by Neil Clarke
My introduction to James Kellard was dramatic in the extreme. I worked for Telegraphic Mechanisms, a company which supplied equipment to the telegraph industry. While I was well known and widely respected as an outstanding tradesman, it was not the sort of respect that got one admitted to the Royal Society.
I had just arrived at my workbench one morning when Merric, my overseer, entered with a man of perhaps fifty. He was dressed in one of the newly fashionable lounge suits, and the top hat that he wore declared him to be a man of quality. He had a military bearing, and there was an old scar across his left cheek.
“Lewis, I want you to meet Mr. Kellard,” Merric babbled nervously, not really sure of the protocols used in genteel society. “Mr. Kellard, this is Lewis Blackburn.”
I had stood up by now. Kellard offered me his hand, but without removing his glove. He was being familiar, but not too familiar. In 1875, this was the way things were done.
“Mr. Kellard wishes to discuss some problems of electro-mechanics,” Merric continued.
“I can’t do that, begging your pardon, sir,” I said, addressing Kellard. “The terms of my employment—”
“No longer matter,” said Kellard. “I have just bought Telegraphic Mechanisms. You may leave us, Mr. Merric.”
As introductions go, it certainly secured my attention. Telegraphic Mechanisms was not a small company, and financially it was on good times. Kellard said no more until Merric was out of earshot.
“Do you know of me?” he asked, bending over to examine a switch on my workbench.
“No sir,” I replied, as deferential as if I were standing before the queen.
“I doubled my fortune by being first to spot trends in the marketplace. Just now I happen to know that electrical switches will gain me great advantage, so I am buying companies that build them.”
“I can build whatever—” I began.
“Please, hear me out,” said Kellard politely, but his tone told me to just shut up and listen. “This is Birmingham, and I need my switches made in London. I only bought this firm to secure your services, Mr. Blackburn. Can you move to London today?”
The only sensible answer to that question was yes, yet that was not my answer.
“I’ve got a mother and two sisters to support,” I began.
“I shall double your salary, your mother and sisters will want for nothing. What do you say?”
“Double!” I exclaimed. “Sir, how can I thank you enough?”
“You could give me an answer, yes or no.”
“Yes sir, yes. Yes with all my heart.”
I traveled with Kellard on the train to London that same day, in the luxury of a first class carriage. I felt guilty about even sitting down, the upholstery was too rich, the seats too soft and welcoming. It was only in the privacy of this carriage that Kellard began to speak of my new duties.
“I am having a machine built,” he explained. “It is a huge, highly secret machine, so an absolute minimum number of people may know of it. I have heard that you are brilliant with circuits, and are worth ten ordinary workers.”
“Someone’s been exaggerating, sir.”
“I hope not, because you will be doing enough work for ten. I need someone with unparalleled skill in the logic of switches and relays, and a grasp of mathematics.”
“What’s the machine to do?” I asked.
“See into the future.”
For a moment I was tempted to laugh. One of the richest men on the country had said something ludicrous. Was it meant to be a joke? I decided not to laugh.
“So . . . it’s a time machine?” I asked.
“No, it is more of a time telescope. Now no more questions until we reach my factory.”
Everyone has heard of the wonders of London, but I did no sightseeing on that first day. One of Kellard’s people was waiting at the station with a hansom cab, and we were driven through the crowds and traffic with the shutters down. We stopped at a factory beside the Thames. It was empty, yet there were men guarding it. Whatever Kellard was building was at a very early stage. He took me inside, and led me up the stairs to a mezzanine floor, then we continued up a cast iron spiral staircase to the roof.
“Look around, Mr. Blackburn, what do you see?” Kellard asked.
I saw slate tiles and iron guttering, all grubby with soot. Off to one side, some bricklayers were building four chimneys. Their work looked nearly complete.
“It’s just a roof, sir,” I said, holding onto my cap in the wind. “There’s four flagpoles with no flags, but they’re hung with . . . insulators, and wire! The poles support insulated wires.”
“Splendidly observed,” said Kellard. “What does that mean to you?”
“It’s some sort of telegraph?”
“Close, Mr. Blackburn, very close. Follow me.”
We descended back into the factory. Immediately beneath the roof, on the mezzanine floor, was a small office guarded by two men. Kellard escorted me inside. The man seated at the workbench was small and wiry, and had mutton chop whiskers and thinning hair. The stare behind his spectacles was rather like that of an owl who had just caught sight of a mouse—intense, darting, but controlled. I had only ever seen him from the back of lecture halls, but even so I knew his face.
“Dr. Flemming, I would like you to meet Lewis Blackburn,” said Kellard.
“Mr. Blackburn, good, good,” said Flemming. “Your name was at the top of my list.”
I was so awestruck that I hardly knew what to say. I mumbled something about being honored to meet him.
“Please, no social pleasantries,” he said briskly. “They are for fools with nothing better to do. I have been conducting experiments into wireless telegraphy, Maxwell’s equations show it’s possible in theory. As always, practice is another matter.”
“Do you know what a working wireless telegraph would mean?” asked Kellard.
“No more wires strung across the country,” I replied. “Thousands of pounds saved.”
“Millions,” said Kellard.
“Lightning produces electromagnetic discharges, what I call radiative waves,” Flemming continued. “Using the great wire loop on the roof I am able to detect these waves, even when the thunderstorms are over the horizon. What do you think of that?”
“It proves theory,” I said slowly. “Have you built a transmitter too?”
I was being cautious, and was acutely aware that I was being tested and assessed. If I had just gasped with wonder, I would have been put on the first train back to Birmingham, in a third class carriage. Kellard might have been my fairy godmother, but unlike Cinderella, I had to prove that I knew some very advanced electrical theory.
Flemming cleared his throat and glanced at Kellard, who took the cue.
“At first I ordered Dr. Flemming to suspend work on the transmitter, and refine the receiver,” he said. “There would be a large and immediate demand for storm detection devices aboard ships. Imagine his surprise when he detected Morse code as well as thunderstorms.”
I was astounded. Kellard paused. I was expected to say something intelligent.
“So wireless telegraphy has been achieved already?” I asked.
“Indeed,” said Flemming. “Here is the proof.”
He gestured to the apparatus on the workbench, which consisted of wire coils, metal plates, and other components of glass, wire, and crystal. At the center of all this was a mirror galvanometer. The light beam employed in the instrument was flickering back and forth in a familiar pattern.
“Morse code,” I said after staring at it for a moment.
“The signal is being fed down here from the loop on the roof. Please, read a little of the message. It’s in English.”
I concentrated on the dots and dashes, spelled out by the flickering spot of light. The words CALCULECTRIC, LOGICAL CELL, ADDITION, DIODIC, TRIODIC, and SWITCH featured heavily. I do not know how much time passed, but I became oblivious of my surroundings as tapestries of numbers and wires wove themselves
in my mind.
“This is the design for a calculation machine of truly epic dimensions,” said Flemming. “The specifications are interspersed with prices from the London Stock Exchange. Prices for the next day, and they are always right.”
I looked up at once. So this was the time telescope that Kellard had mentioned. It was a machine to calculate trends and probabilities faster and better than any human could.
“Not enough data for a man to make a big profit, just a little, to show what can be done,” said Kellard. “Mr. Blackburn, would you like to tell us what you think is happening here?”
This was yet another test, and I fought with my nerves. One of the richest men in Britain and our greatest authority on electrical design were standing before me, checking how I measured up.
“Some British company has invented and built what they call a calculectric, as well as a wireless telegraph,” I said slowly, choosing every word with care. “Charles Babbage may have secretly designed the calculectric for them before he died, and Maxwell himself may be managing their radiative equipment as we speak. They want to keep the design a secret, but need more such machines built at scattered locations. They don’t trust the privacy of the postal or telegraph systems, so they are using wireless telegraphy to communicate. They think that nobody else can detect radiative signals. The design is interspersed with predictions from the stock exchange, so that others may test and calibrate their calculectrics as they build them.”
“The message takes two months, then it is repeated,” said Flemming. “How do you account for that?”
“Several machines may be at different stages of construction.”
“We intend to build our own calculectric in secret,” said Kellard. “We will call it a technarion. Why?”
“Secrecy. Technarion is a neutral name, it betrays nothing about function.”
Kellard looked to Flemming.
“Well?” he asked.
“He’s perfect,” said Flemming.
Kellard went across to a blackboard that was mounted on one wall. Chalked on it were several circles joined by lines, but it was not a circuit diagram.
“This top circle represents myself,” he explained. “Beneath me are Security Chief Brunton, Research Manager Flemming, and the Foreman of Engineering. Beneath the last named are three electrical engineers, who will visit the contract workshops where the logical cells will be made, then wire them together in this factory. Can you do the job?”
“Once I learn my way around London, aye.”
“No, no, I mean you to be Foreman of Engineers.”
It took me just days to build the first logical cell, using the telegraphic instructions. Soon there were dozens being produced every week across the city. Kellard had four steam engines installed to drive magneto-electric generators, then he partitioned off the interior of the factory, so that only from the mezzanine level could one have an overview of the technarion. Six months after Flemming discovered the signal, the technarion came to life. Powered by the four generators, the one thousand and twenty-four cells of the machine did their first calculation.
Words cannot convey what it was like to gaze down on the machine from the mezzanine balcony. There were rows of high wooden bookshelves, each filled with hundreds of logical cells. Overhead frames supported the wires that connected the cells, and held fans to disperse the heat. The clatter from the relays and switches was like a thousand tinkers all gathered under one roof and hammering away together. A huge display board of platinum filament lamps showed the status of the machine. If any lamp went out, it flagged a fault in some part of the technarion. Just three men actually worked in the technarion, one watching for faults and making repairs, and two installing new cells.
The purpose of the machine was shared only between Kellard, Flemming, and myself. Even the security chief did not know what secrets he was protecting from hostile eyes and ears. As the months went by the technarion was expanded, and expanded again. I modified the operating list to run four thousand and ninety-six cells, and its calculations began to prove useful in predicting stock exchange trends. Kellard started to make a lot of money, and I tasted champagne for the first time on the day that the technarion’s earnings exceeded the cost of its construction. The trouble was that it took too long to feed in the instructions, and delays like this meant investment opportunities missed. Kellard told me to find a solution, and to spare no expense.
Thus I advertised for a typist. Skilled typists were not common in 1875, but four of the candidates showed promise. I had them come to the factory, where I had set up one of the new Remington typewriters. This I had modified very heavily, so that it punched patterns of holes into a roll of paper to represent letters and numbers. These could be read into the technarion by means of an array of electric brush switches.
The first three men were good, but not as good as I had hoped. Mistakes were difficult to correct, and involved gluing a strip of paper over the area and punching new holes by hand. The person I hired would be the one who could balance speed of typing with accuracy. McVinty was accurate but slow. Caraford finished in half McVinty’s time but made more mistakes. I calculated that Sims was the best compromise, after I factored in the time to correct his mistakes. I was not inclined to even test Landers, the fourth candidate, because the process took two hours. I walked over to the waiting room to say as much—and discovered that Elva Landers was a woman.
Typing was a man’s occupation in 1875, so I had not dreamed that a woman might apply. She was perhaps twenty, and was well dressed without being at the fashion forefront. She also wore a silver locket on a chain, and this was inscribed with some exquisite, flowing script, probably bought on a holiday in Egypt or Morocco. Women were said to be more patient and steady with some jobs, and I wondered if the new field of typing might be one of them. I decided to test her after all.
I was doing a short course called The Art of Refined Conversation at a college teaching social graces to newly rich tradesmen. I reasoned that I would be taken more seriously if I sounded like a gentleman, now that I had a gentleman’s income. The lecturer had told us never to open a conversation by commenting on the weather, or asking newcomers what they thought of London. I was almost at a loss to think of anything else, however.
“I can’t place your accent,” I said as I fitted a paper roll into the Remington. “Is it Welsh?”
“No, I’m American,” she said guardedly. “I grew up in New York.”
“New York! Why did you come to London?”
“I was living in Paris, learning French and taking piano lessons, when my father’s railway company went broke. He wanted me to return to New York and marry for money. I decided to make my own way in the world.”
All of that made sense. Her familiarity with the use of a keyboard probably came from her piano lessons. She was very pretty, in a classical sort of way, and had a bold but awkward manner. This meant that she stood out in polite London society, but I could imagine people saying ‘It’s all right, she’s American,’ and making allowances for her.
The first typewriters were not as you see them today. The letters struck upwards against the paper on the platen so that gravity would pull them back down. That meant the typist could not see what had been typed until the platen had been turned for next line. I had replaced the platen with a row of cells for punching holes. With so much depending on my first impressions of her, Miss Landers frowned with concentration and struck the keys with hard, confident strokes, like a tinker repairing a kettle. When she had finished, I removed the paper roll for checking. After a few minutes I looked up and shook my head.
“How did I do?” she asked, giving me a very anxious little frown.
“Fastest time,” I replied, “but that’s not the wonder of it. You made no mistakes. None. At all. I’m astounded.”
“Well, you know how it is. We girls have to be that much better than men to do the same job.”
“You’re hired, Miss Landers. Can you start tomorrow?�
�
I lived at a rooming house. This was also owned by Kellard, and all of his employees were obliged to reside there. The managers lived on the top floor, where we each had a comfortable suite of rooms. Everyone was single, from manager to stoker, and were sworn to maintain the highest standards of secrecy.
I was sitting by the fire in my dressing gown, reading, when the door was opened. The door, that I had locked with a key, was opened. Brunton was standing in the doorway. He was thickset without being fat, a slab of muscle who could enter any fight and be confident of winning. Because he was intimidating in size and manner, people deferred to him. Thus he was a good leader, rather like a sergeant major in the army. After glancing about for a moment, he sauntered into my room.
“What’s the meaning of this?” I demanded.
“Secrecy inspection,” he replied.
“Secrecy inspection? Who the hell has the right to do that?”
“Just mind your tongue,” said Brunton. “If you want to talk, talk to Mr. Kellard. There’s been people tattling, lately. They tattled in taverns and brothels, about amazing things in the mill. They’re gone now.”
“You mean fired?”
“Gone, Mr. Blackburn. Now you know some secrets nobody else knows. If those secrets get out, it could only be you who sold ‘em.”
“I’d never dream of betraying Mr. Kellard.”
Brunton looked around the room, then examined some photographs pinned to the wall.
“You’re a photographer, I’m told.”
“Yes.”
“Slums, mills, railway stations, trains . . . why don’t you photograph something grand like Saint Paul’s or Parliament?”
“Saint Paul’s and Parliament will still be here in a hundred years, the slums and steam trains will not. I want people to remember that the wonders of the future were built on the miseries and grime of the past.”
“What wonders?”
“Well . . . I think trains and horses will be gone, and people will get about in their own electric carriages.”
Brunton turned to me, drew a pistol from his coat and drew back the striker. The barrel was aimed at my forehead.