. Rich as Croesus, and used to getting his way.”

  “I figured as much,” Rick said. “What’s he here for?”

  Adam sighed. “Me.”

  “Huh?”

  Adam led Rick over to a large worktable and pulled out a chair, before collapsing into a second one. He set down his empty cup and reached out to grab another, half-finished cup from the table. “Thwaites wants to hire me to work on some kind of project for his new plaything, the Vesta Nine coal mine.”

  Rick raised an eyebrow. “Didn’t look like the mining type to me.”

  Adam chuckled. “I doubt he’s ever stepped out of his carriage onto the mine’s property. But Vesta Nine is the largest coal mine in the world, and rumor has it, the deepest, too. You know guys like Thwaites—got to have the biggest toys. He’s got a partner, but I don’t know his name. Anyhow,” he said, tossing off the cold coffee and looking around for another cup, “the last time Thwaites was here, he wanted to know whether I could build him enough werkmen to run the mine.”

  “Can you?”

  Adam rolled his eyes. “Aside from the fact that it would take me years to construct them by myself, I doubt even Richard Thwaites is rich enough to pay for it. And besides, I don’t trust him.” He dropped his voice. “Fair bet he’s Oligarchy.”

  Rick nodded. “I was thinking the same thing.” He paused. “Think your boss will give in? Because we need you to work up some new pieces for us rather urgently, given what’s been going on.”

  Adam reluctantly set aside his empty coffee cup. “I don’t think my boss will give me up; at least, not just yet. But if Thwaites keeps asking, or if he goes high enough up the la
dder, I won’t have a choice.”

  “You can always come work for Brand and Desmet,” Rick said. “Solid funding, private lab—pretty much free rein as long as we get first pick of the goodies you dream up.” His tone was light, but Rick was serious. It was a discussion they had every time they met, and so far, Adam had managed to deflect a commitment. Now he looked as if he might be considering it.

  “Let’s leave that door open, shall we?” he said. “In the meantime, what did you have in mind?”

  Rick grinned. “First off, we’re all still in awe of the contraption you used at the cemetery. Kovach and I actually agreed on something, for once, and we’re hoping you could make an even more portable version. He’d love to get his hands on something like that, if it could be toted around in a carriage instead of taking up a whole building.” He gave Adam a conspiratorial glance. “And I expect Cullan Adair will want something he can use from up in an airship, too.”

  “Working on it,” Adam said. “Power source is always a problem. The steam tanks take up enough room as it is; creating a furnace makes it unwieldy. The Tesla cells help store energy, but they’ve got their limitations, too.” He stood up, swept the coffee cup to the side, and rummaged in the chaos of the worktable until he emerged with a small stone in his hand the side of a marble.

  “Do you know what this is?” Adam asked, staring at the greenish, opaque stone as if it were gold. When Rick shook his head, Adam turned the stone in the light. “It’s tourmaquartz. Very rare—and fabulously expensive. Most people have never heard of it. Can’t find it many places, but here’s what’s special about it. A small shard of tourmaquartz, contained properly, can power a boiler as effectively as a whole hopper of coal.”

  Rick let out a low whistle. “Wow. And by ‘fabulously’…?”

  Adam shrugged. “Enough that for most purposes it’s not worth it. The small shard still costs much, much more than the hopperful of coal.”

  “So it won’t put the coal mines out of business any time soon. But I bet guys like Andrew Carnegie and Henry Frick could come up with some uses for it.”