Wreck of the Gossamer

by Shawn McCarthy

  They climb aboard. Elmer sits in the driver’s seat, playing instructor. Except that it’s not really a seat at all. The steering lever is so tall that he has to nearly stand to use it. Both Elmer and Amanda lean back against what is basically a tall bench that looks like something a warehouse shipping clerk would use.

  To set the car in motion, Elmer shows her the proper order for using the levers. He also turns a nozzle to redirect some of the steam. With a hiss the car jerks forward a bit, an angry tiger on a leash. “Oops.”

  He then presses a clutch and engages the main lever. As he releases the clutch, the wagon groans and slowly starts forward, gathering steam as Elmer pilots it out of the yard. With each turn of the wheel, water in the tank splashes against the hot sides, making a low hiss. As they pick up speed, the hisses start to blend together into one long murmur.

  “There’s two main pistons,” he points and yells above the noise. “One on either side, just like a train. Each stroke of the pistons bleeds just a tiny bit of the pressure. The pistons crank the two big wheels on the sides. He points to one of the wheels, but it’s spinning so fast it’s all just a big blur to Amanda.

  Out on the road, Elmer stops and starts the wagon several times, showing her how it’s done, going over each of the levers, explaining how they work; showing her what to look for, how to know if there’s too much pressure or too little. “Be good to her,” he smiles. “And careful too. This buggy is old and cranky, just like Agnes.”

  Eventually Amanda takes the wheel. The wagon lurches and sputters as she tries to get the feel of the controls. At one point the tank blows off a huge cloud of steam, and Amanda apologizes, thinking she broke something.

  “Don’t worry about it, dear. It’s just a safety valve. We have all the steam we need right now.”

  Eventually she gets the starting and stopping part down. She can make the transition smoothly. But the steering is tough. She has to pull hard to turn the wheels, and she oversteers terribly. It’s a challenge just to stay on the road.

  “Believe it or not, the faster you go the easier it is to steer. When you get out on the open road, don’t be afraid to open her up.”

  They run for a bit then Elmer points to a small trail that leads down near the railroad tracks. “Head down there. There’s a spring and a small water tower next to the tracks. The water tower has a swing arm. That’s usually where I go to fill this car.”

  “Can we do that?”

  “Bah. The railroad won’t miss the water. I only take about a third of the tank and it will refill itself in a few hours.”

  Amanda bites her lip. It’s a narrow path, little more than a couple of ruts for wagon wheels. She slows down, in spite of Elmer’s warnings, and it takes nearly twenty minutes for her to oversteer all the way to the end. Then it takes another twenty minutes to fill their big water tank. Elmer takes the controls, but he’s not able to line the steam wagon up just right. There’s a fresh pile of coal next to the tower. Eventually they just pile up some dirt and branches so that they can drive onto the tracks instead. Then they have to blow off some of the pressure before they can open the big hatch and let the water in.

  “This is the risky part,” Elmer confides. “Once you lose the steam, you don’t have any power, so you can’t move. I hate having to drive onto the track like this. There’s no way off until you build up your pressure again.” His eyes scan up and down the track, and he listens intently over the sound of the flowing water.

  Luckily, no trains come. They finish filling, close the valves, let the pressure slowly build again, and they’re able to drive off after a few minutes. Amanda runs back to clear the branches away from the tracks.

  They spend the rest of the afternoon on backroads and fields, with Elmer teaching and re-teaching Amanda to drive, shift, and steer. “See the steering mechanism?” he says, pointing to a shaft and attached handles poking up through the floor. “It’s a double-thread screw shaft. And see here? This connects to a swiveling ball joint near the sprung front axle.”

  His words are like some foreign language, but she forces herself to listen.

  “If you move it just this way, it’s a bit easier to steer. I learned that the hard way, let me tell you.”

  He smiles as they whisk down a long dirt road. “It’s grand, I tell you. What an engineer the person was who designed this. What a man ahead of his time! Twenty-five years before we started seeing other kinds of automobiles. Can you believe that?”

  He points down toward the bottom of the ball joint. “But see here too? It’s worn. I think that’s part of the reason why you’re oversteering, dear. Because of that worn spot it doesn’t react quickly. It doesn’t catch until you’ve turned it too far. Then you have to correct. Just be aware of that.”

  Amanda nods, trying to take it all in.

  By late afternoon, she’s gained confidence as she stops, starts, and turns many times. She learns how to light the fire and put it out. She learns how to build up the steam and tweak the valves to keep things working at their peak. She gives a little squeal of delight each time the wagon lurches anew down the road. This is the best adventure she’s had since her trip to the beach and the shipwreck.

  Eventually they return to the water tower for more water, then back to the house for supper. Before they go inside, Elmer shows her about one more little glitch. It’s the one she saw the Quincys experience that day on the beach. “Keep this in mind too. If the cart bumps too hard, things can get knocked out of alignment,” he says. “So this valve needs to be shut off while this pipe here,” he taps on it, “is pulled backwards. You see?” He shows her how to make the adjustment. “Temperamental damn thing!”

  His wife joins them, and the three make plans for Amanda to leave in the middle of the night. At a steady thirty miles per hour, she can get to Boston, in theory, in a bit over four hours. It will probably take longer because the roads aren’t always smooth. She’ll also have to stop for water at least once, so they plan on a five-hour trip, just to be safe. Elmer worries about the excitement a steam car will create, so they agree she should arrive early in the morning, right around sunup if possible. She’ll be able to see where she’s going, but by the time people rise from bed to see what’s causing all the noise, she’ll already be a block away.

  After supper Agnes rides a little one-horse surrey into town. She sends a telegraph to her cousin, Beverly Morgan, who lives in the city’s North End. The Morgan family has a carriage house behind their home, and she asks if Amanda can hide the car there after her arrival. Maybe Beverly can also give Amanda a bed for a few nights?

  The reply comes back in the early evening, carried out to the farm by a telegraph boy on horseback. Beverly says she welcomes a chance to help Amanda. Anything for dear old Agnes and Elmer.

  So everything is set. Amanda is just a few hours from making her escape. She lies down, but her attempt at sleep is restless. So many unknowns. So unclear where things are heading. She’s about to drive off into the dark, toward a vague destination, sitting atop a boiling and sparking beast that she’s not even sure she can trust.

  Chapter 20

  Scrutiny

  A pair of dice thrown onto the deck of a ship during rough seas may be the most honest roll made in any dice game. The sway of the floor makes it hard to cheat. Dice bounce differently. Unpredictably. On land, some gamblers master their own special drop or a creative backhanded throw. It gives them an edge. But such talents are useless when playing on a ship. The unpredictable nature of such games make them seem more honest and more tempting to those who watch. And men grow bored with the monotony of a long voyage. A dice game promises excitement, camaraderie, and a thin promise of riches. The game is the flame, and the sailors are the moths.

  The men who have lost at shipboard gambling are easy to spot. Nursing their anger, they’ll huddle with other losers back on shore to pool their limited funds. They buy a couple bottles of cheap wine and gather on the docks rather than at the dockside pubs. Their sh
ore leave is more subdued than what the winners enjoy. Coils of ropes and tin buckets become their seats. Empty wooden crates become tables. A bottle passes, and so does the time.

  Yet, after days or weeks at sea, there is some level of pleasure in just being ashore. A dock doesn’t rock like a ship’s deck. So they drink. They talk. They laugh. Then they argue about what might have been if the dice rolled the other way. They think about how close they came, and they talk about what life might be like if luck smiles on them the next time.

  Devlin Richards seldom plays dice or cards, but he knows how to mingle with gamblers. He likes the way they spend money if they win. He likes the way they shoot their mouths off if they lose. And if they’re foolish enough to walk alone, he knows what to take and how to take it from them.

  It doesn’t matter if the docks are located in New England or South Carolina; Devlin has learned how to visit the small groups of losers who gather on the docks. He throws in a few coins and shares in the bottle. He listens to the stories and slowly gains their confidences. He hears things. Some of the information is useful immediately, and some is filed away for later. On the morning of June 25, he stands with a small group of unshaven sailors near Boston’s Rowes Wharf. Early drinkers all, they talk of hauling heavy cargo, fishing, and the problem they see with the damn immigrants who will work for practically nothing. Devlin slowly prods the conversation in a new direction. The wreck. It’s becoming old news, but it still draws comments. What have they heard? What about the sailor who survived? Anyone seen him lately? Any details about the things that floated ashore?

  Yeah, they’ve all heard the scuttlebutt. No, not sure how much of it is true.

  Devlin pulls a small bottle of coveted single-malt Scotch whiskey out of his coat pocket and starts passing it around. This is the stuff the rich boys drink. They all want a taste.

  Soon more details spill out.

  “I don’t know,” shrugs the one with the gray beard. “Now I heard this all secondhand. Ya have to understand that.”

  “Of course,” Devlin nods. “It’s just interesting, you know? To be plucked from death like that. If he’s one of the survivors, he’s a lucky man, wouldn’t y’all say?”

  “Yes, I would. I would indeed,” graybeard says, scratching his whiskers. “So that man you say you met in the pub? Another one from the Gossamer?”

  “Yes.”

  “I’d say God grabbed his ass before the devil could grab his ankles to pull him under. That’s what I’d say.” The whole group laughs.

  Devlin laughs too and takes a swig from the bottle as it passes by.

  “The way I hear tell though,” the old man says, “he was a deckhand, not one of the black gang. He was topside, and apparently he grabbed a hammer and some nails before the ship went down. When one of crates floated free, he grabbed it and nailed the sleeve of his coat right onto the wood. Guess he figured it would keep him attached to the thing even if he passed out.”

  Devlin looks confused but says nothing.

  “I’ll have to remember that trick,” one of the sailors said.

  “Oh horseshit,” said another. “What if the crate takes on water and starts to sink? What are you going to do then? Sounds like a risky move to me.”

  “Yes, and what if you die while floating?” Devlin adds. “Imagine finding a floating dead man, nailed to a box like that. Wouldn’t that be a wretched thing to find?”

  “I’d be cursed, I ever find something like that on the water,” says one of the men.

  Graybeard nods. “Can’t say as I disagree. But I guess it worked for him. Story is that he floated for two days. He must have slept some of that time, I’d think. But he was mostly awake when a freighter found him. Couldn’t pull him free though, so they had to haul him and the crate up together with a winch.”

  Devlin elects to speak up. “That’s a much different story than the one told by the guy I met.”

  The old man gives Devlin a hurt look. “What’s that then? You don’t believe us?”

  “Just that I met that sailor at a pub near here, and he told it a lot different. Said he hung on to some boards, not that he nailed his clothes to a crate. Described his rescue different too. And he said it was him and the cook together.”

  “Maybe I’m not talking about him.”

  Devlin raises an eyebrow.

  “How about that,” a younger sailor snorts. “You think a third sailor survived too?”

  More sipping, laughing, and cursing by the other men.

  “Yeah, well, I wouldn’t know about who lived and who didn’t. It’s just something I heard. Take it or leave it.”

  Devlin squints at the man. “So who told you all this?”

  “Mate a’ mine who was on the freighter that picked him up. When they came back from the deep water, they pulled around Oak Bluff and into Steamboat Wharf.”

  “Nantucket?”

  “A-yeah.”

  “So definitely was a different sailor. Did they take him ashore there?”

  “They did.”

  “The crate too?”

  The whole group laughs at this.

  “How the hell should I know?”

  Devlin feels a spike of anger but controls it. He decides to change the subject, asking about the weather, and making small talk about the other tiny islands that are closer to the Boston Harbor. Eventually he approaches the subject of the Gossamer again.

  “I’ll tell ya,” he says, “if I’m ever plucked from the ocean like that, I hope to end up somewhere less godforsaken than Nantucket. Two days? No food or water? Bashed around like that? I’d hope for a good hospital instead.”

  “Oh, they took him to a doctor at least. The doc wasn’t on the island the day they pulled in. So a day later, they loaded him on a skiff headed into Falmouth. So he’s on the mainland now, at a boarding house there. Still under a doctor’s care, way I hear it. Must have been in damn bad shape.”

  “How do you know all this?”

  “Well, funny thing. My friend on the freighter had some pretty vivid details. Said just seeing that made him want to quit sailing. A quick up and back to Nova Scotia for a load of coal, he says, then he’s going to end it. Guy was sort of pale and broken up. Looked like a man run over by a train. Like a ghost. A man don’t forget something like that.”

  “No. I guess he doesn’t.”

  Devlin presses for more details, but he sees distrust in their eyes when he seems to be pressing too hard. He’s gleaned all the information he can from this group. When the bottle is finished, he moves on. The information is useful though. A third survivor? Maybe a surviving crate? It’s good news, and Jeb Thomas damn well better pay him a few dollars to hear the particulars.

  Before heading to The Rose Point, he walks over to the lab of the dead sailor. It’s his second trip to the place since he was able to glean its location from the young boys on the dock. On his previous visit, he’d managed to slip inside and steal a cutting torch and some tools, which he sold for seven dollars. No one seemed to notice his visit. Apparently no one is keeping an eye on the place.

  But maybe he assumed too much. This time he finds the windows boarded up and the front door padlocked shut. So his previous intrusion must have been detected by the landlord after all.

  Devlin finds something to pry off a few boards—just enough to slip inside. Feeling around in the dark, he fashions a makeshift torch out of a stick and a rag then lights it so that he can see the room.

  There’s still a great deal of equipment here. Unusual, expensive-looking stuff. But he doesn’t have any idea how to find a buyer for these specialty items.

  Devlin sorts through the equipment for nearly an hour, exasperated that he has to keep making new torches to see what he’s doing. His work produces little in the way of results. There’s a small electric motor he may be able to sell, some additional hand tools, and a crate of light bulbs.

  There are so many chemicals and mysterious small parts. He knows they must have value, but it’s fru
strating not to have any sort of market to unload them.

  When he’s gathered all he can, he sets his items outside. In a final act of frustration and anger, he knocks over three containers of liquid and sets his torch to them. He’s not even sure if they’re flammable. They are. In fact, they take flame so quickly that he barely has time to squeeze back out the window before the whole room is engulfed.

  Carrying his slim pickings in a small box, Devlin steals quickly away. The street is well lit by the rising flames behind him. He holds less than twenty dollars’ worth of items while the remains of the dead scientist’s lab burn brightly in the night.

  Chapter 21

  Sparks

  Dark sometimes is described as the absence of light. But light, conversely, is not just the absence of dark. Light is something far different.

  With light comes particles and power, and things still unknown to man. Light has mysterious, wonderful properties. It can be created, amplified, reflected, fractured, and bent in ways that darkness can never comprehend.

  Light is energy. Darkness is but a void.

  In the earliest days of commercial electricity, the modest goal was simply to create artificial light. Bring in light to chase away the void of darkness so that the day can continue. And work can too, sometimes far into the night.

  A certain box-like building on the outskirts of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, often remains illuminated until midnight or later. Deep inside this place there are men, driven as much by curiosity as by economic gain, who toil away into the quiet hours of the night. They spend time assembling, testing, rethinking, and occasionally scorching the electrical equipment they hope to perfect.

  These men are employees of the Westinghouse Electric and Manufacturing Company. The experiments they conduct are both their work, and, strangely, their recreation. There is a gee-whiz quality to the things they do, and they love to do it all.